THAT’S A PRICEY BAG OF SALTWATER
Stories about doctors, hospitals and insurance companies overcharging or erroneously billing patients have become the norm in recent years. One TV station in Colorado decided to do something about it.
KUSA-TV Denver investigative reporter Chris Vanderveen and his 9News team have produced 36 in-depth stories and two hours of primetime specials about medical billing. They advocate for patients who, for example, were charged $359 per bag for saline (a 13,000 percent markup on a $2.73 product). Another woman just laughed when she got a circumcision bill for her baby — a girl.
From the story:
The series caught fire when 9News reported the story of a man who went to the emergency room to have a splinter removed from his thumb.
“He got a $2,100 bill,” Vanderveen said. “That seemed stupid.”
Read Al Tompkins’ story here.
THE WEDDING CRASHER
President Donald Trump unintentionally waded into copyright law when he crashed a wedding at one of his golf course in New Jersey last year. Jonathan Otto, a vice president at Deutsche Bank, snapped a photo of the incident. It made the rounds and landed on, among others, TMZ, The Washington Post and Esquire websites. That was not OK, a judge ruled on Wednesday. The judge argued that Esquire posting the photo with an article about it did not meet the “transformative” standard for fair use. Esquire’s parent company, Hearst, is looking at damages of at least $30,000.
DIGITAL VISION
A feature in Teen Vogue highlights the success of three women managing and working in digital media start-ups.
“When you have big money — big business money, especially — going into political candidates or news, there is an effect,” Colorado Independent editor Susan Greene told the magazine. “There is a silencing of people’s stories and issues. It’s enormously freeing to not work under those constraints, but it is also challenging because then journalists need to spend time raising money.”
You can read more about Greene’s efforts in this Poynter piece from earlier this year, or check out Kristen Hare’s profile of Flint Beat founder Jiquanda Johnson.
NO GOOD DEED
The Storyful newsroom reached out to Poynter with this: Troll incubation website 4chan, infamous for spawning bizarre conspiracies, is allegedly targeting journalists. Storyful found a 4chan post that appeared to target a list of laid-off and freelance reporters that had been circulating on Twitter in an effort to find them work. “It contains their emails,” the poster wrote. “Any decent idea on making their life more hellish?” Another poster suggested that the trolls should “flood all of their inboxes” with interview requests so they can’t discern real ones from fake ones. The creator of the list, journalist Emma Specter, said she is taking steps to protect the reporters.
Poynter’s ICYMI headlines:
- NPR: Tribune, Tronc And Beyond: A Slur, A Secret Payout And A Looming Sale (our top pick)
- BuzzFeed: 29 Times Nonprofit Journalism Made A Difference In 2018
- Washington Post: CBS News settles lawsuit with 3 women who accused Charlie Rose of harassment
On Poynter.org
- This paper’s new editor — its youngest and first female — is fiercely protective of a changing institution. By Kristen Hare.
- Why PolitiFact doesn’t use the word ‘lie’ — except once a year. By Angie Drobnic Holan.
Upcoming training:
- Becoming a More Effective Writer: Clarity and Organization. Deadline: Jan. 4.
- The Craft of the Personal Essay. Deadline: Jan. 18.
From PolitiFact.com:
- 2018 Lie of the Year Readers’ Poll results. By Angie Drobnic Holan.
- PolitiFact’s Lie of the Year: Online smear machine tries to take down Parkland students. By Angie Drobnic Holan and Amy Sherman.
PolitiFact is a property of the Poynter Institute.
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