"Can I preview the article before it goes live?"
This week, we dive into a topic that's been trending in a writer's forum we're a part of. And we have some deep thoughts to share.
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This week, we’re covering a topic that came out of a conversation we’ve seen brewing in a writer’s group we’re both in:
Can a publicist — or source — ask a writer to preview an article before it goes live?
Here’s the situation: A writer recently wrote a post in a forum we belong to saying that they had a situation with a print feature that was based on a press trip they attended. Following the trip, the publicist who invited her on the trip asked:
"Will we have the opportunity to fact check the story in order to check correct spelling of the names of the treatments, physicians, etc.?"
So basically the rep wanted to see the story before it was turned in to preview it. And to make things extra awful for the writer involved, the publicist CC’d the property stakeholders in that email asking the writer to preview the story. A-W-K-W-A-R-D!
This writer was quick to tell us: “I felt like that put me in a very awkward position.”
The writer went on to say: “I just have this sinking feeling that if there's anything I wrote that they don't love, I'm going to be held liable in some way. Feeling icky and nervous.”
In this situation, the writer had already submitted the draft to their editor BUT this sparked a huge discussion where other colleagues weighed in on how this is a definite no go for them.
As writers, we get asked ALL THE TIME by publicists if they can see a story before it goes live. Sources also reach out and ask us directly themselves — or bring it up during our interviews with them. And this situation happens more than you think.
There are many reasons why this question will be jarring to a writer — and why the answer will almost always be “no” — (writers who may say yes to this are either less experienced and don’t know how the industry works or have been put in an awkward situation they don’t know how to navigate and give in and end up saying yes when they truly want to say no.).
There are, of course, the occasional special circumstance exceptions to this situation, which we will explore more below as well.
Here goes:
First off, allowing a publicist or source to preview a story before it goes live is not ethical journalism.
When this story started circulating around our writer’s forum, the first thing someone commented was: “That would be a direct violation of journalism ethics.”
This is a very accurate statement.
Sure, someone may want to initially see an article to make sure everything is spelled correctly and to make sure that their client is quoted with a correct title, etc. But if writers allow someone that kind of access, the PR rep/sources is going to inevitably end up reading the article and weighing in with thoughts on how they want certain things to be written.
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