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Editor's Blog: 'It was taken out of context... '
The age of online journalism can do away with the idea of being misquoted

By Tony Hallett

Published: Friday 15 June 2007

I was interested earlier this week to read the conclusion of the incident between England cricket captain Michael Vaughan and The Guardian newspaper.

Vaughan had in an interview referred to the 'Fredalo' incident in the Caribbean, referencing the occasion where England all-rounder and all round good egg Andrew 'Freddie' Flintoff drunkenly fell off a pedalo into the sea in the early hours of one morning during the Cricket World Cup in March.

I needn't go into why that was important or not. But following a negative reaction to this reported criticism of a popular team-mate, Vaughan later claimed he had been misquoted, for example he said he hadn't used the word 'Fredalo'.

Only it just so happened the Guardian journalist in question had recorded the interview with Vaughan - pretty standard practice.

Not only could the newspaper say it could prove what the interview subject had said - it could place the words as an audio file on its website.

Vaughan and the England cricket establishment had to backtrack. The Guardian, showing good grace, didn't make much of what was in any case hardly the biggest piece of world news in the past week.

My point here is that the idea of being misquoted or having words 'taken out of context' need only happen in very rare circumstances.

This publication doesn't record every single interview its reporters carry out. You could argue we should.

But every big event - a one-to-one with a major CIO or CEO or perhaps an important press conference - usually gets the Dictaphone treatment and those files are backed up and kept.

In recent years I can remember occasions where major companies have complained about quotations that have appeared in our stories. Typically it was a corporate comms department that wasn't happy with their inclusion. Note: they usually wouldn't challenge editors with accusations that the words out of the mouths of their bosses were incorrect.

Why would that be? Not only because they know we have recorded the interviews. I'd bet it's because in many corporate settings such as boardrooms and meeting rooms they too are recording them.

It's a two-way street. Think about that, next time you hear a major company or major executive say they have been misquoted.

And expect many publications beyond The Guardian to start posting audio files on their websites.