Journalism sourcing

In journalism, a source or news source is a person, written thing, or other way of getting knowledge gives the reporter information that is new. Sources can be official records, books or other printed works, broadcasts, people who work for governments or businesses, organizations and corporations, people who saw and heard crimes, accidents, or other news, and people to whom a news event or issue is important.

According to Shoemaker (1996) and McQuail (1994), many things can make a source bona fide, or good, or bad. Reporters should build good relationships with sources so that they trust each other, especially if they write about the same kind of thing often. These reporters are called "beat reporters." Beat reporters should also not become close friends with their sources. Journalists should also be skeptical. That means they should wonder whether the source is telling the truth or whether they are lying or wrong. For example, the City News Bureau of Chicago wrote "If your mother says she loves you, check it out." Journalists should not use only one source. Instead, they should find many sources that agree with each other, especially when they are writing about a controversy, or something people might disagree or fight about.

Other websites

• Be Clear About Your Source's Biases and Agendas. Project for Excellence in Journalism. Archived from the original on 18 November 2005.
• Chart – Real and Fake News (2016)/Vanessa Otero (basis) (Mark Frauenfelder)
• Chart – Real and Fake News (2014) Archived 2021-08-18 at the Wayback Machine (2016 Archived 2021-11-10 at the Wayback Machine)/Pew Research Center
• Information for Journalists from the United States Department of State (scroll to "Ground Rules for Interviewing State Department Officials" section)
• Protection of journalistic sources, a factsheet of the ECtHR case law
• Viewers as Sources Archived 2008-11-03 at the Wayback Machine, from Newslab