Frankie Flack: Why can’t I get more biz reporters to go OTR?

I used to gossip more, back in the good old days. A reporter would ring me up, I’d give her the line of the day. Then I’d ask: “Want to go off the record?” She’d say, “Sure!”

And we’d be off to the races: who was up, who was down, what was rumored to be around the corner. It was good fun, but empty calories for us both. We both knew that I wasn’t going to say anything newsworthy.

Still, the conversations were not a complete waste. Everyone came away with a better understanding of the industry, even if front-page scoops weren’t being dished.

I have fewer and fewer of those conversations nowadays. I’ll offer to go off the record, and the journalist will take a deep breath, maybe sigh, pause a few seconds. And then he’ll either take the hard line, say no, and get off the phone. Or he’ll start negotiating. Try to get me to start off the record but pull things onto the record (with my permission, of course).

And then I’ll try my best to hang up the receiver because I wanted was a bull session, not a confessional.

There has always been resistance to going off the record — I’m sure the words “Thou Shalt Make All Necessarily Efforts to Transparently Source Your Story” are engraved above Columbia’s journalism school or on the Forbes building or something — but it’s become worse lately.

I blame the Internet. It used to be that very few reporters were actively engaged in any kind of competition. I mean, the Post and the Daily News engaged in one-upsmanship, and local newspaper types in Detroit or Seattle were at each other’s throats, but most guys didn’t live and die by the exclusive.

Reporters got gold stars by writing smart, approachable stories for a more or less captive audience. Those folks knew the value of an expansive bull session. Now, every joker with a Twitter account is suddenly competing with every ink-stained wretch.

And much as I’d like to pretend otherwise, the pool of journalists who doesn’t have to worry about someone, somewhere eating their lunch is a pretty small group.

That 24-hour pressure to be first, combined with the Hunger Games-style approach to staffing at our nation’s media companies, means that everyone wants to nail the scoop. And an offer of an off-the-record session must sound like the first move in a journalist pas de deux that leads to a juicy morsel of news. But it’s not. Especially not from me. I am a black belt in not making news.

You want to wring news out of someone, get an executive on the phone for an off-the-record chat and them badger them into letting you use a quote or two.

But when I offer to go off the record, just smile, push back from the keyboard, and prepared to shoot the shit for a while. You’ll get smarter, and I’ll be happier. Win-win.