ShareSleuth delays first story

ShareSleuth, the investigative business journalism website started last month by former St. Louis Post-Dispatch business reporter Chris Carey with funding from billionaire Mark Cuban, said it has delayed the publication of its first story after threats from its first target.

Carey also wrote that the site has hired an independent fact checker to verify what it is writing.

Carey wrote, “Over the weekend, my partner Mark Cuban and I settled on a plan that addresses both of those issues. We’re going to pay an independent fact checker to review our stories and ensure that the details are correct and the conclusions are neither false nor misleading.

“That means the publication of the first piece will be pushed back a few days. However, the story will be even stronger as a result.”

Read more here.

Investigative biz journalist Gary Weiss has noted the delay on his blog, and wonders whether the questions about the site’s ethics are also playing a role in the delay.

Weiss wrote, “Cuban is under the delusion that full disclosure, by making it all legal, ties a neat bow around the whole thing. Fat chance. There are many problems with such a thoroughly skeevy and unethical arrangement, one of which is that it gives the targets of your stories a club they can use to beat you over head.

“That may well be happening in this instance. Or maybe not. We shall see.”

Read more of Weiss here.

I am going to hope for the best in that nothing is amiss here.