Toronto biz editor: Companies more aggressive about coverage

Companies are becoming more aggressive in trying to control the coverage that they receive in the media, said Paul Waldie, the business editor at the Globe and Mail in Toronto, in a TedX talk at Queens University.

Waldie gave several examples, including a major Canadian retailer who said that it would no longer talk to the newspaper’s retail reporter.

“She hadn’t made a single mistake in any of her stories,” said Waldie. “She hadn’t been sued for libel. They just didn’t like the angle that she took.”

A Canadian company hired a private investigator to look into the background of one of the newspaper’s tech reporter. And a financial services company demanded that a Globe and Mail not report what its CEO said at a conference because the executive didn’t know the reporter was in attendance.

“Somehow, this was our fault,” said Waldie.

Waldie said that previously companies only complained when a factual error was made in a story. But in recent years, “We’re getting complaints about how we cover companies, about how we do things.”

He cited several reasons for this change:

1. Newspapers and other media struggling to make a profit are less likely to want to criticize major companies for fear of  losing their advertising.
2. Journalists are getting paid to give speeches to the people that they are covering. “None of my reporters take money,” said Waldie.
3. Companies have hired armies of public relations people.
4. Embargoes. “It makes us lazy,” said Waldie. “I’m fighting the embargo battle. I turned down two last week, and they were shocked.”

Waldie, however, noted that many journalists don’t succumb to the pressure from companies.

“It is not all doom and gloom out there,” said Waldie. “I work with an amazing group of journalists every day.”