Journalist best practice

From eg

Some journalist best practice especially relevant to the wiki trade which requires some capacity to moderate and some of the political virtues, but also the following:

• stick to third person and NPOV except when quoting others or in op-ed pieces
• meet your deadline no matter what: fast is better than good.
• persistence, persistence, persistence, location, location, location, patience, patience, patience: papparazi methods
• finding more than one source to back every bit of evidence cited as factual
• outlining, briefly, the entire issue/position/argument that factions are disputing
• avoiding or at least explaining all factionally-defined terms, and avoiding brand names (to avoid becoming spam or spammish)
• attribute any quotes, cite any peer reviewed papers
• get names of persons and locations exactly right - i.e. adopt Wikipedia names, at least the Wikipedia troll factions have already reached a ceasefire over most of those
• once published, do not bend to any pressure whatsoever other than refutation of facts published as facts - a denial that is not a denial is usually an indicator of guilt... if you have all the facts right, but they don't like the logical conclusions one draws based on those facts, and they sue without claiming any errors of fact, then you must be right
• avoid Canadian publications because Canadian libel laws let you be sued for telling the truth - all good Canadian journalists end up working in the US, UK or internationally.

See also the openpolitics.ca journalist best practice list.