To pursue conversation, I sought out Sennett for an email interview about newspaper accuracy and the interesting problem of corrections in online newspapers. Sennett makes several provocative observations and suggestions. Things change fast on the Internet. I think we're seeing a growing consensus, as your previous article demonstrates, that posting prominent links to corrections should be a priority for online news sites. Currently, readers navigating news sites are required to hunt around for varied correctives and clarifications.
Some sites run no corrections at all.
The researchers suggest that the Newspaper Association of America recommend the adoption of a clearly marked hyperlink placed, for instance, in the top-left hand corner of the home page near the masthead of every Web news site. In addition, it would be expected that each correction would be clearly labeled in any archival edition of each story. Clearly, more of us in the field are coming around. However, many online news sites have yet to adopt a reasonable method for posting corrections. And some of the sites that seemed to be making headway have fallen behind.