The first quantifiable element presented is the prominence of the armband blog entry within the media coverage.
The estimation was made by looking at how the original entry is referred to in the article. Three variables were used which were determined by how long, analytical and detailed the description of the blogs content were. Category one (1) applies to the detailed description of the blog entry including several examples and interpretations of the content. To fulfill the requirements for this category the text should contain many details. Second (2) category requirements were fulfilled when an article contains some details of the blog entry, but was lacking in more in depth interpretations. The third (3) category was reserved for items that referred to the blog text by only noting that the author caused a scandal when suggesting armbands to foreigners.
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Table 2: Amount of the details of the blog text in articles in April 11 -26th November 2012.
Level of detail YLE* HS IS IL AL TS* US Mtv* Total
Detailed - - 1 1 2 3 - - 7
Mediocre 3 4 1 1 1 5 2 2 19
Reference only 5 6 11 12 10 9 3 10 76
*Some articles did not contain any reference to the armband blog entry.
Turun Sanomat is most keen in covering the blog in detail, as it tops the chart with three
articles that delve “deep” into the content of Eronen’s blog entry. Detailed descriptions were reported during the first day also by Iltalehti, Aamulehti and Iltasanomat. After the first day only Turun Sanomat continued to report multiple aspects of the blog entry. The overwhelming majority of media coverage appears to refer to the armband blog texts contents by simply indicating the reason for the scandal in a following manner: “Eronen /
PS parliamentary aide proposed armbands for minorities” or “Eronen caused a stir by proposing armbands.”51
As the Turun Sanomat was involved in the scandal, the effort to cover it broadly could be explained by the reason that they wanted to get into the bottom of the issue by covering all sides of the story. This interpretation adheres to the virtues of journalism. Also, compared to other media, Turun Sanomat mainly published articles that were produced by its own reporters. Another perspective on their keen interest to cover the story in depth is that Turun
Sanomat wanted to keep the focus of the whole media on the matter, which ultimately
benefitted its own aims in terms of economy and prestige.
The lack of a more detailed description of the blog entry could be explained by the fact the original entry was not available for reference anymore, as it was removed by the moderator of the service. The blog, however, was still available, with a little search effort from other online sites; something which all the reporters most certainly knew and very likely also
51 Iltasanomat (2012) Hihamerkki-blogistille halutaan antaa potkut. 12.4.2012; Aamulehti (2012) James
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investigated. Other news media relied on Turun Sanomat’s article, thus refraining from making an interpretation of the blog entry themselves. This path provided a way to evade responsibility over the accuracy, but still opened a channel to generate traffic and revenues. The lack of details in articles of other media implicates that there was no interest among the press to explain the matter, and the thoughts of the author, in more detailed fashion. Turun
Sanomat set the primary tone for the coverage. The media aims to present news, which
intrinsically are issues that are “new,” but the massively uniform coverage and aggregation of the same perception implies that the matter was considered to be of a nature that did not require more resources for its coverage.
From the perspective of ethical journalistic practice, however, and because the audience is not able to obtain the original entry itself, it would have been reasonable to open up the matter to the widest possible extent (make further inquiries over what is the true intention of the writer of the blog), not only by Turun Sanomat but other media as well. Then again, if the media would have contacted the writer for comments before publishing any articles, there would have not possibly been any news to report. Ethical codex expects the media to check the integrity of the information and to check facts. In this case, the whole media spectrum relied solely on the interpretation of Turun Sanomat. In November 2012, the ombudsman criticized Turun Sanomat for not making updates to the first article, when it had received new data from the author concerning her “humorous intent.”
The primary observation that arises is the obvious inflation of the ethical codex the media claims to follow. Facts are not checked or if they are, no alternative interpretation is brought up by any competing media. Uniformity of coverage does not support the idea of competitive rivalry (Thompson 2000) between media institutions. Competitive rivalry could establish itself through a contest of varying perspectives on the same issue, but here the case is not so. Therefore it could be assumed that competitive rivalry more likely touches only separate issues and first releases of any type of news. This could indicate that the news organizations aim to be first and refrain from releasing critical or conflicting
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interpretations about the content of each other. Another possible explanation for a low interest in more open coverage could be argued to be economic. It is considered that
polemic and scandal sells better as the contemporary news is considered to favor drama and conflict (e.g. Nieminen and Pantti 2012).