[Air-L] NYT story on academic facebook research

[Eszter Hargittai]

Hi,

I was also quoted in both the WaPo and the NYTimes pieces. I enjoyed
speaking with both reporters, but like others was somewhat disappointed by
Monica's particular angle in the WaPo article.  In addition to the general
tone, I found it unfortunate to be misquoted. (I can't imagine I would've
said that in two years "we may not even call these things social networks."
since I didn't talk to her about social networks in general nor would I have
said what she quotes me as saying if I had. I spoke to her about social
network sites in particular, two concepts that are unfortunate to confuse.)

Mary-Helen mentioned earlier that journalists seem to feel more comfortable
discussing quantitative results.  That comment made me chuckle.  If you only
knew how much time I (and I suspect others in similar shoes) spend
explaining relatively simple statistical findings to journalists only to
have the results misrepresented in the end you would not make that
assumption.  I suspect it's just another case where that comment about
journalists' coverage of other areas applies: if it's not your specialty
you're more likely to think they cover it well.:-}

Eszter

http://www.eszter.com