WaPo Publisher Still Complaining Dinner Parties At Her House Didn't Compromise Journalism

The Washington Post may have canceled its $25,000-a-plate dinners matching lobbyists with top officials, but Publisher Katharine Weymouth is still not seeing it the way journalists do: paying for private dinners at the publisher’s private home looks like deal-making rather than news-making. Howard Kurtz’s Friday story revealed the Weymouth worldview:

Weymouth, who had not seen the marketing copy, said that "we will never compromise our journalistic integrity." But she said other news organizations sponsor similar conferences and that she remains comfortable with the basic idea of lobbyists or corporations underwriting dinners with officials and journalists as long as those paying the fees have no control over the content.

But precisely what would be acceptable remains unclear. Asked whether the forums she envisions might still be viewed as buying access to Post journalists, Weymouth said, "I suppose you could spin it that way, but that is not the way it would have been done." She said the situation would be comparable to a company buying an ad in the newspaper while knowing that it "might hate the content" on that page.

But an ad in a newspaper is public and visible, unlike a private dinner. Kurtz brought in a former Miami Herald editor to offer the newsroom view:

Tom Fiedler, dean of Boston University's College of Communication, said news organizations should be a neutral broker among differing interests and that "what The Post was looking to do was to make a profit on the role of the convener. . . . The idea of crossing a boundary line that seems to me painted so brightly white, I'm astonished that it got this far."

Kurtz reported that Post editor Marcus Brauchli said he told the Post marketing division that his journalists would participate on a number of conditions, including "multiple sponsors for an extended series of forums, rather than companies financing a single dinner involving their industry; a balanced lineup of participants from across the political spectrum; and no charge for the invited guests."

Other media companies do convene top officials and CEOs and top journalists, and charge for the events – but they’re often public, available for journalists to attend, taped and even streamed live on the Internet. Kurtz explained:

A number of media companies charge substantial fees for conferences with big-name executives and government officials, but in many cases the sessions are open for news coverage.

This week, for instance, Atlantic Media is sponsoring the Aspen Ideas Festival, underwritten by Altria, Boeing, Booz Allen Hamilton, Ernst & Young, Mercedes-Benz, Philips, Shell and Thomson Reuters. Speakers include White House economic adviser Austan Goolsbee, U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice, Education Secretary Arne Duncan, Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer and Google CEO Eric Schmidt, along with journalists for Atlantic and other media outlets.

In March, the Wall Street Journal brought together global finance leaders -- including Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd -- for a two-day conference sponsored by Nasdaq and hosted by Robert Thomson, the Journal's top editor, and other editors and reporters. Outside journalists were invited to the session, which was on the record and webcast by the Journal. Participants, who paid several thousand dollars to attend, also had a White House meeting with economic adviser Lawrence Summers, which was off the record at his request.

The Journal also holds conferences with its All Things Digital unit. A session in May, described as offering "unmatched access to the technology industry's elite," was sponsored by Hewlett-Packard and Qualcomm, among others, and featured the CEOs of Microsoft, Yahoo, NBC Universal, AT&T and Twitter, as well as Weymouth.

These kind of events can still signal coziness among the elites, but it’s much more public than the "salons" the Post proposed.

As could have been predicted, the Post newsroom was completely up in arms yesterday:

Many Post journalists were stunned by the Politico story and angry about the fliers. Weymouth told the staff in an afternoon e-mail that the flier "completely misrepresented what we were trying to do," but added: "We do believe that there is a viable way to expand our expertise into live conferences and events that simply enhances what we do -- cover Washington for Washingtonians and those interested in Washington."