Tuesday, March 13, 2012

Gordon in the morning: Bending time and space

There's a textbook example of how Gordon Smart takes a photo and builds a totally made-up narrative this morning. He's got a shitty long lens photo of Matt Smith and Karen Gillan emerging from a Spanish Burger King.

This, then, is a sign that two people have popped in to a Burger King, right?

Er, no:

DOCTOR Who stars Matt Smith and Karen Gillan snubbed the local cuisine while filming in Spain ... in favour of Burger King.
Going to BK once doesn't actually constitute "snubbing the local cuisine". It might be a quick meal in a busy day, but it doesn't say anything about what they eat the rest of the time. They might be eating paella for breakfast, dinner and supper. Eating at a burger bar does not mean anything is being 'snubbed'.

What makes it worse is that Smart creates a made-up quote to try and turn this from being a made-up story into being one of those fact-checked stories he told Leveson he publishes:
An insider said: "They might have been in Spain but it was fast food they were after."
An insider from where? That's about the level of a middle-ranking contestant on Catchphrase saying what they see, isn't it? Admittedly, it's Gordon showing that his "story" is barely stretches to fourteen words, but even so...

Of course, the real story is 'paparazzi fail to get any shots of stars doing something they shouldn't, story runs anyway'.


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