Consumerist.com is watching out for you, but who’s watching consumerist.com?
image via morguefile.com
Yesterday consumerist.com posted an article claiming Dunkin Donuts was providing a free donut with coffee purchase. Unfortunately the promotion was from a previous year and was mistakenly posted by a consumerist editor. Myself and hundreds if not thousands of other consumerist readers hit up Dunkin Donuts only to find out the promotion was invalid. Upon a return visit to consumerist.com, the article had been removed but references and listings for it were still in place without a correction or apology.
Because of the oversight (or cover-up?) I sent the following message to the consumerist editors at 12:36pm on 4/15/2010:
Yesterday you posted that Dunkin Donuts was giving away a free donut with purchase of coffee. That is not a valid promotion. I thought I might have misread your post but after a quick google search I realized it was consumerist who had it wrong. The article has since been removed from comsumerist.com but it still appears in your own search results, google’s, and is still appearing in the consumerist.com article list, yet there has been no correction or public apology for providing the incorrect information. Granted the lack of a free donut isn’t a big deal but I think that a website which fights for consumer rights should at least publish a correction or apology rather than attempt to cover it up by removing the offending article. Such actions make you as guilty as the companies you routinely write about. I wonder how many consumerist readers went to Dunking Donuts looking for the non-existent free donuts?
–
Sincerely,
Christopher Schiffner
[redacted]@schiffner.com
http://www.schiffner.com
Very shortly thereafter (prior to 1pm the same day) the 404 error previously displayed when visiting the page was replaced with a correction and I received the following reply from editor Chris Morran:
I’m glad to see the correction has finally been issued. Should it have required an email from a reader to prompt such action? Offer your thoughts in the comment section.
Original article (now a corection): http://consumerist.com/2010/04/get-through-tax-day-with-free-donuts-from-dunkin-donuts.html
Apr 15th, 2010 at 12:40 pm
I love the consumerist but I supposed there needs to be a system of checks and balances for all. Nice work
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Apr 15th, 2010 at 2:27 pm
I love the concept of The Consumerist and have enjoyed the site for years but it’s hard to deny that the site is no longer the fantastic source it once was. Contributors are posting too many errors and too many blatantly-misleading or sensationalist headlines (some contributors are much more guilty of this than others). There is also, I feel, a change in attitude from the main editors that does not sit with me as well as the tone of the “old” Consumerist.
I still enjoy the site, mind you, but at this point I never take the headlines at face value and I take the “reporting” with a huge grain of salt.
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Apr 16th, 2010 at 10:41 am
Professional journalist should publish corrections when they publish incorrect information without the need for a request to do so. Period.
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Apr 27th, 2010 at 9:50 pm
Again fighting the good fight…I gotta be honest I really like donuts…Especially the ones with the toasted coconut on the outside. Sorry for the dissapointment.
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