Wall Street Journal Follows TechCrunch, No Longer Honoring Embargoes? Not Really..
By Kyle Austin
April 9th, 2009
Update: It would seem the Wall Street Journal is following in TechCrunch’s shoes, no longer honoring embargoes. Nick Ragone broke on his blog Tuesday that the Journal wasn’t honoring embargoes.
Said his source at the Journal:
“We won’t take any embargoed information without prior approval of a deputy managing editor.”
However, in chatting with two folks at the Journal today, they acknowledged that while there is truth to the rumor in some senses, it’s not really a new policy and it certainly isn’t as black and white as TechCrunch’s policy (although I’m not sure they really abide by it).
According to one source there, not a lot has changed, in that they are only interested in embargoed data that other folks don’t have access to:
“We can still work on advanced stuff with a certain publication date in mind, but we can’t accept an embargo that ties our hands to a particular time, particularly one that isn’t exclusive.”
A second person at the Journal played it off as a “non-story.” Noting that there hasn’t been any formal memos or meetings around not honoring embargoes. The “non-story” isn’t that surprising given Robert Thomson’s recent doctrine on breaking news. Journal staffers are now openly judged on the stories they break, therefore tying themselves to embargoes that aren’t exclusive doesn’t make much sense for the paper or their career path.
So yes, Journal staffers are less inclined to take embargoed news, but that doesn’t mean they’ll break it. They’re just not interested in news that everyone else has (especially if you’re not a Fortune 500 company). They’ll still work in advance on some (although the number will probably decrease) trend stories, which they’ll just tie to breaking news when they find out about it (like they have before). And, they’ll still wait to cover “embargoed” news from companies like Google: which Google gives them access to in advance (Saying we’re announcing this at 2:00 p.m.), without access to third parties, because they want to write a balanced story (And any Google story ensures site traffic).
The more things change, the more things stay the same.
Entry Filed under: Public relations
19 Comments Add your own
1. RaceTalk | April 9th, 2009 at 11:41 am
@anneegreen @jaykeith @caspender @KathyKeating @newswise @echtopia WSJ embargoe story is non-story http://is.gd/rCs2 #publicrelations #wsj
2. RaceTalk | April 9th, 2009 at 11:47 am
New RaceTalk Post: Wall Street Journal Follows TechCrunch, No Longer Honoring Embargoes? Not R.. http://tinyurl.com/dlc344
3. Jen Saunders | April 9th, 2009 at 11:53 am
RT @RaceTalk: New RaceTalk Post: Wall Street Journal Follows TechCrunch, No Longer Honoring Embargoes? Not R.. http://tinyurl.com/dlc344
4. Andrew | April 9th, 2009 at 2:41 pm
Good follow-up and good to know the facts. Thanks!
5. Andrew Spender | April 9th, 2009 at 1:41 pm
RT @RaceTalk: @anneegreen @jaykeith @caspender @KathyKeating WSJ embargoe story is non-story http://is.gd/rCs2 #publicrelations #wsj
6. Jen Saunders | April 9th, 2009 at 4:53 pm
RT @RaceTalk: New RaceTalk Post: Wall Street Journal Follows TechCrunch, No Longer Honoring Embargoes? Not R.. http://tinyurl.com/dlc344
7. Kyle Austin | April 10th, 2009 at 9:00 am
Thanks Andrew. Good to see the Gartner folks active in social media…Would love to hear more about how your corp comm team is utilizing, perhaps in a Q&A for RaceTalk?
8. Nick Ragone | April 11th, 2009 at 8:26 am
@kyledaustin2420 … good job with WSJ embargo blog post http://tinyurl.com/dlc344 #wsj #pr #media
9. Paul Young | April 21st, 2009 at 5:00 pm
@christian_twitr found this blog post about the WSJ & embargoes… somewhat hazy http://tinyurl.com/dlc344
10. The Wall Street Journal&#&hellip | August 5th, 2009 at 9:46 am
[...] April RaceTalk reported that The Wall Street Journal decided to follow TechCrunch and no longer accept embargoed news. Today, paidContent.org reported that the WSJ will in fact accept exclusive embargoed news, but [...]
11. PC | August 6th, 2009 at 3:24 pm
Should “data” in this quote be “date?”
“We can still work on advanced stuff with a certain publication data in mind, but we can’t accept an embargo that ties our hands to a particular time, particularly one that isn’t exclusive.”
12. Kyle Austin | August 7th, 2009 at 3:25 pm
Thx for the heads up on the typo… – Kyle
13. The Last Has Fallen. The &hellip | September 23rd, 2009 at 4:57 pm
[...] this year the Wall Street Journal also implemented a no embargo policy unless they get an exclusive, mirroring our position. People freaked out. In [...]
14. ??????????????????&hellip | September 23rd, 2009 at 8:54 pm
[...] Street Journal????????????????????????????????????????????????????6??Microsoft [...]
15. Embargoed Press Releases &hellip | September 24th, 2009 at 7:55 am
[...] this year the Wall Street Journal also implemented a no embargo policy unless they get an exclusive, mirroring our position. People freaked out. In [...]
16. Get Exclusives or YouR&hellip | February 12th, 2010 at 1:17 pm
[...] covered it before, but what is really changing is how tightly intertwined breaking news stories are with compensation [...]
17. 3 tips for PR students gr&hellip | March 22nd, 2010 at 8:08 am
[...] the embargo: Old and new media outlets alike have instituted actual or defacto policies about ignoring embargoes, so be careful if you use this tool. We don’t. Instead, we provide advanced exclusives to [...]
18. At Journal | AllGraphicsO&hellip | March 12th, 2011 at 1:26 am
[...] Said his source at the Journal racetalkblog.com [...]
19. Wall Street Journal busts&hellip | April 26th, 2011 at 5:37 am
[...] honor embargoes “without prior approval of a deputy managing editor,” said Nick Ragone. Kyle Austin of the Racepoint Group quotes an unnamed source at the WSJ, “We can still work on advanced stuff with a certain [...]
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