Moviefone Defends Its Honor
Here is a rather incredible follow-up story, from AOL's Moviefone, about their request of Techcrunch to make a story more friendly. It's bizarre! (The request from Moviefone went like this: "Let me know if you’re able to take another look at it and make any edits.")
And Moviefone says: "The person who wrote that email was not acting in an editorial capacity. That person's job is to act as an intermediary between the studios and editorial… the presence of a person with that role is just one means we have of ensuring editorial integrity on Moviefone." Wha? So people who don't act in an "editorial capacity" can say things like "let me know if you're able to… make any edits." That's sort of definitionally opposed? They go on: "We work with movie studios every day, and it is in our best interests to stay on good terms with them." That's true. It is.
as i post this i am not acting in a commenter capacity. once i have posted it i may edit the comment but at that time i will not be acting in an editorial capacity.
If you want to edit this story to ensure continued access to Jake Gyllenhaal, press one.
Also, this! (Which, frankly, seems a little overheated to me even if in principle, yes, it's probably right.)
Especially the part about how to spell phone.
"WHY DON'T YOU JUST TELL ME THE NAME OF THE MOVIE YOU WANT TO SEE"
DAMN YOU KEISER. One stinking minute before I got to it.
I felt a wave of deja vu when reading about this story; after the AOL/TW merger, I was the editor for one of the magazine websites and was asked by someone at AOL to change a piece about an actor because they were afraid to offend him while he was working with them on a promotion. Uh, no. I went to the top for support in refusing the request.