It's really not that hard to find someone to go to check a address, redditors do this all the time. It should be expected as basic journalism, especially with high claims.

Check an address and interview anyone resident there in a way that gets useful answers to the questions at hand.

In this instance it was a bust because no one useful was there. But if the mastermind behind the whole operation was there you’d want a professional to ask them questions. Because once they know they’ve been rumbled they’re probably going to disappear.

I am pretty sure the BBC, like most bug enough news outlets, has antennas all over the world.

Why does every discussion have to wind up with a digression thread about how "real" or, even worse, "basic" journalism is something from a sepia-tinged golden age of muckrakers getting blitzed with Dorothy Parker? People are trying. There's lots of shıt masquerading as journalism, but this ain't it.

If only this was the actual standard for journalism and not copy pasting half understood content with additional spin.

If what you are typically reading is

>[copypasta] half understood content with additional spin

then what you are reading is not journalism.

> then what you are reading is not journalism

In most cases, if you aren't paying for it, it is not journalism.

Pretty impressive work. I always wondered what all those correspondents do that news organisations employ all over the world. I guess that's one of those things.

I’m… not sure what’s there to wonder, really. They do the exact same thing as reporters back home: journalism. Meaning write articles and do investigative work required for writing articles, whether going to press conferences, finding people to interview, or something like this, called investigative journalism.

A news piece in a foreign affairs section is likely to have been written by a correspondent because that’s what their job and specialty is. If it’s an op-ed or a commentary or analysis piece, even more so. It’s not like you can do good journalism without boots on the ground, no matter how connected the world is these days.

I agree - I noticed this as well. Also feels like it such an upsetting story that someone was motivated to really to the bottom of it. They also probably knew that if the story got traction people would be running down there own checks.

I mean it does feel like that should be standard operation for journalism on bigger stories but I think our expectations from journalists have really fallen over the last 5 years with all the slop coming in.