Talk:Drudge Report

We'd find that an emulation for this approach, will manifest soon here. [ http://www.clubnui.net]

Older talk can be found at Talk:Matt Drudge

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Concerning one of the parody sites of the Drudge Report

I clicked one of the lined parody websites ("Drunken Report") and it came out with an explicitly sexual ad, which embarrased the hell out of me. Some one should get rid of the link or just post a warning.67.80.32.189 22:26, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

Vandalism

I just added in the past couple of days heavily-sourced material about the Drudge Report's extremely well-documented mockery campaign (which goes on virtually daily) against the term "global warming." It was accurate, nuanced and NPOV. And as a separate matter I gently corrected the ridiculous suggestions that the reactionary site is not conservative, and I carefully footnoted that, while still including the opposing views (however ludicrous they are).

I was shocked to see that this material was immediately reverted. I now get the impression that abuse on Wiki is more common than I had realized. People are on here defending their treasured causes, and they don't have any intention of informing, only propagandizing. References that don't support their position are routinely excised. And the supposed mechanisms that Wiki has for policing these abuses have proven hopelessly inadequate. Mare Nostrum 07:29, 5 February 2007 (UTC)

WP:NPOV is just one of Wikipedia's three content policies. Your content, even if NPOV, runs afoul of WP:OR. Poshua 16:26, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

Under BIAS, somebody should write up Drudge's coverage of global warming

Whenever somebody makes a global warming claim, he links it right above a link to a story about some freak incident of frost wiping out a strawberry patch. If you actually made the case that cold temperatures in a specific location negate reports of global warming trends, you'd be called an idiot and a lunatic. But when you imply it through adjacent headlines, you're just Drudge.Bds yahoo 13:30, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

that would be original research--Lehk 06:06, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

drudge is unabashedly conservative and fits the republican stance on global warming and science in general listen to his radio program

Drudge does put quotes around "global warming" whenever it is mentioned on his site. Indeed, this article used to have information on allegations of conservative bias... what happened to it? Tzepish 19:37, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

Source Needed for Income

The article currently states, "he makes over $30,000 per year." He surely makes more than that given his popularity. The most recent estimate I've seen is that he takes in approximately $800,000 per month in advertising revenue, but I don't recall where I saw that figure and I have no idea if it is correct. Can someone supply a more accurate number and a source for it? Non-Riemann Hypercube 19:01, 17 April 2006 (UTC)

Um, yeah. That's complete bs. And he made 800k a year in 2003 when ad CPMs were VERY low and his traffic was also much lower. My guess is he makes $3 million a year now. He basically just runs a bunch of crap ads, but it doesnt matter because he has so much traffic it still ads up to a huge amount.

From the BBC:

5. It's a long way since Monica Lewinsky. But Matt Drudge, the fedora-wearing king of the Drudge Report, is making $3,500 a day, according to Business 2.0 magazine. That's £800,000 a year for an operation that has just two employees. Former Slate boss Michael Kinsley told the magazine: "Matt... thinks he's this incredibly powerful, ruthless avenger. But he's actually sort of an innocent, Walter Mitty type - except that his fantasies are more or less true."

The average exchange rate in 2003 was 1.63, which means his income was estimated at 1.3 million a year. I'll add it to the article. -Quasipalm 14:42, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

NPOV Tag

I've added an NPOV tag to this article. As it stands right now, this article is more a huge criticism piece on the Drudge Report rather than being informative. I also moved the sources to the expanded article to the main page. Equinox137 13:43, 30 Apr 2005 (UTC)

While I think most of the information in the article is sound, I would welcome more general information so that it doesn't give the reader the impression that drugereport is constantly in error or surrounded by controversy. --Quasipalm 22:46, 30 Apr 2005 (UTC)

That's what I'm getting at - I don't doubt any of the information, but it's so spinned by detractors and people who can't stand him - it's not funny. Equinox137 23:19, 30 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Bias

"A later erroneous report emerged in the 2004 US presidential campaign, one week before Senator Kerry announced his selection of Senator John Edwards as his vice presidential running mate. The Report headlined a prediction from a "top D.C. insider" saying that Senator Kerry would be announcing Senator Hillary Clinton as his running mate, declaring it to mark the beginning of a "massive love fest." [16] (http://www.drudgereportarchives.com/data/2004/07/01/20040701_012802_kerryhrc.htm) The story was de-linked one day later. After Edward's selection, Drudge removed all "VP Hillary" coverage without comment; the correction or outright removal of false content published at the Report is usually handled in similar no-comment fashion."

This entire section seems to be in error. Is it false content to report what you are told? While the source may be in error, unless there is evidence that this source did not tell him this, that there was a retraction by this source, or that the source didn't exist, it seems out of place. 172.131.58.54 08:26, 4 Jun 2005 (UTC)

It is good journalism to have two sources for every claim. Drudge recklessly defies that tradition, which is why he is the source of so many falsehoods. 68.9.184.173 13:24, 27 September 2005 (UTC)

You're splitting hairs. Was the New York Post in error when they reported Gephardt was Kerry's VP? Yes. Even though they said that "source say", they should have done fact checking and were being poor journalists. In the same way, Drudge was in error, or at least perpetuated a mistake, and so I don't believe this section is incorrect. --Quasipalm 18:37, 4 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Ok, I'll accept that. The problem then becomes what to include and what not to. As there are many more cases where sources have been incorrect. Is there a certain amount thats proper to reference?172.130.241.8 23:36, 4 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Good point, I think this paragraph could be shortened -- it's a pretty minor error in the big picture. (Not as notable as the NY Post calling Gephardt, or Dan Rather presenting a story with unverified, forged documents, for example.) --Quasipalm 01:50, 5 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for your responses Quasi. I have personally become terrified of actually editing sections of articles due to the edit wars that will inevitably pop-up, and my not-to-great ability at putting my thoughts into words. Sorry if it seems rather lazy of me, but I'd rather bring up objections, or suggest content in the talk pages and let the more brave among us do the actual editing. Again, appreciate your time. 172.130.241.8 09:17, 5 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Drudge as Libertarian

There should be something here about his handling of the Cindy Sheehan story. Once again, he editorializes through images. He keeps posting the most unattractive pictures of her he can find. As a "libertarian," he should actually support private citizens who speak out against big government. Instead, he is siding with the Bush administration against a bereaved mother. Whether you are a hawk or a dove, you have to find it shady when a professed libertarian repeatedly sides with big government against the private citizen. 68.110.199.122 15:01, 25 August 2005 (UTC)

I agree completely. I think this shows that Drudge isn't really a strict libertarian, but rather, he is a person that walks the republican party line (with a few rare exceptions, like bemoaning the rising public debt under GWB).--Quasipalm 16:35, 25 August 2005 (UTC)

I went and checked out the image... It's so rediculous (I mean, this woman lost her son) that I put a comparison of two images into the article. --Quasipalm 17:11, 25 August 2005 (UTC)

Cool, Quasi. 68.110.199.122 06:06, 26 August 2005 (UTC)

This couldn't possibly be because he thinks she is a crock of B.S. Just because someone is a libertarian does not mean that you agree with every individual out there. You can be very antiwar, and still not agree with someone who gives a thumbsup while hugging Hugo Chavez.74.129.17.185 16:08, 19 October 2006 (UTC)

Drudge as "Centrist"

Does anybody have a date on this media study which declared Drudge Report "centrist"? I think the date should be mentioned, since its been part of this article for a while, but still appears at the end of the "Bias" section as though it is an answer to new allegations of bias. 68110.199.122 06:16, 26 August 2005 (UTC)

Never mind, taken care of. 68.110.199.122 06:18, 26 August 2005 (UTC)

Removing the side note on the study's controversy.

"(The study also claims that The Wall Street Journal is the most liberal American news outlet, Drudge Report is more liberal than the average American, and that Newshour with Jim Lehrer is more conservative than Drudge. Some believe that these findings conflict with widely held beliefs about politics and the media.)"

This statement is not needed. If you read the study, Groseclose and Milyo explain these perceived irregularities. The link to the study is available to readers. This note tries to discredit the entire study based on the author's opinion and leaves out explainations to these irregularities mentioned in the study. The langauge is misleading, leaving out the fact that both Drudge Report and Jim Lehrer were found to be slightly left of center in the study. The Wall Street Journal is also cited in the study as has having a liberal news page, but a conservative opinion page, with only the news portion of newspapers observed in the study. The claim that the WSJ is the "most liberal American news outlet" also makes the assumption that the study includes every media outlet in the nation. The study in fact only collected data on 20 media outlets. The link to the study is all that is needed for readers to learn about the study, and the link to the criticism is all that's needed to show the study's controversial. Thorburn 09:24, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

By the way the study actually compared media outlets to the voting records of Congressmen (weighted based on the number of constituents they represent). So the direct conclusion of the study is that e.g. Drudge is more liberal than the average Congressman; the authors assume that this is equivalent to being more liberal than the average American, but that's a debatable inference. Crust 16:21, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

Is this worth covering in this article?

http://mediamatters.org/items/200508100007 68.110.199.122 06:25, 26 August 2005 (UTC)

Archives

Is the Internet Archive no longer archiving Drudge Report? It was being archived daily until Nov 30, 2004 and then stops except for Dec 25, 2004. There is nothing from 2005. Ewlyahoocom 15:45, 10 September 2005 (UTC)

Photos

Not entirely relevant, but how does Drudge get away with not giving photo credits for the pictures he pirates from other sites? And why doesn't he resize them so they don't look so distorted? 68.9.184.173 00:56, 14 October 2005 (UTC)

Who knows -- but the reason he doesn't re-size them is because he doesn't even host them, and sometimes he's even deeplinked images from other news-sources. Basically "stealing" their bandwidth to show images on his page (this is very easy technically, unless they protect themselves). Lately, most of the images are hosted on another (yimg?) server that he probably pays to deep-link from his website. Or maybe he doesn't pay -- it's hard to tell with this guy. --Quasipalm 15:20, 14 October 2005 (UTC)

Today I noticed "deep-linking" ... He is showing an image of the NYTimes' Dowd (http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2005/10/26/magazine/30dowd.450.jpg) and he's not hosting the image himself. He is just linking to the image on the NYTimes' server. Why do these websites let him get away with this? I'm sure it's a ton of bandwidth. --Quasipalm 19:27, 16 November 2005 (UTC)

My guess is that the way he gets by using the photos is specifically because he deep links them. Hosting is stealing but you can link anything that is public.Rtrev 04:51, 4 September 2006 (UTC)--

Word Emphasis

IMHO "However, MOST claims are eventually linked to a real news website." is violating NPOV. The word "most" has no reason to be capitalized. This should be a factual article, not a forum post.

Weasel words

There are several unsubstantiated/uncited "some"s and "many"s -- some critics, many feel, etc. etc. -- that tilt this article away from a neutral point of view. --EEMeltonIV 19:22, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Original Research

Just a reminder... this article more than many others seems to smack of original research. Remember, Wikipedia is an encyclopedia and should be a TERTIARY soruce. Which means you should rarely cite the Drudge Report itself, the Internet Archive, or internet discussion groups. Instead of using your own analysis and observations in Wikipedia, please refer to reputable sources (books, news reports, etc.) that make that analysis and analyze the original research. I removed the following because it seems like the textbook definition of original research. If someone wants to find this analysis and a secondary source and rework the content, that would be cool (although I doubt it can be found)--Bibliophylax 15:36, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

• Actually, according to WP:RS: Material from self-published sources, whether published online or as a book or pamphlet, may be used as sources of information about themselves in articles about themselves, so long as there is no reasonable doubt about who wrote it, and where the material is one of the following: ... (snip) I believe it is completely appropriate to use something from Drudge's archives to verify a statement such as, "On such and such date, the Drudge Report published ..." - Crockspot 23:47, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

• You're definitely right that the Drudge Report isn't ruled out as an unreliable source under WP:RS. But that doesn't mean that it can be used in original research. See WP:NOR. For example, the article talks about pictures being used to editorialize and backs this up with samples of the Drudge Report. That is original research because it doesn't cite a source for the claim that the pictures are editorializing. Another example is the paragraph I removed below on 10/02. It tries to speculate about when the Drudge Report started by looking at evidence. That's original research because it should instead cite another source that has researched it and already reached the conclusion. It's a little confusing... but any analysis or synthesis in the article has to be from another source.--Bibliophylax 16:11, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

• Agreed. Conclusionary statements are certainly OR. Just wanted to clarify that the self source of Drudge can be used in particular circumstances. Crockspot 16:23, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

Only problem is that after looking through the Bias and Criticism sections it seems that the whole thing is uncited or original research. These sections should be in the article but as it stands they are not article ready. The only problem is that I am loathe to delete them outright but they probably shouldn't stay as is. Any suggestions? Anyone have time to re-write/cite/non-original research? Rtrev 17:02, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

I've already put in a ton of time on the Matt Drudge article in the past few days. You could check there and see if any of the new cites I added can be used here. Otherwise, I would suggest moving the entire section here to the talk page, and we can work on it here. Crockspot 17:48, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

Removed the following original research 10/02/06

The Internet Archive "Wayback Machine" shows that the Drudge Report website had its debut on December 6, 1998. It is unclear exactly when Drudge began publishing non-web reports. On April 2, 2004, he splashed a headline on his site which read "Drudge Report Turns Nine Years Old". [1] In a Usenet post from that month, Drudge advertised his Report as covering "the Entertainment industry, Poli-Video shows (political talk shows,) Talk Radio, and a cross section of things that the editor Matt Drudge is focusing in on. This weekly report arrives on Monday and is complimented (sic) with NEWS BREAKS as they occur. Already read by key players, this tip sheet will be sure to peak (sic) your interest." [2]

(Removed by Bibliophylax 15:36, 2 October 2006 (UTC))

I don't think it is confusing at all, pretty cut and dry original research. Rtrev 16:14, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

Photos - Editorializing

I looked all over and couldn't find a cite for the statement that "the Drudge Report has been accused of editorializing with photo selection." Do we have a source? --PTR 20:21, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

Considering that all Drudge does is link the photos directly from AP, Yahoo, etc., I doubt that one will be found. At least, one that meets WP:RS. Mostly just bloggers complaining about it, so probably should remove the statement. Crockspot 20:26, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

If we remove the statement we'll need to remove the photos. I'll do it tomorrow if no one has objections.--PTR 14:04, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

Ignore my last message. Photos have been removed. Should look a the page before commenting.--PTR 14:09, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

Original Section

Here are the images that have been removed -- if anyone can find reputable sources, please re-enter them. -

File:Cindy Drudge Report Texas Copyrighted.jpg
The Drudge Report has been accused of editorializing with photo selection. Above is pictured Cindy Sheehan.
File:Robertson Drudge Report Copyrighted.jpg
The Drudge Report has been accused of editorializing with photo selection. Above is pictured John Roberts.
File:Drudge-5-26-06.jpg
Drudge has been accused of editorializing through the juxtaposition of arguably unrelated linked stories. Above is a sequence of links from a May 27, 2006 issue. Below is a sequence of links from a May 31, 2006 issue.
File:Drudge report 5 31 06.jpg
-Quasipalm 17:00, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

Origins section sources

I attempted to find sources for the last three "citation needed" statements in this section (Connie Chung, Jerry Seinfeld, Jack Kemp). Could not find the primary stories in the Drudge archives. I have not looked outside of Drudge archives, so if someone wants to make that attempt, go for it. Crockspot 15:30, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

Remember, we don't want to look back in the Drudge Archives, see when Drudge posted these stories, and then figure out if he was first. We need to find a source that says "Drudge was first..." --Bibliophylax 20:49, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

These were the ones I found but don't know if they meet criteria.

http://www.cnn.com/ALLPOLITICS/1998/01/30/pandora.web/

http://list.msu.edu/cgi-bin/wa?A2=ind9910a&L=aejmc&T=0&P=8031

http://www.salon.com/media/media960628.html

--PTR 22:05, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

Where in the world is matt drudge?

On his site right now he has a link titled "DRUDGE SEASON GREETINGS FROM MIDEAST... THANKS FOR A GREAT YEAR!!", the text is linked to this picture of himself: http://www.drudgereport.com/drx.jpg, does that mean he is currently in the middle east? and if so what country?

It doesn't much matter in relation to this article. We have no idea if it yet meets WP:NOTE. --Rtrev 05:08, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

Origin

Moved off article: I had always heard that Drudge started his "DrudgeReport" while living in the basement of his parents home. Mark Mayhew

The ABC claim

The subtitle of the article says, "Book Compares Online Newsman to Walter Cronkite" and the claim is made by the authors of that book.[3] The quote on the second page of the article is: "Drudge's coverage affects the media's political coverage, Halperin said." You are disingenuous being by claiming "ABC" said it.

In fact, in the context of the article: "Matt Drudge is not doing stories on policy, on welfare, on healthcare. He's doing stories on the most salacious aspects of American politics," he said. "When that drives the dialogue, that's where the country heads, that's where our political coverage heads." It not really compliment. Arbustoo 21:21, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

• You make a good point, Arbustoo. The ABC article (and book) are potentially misused here as puffery quotes for MD, whereas the actual content is more balanced. I have tried to reflect that. One might go further and quote the stuff about how Drudge tirelessly pushed the Swift Boaters claims. Skopp (Talk) 23:36, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

The title of the article appears nowhere in the book. The book is not mentioned in the article (except for the subtitle) until well into the second half of the article. You are the one being disingenuous here. - Crockspot 21:28, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

You are claiming "ABC News concluded that the Drudge Report sets the tone for national political coverage."[4] Concluded by who? What department? With what research? According to what spokesperson? The CEO believes this? The article is an interview attributing those quotes to authors of a book. If want to claim a news network believes this about a blog get a source to prove it. Arbustoo 21:36, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

Before I take this to an RfC, I will lay out my position as clearly as I can: ABC News published the article titled "Drudge Report Sets Tone for National Political Coverage" without a byline. The title itself makes a charactarization, and it is not quoted from a book. The first three paragraphs of the article are clearly making a similar charactarization (one of the strongest weapons...tremendous influence...can send shock waves through newsrooms and campaign headquarters nationwide ...) without any attribution to a third party. Then follows a supporting quote from Mark Halperin, ABC News Political Director. Then there are several more quotes, interspersed with unattributed statements of fact. Finally, at the thirteenth paragraph, we hear about the book which is referred to in the subtitle. Clearly this is not a book review, it is reporting by a reliable news organization. If the article had a byline, I would offer the compromise of attributing the charactarization to the author, ie., Joe Blow of ABC News drew the conclusion.... Furthermore, reporters do not usually write the headline which appears above their story. That is a task that falls to the editorial staff. So considering that ABC News chose to publish a story with no byline, with a headline that the editorial staff chose, with reporting that tends to support the headline, I would say that there is no one else to attribute the charactarization to except ABC News. The article itself is all the proof that is required. Are you actually asking for a reliable secondary source to prove a reliable secondary source? - Crockspot 23:10, 2 April 2007 (UTC)