Published Corrections Represent Two Percent of Factual Errors in Newspapers

according to a forthcoming research paper by Scott R. Maier, an associate professor at the University of Oregon's School of Journalism and Communication:

The researchers then contacted a primary news source named in each of the stories and asked him to complete a survey about the accuracy of the piece. A news source was defined as a witness or participant with firsthand knowledge of the events described in the story. Only "hard," objective errors alleged by the news sources were included, and the study assumed that the factual assessments of the news sources were correct.

The results might shock even the most jaded of newspaper readers. About 69 percent of the 3,600 news sources completed the survey, and they spotted 2,615 factual errors in 1,220 stories. That means that about half of the stories for which a survey was completed contained one or more errors. Just 23 of the flawed stories—less than 2 percent—generated newspaper corrections. No paper corrected more than 4.2 percent of its flawed articles.

Obviously, a newspaper can't publish a correction until it learns of its error. But the studied dailies performed poorly when informed of their goofs. Maier found that 130 of the news sources reported having asked for corrections, but their complaints elicited only four corrections.

link to Slate article

From

1. false circulation figures (representing fraud against advertisers),
2. to false representations of accuracy,
3. to false representations of reporting the truly important news (when, instead, media frequently withhold news which doesn't mesh with their agenda):

media is a scammified* industry which is well-populated by shallow, immoral pretenders.

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Example:

List of journalistic transgressions, courtesy of Randall Hoven, of American Thinker.

Example 2:

A takedown of a Reuters article about bloodthirsty and racist Texas evangelical Christians.

Example 3:

Seattle Times Editor Scolds Staffers For Cheering Rove Resignation
By Ken Shepherd August 15, 2007 - 17:40 ET

Example 4:

Video: Boos in MSNBC newsroom during Bush’s 2003 SOTU, recalls Scarborough
posted at 11:05 am on August 16, 2007 by Allahpundit

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Here, I will stop listing examples. I could go on for weeks.

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*Scammified: should be a word. You know what it means.