Recently, a controversy has arisen regarding the popular war-news blog "The Agonist." Sean-Paul has addressed this issue himself, but it's serious enough to deserve treatment here, too.
To my mind, this controversy has been unique in a couple of heartening ways:
[1] It ended well - nobody got hurt along the way; and
[2] Everyone involved conducted themselves properly.
The controversy began with a post from Strategic Armchair Command, who noted extensive similarities between key Agonist posts and STRATFOR's briefings/ information feeds. Since "pre-media" news posts had played a major role in the site's rise to prominence, this was fair comment and good detective work. People running SAC down for doing this are out of line.
Over to Sean-Paul.
Some of his STRATFOR pieces had been attributed, others had not. There was also a question of permission hanging in the air.
The Agonist addressed the issue head-on in his blog, and asked his readers what they thought. Overwhelming response from both sides of the political aisle: "no problem, keep blogging." Equally important, he also struck up a conversation with STRATFOR. With the attribution of some previously unattributed items, that conflict was headed off at the pass. They seem to be happy to get the level of publicity and traffic that he brings them.
To me, this is a happy ending. SAC wasn't being nefarious, it was a good and valid investigative piece. Sean-Paul should have cleared his arrangement with STRATFOR earlier, but he had cited them for many items. In the end, the discussion was amicable and so was the arrangement. A cautionary tale, ended without major unpleasantness.
I will be happy to keep reading The Agonist. And also Strategic Armchair Command. Long may they prosper.
UPDATES:
- See the Comments section for a robust exchange of views, and some updates. The ending may not have been as happy as I thought it was.
- Ongoing email exchanges and new revelations prompt a follow-up: Answers About the Agonist.
I'm not sure this is exactly a happy ending. SAC does not seem to want to let this go and was still hurling insults at the agonist as of yesterday. We'll see if there is any change today.
I think that it’s naïve to think that this issue is only between The Agonist and Stratfor. It’s not. Even if Stratfor decides not to sue The Agonist for damages, Sean-Paul was wrong in defrauding his audience. He stole Stratfor's work and tried to pass it off as his own. That's inexcusable. Stratfor may forgive him, but I don't. And you shouldn’t either. Sean-Paul cheated others out of an audience that was rightfully theirs. Perhaps some of that audience would have been paying customers of Stratfor’s site. Or perhaps some would have chosen others warblogs, such as The Command Post or, yes, Strategic Armchair Command. We’ll never know because Sean-Paul stacked the deck in his favor and didn’t give others the chance to compete with him fair and square. You said yourself that a major part of The Agonist’s success has been based on reports that people felt they couldn’t get anywhere else. Well, it turns out they could have gotten it ONE other place, but needed a paid subscription to do so. No wonder that hundreds of thousands of people were thrilled to get it for free! It was good stuff!!! I’m sure that Stratfor thought it was worth whatever premium they had to pay for it. Many other warbloggers must subscribe to Stratfor, but they realized that this information was not theirs to disseminate. Sean-Paul, however, decided that he was above those pesky rules of law, ethics and decency. He stole from Stratfor, lied to his audience and cheated other warbloggers of their share of the audience. Let’s see - lie, cheat & steal – yup, he hit all three! No wonder everyone thinks he’s such a prince!!! Yeah, he’s a regular Robin Hood – stealing from the rich to give to the poor. Please. He’s that pathetic kid who steals candy to give it to the popular kids so they’ll like him. They’ll cheer him on as long as he’s doing their dirty work, “no problem, keep blogging.” And when he gets caught, which he has, they’ll desert him for the next kid who will put out to be popular. As soon as they realize they’re not getting anymore “goodies” from Sean-Paul, they drop him faster than you can say, “there’s a new insecure kid in town.” Good riddance.
Sue, you have a point. Not attributing all of his Stratfor posts was wrong. Not having an arrangement in advance with Stratfor was wrong. Precisely because the material was not his. The use did cross the line from research, as far as any court would rule.
Should he have come clean about his exact sources earlier? Yes. Did he come clean, and even send people to SAC's critical post before I blogged it? Yes, and that counted for something in my books. Did Stratfor decide that benefits of having Sean-Paul fix the unattributed posts (note that some already were attributed) and work with them were valuable enough to warrant their co-operation going forward? Yes, they did. If they had decided otherwise, his ass was grass; the only reason they're playing along is because they want to. That, too, means something to me.
Hence, happy ending. He did wrong - I'll happily say that - and then he fixed it. If it had begun happily, there wouldn't have been a controversy. But at least it ended that way, which is why the controversy died.
"He stole from Stratfor, lied to his audience and cheated other warbloggers of their share of the audience. Let’s see - lie, cheat & steal - yup, he hit all three!"
#1 & 2 I've dealt with. Cheated other warbloggers? I'd say you overstep there. My belief: if every Stratfor item he did not at first attribute was never posted at all, he'd still be a big success.
Sean-Paul started off blogging nearly 24/7 and kept it up (a big factor for others like Command Post and Blogs of War too – probably the biggest factor for all 3), used lots of other sources, and had a good reader network that fed him more information. He also came in with a left-leaning view, so a substantial portion of the blogosphere trusted him much more than, say, Blogs of War (or even Winds of Change). That alone made him distinct, and was much more important than the Stratfor material in cementing his rise. There's a chaos theory principle called "sensitive dependence on initial conditions," and Sean-Paul was reaping its benefits from minute 1.
Did the additional Stratfor material make a difference? Some. Did it make The Agonist? Doubtful. He worked hard, and had the right strategy and positioning, and owes most of his success to that. Which wouldn't have redeemed him had he refused to right his wrongs. But he did right them.
I'm one of those other warbloggers, after all. Do I feel cheated out of an audience? No. They'll come to him for certain things, and me for other things, and others again for different material. It's a big blogosphere, and now that the issues are addressed Sean-Paul is welcome to his place in it. As is Strategic Armchair Command, who did some good and justified investigative reporting. As I say, I have no rancor here, and wish good things for both of them.
By making such mistakes and taking responsibility for them along with correcting them puts him firmly on the path that leads to wisdom. The experience gained cannot be bought and I for one will forgive and move on. I am in no position to tell others what to do but it has been my experience that holding anger against someone causes damage to both parties with no positive results all around. Hopefully others will follow your lead and lighten up.
Hmm. WIRED News has an article that discusses the whole issue in much more detail. I'm willing to forgive, I hold no anger, and I believe that the things I wrote about the reasons for Sean-Paul's success remain true. Still, the article does make the depth of the issues with Sean-Paul's conduct clear. It also casts some doubt on my earlier understanding re: a happy ending all around, and how forthright he was about this.
If you're reading this, you've read the background and the comments debate. Read the WIRED article and decide for yourself.