[danso]

I agree that it was wrong to bring up the tweets during the reporting (the subject went public with his apology before the DMR ran their profile), but when you rhetorically ask, "Going through 7 years worth of tweets?", are you aware of how Twitter advanced search works? You don't have to "go through n years worth of tweets" – you can search by keyword and by author, and in seconds, Twitter will show you any and all tweets with that keyword, across all of time.

So it's like someone asking, "You went through billions of webpages to find my homepage?", because they aren't aware of how Google is used. Yes, reading through 7 years of tweets would be a huge investment of time, but searching for keywords like "Holocaust" or the n-word is not. I haven't had to write a profile of someone in the age of social media, but back when I worked for a newspaper, I would routinely do a courts search for anyone I was doing a profile on, even for fluff profile. Not because I was looking for dirt, but because it's a process that takes a minute and prevents me from unknowingly whitewashing someone with a fluff profile.

[dfsegoat]

He went public after the DMR asked him about it, to get ahead of it. At that point they could have left it out of their yet unpublished piece.

Absolutely fair points and I totally missed the advanced search bit - you are 100% right there.

But, to that point, wouldn't it suggest even more bias if someone were simply searching: @SUBJECT_HANDLE + <RACIST_OR_SOCIALLY_UNACCEPTABLE_TERM_KEYWORD> ?

To me, that seems like the definition of digging for dirt. But, I guess it depends on who's side you identify with more.

I would totally be fine if they could present some sort of SOP or protocol for doing their social media background checks in a standard way. I've seen nothing like that.

[danso]

Note: I definitely don't hold it against him for going public. And the fact that he felt the need to do so suggests to me either he is an extremely stand-up guy, and/or the reporter asked him about it made it seem inevitable that the tweets would be written about.

> To me, that seems like the definition of digging for dirt.

Again, my opinion (and limited past experience) only, but I think the easy and quick mechanics of tweet-searching makes it a routine check and not "digging for dirt". Just like how Google and court searches can be done in a few seconds/minutes. When I did a cursory criminal background check for the subject of a positive news profile, it wasn't because I wanted to find dirt. It's because I don't want to put out a happy naive fuzzy article about an award-winning local business leader, only to find out via letters from victims/litigants who tell me he's the target of serious accusations/lawsuits.

Now if finding bad tweets from someone actually required collecting and reading years of tweets, that would be more akin to digging for dirt, because you have to work for it. You only put in that work when you really want to find something.

That said, if I were the DMR reporter in this case and stumbled upon those controversial tweets in my cursory check, I would've done the math in my head (i.e. King was only 16 at the time), and I would've put in the work to see if there were any recent tweets that indicate his purported bigotry is an ongoing character trait. And if I couldn't find such tweets (which seems to be the case with King), then I wouldn't even bring it up. I just wouldn't see that relevant to this kind of profile, same as I probably wouldn't find it necessary to report on or ask about minor juvenile crimes long expunged.

[dfsegoat]

Thanks for explaining. I found your take here quite refreshing:

> I would've put in the work to see if there were any recent tweets that indicate his purported bigotry is an ongoing character trait. And if I couldn't find such tweets (which seems to be the case with King), then I wouldn't even bring it up.

I suppose I am genuinely curious in the details of tweet searching mechanics from an Info retrieval standpoint: Do you iterate through a list of "bad terms" to search against the subject? If so, what is your source for such list and how is it maintained?

I guess what I'm looking for, is could this be a standardized process set at the 'organizational level' - or is it a process created by individual reporters based on personal experience?

Again - genuinely curious - no snark intended.

[danso]

I can't say from personal experience since I haven't had to write a profile on anyone in the time when social media backgrounding became a common thing. In terms of what things to search for, I imagine it's all subjective, just as it's subjective on what you should judge someone for (social media, criminal background, etc), but I'm sure looking for common bigoted slurs would be standard practice.

One thing worth noting: As I understand it, Mr. King's charity campaign was heavily based off of social media (after the initial appearance on ESPN GameDay) – meaning that he spread it via his own Twitter account. Which makes looking at his Twitter account and past tweets more routine, since social media is essentially a large part of his current fame/notability. For other kinds of profile subjects, such as "Teacher of the Year" or "veteran recalls memories of war on war's anniversary", I'd be surprised if reporters did a social media check. Because unless that person themself says their social media profile is a big deal, then the reporter probably won't even be aware of it.