Legal Marketing & Consulting
Law Firm ‘Fake News’ Video Criticized
Posted Jan 29, 2008, 07:14 am CDT
By Debra Cassens Weiss
A law firm and its public relations consultant are being criticized for a paid program on public access cable that looks all too much like a real news show.
Two partners at the Hartford, Conn., law firm of Shipman & Goodwin are interviewed on the video by a PR consultant who was a former reporter for a local TV station, WFSB-TV Channel 3, the New Haven Advocate reports. The consultant, Duby McDowell, sometimes appears on the station as an on-air analyst. On the video she is identified as a "WFSB Political Analyst.” The subject of the interview is the law firm’s recent $12.4 million win in an eminent domain case.
The story says McDowell and another questioner “toss softball questions” at the lawyers on a set “that looks just like it could be a rebroadcast of a WFSB show.” At the end of the program, though, viewers are informed: "This program has been presented by Shipman and Goodwin.”
Legal Blog Watch, which posted the story, is not comforted by the disclaimer. “To me, this looks like a classic example of fake news, one that is sure to mislead at least some of the people who watch it,” says the Blog Watch’s Robert Ambrogi.
The video is available online.
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Comments
Posted by Mike Hunt - 6 months, 2 weeks, 4 days, 8 hours, 36 minutes ago
You gotta love it! The video has a supposed talking head woman, dutifully reading her news from a script, and two scruffy lawyers being interviewed about some boring realty issue that clearly would never keep my interest on a news program. It’s not surprising people are coming down on the firm for what is probably some kind of attempt to provide biased “news coverage”....but that’s what you have to do to bring in the dopey clients in order to make the big bucks. I wondered about the guy with the beard. He would probably do better to shave it off, unless he has no chin. These guys should know better. They may know their law, but I’ll take Julia Roberts and Richard Gere over these clowns any day, if I want to see some law on the big screen. Even Robert DeNiro, and that bit fat woman lawyer on the Practice come off more real on TV than these clowns.
Posted by Timothy Hollister - 6 months, 2 weeks, 4 days, 12 minutes ago
Shipman & Goodwin LLP would like to respond to this article and comments as follows:
1. The video was posted on a website that contains exclusively public record information about the case of New England Estates v Town of Branford. The website is clearly identified as being sponsored by our firm; thirty-seven times in 29 minutes, the video refers back to the Shipman & Goodwin -sponsored website.
2. The video was taken off the website by citizens of Branford and given to the town’s local public access television station, which made its own independent decision as to whether airing it was appropriate.
3. Ms. McDowell identified herself in the video as a political analyst for a Connecticut TV station because that is an accurate statement of her professional identity; it is how she is known publicly in Connecticut.
4. No reasonable person could have thought that the video was an WFSB news program. The fact that it was prepared by and paid for by Shipman & Goodwin is stated expressly on the screen. Nowhere does the video state that it is a “WFSB production” or show the Channel 3 logo or anything else identifying the TV station as a producer, sponsor or participant.
5. The video and its use bear no resemblance to a “fake news” program because the sponsor and the participants are accurately identified.
6. The original story about the video and website was written by a woman who resides in Branford and who reported on the New England Estates trial in a personal blog while the trial was in progress in August - September 2007. The public record information posted on the website regarding this case reveals significant inaccuracies in those blogs.