From the Village Voice:

We removed last week's cover story, "Do You Wanna Kiss Me?" by Nick Sylvester, from the Village Voice website when questions surfaced regarding the reporter's work. While a review of the story demonstrated that the bulk of the author's article was accurate, the piece also contained fabrication and composite anecdotes used in the interest of narrative.

Whatever happened to the word "lies"? Our guess is the Voice would have used just that term if it were describing the misdeeds of some big bad corporation or one of its other story subjects.

Let's be clear: the term "composite anecdote" is spin, and it is being proffered (time and again now) by members of a profession who sometimes claim to be above spin -- professional journalists.

Having said that, we actually like the idea of adding this new device to our blogging toolbelt. In fact, it sounds so legit, they ought to stop teaching it in fiction-writing classes and start teaching it in J-schools.

So, here goes -- our first attempt at incorporating a "composite anecdote" in Media Orchard:

Yesterday, we were talking on the phone with Jeff Jarvis and he was going on and on about how he -- along with his good friends Jessica Coen and Arianna Huffington -- totally agreed with Steve Rubel that Media Orchard is the best blog on the planet. We then got a beep-beep on our call waiting and asked Jeff to hold for a minute. Turned out Michelle Malkin was on the other line; she needed a ride to Wal-Mart (which we understand is partially owned by Edelman) to buy Naked Conversations. So we borrowed Kos's car and picked her up, and we were almost at Wal-Mart when we got pulled over by this Matt Dillon-looking cop who started to harass Michelle -- but then our car caught on fire and he pulled her out just before it exploded. So Michelle immediately got out her laptop, which was still smoking, and started blogging some pro-"law and order" stuff. Feeding the beast, she called it.

So there you go. We like "composite anecdotes." Keeps the story moving, doesn't it?

(Apologies to Mack -- but that actually wasn't theft, it was "sampling." Hat tip to Romenesko)

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