New York Times: Berkeley Pit Lake is Neat! Wired: Well, Yes.

Earlier this week, the New York Times had a really interesting story about a place in Montana called Berkeley Pit Lake--it's a foul, toxic pool, made from groundwater that filled an abandoned copper mine. But amazingly, a couple of researchers named Don and Andrea Stierle are finding all kinds of novel microorganisms living there, some of them with potential uses in making life-saving drugs.

The September issue of Wired magazine had a really interesting story about a place in Montana called Berkeley
Pit Lake--it's a foul, toxic pool, made from groundwater that filled an abandoned copper mine. But amazingly, a couple of researchers named Don and Andrea Stierle are finding all kinds of novel microorganisms living there, some of them with potential uses in making life-saving drugs.

I edited our story, by the brilliant ex-Washington Post science writer Guy Gugliotta. So I was a bit taken aback by this—as one colleague put it, it's as if the NYT bought a term paper off the Internet.

After a little reporting, I'm convinced that's not what happened. But how two similar stories appeared in two national publications is worth talking about—especially when one of them, the Times, has a reputation for cherry-picking stories from pubs perceived to be beneath them on the food chain. Join me, won't you, after the jump?

Journalism is its own kind of ecosystem, and the New York Times is an apex predator. Stories bubble up from the depths, and the Times can pick them off at will, really. And they do—even though, in our game, being first with a story is one of the Great Virtues. I think Jack Shafer, the media critic at Slate, wrote about this phenomenon years ago, but a quick search didn't yield the story. If someone finds it, ping me and I'll update.

The thing is, the Times is a deservedly powerful force in journalism—correspondents everywhere, lots of investigative journalism, international circulation. They also have a reputation for being a little snooty (and I say this even though many of my friends work there and—even fuller disclosure—the Times has never shown the slightest interest in hiring me, so maybe I'm just jealous). And after all, you gotta get your story ideas somewhere. Other publications are often fair game, even, yes, here at Wired.

So I pinged the story's writer, Christopher Maag, to ask whut up. He's a Cleveland-based freelancer, and he sent a gracious reply.

I found out about the Wired story after I pitched it to the Times. Andrea Stierle told me about yours after I contacted her. I was disappointed to hear about it, honestly, because I thought (perhaps foolishly) that I was the first person to discover them. I did read the Wired story before I wrote mine, and it was well written. I don’t want to take an overly defensive a tone here, but I do want to be clear: I did not plagiarize or steal from your story. My process of reporting the story started with the Stierles, and from there I picked some logical people to comment on their work—mostly local contemporaries in Montana and people with national stature from NIH and the National Science Foundation. In writing my story I consulted only my interview notes from the Stierles and other sources (at times nearly pulling my hair out trying to craft a story that was both creative and short). I don’t see similarities between the Wired story and mine, although I must say I haven’t gone back to re-read yours. As I remember it, the Wired writer started with a long description of the pit’s appearance, and included more detailed descriptions of the Stierles, their relationship and career, their science, etc. I had far less space to work with—my target for the first draft was 900 words—so I only could cover the story’s major themes with much faster strokes, and unfortunately had to leave out lots of interesting stuff about the Stierles, Butte, the mine, etc. After that process, I didn’t think to mention the Wired story in mine, so no, that was never discussed.

I have my own concerns about reporters at national papers cherry-picking stories. [snips] I find the practice deceitful, maddening and lazy. I spent 10 or so years working for local and regional magazines and newspapers, and only in the last few years have I started writing for the Times and other national publications, so I get pretty angry when I hear stories of hard-working reporters getting ripped off.

So, that was cool of Chris to respond, and I want to be clear: His story was not plagiarism, nor did he steal the idea. If I'd been his editor at the Times, and I knew about the Wired story, I might have been inclined to ask him to "spin it forward" or "move the ball forward." (It's always funny when reporters use sports euphemisms, because many of us are so wimpy. And by "many of us" I of course mean "me.") Anyway, the idea is, you want the next iteration of the story, the what's-new, the what's-happening-now, or at least since the last version came out. Because being first with news is one of the ways we journalists keep score.

Why do I care? Fundamentally, I want Guy Gugliotta and Wired to get credit for breaking this story. Since the Times has more readers than we do, that's now less likely.

And now, having talked to Chris, I"m not sure which is worse: the idea that someone at the Times read our story, loved it, and decided to do their own version...or the idea that nobody at the Times reads Wired.

UPDATE: Awesome! At the behest of commenter Nate, I went looking for a Discover story on Berkeley Pit Lake...and found it! From the year 2000! So...Wired not so much with the first, in way. You're thinking. But the Discover story focused on using the Berkeley Pit organisms to clean up the environmental damage at the lake itself. Wired focused on pharmaceutical applications and so, I now argue, moved the ball forward.

To be fair, though, The Washington Post covered Berkeley Pit and the Stierles in 1999, and that paper's story mentioned the possibility of new drugs. I wonder if there's a statute of limitations on scoops.

Creatures from the Black Lagoon Wired

In the Battle Against Cancer, Researchers Find Hope in a Toxic Wasteland NY Times

New Life in a Death Trap Discover

Could a Toxic Lake Yield Life-Saving Microbes? Washington Post

Image: NY Times (take that!)