The Clarion-Ledger reported yesterday a new development was coming to Ridgeland. Check out the story posted below and pay attention to the highlighted words:
Developers of an area in Ridgeland, who have already announced intentions to bring Topgolf to Madison County, have bigger plans.
While Topgolf is still part of the plan for a development off Interstate 55 in Ridgeland, northeast of the Renaissance at Colony Park, the project has grown to include a national grocery store chain, an amphitheater, shopping and upscale living accommodations.
However, there are still a few hurdles to clear. Developers must still get a zoning clearance from the City of Ridgeland to make it all happen.
PraCon Global Investment Group, a Mississippi company headquartered in Jackson by CEO Gabriel Prado, is looking to anchor a mixed-use development with the golf entertainment center. Topgolf will serve as anchor of Prado Vista at Ridgeland, a 77-acre mixed-use development that will include a national grocery store, two high-end hotels, more than 100,000 square feet of office, retail and restaurant space, an entertainment venue, 228 homes for sale, and a river walk.
The site, located off Interstate 55 in Ridgeland at the intersection of Colony Park Boulevard and Sunnybrook Road, is currently zoned residential. To move forward, the project must first win approval from the city of Ridgeland to obtain the overlay district designation.
PraCon Global is in the process of applying to create an overlay district. It is hopeful that the citizens of Ridgeland will continue to show support for this development during the re-zoning process, since the golf entertainment center has the option of going elsewhere in the Jackson Metro area if Ridgeland does not approve the rezoning application.
PraCon also plans to hold a public forum prior to the official public hearing to discuss the conceptual site plan, as well address any questions and concerns area residents may have. The date of the forum will be announced soon, and other townhall meetings with aldermen and citizens will be scheduled upon request, according to Prado.
“We understand there has been opposition to mixed-use developments in the past. The biggest difference between our development and previously proposed developments is that we will add rooftops for sale and not for rent. A top notch golf entertainment center will serve as an anchor, along with a highly sought after national grocery store that has a cult following, and a large national entertainment venue. This development will change the entertainment landscape for the region,” Prado said. “We are very excited to have the number one golf entertainment venue in the U.S. as the anchor. Their presence marks the next level of entertainment and quality of life for the entire Jackson metro area. We have a long way to go, but we want to thank the citizens of Ridgeland for the support they have shown throughout the process." Article.
PraCon Global Investment Group issued a press release about the development to the media yesterday. The TV stations wrote their own articles that were substantially different than the press release. However, it seems the Clarion-Ledger lifted substantial parts of the press release and passed them off as the newspaper's own work. The article never mentioned the source was a PraCon press release.
JJ and the rest of the media are bombarded daily, sometimes hourly with press releases. JJ tends to be rather upfront of their nature and just reports "XXXXX issued the following statement" and then publishes the press release. It is JJ's opinion such a policy is more honest to the reader than the usual media practice of regurgitating the press releases under a reporter's byline. However, the Clarion-Ledger flat-out copied substantial parts of the PraCon press release. The author was too clever by half as he sometimes went so far as to change the subject while copying the rest of the sentence. For example, he "reported":
PraCon Global is in the process of applying to create an overlay district.
The actual sentence in the press release was:
PraCon Global Investment Group, the developer for Prado Vista at Ridgeland, is in the process of applying to create an overlay district.
Here is another example of the subject switcheroo:
Topgolf will serve as anchor of Prado Vista at Ridgeland, a 77-acre mixed-use development that will include a national grocery store, two high-end hotels, more than 100,000 square feet of office, retail and restaurant space, an entertainment venue, 228 homes for sale, and a river walk.
The press release stated:
The golf entertainment center will serve as anchor of Prado Vista at Ridgeland, a 77-acre mixed-use development that will also include a national grocery store, two high-end hotels, more than 100,000 square feet of office, retail and restaurant space, an entertainment venue, 228 homes for sale, and a river walk.
Such sloppiness is what happens when newspaper no longer have local editors and ship proofreading out of state. Once upon a time, the Clarion-Ledger fired a food columnist for plagiarism. However, such standards disappeared with Blackberries and MySpace.
19 comments:
Americans need to understand the First Amendment decline is rapid. A vigilant, honest press is essential to our freedom. The decline of the Clarion Ledger, though common in print media, is still bad for Mississippi.
RMQ
Old man yells at cloud.
KF, I don't think the CL itself, nor anyone else, holds the paper out as a paragon of journalism.
It does have one redeeming quality; my parrot loves the C/L.
All of the local news channels do this on their websites with law enforcement releases. Pretty much the same wording from three separate sources, save an extra word or two. All of course devoid of who, what, when, where, and how.
You typed all that to say what? I do applaud you for not mentioning Jackson, trash, water or Chock.
By the way...When I google something that's currently in the news, I find ten or twelve articles/links that say the exact same thing with the same wording. The only difference being a few tell me I have to pay up in order to continue reading.
Old man cursing clouds indeed.
Everyone under the age of 30 gets their news from attractive influencers on TikTok.
They won’t read more that 8 words combined, and only have a 35 second attention span.
Everyone else with critical thinking skills, reads some form of news aggregator like Drudge, Reddit, ZH, etc,. and then discern the truth from the comments.
Turns out it’s almost always the same parties, still doing the same shady shit, for the last 2000+ years.
Blogs like JJ moderate the truthful comments so there’s that.
More on proof reading:
Last Sunday, March 19, the Clarion Ledger published a story about a “Dateline” edition regarding the murder of Lorenzen Wright to be broadcast by NBC on “Friday at 8 p.m. CT.” The story was lifted from the Commercial Appeal which ran the story four days earlier on Wednesday, March 15.
This particular “Dateline” segment was broadcast on Friday, March 17–two days before the “news” story appeared in the Clarion Ledger. It is obvious that the cut and pasted story was not proofread by anybody at the Clarion Ledger.
Aside from the absence of proofreading, why would anyone at the CL choose to publish a four day old news story copied from another newspaper?
AI wrote it. Get used to it.
6:03 - Internet comments are the last place anyone should ever attempt to discern the truth from
6:16 - You do realize both newspapers are owned by the same company, right?
4:46 AM
Thanks Safiya/Rukia/Lumumba/Melvin.
For decades, press releases have been quoted verbatim or nearly so. The release or information is such that a literate person should be able to identify the source...the company is named , after all.
If they were to alter the press release of the proposal, CL would risk being accused of omitting or changing the descriptions/information so as to help or hurt acceptance of the proposal.
This is not like reproducing and taking credit for a published recipe where not one amount or ingredient is altered.
This seems "much ado about nothing".
A more accurate criticism of all media today is that it profits financially by triggering the anger and fear adrenaline "highs" in humans and the drug dealer profits from a calming those anxieties ( particularly in our young people). So ...no surprise that suicide rates are higher than ever as well as overdose deaths.
We are giving the old "60's" book title Don't Shoot We Are Your Children by Lukas Anthony a new twist. Just give the children a gun and let them shoot themselves or their classmates and teachers or better yet, let the parent or step parent shoot everyone in the house.
LAZY--
This is silly. How do you plagiarize a press release? They want the press to use the words of the press release. Every single TV and radio station in this state (all over for that matter) use the exact words from press releases every single day. To single out the CL on this story is insane. Now do the TV stations and Supetalk. I won't hold my breath. Real plagiarism is TV stations reading original reporting and writing from the CL and other news organizations every day. No mention of that? Of course not. Wanna ding them for not getting quotes or additional reporting? Go for it. None of the tv stations did either.
Someone Doesn't Know the Purpose of a "Press Release" for $100, Alex.
This post is simply trying too hard to make up a story that isn't there.
So, therefore, disregard @ 8:41's comment entirely.
Sounds like another main harbor by gone dream!
8:46 am
Yes, I remember when the Commercial Appeal was Gannettized. It was a sad day. However, they are still two separate publications, independent of each other’s operations. My point was that when the article was cut and pasted from the CA, the CL editor could not have read the story or she/he/they would have realized that the Dateline program had run two days before the CL ran the story.
Worse yet would have been if the editor realized the story was stale and let it run anyway.
Post a Comment