Not so long ago, wire copy was the bedrock of many a publication but newspapers never openly revealed their dependency on agency material. The intro was tweaked, the copy rejigged and the reporter's byline put at the top.
The web exposed the lie when people were easily able to read multiple, but strikingly similar, versions of a story across a range of titles.
Now the Media Standards Trust, an independent journalism think-tank, is shining a light on the cut-and-paste culture around stories and press releases with a "churn engine" that seeks "to distinguish journalism from churnalism".
By dropping a press release into a text box on the Trust's Churnalism.com site, it's possible to run a comparison with articles appearing in the UK media. The churn engine highlights text that is common to both - i.e. has been 'lifted'.
To show how easy it is to place a press release into media output, independent film-maker Chris Atkins created a fake 'chastity garter' story, with just a website and a press release.
The story soon found its way into the Mail Online's science and tech section, and elsewhere.
Atkins' film of what he did and how the media took the bait (above) accompanied the Guardian story about the experiment.
Churn stats show that 40% of the Mail piece (now taken down) had common content with the fake story: "For the footballer with a suspicious mind ... the garter that texts if his WAG is unfaithful." The garter story even made it overseas: e.g. onto US television news shows.
It's easy to scoff but the BBC doesn't come out of it unscathed, with BBC Radio 5 Live giving airtime to another spoof story about Downing Street's new cat.
The back-story about the technology that underpins the results is interesting in itself and has been written up here by Donovan Hide.
Paul Brannan is Editor, Emerging Platforms, BBC News.
