NYTimes and Wikipedia saved the lives of journalists in silence
Last week, NYTimes managed to escape from captivity - the Taliban held him hostage for seven months. However, the public had no idea about this - with the joint efforts of NYTimes and Wikipedia, this story was kept secret until the very escape.
In November 2008, the Taliban captured David Rod and local journalist Tahir Ludin, as well as the driver accompanying the journalists. Rod’s own publication quite logically reasoned that widespread publicity of the abduction could complicate the process of negotiations - the kidnappers will put forward increasingly uncompromising and less and less realistic demands. All this time, the editors of the Times held back more than 35 leading news agencies from publishing posts about Rod. The editors of the publication believed that silence would not only help save the journalist’s life, but also lead to “inflation” of the reporter’s life value, which would make it possible to redeem him for the money at his disposal.
It turned out to be more difficult to contain information on Wikipedia - an unknown resident of Florida during all this time edited thematic articles where he tried to post news about the presence of David Rod in captivity. Wikipedia editors valiantly coped with the task - all this time they constantly moderated messages, never allowing information to leak onto the Web.
This happened until last week - Rod and Ludin managed to escape. It is worth noting the fact that the driver sided with the Taliban and decided to stay with them. Perhaps the role of NYTimes and Wikipedia in this matter was not huge, but one thing is clear - their actions gave journalists not only extra time to escape, but also made its conditions more favorable. ( c )
In November 2008, the Taliban captured David Rod and local journalist Tahir Ludin, as well as the driver accompanying the journalists. Rod’s own publication quite logically reasoned that widespread publicity of the abduction could complicate the process of negotiations - the kidnappers will put forward increasingly uncompromising and less and less realistic demands. All this time, the editors of the Times held back more than 35 leading news agencies from publishing posts about Rod. The editors of the publication believed that silence would not only help save the journalist’s life, but also lead to “inflation” of the reporter’s life value, which would make it possible to redeem him for the money at his disposal.
It turned out to be more difficult to contain information on Wikipedia - an unknown resident of Florida during all this time edited thematic articles where he tried to post news about the presence of David Rod in captivity. Wikipedia editors valiantly coped with the task - all this time they constantly moderated messages, never allowing information to leak onto the Web.
This happened until last week - Rod and Ludin managed to escape. It is worth noting the fact that the driver sided with the Taliban and decided to stay with them. Perhaps the role of NYTimes and Wikipedia in this matter was not huge, but one thing is clear - their actions gave journalists not only extra time to escape, but also made its conditions more favorable. ( c )