undefined | Better HN

0 pointskbenson2y ago0 comments

And good faith conversations don't come away with one party publishing assertions of fact just because the other side didn't directly refute the assertion in question.

If the company thinks the journalist isn't working in good faith, are they not then justified in that?

Context is everything. I think there's poor behavior on both sides, but to my eyes it starts with a journalist making unfounded assertions. Would Lumina have gotten upset and threatened over poor press even if it wasn't to the point where someone was making statement of fact that were both wrong and perceived as hurtful to their business? We'll never know, because it appears those statements were made.

We can dumb this down and make it very simple. If someone interviews me, and asks if I beat my wife and I don't answer (for whatever reason. Maybe I perceive it as a joke that doesn't need a response, maybe I don't want to engage with bad-faith questions), and they then print that I'm a wifebeater, should I not be upset enough to threaten to sue initially? Should I assume they're working in good faith, or is that enough to assume bad faith? Personally, I think my choices would be to assume bad faith or that the person is inept and uneducated at the job, and if the person didn't seem stupid, that seems unlikely.

0 comments

2 comments · 1 top-level

mindslight2y ago· 1 in thread

I can't read the original post due to the takedown from the legal threat, but it sounded to me like a ham-fisted expression of what could have been a reasonable inference. And I'm not going to judge them too hard for failing to beat around the bush with enough weasel words to make their statement airtight technically correct.

The original nastygram from the company opens up with an acknowledgement of believing good faith and talks about trying to cooperate, while also including terms like 'defamation' and 'libel', so I don't know if I'm missing something here or you're just talking hypothetically about those acting in bad faith.

In general I'd say there's a strong division between working with someone in good faith to correct misunderstandings, and threatening a lawsuit. The original letter could (and should) have said "this is wrong in your post" and asked for it to be updated. Then if the journalist is refusing to engage and/or retract, it's reasonable to start wondering if there really is good faith and escalate to legal threats. But doing both at once is effectively just bullying while trying to cloak it.

kbensonOP2y ago

I'm mostly going by the author's own notes on how they responded, in which they state this:

• You assumed we'd never gene sequenced the bacteria, even though I posted the sequence publicly.

I assumed you did not regularly sequence the bacteria because you did not say that you did and you did not report anything about following manufacturing regulations.

That is a very weird defense to take in my opinion, and is the crux of my problem with the author in this argument. It is not acceptable to make a negative inference and then express it publicly as fact because the other party didn't mention something. That is not responsibly journalism, and to me it explains why the CEO was struggling to see good faith initially. That's not usually the behavior you see when people are communicating in good faith.

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse