WIRED journo won't do email interviews–ironic.

A WIRED journalist pinged me for some comments on Michael Arrington and his A-list blogger status. I told the journalist to send me the questions by email and he refused. He said Dave Winer did the same thing.

Journalists have been burning subjects for so long with paraphrased quotes, half quotes, and misquotes that I think a lot of folks (especially ones who don’t need the press) are taking an email only interview policy. (Mark Cuban did this long ago),

Here is the email I sent back to the journalist on my blackberry (I wonder what Chris Anderson if WIRED thinks of this issue since he is pushing the radical transparency thing).

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I’m an email guy like dave winer.. And I own my words as well, and often print them on my blog (after stories come out).

A wired writer who won’t do an email interview–thats ironic!

Frankly, you need to adapt. Journalists have misquoted people for so long–and quoted them out of context that many people like to have their words on record.

I don’t want someone taking half a sentence or paraphrasing me… Just too much risk.

Besides I have 10,000 people come to my blog every day–i don’t need wired to talk to the tech industry.

Also, this is exactly how I would have this to you on the phone… You may not get the exact tone of my voice–but you get my overall tone.

What’s really disturbing is that you would let two of the folks who know mike best walk away from the interview because you don’t like email–horrible for the reader. Also, your stance confirms for folks like me (and maybe dave) that doing email only is safer.

Feel free to print this…. I will probably make a blog post from it myself. There is no off the record and there never was. :