MSNBC declares state of Palestine, read a recent headline at WorldNetDaily.com News networks Arabic-language portal also excludes Israel from country links, a subhead elaborated. While the headline was, at best, hyperbolic, the associated article reported correctly that a new Arabic-language service of MSNBC.com and an Egyptian partner included Palestine as a navigation option in a list of local news choices that otherwise includes only recognized states, and that Israel is not on the list. The combination, it suggested, skewed reality.
The item was picked up by an organization called MideastTruth, which urged supporters on its mailing list to contact MSNBC.com. The result was several dozen letters to the editor, depicting the situation as evidence of anti-Israeli/pro-Palestinian bias on the site.
I dont buy the bias argument, though I do think the incident, now resolved, raises difficult issues concerning the responsibilities of MSNBC.com as it seeks to broaden its reach to the global Internet audience.
Whenever we talk, think and execute deals that put us in content partnerships with other news organizations, we have to constantly and completely understand how our content, brand and reputation is being used.
First a bit of background. MSNBC.com announced a strategic alliance last October under which the Cairo-based media firm, GoodNews4ME, established this sites Arabic language portal, GN4MSNBC.com. In addition to the MSNBC.com brand, the five-year licensing arrangement gives GN4ME access to selected articles and multimedia content from the U.S. site. GN4ME handles the translation and, by contractual agreement, has editorial control over the Arabic-language site, publishing articles from MSNBC.com as well as content from its own stable of media properties and other sources.
While MSNBC.com is now more focused on improving English-language international coverage, says Uli Haller, vice president business operations, the GN4ME deal originated at a time when the business emphasis was more on foreign- language sites as the means of extending MSNBC.coms reach abroad. Microsoft Egypt brought us together, he adds. But the arrangement obviously had implications for the editorial image of MSNBC.com, an independent news organization that is a joint venture between Microsoft and NBC.
Michael Salata, then MSNBCs business development manager, stressed in interviews at the time that in a region where much of the press remains government-controlled or at least heavily government-influenced, GN4ME represented an independent voice that would be clear of anti-Semitic bias and free of government censorship. There is a need for unbiased news in the region, and we hope to go beyond state-run media, he said.
The alliance would help his company to reach not just the roughly 3 million Arabic-speaking Internet users in the Middle East, but the much larger audience of Arabic- speaking people outside the Arab world, Good News Chairman Emadeddin Adib told the newspaper Al-Ahram around the same time.
MSNBC.com’s Arabic-language partner, GoodNews4ME, has the look and feel of the MSNBC site, but makes its own news decisions. Given that focus, its not surprising that GN4MSNBC.com excluded Israel from its list of 20 local news options. While Israel has a significant Arab population, its dominant language is Hebrew. Moreover, Israel was specifically excluded from the Good News deal, according to Haller. The reason: MSNBC.com has been trying to find a local partner for a separate Israeli site.
Cherylynne Crowther, vice president for marketing and communications, says MSNBC.com was disappointed in GN4MEs Palestine reference, and that it is a term that the U.S. site would never use in this context, since it is not a recognized nation. As she told WorldNetDaily: With any of our business partners, we monitor their products for their quantitative and qualitative performance. Its been understood that in the case of GN4ME, the review needed to include translations of top stories and headlines, Crowther indicated. But navigational labels were overlooked.
The lesson here is that Internet audience is global and communication difficult even when everybody speaks the same language is even more so when they dont.
Having struggled with organization and navigation issues on Web sites myself, I can understand GN4MEs problem. In addition to news and other information from 19 different Arab countries, it wants to let users know that it also has content of particular interest to Palestinian Arabs. While there has never been an independent Palestinian state, Palestine as a regional reference has been around for two millennia. The bounds of the historical region of Palestine have varied through time, notes the National Geographic Atlas of the World, but it is generally agreed that the land between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River constitutes its core. And there are millions of Arabic-speakers around the world who trace their roots to this historical Palestine. As a navigational aid, Palestine works.
The problem is that use of the term in the Middle East political context is seen by some as a biased endorsement of a Palestinian state on the West Bank of the Jordan River and the Gaza Strip an endorsement meant to put pressure on Israel to make concessions these critics see as compromising Israeli security. Thats why the mainstream American media, in an effort to remain balanced, generally avoids the term in its coverage of the Mideast conflict.
Alerted by MSNBC.com to the navigational issue, GN4MSNBC.com has now changed the label to Palestinian Authority the entity recognized by both Israel and the Palestinians as responsible for administering most of the West Bank and Gaza.
The incident is, nevertheless, a reminder that the Internet audience is global and that communication, difficult even when everybody speaks the same language, is even more so when they dont.
Whenever we talk, think and execute deals that put us in content partnerships with other news organizations, we have to constantly and completely understand how our content, brand and reputation is being used, comments Merrill Brown, MSNBC.com vice president and editor-in-chief. This is particularly difficult when one has language hurdles. Both editorial and business management might have been more aggressive and vigilant in monitoring this partner and other current and future partners.
Brown adds that there were attempts for some months to put a better monitoring system in place, but that for a variety of reasons including the press of other business, staffing changes and the impact on editorial operations of Sept. 11 those efforts were ineffective. As a result, MSNBC.com spot checks of the Arabic-language sites content only began early this year, even though the site was launched last October and the deal was signed last May.
I dont know if the Palestine problem could have been avoided had there been earlier and more aggressive U.S. editorial involvement, but I suspect it wouldnt have hurt. Its a lesson Id argue is well worth remembering as MSNBC.com expands its list of international partners publishing in any language.
