 | This is an essay on the Verifiability and Reliable Sources policies. It contains the advice or opinions of one or more Wikipedia contributors. This page is not an encyclopedia article, nor is it one of Wikipedia's policies or guidelines, as it has not been thoroughly vetted by the community. Some essays represent widespread norms; others only represent minority viewpoints. |
 | This page in a nutshell: This is a morality tale. It should speak for itself. Read, learn, and beware. Everything here is verified from sources, not everything is true. You have been warned. |
What's the point of this? (Well, read the article first.)
This is an illustration of the old adage "don't believe everything you read in the papers" – not even in so-called quality papers. Moreover, it shows the danger of Wikipedia's tendency to collate media stories, and assume that multiple attestation of the same story gives "reliable sourcing". It does not. Especially in the cases of breaking news events and celebrity interest stories, newspapers (even quality ones) feed on each other and lazy journalists repeat stories with the caveat "it is reported" without checking veracity. Here it looks like one anonymous individual fed one gullible journalist a line, an official "no comment" policy was foolishly taken as an admission, and no fact checking was done. The story was then repeated multiple times, and even embellished, before anyone checked anything. If even one person with a passing knowledge of Middleton had been asked for comment, her non-ownership of a dog would have been quickly discovered. The point? Journalists write stories on subjects they know nothing about – but we then treat them as authoritative sources. Be very careful.
Otto Middleton is supposedly a black cocker spaniel who according to widespread media reports is owned by Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge.