Spoilologi (tilegnet Josefine Graakjær: DET ER NAVNET PÅ KÆLKEN!)

New York Times' "Public Editor" Margaret Sullivan tager alvorligt stilling til NY SPOILERTEKNOLOGI apropos The Jinx:

Updated. For some of those enthralled with HBO’s documentary series “The Jinx,” the Sunday night news alert from The Times was the very definition of a spoiler.

Leaving nothing to the imagination, it read: “Breaking News: In Documentary, Robert Durst Says He ‘Killed Them All.’ ” And it linked to a just-published Times article about the high drama moment in the final episode of the six-part series, which had just aired. The real estate heir at the heart of multiple murder investigations had muttered some words, recorded on audio, that seemed to be a confession. The day before, in real life, that suspect, Robert Durst, had been arrested on a murder charge in New Orleans.

On Twitter and in my email, there was outrage, particularly from West Coast viewers who hadn’t even had a chance to watch the finale.

In this eerie convergence of police news and popular culture, where many weird questions arise, do these viewers have a point?

The Times’s Metro editor, Wendell Jamieson, told me The Times was on solid ground here because the show had aired.

“We published the story as the credits rolled,” he said, and that was when the news alert went out as well.

“This was news, and it would have been tweeted all over anyway,” he told me. “There’s a competitive element to this; it would have made no sense to hold back.”

(...)

Spoiler. I have no problem with The Times publishing an article that appears as the credits roll and in promoting that article. But in its breaking news tweet and especially in the “push alert” that flashes across your phone, a different issue arises. It’s worth thinking about.

I discussed this Monday with Emily Nussbaum, The New Yorker’s television critic, who has written perceptively both about “The Jinx” (managing, in the current issue, to write something that holds up, despite its being published before the arrest and possible confession) and, years ago, about spoilers. In an email, she put it this way:

The problem with the ethical line on TV spoilers is that, as William Hurt’s character puts it in “Broadcast News,” “They just keep moving the little sucker.” Every time the digital options shift, a new etiquette pops up. With push alerts, personally, I do see the problem, which is that there’s no way for subscribers to “opt out” — especially if the spoiler is in the headline. So for viewers, it’s like some guy throwing your window open and shouting, “Rosebud is his sled!” even if it’s justifiable as news.

So, yes, by all means report the news. Obviously, that’s the priority here. But given the unavoidably in-your-face nature of a “push alert,” a warning and some less specific wording could have eased the pain of “Jinx” devotees who didn’t see the show in real time.