Apr 8, 2012

Interviewees who ask to preview your article

An interviewee wants to see the article before publication. What should I do?

If the media outlet you're writing for has a specific policy about this, it's almost certainly that the article text should not be shown to anyone prior to publication.

On many occasions, however, I've emailed those parts of an interview I plan to use to the interviewee for his/her approval before sending the finished article to the editor. I do this to protect myself; I don't want to misquote someone, and I don't want to misrepresent a person's opinions when paraphrasing him/her. Also, many of the people I interview aren't native speakers of English, and they appreciate my offer to send them the quotes I want to use ahead of submission. I'm not the kind of investigative journalist who's trying to catch out bigots, criminals or corrupt politicians. (If you are that type of journalist, you should of course being giving your target an opportunity to respond to any allegations.)

I never send the entire article unless the interview subject has made it an explicit condition for agreeing to the interview. And if that's the case, I always warn them that the editor has the right to make changes up until the moment of printing.

If you're a balanced writer, you've nothing to fear from this process. I've never had an interview subject request more than very minor changes, nor have I ever had an editor reject a finished piece that has been reviewed by a source before submission.

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