Thanks Mike. It's a balancing act, that's for sure. Do I know something that others don't? Yeah, I do. But it's with strings attached. Sometimes I'm told something on the condition that I can't report it (with the idea I get the scoop) until the deal has reached a certain level.
Other times it's simply a matter of sorting through the clutter. Example: some guys with no visible means of great wealth insisted more than a year ago they were going to build an NFL stadium here in OKC. They sent press releases and wanted coverage. I passed on doing a story.
So far, I've yet to see any work start on that stadium.
But on another "scoop," I worked very hard to get enough comfort in reporting the possibility of a new Devon Energy Tower. I worked months (more than a year) trying to nail it down, and I broke the story several months before Devon officially confirmed that indeed they had such plans.
In that same story I also broke news of SandRidge buying Kerr McGee Tower. And I had one more bit - that American Fidelity Assurance Company was planning on a new downtown corporate hq as well. That last angle had as much sourcing as the other two. And yet I can tell you now that I'm no longer sure about the timing or certainty of that last bit of the story.
Final note: I'm very, very critical of the cable news networks and their judgment. I have old friends who now appear regularly on these channels (one you might remember is former Gazette writer Holly Bailey) and while they are good reporters, the folks in charge of these channels are absolute jokes.
I still recall flipping channels the night Anna Nicole Smith died looking for some real news. I was sickened by one anchor stating, quite seriously, that it was the most important news story in the world.
Um, yeah, right.

So now that we've hijacked this thread, let's see if we can really irk the moderators further...

I'm intrigued by your use of the Kindle. How's it working out? Why did you get it? How do you use it?