Eiffel Tower hit by fantasy

You may already have seen this picture of the stunning observation deck that is to be built around the top of the Eiffel Tower to mark the 120th anniversary of the Paris monument next year. The photographs flashed around the world after a Paris architectural firm won a contest staged by the tower's management. The New York Times and the London Guardian have already reported the story.

The trouble is that the tale is false. It was just a publicity stunt but it does offer a nice lesson in the power of the internet to disseminate nonsense and the danger that this poses for traditional media. In our business dog is not suppposed to eat dog. We don't like criticising one-another. But I'll make an exception. None of my Paris colleagues were involved.

The story began a few days ago when Serero, the Paris firm, released a design for revamping la Tour Eiffel, the world's most visited paying monument. It said that its concept was an entry to a competition by the Société d'exploitation de la Tour Eiffel (Sete), the managing firm.  The striking -- some might say horrible -- design and pictures took off on specialist blogs and architectural sites, stirring comment in half a dozen languages.

Then the Guardian reported on its website: The elegant, tapering signature of the Eiffel Tower is to be reshaped, altering the skyline of Paris, in time for the structure's 120th anniversary next year, the Societe d'exploitation de la Tour Eiffel (Sete) has just announced.

The New York Times took the Guardian report and wrote it up complete with the usual quotations from the tower's 19th century critics who found the new contraption "useless and monstrous...arrogant ironmongery... a black factory chimney" and so on.

It embellished the tale with an imaginary controversy in Paris, saying:  Critics are already fretting that the crowds will dissipate along with the awe-extinguishing addition. The temporary nature of the deck expansion means that it will not need to stand the test of time. It also means that it will not have much time to win over critics, a number of whom are starting to come into view.

The good yarn had clearly not been troubled by a boring fact check. If asked, any journalist in Paris would have knocked it down with a phone call, as we all did when it emerged.    

With the weight of the NYT behind it, the story landed in other media, including Chinese, Australian and Latin American. The hoax was nailed when the tower management said yesterday that it had never launched a competition and Serero had never had any dealings with them. David Serero, principal of Serero Architects, has now told the New York Times said that his firm's proposal was merely a spontaneous submission to the tower company.

Newspapers can correct themselves, but the internet does not. The false story and the blogging debates that it engendered will live on in cyberspace. On a similar trivial level, we recently saw the same process with the tale of President Sarkozy's false text message to Cécilia. On the more worrying side, it feeds conspiracy theories such as Marion Cotillard's belief that the Twin Towers were not attacked on 911.

If anyone's wondering, we had no idea about the tale until it was picked up outside France. When we checked on Thursday it was obvious that it was phony.  The French media reported the anger of the tower management today. "It's not a joke. It's disinformation," Jean-Bernard Bros, its chairman, told le Parisien.

But David Serero got a free buzz and maybe the observation deck is not such a bad idea anyway.      

Comments

[Jujupiter]

Nobody wants to hear about my ideas: to promote the "Grenelle de l'environnement" and revamp the Tower, we should cover it with solar cells! The Tower would shine all over the world!!!

[Lily]

« We don't like criticising one-another. But I'll make an exception.”

The best journalists are definitely those who don’t fear trouble when reporting. :)
Long live the Eiffel tower (as is)! Long live Charles!

[christopher muir]

No doubt a spectacular revenue-making bungy jumping launch pad should have been included. Making such a daring dive would be a moment of glory for any publicity-seeking politician. And surely the Council of Ministers would follow the president's example - perhaps a different minister displaying their courage every Sunday afternoon..

[rockinred]

Interesting story. You make the point -quite rightly - that the internet is prone to spreading nonsense round the world, which speaks volumes about the credulity of internet users. But I think you're rather too gentle on your colleagues in the press. It's outrageous- and alarmingly, seems now to be the norm - that there's no fact-checking, no standing up the story. Proper journalists (of which you are one, Charles!) are sceptical of what tbey're fed, don't toe the line, ask awkward questions. The excuse is often heard that there's no time, it's the 24 hour rolling news global media environment etc - nonsense. It's a combination of idleness and spinelessness in the face of today's media barons calling the shots. Your Tour Eiffel story is a gentle, amusing one; how many serious, worrying, important stories are being similarly misreported or faithfully trotted out by poodle journos?

[Romain]

It was about time someone called for restraint and dialogue in resolving the crisis.lol
There is a fringe benefit though, the pretty steep fee for image rights on every published photograph of the Old Lady.

[azloon]

yes, indeed, Rockinred

[john o'doe]

OK I can understand you hesitate to criticise colleagues but I would dearly like to have your take on the French media's initial adulation and their subsequent trashing of you-know-who-zy.

[Daisy]

A triumph for French media. Obviously a lesson learnt from the Sarko/SMS affair.

[Jorg Andersen]

It's frightening to see how great organs of the media like the New York Times are being fooled into publishing rubbish because of the internet. There is such pressure to be first and break news that even they do not bother to check any more. It's a sad day.....

[Joan Arles]

How could anyone have believed they would strap that on the Eiffel Tower? The more information is available, the more people are becoming gullible.

[Lily]

Now, that Paris-based journalists, have cleared up the air from this fake story surrounding the Eiffel tower - while die-hards will keep on dreaming of bungee-jumping from above Paris on the internet :) - some NYT journalist should come out to make that desperately needed phone call for a simple fact-check to eventually dispel those worryingly persisting and spreading rumours around 911.

[christopher muir]

For anybody interested in the chances of quality journalism surviving in the expanding cyber age, may I suggest you go to the attached link. A couple of days ago the Australian Broadcasting Corporation had a radio discussion on the subject. Some pretty surprising information surfaces: 30 minutes - audio and a transcript.

http://www.abc.net.au/rn/mediareport/stories/2008/2200571.htm#transcript

[Valerie]

Of course, the 'Internet' corrects itself, Charles... Please don't be one of those people who disparage everything 'Internet'! Serious bloggers always correct themselves and most blogs that maintain a healthy comment section will eventually hash out most inaccuracies if the blogger himself/herself missed something.

The architects were looking for publicity. They are to blame for the release of the image.

The NYT is, more and more, a paper that can no longer be trusted to do some of the basics, fact-checking being one of those basics.

This fake story that got legs shows up the lack of rigor in legacy media, surely - the Internet, after all, relies mostly on mainstream media for information.

And many stories that have been much more hurtful, like Charles Enderlin and FR2's story about the little boy that was supposedly shot by the Israeli military are much more debated by the 'Internet' than by legacy media, it seems to me.