Comment by anon373839
12 hours ago
> please explain what Reuters should have done here
This is very straightforward: use direct quotes or use neutral language. The article describes the alleged incident as both an “attack” and a “strike” in the first two paragraphs. And neither is within verbatim quoted text.
Reuters, however highly you may regard them, simply adopted Anthropic’s framing uncritically in this instance.
You are confusing stylistic choice with framing.
A lot of times Reuters paraphrases instead of "quoting quotes".
> "uncritically"
You are mistaking Reuters with CNN or FoxNews. If you want "critical" reporting you should read some bloggers instead of news agencies.
It’s not the paraphrase that’s the problem. It is the adoption of the viewpoint by the writer. Reuters has parroted Anthropic’s judgment of what distillation is in Reuters’s own voice, which imparts legitimacy to the PR spin Anthropic is trying to broadcast. A journalist’s job is not to be the mouthpiece for PR flacks.
If you don’t think a reader who is unfamiliar with the concepts took away a sense that “distillation” is inherently a Bad Thing, I think you’re reading this obtusely.