Add reporting to the ever growing list of things Vixen doesn't understand....
I was recently at a 'press conference'/media statement when bushfires hit a nearby town very badly and most of the reporters there actually audio recorded the entire thing , either on their phones or a dedicated device (interestingly, they all appeared to use either similar or identical external mics, which looked to be bluetooth connected (no wires) and had large 'wind mufflers' and seemed fairly directional to boot (they always kept them aimed quite closely at the speaker at the time, swing them from side to side at the person speaking)- very few appeared to be 'taking notes' in writing, and the few that did, seemed to be only noting a brief description and a time stamp...)
And of course if they were quoting something someone said, it would appear to be the same in multiple different publications- that is after all, the entire point of 'quoting'- it wouldn't be an actual quote if it was reworded differently would it lol
Note too, that in this press conference (well more of a town meeting in reality, with a prepared media statement first and a Q&A afterwards with the townspeople) they didn't 'prepare for the meeting' and have a carefully worded script- indeed, several times a speaker would be corrected by another speaker as they had more up to date information (there were representatives of both the volunteer bush fire brigades (several involved, each under their own command and with different spokespeople), the 'town firies', the ambulance service, local council and several charities all speaking, not all of them had the latest info obviously) so even at this one press conference, there was different 'facts' in an unfolding situation...- organised chaos in other words (as is often the case when a major emergency happens...) no fault of the organisations involved- just a chaotic situation, with multiple (and sometimes differing) information streams coming in from different sources...
In any major emergency, there is not time for 'rehearsing your speech' and especially when there are those asking questions- it isn't a choreographed 'set question and answer' routine- the spokesperson has to answer 'off the cuff'- using some of the available information to hand and some from memory- they will usually use 'qualifiers' from what I have seen when they are unsure or simply say so if the info isn't available at all (like at the one I attended, there was plenty of 'we believe' and 'we assume' and 'at this point in time' qualifiers in their actual speech (along with lots of ums and ahs and quick searching of notes for something they couldn't readily remember accurately) and as I said, sometimes corrections from other speakers with more up to date information (the charities had little info on which houses/ roads were under threat or had been destroyed, the firies had little info on who to contact for those who had had to be evacuated and the resources available to them- as would be expected- each specialising in the area of their expertise...)
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