The Noble Truth?

An interesting case has occured in Britain over a journalist using a certain amount of artistic licence in several interviews he had.

Instead of putting down the spoken words of the interviewee, he instead replaced what they had said with pieces of their work instead saying that it is easier to get the point across in this way. But as a result he stands accused of plagiarism by using quotes from other interviews.

As a journalist what he is writing is not the truth of his interview, but he is claiming that by doing so, it gives greater understanding of the topics and people being discussed?

A piece against it
A piece for it

So is he right to write in this way?

In the context of an interview, I think he's wrong. If you're going to ask someone questions, and then get their answers from some other source, and doesn't really seem like an interview to me. If journalist Y doesn't want to hear what public figure X has to say, then why interview him at all?

It seems dishonest to portray other pieces of writing as answers to interview questions.

I guess Orual and I are having basically the same problem. I've got no problem with a "profile" issue that gives you a mix of the subject's answers to questions and bits from their written work, to let you know what they're about. Why do that then call it an "interview"?

Holding out a jumble of actual quotations and excerpts from the subject's previous work as an "interview" is misleading and wrong. He should be fired.

Yeah, a profile is different from an interview. If you profile someone by quoting them from various contexts, that's fine. So long as it's identified and you state where those quotes came from. Claiming it's an interview is unethical, however, as an interview is understood to be a specific encounter.