How EM’s reporters conduct and publish interviews

Are you being interviewed by EM? Then the EM reporter has to abide by certain rules. However, after agreeing to the interview, various rights and obligations also apply to you. Please read below how we handle interviews and publications.

The interview

• The interviewers must clearly state that they are journalists working for EM. Generally, this is done before or during the conversation.
• During the course of the conversation, the interviewer must explain the purpose of the interview.
• During the interview, the interviewer and interviewee both have clearly defined roles: the interviewer determines what kind of questions will be asked, while the interviewee decides which questions will and won’t be answered and how they will be answered.
• If the interviewer has explained that they are a journalist working for EM and that the conversation constitutes an interview, and if the interviewee then proceeds to answer the interviewer’s questions, the interviewee is deemed to have implicitly consented to being interviewed.
• The interviewee does not affect and has no say in the chosen publication method. The interview may take the form of a video, a written article or a social media post (among other things).
• Once a person agrees to be interviewed, they agree to the publication of the interview. There is no need for the interviewee to sign a consent form. Interviewees cannot withdraw their consent after the interview.

Interviews recorded for written articles

• In some cases, interviews for written articles will be recorded by the interviewer. Except for highly exceptional cases, recordings can only be made with the interviewee’s or interviewees’ prior permission.
• Recordings made for written articles are not published unless the interviewee has explicitly consented to such.
• Recordings must be deleted when there is no longer any need for them to be saved.

Interviews recorded for video items

• Interviews involving a camera do not require a different type of consent than the one outlined in the foregoing section on consenting to an interview.
• If an interviewee has consented to an interview beforehand, either verbally or in writing, the recording can be used, even if the interviewee withdraws his/her consent during or after the interview.

Review before publication

• Upon the interviewee’s request, the author of the article will allow the interviewee to review the facts or quotes included in the part of the article to which the interviewee has contributed, before publication.
• Best practice is to do this with ‘Track changes’ or comments in a Word document.
• If any changes are suggested, they will be only be accepted if they refer to facts and quotes, not of the tone of the article or the choices that are made by the author.
• The interviewee will not be given the opportunity to review the headline, the photo or illustration chosen to accompany the article, the subtitle, the subheadings or any other ‘ornaments’ to the text (e.g. streamers and links).
• Authors of articles are not required to allow interviewees to review the article before publication. People interviewed for audio and video publications are never granted the right to review the publication beforehand.
• When an interviewee is granted the right to review an article beforehand, the interviewee is granted the opportunity to check whether the facts and quotes have been incorporated into the article correctly.
• Interviewees cannot retract or revise things they said during the interview after the fact. Proposed changes to quotes used in an article will only be accepted if the wording used in the article is not identical to what was said in the interview, or if the quotes were used in the wrong context.
• All comments and revisions proposed by the interviewee will be thoroughly assessed and seriously considered by the author of the article. The decision as to whether or not the proposed revisions will be incorporated into the article is up to the author. No feedback will be provided on the decision-making process.
• Generally, when an interviewee is granted permission to inspect an article before publication, a feedback deadline is agreed. If no deadline has been specified, we will assume that a reaction will be submitted within 24 hours of the sending of the draft article. If a reaction is received more than 24 hours later (or after the agreed deadline), we cannot guarantee that the proposed revisions will be incorporated into the article before publication.
• Naturally, all stakeholders (including the interviewee) are free to criticise the article after its publication, by phone or by e-mail. If a factual error was included in the article, and if the revision is significant, the mistake will be rectified in the article or by means of a note added to the article.
• If an author refuses to accept a revision that you deem crucial, you are welcome to submit a letter of objection to the editor-in-chief. If the decision turns out unsatisfactory, you may lodge an appeal with the Editorial Board, which will issue a decision independently, without recourse to EM’s editors.