`Mueller: 'Times Piece Doesn't Square with What I Think' - Olive Oil Times

Mueller: 'Times Piece Doesn't Square with What I Think'

By Olive Oil Times Staff
Jan. 29, 2014 17:24 UTC

Tom Mueller, who wrote the 2012 book Extra Virginity: The Sublime and Scandalous World of Olive Oil, responded today to crit­i­cism sur­round­ing a New York Times info­graphic on olive oil fraud that cited the author as its source.

The Times piece con­tained state­ments indus­try experts, and some read­ers, have called sen­sa­tional and inac­cu­rate.
See Also:NY Times Olive Oil Fraud Infographic Timeline
Mueller sent his state­ment in an email to Olive Oil Times:

I first heard about Nicholas Blechman’s info­graphic through an avalanche of tweets and emails, ask­ing me in var­i­ous ways how I’d come to be involved in this project. I took a quick look at the info­graphic, flick­ing through the slides.

I found the images amus­ing and witty – the Tower of Pisa becom­ing a minaret, and the poor olive com­mit­ting sui­cide in front of an ever-down­ward-trend­ing price graph, struck me as truly inspired. But I did not read the words at that time.

I then tweeted a con­grat­u­la­tion” to Nicholas Blechman, mainly attempt­ing to sig­nal to all who had seen it that I was *not* the author.

Later, I went back and read the words. In them I saw fac­tual errors and mis­rep­re­sen­ta­tions, that did­n’t square with what I’ve writ­ten, or what I think. At this point, I deleted my tweet. But nat­u­rally, on the inter­net, what’s done is done.

Essentially, my ini­tial reac­tion was pre­ma­ture, based on my first, visual impres­sion of the info­graphic; hav­ing taken in the words, I can only say that I regret, and retract, my con­grat­u­la­tion.’ ”

Earlier, Mueller said he knew noth­ing” about the Times piece and was dis­mayed” that his name was attached. The author and I spoke briefly by phone, and we exchanged an email, in both of which I gave him gen­eral info on the olive oil indus­try and pointed him in the direc­tion of more info,” he said.

The graphic, which the New York Times called inter­ac­tive” despite hav­ing no way for read­ers to com­ment, con­tained sev­eral state­ments that have alarmed indus­try experts with their inac­cu­ra­cies and fueled yet another debate about an indus­try at least as rife with mis­in­for­ma­tion as it is with fraud.

Sources say the New York Times will soon be revis­ing the piece, con­sid­er­ing infor­ma­tion it has received over the past few days.


The New York Times Olive Oil Fraud Infographic Timeline



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