That's sort of my point, richy. CERN is doing their job (and pretty well). The original statement (from september) was:
“This result comes as a complete surprise,” said OPERA spokesperson, Antonio Ereditato of the University of Bern. “After many months of studies and cross checks we have not found any instrumental effect that could explain the result of the measurement. While OPERA researchers will continue their studies, we are also looking forward to independent measurements to fully assess the nature of this observation.”
“When an experiment finds an apparently unbelievable result and can find no artefact of the measurement to account for it, it’s normal procedure to invite broader scrutiny, and this is exactly what the OPERA collaboration is doing, it’s good scientific practice,” said CERN Research Director Sergio Bertolucci. “If this measurement is confirmed, it might change our view of physics, but we need to be sure that there are no other, more mundane, explanations. That will require independent measurements.”
Pretty much an open invitation to the scientific community to check their results, and give them new ideas as to how to confirm or disprove the results they got. Again, good scientific practice, reporting on the results they found. They speculated about what the results *might* mean, but really just said, "hey, guys, check our math"
I saw more than a few "Einstein was wrong!" headlines when the story first hit, which is not what CERN was saying at all (even if the FTL neutrinos are confirmed, it does not "break" relativity).
But more egregious is the current reporting. CERN has stated "hey, we found two possible sources of error, one confirms, the other disproves, but we're going to test them both in May".
The headline from Time that Cracker Funk linked?
Einstein Was Right All Along: ‘Faster-Than-Light’ Neutrino Was Product of Error with similar such headlines from Popular Science, Ars Technica and Fox News. Again, check CERN's press release that I linked in my last post. That's not what CERN said, at all.
Okay, headline grab, right? Sensationalize to get people to read the article where you put out the real facts. The article does not ONCE mention the second possible error. They only present the facts that support their view...which is exactly NOT what CERN is doing.
They absolutely should be reporting on this; this is exciting stuff! I just wish they were doing a better job of it. Or, at the very least, reading what CERN is releasing (not just the parts they like).