When Ronan Farrow made a guest appearance on MSNBC’s “The Rachel Maddow Show” on Tuesday night, he tried to make it clear that he was the reporter, not the story.

“We are there in service of women doing something really tough,” Mr. Farrow told the host, “and I hope people hear their voices and focus on that.”

The next day, however, the media and entertainment industries were still discussing how and why Mr. Farrow’s story on allegations of sexual abuse levied against the film mogul Harvey Weinstein by numerous women had ended up being published by The New Yorker — after it began as an investigative report for NBC News.

Mr. Farrow, formerly a contributing correspondent for NBC News, told Ms. Maddow he had taken his investigation to The New Yorker only after the network dragged its feet. But Noah Oppenheim, the president of NBC News, disputed the suggestion that the network’s news division had lacked the courage to air Mr. Farrow’s exposé.