.NET String Assignment Removes Characters [closed]

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Never seen anything like this before. I'm doing a very simple DataReader value assignment.

story.Byline = _r["Byline"].ToString();

But the values of _r["Byline"].ToString() and story.Byline are different after the assignment. Here's the output from the Immediate window:

story.Byline
"Associated Press - FIRST LASTAssociated Press - FIRST LAST"
_r["Byline"].ToString()
"Associated Press - FIRST LAST<br />Associate开发者_开发问答d Press - FIRST LAST"

Why is <br /> being removed?

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Calling reader["x"].ToString() you actually calls x' type possibly overridden method ToString().

If you're sure that it's string, use reader.GetString(reader.GetOrdinal("x"))

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Well, this is a bit embarrassing:

public string Byline
{
    get { return !_elements.ContainsKey("Byline") ? "" : (string)_elements["Byline"]; }
    set
    {
        string _buf = Functions.StripTags(value);
        _elements["Byline"] = _buf;
    }
}

Incorrect assumptions FTL. Can this question be deleted?