Committing Acts of Journalism
Decent piece by author Tricia Todd over at Huffington Post regarding the new "press shield law."
Full article can be read here:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/tricia-todd/shield-laws_b_3698374.html?utm_hp_ref=media&ir=Media
From this article:
(Co-authored by Eric Matthies -- Co-Producer/Director of the documentary film, Killing The
Messenger: The Deadly Cost of News)
The question of who is and who isn't a journalist should no longer be in question. Modern
methods enable modern reporting. To quote journalism professor Jeff Jarvis:
"There are no journalists, only the service of journalism."
The importance of the definition is in direct relation to who is protected under the "Free
Flow of Information Act of 2013." This bill is essentially a Federal Shield Law designed to
protect journalists from having to disclose their confidential sources. A version of this
law was shot down in 2009 but is back waiting for a vote by the 113th Congress after public
outcry over the secret subpoena of Associated Press phone records and the calling out of
James Rosen as a "co-conspirator" in a leak case. Additionally, the Justice Dept. is
putting an undue amount of pressure on NYT reporter James Risen to testify in an Espionage
Act case against a CIA employee.
The bill is not about extending special privileges to journalists but rather:
"To maintain the free flow of information to the public by providing conditions for the
federally compelled disclosure of information by certain persons connected with the news
media."
Sounds good on paper until you allow politicians to (again, just like in 2010) express
frustration with bloggers and other non-traditional reporting. With the bill on the table
prior to August recess, Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) introduced an amendment to narrow the category of people protected by the shield bill.
(SNIP)
Definition of journalism by Josh Wolf, who was an independent journalist who was jailed 226 days in 2006-7 for refusing to cooperate with a federal investigation which sought his sources says,
"The moment we start to define who is and who isn't a journalist in a legal sense as the
U.S. Government saying, "You're a journalist, you're not a journalist"...I mean that's the
strongest move against the first amendment you can imagine because Congress should make no
law infringing on the power of the press or the role of the press.
"Well, if you decide, "You're the press and you're not the press" -- that sure sounds like
infringing to me."
= new reply since forum marked as read
