Telegraph: Cap lawyers’ success fees in libel cases at 10 per cent, says Jack Straw

Success fees for lawyers in libel trials should be capped at 10 per cent, Justice Secretary Jack Straw has suggested, as part of plans to boost freedom of speech and investigative journalism.

News organisations and investigative journalists in the UK have argued that the risk of huge legal bills in libel cases has had a chilling effect on investigative work. The use of Conditional Fee Agreements (CFAs) in particular has been criticised, as these have under “no win no fee” terms allowed lawyers to claim a success fee of 100 per cent on top of their usual rate from the losing side.

Straw said such fees should be capped at 10 per cent and will undertake a four-week consultation of the proposals.

Last year freedom of expression groups Index on Censorship (IOC) and English PEN launched a campaign to reform libel fees and court proceedings and suggested that fees should be capped at £10,000.

But a Law Society spokeswoman told the Telegraph yesterday:

Reducing maximum success fees to 10 per cent would be tantamount to abolishing conditional fees and would thus leave people who have been libelled with no effective access to justice.

Full story at this link…

Similar posts:

• Ministry of Justice to reduce success fees in defamation cases
• Jack Straw proposing ‘wholesale reform’ of UK libel law
• Liberal Conspiracy: Why Tom Watson opposed libel costs reform
• Journalism.co.uk backs Libel Reform Campaign
• Shadow justice minister says libel reform issue would be a ‘priority’ for a Tory government

#FollowJourn: @mattchorley/London editor

Who? London editor for Western Morning News.

What? Writes for the News from Westminster.

Where? Take a look at his politics blog for the News too.

Contact? Follow him at @mattchorley or email mchorley [at] westernmorningnews.co.uk.

Just as we like to supply you with fresh and innovative tips every day, we’re recommending journalists to follow online too. They might be from any sector of the industry: please send suggestions (you can nominate yourself) to judith or laura at journalism.co.uk; or to @journalismnews.

Similar posts:

• #FollowJourn: @olivershah/freelance journalist
• #FollowJourn: @gordonmacmillan/social media editor
• #FollowJourn: @rebeccats/reporter
• #followjourn: @chriscondron/head of digital strategy
• #FollowJourn: @iainmhepburn/digital editor

Daily Intel: New York Times to bring back pay wall?

Update: New York Times confirms it will bring in new charging system from January 2011.

Having already pioneered and seemingly abandoned charging for its website, is the New York Times about to introduce a new pay wall or Financial Times style metering system for its website?

According to the Daily Intel, a new access model will be brought in within a matter of weeks. (Note that in November last year a pay wall decision for the times was also scheduled for “within weeks”, but didn’t emerge.)

Full story at this link…

On paidContent.org, James McQuivey, an analyst at Forrester Research, looks at how paid content on NYTimes.com might work and what the Times should be looking at when building a wall.

But, McQuivey adds:

Notice that this advice is directed to NYTimes.com and nobody else. Because there is no other newspaper that we believe can pull this off at this time, even though a majority of newspaper editors are considering it.

Similar posts:

• Confirmed: New York Times website will introduce FT-style charging system
• Wall Street Journal: New York Times to start charging for online in January
• OJR: New York Times ‘needs an online impresario’
• Google looks to failed searches to find story ideas
• Independent.co.uk: New York Times considering charging for content?

AP: Using and verifying citizen journalist photos

News breaks.

Images are uploaded to photo-sharing services like TwitPic and yFrog. Links are tweeted by the original photographer. Other people retweet those links or copy and paste them into Facebook or other blogs. In a matter of minutes, an individual photo can spider out in myriad directions.

So how does a news organisation verify images? Director of photography Santiago Lyon explains the Associated Press’ explains the agency’s process and establishes some useful guidelines for other news orgs – above all: “If we can’t verify the content, we don’t use it.”

Full post at this link…

Similar posts:

• AP (via Captured Photos): Why the AP published images of a fatally wounded marine
• weijiblog: What it takes to build a magazine iPhone app
• BBC Trust will not ‘intervene’ in BBC’s BNP Question Time decision
• #Tip of the day from Journalism.co.uk – using badge systems on news sites
• Photojournalism student’s work captures attention of New Yorker visual editor

Econsultancy: ‘How small newspapers can make money from Twitter’

Ben LaMothe expands upon an idea he had at last week’s news:rewired conference of local newspapers making money through building focused, well-researched Twitter networks.

Newspapers are selling their Twitter streams as an targeted advertising platform. If you’re a small newspaper and you sign up 10 businesses to a Twitter advertising scheme, charge them £100 per week, you could end up with a few thousand pounds worth of advertising revenue.

As your Twitter following grows to a certain point, adjust your rate to reflect the growing audience. If it drops, to a certain point, adjust it down.

Full post at this link…

Similar posts:

• @SOE: (Audio) ‘It may be heresy, but it’s just possible that the advertising prize of the internet may not be as big as people want you to believe’ Gavin O’Reilly
• What’s the Drudge Report worth?
• US newspaper circulations still falling, but decline is slowing
• Civic Edition: Text message marketing for local newspapers
• Felix Salmon: ‘Online subscription revenues won’t make newspapers profitable again’

#Tip of the day from Journalism.co.uk – maintain a dialogue on social sites

From @paul_a_smith: If you use Twitter and Facebook, maintain a dialogue with your followers. Don’t just broadcast headlines or use it only when you want something. Converse and answer questions. They’ll trust you more, and come to you with stories. Tipster: Judith Townend.

To submit a tip to Journalism.co.uk, use this link – we will pay a fiver for the best ones published.

Similar posts:

• #Tip of the day from Journalism.co.uk – think about the medium
• #Tip of the day from Journalism.co.uk – maps on Twitter
• #Tip of the day from Journalism.co.uk – marketing tips from SEOmoz
• #Tip of the day from Journalism.co.uk
• #Tip of the day from Journalism.co.uk – promoting your ‘brand’ via Twitter

Giving up newspapers for a year – a PR’s experiment

PR consultant Adam Vincenzini is experimenting – starting from 1 January this year he has given up reading and buying newspapers for 365 days.

Vincenzini, who describes himself as a news junkie and avid consumer of newspapers, wants to see what effect this withdrawal will have on him personally, but more significantly on his work.

He sets out the ‘rules’ for his experiment on his blog, which he’ll be using to chronicle his 365 days without newspapers and explore new digital ways for delivering news. He also promises to use the blog to be more critical of digital devices, such as e-readers and digital editions, to offer advice for what print, online-only and multimedia news organisations could be doing better.

In 12 months time, I hope that I can say that every element of the media mix has its place (which, coincidentally, is where things are likely to end up anyway).

I hope that I can say that the acquisition of new/staying on top of current affairs is possible by adopting a purely digital existence, but that quality analysis, probing features and thought provoking campaigns are best delivered in print.

For week two, avoiding free newspapers on the London Underground has become a particular challenge:

You can follow the experiment via Vincenzini’s blog and we’ll be catching up with him later in the year to find out more about the effects on his work.

Similar posts:

• Adam Vincenzini’s year without newspapers is over, but what did he learn?
• PR without newspapers… gets newspaper coverage
• Independent launching new ‘quality’ daily
• Birmingham student launches hyperlocal site for final year project
• WAN 2008: Print and online newspapers on the rise

JournalLocal: ‘Is social enterprise the future of local media?’

Philip John, one of the Lichfield Blog team, highlights remarks made by Derek Wyatt, Labour MP for Sittingbourne & Sheppey, during a recent parliamentary debate:

[He] made reference to the The Guardian’s status as the subsidiary of a charity, the Scott Trust as opposed to its rivals who are for-profit ventures. He went on to propose the model for local media as an answer, whether in part of whole, to the trouble facing newspapers.

Wyatt said, “There will be a Guardian alternative locally for groups of people wanting to set up not for profit newspapers often online but need funding.” The suggestion here is that at a local level the answer might be the Guardian-style of ownership whereby the media is part of a charitable trust or social enterprise, and a not-for-profit operation.

Full post at this link…

PS. Happy Birthday to the Lichfield Blog – it’s one year old today!

Similar posts:

• BBC Trust’s dilemma over local video plans
• Community Newswire service to close due to funding cuts
• ‘Having blog in our name was causing problems’: Lichfield Blog renamed
• BBC Radio 4: ‘Has the local rag had its day?’
• Media Release: Newspaper Society launches new audience measuring system

paidContent:UK: Publishers should skip thinking about e-readers

paidContent:UK’s Robert Andrews picks up a Radio 5 Live discussion on e-readers and shares his own view: that single function readers are no magic pill for publishers.

An ‘e-reader’ is a mere neologism – conceived by those who seek to replicate an old, physical medium in modern, electronic form. But newspapers have spent the last 15 years divorcing their content from the physicality of their origin medium – not only does charging on what looks like a plastic newspaper fly in the face of that strategy, it’s also going to be rather difficult when few mechanisms beyond Kindle’s Whispernet truly exist – in the rush to build e-readers, manufacturers are all pulling in their own direction.

Full post at this link…

Similar posts:

• paidContent:UK: Is raising the pay wall an ‘impossible dream?’
• MediaGuardian: Mecom pushes ahead with niche paid content
• paidContent.org: How are newspaper sites that charge faring?
• virtualeconomics: Why a Telegraph paywall might just work
• Newsweek’s Daniel Lyons: ‘Don’t bail out newspapers – let them die and get out of the way’

Lost Remote’s new iPhone app

Local media blog Lost Remote has launched a free iPhone app. Journalism.co.uk will have a play with it today and let you know what we think. In the meantime, here’s the link. The site explains the process, below:

We used the company AppMakr to develop the app, and based upon the results, we recommend you give it a try. The company charges all of $199 for a basic app, and I set it up in minutes using the Lost Remote RSS feed. The process was simple. AppMakr submitted it to Apple, and within about it [sic] week, it went live. We’d love to get your feedback. Download the LR app, and tell us what you think.

Similar posts:

• Lost Remote: Q&A on Bloomberg TV’s new iPad app
• Lost Remote: Media brands stand to benefit from new Facebook features
• Qik could soon be live-streaming from iPhone
• LostRemote: ‘Five things newspaper employees can do to help save their company’
• 70k downloads for £2.39 Guardian App in first month