Journalism.co.uk Editors' Blog » online world

Editor&Publisher (via AP): Murdoch tells ‘cynics’ that newspapers will survive

Judith Townend — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 11:57:06 +0000

It's widely reported, but worth flagging up for those who haven't seen coverage. AP reports: Rupert Murdoch has said that doomsayers 'who are predicting the internet will kill off newspapers are 'misguided cynics' who fail to grasp that the online world is potentially a huge new market of information-hungry consumers.'

Naming Baby P is not about giving into a Facebook campaign

Judith Townend — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 10:45:30 +0000

Naming Baby P and his mother is not about giving into a hysterical Facebook campaign group; this is about confronting the reality of the online age.

I can’t link to it here, because it would be breaching reporting restrictions, but I know Baby P’s name, the baby’s mother’s name and the name of her partner.

So does anyone with even a little bit of Google cache savvy about them: it’s on a BBC report from 2007. Google cache preserves a page even if, as the BBC has done, original articles have been removed.

As the Independent reported, Facebook groups have published the details, despite the court order not to.

My argument is not about revealing the names for justice, it is about having a law which can actually be enforced.

If it had been reported abroad, on non-UK websites, they would be not be held accountable under the UK Contempt of Court legislation. Court orders, such as the one in this case protecting the names of the defendants, are simply not feasible in the web age.

I believe that whatever ensures fair trials without prejudice, protects the innocent people involved in the case (other people connected or in the family, for example) is necessary, and if keeping the names secret does that, then that should be done: I certainly won’t be joining any Facebook group to force their disclosure.

But it should be done in such a way where they really are secret, which has not happened in this case:

Jason Owen’s name is known; the mother’s name has also been previously published and is reachable with a quick search; the baby’s photograph is in the press.

One of the Facebook groups has a description reading: ‘For sum [sic] reason the press have seen it fit not to reveal the sick people who killed this poor helpless child.’

The press has not chosen to keep quiet (they certainly would print the names if they could); they are bound by law not to. But what happens when the wider community who have not been taught about reporting restrictions and contempt of court choose to publish, using blogs and social network sites?

I imagine that most people in that community, and wider geography, knows who the family are. Last night’s BBC Panorama showed that the research team were able to access things the mother wrote on social networking sites.

Yet the names cannot be disclosed by the British press without contravening the Contempt of Court Act. This means that disclosures are made through people who aren’t necessarily so concerned about, or even think about, media ethics or face any kind of editorial process.

As I reported in September, Bob Satchwell from the Society of Editors believes the legislation is out of date and redundant, as do many others.

Orders, such as those under section 11 of the Contempt of Court Act 1981, for example, allow a court to ban publication of specific information, in addition to statutory reporting restrictions. But how on earth to enforce this in an online world?

This is starkly proven in the case of Baby P.

It’s time to readdress our laws, as Satchwell has urged the Attorney General, and make trials really fair.

Postscript: I’ve just found Martin Belam’s blog post, which makes a similar point, and also focuses on the ’sheer scale of useage of the internet’ in the UK as compared to 2000 when Victoria Climbié case was reported, for example.

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Inflection Point: Pay per performance for online journos

Oliver Luft — Wed, 14 May 2008 10:09:52 +0000

Journalism.co.uk wrote a story last week about comments RBI managing director Jim Muttram made to the PPA conference about performance related pay for journalists.

Back on his own blog Jim has posted about the hubbub surrounding the issue.

“If any pay for performance scheme were ever to be implemented in a blanket fashion that very well might be the result – which, for the record, would be a bad thing!

“However, in an online world where attention is firstly more valued and more difficult to get, and secondly increasingly measurable it surely comes as no surprise that questions about how to maximise it arise from time to time.”

I recommend a click through to read the whole post.

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Happy birthday WWW!

ruth morgan — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 16:40:35 +0000

Today is the 15th birthday of the World Wide Web, marked by the CERN announcement on April 30 1993 that the web would be free to all.

It’s a cue to sit back and marvel at how much has changed in a relatively small amount of time and post screen shots that may induce the same feeling as mum fetching the baby photos.

After the WWW age was born, online news and journalism was swift to follow: The Tech – an online version of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology newspaper, went live in May 1993; closely followed by the first journalism site from the University of Florida that October.

By 1994 there were already more than 20 online newspaper and journalism services. The Sunday Times and the Daily Telegraph were the first British papers to enter the online world in 1994 with the Beeb taking slightly longer to catch up, launching its news website in 1997.

1999 saw the launch of Journalism.co.uk in its first form and my haven’t we grown…

With web technology advancing daily, the slick news sites of today will surely be drawing fond smiles in another 15 years.

Happy birthday Web, here’s to many more…

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French court finds website guilty of privacy breach for linking

Oliver Luft — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 11:02:51 +0000

Last week a French court found a website guilty of breach the privacy of actor Olivier Martinez because it linked to a story about him (hat tip Cybersoc).

The site, Fuzz.fr, had linked to a gossip website which was carrying a story about the actor’s relationship with Australian singer Kylie Minogue.

In landmark ruling for the French online world, the court decided that Fuzz.fr has taken ‘an editorial decision’ to link to the other site and was therefore responsible for the content.

The site, which allows users to post their own links, was taken offline shortly after the ruling.

“It’s a black day for French participatory websites, because it opens the door to all kinds of (court) procedures,” Fuzz’s creator Eric Dupin told AFP.

According to a report on Yahoo News, Dupin was ordered to pay 2,500 euros in damages and legal costs.

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