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When Bloggers Write Like Journalists by Carl Ramirez
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When Bloggers Write Like Journalists |
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Education
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Maybe the Courts Will Recognize Them as Journalists A recent U.S. Court ruling is ruffling bloggers everywhere. A blogger was sued by a financial group for defamation of character. Her defense was that she was a journalist and did not need to reveal her sources. The court didn't agree. After a review of dozens of blog sites designed to dominate organic searches, the court found no evidence that the blogger could back the many accusations she made about principle of the financial group. She has been ordered to pay $2.5 million. The U.S. District Court Judge presiding over the case stated in his ruling that the blogger wasn't a journalist because she was not "affiliated with any newspaper, magazine, periodical, book, pamphlet, news service, wire service, news or feature syndicate, broadcast station or network, or cable television system." This has upset many bloggers, who consider themselves journalists. A closer reading of the decision is more telling. Defendant fails to bring forth any evidence suggestive of her status as a journalist. For example, there is no evidence of (1) any education in journalism; (2) any credentials or proof of any affiliation with any recognized news entity; (3) proof of adherence to journalistic standards such as editing, fact-checking, or disclosures of conflicts of interest; (4) keeping notes of conversations and interviews conducted; (5) mutual understanding or agreement of confidentiality between the defendant and his/her sources; (6) creation of an independent product rather than assembling writings and postings of others; or (7) contacting "the other side" to get both sides of a story. Without evidence of this nature, defendant is not "media." The backstory suggests that the blogger may deserve little pity. The woman successfully manipulated organic search so effectively that the CEO's name and the financial group's reputation may never recover, at least not on Google. The attorney representing the group can produce an email from Cox offering to repair the CEO's and company's reputation. This case highlights one of the reasons bloggers often aren't worthy of the title. The blogger would have been wise to consult an attorney before she began writing defaming content. The moment something is placed in print, the writer has an obligation to prove the charges are true and/or face a lawsuit. This was one of the first things I learned when I took journalism. Make sure you can back up what you write. I will not argue whether the judge is right or wrong in ruling that this particular blogger is not a journalist, though if she failed to provide proof that her allegations were true, it suggests that she did not understand journalism or the laws protecting journalists. It appears that the only one of the seven points in the judge's opinion the blogger met was this one - she created an independent product. One out of seven isn't going to make it. When the law allows one person to defame another's character by hiding behind the moniker "journalist", no one will be safe. The laws we have today were shaped by the era of sensational journalism in the late 1800s and early 1900s. We can be thankful they exist. If we want to have our blogging activities considered journalism, then we must behave like journalists. Start a news site, or at least follow good journalistic practices--five out of the seven listed by the judge in his opinion would do. It's going to take a better case than this one to draw the lines more accurately between bloggers who are just slogging words around and bloggers who are journalists. cheap research papers
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