Atlanta Media Bloggers

A good reason to be careful what you say

Link: Courts are asked to crack down on bloggers *

Maybe Libel Law would be a good topic for one of our future monthly meetings. I'm not trying to scare anyone, because you really don't need to fear threats of libel if you don't say bad things about people that you can't prove to be true.

The beauty of libel law is that Truth is the primary defense against libel. That's how you CYA. Just don't make things up.

And Fair Comment and Criticism (which allows you to review a film and say nasty things about how badly it sucks) is PROTECTED SPEECH. That allows you to have nasty opinions about things.

Good ethics would require you back up hasty generalizations with support, reasons for why you think the film sucks, for instance.

PARODY is generally considered Fair Comment and Criticism. I do believe that usually includes filksongs (bastardized song lyrics) and Fark.com-style "photoshopping" joke sites.

But with the heated nature of online discourse, where folks get sloppy is when they're busy flaming someone who maybe isn't wearing asbestos underwear, and instead of criticism, they start playing the "dozens," or an online variant, essentially saying bad things about someone's mother or parentage, or other exaggerations that are made up completely of whole cloth.

I dunno. Don Rickles gets away with that style of insult, but if it is something that can be fact-checked, it had better be true. If Don Rickles says out loud that someone's mother wears army boots, it is aural and generally considered slander. Libel is a bigger deal, because it has more permanence, and if etched forever on the ethers, Google-searchable, that could add up to a sizable settlement.

So an exaggerated insult COULD be construed as taking from a person her or his good name or reputation, and if it ain't true, that's libel.

For those of you for whom this is pretty basic stuff, or old news, please forgive me for going over old ground. I just figure it's better safe than sorry.

Chris

Link: Courts are asked to crack down on bloggers *

Link: USATODAY.com - Courts are asked to crack down on bloggers, websites.

Link: AsiaMedia :: US: Blogs hit by libel suits.

US: Blogs hit by libel suits

People criticised in online journals fight back, experts fear the impact on free speech

Singapore Straits Times
Thursday, October 5, 2006

New York --- Mr Rafe Banks, a lawyer in Georgia, took his ex-client David Milum to court when the latter wrote on his blog that Mr Banks had bribed judges on behalf of drug dealers.

Last January, Mr Milum became the first blogger to lose a libel case in the United States and was ordered to pay US$50,000 (S$79,000) in damages to Mr Banks.

The case is just an example of how blogs are increasingly being targeted by those who feel harmed by attacks on the online journals.

In the past two years, more than 50 lawsuits stemming from postings on blogs and website message boards have been filed in the US, reported USA Today.

The suits have sparked a debate over how the "blogosphere" and its impact on speech and publishing might change libel law.

Legal experts say the lawsuits are challenging a mindset that has long surrounded blogging -- that most bloggers are "judgment-proof" because they are often ordinary citizens who do not have money.

This is unlike traditional media such as newspapers, magazines and television stations.

But the lawsuits by Mr Banks and others were undertaken not with the sole purpose of claiming damages, but also to silence their critics.

"Bloggers did not think they could be subject to libel," said Mr Eric Robinson, a Media Law Resource Centre attorney. "You take what is on your mind, type it and post it."

Mr Robert Cox, founder and president of the Media Bloggers Association, which has 1,000 members, told USA Today the recent wave of lawsuits means that bloggers should learn libel law.

"It has not happened yet, but soon, there will be a blogger who is successfully sued and who loses his home," he said.

[...]

Arianna Huffington is keynote speaker at the Decatur Book Festival tonight!

Link: The AJC Decatur Book Festival | Event Schedule.

Sorry for the last minute notice. I'm not too organized these days.

It's at Agnes Scott College, Presser Hall, 8-9 pm.

I've always wanted an excuse to poke around the Agnes Scott campus. It's so beautiful.

Anybody feel like going? I plan to be there. While she isn't directly scheduled to talk about Huffington Post (slated to talk about her book on work/life balance), I expect she'll get some questions about the Post during the Q&A session, if there is one.

I'm a fan of what she's done with the Post, both in its navigation and architecture, and its sense of being a "stable" of a wide range of well-known people. She's given them a forum to blog and unleashed a powerful and now influential collective voice on the blogosphere and beyond.

In particular, I hope to ask her for more information about how she set up her deal with Yahoo! News, both to repurpose content from her site, but also getting primo structural representation in the opinion section of the Yahoo! News page. Did she make the deal the way it has usually been done with newspaper syndicated columnists? Or was there more of a trade or exchange aspect involved? Did she approach Yahoo! News, or did Yahoo! News approach her? I'm just really curious about the business model of the arrangement. Inquiring minds want to know!

Keynote Address

The AJC DBF is proud to announce political columnist Arianna Huffington as its keynote speaker! Join Ms. Huffington as she opens the festival Friday night at Presser Hall at Agnes Scott College with a discussion of her new  book, On Becoming Fearless… In Love, Work, and Life.  

View Arianna  Huffington’s bio.

There's a ton of other events at the conference, plus a festival atmosphere with a book market on the Decatur Square, a barbecue and fireworks among the many things scheduled.

Activities In-Depth:

• Antiquarian Book Fair
• Barbeque and Fireworks
• Children's Activities
• Cooking Authors and Demonstrations
• Food, Beer, and Wine
• Keynote Address    
• Live Music and Poetry
• Panel Discussions and Book Signings
• Writer's Conference
• DBF Stages
• Event Schedule

That grid schedule is just a BEAR to read tho. Wish they'd redesign it. Here's some other events that pertain to blogging:

PANELS – SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 2

E-Storytelling: In which we discuss the new form of writing commonly referred to as online fiction, from short stories to comedy pieces to email-text-and-Instant-Message-as-storytelling device. 10 a.m.

• John Warner, editor of McSweeney’s Internet Tendency
• Jack Pendarvis, author of The Mysterious Secret of Valuable Treasure, Pushcart Prize winner
• Jamie Allen, editor of The Duck & Herring Co.

Real Writers Blog: In which we discuss whether today's writers need a web site, a blog, a podcast, and/or a MySpace account.  1 p.m.

• Laurel Snyder, poet and NPR contributor
• Tayari Jones, author of Leaving Atlanta and The Untelling
• Touré, contributing editor with Rolling Stone
• Amy Guth, author of Three Fallen Women

I'm also interested in this session by The Atlantic Monthly fiction editor. Gotten a few rejection letters from him over the years! But I think I need special (free) registration, and I haven't heard back yet.

Magazine Fiction: In which Atlantic fiction editor C. Michael Curtis discusses the realities of rejection, cover letters, and other literary matters. 5 p.m.

• C. Michael Curtis, Atlantic Monthly, author of Faith: Stories and God: Stories.

I think you need special registration for this one too, but I know there are comedy writers in this group, so I thought I'd pass it on:

WORKSHOPS – SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 2

That's Not Funny: A Definitive Guide to Written Hilarity, Wit, and Mirth, By Prof. Rev.  John Warner, Humorologist. 3 p.m. – 5 p.m.

Political bloggers would probably love to be a fly on the wall in the $13 admission brunch with a former editor of The Nation. I dunno if any spaces are still available tho.

And one of the Indigo Girls, Emily Saliers, will also be speaking on a topic with her father.

A delightful parable by Nick Carr

This whole topic has generated much kerfuffle in the blogosphere, but it's the kind of kerfuffle I like, because it forces introspection, forces one to examine unquestioned assumptions about whether online interfaces are as democratizing as the spin often claims, whether there could be political/social biases embedded in deep structure interfaces.

The folks who have roundly spanked Carr for claiming things that they say the open "Home on the Range" of the Internet makes impossible have a point, but still, Carr's humorous parable rings true more often than not, particularly in the opening bit, and the epilogue.

Link: Rough Type: Nicholas Carr's Blog: The Great Unread.

The Great Unread

Prelude

Once upon a time there was an island named Blogosphere, and at the very center of that island stood a great castle built of stone, and spreading out from that castle for miles in every direction was a vast settlement of peasants who lived in shacks fashioned of tin and cardboard and straw.

Part one:
On the nature of innocent fraud

I've been reading a short book - an essay, really - by John Kenneth Galbraith called The Economics of Innocent Fraud. It's his last work, written while he was in his nineties, not long before he died. In it, he explains how we, as a society, have come to use the term "market economy" in place of the term "capitalism." The new term is a kinder and gentler one, with its implication that economic power lies with consumers rather than with the owners of capital or with the managers who have taken over the work of the owners. It's a fine example, says Galbraith, of innocent fraud.

An innocent fraud is a lie, but it's a lie that's more white than black. It's a lie that makes most everyone happy. It suits the purposes of the powerful because it masks the full extent of their power, and it suits the purposes of the powerless because it masks the full extent of their powerlessness.

What we tell ourselves about the blogosphere - that it's open and democratic and egalitarian, that it stands in contrast and in opposition to the controlled and controlling mass media - is an innocent fraud.

Part two:
The loneliness of the long-tail blogger

The thing about an innocent fraud, though, is that it's not that hard to see through. Often, in fact, you have to make an effort not to see through it, and at some point, for some people, the effort no longer seems worth it. A few days back, the blogger Kent Newsome asked, "Who are the readers of our blogs?" His answer had a melancholy tone:

The number of bloggers competing for attention makes it seem like the blogosphere is a huge, chaotic place. But it only seems that way because we have all ended up in a small room at the end of the hall. When people refuse to converse with me or go out of their way to link around me, it hurts a little. Until I remember that while they aren't listening to me, no one in the real world is listening to them either ...

[...]

The best way, by far, to get a link from an A List blogger is to provide a link to the A List blogger. As the blogophere has become more rigidly hierarchical, not by design but as a natural consequence of hyperlinking patterns, filtering algorithms, aggregation engines, and subscription and syndication technologies, not to mention human nature, it has turned into a grand system of patronage operated - with the best of intentions, mind you - by a tiny, self-perpetuating elite. A blog-peasant, one of the Great Unread, comes to the wall of the castle to offer a tribute to a royal, and the royal drops a couple of coins of attention into the peasant's little purse. The peasant is happy, and the royal's hold over his position in the castle is a little bit stronger.

[...]

Epilogue

One day, a blog-peasant boy found buried in the dust beside his shack a sphere of flawless crystal. When he looked into the ball he was astounded see a moving picture. It was an image of a fleet of merchant ships sailing into the harbor of the island of Blogosphere. The ships bore names that had long been hated throughout the island, names like Time-Warner and News Corp and Pearson and New York Times and Wall Street Journal and Conde Nast and McGraw-Hill. The blog-peasants gathered along the shore, jeering at the ships and telling the invaders that they would soon be vanquished by the brave royals in the great castle. But when the captains of the merchant ships made their way to the gates of the castle, bearing crates of gold, they were not repelled by the royals with cannons but rather welcomed with fanfares. And all through the night the blog-peasants could hear the sounds of a great feast inside the castle walls.

   

How seriously do you take citizen journalism?

Blogger Jailed After Defying Court Orders

By JESSE McKINLEY
New York Times
Published: August 2, 2006

A freelance journalist and blogger was jailed on Tuesday after refusing to turn over video he took at an anticapitalist protest here last summer and after refusing to testify before a grand jury looking into accusations that crimes were committed at the protest.

The freelancer, Josh Wolf, 24, was taken into custody just before noon after a hearing in front of Judge William Alsup of Federal District Court. Found in contempt, Mr. Wolf was later moved to a federal prison in Dublin, Calif., and could be imprisoned until next summer, when the grand jury term expires, said his lawyer, Jose Luis Fuentes.

Earlier this year, federal prosecutors subpoenaed Mr. Wolf to testify before a grand jury and turn over video from the demonstration, held in the Mission District on July 8, 2005. The protest, tied to a Group of 8 meeting of world economic leaders in Scotland, ended in a clash between demonstrators and the San Francisco police, with one officer sustaining a fractured skull.

A smoke bomb or a firework was also put under a police car, and investigators are looking into whether arson was attempted on a government-financed vehicle.

Mr. Wolf, who posted some of the edited video on his Web site, www.joshwolf.net, and sold some of it to local television stations, met with investigators, who wanted to see the raw video. But Mr. Wolf refused to hand over the tapes, arguing that he had the right as a journalist to shield his sources.

On Tuesday, Judge Alsup disagreed, ruling that the grand jury “has a legitimate need” to see what Mr. Wolf filmed.

READ: NYTimes: Blogger Jailed After Defying Court Orders

Attacking Citizen Journalism

Hey Jim Stroud, Didn't you recently find an article that stated that bloggers had the same rights as Journalist?

http://www.marketingvox.com/archives/2006/08/03/feds_jail_blogger/

Feds Jail Blogger

In the first known case of a blogger being jailed by federal authorities, freelance journalist and blogger Josh Wolf was jailed Tuesday after refusing to turn over video he took at an anti-capitalist protest in San Francisco and for not testifying before a grand jury examining whether crimes took place at the protest, writes the New York Times.

...But he refused to hand over the tapes to investigators, arguing that he had the right as a journalist to shield his sources