Freedom of the press ought to belong to all... not just to approved 'journalists'

Online Journalism Review ^ | October 16, 2009 | Robert Niles

[abb]

Of interest to our group.

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ping

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http://www.suntimes.com/business/1829008,chicago-sun-times-investors-101509.article
James Tyree names Chicago Sun-Times investors

http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/chi-biz-sun-times-investors-tyree-oct16,0,6038964.story
Names of Sun-Times investors emerge

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/chi-oped1016beckoct16,0,2391601.story
Love him, hate him: Your reaction?

http://www.cjr.org/behind_the_news/the_ap_intimations_of_politico.php
The AP: Intimations of Politico

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/hr/content_display/news/e3i8ecb95ad2867bbdbf3ea9514786f0f2e
Ted Turner wants to run CNN again

[Mark was here]

There ought to be no special class of citizen called a "journalist."

Exactly.

[abb]

http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/364355-Stephanopoulos_To_Be_Primary_Sub_For_Sawyer.php
Stephanopoulos To Be Primary Sub For Sawyer

http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/358418-_Yellow_Light_Democrats_Weigh_In_On_Net_Neutality.php
“Yellow Light” Democrats Weigh In On Net Neutality

http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/358297-Westin_Rejects_Infusing_Opinions_Into_ABC_s_Reporting.php
Westin Rejects Infusing Opinions Into ABC’s Reporting

http://www.buzzmachine.com/2009/10/16/the-collaboration-economy/
The collaboration economy

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/10/15/AR2009101502354.html
A Deal for NBC Could Be Comcastic

http://www.deadline.com/hollywood/
Post-NBC Ben Silverman Snarling At Media

http://www.deadline.com/hollywood/ted-turner-wants-to-run-time-warner-is-he-taking-his-meds/
Ted Turner Wants To Re-Run Time Warner (Is He Taking His Meds?)

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1004023014
Ted Turner: No Fan of Print Newspapers

http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/chi-fri-redbox-oct16,0,4111569.story
Redbox DVD vending company bargains for success

http://www.nypost.com/p/news/business/conde_nast_slices_staff_at_golfing_bTPaDM0IkNE79duNFtdIVK
Condé Nast slices staff at Golfing, Media groups

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Times-Co-wont-rule-out-job-apf-898127001.html?x=0&.v=2
Times Co. won’t rule out job cuts at Boston Globe

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1004022708
EXCLUSIVE: Huffington Post Passes WashingtonPost.com in Unique Visitors, in September

[abb]

http://newsosaur.blogspot.com/
The un-sale of the Boston Globe

http://www.niemanlab.org/2009/10/what-the-nyts-bay-area-report-looks-like-in-print/
What the NYT’s Bay Area Report looks like in print

[Jacquerie]

Obama will be unable to consolidate power until the pesky internet and talk radio are brought to heel.

[GeronL]

Someday we will have $2,500 subscriptions to a dailt pamphlet

[abb]

Obama will be unable to consolidate power until the pesky internet and talk radio are brought to heel.

It won't happen. The internet is the most liberating and freedom-enhancing form of human communications invented since the dawn of mankind. Human animals are THE most social creatures ever. We were meant to communicate with each other by Divine Providence.

Tyranny hasn't a chance any more.

[conservatism_IS_compassion]

There ought to be no special class of citizen called a "journalist." Anyone who does journalism, even if for just a moment in their lives, ought to enjoy the protections of the First Amendment when they choose to speak or to publish. Otherwise, we are ceding to unelected corporate employers the power to determine who gets First Amendment rights, or not.

Article 1 Section 9:

No title of nobility shall be granted by the United States

IOW, "the press" or "journalist" cannot legally be a title of nobility which makes "some animals more equal than others."

OTOH, the First Amendment does not apply to the Internet, the radio, or even the telegraph - at least not directly. They weren't invented yet, and were not and could not have been mentioned - but that doesn't matter. It doesn't matter for two reasons: first, the Constitution is a (truly) progressive document:

Article 1 Section 8:

The Congress shall have power . . . To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries . . .

. . . which means that even tho those particular inventions lay in the future, they were in principle contemplated by the framers and not specifically excluded from the freedom which is

the mission of the Constitution:

We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

The First Amendment, indeed the entire Bill of Rights, was opposed by Madison and the Federalists not because they opposed the rights but because they feared that the construction of Constitution would not adhere to the

Ninth Amendment:

The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.

That is, they feared that the Bill of Rights would be treated not as a floor under the rights of the people, but as a ceiling limiting them. Which is precisely what happens when the government censors a new communications technology on the pretext that it was not mentioned in the First Amendment.

The Right to Know

[E.G.C.]

BTTT

[Landru]

Thanks for the ping, my friend.
Very busy day, *must* split.

Bump for later read!! :^)

[conservatism_IS_compassion]

Henry Mencken famously said that "freedom of the press is limited to those who own one." But with the Internet making a "press" available to anyone for free, does that "press" have to be of a certain type, or reach a certain number of people, to qualify for First Amendment protection?

The criterion which Associated Press journalism applies to the question of who is entitled to First Amendment protection is painfully obvious: either you are in their club, or you are not. If you are in their club you adhere to their rules, emphatically including the one which says that you do not question the objectivity of a fellow member of the club - and you mercilessly savage anyone who does not respect that rule.

Associated Press journalism was the entire constituency of "campaign finance reform," it is their baby, and they are not in the slightest bit interested in seeing the First Amendment applied to anyone outside their club.

The prohibition against questioning the objectivity of a member of their club, and the prohibition against anyone outside the club claiming objectivity for themselves, is a form of self-flattery. It leads to the arrogance of taking their own objectivity for granted, and that is a perfect definition not of objectivity but of its opposite. AP "objectivity" is a parody of the real thing.

[T Lady]

*PING*

...In a closely related issue regarding the Press, when I listened to Anita Dunn's attack on Fox News, it really struck me just how much the attitude of President Obama somehow mirrors that of President Nixon, in how he viewed the Big Three (ABC, CBS, and NBC), along with the major print media as the enemy back in the 1970s. We could very easily see history repeating itself nearly forty years later with the rise of a Right Wing Woodward and Bernstein spilling the beans on this corrupt Administration, just as the original duo had done with Nixon.

[conservatism_IS_compassion]

We could very easily see history repeating itself nearly forty years later with the rise of a Right Wing Woodward and Bernstein spilling the beans on this corrupt Administration, just as the original duo had done with Nixon.

Your keyboard to God's monitor . . . but we of course know that the situation is so much different when the alphabet soup media are running interference for the president, as in Obama's case, instead of investigating him, as in Nixon's.

Breitbart obviously is the "Woodward & Bernstein" of this era - and he strategizes over how to force AP journalism to cover stink-to-high-heaven scandals in this administration.

[Mind-numbed Robot]

Freedom of speech is easy to understand. It gets complicated when you introduce “freedom to be heard.” This involves the distribution of speech, a subject you have covered many times in many ways, and that is what tyrants try to control, the distribution system.

Stalin said about voting, “It doesn’t matter who votes. It only matters who counts the votes.” The same is true of Freedom of Speech. It doesn’t matter who says what if no one hears it or if what is said can be directed to selected groups.

Again, you have covered this many times in essays on licensing airwaves, etc., but that is the battle that is being joined anew.

[T Lady]

'Breitbart obviously is the "Woodward & Bernstein" of this era - and he strategizes over how to force AP journalism to cover stink-to-high-heaven scandals in this administration.'

Pretty much the way Matt Drudge forced NBC and the other major Media outlets to cover the Clinton-Lewinsky scandal over a dozen years ago.

[conservatism_IS_compassion]

True.

[Jacquerie]

It won't happen

Not if Mark Lloyd at the FCC gets his way.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2367986/posts

"The FCC would decide how and what information could flow through the Internet."

"Net neutrality is not designed to liberate, but to suppress. It's the Fairness Doctrine of the Internet that, like diversity in talk radio and the war on Fox News, is designed to marginalize and silence those who disagree with those in power."

[Jacquerie]

Uh, make that, “It will if Mark Lloyd gets his way.”