Leveson: The way ahead for a free press in the UK
A tough but voluntary regulator is the best way to ensure a free press and a fair society, Index says in a new policy note (more…)
Game of Trolls
You know you’ve made it when you’re on the front page of the Sun. By that measure, the time of the troll has truly come, as Britain’s favourite paper has led with the story of the singer Adele being “targeted” by “sick trolls” “threatening” her and saying the star’s baby “should be killed”. Note the fact I had to put almost every word in scare quotes. The Mail ran the same story with the same tone, as did the Independent.
The story “reveals” that some people made jokes about a celebrity and her baby on Twitter. But what none of the quoted tweets appears to do is to “target” Adele. There is an OfficialAdele account, but it’s unclear whether she actually runs it, and it’s not exactly prolific. In any case, not one of the “sick jokes” made by the “vile trolls”, is actually directed at the account. There are just some rubbish jokes, chucked into the ether, and picked up by a journalist desperate for Monday morning copy. As so often happens with red-top stories, we have a celebrity, and a big current talking point — free speech on the web and cyberbullying — conflated into one big nothing.
Trolling can be defined as posting irrelevant, off topic or inflammatory material in order to get a heightened, perhaps irrational response. No wonder tabloid newspapers are so nervous about it — they’ve been sole practitioners for years, and have only just realised they’ve got rivals.
Would it have been OK to hack Jimmy Savile's phone?
As already mentioned on this blog, at least one editor has said the libel laws made him nervous of printing allegations of broadcaster Jimmy Savile’s abuse of young girls. There are certainly more complex reasons behind the failure to properly report the story in the past, but it is worth looking at the broader ethical questions the case raises. Former trustee and long-time associate of Index on Censorship Mark Stephens has posed one such question on Twitter this morning.
Moral dilemma of the day: would it have been ok to phone hack Jimmy Savile to get evidence and expose his child abuse and grooming? #leveson
— Mark Stephens (@MarksLarks) October 11, 2012
Or, to generalise the question: what kind of issue justifies intrusion and subterfuge on the part of journalists? And what level of intrusion and subterfuge? It’s a problem Lord Justice Leveson’s panel of assessors is bound to be discussing. What do you think?
Dominican Republic: Proposed law would fine, jail “unqualified” journalists
Mandatory membership to a professional body for journalists has been proposed in the Dominican Republic. The Dominican Journalism Guild (CDP) proposed mandatory membership which would penalise those who act as journalists without relevant degrees with prison sentences and fines of approximately $25,700 (£16,300). The draft bill suggests that media organisations would be able to freely contract employees, but only those with bachelors degrees or the equivalent from an “accredited school of journalism” would be employed as journalists. The CDP would also provide the media with a list of employable journalism graduates, according to the bill.