Bloggers try to avoid pitfalls
2008-06-18 11:34
Caryn Rousseau
Chicago - Miami real estate agent Lucas Lechuga began blogging to share his knowledge of the local market. He did not bargain for a $25m defamation lawsuit when he wrote that a Miami developer had gone bankrupt decades ago.
In Lake Geneva, Wisconsin, commodities trader Gary Millitte registered the internet domain name LakeGenevaNews.com eight years ago, but is so worried about the legal boundaries of writing online that he still has not started the ultra-local news site.
Non-journalists entering the world of blogs, online feedback forums, online videos and news websites provide information that newspapers and other media can't or don't. But many are now turning to professional journalists for help with dilemmas they're facing: When is something libellous? What's the difference between opinion and news? And how do you find public documents?
About a dozen would-be reporters navigated the basics of journalism at a recent training offered by the Society of Professional Journalists in Chicago. The group plans similar seminars this month in Greensboro, North Carolina, and Los Angeles.
Lechuga, who didn't attend the training, said it would have been a good idea. Having jumped into the world of online publishing with a finance degree, he said the claims against him - which are still pending - arose from a question of semantics, and he would have chose his words differently if he had a second chance.
"It would definitely have been something that would be worthwhile and I'd (have) been able to prevent this," said Lechuga.
Roy Peter Clark, a senior scholar at the Poynter Institute in St Petersburg, Florida, which supports working journalists, praised the effort to offer training to so-called citizen journalists.
"I think that what we're moving toward is some king of positioning between amateur and professional," Clark said.
'The threats against bloggers are very real'
Amateurs have long contributed to professional news reports, including the film of John F Kennedy's assassination and photos from the Virginia Tech massacre last year, Hurricane Katrina in 2005 and the tsunami in Southeast Asia in 2004, Clark said.
Now, many distribute their content on their own, and some have got into trouble, said Clint Brewer, the national president of SPJ.
Geoff Dougherty, editor of the website ChiTownDailyNews.org and a presenter at the SPJ programme, is trying to prevent that by offering his reporters online training.
With a $340 000 Knight News Challenge, he's creating a team of 77 to report on the smallest of meetings in every city neighbourhood - gatherings that mainstream news organisations don't cover.
"I see us in five years as the go-to source for Chicago news," said Dougherty. "It's a big goal."
Robert Cox, president of the Media Bloggers Association, said more than 100 judgments valued at $17m have been handed down against bloggers over the last three years - about 60% for defamation, 25% for copyright infringement and 10% involving privacy.
"It's the tip of the iceberg," Cox said. "Bloggers are being asked to write cheques. The threats against bloggers are very real. The costs are very real."
Other groups offer help, including NowPublic.com - a site that gathers photos, video and news tips from the public and distributes them to news organisations, including The Associated Press. NowPublic, funded with venture capital, offers resources for contributors and helps them learn to police themselves, said co-founder Michael Tippett.
"A lot of our members are aspiring journalists," Tippett said. "They'll get half of it right. We'll push them to getting all of it right."
- AP