Posts by ChristopherDaly:
Press freedom: A new “Ken Burns effect”
February 21st, 2013By Christopher B. Daly.
Thanks to documentary film-maker Ken Burns, a federal magistrate has struck a blow for press freedom that strengthens the legal protections for documentary film-makers, journalists, all sorts of people who prepare non-fiction for audiences, and — not least — those audiences themselves. In this case, everyone wins except the government lawyers who wanted to rummage through Burns’ outtakes from a controversial film.
Briefly, the case involves a 2012 film made by Burns and his daughter, Sarah Burns. The film, titled “The Central Park Five.”
Tells the true story of a notorious 1989 rape that occurred in New York’s Central Park. It tells of the fateful rush to judgment by law enforcement officials and the railroading of five young African-American men who were sentenced to long jail terms, even though they were innocent of the crime. Eventually, the men sued the city of New York.
Then, the city’s lawyers, presumably seeking some exculpatory material, decided to go fishing in the Burnses’ raw footage. They probably hoped to get lucky and find something that would let the city off the hook or at least muddy the waters. The city’s lawyers demanded access to the Burnses’ notes and outtakes. Right there, they should have known better. What could be more chilling to the practice of journalism (or documentary film-making, or history, for that matter) than having government lawyers picking through the material that doesn’t meet the standard of truth and accuracy. (I know that I have cartons full of notes of material that never saw the light of day because I considered that stuff wrong, unfair, or simply incomprehensible.)
To his credit, Ken Burns resisted that demand and hired lawyers of his own. This week, Magistrate Judge Ronald L. Ellis of United States District Court in Manhattan threw out the government lawyers’ request.
[Before any journalists reading this get too smug, “The Central Park Five” is also a cautionary tale about the news media’s own rush to judgment in the case, which was just as grotesque as that of law enforcement — indeed it may have been a driver of the ultimate injustice.]
So, congrats to Ken and Sarah Burns for standing up for freedom. In the rape case, it turns out the authorities had the wrong guys. In the subpoena for outtakes, it also turns out the authorities had the wrong guys.
From today’s New York Times:
Judge Ellis also ruled that the city failed to meet the requirements for subpoenas to journalists for nonconfidential material: that the material would be significant and relevant to its case and was unavailable elsewhere. He said pretrial depositions would give the city’s lawyers ample opportunity to question the five men.
“It’s a marvelous decision for documentary filmmakers and point-of-view journalists,” Mr. Burns’s lawyer, John Siegal, said. “And it’s an important victory for the media industry generally.”
The lure of owning a whole newspaper
January 3rd, 2013By Christopher B. Daly.
What would you do if you were worth a couple of billion dollars and were the mayor of New York City and (probably) banned from seeking a fourth term? If you are Michael Bloomberg, your thoughts might stray toward buying a newspaper. Not a copy of a newspaper, of course, but a whole newspaper company.
That’s the upshot of a story in today’s Times, which says that Bloomberg is reportedly considering buying Financial Times Ltd., which owns all of theFinancial Times newspaper and a half interest in The Economist magazine. (FT Ltd is a division of the British media giant Pearson.)
You might ask: why?
Michael Bloomberg has made a fortune multiple times over from the “media” company that he already owns — Bloomberg L.P. The company is based on the phenomenally lucrative business of supplying patented terminals to stock traders, along with content from Bloomberg’s own company and other sources. In that business, Bloomberg made billions. But it’s not enough.
What follows is pure speculation (since I have never met him or interviewed him). I don’t believe Michael Bloomberg wants any more wealth. Besides, getting into the printing of newspapers or magazines is hardly the road to riches. I suspect that what drives Bloomberg is the electricity that comes from power — the kind of power he now wields as mayor of the country’s biggest city but which will be passing from his hands.
Like many another media mogul before him (Greeley, Hearst), Bloomberg has toyed with the idea of offering the whole country his services, as president of the United States. There are many reasons to believe that will not happen, so what else is there? He probably does not want to go back to minding the store at a company that sells trading terminals to Wall Street types.
No, the only kind of activity that offers the promise of that much power (or at least influence) is owning an important publication. Since the time of the first truly mass-circulation daily newspapers in the 1830s, that has been the pattern throughout U.S. history (see my book Covering America on Bennett, Greeley, Pulitzer, Hearst, Luce, Murdoch, etc.) . Time and again, as publishers have connected with masses of people, they have convinced themselves that they are indispensable to the fate of the nation and start throwing their weight around.
Michael Bloomberg already has a record of accomplishment. He has come a long way from his origins in Medford, Mass. If he really wants to help our country, and if he really wants to boost the news business, he should buy a couple of newspapers — every day, at a newsstand — then take them home and read them.
