Posts by insider outsider
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Can I just say that I find it remarkable that i/o feels able to judge - with no knowledge of the facts beyond those published - exactly what went on/is going on.
Sorry I'm not part of your " in crowd" and in on the big secrets. If you don't want these things discussed and people to make judgements, why do you post them on a public blog?
You posted a story and passed judgement on Pamela stirling and the Listener and encouraged others to do the same based solely on what you published - did you even bother to ask her for her version? - and then you get sniffy that the same standard is applied to you.
You don't see the slightest hypocrisy in that? What did you expect?
If you think I am the only one with concerns about your post you need to read a bit more widely than your blog.
And if a media law specialist (Steven) and two former editors (Paul and I) can't mount an argument you deem credible, it might just be time to give up anywayWhat? I am supposed to be so awestruck by the ranks serried against me that I just suspend my views? Don't be so fucking arrogant.
I never said you weren't credible but most of what you said was just opinion, perhaps well informed, but still just opinion. I think there is a legitimate alternative view. If you can't see beyond your own, that says more about you than me.
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Okay, on the basis that you're really not just being disingenuous ...
Why would you even think that? Just because someone disagrees with your POV? Or blog weariness?
What's interesting in yours and Paul's posts is a whole range of assumed unwritten 'rules' about polite behaviour between media organisations.
The problem i have is that it does give the appearence of special pleading. maybe you are just reflecting the practical realities/difficulties of what you do. But you are also mixing up the treatment/behaviours of mainstream media with individual media like blogs, which I think is risky.
But if you want blogs to be treated like fellow media and you want the mainstream to follow these 'rules' when dealing with them, surely the expectation goes both ways?
So where were the most basic journalistic behaviours in this case - checking your facts and balance? Nowhere that I could see.
The post was prompted/written by two experienced media personalities on a site half-funded by a reasonably sized media organisation, yet they did not do the basics.
Now maybe APN went nuclear too early, but they may have taken the view that they were not dealing with a responsible competitor, they were dealing with someone hostile, who had not contacted them, who had taken the opportunity to take the issue public and they wanted the offensive item removed.
Hot Topic could have changed the post or temporarily withdrawn it while seeking advice. I'm not sure why they reacted as they did.
A legal threat of this level is rarely the first recourse -- and never in the case of a dispute between journalists or editorial organisations. There's a reason for that: because that would be to endorse conduct that would make robust but reasonable reporting perilous and perhaps impossible.
"never' is a big word - I think some of the ladies mags are quick to throw lawyers at intermag disputes.
I think you are being overdramatic. I don't think media organisations would be cowed by threats. There are plenty of examples of media reporting on each other even in the face of threats. Private Eye almost makes a point of doing it and were famous for their pursuit of Maxwell. MEdia here have been pretty good at facing down threats from vested interests, eg Te Qaeda. They also seem to revel in each others' misfortune. So I don't think it will have any effect on robust reporting.
It may impact some less savoury blogs - good thing too IMO. Freedom of speech is NOT unlimited. Perhaps there does need to be a reminder of that. There is some pretty shabby behaviour by bloggers and comment posters.
The upshot of such conduct becoming commonplace as a first recourse is often referred to as a chilling effect.
I think you are making a big leap that this might be commonplace. I also suspect that if it did, it would quickly lose its effect.
But the blog post in question clearly fell almost wholly in the domain of honest opinion, and the ludicrous dictated "correction" trampled all over the right to such opinion.
I disagree. I think there were some pretty nasty accusations there that came from adding 2+3 and getting 7. Plus I have issues about them not revealing some key information early on.
Dammit, if Gareth Renowden wants to say he doesn't think The Listener's attitude to environmental issues is any good, or that it shouldn't give space to "climate cranks" he has every right to say so, and he shouldn't have to run an "apology" about it.
You;re dead right but he didn't say that - he went a lot further. He accused them of rolling over under pressure and behaving badly over the events.
This is a balance I have to strike all the time with discussions here. Fortunately, most of our readers are sensible -- but there's no doubt that that if this is a precedent, it's one that makes my job more perilous and more difficult.
i'm not sure if it does. The rules haven't changed. APN went for the original post, not the comments and there were some fairly blunt ones about Pamela Stirling's actions, including from Dave hansford. It may be that a court might view blog comments as transitory and with little lasting effect while the orignal posts may be considered as more important.
That said I think you are a braver man than me even before this issue.
Any further questions?
I think there are a whole lot more around defamation and the internet. It's a really interesting area. If I were going to change the law it would be that companies could not sue for defamation (cf McDonalds) only 'natural persons'.
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Journalists should settle these things like journalists...
What? A punch up at the Qantas Awards?
Seriously, I can't see the handwringing over this. Russell might think I am being naive, but an experienced writer wrote a blog column that trashed an editor's decisions and reputation, doesn't appear to have checked out the other side of the story before doing so, and got a nasty letter from a lawyer pointing out the error of his ways.
Is there anything that happened here that doesn't happen most weeks on newspapers and magazines that is especialy new and worrying?
just because it was on a blog the usual writing and reporting rules don;t apply...?
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I have no doubt that the correction was offered by the offended party - that is standard practice. There is nothing dictating that Hot Topic had to accept it or that it run it without advice.
They could have taken down the post temporarily until they got that advice.
Seems odd they caved in to pressure when their whole post was about that subject and people not having the strength to withstand it. Perhaps they realised they had got it wrong, perhaps they did not feel it worth fighting, perhaps they were intimidated. If so, that's a shame but we should remember that lawyers are as often wrong as they are right, and they don't make the law nor do they enforce it, so their letters can be hollow.
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Since when is getting a correction and apology “legal intimidation”? If there was a risk of legal action wouldn’t you want someone who knew something about the law to front it? This whole ‘intimidation’ meme was not credible in the original post and less so now, given the resulting apology.
This is not some poor-me individual blogger. Renownden and Hansford are professional writers. They know the rules. Hot Topic is part funded by AUT Media, a professional publishing company, just like APN. Sounds like a contest of equals to me.
Were AUT Media’s lawyers involved in the decision? Perhaps they could see the wood and were not blinded by the trees of righteousness?
The correction and apology itself is pretty damning. You can often tell how wrong someone has got it by the level of the correction. Note it wasn’t just a clarification but an all out correction and apology. If you have ever tried to get one from the media, you know how hard that can be.
The word ‘apology’ tells you why there is wording about something that didn’t appear in the story – it was covering any inferences that may have been drawn not just correcting the wording. I think Stephen Price is wrong in making a point of that and in his characterisation that the original piece was “largely a model of fairness”. He seems to ignore the headline “climate cranks claim another scalp” which leaves no doubt in my view as to what the conclusions of the story were. As it turns out they were just the imaginings of a couple of people, and if anything was ham fisted it was their conclusions.
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No be pedantic. If i'm wrong I'm wrong. I was going on vague memory - doesn't seem like years since Romanos went - and a few stories about the Listener's changing face.
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I thought you were one of them Philip! John Drinnan today says "Ussher [who has left as well] joins a long list of long-time staffers who have left the magazine and past luminaries include Denis Welch, Bruce Ansley, Alastair Bone and Phillip Matthews."
Joseph Romanos is no longer in there too.
Hansford was only there since November and I think he replaced some English woman who was also short lived.
I see the story has made the NZ Herald. Pamela stirling said the column is now being done by a staffer and Hansford's was only a short term role.
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Probably? Wouldn't it be prudent to, like, read the column?
But that might spoil things.
Sorry to spoil things for you Russell, I actually did read the hansford article plus the hilarious letter from the Heritage guy. Not caught up with the latest issue.
DH spouted the usual oil company "i danced with a friend who danced with a friend who danced with the Prince of Wales" conspiracy - that's hardly leading environmental writing. GP have been banging on about it for oooh what? 10 years?
What is singularly lacking is any evidence that DH was given the chop because of a single article. From what has been published it's just DH's opinion because he didn't find adequate the explanation he was given as to why his services are no longer required.
As pointed out on the other blog, a number of other Listener columnists have been pushed in the the last month. Couldn't possibly be that they just didn't rate him could it?
No let's just blame a bunch of old geezers with little PR nous and less political clout, and a letter from a US think tank and imagine something sinister. If that's "fairly heavy pressure" then I'm a banana.
And you, who is supposed to be a serious media critic, appear to have uncritically jumped on the bandwagon. You at least should have known about and mentioned the other columnists going - pretty critical context I would have thought in any assessment of what is going on at the Listener.
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I just think Hansford was a piss poor columnist who either recycled the latest Greenpeace media release or spouted "sustainable" banalities with little logic in his eco.
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I do know plenty who would look askance at someone so naïve and incurious as to have never even been tempted.
This is so lame it reflects more on Finlay that he can;t envisage anyone as being complete with out having tried some form of narcotic. Some of us have seen the impact of them at close hand and made informed decisions as a result.
And to think all that under and post graduate study in science, art, history, languages, the working and travelling in 30 countries, the creation of a home and family all comes to nothing in terms of making me worldly because I didn't do drugs. oh the infamy.
I mean what has John ever done? it's not as if he has ever seen the world has he? He;s never had to lead people, never had any real responsibility or anything. And he;s never done drugs!!
Compare that to HC who was a student, was a tutor, was an MP. Oh and shes nbeen tramping in Norway and done some progressive politics conferences. Now you just can't beat that kind of life experience.
PS Didn't Key's father have a dependency issue. Perhaps that may have had an impact.