Ethics 2.0 And What The Law Says About New Media

(Alt. Hed: Where I Spent An Hour And A Half This Morning)

The media relations committee at the Dallas Bar Association put together a panel addressing “The Legal & Ethical Issues of ‘New Media.’” The panelists: Joe Chumlea (lawyer), Bill Murchison (columnist), Mike Raiff (lawyer), Dr. Randy Reddick (journalism professor) Paul Watler (lawyer), and Robert Wilonsky (Big Bob). If you’re keeping score, that’s three lawyer types and three journalism types. What did they talk about? Oh, all sorts of things but nothing particularly revelatory. But if you’re interested in some of my notes, let’s meet after the jump.

–Bill Murchison kicked things off by saying we’re living in a new world. He referenced colonial times and printing presses. He did resolve that the Internet is a good thing because it allows people to express arguments. I’m paraphrasing. But just barely. He also said that, on the Internet, there are No Rules. The lawyers on the panel later refuted that claim.

–Then, oh goodie, some of that newfangled New Media broadcast on big screens. Specifically, they showed the YouTube clip of Don’t Taze Me Bro. First up for discussion, Are there copyright issues to broadcast that? Nah, the panelists decided. It’s on YouTube. Plus, it’s Fair Use. (I’m considering replacing “I know you are but what am I?” with “Fair Use, Fair Use, Fair Use” as my go-to debate move.) Are there privacy issues of the cops seen in the footage? Nah, it’s a public event. What about the ethics of posting that video if you don’t know the source and you don’t know the validity of the person who posted it and couldn’t the footage have been edited? and all sorts of other considerations I really never even thought to consider. Dr. Reddick said there was no reason to believe there was deceit. That video would be okay to rebroadcast. Moving on.

–I forget what his comments were in response to or in the context of, but Wilonsky mentioned that Unfair Park does not publish anything that would not meet the rigors (my word) of the print version. Blog posts there must be newsworthy and verified and fact-checked and all of that stuff. You’re probably asking: “Adam, are the same standards in place at FrontBurner and D Magazine? Would you post something that you wouldn’t print?” If you are asking that, I’d tell you that I’m too tired to answer those questions coherently and at length ’cause I stayed up watching the best hockey game I can ever remember seeing ever. Plus, I can’t speak for the FrontBurnerers as a whole. But, short answer, content-wise: No. In some (I’d go so far as to say most) instances, we post things because we wouldn’t print them. Poop stories, for instance, don’t go well on paper (insert toilet paper joke here) but are fun and flippant and very Internet-y. Blogs are a different medium than magazines (which is a different medium than newspapers and alt-weeklies, natch.), so different conventions rule the day. Now, if you were to ask that question legally and ethically and “If someone sues us for this blog post will we win”-wise, Yes, we have a similar standard that we try to maintain. And when we slip up, we update and try to make amends. Again, I should try to speak for the whole group. Besides, I’m getting sidetracked from this morning’s panel. And also, as stated, that game last night was unreal.

–I should point out somewhere in here that I consider Robert Wilonsky a friend. And I guess Unfair Park is kinda sorta maybe a competitor, although blog reading, in my experience, ain’t a zero-sum game. So if I appear to be ripping on Robert (which he asked me afterwards if I was going to do; “No more so than usual,” I told him), please take it as good-natured as it’s meant. I’m glad he was on the panel; he kept it interesting and not all lawyerly.

–The Internet creates an interesting legal dichotomy between Fair Use versus Right to Publicity. I nodded along, as if I knew exactly what all of that meant. This discussion topic was accompanied by Ashley Dupree’s MySpace page. “You may have seen it,” moderator Kara Altenbaumer-Price told the audience. “I have a poster of it above my bed,” Wilonsky said. “Okay, good,” Altenbaumer-Price deadpanned. (Ibid.)

–Dr. Reddick is very old-school about journalism on the Web. Facebook and MySpace help “extend the reach of newsgathering,” but news that is gathered there must be verified.

–Attention media types: If you are referencing or reporting or blogging about anyone’s MySpace page or Facebook profile or the like, be very aware that you may be dealing with a minor. MySpace doesn’t verify ages, donchaknow. And the courts, they don’t have much sympathy for media types in such cases.

–Should a reporter use Wikipedia as a source? I can’t remember the exact conclusion. I mostly remember Wilonsky talking about his Wikipedia page and the time Pegasus News put up a bad photo of him from high school (bad quality), so he posted the original one on Unfair Park.

–Altenbaumer-Price asked Murchison a question. I forget what it was. Doesn’t matter, really. Murchison himself said he’d get around to answering it, but first he took a discussion detour. He identified himself as a dinosaur and said he was prehistoric. That was to give context for his following statement: “Media and law aren’t the problems. It’s the culture! It’s exhibitionist, there are no boundaries, and there no standards.” (You might remember Murchison from Tim’s critique of one of his editorials.) Murchison went on to amend his “There are no rules on the Internet” to add, “But there should be considerations.” Specifically, he wants media peeps to consider, before posting something, if people need to know about it. “Just because something happened doesn’t mean we have to talk about it,” he said, giving me the perfect way to wrap up this post.

–Except I would add that twitter.com/williammurchison is available.