Our Response To Sony Sending Us A Threat Letter For Reporting On The Company's Leaked Emails

from the go-pound-sand dept

Yesterday we wrote about how Sony's high-powered lawyer on retainer, David Boies, had apparently been sending major media properties an idiotic letter warning them not to report on the leaked Sony hack emails. And then, what did we find in our mail on Monday afternoon? A copy of the same damn letter of our very own. How thoughtful of David Boies to send us a personally signed copy. I've asked my staff to frame it and hang it on the wall. I hope that he's charging Sony top dollar to send us a letter we'd already mocked as ridiculous, wrong on the law and pointless.

Anyway, given that we've now personally received our own copy, I feel semi-obligated to respond -- and to respond in public.

So, David, Leah and Sony Corp. -- our official response is: go pound sand.

Here's the really astounding thing: In December, Sony tried to turn this whole story into how the hack itself was an attack on free speech. It never was. Even if you believe the (incredibly dubious) story line that North Korea hacked Sony to try to prevent the company from showing a comedy about North Korea, the only "attack" on free speech came when Sony's top execs actually folded and originally agreed to not release the flick. It was only after being widely mocked that Sony worked out alternative plans and then tried to wrap itself in the flag and proclaim itself a true beacon of free speech.

But to take that "we're the bastions of free speech" and immediately turn it around and effectively threaten the media for reporting on newsworthy leaked content -- something that is quite clearly protected by the First Amendment and with some pretty high-profile case law backing that up -- just demonstrates how little Sony actually believes in free speech. Sony "supports" free speech when it's useful to make the company look good and then is willing to throw around a bunch of expensive legal FUD to try to intimidate the press, when actual free speech can be used to embarrass Sony.

Yes, it sucks for Sony that its emails were hacked. It would suck for just about any company, I'm sure. But that doesn't change the fact that the media has every legal right to report on those emails if they find it newsworthy. Threatening the media is not just counterproductive, it makes Sony look incredibly clueless and thin-skinned while at the same time just adding more life to the story itself.

Filed Under: david boies, first amendment, free speech, journalism, reporting, threats
Companies: sony

UK Police Can't Confirm Or Deny Investigation Of Journalists It Publicly Confirmed In 2013

from the Glomar-logic dept

If you're a UK-based journalist who's reported on the Snowden leaks, it's safe to say you're under investigation. Not only are you being investigated, but that investigation itself is so secret, it can't be discussed. The Intercept's Ryan Gallagher sent a Freedom of Information request to London's Metropolitan Police (the Met) for more information about the investigation -- something twice publicly confirmed by Met representatives.

But when asked specifically for information on the ongoing investigation, the agency had nothing to say.

[T]he Metropolitan Police... says everything about the investigation’s existence is a secret and too dangerous to disclose. In response to a Freedom of Information Act request from this reporter, the force has repeatedly refused to release any information about the status of the investigation, how many officers are working on it, or how much taxpayer money has been spent on it. The Met wrote in its response:

"to confirm or deny whether we hold any information concerning any current or previous investigations into the alleged actions of Edward Snowden could potentially be misused proving detrimental to national security.'

In this current environment, where there is a possibility of increased threat of terrorist activity, providing any details even to confirm or deny that any information exists could assist any group or persons who wish to cause harm to the people of the nation which would undermine the safeguarding of national security."

The response is hardly a response. In fact, almost the entirety of the nine-page document Gallagher received is simply reasons WHY the Met won't be responding affirmatively or negatively to his inquiry. The only new information gleaned is that control of the investigation has changed hands.

AC Mark Rowley has taken over as Head of Specialist Operations following the departure of Cressida Dick

That's the one thing the "Counter Terrorism Command" can confirm. This would be the same department within the Met that was directly involved with the detainment and questioning of Glenn Greenwald's partner, David Miranda. Everything else falls under a variety of exemptions, including the oh-so-opaque "state secrets" designation.

The Metropolitan Police Service can neither confirm nor deny whether it holds any of the information that you have requested, as the duty in S1(1)(a) of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 does not apply, by virtue of the following exemptions:

Section 23(5) - Information supplied by, or concerning, certain security bodies
Section 24(2) - National Security
Section 30(3) Criminal Investigations
Section 31(3) - Law Enforcement
Section 40(5) - Personal information

There's more detail later, when the response details the agency's decision to declare the request to be "not in the public interest."

The security of the country is of paramount importance and the Police service will not divulge whether information is or is not held if to do so would undermine National Security or law enforcement. Whilst there is a public interest in the transparency of policing operations and providing assurance that the police service is appropriately and effectively engaging with the threats posed by groups or individuals there is a very strong public interest in safeguarding the integrity of police investigations and operations in the highly sensitive area of extremism, crime prevention, public disorder and terrorism prevention.

[...]

After weighing up the competing interests I have determined that confirmation or denial of any information being held concerning whether the MPS has investigated the alleged actions of Edward Snowden or not would not be in the public interest. To confirm or deny that information is held regarding any individual or investigation that may or may not have taken place could be detrimental to any investigations that may be being conducted now or in the future.

But, of course, all of this discussion about national security, public interest and possibly compromised investigations does not confirm that there's a twice-previously-confirmed investigation of UK journalists in progress.

However, this should not be taken as necessarily indicating that any information that would meet your request exists or does not exist.

This UK-style Glomar tosses the request back to The Intercept, which has tossed it to the nearest governing body..

The Intercept has filed a complaint with the Information Commissioner’s Office, the public body that enforces the U.K.’s freedom of information laws, about the Met’s refusal to release information about the current status of the investigation. The commissioner will now look at how the police handled the request and decide whether they should be ordered to hand over the relevant details.

Even in the UK, information doesn't want to be free. It wants to be litigated.

The Met continues to maintain its code of silence in the face of its earlier public statements about investigating those publishing the Snowden leaks. When asked how something the agency itself publicly discussed several months ago is now a "national security" issue, the Met offered a swift "no comment" -- a handy way to dodge the logic hole in its Freedom of Information request denial.

Filed Under: ed snowden, foia, investigation, metropolitan police, police, reporting, uk

Hall & Oates Suing Breakfast Company Over Haulin' Oats Granola... And For A Pretty Good Reason

from the under-oats dept

As someone with only a mild and very uneducated interest in music, I am of course a huge fan of the band Hall & Oates. Private eyes, man, they're watching you, and all that. Hall & Oates, can apparently get very unhappy when things are named after them, as we saw when a bunch of drunken weirdos decided to name a SuperPAC after the band. The band, of course, couldn't go for that and got them to shut the whole thing down. And, now, according to the Guardian, the famed rocking duo are going one-on-one with the most unlikely foe: granola. Cue outrage about rockers feeling entitled:

Rather than being flattered by the promise of rolled oats and maple syrup mix that, Early Bird insists, is “perfect by itself or as the base for a breakfast parfait creation”, Daryl Hall and John Oates claim “the name and mark Haulin’ Oats is an obvious play upon Plaintiff’s well-known Hall & Oates mark, and was selected by defendant in an effort to trade off of the fame and notoriety associated with the artist’s and plaintiff’s well-known marks.”

The pair have brought the case in the Brooklyn federal court, where they claim the food company have infringed their trademark with a “phonetic play on Daryl Hall and John Oates’ well-known brand name”.

Now, if you hadn't noticed, two bandmates from the 80's and a freaking granola company probably aren't in the same industries, aren't competing with one another, and customers won't be confused at all into thinking a granola parfait is either Daryl or John, their personalities notwithstanding. So it seems like this should be tossed out, right? Well, maybe not.

Deep within the lawsuit (but not in the Guardian article linked above) is another bizarre tidbit. Apparently, a few years ago, someone else registered a "Haulin' Oats" trademark and started selling oatmeal with that brand. Rather than freak out and sue, representatives for Daryl and John resolved the whole thing amicably, with the other company agreeing to assign the trademark to the rockers and continue to sell their Haulin' Oats oatmeal -- in exchange for a royalty based on sales. You can see that trademark here. As Hall & Oates note in their lawsuit:

Plaintiff is the owner, via assignment, of the mark HAULIN’ OATS that is used in connection with the sale of oatmeal and the provision of food delivery services. Plaintiff is the owner of United States Trademark and Service Mark Reg. No. 4,345,444 for the mark HAULIN’ OATS in International Class 30 for oatmeal and in International Class 39 for food delivery, which mark has been in use since March 1, 2012.

And here's how it all came about:

In 2014, Plaintiff became aware that an entity named Haulin’ Oats, a partnership organized under the laws of California and based in Nashville, Tennessee, was also utilizing the mark HAULIN’ OATS in connection with the sale of oatmeal and the provision of food delivery services.

Thereafter, Plaintiff and Haulin’ Oats entered into a business relationship whereby Haulin’ Oats assigned to Plaintiff its trademark and service mark rights in and to the mark HAULIN’ OATS (including the United States Trademark and Service Mark Registration identified above) and Plaintiff granted a royalty-based license back to Haulin’ Oats.

Based on that, the lawsuit actually makes a lot of sense -- though you wouldn't get any of that from the Guardian's coverage.

There are some bizarre parts in the lawsuit, such as Hall & Oates arguing that because they once put oats on an album cover there might be confusion: That seems difficult to take seriously. But, rather than this just being a case of the rockers freaking out over someone making a play on their name (as implied in the Guardian piece), this actually has a legitimate basis: two different companies came up with the same play on the duo's name, and the rockers actually worked out a reasonable deal with the first, and now that they own the trademark, they're the ones who have to file against the other company using the same name.

Filed Under: daryl hall, granola, hall & oates, haulin' oats, john oates, journalism, reporting, trademark

Fair Use: The Foundation Of Jon Stewart's Success

from the celebrating-fair-use dept

Jon Stewart's announcement on February 10 that he will be retiring from The Daily Show later this year has been met with tributes to his comic genius and his impact on political discourse. But these tributes have overlooked the legal doctrine that has enabled Stewart to be so effective: fair use. (This is my second post this week about the importance of fair use to popular culture; on Tuesday I wrote about how the Fifty Shades of Grey trilogy was first written as fair use-dependent fan fiction based on the Twilight vampire series.)

Stewart's most powerful critiques result from his juxtaposing clips of politicians and commentators on news broadcasts to demonstrate their hypocrisy. He'll contrast a clip of a Fox News commentator expressing outrage at President Obama taking a particular action with a clip of the same commentator praising President Bush for taking a similar same action. Stewart also uses montages of clips from CNN and other news networks to demonstrate their simultaneously sensationalistic and superficial coverage of disasters and trials. But for fair use, Stewart's rebroadcast of these clips would be willful copyright infringement, subject to statutory damages of up to $150,000 per clip.

Jon Stewart's heavy use of clips for the purpose of humorous political criticism has inspired other comedians to emulate him, most notably his former "correspondents" Stephen Colbert on The Colbert Report and John Oliver on Last Week Tonight. Stewart's reliance on clips no doubt has also encouraged the growth of the remix culture online, where individuals combine clips of preexisting works for the purpose of political or artistic expression.

Stewart's reliance on fair use likely made him progressive on other copyright matters. He supported fans distributing excerpts of The Daily Show online, he questioned the position of Viacom (the owner of Comedy Central, the channel that carries The Daily Show) in its litigation with YouTube, and he opposed SOPA.

Additionally, Jon Stewart's fair use of clips has had a positive impact on policymakers. The Daily Show is perhaps the easiest example to give lawmakers and their staffs of the importance of fair use. A reference to The Daily Show makes them instantly understand how fair use functions, in Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg's words, as one of the copyright law's built-in accommodations to the First Amendment. Further, The Daily Show demonstrates clearly that large media companies (e.g., Viacom) rely on fair use.

Jon Stewart has not announced what he will do after he leaves The Daily Show. But it is hard to imagine that the greatest practitioner of fair use in this generation will not at some point embark on another venture that employs fair use.

Reposted from the Disruptive Competition Project

Filed Under: clips, copyright, fair use, jon stewart, journalism, news, reporting, satire
Companies: viacom

Maryland Politician Says Local Paper Can't Use His Name Without Permission

from the my-imaginary-rights-will-be-respected! dept

All Frederick County (MD) Councilman Kirby Delauter knows is that he doesn't like unfavorable press. Literally, that appears to be all he knows -- at least as far as press relations go. He apparently believes that he holds the power to decide whether his name appears in print, rather than the other way around. Delauter blew off a phone call from Frederick News-Post writer Bethany Rodgers seeking comment on a story and then turned around and called her out on Facebook for using his name without permission.

The post has since been deleted by Delauter, but the image will live on forever... as will Delauter's inability to comprehend how journalism actually works.

Here's Delauter's rant in case you can't see/read the screencap:

Shame on Bethany Rogers for an unauthorized use of my name and my reference in her article today. She contacted me by phone yesterday, I did not return her call and did not authorize any use of my name or reference in her article. I had let her know after her hit piece during the election where she embellished, twisted and downright lied about what we discussed for that article, that she was never contact me again since she has absolutely no morals or journalistic ability.

Bethany, please understand, when you do a hit piece, you need to know who you're dealing with. I have worked very hard to earn an honest reputation in this county. You could have earned my respect, instead you've shown that you will sell your soul for the liberal agenda at the FNP. You're better than that, but you have already sold your credibility and this is something you won't easily get back.

So let me be clear…….. do not contact me and do not use my name or reference me in an unauthorized form in the future.

Having firmly established who's wearing the pants in this councilman/unruly press relationship, Delauter was undoubtedly surprised to find himself swiftly de-pantsed by Rodgers herself.

Wow. Well, just to answer a few of these accusations: First of all, there is no requirement to get a person's authorization in order to mention them in the paper, particularly if that person is an elected official. It is not just our right but our responsibility to report on people like you, who occupy positions of trust in our government, and I make no apologies for doing that. I am aware that you asked me not to call you anymore. However, it is a journalistic principle to reach out to individuals who are part of the article. Again, it would be irresponsible for me NOT to do so, and I plan to continue giving you the opportunity to comment on articles that concern you. Whether or not you return my calls is up to you.

Delauter's response? SWING BLUDGEON OF LAWTHREAT +2.

Use my name again unauthorized and you'll be paying for an Attorney. Your rights end where mine start

And those rights? Nonexistent. Newspapers have been writing about all sorts of people for years, using all sorts of names without permission. That's how that works. Eugene Volokh puts it this way.

Uh, Council Member: In our country, newspapers are actually allowed to write about elected officials (and others) without their permission. It’s an avantgarde experiment, to be sure, but we’ve had some success with it.

Now, Delauter's name is everywhere (including this Kirby Delauter-deluge of an editorial by the newpaper hit with Delauter's legal threats). His first mistake was assuming he could control it. His second was to broadcast his ignorance via a public forum. And, unless he's willing to go the full Rakofsky, the internet is going to keep "using his name unauthorized" without having to worry about "paying for an Attorney."

Ignoring reporters doesn't keep your name out of the papers. All it does is allow them to push the narrative they want to push. At best, you'll get a "did not immediately return phone calls seeking comment." Your decision to not participate in Rogers' news gathering only hurts you, Delauter. It doesn't make you immune from criticism or grant you some special right you can use to deprive others of theirs. If he didn't want a public life, then Dealuter shouldn't have gotten into the public service field. Delauter's lousy grasp of pretty much every facet of this situation makes it pretty clear he shouldn't be allowed to operate a desk, much less be an integral part of local governance. Politicians who think they have special rights are the worst.

Delauter has a small chance to salvage this situation, as Scott Greenfield points out. Anyone want to place odds as to whether he will?

There really isn’t much to add to such a facially laughable assertion as this, but I felt I would be remiss not to join in the Streisand-ing of Kirby Delauter (whose name is used here without permission) because this is a guy who is allowed to have a say in matters that impact on other people’s lives. And he’s a monumental dumbass.

The only question now is whether he’s got the guts to admit the abject stupidity of his threat, apologize and own his stupid. Tough guys like Kirby usually can’t.

We'll see. Delauter has scrubbed his post from Facebook, so it appears there will be no immediate "ownership." Of course, he may believe his rights extend on and on forever, unlike those of pesky journalists. Adam Steinbaugh captured this bit of unauthorized name appropriation by Delauter. Like Bethany Rogers' phone calls to the councilman, this has yet to receive a response.

Did Derek Jeter authorize this use of his name #KirbyDelauter pic.twitter.com/ZLixYkiEBC

— Adam Steinbaugh (@adamsteinbaugh) January 6, 2015

Filed Under: bethany rodgers, frederick county, frederick news-post, free press, kirby delauter, maryland, reporting

Canadian Newspaper Under Investigation For Violating Ban On Publishing Names Of Child Pornography Victims

from the where-good-intentions-meet-the-friction-of-real-life dept

A Canadian newspaper is under investigation for violating a court-ordered ban on publishing the names of child pornography victims. The Chronicle Herald covered the sentencing of a young man on child pornography distribution charges but included the name of his victim, Rehtaeh Parsons.

Rehtaeh Parsons was 15 when the then-17-year-old young man sent a photo of him having sex with her to two other females. Parsons was apparently unaware she was being sexually assaulted. The photo showed not only the young man's actions, but her vomiting out a window.

The subsequent distribution of these photos, along with additional harassment from both the participants and Parsons' peers, eventually led to her suicide. Her suicide then prompted Nova Scotia's legislators to enact an extremely unfortunate cyberbullying law in late 2013, nearly two years after the incident and four months after Parsons took her own life.

In May of 2014, the legally-ordained ban was upheld, forbidding anyone or any media entity from publishing Parsons' name, despite objections from Rehtaeh's parents, who were actively seeking an exception from this part of Canada's child pornography laws. But the Royal Canadian Mounted Police had decided to pursue child pornography charges rather than sexual assault charges and the resulting indictments dragged Retaeh's name under the cover of this ban.

The Chronicle Herald's story on the guilty plea entered by of one of the two perpetrators (whose names are still being withheld because they were minors at the time) leads off with this editor's note:

We’ve decided to publish the name of the victim in this story, despite a court-ordered ban. We believe it’s in the public interest in this unique case, given the widespread recognition of Rehtaeh Parsons’ name, and given the good that can come, and has already come, from free public debate over sexual consent and the other elements of her story.

Rehtaeh’s parents want her name printed, and Judge Jamie Campbell, who upheld the publication ban, wrote in his decision that “the ban serves no purpose,” though he had no choice but to uphold it. Waiving Rehtaeh’s privacy rights “would be a good thing, if it could be done just for this case, just this once,” the judge wrote.

It is difficult for readers to follow a news story when the name associated with it is omitted, and we want to inform Nova Scotians of the outcome of this legal case. We would like to reassure other crime victims that their own court-ordered privacy rights will be respected as always.

As is noted here, Parsons' parents fought to keep her from being "forgotten" by this ban, but to no avail. The Parsons' have given their blanket permission for publication, but that has had no effect on whatever sort of busybody it is that reads this disclaimer and still files a complaint. An accompanying story notes that the Chronicle Herald is being investigated by local law enforcement.

Police have launched an investigation into a possible breach of a publication ban after a major news outlet in Halifax published the name of a teenage girl at the centre of a high-profile child pornography case.

Const. Pierre Bourdages said Tuesday that they had received several reports from citizens complaining about the use of the girl’s name, which is subject to a publication ban under the Criminal Code.

“There’s already been a number of complaints filed with the department in relation to this article,” he said.

“There’s an alleged breach of the publication ban … so we have an investigation ongoing now.”

Now, it would seem that the only party with any true claim over Parsons' name would be her parents, but apparently, certain members of the public feel otherwise. The good news is that this isn't the police's first run-in with the publication ban and they seem to be handling other cases in a responsible manner using context and common sense, rather than blindly asserting that "The law is the law" and punishing those who violate the letter, rather than the spirit.

“Investigators considered whether the victim’s name was used in connection with the child pornography charges as well as the overall context in which her name was used,” police said in a statement.

Based on that and consultation with the Crown, charges were not laid, police said.

Even the prosecutor seems uninterested in laying charges just to be laying charges.

Chris Hansen of the province’s Public Prosecution Service said they consulted police in the seven previous instances, but concluded that there was either not a likely chance of conviction or that if there was, it was not in the public interest to pursue it.

She said they considered several factors, including the past publicity and widespread publication of her name, the wishes of her family to have her name published and the possibility that it would facilitate public debate on a “serious societal issue.”

It's refreshing to see this recognition that the law isn't always binary. The Parsons' have repeatedly stated they don't want their daughter's name removed from additional coverage of this case. The judge upholding the ban also noted that exceptions were needed but wasn't something that could be handled from the court's end. Meddling citizens with no actual stake in the matter may be trying to make things more difficult for the press by complaining about ban violations, but so far it appears they won't be receiving any help from those actually charged with enforcing the law.

Filed Under: canada, child porn, free speech, harassment, journalism, rehtaeh parsons, reporting, sexual assault

Obama Administration Has Put Media Leakers In Jail For Nearly 50 Times As Long As All Other Administrations In History

from the ouch dept

We've been among those who have pointed out that the "most transparent administration in history," the Obama administration, has prosecuted media leakers more than all other Presidents in history combined (eight prosecutions in this administration, compared to three total in all previous administrations). Gabe Rottman, over at the ACLU, decided to dig into another stat: how much time has the Obama administration been able to lock up media leakers in jail compared to all other administrations. The answer? The Obama administration has put folks who leaked info to the media in jail for 526 months as compared to 24 months for all other Presidents combined. Admittedly, 420 of those months went to Chelsea Manning, but even if you take that out, we're still talking 106 months for other leakers in cases from this one administration vs. 24 months for all other administrations.

It once again has to make you wonder why the Obama Administration is so focused on punishing anyone who leaks information to the media (even as it likes to "unofficially" leak information all the time). In the end, I keep going back to the speculation I heard from Daniel Ellsberg nearly four years ago (which is also where I first heard the stat about the number of Obama prosecutions against leakers -- at that time, it was just five prosecutions, rather than eight).

Ellsberg's theory was that while President Bush abused the power of the Presidency in the surveillance realm, he was actually proud of it. And while people were upset about secrets leaking, they didn't find it embarrassing. President Obama, on the other hand, came into office claiming to be different -- arguing against those kinds of abuses and promising changes and protections for civil rights. Instead, it appears that the process started under President Bush continued and expanded under President Obama and -- Ellsberg speculated years ago -- the President is somewhat embarrassed by this, leading him and his administration to react negatively to the leaks. Not because of any legitimate security concern, but to try to silence those who seek to reveal that the administration and the President have not come close to living up to their ideals but rather went the other way entirely.

Putting those who leaked info to the media in jail for 526 months -- nearly 44 years -- says a lot about the way the administration truly views whistleblowing, and it's not a saying anything good.

Filed Under: chelsea manning, espionage act, free speech, leak prosecutions, leaks, obama administration, reporting, transparency, whistleblowing

Fact Checking Is Dead: Mainstream Media Goes Nuts Repeating Debunked Claims By The Fake 'Inventor Of Email'

from the is-this-really-so-hard? dept

I had honestly hoped that yesterday's story about the Huffington Post finally retracting its series of totally bogus articles (mostly written by Shiva Ayyadurai or his colleagues and friends, but a few by its actual "journalists"), pretending to argue that V.A. Shiva Ayyadurai had "invented email," would be the end of this story. Ayyadurai has built up quite a reputation around this false claim, even though it's been debunked over and over and over again.

Ayyadurai keeps coming back, often moving the goalposts and changing his definitions, but still ultimately flat out lying in pretending to have "invented" email. To be clear, he did no such thing. Email was in wide use at the time he supposedly wrote his software. Ayyadurai, however, has cleverly used misleading (to downright false) claims to make what appears on its face to be a credible story, fooling a number of gullible reporters. The crux of his argument revolves around the copyright registration he obtained for a software program in 1982 called EMAIL. But, as we've explained over and over again, a copyright is just for a specific expression (i.e., that specific program), and not for "inventing" anything. The most obvious parallel would be Microsoft, which holds a copyright on "Windows" -- the operating system -- but did not "invent" the idea of a graphical user interface involving "windows."

And yet, yesterday morning, everyone began flooding me with new stories about Ayyadurai, written by clueless entertainment reporters, all because Ayyadurai apparently got married to actress Fran Drescher. The "dating Fran Drescher" story has been making the rounds for a while now, and it was so random and unrelated that we'd ignored it in previous posts, even though one part of the HuffPo series was HuffPo Live talking to Ayyadurai about Drescher, in what was an incredibly awkward exchange (note: despite pulling most of the other articles about Ayyaduria, HuffPo left this one up). In the video (which has been taken down), Ayyadurai made this incredibly awkward "introduction" to Fran, in which he repeatedly highlights that he's just hanging out "in Malibu with Fran," and then says for emphasis "with Fran Drescher, who I'm dating." That leads Fran to jump into view, and the HuffPo live "reporter" Caroline Modarressy-Tehrani starts absolutely gushing over Fran. It was weird, but since it wasn't directly related to whole lie about "inventing email," we hadn't mentioned it.

However, thanks to the "wedding," now it appears that tons of mainstream press reports are writing about the wedding and repeating the totally debunked claim about Ayyadurai "inventing" email. This has resulted in many people wondering if the whole HuffPo series was deliberately ramped up prior to the "wedding" to get the mainstream press to roll with the bogus claim. It's entirely possible, but considering that Ayyadurai has been trying to make this lie stick for years, it may just be a convenient coincidence. Either way, the mainstream press apparently is unable to do any fact checking and is repeating bogus claims as facts. Let's highlight a few:

• People Magazine, written by "reporter" Gabrielle Olya, not only falsely claims Ayyadurai invented email, but says he "holds the patent for creating email." This is all kinds of wrong. He doesn't "hold the patent for creating email." He didn't create email, and he only got a copyright (not a patent) on a program called EMAIL long after email had been created. The People Magazine piece links to the bogus, now retracted, HuffPo story.
• E-Online "reporter" Mike Vulpo falsely calls Ayyadurai "the inventor of email" and also links to the bogus, now retracted HuffPo story. Even more bizarrely, Vulpo links to the now debunked Washington Post articles from a few years ago (which have a huge correction apologizing for the misreporting on Ayyadurai) saying "reports say he holds the copyright to the computer program known as "email." Others say he indeed came up with the term "email" when he was in high school in the late 1970s. Pretty impressive, right?" I love the hedges "reports say" and "others say" while ignoring the fact that his claims to have "invented" email are debunked. And while this is slightly more accurate in noting that he has a copyright in a program called "email," it's not "the" computer program called EMAIL, which falsely implies it was the first one. Even more bizarrely, this same piece was reposted to "NBC Bay Area." You would think, being in the Bay Area, that they might have reached out to folks actually in the tech industry to debunk Ayyadurai's ridiculous claims.
• ABC News / Good Morning America "reporter" Michael Rothman falsely claims that Ayyadurai is the "inventor of email" and makes it even more stupid by saying that Ayyadurai is "widely credited with having invented email." This is not even remotely true. He is only credited with that by himself and a tiny group of friends. Rothman also doesn't appear to understand even the basics of copyright by saying that Ayyadurai is "the first person to hold a copyright for 'EMAIL.'" Again, all he did was write a program called EMAIL, long after email had been invented. It also claims that Ayyadurai "currently teaches at MIT." A search of MIT's staff directory does not actually return Ayyadurai as a current staff member.
• CBS News expands their reputation for skipping over any fact checking by saying Ayyadurai "holds the patent for inventing email." Again, basically everything in that statement is wrong. He doesn't have a patent for inventing email. He got a copyright (very different) on a program called EMAIL. And he didn't invent email. At least CBS News is smart enough not to put a byline on this bogus reporting, but it also quotes the Huffington Post.
• UPI has an article that doesn't mention Ayyadurai's false claims in the text of the article, but does falsely call him "email creator" in the headline (which may not have been written by the reporter who wrote the article).
• The Daily Mail is somewhat famous for its lack of reporting skills and fact checking -- and the publication lives down to its reputation in an article by Chelsea White, which again repeats the myth that Ayyadurai invented email. And while it claims there's "controversy" over the claim (there isn't: everyone except him and his friends know he didn't invent email) it repeats the bogus claim that he has a patent on email: "Dr. Ayyadurai - who owns the patent to email and is often credited as the inventor of the electronic mail system amid some controversy." It also links to the Huffington Post.
• US Magazine "reporter" Madeline Boardman more or less repeats verbatim what others are saying about Ayyadurai being "the inventor" of email and that he is "widely credited" as such.
• Headline and Global News "reporter" Dina Exil repeatedly calls Ayyadurai the inventor of email and also claims he "is known for being the first person to invent email," except none of that is true. He's known for pretending that.
• Popcrush "reporter" Michelle McGahan calls Ayyadurai "the inventor of email" and also falsely claims he "owns the patent for email."

Now, considering that this just some random celebrity gossip, it's not that surprising that these "entertainment reporters" didn't bother to do any sort of fact checking. Why would they? And it's tough to fault them for going for the easy layup on the typical "famous person weds" story. But the problem here is that Ayyadurai has been focused on using any and all press mentions as "evidence" in his bogus campaign to declare himself the inventor of email, and now he has a number of other sources to cite, even though they're all totally wrong.

It is worth noting that not everyone fell for the spin. The LA Times and San Francisco Chronicle both focused mainly on Drescher and more or less ignored Ayyadurai's bogus claims (though, the LA Times does say he's at MIT, which again, does not list him as a current staff member).

The only publications I can find that really called out the bogus claims were Mashable, which noted that Drescher has married someone who "likes to claim he invented email" and Gawker, which noted that if Fran Drescher had actually read its previous articles about Ayyadurai, she might not have married him. What's funny is that in writing our series about the Huffington Post's bogus stories, some of our commenters insisted that this was actually proof as to why these "new media" players weren't trustworthy compared to traditional vetted media. And yet, above we have "trusted" media like ABC and CBS repeating totally false claims, while new media players like Mashable and Gawker are debunking them.

Anyway, I'd like to think this story is now over, but somehow I get the feeling that Ayyadurai will continue to press his bogus claims again and again and again.

Filed Under: copyright, email, fact checking, fran drescher, inventor of email, journalism, patents, reporting, shiva ayyadurai, v.a. shiva ayyadurai, wedding

Real Reporting Is About Revealing Truth; Not Granting 'Equal Weight' To Bogus Arguments

from the nyt-failures dept

Journalism Professor Jay Rosen has long been the leading advocate in condemning the prominence of "he said/she said" journalism in the mainstream media. This kind of journalism is driven by a complete distortion of what it means to be an "objective" journalist. Bad journalists seem to think that if someone is making a claim, you present that claim, then you present an opposing claim, and you're done. They think this is objective because they're not "picking sides." But what if one side is batshit crazy and the other is actually making legitimate claims? Shouldn't the job of true journalists be to ferret out the truth and reveal the crazy arguments as crazy? Rosen's latest calls out the NY Times for falling into the bogus "he said/she said" trap yet again. This time it's on an article about plagiarism and copyright infringement charges being leveled from one biographer of Ronald Reagan against another. We wrote about this story as well, and we looked at the arguments of both sides, and then noted that author Craig Shirley's arguments made no sense at all, as he was trying to claim ownership of facts (something you can't do). Furthermore, his claims of plagiarism were undermined by the very fact that he admitted that competing biographer Rick Perlstein's quotes were different. Shirley claimed that "difference" in the quotes showed that Perlstein was trying to cover up the plagiarism, but... that makes no sense.

Of course, when the NY Times reported on this, it did the "he said/she said" thing, providing no enlightenment whatsoever to the public who was reading it about whose argument actually was legit, and whose was ridiculous. Reporter Alexandra Alter played the false equivalence card:

Mr. Perlstein, 44, suggested that the attack on his book is partly motivated by conservatives’ discomfort with his portrayal of Reagan. Mr. Shirley is president and chief executive of Shirley & Banister Public Affairs, which represents conservative clients like Citizens United and Ann Coulter.

But Mr. Shirley and his lawyer contend that Mr. Perlstein paraphrased original research without properly giving credit. “The rephrasing of words without proper attribution is still plagiarism,” Mr. Shirley said in an interview.

As Rosen notes, this is the "easy" way out for a journalist. Actually figuring out who's right takes work, and hell, you might be wrong. So why take the risk:

You’re safer because you could be wrong if you choose, so why choose? You’re safer because even if you’re not wrong you can be accused of bias, and who needs that? You’re safer because people will always argue about [fill in some bitterly contested narrative here] and you don’t want to be a contestant in that. In the middle is safe. Neither/nor is safe. Not having a view of the matter is safe… Right?

But, as Rosen notes, thanks to the internet these days, newspapers are increasingly having trouble with this kind of lazy "safe" journalism. Because the public will call them out when they avoid reporting the truth, favoring a false narrative instead. In this case, the NYT's public editor, Margaret Sullivan, (whose job it is to examine whether or not the NY Times is best serving the public) called the paper out for this weak effort in response to complaints from the public. She directly notes the problem of this he said/she said journalism:

By taking it seriously, The Times conferred a legitimacy on the accusation it would not otherwise have had.

And while it is true that Mr. Perlstein and his publisher were given plenty of opportunity to respond, that doesn’t help much. It’s as if The Times is saying: “Here’s an accusation; here’s a denial; and, heck, we don’t really know. We’re staying out of it.” Readers frequently complain to me about this he said, she said false equivalency — and for good reason.

So I’m with the critics. The Times article amplified a damaging accusation of plagiarism without establishing its validity and doing so in a way that is transparent to the reader. The standard has to be higher.

As Rosen further points out in his blog post, the ability of the public to weigh in may be changing the equation here. The "easy" and "lazy" response of just doing he said/she said journalism won't cut it because you'll get called out on it. Journalism should be about reporting what's true, not just what people say is true. The continued use of he said/she said is actually "reckless behavior that may easily blow up in its face." Rosen even points out that the BBC is now specifically retraining its reporters to stop inserting "false balance" into stories where there's an underlying truth and an attempt to distort it. It seems amazing that this even needs to be repeated, but it's been that way for so long in many publications.

Hopefully, the ability of the public to call it out will make more lazy journalists and editors recognize what used to be the "safe" move is no longer so safe.

Filed Under: alexandra alter, craig shirley, false equivalency, he said she said, jay rosen, journalism, margaret sullivan, reporting, rick perlstein, ronald reagan, truth
Companies: ny times

A Special Thanks To Twitch And Namecheap For Providing The Matching Funds For Our Crowdfunding Campaign

from the step-on-up dept

Reminder: If you support our crowdfunding campaign today
your support will be immediately doubled thanks to matching funds. »

As we recently explained, the type of reporting we do isn't always conducive to advertising support -- in fact, our work on the SOPA fight caused us to lose a significant amount of revenue, and the blog itself operates at a loss. Earlier this month we announced that we were running a crowdfunding campaign on BeaconReader to fund our net neutrality coverage in particular -- as that's another subject that deserves deep-dive coverage, and which traditional advertisers don't want to go anywhere near. One of the great things about working with BeaconReader was that they were able to line up matching funds, so that every donation to us is automatically doubled by the matching donors. Today we're happy to announce that the first two matching donors have been revealed as Twitch and Namecheap -- two companies that are dedicated to preserving an open and free internet, and who wanted to support our coverage in this way, by multiplying the impact of anyone who donates. We're also announcing that Reddit founder Alexis Ohanian has backed our project as an "Event Sponsor," for a net neutrality salon that we'll be holding later this year.

We're excited to have this support, and just as excited to see so many of you step up to back the project as well. We're about a week away and there's still a long way to go, but the initial support has been fantastic. If you enjoy what we do, and would like to see it continue (and go deeper and be more involved), please consider backing the project in the next week and thank Twitch and Namecheap for immediately doubling the impact of your support. If we succeed, we'll be able to devote more time and resources to our net neutrality reporting, including bringing in additional voices, meeting with key players, and just generally spending more time digging into the details of this important topic -- rather than having to spend it convincing advertisers that, no, we don't want to force a giant annoying video to play on the site before you can read anything, because that's not how we treat our community. It's great that Twitch and NameCheap were willing to step up via BeaconReader, to show their commitment to dedicated, independent reporting on these important topics.

You can help by supporting our coverage right now »

Filed Under: advertising, alexis ohanian, crowdfunding, matching funds, net neutrality, open internet, reporting
Companies: namecheap, twitch