The fake quote was published in newspaper obituaries all around the world. Hoax! Fitzgerald told the Irish Times: “I didn’t expect it to go that far. I expected it to be in blogs and sites, but on mainstream quality papers? I was very surprised about”. The BBC and the Daily Mail removed the quote from their websites, and the Guardian published a retraction. It shows that there now exists a major reliance on the internet for information – even in professional journalism. Most worryingly though, this reliance extends to wikipedia, a resource that can be edited by anyone. Scary times for journalism.

This is the hoax quote: “One could say my life itself has been one long soundtrack. Music was my life, music brought me to life, and music is how I will be remembered long after I leave this life. When I die there will be a final waltz playing in my head, that only I can hear”.

The traditional image that many of us have of the internet – as the last bastion of truly free speech – is rapidly vanishing. There are few places left on the net that the ‘Wild West’ of old still exists. It being killed off by laws that restrict online freedom and invade personal privacy, as modern society gradually moves toward the 1984 model envisioned by Mr Orwell. Interestingly, the rhetoric behind the various actions taken by governments against internet freedom is virtually indistinguishable from anything else that we’ve seen in the history of human government: It’s for our protection/freedom, etc. With the internet, the reasoning has fallen broadly into three categories:

1. Prevention of terrorism
2. Prevention of child pornography
3. Prevention of copyright infringement

Outside of that, there are some things like defamation law - difficult to enforce because the internet is an international entity (mostly), and such laws vary from country to country. But to return to the above, different countries have used one or another reason to restrict the Internet.

President Obama, for whom the internet was a most vital election campaign tool, seems to have largely turned his back on his ally. Aside from all the other promises that he has so far broken, one that disappointed alot of people was his promise to make government more accounatable through use of the web. He promised to do this by allowing five days before the signing of each bill on the White House website, to give the public the opportunity to comment. Unfortunately, it hasn’t happened - a shame, but not much of a surprise. However, the two new bills introduced to the Senate are a little bit more alarming. The legislation would grant the government even greater powers to monitor and control cyber traffic. Mother Jones notes that the law “gives the president the ability to ‘declare a cybersecurity emergency’ and shut down or limit Internet traffic in any ‘critical’  information network ‘in the interest of national security.’ The bill does not define a critical information network or a cybersecurity emergency. That definition would be left to the president.” World Net Daily observes that it would “grant the Secretary of Commerce access to all privately owned information networks deemed to be critical to the nation’s infrastructure” – an alarming concept surely.

It’s not just in the United States however. The UK is introducing incredible new laws that allow the governement to monitor and record all social networking conversations, in order to ‘fight terrorism’. Apparently bebo is a real hotspot for WMD. In what, as far as i can ascertain, is a genuine comment – a Home Office spokesman said: “We have no way of knowing whether Osama bin Laden is chatting to Abu Hamza on Facebook”. The legislation covers all forms of social networking communication, including Myspace, Twitter, Bebo, Facebook, and even Skype.

Ruth points out that many Public Service Broadcasters, such as RTE and BBC now allow users to listen online for free, and that most radio stations now offer such a facility. She notes that this has the added advantage of allowing users to catch up on shows that they may have missed.
 
Such observations are very relevant to online journalism. Much of the discourse on the internet has been about how it has negatively affected other media, but as we see from these points, this is not always the case. As someone who has never been a big fan of Irish radio, the internet has been very useful in allowing me to access radio programmes in the United States and Europe – whether it be live, or a downloaded mp3 from a past show. Even programmes like iTunes allow for easy access to hundreds of radio stations, through use of the ‘radio’ feature (see below).

For further reading on this Ruth’s blog  ‘Radio Journalism Online’, see a post made by Cliodhna, which may be found here

iTunes Radio Feature

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Moving on. The proposals would stipulate that children would leave national school comfortable with an all round knowledge of media technology – including that required to perform basic citizen journalism.  This includes the ability to use Twitter and wikipedia as sources of information, and also lessons on how to do blogging and podcasts. The Guardian also notes: “They must gain “fluency” in handwriting and keyboard skills, and learn how to use a spellchecker alongside how to spell.”

 This is undoubtedly a very interesting development for modern education, apparently taking focus away from history and putting it instead on the present. The story also says: “Children will no longer have to study the Victorians or the second world war…” A switch to a more modern media based teaching and “web-based skills” has its advantages and disadvantages. While it would equip a generation to perhaps utilise things like online journalism more efficiently, there are dangers. Over-reliance on technology (ie wikipedia) is already becoming a big problem today. It’s definitely worth keeping an eye on how this develops.

There have been many blogs about this subject already, one such entry may be found here

Online version of the same story

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Project Censored Front Page

Of the top 25 under-reported stories selected for 2009, top of the list came: ‘Over one million Iraqi deaths caused by US occupation’. The full list of this year’s Top 25 Censored stories can be found here. A video about Project Censored may be viewed below.

The Story:Poll of Media Elites

Among the reasons cited for this answer were the massive financial losses incurred as a result which has rendered “challenging, independent reporting” almost impossible. Further reasons given were a percieved blurring of the line between opinion and fact, and an increase in “extreme thought” at the expense of “balanced judgment”. One media insider said “the cost to the business model…and the inability of the business model to monetize the Internet means that there is a disturbing net cost to newsgathering”.

The story did highlight some of the positives done to journalism by the internet, such as improvement in audience reach and reader feedback, as well as the overall quantity of information available – but the sheer proportion of those who feel its influence is negative is ominous indeed.

The Atlantic's Website Hompage

The Atlantic is an American magazine that discusses politics, economics, and foreign policy. It was founded in 1857 as the Atlantic Monthly, and has since developed a very useful and informative website. The site used to be a registered subscribers-only operation, but since 2005 has opened its doors to one and all, allowing all readers the liberty to browse at will, and view back issues in the archives.

NewsTrust Blog

NewsTrust Front Page

NewsTrust’s Execeutive Director is Fabrice Florin, a journalist and media technology expert. A brief (if slightly dated) video tutorial as to how the site functions is below. It explains how each story is appraised by members for its quality.

Democracy Now! Front Page

Notably, it does not receive any corporate, government, or public broadcasting funding in order to maintain the independence and integrity for which the show has become known. In fact, the striking thing about the website is the absence of any advertising at all. It is most refreshing – not only does it reassure the audience that the programme is not compromised, but also the webpages appear clutter-free and more user-friendly.

Free Video Streaming

Democracy Now! provides a number of online features that make it an excellent news website. It has a twitter account that is regularly updated. There is a weekly column, as well as a news section called ‘Today’s Headlines’ which provide headlines and short summaries of news items. The site also includes a well-maintained blog with updates on news involving Democracy Now!, as well as providing links to Amy Goodman’s new column entries.

The Dynamic Duo - Juan and Amy

Democracy Now! and its workers have countless awards for their journalism, which is often used as a forum for voices that the corporate-sponsored media tend to suppress – critics of US policies, and its victims. It also plays host to a number of notable dissidents and commentators – for example Norman Finkelstein, Noam Chomsky, Howard Zinn are regular guests. The increasingly popularity of Goodman and Gonzalez’s work, and their willingness to facilitate audiences by use of the website and free access to the material makes Democracy Now! very important in terms of journalists using different media platforms with great success.