More on Kevin Sites/CNN
Notes and comments are flying about CNN asking Kevin Sites to cease posting to his war blog. Jimmy Guterman says he is talking about it and pointing to Jarvis. The message below was sent out by Dave Farber. to folks on his list.
Has it occurred to anyone that the simplest solution would be to bring Site’s blog–or some web page version thereof–onto the CNN site?
Of course, that would mean highlighting one correspondent above the others, which is not part of the CNN m.o., not unless it’s an anchor they select…
Forwarded Message
From: Bonnie Bucqueroux
Date: Mon, 24 Mar 2003 10:16:28 -0500
To: dave@farber.net
Subject: CNN foolishness
I posted to the Society for Professional Journalists listserv about CNN
ordering Sites to stop his weblog. I was surprised that it generated
relatively little comment and that most of the posters seemed to view this
as a copyright or contract issue rather than a free speech right. My hunch
is that the CNN lawyers also saw it this way — that they own whatever
Sites produces over there, by contract, and that they do not want to be
liable for something they do not control. One poster noted that CNN, of
all the cable networks, was the only one to demand that all field producers
get script approval before putting anything on the air.
For all the live coverage of the fighting, so much of the war reporting
seems as processed as American cheese. I am truly sorry to see an
independent voice silenced.
Bonnie Bucqueroux
Michigan State University
Victims and the Media Program
School of Journalism