CWD--PORN-O-RAMA [part 2]

[David Farber <farber () central cis upenn edu>]

[continued from part 1]


Fast Forward to March 1995:


Rimm finally finds a place to publish:  The Georgetown Law Review.  But he
cuts a deal first:  No one -- absoltely no one -- outside of the law
review's immediate staff is allowed to read the full study.


David G. Post, a visiting associate professor of law at the Georgetown
University Law Center is approached "to help several of the student editors
with questions that they had arising out of the study," he writes in a
"Preliminary Discussion of Methodological Peculiarities in the Rimm Study
of Pornography on the 'Information Superhighway,'" distributed after the
Time article runs.


But when Post, who says he has "research interests in this area," asks to
be shown a copy of the study before advising the students, he too is
rebuffed.  "[T]hey were unable to do so because of a secrecy arrangement
they had made with Mr. Rimm," he writes in his preliminary discussion.


Post also writes: "One would have, perhaps, more confidence in the results
of the Rimm study had it been subjected to more vigorous peer review."


Law review journals, however, unlike rigorous scientific journals, are not
routinely peer reviewed.


But this study and it purported results were anything but "routine."  The
potential magnitude of the study, which was not lost on Rimm -- he'd
already seen the white bread Administration at CMU rush to trample the
First Amendment after reading an early draft -- should have been enough for
the Georgetown Law Review, not to mention the editors at Time, to *demand*
outside review and Rimm be damned.


Hoffman readily acknowledges that law reviews aren't subject t peer
reviews.   (Note:  Maybe this is why the majority of lawyers can't write
their way past a moderately brigh 14-year-old.)  However, she says quite
bluntly and correctly:  "A study like this belongs in a peer reviewed
journal if it's going to be used to impact public policies and stimulate
public debate on an important societal issue."


June 1995:


Mike Godwin, online council for the Electronic Frontier Foundation and
Daniel Weitzner, deputy director of the Center for Democracy and
Technology, have, at separate times, been asked by Rimm to review the legal
footnotes for accuracy.


Godwin and Weitzner say the task is impossible without seeing the full
report.  They are denied that request.


Weitzner fires off several critical concerns he has about the footnotes
anyway, noting that any kind of real analysis is impossible.


Rimm later "thanks" Weitzner for his "participation," even though Weitzner
clearly had denied the review request.


June 8-18, 1995:


A copy of the study arrives at Time magazine where it sits idle.  DeWitt is
up to his journalistic elbows trying to edit a major Time cover story on
Estrogen.  The story is complex and riding herd on it stresses DeWitt.


The good news:  word filters down to him that his promotion, which has
"been in the works for some time," he says,  will be official in a couple
of weeks, about the time of his vacation and right after he puts another
major cover story bed:  the flash point "Cyberporn" story."


Four Time correspondents are assigned to the story to help with the
research.


Time passes quickly.  Rimm's story, like a forest fire, begins to create
its own atmosphere, that  rarefied air of "The "Exclusive." In the
unrelenting, brutalizing competition of the newsweeklies, the scoop is
the ace in the hole.


The Time editors were convinced the Rimm study was their Ace. Somebody
should have told them it was dealt from the bottom of the deck.


So now DeWitt begins pushing for his story, citing its exclusive nature.
But DeWit is negotiating the story's placement based on character flaw:
He was already sold on the story, having used it back in November during
the CMU censorship dust up.  The story held up then, it should hold up on
the cover.  Besides, if it were good enough for the Georgetown
Law Review, it was good enough for Time.


And DeWitt plays the law review card readily, admitting:  "If [Georgetown]
hadn't accepted [Rimm's study] for publication, we wouldn't have done our
story."


At this point, DeWitt has too much invested in the story.  Somehow he
ignores the lingering doubts and presses forward with the writing.  Later,
on the WELL he will admit to personally be "pulling for" the validity of
Rimm's study.


Meanwhile, one of his reporters, Hannah Bloch, is picking up some bad vibes
from professor Hoffman.


Hoffman and her husband/research partner, Tom Novak, have tagged-teamed
some of the Net's trickiest usage based problems, developing some of the
first quantitative models for accurate WEB "traffic accounting." And even
from reading the abstract of Rimm's study, Hoffman smells sloppy research.
"This is a nice example of bad research," she says.


After the Bloch-Hoffman telephone tag review finally ends, Hoffman says she
still feels like Bloch "didn't get it."  Hoffman E-mails DeWitt directly
with her concerns


When Hoffman asks DeWitt to see a copy of the study, he balks, citing the
secrecy arrangement with Rimm.  Hoffman lays out her concerns about Rimm's
methodology and E-mails them to DeWitt.  Among those concerns, Hoffman
notes that a study of such reported significance should have been subject
to some kind of peer review.


But DeWitt blows off Hoffman's concerns, not because of flawed logic or
some perceived hidden agenda.  Nope, DeWitt decides to dismiss Hoffman out
of hand when he discovers -- quite suddenly -- that law review journals are
rarely peer reviewed.   This somehow significantly lowers the credibility
factor of Hoffman's concerns in DeWitt's mind and for whatever reason, he
ignores them.


The concerns are never raised.  Not in editorial meetings, not in the text
of the story.  Nowhere.  A Time reader is lead to believe that the study
was rigorous and without fault.


In truth, the story had been criticized on several levels and by several
different people.  The connection?  None, save for their concern about
sloppy research.


So DeWitt presses on.  Don't let facts stand in the way... he has a story
to write, a vacation to get ready for.  This is his baby and he's under the
gun to deliver.


June 19-23


With barely a chance to breathe after the work on Tme's Estrogen cover
story, as well as several other stories, DeWitt wades into the reports from
his other correspondents.


He fields editorial questions from higher up.  There are still gapping,
mawing holes in the story.  By end of the day Monday, the 19th, he knows he
has to start writing come Tuesday morning.   This is crunch time.  There is
no more slack in the schedule.   Artwork has been commissioned.  The cover
slot secured.  His vacation is looking better all the time....


Meanwhile, Time's public relations arm is cranking into high gear.  They
know they have a hot cover coming up.  They want to get the most mileage
out it they can.  Where do they turn?  Television.


They consult with Rimm.  He's pitched the idea of giving the story to
20/20's Barbara Walters.  Rejected.  Too light weight.  Larry King Live is
suggested.  Good talk hype, high visibility, but not a serious enough
venue.  Rejected.  Conan and the Late Show were never considered.


Finally, the Time spin doctors decide on Ted Koppel and Nightline.  "We
thought Koppel would do a more balanced job," DeWitt said.


Time calls ABC.  "It's an exclusive and it's yours if you want it."  Nobody
mentions the fact that ABC was the third choice...


Another secrecy deal is cut.  Nightline can't give the study to anyone else
either  The article hits the stands on the 26th, but by that time DeWitt
will  be vacationing.  The ABC producers decide to tape him Friday, the
23rd.


Thursday hits and DeWitt mets the 6 p.m. deadline.  Researchers comb the
story.  Top editors read it, too.  "Needs some work," they say and DeWitt
cranks up the computer to satisfy his bosses.  The issue is put to bed.


Friday, June 23rd -- It's Darkest Before the Dawn


At 22 hundred hours, 43 minutes, Jim Thomas uploads to the WELL, under a
new topic residing inside the "media" conference, an urgent message being
sent through Cyberspace by Voters Telecom Watch.


The VTW alert puts the Net on notice: Time is ready to publish on Monday a
study of porn on the Net.  The VTW alert acts like an early warning flare:
"The catch is that no one even knows if the study's methods are valid,
because no one is being allowed to read it due to an exclusive deal between
Time and the institution that funded the study."


Saturday, June 24th -- Bad Moon Rising


Early in the morning Hoffmn logs on to the WELL and jolts the media
conference, calling the Rimm study "reckless research" and noting how
difficult it is to discuss porn on the Net without throwing fuel on the
fire.


DeWitt follows some five hours later with his own assessment of Hoffman's
opening salvo.  He says that Hoffman is right about fueling the fire.  But
he drops a bomb of his own:  He wonders aloud how Hoffman can call the
study reckless when she's never even read it.


However, he conveniently forgets to tell other WELL members that he denied
several requests -- Hoffman's among them -- from people to see the study
before they commented on the record.  He also fails to mention  that it was
a secret agreement with Rimm that made any independent review of the study
impossible.


This early exchange, in a topic called merely "Newsweeklies," set the stage
for what would become a romp into "way new" journalism of the first degree.


Over the course of the next eight days, this topic on the WELL would
ignite a grassroots investigative team held together with no particular
agenda other than seeing all the facts about the Time story vetted.


Steven Levy, a writer for Newsweek, weighs in  He's also written something
about Porn and the Net for his publication that will run on Monday.   The
Rimm study gets a single, dubious paragraph.


Levy would have missed the Rimm reference altogether, but Georgetown law
professor David Post tips him to the fact that Time is running the story.


Levy scrambles himself to get a copy of the study.  He gets shutout.  The
law review won't give him a copy, citing the secrecy arrangement with Rimm.




Levy tries to find out what Rimm or the Law Review are getting in return
for all their secrecy.  Each tells Levy to talk to the other.  He gets no
answer.


In the WELL conference he voices his concern about such secrecy
arrangements, wondering if it was trade off for assurances that the story
would get a cover.


What Levy doesn't know is that in the coming days, the mere mention of
Rimm's study in his story causes the blood pressure to rise within the Time
top editorial staff.   Gone was their "exclusive," or so they thought,
despite the fact that Levy had virtually no detailed knowledge of the Rimm
paper.  DeWitt will be made to answer for "the leak" when Time does a
postmortem on the story.


DeWitt barks back at Levy, defending the secret agreement with Rimm.  He
says he's "much more comfortable" with that arrangement than with some that
Newsweek has made made with top business executives.  He drops Levy a
compliment, calling him "one of the best," and then backhands him:  "It's
not my fault he works for the magazine that secured exclusive rights to
Hitler's 'diaries.'"


He later takes back the remark about the Hitler Diaries, admitting it was
"a low blow," explaining he found it a bit ironic for Newsweek tobe
claiming the high moral ground.


A critical mass begins to form;  WELLites begin to limber up, taking free
shots at Time and DeWitt... and all before anyone has seen the story.


EFF's Godwin weighs in, the voice of reason: "Let's hold off criticizing
Time until we see what the story looks like."  And yet, in the coming days,
it will be Godwin that rises up as judge, jury and executioner of DeWitt
and Time.


The fun has just begun and DeWitt is about to step into a virtual home only
the Menendez brothers could love.


 June 25, 7:36 p.m. --  The Feeding Begins


 "The Time article is available on America Online right now," is the single
line message posted to Newsweeklies on the WELL.


A feeding frenzy is about to take place and over the course of the next
several days the topic will resemble a great roiling, shark infested pool.
Time and DeWitt are the chum.


The events that shake out over the next few days, while localized on the
WELL, are significant.  First, the article's principal author has his
virtual "home base" here.  Second, the WELL becomes the focal point of the
most intensive and extensive critiques of the Rimm study, a factor that
proves invaluable, considering that Rimm was successful in bypassing this
traditional academic gauntlet.


The early reviews of the Time story are horrendous.   Someone suggests that
the phrase "Rimm Job" will be used to identify overhyped undergraduate
studies that masquerade as major newsmagazine cover stories.


Monday June 26, O-Dark-Thirty


DeWitt logs and posts a comment at 2:38 a.m.  That prompts John Seabrook
of the New Yorker magazine to query nearly 3 hours later:  "You're up
early. Trouble sleeping?"


At 2:39 p.m. Godwin's life for the next eight days is defined by this
posting:  "Philip's story is an utter disaster, and it will damage the
debate about this issue because we will have to spend lots of time
correcting misunderstandings that are directly attributable to the story."


Godwin proceeds to take huge, vicious chunks from the underbelly of Time
article by attacking it's least defensible position:  The infamous 83.5%
figure.


Godwin will continue to feast at table of Time for days to come, at times
posting several devastating comments in a row.  He is a machine.  He admits
to "obsessing" on the issue, but "I'm obsessing over what is the truth," he
tells Dispatch about midnight.


He is on the edge of a day too far gone to care about, at the brink of the
next too dark to foretell.


He has been unrelenting in his strategic dismantling of DeWitt and the Rimm
paper.  Even his voice sounds tired.  But all thi takes its toll:  DeWitt
had been a friend.  "I feel like something has died," he will say later.
And to a large extent, something has.


The packaging of the story gets hammered as wll.  The shock artwork, which
includes a damn near pornographic image in its own right -- what can only
be described as a man fucking a computer terminal -- is outrageously
sensationalistic.  DeWitt even admits at one point that he agrees with
views that the art is "over the top."


9:30 Monday Evening...


By now DeWitt and Time are bloody if not bowed.  A crack in Time's sory
begins to surface.


DeWitt admits it himself, acknowledging that he "should have had a graph"
in the story that referenced the advanc criticism of the study that he
knew about.  "That was probably a screw up," writes on the WELL.   He says
he "couldn't risk" giving anyone, such as Hoffman, and advance copy of the
study for fear it would "leak."


Tuesday June 27th -- The Plot Moistens


Virtually bleeding from a thousand cuts, DeWitt acknowledges that the
pressure got to him while writing the story.  In fact, he says that if he
and his team had had more time and "more presence of mind" they would have
called in an "outside expert" to review the study.


But "presence of mind" was apparently lacking.  DeWitt admits that he had
to go from editing one cover story to writing the next with only the
weekend to rejuvenate.  "Such is the life at a newsmagazine these days," he
writes.


Jim Thomas surfs into a WEB site that is supposed to carry the Rimm study.
What Thomas finds instead is a brief description of thestudy, a pointer to
the law review article and a phone number were you can buy it -- not
download it.


And then he points out a curious note contained on the page:   "Current
plans for pages include the Introductory text from this article and the
conspiracies which have reached the ears of the researchers."  But there's
no other explanation.


Nightline runs its exclusive by arrangement segment.  DeWitt has already
been taped the previous Friday.  Godwin goes head to head with Ralph Reed
of the Christian Coalition.


Godwin becomes an instant hero:  He jumps into first into the discussion
and is able to play the "family values" card before Reed.  But Reed is
tossing out facts and figures as if he has somehow been given an advance
copy of the so-secret study.


When Rimm is asked if Reed had some kind of advance peek at the study, Rimm
says:  "Ralphy never saw the fucking study."


Wednesday, June 28th


Hoffman appears back on the WELL after a two day absence.  She is shocked:
In the media topic alone there have been 250 new posts.


Hoffman announces that she and her husband/partner, having finally obtained
a copy of the study, are beginning a systematic critique of the Rimm
report.


Six days later the Hoffman/Novak report is complete, all 9,000 words of it.
 It turns out to be devastating.


Professor David Post, from the Georgetown University Law Center, crusises
onto the Net with his own detailed critique of the Rimm study.  Post
deconstructs Rimm's report in the same manner as the Hoffman/Novak paper.


Thursday, June 29th


Hoffman discovers that the cryptic WEB page message alluding to
"conspiracies" is aimed at her.  On the WEB site, it seems Hoffman is being
singled out for being a bit too vocal.


Hoffman fires off a nasty note to Rimm's faculty advisors at CMU.  They
answer quickly, apologizing for "conspriacy" language that "has no place in
academic discourse," according to Marvin Sirbu, one of Rimm's advisors.


Rimm answers Hoffman, too.  He apologizes for the WEB page, saying that the
person who put it up had done so "accidentally."


The WEB page goes back to "normal."


Friday, June 30-Monday, July 3rd


There is not a minute's rest for DeWitt.  He is continuously hounded
whenever he goes online.  All this is very tiring for DeWitt.  Finally,
after a long protracted battle on the WELL, DeWitt seems to be inching near
defeat, at least on certain points.


David Kline, a freelance writer and contributor to Wired magazine, logs in
and writes that DeWitt didn't conduct what he calls "journalistic due
dilligence" by investigating the study throughally ad by not mentioning
that other experts raised several doubts.


Kline's message has rung the brass bell.


The next time DeWitt logs in, he cites Kline's message saying: "I think
he's put his finger on precisely where I screwed up."


And yet, the story won't die.  Going into Monday night (July 3), Rimm
himself was preparing a detailed assault the Hoffman/Novak critique.


I asked for an advance copy... Rimm said it was secret until he was ready
to announce it.


Why am I not surprised?


Meeks (whew... finally) out...