Debunking Time censorship rumor (Was: why did TIME censor George H.W. Bush's quotes from its web-site?!

[Dave Farber <dave () farber net>]

rom: Declan McCullagh <declan () well com>
Subject: Debunking Time censorship rumor (Was: why did TIME censor George H.W.
 Bush's quotes from its web-site?!
X-Sender: declan () mail well com
To: Jim Warren <jwarren () well com>, dave () farber net

It is silly to claim that Bush Sr. and Scowcroft would strong-arm Time Inc. 
into removing an article from time.com -- when that article was an excerpt 
from their book that you can buy today from Amazon.com:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0679432485/002-4329529-5336027?v=glance

Unfortunately the Memory Hole (which has done yeoman's work in the past 
documenting real instances of censorship) forgot to mention that.

See page 489 of the book, A World Transformed (on sale for $21!), via 
Amazon's full text search:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/0679432485/ref=sib_books_ref/002-4329529-5336027?v=search-inside&keywords=While%20we%20hoped%20that%20popular%20revolt%20or%20coup%20would%20topple%20Saddam

Other explanations seem more likely. Perhaps the article was lost in a 
redesign? Or perhaps Time Inc. inked a deal with the publisher that it 
would only be available on time.com for a few years?

A quick search suggests the second explanation. This is an excerpt from 
Jack Shafer's May 30, 2003 article for Slate:
http://slate.msn.com/id/2083796/
> At the time of the Memory Hole posting, Sept. 21, 2002, the essay could 
> still be found on Time's Web site. When the essay disappeared from Time's 
> site sometime afterward, the Memory Hole noted its disappearance in a text 
> box accompanying the essay. The essay doesn't exist in Time's Nexis 
> archives, either.
> The suggestion is that Time might cleanse its archives for political 
> reasons. But Time Managing Editor Jim Kelly says, "There's nothing 
> nefarious here." He explains that book publishers often insist on limiting 
> online use of an excerpt to the period the physical magazine is on the 
> newsstand.
> "I don't know when the Bush-Scowcroft excerpt came off [Time's site], but 
> the deal with that particular publisher is that it's on for a week. If we 
> took it off recently, it's because we realized it should just be on for a 
> week," Kelly says. "When we do a book excerpt, we always try to get the 
> publisher to agree to keep it on our archives forever, like we do the rest 
> of the contents of the magazine, but publishers being publishers don't 
> like that."

-Declan
(former employee of Time Inc.)


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