FC: When anyone can publish, who's a journalist now?

[Declan McCullagh <declan () well com>]

*********

To: declan () well com
cc: politech () politechbot com
Subject: Re: FC: Prosecutors, judges keep Vanessa Leggett in jail for 37 days
Date: Mon, 27 Aug 2001 12:13:02 -0400
From: Dan Geer <geer () world std com>

Declan,

This

  >http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A60302-2001Aug25.html
  >So let's return to the question: Just who is a writer? The
  >obvious first answer to the question is: Anyone who writes.
  >That is the old formula -- if it walks like a duck, and quacks
  >like a duck . . . . But such an all-embracing definition may be
  >too broad for situations where there are strong countervailing
  >societal interests. A murder investigation would be viewed as
  >such a situation. Someone with crucial information shouldn't be
  >able to declare himself a "writer" and thus frustrate a
  >legitimate state inquiry.

leads to a very interesting thought experiment:  The privileges being
claimed inure to the putative journalist by way of role-based access
control.  Their "professional" role is one "characterized by or
conforming to the technical or ethical standards of a profession" where
profession is, itself, "a calling requiring specialized knowledge and
often long and intensive academic preparation."   If you are in The
Role, then you get access to The Privileges thereof, Q.E.D.

Now the thought experiment is this:  If the Profession of Jornalists
(PoJ) chooses to defend the proposition that anyone who wants to be one
automatically is one, then whether I am today a journalist or not is a
role decision that presumably I get to make, both to adopt the role and
to rescind the role, according to my whim.  As the role has and claims
substantial privileges, what bargain would the PoJ offer to society at
large to justify, whether politically or morally or economically, the
extension to the many what had heretofore been special privileges
afforded to the PoJ few?  In other words, if the right claimed is to
not tell law enforcement what one knows today in exchange for the
promise to eventually tell the entire public that part of it that can
be woven into a readable narrative, then the terms of the bargain are
at least clear.

If I were a journalist I'd worry about ending up with fewer privileges
in exchange for many more journalists.  In the meantime, may I borrow
your Press Pass?

--dan




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