Defining "Journalist"

For the sake of clarity, all facts presented are from online sources and have not been confirmed. No one has been convicted and should be presumed to be innocent until the courts deem otherwise:

In October, a freshman SF State journalism major named Omar Vega was in the dorms where he lived. Mr. Vega had previously photographed a story for the university’s online-magazine about sexual activities in the dorms, so was already on the radar of campus officials who were not happy with this exposure.

Mr. Vega accompanied a group of four students who found a set of car keys, and photographed them as they stole from, and vandalized the car. He did nothing to stop them, and made no report to officials or police following this incident. It is unclear how the participants were found out.

From SF Gate:
"All he did was take photos. ... He was a journalist acting as the eyes of the public, shedding light on the kinds of things that kids do," said James Wagstaffe, one of Vegas' attorneys, who also teaches media law at the university.
SFSU photojournalism Professor Ken Kobre, who teaches Vega, says he believes Vega's actions were ethical. "Journalists can't be expected to stop an event that is taking place, otherwise they are stopping history," Kobre said. "Their job is to record history, and that is exactly what he was doing." Kobre said.
While Mr. Vega had no actual assignment this night, he now claims that this was part of a long-term project about life in the dorms, and is claiming First Amendment protection as a journalist, as is his professors at SF State.

To me, it seems that the courts are going to be forced to define journalist.

Here’s my concern:
Three “gang bangers,” real criminals, have a website to share their exploits with their friends. GB 1 and GB 2 rape a young woman in an alley, while GB 3 photographs their crime with his digital camera. They post the pictures on the website, thereby publishing these images, and fulfilling the requirement of being a journalist.

Does he now get to claim that he was a journalist and should not be prosecuted as a participant in the felony? This is scary!

Ira

'Fake' reporters, eh?

As I read this Salon.com piece about "Jeff Gannon" and how he was able to gain access to the White House press corps despite a complete lack of journalistic credentials, I tried to see this how my students--and moreover, the public--might view it.
Why shouldn't Gannon, self-proclaimed journalist that he is, be able to ask questions along with the media "elite"? The common sense answer I hear from everyone: Must be because he's a conservative who threatens the iron grip of the leftist media. Introduce the subject to students and try to explain why Gannon's treatment is suspicious and you must be trying to defend the media status quo.
Professional journalists, in the public's mind, aren't like professional brain surgeons. Just about anyone can put up a website and gab. Or go on a radio talk show and propound. Or make a cable TV show. Or do a direct mailing.
The infosphere is a messy place. How do we help our students navigate it? They are lost in the mire of words and images. I have 155 students in J-101. Most won't ever take media ethics. They're pursuing degrees in education, business, art and engineering. This is my chance and I feel like I'm not getting through.
Any suggestions on how best to leave a lasting impression on topics like identifying reliable information, gatekeepers, etc., without seeming biased?

The Ethics of Grading

I just read a very interesting article in the B.Y.U. Education and Law Journal (2003) on "The Ethics of Grading" by Gary Chartier (available on NEON).

The author's thesis is that a grade should accurately reflect a student's "subject matter competency." This means that someone who receives a grade of A in a class should have mastered the subject matter and someone who receives a D should be judged as not having a mastery of the subject material. To avoid deception, teachers must be careful that grades reflect competency in subject matter and nothing else.

Therefore, other factors that measure non-academic traits, such as the student's ability to show respect, responsibility, or persistent effort, should not be used to help determine grades. Factors such as attendance or meeting deadlines are not measures of subject matter competence. Giving extra credit for attendance at particular events is not based on any evaluation of subject matter. Instructors who use these factors to influence grades are being deceptive, because they are not an accurate indication of how much a student knows about a particular subject:

Encouraging student responsibility or punishing student irresponsibility does not warrant inaccurate grading.

A student who demonstrates excellent mastery of a subject but has poor attendance and misses deadlines in our school is likely to receive a lower grade than someone who has middling competence but excellent work habits and attendance. Someone who has good mastery of a subject but copies work on an assignment without attributing it will fail a course, thus indicating zero mastery of the subject. According to this author, we can only grade in this way if in good conscience we know that everyone who looked at a student's grades understands that we are evaluating two different things when we assign grades: academic performance and moral character.

The author believes that assessing subject material and assessing personal characterics are incommensurable factors and cannot be mixed. He advocates notations on transcripts that provide personal information, as opposed to conflating the messages of grades. How does this argument stand up to examination as we evaluate our own grading schemes?

Sportswriter fired for plagiarism

A sportswriter covering the Super Bowl for the Worcester Telegram & Gazette in Massachusetts was fired for plagiarism this week. As a poster on the SPJ Ethics listserv noted today, the penalties for plagiarism are getting increasingly severe. A headline in the SF Chronicle sports section reported:

Patriots beat writer
fired for plagiarism

A warning for our students...

GPS Metadata Embedded in Photos

"Apple has confirmed that MacOS 10.4 will support the GPS metadata tags in photos. This will open up a whole realm of opportunities for users and developers to take advantage of the position data on photos."

The Ricoh Pro G3 is a camera that will embed GPS data into the photos; other cameras may be adding this option soon.

The impact this will have on searching will be interesting... "Google me images along the route I will be taking in the order I'm likely to see them."

There are many implications for this technology for the photojournalist if such metadata is made accessible on a paper's web site. Some of these effects will doubtless advance the informational value of the documentary image. Other issues will be raised which may have ethical implications.

[Thanks to Kevin Reynen for this.]