By Donal Brown
The panel on journalists and social media at the First Amendment Coatition Assembly offered wise advice and a few emphatic warnings, chief among them: everything a journalist puts up on Twitter or Facebook or other social media is public.
Speaking at the assembly October 24 in Los Angeles on the panel entitled “Twitter with Care: Journalists and Social Media,” prominent Southern California media attorney Kelli Sager suggests that journalists put nothing up on social media that they wouldn’t put in newspapers or broadcast since you create a public record when you go on Facebook or Twitter.
“It’s not private,” she said. “It [what a reporter posts] is easy to find even if you try to restrict access.”
Sager cited recent suits resulting from careless postings. In July a landlord in Chicago sued a tenant for $50,000 when the tenant tweeted about her “moldy apartment”.
And last March a fashion designer sued Courtney Love for defamation after Love called her a “nasty lying hosebag thief”.
Journalists also run a risk, said Sager, if they Tweet something like “I really got this guy” in commenting on one of their stories. In a defamation suit that could be used to establish actual malice.
Los Angeles Times attorney Karlene Goller said that although reporters would like the newspaper to protect them when they go on Facebook, there was no insurance for that.
The panel did say there are exciting opportunities for journalists who are open to the use of social media. Henry Fuhrmann, assistant managing editor of the Los Angeles Times said about half the staff used Facebook and that Times personnel have over 150 twitter accounts.
Editors and reporters use the social media to get tips for stories, conduct interviews, gather information, enter into dialogue with readers, promote stories and even collaborate on stories with members of the public who are not professional journalists.
Fuhrmann uses Twitter to follow a reporter’s progress on a story. And the Los Angeles Times has an official Twitter site to tap readers for information on traffic tie ups and other breaking news.
Another panelist, Melissa Griffin, a San Francisco blogger and political analyst, was impressed by the dynamic way the social media could expose a story. She was at an October 7 Democratic fundraiser in the City to which Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger was invited. When he spoke briefly, according to one blogger, he met a “chorus of boos” and “random hissing noises”. Griffin said there were no members of the media in attendance, but in no time the report of the incident was out on Twitter and Facebook.
Most of the important media outlets including the Los Angeles Times have published guidelines for journalists’ use of social media. Fuhrmann said that among the most important guidelines for Times reporters is to keep their own biases under wraps. The guidelines say, “Just as political bumper stickers and lawn signs are verboten in the offline world for LAT editorial employees, so too are partisan expressions in the online world.”
It is important then, as the guidelines suggest, that when becoming a “friend” on one side of a debate, to also become a “friend” on the other side as well. Reporters should make it clear they are there to gather information.
Reporters also need to maintain great caution in protecting privileged information. It should never go out on Twitter.
In the end sensible, responsible reporting practices will protect journalists in the brave new world of the social media. Sager and Goller stressed the need for diligence in authenticating sources and information. A reporter can’t assume an online source is using a real name. A reporter can’t assume that a story circulating through blogs is true.