Deja Vu

At Rising Tide I, one of the keynote speakers, then Wall Street Journal reporter Chris Cooper told the bloggers in the room that "the difference between you and me is I have a 401k" I tend to think that Cooper was trying to give everyone a compliment there although I've read where some of the bloggers found the line to be condescending somehow.

Anyway, it's the first thing I thought of when I read that it's this very distinction which is currently being written into the legal definition of journalism.

Well, read the fine print to see how citizen journalists are left legally hanging out to dry. Schumer’s amendment draws a distinct line between bloggers and “real journalists” that:

limits the definition of a journalist to one who “obtains the information sought while working as a salaried employee of, or independent contractor for, an entity–

a. that disseminates information by print, broadcast, cable, satellite, mechanical, photographic, electronic, or other means; and

b. that—
1. publishes a newspaper, book, magazine, or other periodical;
2. operates a radio or television broadcast station, network, cable system, or satellite carrier, or a channel or programming service for any such station, network, system, or carrier;
3. operates a programming service; or
4. operates a news agency or wire service.”

Personally, I much prefer Matt Taibbi's definition which I think I'm going have framed and hung on the wall somewhere.

Journalists are supposed to be assholes. The system does not work, in fact, if society’s journalists are all nice, kind, friendly, rational people.

You want a good percentage of them to be inconsolably crazy. You want them to be jealous of everything and everyone and to have heaps of personal hangups and flaws. That way they will always be motivated to punch holes in things.

Also, we've just been informed that Cooper, himself, is now actually a lobbyist(!) I wonder what aspect of his benefits package helped define that transition.