Category Archives: pcc

Joanna Geary: Privacy and social media investigation: how I tracked down an entire family from one tweet

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"It’s easy to say it’s incumbent on the individual to protect their own privacy, but it’s hard to see how we can always stop this type of jigsaw identification of people online. Sometimes people are mentioned online without them even knowing. Certainly having stricter default Facebook privacy settings would help, but it’s not the only answer."

Guardian: Telephone hacking: Cursory and complacent

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Guardian leader: "Since the information commissioner first reported on the widespread use of private investigators by journalists in 2006, the only bodies to have made a determined effort to find out what was going on have been the information commissioner, the police and parliament. The PCC has repeatedly declined to make its own detailed inquiries, pleading that it is beyond its remit. Most neutral observers would conclude from this pattern of behaviour that the only effective scrutiny and regulation of the press currently comes from outside, which is a dangerous state of affairs. The PCC has just announced a governance review. Unless it proposes serious reforms, the cause of effective self-regulation will be unsustainable. That would be very troubling."

Press Complaints Commission: Adjudicated – Iain Dale v Daily Mail

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PCC shock: "Mr Iain Dale of Kent complained to the Press Complaints Commission that an item in the Ephraim Hardcastle diary column, published in the Daily Mail on 30 September 2009, contained discriminatory references to his sexual orientation in breach of Clause 12 (Discrimination) of the Code of Practice. The complaint was not upheld."

currybetdotnet: Has Jan Moir hastened reform of how the PCC handles 3rd party complaints?

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Martin Belam: "The events surrounding Jan Moir's article may seem like some karmic comeuppance for the Mail. It was the paper that led the campaign that saw 2 complaints about Russell Brand from people who had listened to his show swell to tens of thousands, mostly made by people who had read about it."

Times Online: Even a child isn’t spared by the nameless internet poisoners

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Sunday Times columnist India Knight picks up Martin Belam's post about the difficulty of complaining to the PCC view to ponder the nastiness of anonymous commenters on newspaper sites. Bonus item: "I wrote sniffily about Twitter a few weeks ago, saying it was needy and megalomaniacal and plain weird for any sane person to spend the day posting random thoughts onto a public site. I’d like to eat my words. I was completely wrong: Twitter is amazing."

currybetdotnet: Why the PCC is broken – a case study in trying to complain

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Martin Belam joins the debate about whether the PCC needs reform with a little case study from the Daily Mail: "Quite how publishing pictures of a named 13 year old in her school uniform and inviting readers to discuss whether she looks like a slut or not squares with ... the PCC code of conduct I'm not sure."

Guardian: What, exactly, is the PCC for?

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Peter Wilby: "Big American newspapers and magazines go to immense lengths to report responsibly and accurately, demanding multiple sources for stories, employing fact-checkers and making public apologies when, for example, they got it wrong over WMDs in Iraq. That hasn't saved them from circulation declines that are, if anything, steeper than those of Fleet Street. Nor has it saved them from the distrust of many Americans, with the right particularly accusing them of being parties to a liberal conspiracy."

Roy Greenslade: PCC attacked by Media Standards Trust

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"My initial reaction is that [the report] will be pooh-poohed by the majority of the journalists - and by the PCC's members and staff - because it fails to take account of history, whether it be the history of the press or the history of self-regulation. However, it does raise several questions that we should not ignore. ..."

Media Standards Trust: A More Accountable Press: Part 1: The Need for Reform

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"'A More Accountable Press', a major review produced by the Media Standards Trust in consultation with a group made up of 12 leading figures from journalism and civil society, finds that the existing system of press self-regulation, as currently constituted, is unable to deal with the serious and growing threats to press standards and press freedom. "