Fergus Cassidy

Heard back today from the London insurance company about their libel cover. They also sent me a copy of the Professional Indemnity and Public Liability Insurance policy. Seems to cover all the bases and they do cover Ireland.

Alas, you have to be an NUJ member.

In a previous post, I mentioned that more and more publications are now requiring freelancers to indemnify against libel/slander/defamation as a condition of accepting the story.

Damien wonders:

‘I would have thought the publications as the ones publishing were the ones liable, contract or no’.

Under current legislation they are liable along with the printers and distributors. And of course, the writer. There will be changes (defences eg privilege, innocent publication) when the new Defamation Bill is passed.

By getting freelancers to sign an indemnity, the publication is acknowledging that if the writer is sued personally, they’ll be paying their own legal costs. Most staffers will have these paid by the publication.

The other point worth mentioning is that small publishing companies (magazines in particular) can cut costs by getting freelance writers to pay for legal opinion themselves. If you’re writing about something controversial, you’re going to make sure you’ve had it checked by a libel expert.

Damien also asks:

‘What’s the point in writing for the big orgs if they are not going to protect you?’

The big ones might back the freelancer up alright if there’s trouble brewing. Makes them look bad otherwise. But with the way cuts are being implemented throughout the industry, I wouldn’t be surprised if that situation changes.

Obviously, freelancers need to earn a living and competition is fierce. Publishers take good advantage of this. Starting off as a freelance is very difficult and some are prepared to do whatever it takes to get a byline. That includes writing for peanuts and/or for free.

What’s alarming for me, is that faced with these indemnity contracts, the risk becomes too high for freelancers to consider writing stories with even a whiff of controversy. And who could blame them?

It doesn’t bode well for journalism and underpins why the interweb is so important.

I’m not fond of the term Web 2.0. Good name for a book maybe. To reduce the complex and evolutionary nature of networking technology to such a simplistic expression reveals print and broadcast media habits of old: ‘let’s give it a name so we know what we’re talking about’.

Business also prefers the naming game. If there’s money to be made, you gotta know where and how. Does it really matter what the pesky kids are up to? No. Until Rupert Murdoch and Google shell out gazillions on domain names. If there’s gold in them thar hills, you need somewhere to stake a claim.

So what are the pesky kids up to anyway? Well they’ve also been given a name: digital natives. The rest of us, by implication, are mere tourists. Here to check our email and book cheap flights. Occasionally looking in amazement/amusement at what the natives are up to.

What they are up to, we are informed, is ‘social networking’, which is even more perplexing to a digital immigrant. There’s me thinking that social networking has been around since the voice box dropped down lower in our throats and we managed to stand on our own two feet.

But it’s not. It’s found in web sites named with variations of My or You. And that’s where the pesky kids hang out these days, busily building their own culture. These are the kids who were once able to programme the video recorder while the olds looked on in confused resignation.

Now those same kids are video directors, editors and actors in their own productions. If the tools are ready to hand the make their own creations.

There is nothing about Web 2.0 that hasn’t been seen before. Anyone who ever temporarily lost the use of their legs while trying to put together a newsletter or ‘magazine’ on a floor knows what I mean. Or freezing their asses off in some grotty garage building a radio transmitter.

We use the tools that are there in front of us. The ones we don’t have we try and get but plough on regardless. The kids ten years from now will chuckle patronisingly at the best efforts of today. And on it goes.

What is new – and exciting – is that the kids are using the internet in such vast numbers. Creativity abounds. It might not be to everyone’s taste but that’s the beauty of it. Taste is becoming non-hierarchical, a break with top-down culture.

And while they’re at it, the kids are experimenting with the limits and weaknesses of the network’s technologies, bending and breaking them until they give up or finding new ways of doing things..

What they have going for them in a big way is connection speeds. No longer just the amount required to consume but enough to upload their myriad creations. And that’s never enough.

So I prefer Bandwidth 2.0. For the time being anyway.

Apparently it’s a useful writing tip to read out loud what you’ve written. I tried it once or twice but it felt weird. Ended up trying to do impersonations and got scared after I read it in Dunphy!

But Talkr.com (amongst others I presume) can convert a blog feed to an audio file, so it can be downloaded as a Podcast/audio.

The female voice sounds like a newsreader on the English language service of Radio Bratislava.

Have a listen in the player below to the first few lines of my previous post, Libel Insurance:

 

 Standard Podcast: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Through the NUJ, I’ve come across an insurance company in London that provides cover for “libel and slander” and “infringement of copyright”, among other things. The prices start at £251 a year (€372 app), payable in monthly installments if required.

The company today confirmed to me that they do provide the policy (called Professional Indemnity and Public Liability Insurance) to people living in Ireland.

Have asked to see the Schedule and policy wording and also enquired whether it applies to bloggers etc.

More and more publications are now requiring freelancers to indemnify against libel/slander/defamation as a condition of accepting the story. I’ve seen these so-called contracts.

In other words, if there’s a legal challenge the publication washes its hands and points the finger at the writer.

The same publications usually require copyright be assigned to them. So they own the copy but disown any responsibility if the lawyers get involved. Cheeky.

Anyway, I’ll let you know more about the policy details as soon as I have them.

I was recently trawling through old Dail debates (the horror, the horror) and it struck me that very little has changed in decades in how the various government departments are organised.

The current list, with one or two obvious exceptions, wouldn’t have been out of place 50 years ago:

• Department of Agriculture and Food
• Department of Arts, Sport and Tourism
• Department of Communications, Marine and Natural Resources
• Department of Community, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs
• Department of Defence
• Department of Education and Science
• Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment
• Department of Environment, Heritage and Local Government
• Department of Finance
• Department of Foreign Affairs
• Department of Health and Children
• Department of Justice, Equality and Law Reform
• Department of Social and Family Affairs
• Department of the Taoiseach
• Department of Transport.

I don’t believe the organising of government (regardless of hue) truly reflects the changed circumstances in Ireland today, so here’s my rejig:

• Agriculture and Marine
• Culture and Sport
• Communications
• Gaeltacht and Rural
• Defence
• Education
• Enterprise, Trade and Employment
• Environment, Natural Resources and Heritage
• Local Government
• Finance
• International Relations
• Health, Community, Social, Family and Children
• Justice, Equality and Law Reform
• Science and Technology
• Taoiseach
• Transport
• Tourism

There’s an extra two departments in my list, but hey, we’re worth it.

Any suggestions?