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Video bloggers ready to incite 'media revolution'
June 9, 2006
One of the Internet's earliest video bloggers, Wolf refused to testify before a U.S. grand jury and also refused to hand over unpublished video footage he shot during a clash between San Francisco police and anti-G8 protesters in July 2005.
Wolf might normally be protected by California's shield law. But federal prosecutors, who want to see if Wolf's footage shows a San Francisco police car being set on fire at the protest, say they have jurisdiction over the case because the car was paid for in part by federal dollars. (Click here for video. Note: Contains some profanity.)
And in an ironic twist, the very members of the corporate-controlled mainstream media that Wolf and many fellow new-media members like to criticize, have come to his defense and are contributing to his legal fund. Former New York Times reporter Judith Miller, who spent 85 days in jail last year for refusing to testify in a federal investigation, aired her support for Wolf on Saturday in front of the facility in which he is being held in Dublin, Calif., but was denied an interview with him.
Prison officials allowed CNET News.com to do a 15-minute phone interview with their now famous Netizen inmate, who calls himself a "student of anarchist philosophies." The San Francisco man said his jailing might have something to do with his politics, or at least the politics of the people on the tape. But his greater concern is what he sees as the government's attempt to further erode the protections affording to journalists.
Q: First of all, how are you holding up in there, and what's your situation like? Are you being housed in a protected area or among the hard-core felons?
Wolf: I'm holding up quite all right. I'm very lucky to be in this facility. It seems more akin to what one might expect from a mental ward, except the people aren't crazy. I've established a rapport with most of the inmates there. The food is edible, which is a great relief seeing as I'm someone who's a little finicky about food and you can't be too finicky in jail, if you know what I mean. I'm going to refrain from discussing who's in the population other than to say that everyone has been respectful to me and quite friendly and outgoing. The guards have also been very professional and treat everyone, not only myself, but everyone in the population as human beings which is something I was a little afraid I wouldn't observe but I'm happy to say is the case in this federal facility.
Tell us about your rationale in deciding not to hand over the video tapes. How much of it was about protecting your sources, or activists caught on tape, and how much of it was about First Amendment rights?
Wolf: First and foremost, this issue should be a state issue. The federal grand jury is investigating the alleged attempted damage to a San Francisco police vehicle. That is the subject of the investigation. If an S.F. police vehicle is considered federal property, then what isn't federal property? Your school? Even City Hall itself. I'm not sure that that extension is accurate, but it's not very much of a stretch and that is very disturbing.
Beyond that, I should be protected in the state system by the California shield law. The state of California, the local jurisdiction, has made no attempts to try to get this footage. This is an attempt of the federal government circumventing the state protections for who knows what purpose. Something tells me that it's about more than damage to a San Francisco police vehicle. And it's a scary position when you have the government acting in such a coercive, secretive manner. The fact that I am a journalist and should be protected is a very big part of it. When I went in and began documenting this movement, I gave my word to numerous people that I would only publish what my discretion allowed and beyond that would not turn over additional material. So they are sources in a different sort of way than the Judith Miller case, but there still is an element of protecting sources and also protecting people's right to privacy and freedoms of association.
Do you feel the federal government is making an example of you because of your political beliefs?
Wolf: I don't feel that that is the case so much, but I do feel it's an attempt of the government to further erode the protections affording to journalists. I do feel it may be a political attempt to catalogue and chronicle who in the San Francisco Bay Area identifies as anarchist, not particularly myself, but the people on the tape. I'm sure you're aware of the 1950s HUAC (House Un-American Activities Committee) McCarthyism. Today's communist is the anarchist. I'm very much concerned that this is a political witch hunt, although I feel it's less about me than about people out in the community.
See more CNET content tagged:
jury, blogger, San Francisco, journalist, attempt
so one must possess a degree in journalism to be a reporter? i wonder what reporters did before the advent of the communications degree... blogging is the evolution of journalism. big time reporters for big time companies are tied to whatever the profit and political agenda is of their company. but a little kid with a video camera can stop a catastrophe. a little girl with a MacBook might just save the world. our journalists are more worried about advert pricing than reporting the news.
even if every blogger out there was crap - i have the right to decide to read it or not. or at least thats how the constitution used to read.
It might be more behind his case then reported in this article. I read in the text that he was a anarchist? You can't jail people because of what they believe but I had a guy in my school a few years ago, when I was still going in school, and he was anarchist. He had the most strange ideas you can magine and if we would live like the anarchist want us to do it would be like going back to the stone-age or something.
And who is really a journalist?
I don't think he is a journalist. It's too easy to be a journalist today. If I write a diary for my own at home, am I a journalist? No. If I publish it on the web on a blog, an I a journalist? Well, it's seems like I'm. You are not a journalist because you have your own blog or something, that's stupid.
As he mentioned in the interview, there is a difference between a criminal organization (the Mafia) conducting an "interview" or journalism and that of a non-criminal entity doing so. When we start to treat people whose ideology we disagree with as criminals, we have started to do a really stupid, dangerous, and sad thing.
Are you only a journalist if you write for one of the corporate owned media outlets ?
time feeling sorry for him or backing him on this one.
You can protest without breaking the law.
He has film of somebody igniting a police car. He needs to hand
it, or a copy of it, over.
Charles R. Whealton
Charles Whealton @ pleasedontspam.com
A fundamental ideal of the right to free press is the dissemination of said press. To capture video and not allow 'free' access is in itself a violation for all involved. In particular, the footage captured seems to suggest itself as evidence to a crime...a federal crime at that. I for one don't think to be any sort of slippery slope, but a rational agenda being played in the open by blaspheming the very concept of 'free press'.
In one paragraph alone, this youngest admits how mistaken he was about the way the world actually works...a common sentiment to these 'anarchist' types...a group who, much like this person, will cowardly hide behind the VERY ideals they would abolish. How nice for him to live in the United States...where an individuals rights and freedoms are protected, even at the detestment of the individual. He has no idea how lucky he is to be here...
How low we have sunk... If this is an accurate reflection of the attitudes of most Americans, then the trasnformation of the United States into the tyrannical police state it is already becoming is guaranteed (because most people will not resist it), and much sooner than anyone might imagine.
The American experiment in "democracy" and "freedom" is coming to an end -- enjoy its last vestiges while they last!
Winston Churchill: "Democracy is the worst form of government, BUT IT'S BETTER THAN ALL THE OTHERS."
police shouldnt be forced to be jerks in order to pay their bills.
http://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/constitution.billofrights.html
[b][u]READ[/u][/b], [i]DIG[/i] some [u]more[/u] and [b][u]LEARN![/u][/b] ;)
~Mahatma Ghandi
This blogger as well as some in other places are in the [i]fight[/i] phase at present. ;)
That remark highlights his complete inability to grasp the issues
in his case. The grand jury is not meant to be a judgmental
body as Wolf thinks it is. It is an investigative body meant to
gather information. Everyone has a duty to cooperate in the
information gathering function.
There can be only two outcomes to this situation:
1) Wolf will comply with the order to turn over the video, or
2) Wolf will serve his current term for contempt, and, possibly,
more time if he continues to refuse to cooperate.
The entire legal system will not be reformulated to meet a
spoiled 20-something 'anarchist's' specifications.
That remark highlights his complete inability to grasp the issues
in his case. The grand jury is not meant to be a judgmental
body as Wolf thinks it is. It is an investigative body meant to
gather information. Everyone has a duty to cooperate in the
information gathering function.
There can be only two outcomes to this situation:
1) Wolf will comply with the order to turn over the video, or
2) Wolf will serve his current term for contempt, and, possibly,
more time if he continues to refuse to cooperate.
The entire legal system will not be reformulated to meet a
spoiled 20-something 'anarchist's' specifications.
american revolutionists of yore would probably be locked up today.. labled terrorists.. brainwashed.. etc..
Two major issues at play here, from my perspective at least...
1. Responsibility of journalism. This is truly a corrosive element, in that a society is supposed to readily accept ?freedom of the press? without a clear definition of what that entails. Is this person a journalist? I?ll grant protections and freedoms to the press when they?re warranted, but along with those ?items? must come a responsibility OF the press.
Perhaps the Michael Moore?s and the Dan Rathers of the world have taught this generation?s would-be Murrows that it?s fine and dandy to scramble the facts, to pick and choose what constitutes ?real? news. From my standpoint, the paramount responsibility of those entrusted with the title ?journalist? have to be tied with a reality and to report that reality?not to decide what?s newsworthy. This particular person witnessed a CRIME, documented a CRIME (a federal one, at that), and has not only refused to adequately REPORT this crime, but refuses to turn over said record of CRIMINAL activity.
For me, this firmly places himself outside the realm of ?objective journalist? and that?s an entirely different issue.
2. Convictions -- what makes an anarchist? What would drive a person?s desires for an end to organized government? I?m sure these are fascinating questions, but certainly not ones to be bothered with by myself or this particular person? someone so convinced of their anarchist ways he?s willing to hide behind the protections of that he so readily forsakes. Freedoms for the Press? How?s about FREEDOMS in general...
I guess the most ironic thing here would be this person?s desire to martyr himself, hiding behind principle?s he?s rallied against in the past (and will surely again once released), to grab whatever media attention possible?as his individual efforts in the past have done little. Gandhi he ain?t, but then I suppose he doesn?t have to be. What makes this so hilariously scary is that, supposed the tables be turned and this was an act of violence BY the police (as opposed to AGAINST them) this video would be all over YouTube, on every Daily Show broadcast, CBS segment, and half the blogs out there. Being subjective must be a hoot?
Well posted teeter, well indeed.
- Liberal Sympathy for the devil
- by gerhard_schroeder August 15, 2006 1:58 PM PDT
- Oh BOO HOO you big liberal baby... so sorry you got caught. I guess I should just go down to the new york times and videotape my friends burning down their building. Then I can claim innocence of blogging...
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