Apple case: are bloggers journalists?
This one should be fun to watch.
As part of a lawsuit filed by Apple in Santa Clara County Superior Court on Dec. 13, the company obtained a court order allowing it to issue subpoenas to AppleInsider.com, PowerPage.org and Thinksecret.com. The three Web sites published or linked to information on what they said was a future Apple audio device that was code-named “Asteroid.” The subpoenas are aimed at getting the operators of those sites to disclose the sources of the information that was reportedly leaked.
lullaby pit 
This would hardly be the first time Apple has sued a web site for releasing its marketing plans in advance of a Macworld show. To the best of my knowledge, nothing has ever come of these suits other than the web sites removing the offending photos and/or text.
Also, this is not really a mandate on bloggers so much as it is on web site publishers. The web sites in question existed long before the term “blogging” became generally known, and certainly long before the general public began to think of bloggers in any way as news reporters. So the real question is whether private citizens who run news- or gossip-related web sites can be held to the same standards as journalists, not whether they are journalists and therefore must be held to the same standards.
Finally, there is one school of thought that states that this suit was just added publicity for Apple. I tend to agree with that, quite frankly, and won’t be surprised in the least if this suit is dropped or quietly disappears sometime within the next few months.
–debby
That journalist/private citizen thing is actually an interesting issue all its own. But those of us who hope to avoid being litigated will nonetheless be keeping an eye on things.
That said, it’s about gotten to the point where cheap publicity stunts and the iPod are all Apple has left, huh? 🙂
You just keep telling yourself that while running your anti-spyware software 10 times a day, and reinstalling your system software after viruses have hosed it, eh? I’ll be sitting here, using my PowerBook, being productive, and laughing my ass off 😉
–debby
ThinkSecret publisher identified
He’s a student at Harvard. As the former chairman of the MIT student newspaper, it pains me to admit that The Harvard Crimson actually did a decent job writing up the story … but here it is nevertheless.
The kid does consider himself a journalist, and not just because he’s an editor at the Crimson.
–debby