Apple court loss a landmark win for new media

Stan Beer
Saturday, 27 May 2006 21:51

Opinion and Analysis

Apple showed recently that it can go to court and be successful against old media companies like Apple Corp. However, when confronted with new media journalism, Apple finally met its match on the legal battle field. In a landmark decision, a California appeals court has ruled that bloggers are journalists and therefore subject to the same rights and protections as print journalists.

The attempt by Apple to force bloggers and an ISP to reveal the identities of sources that had leaked company information about a new device on the drawing boards has failed. This may be bad news for Apple and other technology vendors but good news for the online publishing industry and the free flow of information in its many shapes and forms.

In the final analysis, however, how could the unanimous three judge decision have gone any other way. With each passing day, the world of print journalism becomes less relevant, while online media, through news websites, blogs, forums and social networks, becomes the primary source of information for more than 1 billion people globally. To argue that writers for the new media should not be afforded the same privileges available to writers for a dying medium is ludicrous.

This is not to say that Apple did not have a right to pursue any errant employees within its organisation that may have leaked the information to the media. Divulging confidential information about intellectual property is a serious offence and Apple was perfectly within its rights to take whatever action the company deemed necessary to find the identity of the offenders.

However, for whatever reason, Apple chose the wrong targets. Instead of going after online journalists and internet service providers, Apple should have conducted a thorough internal investigation of its own staff and processes. As a result of its actions, Apple has only succeeded in alienating an increasingly powerful media bloc by attempting to denigrate its status and importance in the current environment of information dissemination.

This is a pity. A large section of Apple's target market is the very same people who shun print media and obtain most of their information from online sources.

And speaking of sources, one of the cherished principles that all journalists worth their salt adhere to is to protect your sources at all costs. For some journalists the cost has been great but they have stuck by their principles even to the point of going to jail. However, in the final analysis, journalists have little choice if they want to stay within the profession. Journalists who cannot guarantee confidentiality to their sources are journalists not worth talking to. Apple, welcome to the world of online journalism!