The week six media law lecture was short and sweet, but contained some fascinating stuff. Intellectual property was an area where I had some experience having been in the software business for many years, and the key messages I took away were to properly understand Fair Dealing and Creative Commons licenses.
However, it was the Freedom of Information (FOI) section that really captured my interest, and I've spent an interesting hour looking through http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/ and http://www.foinews.co.uk/ . My aim is to build my freelance work and the Freedom of Information Act might just be one of the ways that I can do that. I've already started to draft some FOI requests in order to build a portfolio of information that can be unleashed on an unsuspecting public - and editors - at the appropriate time. I have been looking at past requests to public organisations with which I am familiar, and there is some great stuff in there - I found Hampshire Constabulary, Hampshire County Council and Winchester City Council to be a mine of information, not all of it useless!
Martin Rosenbaum's Open Secrets blog has some good stuff, and just because requests have been made, it doesn't mean that there are no 'supplementaries' to ask. I'm old enough to remember Michael Hesletine storming out of Thatcher's cabinet over the Westland affair, and "The Secretary of State withdrew from the meeting at that point," made me smile!
I reckon there's a lot of fun to be had with the FOI Act over the coming months - a good starting point is to watch Matthew Davis - he of http://www.foinews.co.uk/ - on the course website.
You are right - copyright is a pain. There's a freelance goldmine though in the FOIA - I would have thought there's bags of stuff in the area of horses and racing, but I can't think what. I know Martin Rosenbaum very well and I play football with him Thursday evenings and Sunday mornings (or I used to before this term started and I lost all my evenings and all my weekends, moan,moan). Maybe you could invite him down to do a talk (save me a job) using my name and credentials - I am sure he would come. There is also a channel four fund for investigative journalism using the FOIA and a man you write to with ideas for big projects whoser name I have forgotten. Then there's Operation Sunlight (in the USA) which is a foundation for funding US / UK FOIA, then there's wikileaks - so it is all happening.
ReplyDeleteBut please DO NOT do any FOIA on Winchester University. I am in enough trouble as it is...
come to think of it you might want to do a work attachment with him in some way instead of doing a conventional newsroom thing, if that is not your thing.
ReplyDeleteBetter still let's set up a little informal Winchester FOIA journalism group - contact Stu Appleby on WINOL (year three), Joey Lipscombe (Y3), Andrew Giddings (Y2) and Jule Cordier (Y2)... I know they are also keen on this so maybe you could work together, not as part ofthe course as such but as an extra curricula activity, similar to going drinking or joining chess club but more journalistic! Plus maybe other students - I am not trying to exclude anyone.
As Matthew Davis shows it is not just good looks and good hairstyles in journalism... FOIA is the quick route to money and fame. Some say it isthe one and only unambigously good thing Blair ever did. He starts a secret war and gives journos the right to find out all about it... you gotta love the guy.