Blogger anonymity & what has The Times newspaper group got against it?

Earlier today there was a landmark decision in our courts when Mr Justice Eady refused to grant an order to protect the anonymity of police officer Richard Horton who is the author of a blog called NightJack.  According to The Times, Horton "began the NightJack blog in February last year" and "at one stage he attracted nearly 500,000 readers a week with his pithy observations of life on the front line of policing."  Horton won the Orwell Prize for blogs in April of this year.  (The Times claims it was for "political writing".  They seem to lack a bit of attention to detail there.)

But let's not overlook that it was The Times itself that sought to out the blogger.  After the decision, they seemed to gloat in the fact of their "win".  The blogger was named and his picture placed in a prominent position on screen on three separate pages of reporting here, here and here.  And just in case you might miss it, also on the homepage at the time (another story took over later).  Almost unbelievably, the Crime Blog at Crime Central in The Times then published this comment "We must confess to mixed feelings about the High Court ruling which allows the name of the award-winning blogger Nightjack to be published...", before lauding the "journalistic digging" and "detective work" of their Media Correspondent colleague Patrick Foster.

There may be a better argument for outing NightJack's identity, but the Times Group has previous on this, in the silliest of circumstances.  Back in 2006, it was The Sunday Times which outed the identity of the pseudonymous "Abby Lee" who wrote a rather sexually explicit blog "Girl with a One Track Mind".  At The Guardian, their memory is as long as mine as Zoe Margolis - the outed one - has given some comments in this article.

Why does this newspaper group appear to be so insecure that it feels the need to attack bloggers in this way?  What threat to journalism does it see, exactly?  Margolis may have done it in all sorts of ways, with urgency and great frequency on times, but when it comes to writing, bloggers do it for free.  Or at a cost to themselves, depending on the platform/host chosen.

Again, according to The Times, Horton has now "deleted the website and received a written warning for misconduct for the fact that he was writing a blog, the success of which has led him to receive numerous offers to publish a book."  If he is exposing the truth, and in this blogging method found the contemporary way to do so - where, whatever the legislation, whistleblowers come out pond bottom - good luck to him and I hope he gets a really good publishing deal.  I suspect his career-to-date may be over after this one.

As for the judgement itself, Eady's record invites the companionship of controversy.  I need time to assimilate his full thoughts.  For example, what happened to his consideration of the right to privacy under Human Rights Law?  Hard to tell, given the media reporting.

One thing's for sure.  The old maxim of "buyer beware" has now extended to a digital "blogger beware".  Your next thoughts - if you blog - may concentrate on "Why is it so important to me that I remain anonymous?" and "Where does public interest sit in all this?"

Comments

[Clare D]

Something that struck me reading this is you describe the Times as 'having a previous' - this is something I've only ever heard on cop shows, and given the context, found it wryly amusing. I disagree with virtually everything this judge does...and I know I'm not alone in this. It seems strange to me that this one man has so much power.

[cfr]

Very much aware, Maxine and posted on Singh previously and signed up to the petition.

I'd like to say that viewing the latest Paronama programme earlier today on privacy enlightened me. It did, but as a scratch to an itch and not an in depth analysis of the surgery kind. Even the music is dumbed down for less impact, it seems.

But there was a taster and times are changing. Not sure for the better, though.

Personally, I can ignore/take sexual proclivities/matters in the public interest, but I feel a blogger, if choosing to be anonymous and spouting forth in the name of public interest deserves more protection than this.

But when did we ever really value the whistleblower?

Picked up a book today on one such in the EU. Looking forward to reading it.

[Maxine]

Mr Justice Eady is the judge involved in the Simon Singh case, as I'm sure you know, which is causing much consternation in the scientific world just now. A call for reform of the libel laws is at the Sense About Science website, signed by various luminaries including the Editor of Nature. Meanwhile, Simon Singh fights on.