I'm starting a new section called "The Rules of Work". My ideas and advice on how to flourish in an office environment, accumulated over the last decade and a half (almost) of working in offices in the UK - in banking, insurance, the Metropolitan Police, local councils, charities and IT departments. I've been around a bit ;)
Here are some rules to get you started:
Look Busy. When you walk somewhere in the office – to another part of the building, to the photocopier, to have a chat with your friend about anything – always carry file conspicuously held in your hand or tucked under your arm. If not a file then a notepad or a bunch of papers. Take something with you on every trip you make. It makes you look professional, like you have a purpose and are a dedicated guy who is focussed on their work and not an idler who is loafing around. Of course, you are focussed on your work. I know that, and you know that. But even if you’re going for a chat about what your friend did over the weekend, always carry your file with you; you always want to look busy.
If you make a mistake, for goodness’ sake don’t try and cover it up. Ever.
If it’s your fault apologise. Don’t try and qualify your apology, deflect blame or justify yourself. If you do it will be easy to spot and your apology will be ignored; in fact people will regard you worse than they did if you hadn’t apologised at all.
· When you write an email, put together the text first; add in the name of the addressee afterwards.
· Never write anything personal about anyone in an email. Ever. No matter how much of a git they are. Anything you type on a keyboard remains in cyberspace FOREVER and can come back and haunt you. IT departments are rubbish at most things but strangely are very good at keeping things that can damn you.
· Never badmouth anyone, even in private. You think it’s safe by the water cooler, but it’s not. For a start you can (and probably will) be overheard; but even if you’re not, your co-conspirator only needs to tell one person they think they can trust and the dominoes will start falling – a chain reaction which will lead inexorably to someone who will hear that you have been badmouthing their best buddy. Oops. If you really have to, criticise their work, never them personally. That way you have something to back yourself up with.
· Try and keep your private life out of your work life. Especially relationships.
Friday, 7 August 2009
Extradite Gary McKinnon
Always be suspicious when has-been ‘celebrities’ join forces with politicians to campaign for something. Especially when the something in question has been reduced to a black-and-white, good versus-evil protest with political agendas thrown in. Enter Gary McKinnon.
GK has admitted hacking into Pentagon computers and the US authorities, not surprisingly, want to try him for it. He's been fighting extradition. Not because he didn't do it - he's admitted that he did - but because (a) he doesn't think he can handle a long stretch in the clink and (b) he says really didn't mean it - he was looking for aliens, you see.
Now I don't know the full facts of the case. And neither do you. But neither, more importantly, do Boris Johnson and all the other media whores who have jumped on the McKinnon bandwagon. None of them know the full facts. But they are quite happy to prefer not to hear them in a court of law because it means they can use this case as a political football.
Boris Johnson's argument is that McKinnon is a 'classic British nut-job' - and so should not be tried on that basis! I didn't know that being a nut-job determined the validity or otherwise of an extradition request. Don't judge people by your own standards, Boris. The Daily Mail wants another stick to beat the Government with and so has championed his case. Gary McKinnon's mother is deluded in the way that only the mother of a criminal could be - 'not my boy!' is her argument.
There is a familiar narrative of self-pity in this tale. Our culture's first priority is to look for victimisation - either find it, or perpetrate it ourselves. So this story of an alleged crime and possible trial has instead been transmogrified into a pantomime story of victimhood: one of our boys being bullied by the American military; a poor hacker faced with oblivion by a faceless prison-system. No-one actually claims he didn't do it. It's just that his supporters don't want him to be punished; or more specifically, they don't want the Americans to punish him.
If McKinnon had hacked into the American branch of Stop the War, Save the Burkha, or The Campaign Stop the American Military Whilst Spreading Love and Happiness these protestors would swivel 180 degrees and be releasing albums urging he be packed off onto the first jet to the US.
Anti-Americanism. Again. Don't these people ever get tired of it? It's so passé. You can bet your bottom dollar - or British Pound - that if the situation were reversed and an American geek had hacked into the Ministry of Defence's computers and potentially compromised or endangered 'our boys' in the military then the Daily Mail would be screaming for his extradition to Belmarsh.
And then there's a political point that people who don't really care about McKinnon have been pushing. That the extradition treaty between the UK and US, signed in haste after 9/11, is unfair and biased towards the US system, they claim. And maybe it is. But so what? Argue about the treaty, don't have a hissy fit and say "That's it, you're not having this hacker now". The terms of the treaty are clear. If you want to abrogate the treaty then do so - but do it for everyone.
The last argument is a relatively new one in this case. That Gary McKinnon 'suffers' from something called Asperger's Syndrome. Apparently it's a form of autism that, according to the National Autistic Society's website can cause difficulty with social interaction, social communication and social imagination.
Nothing about distinguishing right from wrong. Nothing about being compos mentis. Nothing about being fit or otherwise to stand trial. It's just not relevant.
McKinnon knew what he was doing. He knew that his excuse that he was looking for aliens was hogwash. He just dreamt that up when he got caught, and celebrities-without-a-cause bought his line and signed up to his defence without the slightest clue about what they were doing.
He's as guilty as sin. Think I'm jumping the gun? Fine, let a jury decide. The House of Lords and the European Court have all agreed to his extradition. None of their eminences have agreed with his mum that he faces an unfair trial, that he is unfit to stand trial, that the offence is not serious enough - in other words they have thrown out all the excuses Gary McKinnon has come out with.
So off you go to America, Gary. If you're clever enough to crash Pentagon computers then I'm sure you'll have no problems at all in a court of law. If a jury agrees that you're a harmless fantasist you'll be back home for tea and biscuits. If not, then I hope you like prison food. :)
GK has admitted hacking into Pentagon computers and the US authorities, not surprisingly, want to try him for it. He's been fighting extradition. Not because he didn't do it - he's admitted that he did - but because (a) he doesn't think he can handle a long stretch in the clink and (b) he says really didn't mean it - he was looking for aliens, you see.
Now I don't know the full facts of the case. And neither do you. But neither, more importantly, do Boris Johnson and all the other media whores who have jumped on the McKinnon bandwagon. None of them know the full facts. But they are quite happy to prefer not to hear them in a court of law because it means they can use this case as a political football.
Boris Johnson's argument is that McKinnon is a 'classic British nut-job' - and so should not be tried on that basis! I didn't know that being a nut-job determined the validity or otherwise of an extradition request. Don't judge people by your own standards, Boris. The Daily Mail wants another stick to beat the Government with and so has championed his case. Gary McKinnon's mother is deluded in the way that only the mother of a criminal could be - 'not my boy!' is her argument.
There is a familiar narrative of self-pity in this tale. Our culture's first priority is to look for victimisation - either find it, or perpetrate it ourselves. So this story of an alleged crime and possible trial has instead been transmogrified into a pantomime story of victimhood: one of our boys being bullied by the American military; a poor hacker faced with oblivion by a faceless prison-system. No-one actually claims he didn't do it. It's just that his supporters don't want him to be punished; or more specifically, they don't want the Americans to punish him.
If McKinnon had hacked into the American branch of Stop the War, Save the Burkha, or The Campaign Stop the American Military Whilst Spreading Love and Happiness these protestors would swivel 180 degrees and be releasing albums urging he be packed off onto the first jet to the US.
Anti-Americanism. Again. Don't these people ever get tired of it? It's so passé. You can bet your bottom dollar - or British Pound - that if the situation were reversed and an American geek had hacked into the Ministry of Defence's computers and potentially compromised or endangered 'our boys' in the military then the Daily Mail would be screaming for his extradition to Belmarsh.
And then there's a political point that people who don't really care about McKinnon have been pushing. That the extradition treaty between the UK and US, signed in haste after 9/11, is unfair and biased towards the US system, they claim. And maybe it is. But so what? Argue about the treaty, don't have a hissy fit and say "That's it, you're not having this hacker now". The terms of the treaty are clear. If you want to abrogate the treaty then do so - but do it for everyone.
The last argument is a relatively new one in this case. That Gary McKinnon 'suffers' from something called Asperger's Syndrome. Apparently it's a form of autism that, according to the National Autistic Society's website can cause difficulty with social interaction, social communication and social imagination.
Nothing about distinguishing right from wrong. Nothing about being compos mentis. Nothing about being fit or otherwise to stand trial. It's just not relevant.
McKinnon knew what he was doing. He knew that his excuse that he was looking for aliens was hogwash. He just dreamt that up when he got caught, and celebrities-without-a-cause bought his line and signed up to his defence without the slightest clue about what they were doing.
He's as guilty as sin. Think I'm jumping the gun? Fine, let a jury decide. The House of Lords and the European Court have all agreed to his extradition. None of their eminences have agreed with his mum that he faces an unfair trial, that he is unfit to stand trial, that the offence is not serious enough - in other words they have thrown out all the excuses Gary McKinnon has come out with.
So off you go to America, Gary. If you're clever enough to crash Pentagon computers then I'm sure you'll have no problems at all in a court of law. If a jury agrees that you're a harmless fantasist you'll be back home for tea and biscuits. If not, then I hope you like prison food. :)
Thursday, 6 August 2009
A Little Wit
"Can I ask a stupid question?"
"Yes - better than anyone I've ever met".
(Golden Girls, TV Show).
Love this one. I gotta remember it!
"Yes - better than anyone I've ever met".
(Golden Girls, TV Show).
Love this one. I gotta remember it!
Thursday, 23 July 2009
The Great Financial Crisis
The following is a copy of a short essay I was required to write recently as part of a job application I made to a Business-to-Business media company as a trainee journalist.
The essay was required to be 500 words long and the only stated requirement was to "discuss the response of the British Government and regulatory authorities to the financial crisis". A pretty broad topic, and not many words to do it in. Here it is.
In late 2007 Northern Rock found itself struggling to raise money on capital markets. Defaults on sub-prime mortgages in the US had triggered a banking ‘credit crunch’ and banks which had specialised in mortgages found themselves unable to raise funds on capital markets. The government searched in vain for a private buyer before finally nationalised Northern Rock in February 2008. As credit tightened and liquidity decreased the Government moved to a Keynesian policy of active intervention to free up credit, consisting primarily of capital injection and asset guarantees.
The Government at first encouraged buy-outs, such as Lloyds TSB’s takeover of HBOS. The Bank of England, although its remit was supposedly limited to inflation targets, created a Special Liquidity Scheme to swap banks’ risky mortgage assets for billions of pounds of government debt. As banks refused to lend and share prices plummeted, private buyers stayed away and the Government was forced to nationalise banks such as Bradford and Bingley, taking on their debt. This process snowballed by October 2008 into the offer of unlimited guarantees to all British banks. The objective was to restore confidence, encourage lending and forestall a recession. Despite this the UK entered recession anyway.
In September 2007 the FSA imposed a belated ban on short-selling to relieve downward share price pressure. It also announced it would guarantee savings of up to £50,000 to try and reassure small savers. To boost lending the Bank of England made a succession of interest rate cuts until they reached the lowest rates ever seen in the UK. As the economy deteriorated the UK Government injected billions of pounds of taxpayers’ cash to bail out major banks in exchange for equity stakes. Confidence and lending had fallen so low that it was felt that only the most direct form of state intervention and control could restart lending. The Government had to hope, rather than guarantee, that taxpayers would eventually get their money back.
A second bank bail-out was launched in January this year, taking the total to almost £400 billion. The government also tried to tackle the problem by cutting VAT to encourage consumer spending; but (as German politicians pointed out) when weighed against the public’s instinct to save and continuing high street sales, the small VAT reduction had little effect. The government also unveiled plans to guarantee up to £20 billion of loans to firms.
The response of the Government and regulatory authorities has been incremental, reactive and often too little too late. The Chancellor’s recent reforms to vet the pay deals of bank executives, force banks to hold more capital and stop lending ‘overstretch’ by banks have not fundamentally altered the ‘tripartite’ regulatory structure between the Treasury, FSA and Bank of England. Nevertheless, the government has avoided a total banking collapse and this should be praised. The real cost, however, aside from huge debts, has been a collapse in the public’s trust.
498 words
The essay was required to be 500 words long and the only stated requirement was to "discuss the response of the British Government and regulatory authorities to the financial crisis". A pretty broad topic, and not many words to do it in. Here it is.
In late 2007 Northern Rock found itself struggling to raise money on capital markets. Defaults on sub-prime mortgages in the US had triggered a banking ‘credit crunch’ and banks which had specialised in mortgages found themselves unable to raise funds on capital markets. The government searched in vain for a private buyer before finally nationalised Northern Rock in February 2008. As credit tightened and liquidity decreased the Government moved to a Keynesian policy of active intervention to free up credit, consisting primarily of capital injection and asset guarantees.
The Government at first encouraged buy-outs, such as Lloyds TSB’s takeover of HBOS. The Bank of England, although its remit was supposedly limited to inflation targets, created a Special Liquidity Scheme to swap banks’ risky mortgage assets for billions of pounds of government debt. As banks refused to lend and share prices plummeted, private buyers stayed away and the Government was forced to nationalise banks such as Bradford and Bingley, taking on their debt. This process snowballed by October 2008 into the offer of unlimited guarantees to all British banks. The objective was to restore confidence, encourage lending and forestall a recession. Despite this the UK entered recession anyway.
In September 2007 the FSA imposed a belated ban on short-selling to relieve downward share price pressure. It also announced it would guarantee savings of up to £50,000 to try and reassure small savers. To boost lending the Bank of England made a succession of interest rate cuts until they reached the lowest rates ever seen in the UK. As the economy deteriorated the UK Government injected billions of pounds of taxpayers’ cash to bail out major banks in exchange for equity stakes. Confidence and lending had fallen so low that it was felt that only the most direct form of state intervention and control could restart lending. The Government had to hope, rather than guarantee, that taxpayers would eventually get their money back.
A second bank bail-out was launched in January this year, taking the total to almost £400 billion. The government also tried to tackle the problem by cutting VAT to encourage consumer spending; but (as German politicians pointed out) when weighed against the public’s instinct to save and continuing high street sales, the small VAT reduction had little effect. The government also unveiled plans to guarantee up to £20 billion of loans to firms.
The response of the Government and regulatory authorities has been incremental, reactive and often too little too late. The Chancellor’s recent reforms to vet the pay deals of bank executives, force banks to hold more capital and stop lending ‘overstretch’ by banks have not fundamentally altered the ‘tripartite’ regulatory structure between the Treasury, FSA and Bank of England. Nevertheless, the government has avoided a total banking collapse and this should be praised. The real cost, however, aside from huge debts, has been a collapse in the public’s trust.
498 words
Tuesday, 21 July 2009
BBC Licence Fee - licenced robbery
I've just had my latest direct debit through the post for the BBC licence fee. £142.50. The Licence Fee seems to be one of those things, like rain in the summer, that people seem to think is inevitable unless you go abroad. Except that it isn't. The Licence Fee should be abolished and the BBC privatised.
The licence fee is an anachronism, as well as being unfair and an inefficient way of funding what remains an organisation that still produces a lot of good stuff. Anachronism because the BBC is no longer the only channel out there. Unfair because you are forced to pay - under pain of jail - whether you watch the BBC or not. And inefficient because it stifles innovation and distorts output.
There is simply no coherent reason why the entire TV-watching population should fund a media organisation, even if they never watch it. The counter-argument is that the BBC is a source of excellence and a national institution: "Auntie". Well, I like my aunties but I still think they should pay their way.
I've always thought that simply being around a long time and having a bit of history - or being old, in plain English - is not sufficient to isolate an instutution from changing times. A bit like the Royal Family.
There are lots of sources of excellence in TV (and other media) - the internet has opened the floodgates and the market is king. If people like it, it will pay it's way; it they don't, it dies. I do actually support the state stepping in and preserving and nurturing our cultural heritage if society becomes more Philistine and prefers Big Brother to quality documentaries.
But the irony is that the BBC cannot escape market forces; it actually has to join the mob and pay Jonathan Ross his millions, bid for cricket, Wimbledon, football and other sport, buy film rights to screen them. So in fact the BBC would be better off being freed from the grip of the Government and the Culture Secretary telling them how to spend our money (not 'their' money) and going it alone by selling its output, having adverts and making better use of the internet and newer technologies. If the BBC's supporters are so confident that its output is first-rate, world-beating and second to none, then why not put their money where their mouth is? Why do you need a subsidy?
This isn't the USSR. Why should the Government control the BBC? What's that you say? They don't control the output? Au contraire, the Govenment can raise or lower the licence fee and appoint the Director General and therefore has the BBC by the short and curlies. The irony is it's our money, not the Government's. Any yet the licence-fee payers have very little, if any, control over the BBC's output.
The licence fee has also distorted the political slant of the BBC. Ever wondered why the BBC advertises its jobs in the Guardian and not The Telegraph? Surprise, surprise. BBC, of course, has a left-wing slant, which unless you've been living on the dark side of the moon for the last 50 years you can't have failed to spot. Left-wing, by the way, means more state influence and control as opposed to free enterprise; it does not mean equality as opposed to racism, as some people seem to think. State influence - it's starting to make sense, isn't it?
It's said by some that privatising 'Auntie' would lead to a political slant anyway. Maybe. But so what? At least people would have a choice whether to fund it or not (by watching it). Right now there is no choice. A company that forces money out of you and then creates content that has a slant you may not agree with! Want to switch over? Fine, don't watch us, but guess what - we'll take your money anyway! We don't care if you think it's mad, it's the law.
Scrap the licence fee and privatise the BBC.
The licence fee is an anachronism, as well as being unfair and an inefficient way of funding what remains an organisation that still produces a lot of good stuff. Anachronism because the BBC is no longer the only channel out there. Unfair because you are forced to pay - under pain of jail - whether you watch the BBC or not. And inefficient because it stifles innovation and distorts output.
There is simply no coherent reason why the entire TV-watching population should fund a media organisation, even if they never watch it. The counter-argument is that the BBC is a source of excellence and a national institution: "Auntie". Well, I like my aunties but I still think they should pay their way.
I've always thought that simply being around a long time and having a bit of history - or being old, in plain English - is not sufficient to isolate an instutution from changing times. A bit like the Royal Family.
There are lots of sources of excellence in TV (and other media) - the internet has opened the floodgates and the market is king. If people like it, it will pay it's way; it they don't, it dies. I do actually support the state stepping in and preserving and nurturing our cultural heritage if society becomes more Philistine and prefers Big Brother to quality documentaries.
But the irony is that the BBC cannot escape market forces; it actually has to join the mob and pay Jonathan Ross his millions, bid for cricket, Wimbledon, football and other sport, buy film rights to screen them. So in fact the BBC would be better off being freed from the grip of the Government and the Culture Secretary telling them how to spend our money (not 'their' money) and going it alone by selling its output, having adverts and making better use of the internet and newer technologies. If the BBC's supporters are so confident that its output is first-rate, world-beating and second to none, then why not put their money where their mouth is? Why do you need a subsidy?
This isn't the USSR. Why should the Government control the BBC? What's that you say? They don't control the output? Au contraire, the Govenment can raise or lower the licence fee and appoint the Director General and therefore has the BBC by the short and curlies. The irony is it's our money, not the Government's. Any yet the licence-fee payers have very little, if any, control over the BBC's output.
The licence fee has also distorted the political slant of the BBC. Ever wondered why the BBC advertises its jobs in the Guardian and not The Telegraph? Surprise, surprise. BBC, of course, has a left-wing slant, which unless you've been living on the dark side of the moon for the last 50 years you can't have failed to spot. Left-wing, by the way, means more state influence and control as opposed to free enterprise; it does not mean equality as opposed to racism, as some people seem to think. State influence - it's starting to make sense, isn't it?
It's said by some that privatising 'Auntie' would lead to a political slant anyway. Maybe. But so what? At least people would have a choice whether to fund it or not (by watching it). Right now there is no choice. A company that forces money out of you and then creates content that has a slant you may not agree with! Want to switch over? Fine, don't watch us, but guess what - we'll take your money anyway! We don't care if you think it's mad, it's the law.
Scrap the licence fee and privatise the BBC.
Saturday, 27 June 2009
Michael Jackson and the curse of fame
Farewell Jacko. The Sun was right - you really were wacko, but the thing is, you probably couldn't have been anything else. If there is a lesson from his life it is that being famous is more of a curse than a blessing.
He had no childhood. Well, not a childhood that any of us would recognise. Being the object of a marketing campaign when you're twelve or whatever just ain't good for you. For a start you don't rub alongside the other kids because you've got a tour to do. As a kid you need to experience a few failures and find a way to deal with them. But if you're famous your manager and record company deal with that. You're just a money-making machine to them.
He had so much money he didn't seem to understand the value of it. He covered up his kids and himself in public because they didn't have a private life. What child deserves that? That's got to be the most devastating thing about being famous in that instantly-recognised, dumbly-adulated way: no privacy whatsoever. If that's not a living hell will somebody please tell me what is.
If people who go on X-Factor, Britain's Got 'Talent' (couldn't resist the quotation marks) and others can't learn from Michael Jackson, if they still think that it's a good career move to be human heroin for TV and tabloid junkies to inject themselveswith for an instant thrill or distraction, then more fool them.
He had no childhood. Well, not a childhood that any of us would recognise. Being the object of a marketing campaign when you're twelve or whatever just ain't good for you. For a start you don't rub alongside the other kids because you've got a tour to do. As a kid you need to experience a few failures and find a way to deal with them. But if you're famous your manager and record company deal with that. You're just a money-making machine to them.
He had so much money he didn't seem to understand the value of it. He covered up his kids and himself in public because they didn't have a private life. What child deserves that? That's got to be the most devastating thing about being famous in that instantly-recognised, dumbly-adulated way: no privacy whatsoever. If that's not a living hell will somebody please tell me what is.
If people who go on X-Factor, Britain's Got 'Talent' (couldn't resist the quotation marks) and others can't learn from Michael Jackson, if they still think that it's a good career move to be human heroin for TV and tabloid junkies to inject themselveswith for an instant thrill or distraction, then more fool them.
Monday, 22 June 2009
NightJack vs The Times
A police officer and blogger who reported from inside the police has been revealed. He had battled in the courts to keep his identity secret, but the judge overruled him and he was unmasked. He called himself 'NightJack. In fact he is Richard Horton, a detective constable in the Lancashire constabulary.
The ruling is significant because it sets a precedent: My Justice Eady ruled that blogging is essentially a public activity and that bloggers therefore have no automatic right to privacy.
So it’s a bad day for us bloggers. If you are a whistleblower exposing corruption or incompetence, the law will not ride to your defence. Even if you have something interesting to say that gets you a following (NightJack had 500,000 apparently – if only I had that!) you have no legal right to privacy and so your employer can, and probably will, catch you. And sack you.
The Times is responsible for this. The reporter who sniffed out NightJack is Patrick Foster. Readers of my blog will see that I worked at The Times recently, doing work experience on their Home News section. I didn’t meet Patrick Foster, but as you will see in my previous post, I got a flavour of the ethos of The Times during my time there.
Was this a blow for, or against freedom? This judgment doesn’t restrict freedom to blog, just freedom to hide. And as we can see in Iran and China, anonymity is an essential tool in the arsenal against the power of the state. But there is a competing freedom: the freedom to report.
If The Times wants to report upon, and scrutinise, an anonymous blogger who may or may not be telling the truth 100% of the time, then why shouldn’t they? NightJack wasn’t asking the court to allow him to write; he was asking the court to censor someone else’s freedom to publish. So the onus in this case was on NightJack to explain why the media should be muzzled, not why he should be allowed to blog with complete anonymity. If you want to have freedom of the press – and I do – it has to be absolute, and cut both ways.
I am a blogger. If I want to publish something critical, mischievous, seditious, scurrilous or scandalous then I remain free to do so. That is freedom of expression. As long as I’m not doing anything criminal, that remains the case. What this judgement says, however, is that I cannot expect other journalists’ freedom of expression and reporting to be curtailed on my behalf, just because I will be left feeling uncomfortable when my employer (or anyone else) finds out who I am.
Now there’s a lot of cant being spouted by The Times right now. They weren’t acting as guardians of free expression in bringing this case, that’s for sure. They argued in court that it was in the public interest for NighJack to be exposed. Come off it. We love the sheer cheek of a guardian of the law savaging his superiors and gving us the inside picture on how the fuzz go about their business. The Times knew full well that if they won then anonymous blogs that challenged authority in any way shape or form would be doomed.
Legally The Times deserved to win, because their freedom of reporting trumps NightJack’s desire for court censorship. Yes the ruling will restrict his freedom to publish, and will worry all the other subversive bloggers out there. But NightJack’s discomfort when the Chief Inspector asks him into the office for ‘a little chat’ is part of the chain reaction of the ruling, and not strictly the issue the courts had to pass judgment on.
The Times doesn’t come out well from this. They brought this case out of self-interest, not to champion freedom of speech. When I worked at The Times in May 2009 I was told over and over again that the printed media is in a death spiral, unable to pull out of the destructive wake left by online media content. Why pay for a paper owned by Rupert Murdoch to tell you about the police when a real copper can give you the inside picture without having to pass through the filter of the Police’s own media department?
So The Times brought this case to kill off blogs as a viable alternative to mainstream media. Perhaps they didn’t set out with that aim in mind initially – no-one can really say, apart from the editor. But they are smart people; I know because I’ve met and worked with them. They knew that the blogosphere, at least in the UK, would never be the same if they won this case.
The Times’ defence, as articulated by Daniel Finkelstein, doesn’t pass muster. Sure, NightJack might have been a politician masquerading as a copper. So what? The whole point of the internet, of ‘citizen journalists’, is that there are so many of them. We don’t have to take anyone’s word for it.
So the end result is that blogging is really no different to standing up on Hyde Park corner and yelling something. You can say what you like, as long as you don’t break the law. If what you say upsets your company, they can sack you. You can challenge them in an industrial tribunal. If your contract has a clause of ‘gross misconduct’, the tribunal must interpret whether you have been in breach of this. It’s not an automatic ‘you’re fired’ judgment. Companies need protecting from anonymous employees who may lie about them. But the downside of this judgment is that one more avenue for whistleblowers has been firmly closed. It looks like they’ll just have to go to The Times now. Which is probably what they wanted. If anything good is to come out of this judgement it should be how to give whistleblowers more protection. The blogosphere is not the answer.
So I mourn the exposure of NightJack, and The Times' victory. But it was inevitable, and bloggers need to understand that the internet isn’t anonymous. It never was. Suppose The Times had lost the case. What if another blogger found out who NightJack was and wanted to expose him? Would the courts be right in silencing him too? You can’t pick and choose freedom of expression. Get over it guys. And keep blogging.
The ruling is significant because it sets a precedent: My Justice Eady ruled that blogging is essentially a public activity and that bloggers therefore have no automatic right to privacy.
So it’s a bad day for us bloggers. If you are a whistleblower exposing corruption or incompetence, the law will not ride to your defence. Even if you have something interesting to say that gets you a following (NightJack had 500,000 apparently – if only I had that!) you have no legal right to privacy and so your employer can, and probably will, catch you. And sack you.
The Times is responsible for this. The reporter who sniffed out NightJack is Patrick Foster. Readers of my blog will see that I worked at The Times recently, doing work experience on their Home News section. I didn’t meet Patrick Foster, but as you will see in my previous post, I got a flavour of the ethos of The Times during my time there.
Was this a blow for, or against freedom? This judgment doesn’t restrict freedom to blog, just freedom to hide. And as we can see in Iran and China, anonymity is an essential tool in the arsenal against the power of the state. But there is a competing freedom: the freedom to report.
If The Times wants to report upon, and scrutinise, an anonymous blogger who may or may not be telling the truth 100% of the time, then why shouldn’t they? NightJack wasn’t asking the court to allow him to write; he was asking the court to censor someone else’s freedom to publish. So the onus in this case was on NightJack to explain why the media should be muzzled, not why he should be allowed to blog with complete anonymity. If you want to have freedom of the press – and I do – it has to be absolute, and cut both ways.
I am a blogger. If I want to publish something critical, mischievous, seditious, scurrilous or scandalous then I remain free to do so. That is freedom of expression. As long as I’m not doing anything criminal, that remains the case. What this judgement says, however, is that I cannot expect other journalists’ freedom of expression and reporting to be curtailed on my behalf, just because I will be left feeling uncomfortable when my employer (or anyone else) finds out who I am.
Now there’s a lot of cant being spouted by The Times right now. They weren’t acting as guardians of free expression in bringing this case, that’s for sure. They argued in court that it was in the public interest for NighJack to be exposed. Come off it. We love the sheer cheek of a guardian of the law savaging his superiors and gving us the inside picture on how the fuzz go about their business. The Times knew full well that if they won then anonymous blogs that challenged authority in any way shape or form would be doomed.
Legally The Times deserved to win, because their freedom of reporting trumps NightJack’s desire for court censorship. Yes the ruling will restrict his freedom to publish, and will worry all the other subversive bloggers out there. But NightJack’s discomfort when the Chief Inspector asks him into the office for ‘a little chat’ is part of the chain reaction of the ruling, and not strictly the issue the courts had to pass judgment on.
The Times doesn’t come out well from this. They brought this case out of self-interest, not to champion freedom of speech. When I worked at The Times in May 2009 I was told over and over again that the printed media is in a death spiral, unable to pull out of the destructive wake left by online media content. Why pay for a paper owned by Rupert Murdoch to tell you about the police when a real copper can give you the inside picture without having to pass through the filter of the Police’s own media department?
So The Times brought this case to kill off blogs as a viable alternative to mainstream media. Perhaps they didn’t set out with that aim in mind initially – no-one can really say, apart from the editor. But they are smart people; I know because I’ve met and worked with them. They knew that the blogosphere, at least in the UK, would never be the same if they won this case.
The Times’ defence, as articulated by Daniel Finkelstein, doesn’t pass muster. Sure, NightJack might have been a politician masquerading as a copper. So what? The whole point of the internet, of ‘citizen journalists’, is that there are so many of them. We don’t have to take anyone’s word for it.
So the end result is that blogging is really no different to standing up on Hyde Park corner and yelling something. You can say what you like, as long as you don’t break the law. If what you say upsets your company, they can sack you. You can challenge them in an industrial tribunal. If your contract has a clause of ‘gross misconduct’, the tribunal must interpret whether you have been in breach of this. It’s not an automatic ‘you’re fired’ judgment. Companies need protecting from anonymous employees who may lie about them. But the downside of this judgment is that one more avenue for whistleblowers has been firmly closed. It looks like they’ll just have to go to The Times now. Which is probably what they wanted. If anything good is to come out of this judgement it should be how to give whistleblowers more protection. The blogosphere is not the answer.
So I mourn the exposure of NightJack, and The Times' victory. But it was inevitable, and bloggers need to understand that the internet isn’t anonymous. It never was. Suppose The Times had lost the case. What if another blogger found out who NightJack was and wanted to expose him? Would the courts be right in silencing him too? You can’t pick and choose freedom of expression. Get over it guys. And keep blogging.
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