"Mere Hours Left To Save Net Neutrality"

A staffer with Free Press, the media reform group, argues today (with hours left to express yourself to the Federal Communications Commission) that Net Neutrality may be hanging by a thread:

Earlier this month, FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski released a proposal that is Net Neutrality in name only. While details are still scarce, the Genachowski proposal reportedly would not offer the same protections to wireless Internet users as it would to those using wired connections. It would also open the door to "paid prioritization," which could allow phone and cable companies to create toll roads that would favor the traffic of a select few companies that can pay by slowing down everyone else.

Scary Picture of Wireless Web, according to a Free Press staffer.

Downside of the Internet

For months, we've discussed how important Internet has been in growth of independent media. There are downsides to the Internet, of course, such as people blabbing (or lying) in public and shrinking attention spans.

Live blogging from Assange bail hearing

The Guardian, one of the leading dailies in England and a NON-PROFIT, has been live blogging from the Assange bail hearing in London. No daily has worked more closely with WikiLeaks in publishing/analyzing the once-secret U.S. documents.

New whistle-blowing website, OpenLeaks.org, launched this week by former WikiLeaks associates.

Here's writer Ted Rall on what leaked State Dept cables tell us about U.S. support for dictators in Central Asia.

2010 Izzy Award Nominations Now Open

Nominations are now being accepted (until Jan 13, 2011) for the 2010 Izzy Award. The Izzy for outstanding achievement in independent media is named after I.F. "Izzy" Stone, the legendary independent journalist/publisher. Details here.

Good discussion of Net Neutrality

MSNBC's Keith Olbermann on Internet nondiscrimination in August along with Josh Silver of Free Press.

Sen. Lieberman vs. WikiLeaks

The publication by WikiLeaks.org of leaked US diplomatic cables is causing a stir around the world and embarrassment to US officials who did some nefarious things -- like pressure democratic governments not to prosecute torture and kidnapping conducted in the "war on terror." In the land of the free and home of the brave, Sen. Joe Lieberman stepped forward to successfully pressure Amazon.com to drop its hosting of WikiLeaks. I see on the blogs a bunch of folks who won't be shopping at Amazon this holiday season.

Iran Bloggers Face Death?

H/t to Andrew C for this video.

O'Reilly says he doesn't make up his own facts.

Oh really?

Political editing at "public television"

Intimidation from politicians + lack of insulated funding = embarrassing timidity at so-called "public television" . . . as evidenced by PBS surgically removing Tina Fey's swipes at Republican hero Sarah Palin from a recent broadcast.

Oddest pitch in history?

From "Seinfeld": George proposes to Jerry a unique approach to pitching a new TV comedy series to NBC. George melts down just before pitch meeting. After the pitch meeting that George screwed up by saying he wouldn't compromise his "artistic integrity, Jerry explodes.

Don't Get In This Bind: After quitting a job in anger and without a plan of any kind, George ponders career options.

Why don't we have public TV like this in U.S.?

Weeks before the Iraq invasion, Jeremy Paxman of BBC's "Newsnight" and skeptical British citizens literally cross-examined Prime Minister Tony Blair about evidence/reasons/legality behind the invasion. This interview with Blair resurfaced this year during Britain's official Iraq inquiry. Here's another tough Paxman interview of Blair having nothing to do with Iraq.

Digital Divide -- Many in U.S. Lack Hi-Speed Internet

My middle-class daughters are NetNerds, having grown up with computers in the home and fast Internet. In poor rural areas and inner cities, such tools for learning and commerce are often out of reach. Here are videos of rural Southerners asking the government to step in and help folks get broadband.

What's with the language in indy media?

Adam P and Rebeca C posted this "WTF Has Indy Media Done So Far?" slide show.

Kellan D posted this (literally FY) response from a Gizmodo editor to a commenter's claim of bias.

Fast,Open Internet in US?

U.S. falling backward on broadband penetration and Internet speed.

Big Internet providers such as Verizon, Comcast, AT&T didn't even apply for any of the billions in stimulus grants for building out broadband infrastructure, according to the Wall St. Journal, because recipients of our tax money had to agree to respect Net Neutrality.

It wasn't just Fox News...

...and other TV networks that conveyed Andrew Breitbart and BigGovernment.com's false impressions about ACORN, leading to that group's demise. The NY Times "Public Editor" laughably tried to defend an aspect of that paper's bogus coverage.

Victim of video distortion by blogger (and later, MSM)

US Dept of Agriculture employee Shirley Sherrod was fired by the Obama White House after BigGovernment.com posted a 1-minute, 40-second video excerpt purporting to show that, during a speech to the NAACP, Sherrod boasted about discriminating against a white farmer while she was a federal employee during the Obama administration. Actually, she was describing events in the 1980s when she was Georgia field director for the Federation of Southern Cooperatives, a private group working primarily with Black farmers that had grown out of the civil rights movement; she was not a federal employee at the time. More importantly, a fuller version showed that Sherrod told the story to illustrate how she had overcome her racial hostility toward whites and ultimately helped the white farmer save his farm.

Debtors again going to jail in the USA?

Remember how the first labor weeklies advocated against jail time for those who owed money? Those brave indy journalists won that battle 170 years ago, right? I guess some social problems have to be addressed and re-addressed through the generations, as these two reporters have done for the Minneapolis daily.

It's not a crime to owe money, and debtors' prisons were abolished in the United States in the 19th century. But people are routinely being thrown in jail for failing to pay debts. In Minnesota, which has some of the most creditor-friendly laws in the country, the use of arrest warrants against debtors has jumped 60 percent over the past four years, with 845 cases in 2009, a Star Tribune analysis of state court data has found.

Watch out for "Drudge Exclusives"

Perhaps Matt Drudge should stick to aggregating content from elsewhere (with revved-up headlines) rather than "report" -- as demonstrated by this 1999 "world exclusive." And by his 2007 "exclusive" in which he accused CNN reporter Michael Ware of "heckling" Republican senators during a news conference in Iraq and "laughing and mocking their comments." Drudge's evidence-free charge -- based on an anonymous "official" -- was picked up by rightwing blogs and the Washington Times.

Selectively-edited tapes...

....distributed by Andrew Breitbart's BigGovernment.com, played repeatedly on Fox News and elsewhere, helped kill the anti-poverty group ACORN. Rachel Maddow dissects the distorted presentation.

Campaign Donations from Mainstream Media

Mayhill Fowler of HuffPost "Off the Bus" let folks know she was an Obama symp. Readers/viewers should know about journalists' and media companies sympathies/donations, but usually don't. Mainstream media owners donate millions -- mostly to conservative campaigns -- and it's rarely news. Working reporters, editors, magazine writers, TV hosts donate thousands; sometimes it becomes news. And huge news, as I'm blogging this, in the case of Keith Olbermann, who is now suspended.