Media Nation

There is some justice in the literary world. Megan McCafferty, whose novels provided such rich, er, source material for Harvard typist Kaavya Viswanathan, is at #7 on the Wall Street Journal’s hardcover bestseller list for her latest novel, “Charmed Thirds.” Good for McCafferty, who’s got enough class that she doesn’t even mention Viswanathan on her blog.

The Boston Globe has played Viswanathan’s copycat ways on page one, above the fold, each of the past two days. (Yesterday’s story is here; today’s is here.) But the Harvard Crimson, which broke the story on Sunday, makes clear in a way the Globe doesn’t that Viswanathan’s excuse — that she must have unconsciously recycled passages from a novel she loved when writing “How Opal Mehta Got Kissed, Got Wild, and Got a Life” — has failed to impress McCafferty’s publisher.

Paras D. Bhayani and David Zhou, writing for the Crimson, report:

… Random House, which published McCafferty’s novels, is confident that “literal copying” occurred in Viswanathan’s book, according to a confidential letter from the publishing giant to Little, Brown that was obtained by The Crimson.

“We are continuing to investigate this matter, but, given the alarming similarities in the language, structure and characters already found in these works, we are certain that some literal copying actually occurred here,” read the letter, which is dated April 22 and was signed by Random House lawyer Min Jung Lee. “As such, we would appreciate your prompt and serious attention to this matter.”

Indeed, if you take a look at the Crimson’s side-by-side comparisons, you’ll find it hard to rule out the possibility — the likelihood? — that Viswanathan propped McCafferty’s “Sloppy Firsts” open in her lap and started typing, making just a few changes in an inept attempt to cover her tracks.

It’s hard to muster much sympathy for Viswanathan, who got a $500,000 contract to put her imprimatur on a novel that others “conceptualized” for her, and that she then couldn’t apparently bother to write entirely on her own.

But I’ll give her this much. In a more sane world, she never would have gotten the contract and the publicity that put her in the public spotlight in the first place. She would have plagiarized at Harvard, flunked a class, maybe even been forced to transfer to another college. And she would have learned an important lesson — quietly. Instead, she’s dealt herself a devastating blow from which it will be hard to recover.

An enormous threat to everyone’s media future is playing out in Congress this week. As I wrote in March, executives of the giant broadband companies are trying to talk government regulators into letting them discriminate in favor of Internet services that are willing to pay for the privilege of having their data move at ever faster speeds.

According to this article from InternetWeek, “The House Judiciary Committee’s Task Force on Telecommunications and Antitrust is holding a hearing Tuesday on whether the Internet should operate like a utility, with equal service, or whether providers should be able to provided tiered access and pricing.”

Here’s a good video overview of what’s at stake.

Save the Internet, a coalition headed by the progressive group Free Press, puts it this way:

Congress is pushing a law that would abandon Network Neutrality, the Internet’s First Amendment. Network neutrality prevents companies like AT&T, Verizon and Comcast from deciding which Web sites work best for you — based on what site pays them the most. Your local library shouldn’t have to outbid Barnes & Noble for the right to have its Web site open quickly on your computer.

Net Neutrality allows everyone to compete on a level playing field and is the reason that the Internet is a force for economic innovation, civic participation and free speech. If the public doesn’t speak up now, Congress will cave to a multi-million dollar lobbying campaign by telephone and cable companies that want to decide what you do, where you go, and what you watch online.

Sorry for this long cut-and-paste job, but Save the Internet continues with a frightening list of ways that this could harm all of us. It’s worth reading in full:

Google users — Another search engine could pay dominant Internet providers like AT&T to guarantee the competing search engine opens faster than Google on your computer.
Innovators with the “next big idea” — Startups and entrepreneurs will be muscled out of the marketplace by big corporations that pay Internet providers for dominant placing on the Web. The little guy will be left in the “slow lane” with inferior Internet service, unable to compete.
Ipod listeners — A company like Comcast could slow access to iTunes, steering you to a higher-priced music service that it owned.
Political groups — Political organizing could be slowed by a handful of dominant Internet providers who ask advocacy groups to pay “protection money” for their websites and online features to work correctly.
Nonprofits — A charity’s website could open at snail-speed, and online contributions could grind to a halt, if nonprofits can’t pay dominant Internet providers for access to “the fast lane” of Internet service.
Online purchasers — Companies could pay Internet providers to guarantee their online sales process faster than competitors with lower prices — distorting your choice as a consumer.
Small businesses and tele-commuters — When Internet companies like AT&T favor their own services, you won’t be able to choose more affordable providers for online video, teleconferencing, Internet phone calls, and software that connects your home computer to your office.
Parents and retirees — Your choices as a consumer could be controlled by your Internet provider, steering you to their preferred services for online banking, health care information, sending photos, planning vacations, etc.
Bloggers — Costs will skyrocket to post and share video and audio clips — silencing citizen journalists and putting more power in the hands of a few corporate-owned media outlets.

Longtime media activist Jeff Chester writes on his blog:

We all know what AT&T, Verizon, Comcast, et al really want: to help their tired old media monopoly business model gain a faster hold over the broadband digital marketplace. That’s the reality. And if we permit that to happen the “Reality” will be harmful to consumers, seniors, educators and everyone else who desires a America that reflects our highest aspirations as a culture. Not some dumbed-down, meter always running, and ‘we’re data collecting on you,’ AT&T/Verizon/USTA Internet.

Chester also worries that big companies that are allied against the broadband providers, such as Google (notwithstanding the example offered by SavetheInternet.com), Microsft and Yahoo!, aren’t necessarily all that committed to the battle. After all, simply by paying a fee that they could easily afford, they could shut out competitors, both present and future.

What can you do? On the Save the Internet Web site, you can find out where members of the House Energy and Commerce Committee stand, as well as send an e-mail to members of Congress. MoveOn.org is running an online petition campaign as well.

This threat is very real.

Here is a blog dedicated to Neil Young’s forthcoming anti-album, “Living with War.” It includes a long interview he did with CNN, a task made excruciatingly difficult by the fact that he was the only sentient being taking part in the conversation.

Young has never been a knee-jerk lefty. His 2001 song “Let’s Roll” showed he was deeply affected by the terrorist attacks of 9/11. In the ’80s he was seen as something of a Ronald Reagan supporter. Which makes it all the more sad that he’s going to be dismissed as a burned-out hippie when “Let’s Impeach the President” hits (or, more likely, doesn’t hit) the airwaves a couple of weeks from now.

So, who would you rather have seen pitching against the Blue Jays today? Bronson Arroyo or Lenny DiNardo? How about in the 12th inning of last night’s loss? Arroyo or Rudy Seanez? Hmmm. I guess I’d have to say Arroyo, based on his latest.

And let me respond in advance to the comments I know are coming. I like Theo. I’m glad he’s back. He’s done a lot more good than harm, and I’m confident he’ll continue to do so. But this was a bad trade, and that holds true even if Wily Mo Peña becomes a bona fide major-league ballplayer over the next couple of years. I mean, the Sox are trying to win this year, right?

There is no such thing as too much pitching. Period.

Ron Newman catches the Boston Globe’s Names column lazily rewriting a press release — and not bothering to check whether the predicted event actually happened. Whoops.

If you go to the Huffington Post right now, you’ll see that the home page flogs a commentary posted today by Sen. John Kerry as being “ONLY ON HUFFPOST.” In fact, it is identical to the Kerry op-ed in today’s Boston Globe. Sorry, Arianna.

Jay Fitzgerald unveils a new look for Hub Blog.

You have to wonder what Bobby Dellelo was thinking. The ex-convict, who served some four decades in connection with the murder of a police officer, allowed himself to become a public face of efforts to reform the Criminal Offender Record Information (CORI) law. What happened next was inevitable.

Advocates of reform say that prospective employers use CORI to screen out ex-cons, making it impossible for them to find work and turn their lives around. Yesterday the Boston Globe published a longish feature on Dellelo by Megan Tench, complete with an evocative portrait by photographer Dominic Chavez. Tench quoted Dellelo as follows:

“I can’t even get a job driving a cab,” said Dellelo, 68, who holds a bachelor’s degree in sociology from Curry College.

“I can’t get a home. I can’t get a job. I know how to rob banks. I know how to hotwire armored cars. I did it. What do you think I should do?”

But there is absolutely no mention in Tench’s story of Dellelo’s murder conviction. So would you care to guess what happened today? In what might be termed a double make-up call, the Boston Herald ran an O’Ryan Johnson piece headlined “Globe’s ex-con exclusive excluded killer details: Tale of woe left out conviction in murder.” And the Globe itself ran a follow-up — bylined by Marcia Cramer and Tench — dredging up Dellelo’s past in loving detail.

Johnson’s article quotes Thomas Holmes, who was 9 years old when his father, George Holmes, was shot to death by Dellelo’s accomplice in a jewelry-store robbery. “Why not mention the truth of what he is?” Holmes is quoted as saying. “If it was me they’d go through my background, they’d dig up everything they could. They want to make everyone feel sorry for this guy because he was in prison. My father was shot six times without having his gun pulled out of his holster.”

The print version of today’s Globe includes two photos of Dellelo being forcibly apprehended by authorities, once after his arrest in 1963, and another time after he’d escaped from prison in 1968 — not his only escape, by the way. The article quotes Robert Kenney, president of the Boston Police Detectives Benevolent Society, as saying, “I think it’s a little disgusting. I think it’s shocking we’re supposed to feel sorry for a guy who killed a police officer…. There is no reason for him to be walking the streets.”

Holmes’ and Kenney’s sentiments are absolutely understandable. But let’s not forget that Dellelo never shot anyone. He and his accomplice, Nicholas Yasaian, had actually gone off in different directions before Yasaian, unbeknownst to Dellelo, murdered Holmes. Yasaian later committed suicide. Legally, Dellelo is just as culpable as Yasaian. Logic and morality, though, would dictate otherwise.

Still, the Globe certainly should have offered more details about Dellelo’s past in its first article — not just because readers have a right to know, but out of respect for George Holmes’ memory and his family. And it’s not as if no one knew. Here is the lead of an April 4, 2004, Globe Magazine piece to which the Herald alludes: “After 30 years in state and federal prisons plus a few years in juvenile detention, Bobby Dellelo thought he had experienced everything there was to life behind bars. He was serving a life sentence for his part in a Boston jewelry heist in which an off-duty police officer had been killed.” That’s certainly clear enough. Aren’t you supposed to check the clips?

As for Dellelo himself, how could he have not known what was going to happen when he stepped forward — especially if he failed to come clean about his past?

For Dellelo, there is one consolation. In yesterday’s Globe story, he was 68 years old. Today he’s 64. Given enough time, maybe he’ll get back a few more of the years he served.

I had intended to issue a ringing endorsement this morning of the Northeastern Patriot’s right to publish. But I can’t. You see, when I investigated the Patriot on the Web, I learned that the production manager’s Facebook photo is of a license plate that reads “RDSXSUX.” Worse, the plateholder is emblazoned with “New York Yankees.” I mean, there are limits.

But seriously. The Patriot is a new conservative newspaper on campus. I haven’t seen a copy, since it ran into distribution problems earlier this week. But judging from coverage in the Northeastern News and the Boston Globe, it sounds like the problem isn’t its content, but, rather, the fact that the students who put it together put the Northeastern brand in its title without going through the proper channels. Apparently they don’t even have to do that if they simply drop “Northeastern” from the name.

An example would be Boston University’s student paper, which is known simply as the Daily Free Press. Beneath the nameplate appears this: “The Independent Student Newspaper at Boston University.” Problem solved — and a censorship controversy avoided.

Disclosure: If you don’t know already, read my bio under “About the blogger,” in the upper-right corner of this page.

Tom Finneran, where are you? The iron-fisted former Massachusetts House speaker would have known exactly what to do about the State Ethics Commission‘s ludicrous attempt to ban political statements on state-owned property. He would have abolished the commission. Now, some might say that would be extreme. But as Barry Goldwater once said, “Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice.”

Yesterday, the Boston Globe’s Andrea Estes reported that the commission had “tightened its rules on political activity by public officials, barring them from writing stump speeches, answering campaign questions, or holding news conferences on political topics inside the State House or other state office buildings.”

The ruling follows a complaint filed by Massachusetts Democratic Party chairman Phil Johnston and state Rep. Jim Marzilli, D-Arlington. Their beef: Gov. Mitt Romney, accompanied by several staff members, had appeared outside his State House office in July 2004 to verbally cuff Sen. John Kerry. Yet the Globe story also notes that several Democrats, including Attorney General Tom Reilly, have made purely political statements while inside state office buildings. Indeed, Republican consultant Rob Gray, quoted in Estes’ story, gets it exactly right:

“If the Ethics Commission intends to stop all political lines of questioning for elected officials inside the State House, that’s ridiculous and impractical,” said Rob Gray, a Republican consultant and press secretary to former governors William F. Weld and A. Paul Cellucci. “These are elected officials. That in and of itself means there is a crossover between policy and politics. Stifling reporters’ questions only lets elected officials off the hook. What’s an elected official going to say when a reporter asks a political question — ‘Hey everybody get your coats and meet me at the corner of Beacon and Park streets and I’ll answer the question.’ It’s silly.”

The trouble is, this isn’t just ridiculous and impractical, although it’s surely that. It’s also an attack on free speech — a logical extension of misguided attempts to limit and regulate speech through so-called campaign-finance reform. Romney, Reilly and every other elected official ought to be able to say exactly what they want, regardless of where they happen to be standing or sitting at the time.

Johnston himself may be having some misgivings. In Estes’ article yesterday, he’s quoted as saying, “I’m delighted. We feel completely vindicated.” Today, though, Johnston tells Globe columnist Adrian Walker, “I think it’s a bit extreme. We didn’t ask that [political questions] be prohibited. Obviously, it’s a bit absurd to say reporters can’t ask political questions at the State House.” Well, Phil, that’s the problem with asking the ethics police to crack down on free speech: They just might go even farther than you’d intended.

WBZ-TV (Channel 4) political analyst Jon Keller wonders if the commissioners “ate a batch of mystery brownies without checking to see what the ingredients were.”

Veteran political columnist Alan Lupo, writing in today’s Boston Herald, waxes indignant at the whole notion that speech on Beacon Hill can be regulated. Lupo writes:

Would it be such a violation of our common sense if, in the middle of a gubernatorial press conference, a reporter might ask the chief executive’s opinion of a presidential candidacy, and the governor might actually respond?

Are we now to believe that politics stops at the door of government? This foolishness reminds me of those cloying candidates for office who insist, “I’m not a politician.” Well, what are you then if you are running for office and hope to serve? A tree surgeon? An alto sax player? A member of the Black Watch Regiment?

The Berkshire Eagle makes a similar point in an editorial published today:

Government is politics and politics is government, and it is impossible to determine how a distinction can be made when elected officials are queried during campaign season. It is easy to imagine politicians using the commission ruling to avoid answering tough questions from reporters on the grounds that the questions are political in nature. According to the commission’s ruling, press conferences should be stopped in their tracks by a press officer if political questions begin to dominate. The distinction between a campaign question and a question related to official matters is a subjective one, as is the decision as to when one kind of question or the other dominates. This guideline is so vague as to be meaningless, and the prospect of a press conference at the State House being ended abruptly so it can be resumed at a campaign office is absurd.

Good for the Eagle. Neither the Globe nor the Herald has editorialized on this yet, and news of the ruling came too late for the Boston Phoenix’s deadline. I’m afraid that this is going to fall through the cracks unless there’s a concerted effort. Yes, this led the Globe yesterday, but stories have a way of fizzling out quickly unless there’s sustained follow-up.

This is scary. If nothing is done, I hope some brave politician will challenge the commission by speaking out as he or she pleases and then refusing to pay the fine that will inevitably result. It’s called civil disobedience, and the future of our political discourse depends on it.