Here’s an anniversary you won’t hear about: it’s 100 years since World War I’s press censorship ended
(This is adapted from a piece I wrote for Maclean’s magazine earlier this year. The piece is about censorship, but the real topic is the value of news — even when that news is bad. Press censorship was extended after the end of the First World War while the government was trying to crush what it believed to be a
Canadian Border Services Agency’s New List of Banned (and Awful but not Banned) Publications
Quarterly List of Admissible and Prohibited Titles by Canadian Border Services Agency This report contains a list of titles reviewed by the Prohibited Importations Unit (PIU), Program Compliance and Outreach Division, at Headquarters in Ottawa, during the period January 1 to March 31, 2019. Titles for which a determination was rendered in accordance with section 58 of the Customs
Hanging the Sin Eater: International Criminal Law’s Failure to Engage with the Role of Media in a Criminal State.
Mark Bourrie MJ JD PhD Barrister and Solicitor, Ottawa, Canada Mainstream news media play an important role in the political system. They can use their authoritative voices to give domestic and foreign legitimacy to regimes. In contrast, fringe press is easily identified by its partisanship and refusal to give space to contrasting opinions. Fringe media such as Julius Streicher’s Der
Canadaland’s WE obsession: Foreshadowing Jesse Brown’s Attempt to Take Down a Children’s Charity
The next chapter in the bizarre saga of Canadaland trying to take down a children’s charity is about to be written. I’m going to give you a sneak preview of the picture Jesse Brown will be trying to paint this time, based on answers to questions I sent to WE and Canadaland. I have spent a lot of time on
Arthur Kent v Don Martin: A Cautionary Tale as We Head into Election Season
We’re heading into a federal election, and this campaign looks especially nasty. This column is a warning for journalists and political insiders to stay focused on facts and to deal fairly. The alternative is to risk writing a take-down of a politician that could lead to a (admittedly rare, for a column written in a campaign) libel judgment. A spectacular
Parody sites can be whacked for IP breaches
A web site that parodied the Journal de Montreal has been whacked with a $23,500 judgment for trademark infringement. The judge took the site’s profits from the parody (plus costs). That means college papers that traditionally do spoof issues must be careful to make sure their parodies don’t look too much like the real thing. No word yet on an
How long can Jesse Brown keep up his vendetta against a children’s charity? (Hint: It’s not over)
I was in Toronto in early May for the 2019 Toronto Watchdog Workshop on investigative journalism. The weekend event included several excellent panel discussions including Julian Sheer on Mastering the Investigate Interview, and Writing the Investigative Narrative with Susanne Craig from The New York Times. A draw for me was the final session of the weekend – “WE Charity versus
Lobby group, unions, journalists’ associations will decide who gets media bailout money
The federal government has announced the organizations that will appoint people to the committee that will decide who’s eligible for bailout money. The lobby group that pushed for the bailout is on the committee. So is the Canadian Association of Journalists, a group that has relatively few members among working journalists, and is mainly made up of, and run by,
Getting rid of CBC News: Is it still Conservative policy?
When he was running for the leadership of the Conservative Party of Canada, Andrew Scheer said he’d get rid of CBC’s public affairs department. For many years, people in the rank and file of the Conservatives, and its predecessor parties, the Reform Party and the Progressive Conservatives, had been advocating for big cuts to the public broadcaster. At most, many
More media bloodletting as Globe announces buyouts, CTV cuts newsroom, TVO budget cut
The Globe and Mail has offered buyouts to staffers to try to cut $10 million a year from its payroll. A big buyout, in 2013, saw the paper lose some of its best newsroom talent. Kirk Makin, Canada’s premier justice and legal reporter, left the paper, along with several top investigative reporters like Stan Oziewicz, feature writer Tim Appleby, regional