Bloggers go to court as journalists

Bloggers will no longer be barred from a seat and deprived of the opportunity to cover trials like other journalists do. Well, at least one trial will have some seats reserved in the press section for bloggers. It's about time.

The perjury trial of former White House aide Lewis Libby gets under way in Washington this week. For the first time in a federal court, the press room will have seats for bloggers; two places will go to members of the Media Bloggers Association.

The group represents about 1,000 online writers, and it's trying to bring some of the powers of the press to the blogosphere. Robert Cox is the president of the Association, and he negotiated the deal with the court. (NPR)

Robert Cox at Media Bloggers Association reports, "The U.S. District Court in Washington, DC has agreed to provide the MBA with two press credentials at the upcoming Scooter Libby Trial." Actually Mr. Cox is doing a great deal move for bloggers and the word needs to spread:

... new membership policies designed to help bloggers who see themselves more as journalists than freeform diarists... Among the planned criteria: Members would have to take an online course offered by the Poynter Institute, a journalism think tank, covering legal issues related to blogging.

Members also could seek credentialed status by undergoing training or demonstrating other work as professional journalists. They also must agree to the organization's ethical standards and adopt formal editorial and corrections policies. Doing so could give them the backing they need to obtain review copies of books and access to newsmakers and events, Cox said. --Mercury News

Membership requirements can be read here. In order to become a member, you must be nominated by a current member and meet all the stated requirements.

On the topic of journalism and the media, Mark My Words has this: The country is getting screwed

As said by a UPI reporter. But it isn't because of what some moonbat types would prefer to hear from a reporter.

See the video here at Hot Air.

Take away quote:

“If as a reporter you do ask the national security question, all of a sudden you’re carrying Bush’s water. There are national security questions at stake, we're ignoring them and the country is getting screwed."

Notice the typical libtard response to her comments.

And then there's this "Moussed Mujahideen Update" from Making Sense of Jihad:

Convicted terrorist, IMK member, radical Islamist, and terrorist camp visitor Yassin Aref has a friend in Fred LeBrun, the combed-over lefty columnist at Albany's Times-Union newspaper. Fred's Friday column is an exemplar of lefty delusions, unmitigated arrogance, dime-store psychoanalysis, and a willful disregard for the facts. The best part of the article is the fact that Fred writes it with all the conviction of someone who truly believes what he's writing.

Finally: On My Open Forum, there is this article, "Michelle Malkin's credibility, R.I.P." about the AP dispatch quoting Iraqi police Capt. Jamil Hussein, and whether Capt. Hussein actually existed.