Laden...
Making someone completely disappear is a very difficult feat.
Letter from the Editor Dear Reader, Kelly Frick is not a magician, but people ask her every day to help them disappear.
As senior news director for MLive.com, Frick oversees the reporting efforts of our news reporters throughout Michigan and determines what we publish. Increasingly, she has been making important decisions about what to unpublish.
There’s a growing phenomenon, fueled by the ruthless efficiency of the internet and search engines to find and surface content, of individuals who have been the subjects of news coverage to ask to have those stories removed, permanently.
“I have three in my inbox right now to deal with,” Frick said. “I would say we're looking at anywhere between five and 10 requests a week. So, it's a lot.”
This mirrors a growing trend worldwide to enhance privacy rights, lessen the stigma of minor crimes, and even decriminalize some activities. Just this week in Michigan, Gov. Gretchen Whitmer signed a package of bills lessening the consequences and punishment for minor or first-time criminal activity.
Some of that is criminal justice reform, but a big part of it is because the internet has amplified the ubiquity, presence and persistence of unflattering news. What used to become archival material within 24 hours in the newspaper era, living on only in microfilm and scrapbooks, now is a few finger taps away on Google … forever.
“Does every piece of content we’ve ever written need to stay on the internet?” Frick said. “We’ve made the decision that no, not everything continues to be relevant. Sometimes, people make mistakes and they pay the price and they’ve atoned for it, done the jail time or community service, and we feel it’s no longer relevant.”
Typically, the requests for story removal come from people who committed minor crimes years ago and find it dogs them in efforts to find work or otherwise move ahead in life. Other times, it’s as simple as they believe a story or photo casts them in an unflattering light, or doesn’t represent who they have become as a person.
Cleveland.com, a sister news organization, recently announced a partnership with Google to take an aggressive approach to removing archival stories about minor crimes; some of that will involve artificial intelligence that will scour archives to surface old stories for review and removal. The news organization also is inviting readers to submit old stories for similar review.
MLive doesn’t have a formal set of guidelines, nor software tools, to proactively find all old content that might merit review. But we do welcome take-down requests, and each one is reviewed thoroughly by Frick and relevant editors before a decision is made.
“There’s nothing out there that says, ‘These are the things you have to remove,’” Frick said. News organizations in America, under First Amendment protections, have the right to exercise independent judgment about what gets published.
However, when we get a removal request, Frick and her editors ask themselves: How significant was the crime? What was the lasting impact on a community? Are there people going forward who would benefit from accessing the story?
When a story is not removed, Frick said, sometimes it’s because “that content tells part of the community’s story, we need to keep that as a part of the record for a community. The other reason is to protect the public – there are people who have done some horrible crimes, and part of keeping that content out there is to make sure people can find it.”
Some things about our journalistic mission have not changed in the internet era: We seek information as we always have; and as we always have, we make informed but subjective decisions about what we think people need to know.
What has changed is that the internet does not let the world un-know, and the consequences get compounded for people in ways that were never part of society in the past.
“The internet really has made us be more thoughtful as a news organization,” Frick said. “When we do stories now, we have to think, ‘How is this going to be perceived a year from now, or five years from now? Is this story important enough to write about it in this particular way?”
The world can use more “thoughtful,” and I’m pleased we extend that into the important work we do. If you were the subject of an MLive.com story that you’d like us to review, contact Frick at kfrick@mlive.com. Include a link to the story in question, and explain why you’d like it removed.
While we review each request, Frick adds that a request is not a guarantee we will remove the content, and our decisions only affect what is within MLive’s realm. Making someone completely disappear is a very difficult feat.
🎧To hear the entire conversation with Kelly Frick about the “right to be forgotten” and the factors that go into MLive decisions to remove content, listen to the latest episode of our Behind the Headlines podcast by clicking here. To hear all the stories behind the stories, click here and subscribe to our Behind the Headlines podcast.
Editor's note: I value your feedback to my columns, story tips and your suggestions on how to improve our coverage. Let me know how MLive helps you, and how we can do better. Please feel free to reach out by emailing me at editor@mlive.com.
John Hiner Executive Editor Vice President of Content Mlive Media Group
Download our Apps:
Having trouble viewing this email? View in your browser.
To ensure receipt of our emails, please add newsletters@update.mlive.com to your address book or safe sender list. You received this email because you are a subscriber to MLive.com newsletters. Privacy Policy 169 Monroe Ave NW #100 |
Laden...
Laden...
© 2024