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En inglés hay una frase del propietario del New York Times, Arthur Suzberger, Jr., que dice "in newspapers, what matter it's no paper". No hay que confundir el soporte donde recibimos información como la función que cumple. El periodismo permite informar, discutir... Esas funciones no van a ser satisfechas por la misma gente ni por los mismos medios, pero no hay que pensar que van a dejar de ser cumplidas. El problema es de adaptación. Una versión rigurosa dice que se muere y una más amplia dice que se adapta y se transforma.

Además, ¿quién dice la muerte de periodismo? Los periodistas. Cuando trabajaba como corresponsal en Nicaragua durante la guerra, éramos un pequeño grupo de periodistas que decíamos lo que estaba pasando. Hoy hay miles de personas que informan por el medio que sea. Hemos perdido el monopolio del acceso y de la distribución de la información. Las nuevas tecnologías permiten crear un espacio antes inexistente como el de la información a tiempo real y realizada por no profesionales. El uso de Twitter, por ejemplo, es información y periodismo.

Discutible e interesante.

Next time you think about getting snarky on a social network, consider this: A Chicago woman's Twitter post about her "moldy apartment" has landed her with a $50,000 lawsuit from a local management company.

Updates on social networking sites, such as Twitter and Facebook, have led to lawsuits and resignations.

(ABC News Photo Illustration)

According to the Chicago Sun-Times, Horizon Group Management LLC, which has more than 1,500 tenants in the Chicago area, filed a libel lawsuit Monday against Amanda Bonnen, a former tenant.

Although it appears that Bonnen has since closed down her Twitter account, a May 12 tweet from "abnonnen" read: "Who said sleeping in a moldy apartment was bad for you? Horizon really thinks it's okay."

Bonnen did not immediately respond to a request for comment from ABCNews.com.

Asunto a seguir, entre otros.

Just before the start of spring term, a friend and colleague in journalism sent an e-mail message to our department: Technology had changed, she wrote; perhaps our reporting curriculum should change with it. She planned to teach with a focus on live blogging and Twitter, and suggested that those students not particularly interested in using the new technology should be tracked into the other reporting class.

That is, my reporting class—one in which we emphatically would not use Twitter.

Un comentario al largo artículo dice "Anyone who thinks Twitter will replace journalism is missing the point: journalism itself is something more than a profession. It's a mode of existence, and it's no longer only the domain of those paid to report on the news."

Otro, bien sensato: "Twitter should be used as the media to draw attention to your original news and articles (Links). Don't use it a the media to publish your articles."

Atentos a la lección de rigor informativo y de ética periodística que da hoy PRISA. El País la publica en portada y a cuatro columnas sobre el presidente del Poder Judicial: “Dívar apela a sus creencias para impedir el informe sobre el aborto”. Yo esperaba a Dívar proclamando que su voto no se debió al Art.15 de la Constitución (”Todos tienen derecho a la vida”), ni al Art.3 de la DUDH (”Todo individuo tiene derecho a la vida”) ni a la Sentencia 53/1985 del TC (“la vida humana es un devenir, un proceso que comienza con la gestación”), sino al 5º mandamiento (”No matarás”). Nada de eso: según El País, su titular de portada corresponde a algo que Carlos Dívar “comentó a personas de su entorno”. Flipante.

Sorprende, desde luego: es lo meno que cabe decir.

It might be the pessimism that strikes in later years, it might be the clear-mindedness that age endows us with, but I feel a certain kind of hesitation mixed with scepticism that keeps me from intervening (at the request of the editorial office) in defence of freedom of press.

Allow me to explain: when someone has to take a stand in defence of freedom of press, it means that society (and also a large portion of the press) is already ailing. In democracies that we would define as "strong', there's no need to defend freedom of press because no one would even dream of limiting it. This is the first reason for my scepticism, followed by a series of others.

The Italian problem is not Silvio Berlusconi. History (dare I say from Catiline on) has been brimming over with adventurous men, who were not lacking charisma, who had a restricted sense of State but an extremely broad sense of their own advantage, who wanted to establish their own private power by clambering over parliaments, judiciaries and constitutions, distributing favours to their own courtiers and (at times) to their own courtesans, identifying their own pleasure with the interest of the community at large. But these men were not always successful in gaining the power they aspired because society itself did not allow them to. When society did allow them to, then why take it out on these men and not on the society that allowed them to do as they pleased?

Lo dicho para la anterior versión italiana.

di Umberto Eco

Il premier vuole imbavagliare l'informazione. E nella nostra società malata la maggioranza degli italiani sembra pronta ad accettare anche questo strappo. Ma il famoso intellettuale dice: 'Io non ci sto'.

 

Umberto Eco

Sarà il pessimismo della tarda età, sarà la lucidità che l'età porta con sé, ma provo una certa esitazione, frammista a scetticismo, a intervenire, su invito della redazione, in difesa della libertà di stampa. Voglio dire: quando qualcuno deve intervenire a difesa della libertà di stampa vuole dire che la società, e con essa gran parte della stampa, è già malata. Nelle democrazie che definiremo 'robuste' non c'è bisogno di difendere la libertà di stampa, perché a nessuno viene in mente di limitarla.

Questa la prima ragione del mio scetticismo, da cui discende un corollario. Il problema italiano non è Silvio Berlusconi. La storia (vorrei dire da Catilina in avanti) è stata ricca di uomini avventurosi, non privi di carisma, con scarso senso dello Stato ma senso altissimo dei propri interessi, che hanno desiderato instaurare un potere personale, scavalcando parlamenti, magistrature e costituzioni, distribuendo favori ai propri cortigiani e (talora) alle proprie cortigiane, identificando il proprio piacere con l'interesse della comunità. È che non sempre questi uomini hanno conquistato il potere a cui aspiravano, perché la società non glielo ha permesso. Quando la società glielo ha permesso, perché prendersela con questi uomini e non con la società che li ha lasciati fare?

De acuerdo o no, hay que considerar lo dicho por Eco.

In the late afternoon of July 1o, President Obama met privately with Pope Benedict XVI for just over 30 minutes. According to official Vatican spokesman Rev. Federico Lombardi, S.J., "The president explicitly expressed his commitment to reducing the numbers of abortions and to listen to the church's concern on moral issues."

 

On July 13 in a Senate committee hearing, Sen. Barbara Mikulski was forced to admit under persistent questioning by Sen. Orrin Hatch that the new health-care bill includes abortion coverage. Planned Parenthood's Guttmacher Institute estimates government funding of abortion increases abortion by 20 to 35 percent.

 

There were 1,206,200 abortions in 2006, according to National Right Life (the last annual results available). The math is easy: If the heath-care package currently being pushed by Obama is passed, the result will be 240,000 to 420,000 more abortions in the first year alone.

 

Did President Obama know these abortion provisions were in the Senate health-care bill when he met with the Holy Father? There is no reason to think he didn't. He certainly knew he had gone on the record supporting federal funding for abortion in the District of Columbia.

Pienso que es muy interesante ler los razonamientos de Deal W. Hudson, autor del artículo, y no pocos de los numerosos comentarios. Son también de lo más razonable y ayudan a pensar.

De todos modos, me parece que el Papa no se deja "engañar /equivocar" tan fácilmente, y menos en estos asuntos.

In a perfect world former Honduran President Manuel Zelaya would be in jail in his own country right now, awaiting trial. The Honduran attorney general has charged him with deliberately violating Honduran law and the Supreme Court ordered his arrest in Tegucigalpa on June 28.

But the Honduran military whisked him out of the country, to Costa Rica, when it executed the court's order.

His expulsion has given his supporters ammunition to allege that he was treated unlawfully. Now he is an international hero of the left. U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Cuban dictator Raúl Castro, and Venezuela's Hugo Chávez are all insisting that he be restored to power. This demand is baseless. Mr. Zelaya's detention was legal, as was his official removal from office by Congress.

If there is anything debatable about the crisis it is the question of whether the government can defend the expulsion of the president. In fact it had good reasons for that move and they are worth Mrs. Clinton's attention if she is interested in defending democracy.

Besides eagerly trampling the constitution, Mr. Zelaya had demonstrated that he was ready to employ the violent tactics of chavismo to hang onto power. The decision to pack him off immediately was taken in the interest of protecting both constitutional order and human life.

Más sobre la cuestión de Honduras, ahora bastante silenciada tras los primeros tambores de guerra. El WSJ no parece impresionado por la señora Clinton.

«No diga que tiene unas excelentes relaciones con la Santa Sede cuando está desobedeciendo desde el año 1991»

El Arzobispo de Lima y Primado del Perú, Cardenal Juan Luis Cipriani, pidió a las autoridades de la Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú (PUCP), adecuar sus estatutos a lo que pide la Santa Sede a las universidades católicas, y llamó al rector de esta casa de estudios, Marcial Rubio, a no desinformar a la opinión pública.

Las Instituciones universitarias que llevan en su título la palabra "Pontificia" en principio se supone que han de seguir las indicaciones pontificias.

Experimentado editor cultural del periódico La Vanguardia, Llàtzer Moix sabe reconocer el alud de eufemismos que inunda diariamente a la prensa. El tránsito de la información a la propaganda y la responsabilidad del periodista son los temas centrales de este ensayo.

Conviene leer este ensayo de Llàtzer Moix, en el que escribe -y no sólo sobre el periodismo de guerra- para lectores que saben leer. Esta es su declaración de propósitos:

estoy convencido de que la opción opuesta —es decir, la lista de "guerras humanitarias" o "preventivas", de expresiones cosméticas, medias verdades, intoxicaciones y mentiras a la que recurren los mandos políticos y militares estadounidenses a la hora de difundir sus hazañas bélicas— resulta ofensiva para la inteligencia, lesiva para el concepto de verdad y, en consecuencia, también para la salud del lenguaje y de los medios de comunicación.
Me propongo reflexionar sobre este particular, basándome en la experiencia acumulada desde mi observatorio periodístico durante el último cuarto de siglo. Y, en la medida de lo posible, responder a dos preguntas. Una: ¿Puede convertirse la información de prensa en la prolongación de la propaganda militar, en su brazo mediático? Y, dos: ¿Cuál es la responsabilidad del periodista en este orden de cosas?
Me permito adelantar que la respuesta a la primera pregunta es "sí"; y que la respuesta a la segunda pregunta es "mucha".