WE MEDIA -ZOGBY POLL: Most Americans say bloggers and citizen reporters will play a vital role in journalism’s future. Online survey finds general public, media conference attendees agree that traditional news outlets could do a better job.

NEW STUDY: http://www.hypergene.net/wemedia/download/we_media.pdf]

NYPD POLICE TV CURBED IN NYC

The NY Civil Liberties Union reports:In Victory for Free Speech, Judge Bars NYPD from Routinely Videotaping Lawful Protesters

February 15, 2007 — The NYCLU today applauded a federal judge’s decision to stop the New York City Police Department from routinely videotaping individuals engaged in lawful political protest.

“The NYPD had transformed the atmosphere for political dissent in New York City with its omnipresent videotaping of every demonstration, regardless of the likelihood or suspicion of criminal activity,” said Donna Lieberman, NYCLU Executive Director. “This decision should restore the expectation that New Yorkers can participate in lawful demonstrations without fear of being placed in political dossiers.”

DAVID TERESCHUK ON LIDDY TRIAL

THE NATION’S CAPITAL, THOUGH, COULDN’T REMAIN far from the minds of the news-hounds among us, and former Washington Post-er Carl Bernstein, my table companion along with his wife Christine Kuehbeck and my wife Melissa Bellinelli, later fell to discussing the Lewis “Scooter” Libby perjury trial, and what it has exposed about the deep embeddedness of DC journalists within the Bush White House.

Bernstein was amused at the expunging of familiar, friendly expletives during the courtroom replay of the taped phone-call between his former Watergate-cracking cohort Bob Woodward and ex-Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage. The much less plodding half of the “Woodstein” investigative duo agreed with me that his old partner’s line of questioning sounded a little slow on the uptake. On the tape, Armitage is heard taking three tries to sell Woodward the Administration’s smeary line about CIA operative Valerie Plame (Courtesy of the Associated Press, we can all hear the evidence or read the transcript.) The Neo-Cons’ propaganda machine, embracing even a relatively tame “believer” like Armitage as well as hard-core “Vulcans” like Dick Cheney and Libby himself, was clearly spinning in the highest gear possible, almost out of control.

But the trial’s revelations took us back to Lincoln again - and the hope offered by Honest Abe’s (possibly apocryphal) reassurance, supposedly given during an 1858 speech in Clinton, Illinois, that … rather indisputably …

“you may fool all of the people some the time; you may even fool some of the people all of the time; but you cannot fool all of the people all the time”.

Sidney Blumenthal: Libby’s cynical defense

In the courtroom, I watched Libby’s lawyers grill Bob Woodward and Robert Novak, trying and failing to obscure the charges against the vice president’s man.

_http://www.salon.com/opinion/blumenthal/2007/02/15/libby_trial/print.html_
(http://www.salon.com/opinion/blumenthal/2007/02/15/libby_trial/print.html)

Viacom to Move Cable Channels Downtown

Viacom plans to move its MTV Networks Entertainment Group, which includes Comedy Central, Spike TV and TV Land, into offices on Hudson Street as part of it cost-cutting efforts. The move could be the initial stage of Viacom’s relocation out of its pricy Times Square headquarters.

OLBERMANN REUPS WITH MSNBC

Jerry Policoff notes:

By the way, last February Olbermann averaged 163,000 Adults 25-54 per night. So far in February 2007 he is averaging 284,000 per night, an increase of 74%. Any wonder that MSNBC did not want to let him get away? This also demonstrates that when journalists stand up to the Bush administration and speak truth to power, the viewers respond. Given his current growth trend, Olbermann could pass O’Reilly this year. O’Reilly averaged 500,000 Adults 25-54 in January which might seem like a lot unless you compare it to his earlier audience which peaked at 1,750,000 Adults 25-54 per night in April 2003. That represents an audience erosion of nearly 70% for Bill’O in the past four years. Olbermann was in fourth place in the time period among thefour cable news/talk networks just a little over a year ago, and he is now a very strong number two, having passed both Paula Zahn and Nancy Grace. His is also by far and away the most watched program on MSNBC.

Ex-BBC reporter Rageh Omaar on the ‘Scud Stud’ label, switching to Al-Jazeera, and why he’s fallen in love with Iran

http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,,2013253,00.html

FOX PRODUCERS OF 24 REJECT HUMAN RIGHTS GROUP PROTESTS BUT CUT BACK ON TORTURE ANYWAY (Philly.com)

It wasn’t protests that carried the day, but the programmers’ belief that torture had gotten “trite.”

Fox’s 24 will become less torturous, but not because the U.S. military, human rights groups and children’s advocates want it to.

So says Howard Gordon, an executive producer of the hit thriller starring Emmy winner Kiefer Sutherland as secret anti-terrorist operative Jack Bauer, whose interrogation tactics make oatmeal of the Geneva Conventions.

Our hero routinely shoots, suffocates, drugs and/or electrocutes suspects. One of them, his treacherous brother, Graem, died in last week’s episode. (Their evil father, played by James Cromwell, actually did the deed, although Jack is convinced that he was responsible.)

The decision to cut back on torture is driven by creativity, not criticism, according to Gordon. In its sixth season, 24 has become so torture-heavy that it borders on cliche, he says.

Oh!