Comment by andreyf | Hacker News Reader

Comment by andreyf | Hacker News Reader

Sounds like a great opportunity for real reporters to dress up as fishermen to sneak out there and take some unique pictures. This kind of thing only stops the half-ass-reporters out there who will go home after running into the coast guard to complain and feel sorry about themselves.

boo hoo BP is trying to control the press coverage

Uh, yes, that's what a public company has to do: maximize shareholder value. Now do what real journalists are supposed to do do: break a couple of stupid rules, find a way to get out there, and take some damned pictures. What are they going to do? Shoot down your plane? Seriously.

I mean, what kind of journalist decides because the coastguard stopped you, you're going to sit back and write self-pitying articles like this? Grow some balls, just hide in a fishing boat for all I care, and take some damned pictures.

Then write another story of how badass you were nearly getting shot down by the BP Air Force. Reporters nowadays, sheesh.

The truly messed up thing about this - that we should be very angry about - is the U.S. Government is helping out in the cover up. Yes, companies are supposed to spin and do damage control. I guess getting the coast guard to give you hand is probably a pretty effective way to do that.

Also, it should be noted that print media has been in a downward spiral for the last four years and no longer has the reporters, photographers or resources they did five years ago, let alone 21 years ago.

New media to the rescue? Where's the bloggers an community journalists covering this?

But why? Why is the coast guard helping? The article didn't even conjecture a reason, they just stated it baldly.

I'd guess BP is paying someone off.

SomeONE? Maybe you didn't notice but the coast guard is not one person.

I find it hard to believe they could pay off enough, or high enough, level people for that to be possible.

Might've been an instance of a not-paid-off coast guard douche getting all authoritative on some reporters. Reporters then write story blaming the coast guard.

Or who knows. It's probably not a conspiracy though.

>SomeONE? Maybe you didn't notice but the coast guard is not one person.

One characteristic of hierarchy is that influencing one person ends up influencing many.

>I find it hard to believe they could pay off enough, or high enough, level people for that to be possible.

BP is a very connected company. I doubt very much that influencing high-ups is only possible in non-US countries.

They ever-so-slightly hinted that it may be because of the massive demand for media coverage the coast guard has received. I don't really know though - I've seen some pretty damaging pictures, but I suppose not as bad as the pictures could be.

Less press coverage is good for the government as well, as the focus will only turn to "why haven't you been able to stop this yet?"

Unfortunately, lone bloggers and community journalists don't have the resources to fight a legal battle if caught. Back in the golden age of print media, you at least had the possibility of support from the publication you worked for or its parent company.

Wait-a-sec, what about the kids over at Crisis Commons (http://oreil.ly/dm1OW0) and Grassroots Mapping(http://bit.ly/99sLWo) considered community journalists, and doing their best to work around the resources issue?

That's great stuff! I guess I didn't mean no one's actually doing it, but that there used to be a whole industry interested in and capable of doing amazing investigative journalism with backers willing to stand up for them. If these guys run afoul of the law, how long will they last?

In all understanding of the laws of the United States...

Uh, yes, that's what a public company has to do: maximize shareholder value. Now do what real journalists are supposed to do do: break a couple of stupid rules, find a way to get out there, and take some damned pictures. What are they going to do? Shoot down your plane? Seriously.

From the article:

The problem, as many members of the press see it, is that even when access is granted, it’s done so under the strict oversight of BP and Coast Guard personnel. Reporters and photographers are escorted by BP officials on BP-contracted boats and aircraft. So the company is able to determine what reporters see and when they see it.

I mean, what kind of journalist decides because the coastguard stopped you, you're going to sit back and write self-pitying articles like this? Grow some balls, just hide in a fishing boat for all I care, and take some damned pictures.

From the article:

Local fishermen and charter boat captains are also being pressured by BP not to work with the press. Left without a source of income, most have decided to work with BP to help spread booms and ferry officials around. Their passengers used to include members of the press, but not anymore.

How can you take those pictures?

EDIT: I apologize for not being able to properly use the <i> tags, I am in all honesty going through the arc3 code right now and this issue will soon be addressed.

EDIT^2: Many kind thanks to anigbrowl for suggesting the correct formatting!

How can you take those pictures?

Use your imagination ;)

Edit (for you down-voters): Fine, here's some off the top of my head:

  * Rent your own plane and fly over without permission,
  * register a fishing company and get a job working for BP,
  * find a way to take pictures while avoiding detection, or just
  * bribe the fishermen.

These are off the top of my head, I imagine someone whose full time job depends on thinking of them will have many more and better ones.

Edit-reply: you're right about my first example, if violating the FAA regulations is as risky as it sounds. But my larger point, that entrepreneurial journalists should be able to find a low-risk way, stands.

I'm sure you recognize the scale of numbers, but as currently suggested the current surface area for the spill is:

157,168 square km

So if you think there's a way to rent a plane to avoid FAA regulations over this enormous area, or bribe fisherman to do this and potentially risk their lives, go ahead.

Who's funding these entrepreneurial journalists?

"The truth" is worth a lot of gratitude and 0 actual dollars.

Journalism is all about advertising, i.e., page views and publications sold.

This is one of the hottest topics in the U.S. right now.

Nobody likes dry analysis; everyone is eager for a quick, vivid, and emotionally compelling way to engage with the story.

Therefore, if you publish more and better pictures than the competition, you'll attract more (non-)readers and make more money.

Still doesn't add up. You're talking about a huge expenditure and significant personal risk in order to hopefully be a viral hit and not just be scooped and republished. Even then, you have to get lucky and pick up an iconic photo, it's not like you're going to find a bunch of great prose in the ocean besides synonyms for "lots of gallons".

Why pursue this story instead of one that's much cheaper and will get you only a fewer impressions on average?

If the photographers are already in the region racking up travel expenses and trying to charter private planes, expense isn't the problem.

You're right in your final concession, but this is where the weakening of mainstream media is most obvious. My guess is there are fewer reporters per publication on the ground with smaller expense accounts and fewer overall resources than what was available to their brethren covering Valdez in 1989.

As a result they have to write whiny stories about how they can't get access when the story they wanted to have falls through. Newsweek should have left those pages blank with the words "oil spill photo spread here" instead.

What you propose risks criminal and civil liability from multiple directions. Few, if any, photojournalists can afford to take such risks. Most news organizations won't. Yes, disasters and war are where much great photojournalism takes place. But it's ironically easier to do that abroad with the specter of the mighty US State Department at your shoulder than it is in your own backyard, where you're just a meddling shutterbug on the make and in the way - and will be described as such by an ambitious prosecutor.

Sure,it's worth a try and might make for some great photos. But being accused of endangering safety or hampering the mission or both by the Feds is not fun, and rather than threatening you with a possible first-amendment case, it's a lot easier for them to go after your pilot and pressure them into signing a statement saying you suborned them into an illegal act.

For these reasons, it's much likelier that news orgs will seek an injunction or declaratory judgment permitting them to gather pictures and video, rather than proceed by stealth.

This is pure FUD. What criminal and civil statutes would be violated by taking a picture of a public place? Something a low-level drone working for the government says does not a law make.

Tell you what - hack into the SEC and DOJ servers and give me the skinny on that Goldman Sachs case. Yeah I know access is restricted, but its our tax dollars, right? I mean, what could go wrong?

Basically, if you persuade the pilot of a plane or boat to flout FAA or Coast Guard regulations by bribery or deception, you could be charged with reckless endangerment or be accused of having committed various torts. I do not agree with this media blackout at all, but as a practical matter most journalists and pilots would rather not run afoul of some overstressed official with arrest powers.

Also add:

* Balloons! http://bit.ly/99sLWo

asterisks at the beginning and end of your emphasis worthy text will make it italic. No spaces next to the asterisks or * this happens.

The flight ban is also being enforced by the FAA. Probably difficult to find a pilot willing to put their career at risk. I'm not clear why my tax dollars via the FAA should be used to fund the PR response of a public company.

I can see them putting some restrictions on the area due the the massive amount of press that will want access to the airspace (i.e. to prevent aerial traffic jams over the hardest hit areas or the areas with the most damning photos). But the idea that BP is pulling the strings and that only BP-charter flights can get clearance is getting too close to the realm of Big Brother (well, closer to the Neal Stephenson vision of the future in Snow Crash where corporations rule everything) for me.

Funny, there's dozens of aircraft aloft over my city of Los Angeles at any given moment, and it's far smaller than this spill.

Crowded airspace is not the issue.

Career? You do know that if you have a pilot's license you can just go rent a Cessna for $100 an hour, right? (And a pilot's license is not that hard to get. It's like a driver's license; except that when I got a driver's license, I had to have 100 hours of driving logged before I could take the test. For a pilot's license, it's like 40 hours.)

There's no ramifications for violating FAA restricted airspace?

The flight ban is a minor issue. The reasons for the flight ban are not.

The problem is that the oil spill releases vapor. Said vapor has two nasty tendencies. The first is that it makes people woozy so that they make bad decisions. The second is that it can explode when exposed to fire, such as may be found in airplane engines.

Unless you understand how to avoid the risks, flying low over an oil spill is a really good way to get yourself killed.

(Incidentally the observant may wonder why the workers aren't being provided with masks. They weren't until people complained. Now they have the masks. But unofficial reports say that BP is threatening to fire people who use the masks. This fact alone shows sufficient hypocrisy that I'm expecting BP to dodge all responsibility as fast as possible. Just like Exxon did when they got over 3000 lawsuits over people sickened by fumes from the Valdez spill thrown out because "they just had flus and colds". Yet another reason for them to not want photographic documentation of the cleanup efforts.)

Update: See http://www.adn.com/evos/stories/T99032316.html for background on how Exxon dodged health claims, and http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/05/26/gulf-oil-spill-clea... for confirmation that there are health problems with the cleanup this time.

I'm not sure that obstructing the legitimate first amendment rights of the press (which courts have tended to interpret broadly) in pursuit of short-term advantage necessarily maximizes shareholder value. Fighting a lawsuit against multiple news organizations or a class of professional freelance photojournalists could get quite expensive.

Does the first amendment apply to corporations? No doubt it would apply to government organizations, but I can't see that nattering to BP's shareholders.

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