Fake News for Big Brother

[David Howe]

at Tuesday, April 29, 2003 3:16 PM, Trei, Peter <ptrei at rsasecurity.com>
was seen to say:
> I'm not sure how I feel about this. Problems would arise if there
> *were* a law against news media presenting false information.
> The question becomes 'What is truth?', and
> 'Who decides". Laws of this type are used in many tyrannies (recently,
> Zimbabwe) to persecute reporters on the grounds that they
> were 'libeling the government'.
I think there is a distinction between truth as an absolute, the twisted wording required to
avoid libel in the uk, and deliberately lieing to people who believe you are a source of
truth about the world they can't see.
The UK has some pretty strong rules in this area - for instance, a newsreader can't be seen
to promote (advertise) a product, as a viewer could confuse marketing (which is always a bit
suspect) with "news" (which is supposed to be unbiassed and as accurate as the broadcaster
can make it) and in libel/slander cases, the burden of proof is on the defendant - not fun
at all.

> 'Truth in media' is a sword that cuts both ways.
Indeed - but (at least in a free press) there is supposed to be a distinction between
"marketing" "news" and "propaganda". Of course, freedom of the presses has only ever been
available to those who own presses....