In Australia we tend to give our media an ample serving of skepticism – more than it deserves if you ask me. But an ethical atrocity like the one unearthed by Egyptian blogger Wael Khalil this week puts most others in the shade.
The Australian Federal election campaign has to this point consisted mostly of shallow and confected photo-ops and simplistic sloganeering. There is generally one stage-managed event enacted for the cameras each day, crafted to illustrate whatever policy announcement the party is planning to unveil.
However the Prime Minister Julia Gillard has acknowledged in recent days that Labor’s campaign strategy has not served her well, and to that end she has announced that for its remaining weeks she will take personal control and that from now on Australians will get to see ‘the real Julia’.
But if it’s authenticity the PM wants, there’s a pretty simple way to go about achieving it. She wouldn’t even be pioneering new ground, because the White House and Downing Street have been doing it for years.
When the PM travelled to Perth yesterday it was always going to be an opportunity for political theatre. The trip had been identified by mining industry strategists as a key moment in their public campaign against his government’s proposed new “super profits” tax and Andrew “Twiggy” Forrest lead a TV ambush as good as any.
Pardon my focus on the Brits of late but they’ve been dealing with a couple of issues that we shouldn’t underestimate the possibility of facing here one day. The Orphan Works legislation may have only just been defeated, but an equally great threat might be just over the horizon.
The UK Parliament has just rushed through its Digital Economy Bill which contained that contentious Orphan Works legislation you may remember, but the good news is campaigning British photographers have achieved a major win for us all.
It appears increasingly likely that Britain will pass into law The Digital Economy Bill 2009-2010 which contains an “orphan works” provision similar to what the Americans faced last year.
Orphan works encompass photographs or other types of intellectual property where, for whatever reason, the original creator cannot be found. The Digital Economy Bill seeks to implement a mechanism whereby publications can go ahead and use them anyway without having received the necessary authority to do so from the copyright holder.
Federal MP Peter Slipper was caught snoozing in the House of Representatives a couple of weeks ago. He was photographed by one of his colleagues on their Blackberry. Slipper, who insists he was just resting his eyes, complained to the Speaker who instigated the inevitable inquiry.
It was a bit unfortunate that this coincided with an address to Parliament by the visiting Indonesian head of state, but if I had to endure the sort of workload our MPs seem to I’d be pretty tired too, I guess.
When the picture was published in a Queensland newspaper a few days later, Slipper wasn’t a happy camper and he told the house he wanted the culprit found.
“I also imagine, Mr Speaker, that it makes it difficult for you to discipline members of the press gallery who might be inclined to breach the rules on photography,” Slipper said.
Whoever did it, they’re in good company because the rules controlling photography in the Federal Parliament are so restrictive they are breached almost as often as anything seriously newsworthy needs to be photographed in that place.
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