Media Law Center for Ethics and Access

Director of Kent State University Media Law Center for Ethics and Access Shares Views on Brian Williams' Reinstatement There’s no sense piling on former NBC News anchor Brian Williams, even as he has been effectively demoted from the network’s Nightly News to its MSNBC cable operation. He has said the last few months have been “torture....

Data Minefields? Big data. Big search. Big opportunities. Big complications. And big implications for the First Amendment, privacy, information security and the media. This year's Poynter KSU Media Ethics Workshop will go beyond the headlines to explore this issue from multiple perspectives. What is it? The Media Ethics Workshop is a ...

"To the frustration of civic do-gooders and journalists alike, “overly broad” has become the new mantra of government officials in denying requests for public records in Ohio. It has become difficult, critics say, to fashion requests to obtain records that are seen as specific enough to please some officials and lawyers who control the rel...

In response to an increasing number of issues dealing with plagiarism and fabrication, the American Copy Editors Society (ACES) produced and released a free e-book to address these issues. KSU's own Jan Leach worked on the book as part of the National Summit on Fabrication and Plagiarism. Both she and the KSU Media Law Center for Ethics...

LORAIN - A pledge signed by every City Council members threatening them with prosecution if they disclose what was said in executive sessions is an illegal gag order designed to muzzle public officials, according to an Ohio Sunshine Law expert. "Even though they signed, it's not enforceable," said attorney Tim Smith, a former Akron...

Riley “There are certain things the public isn’t supposed to know at certain times,” Riley said during an often-contentious Monday meeting with Chronicle Editor Andy Young, Chronicle reporters and Mayor Chase Ritenauer. “This is not a law that is subject to interpretation. It is clear.” Riley said a confidentiality pledge City Counci...

"For all our cultural kinship, Britain and the United States approach expressive freedom in ways that are often sharply different. The Brits have no constitutional free-speech guarantee comparable to the First Amendment. Their government muzzles the press even without court approval.  Official oversight of news media isn't unthinkable...

Perhaps Liane Membis, the Wall Street Journal intern fired recently for inventing quotes, started out with noble intentions. As Miss Black America-Connecticut last year, she spoke against high illiteracy rates among African American children and of wanting to represent black women “in a positive light.” We’d assume that...

Connie Schultz is a nationally syndicated columnist for Creators Syndicate, and a regular essayist for Parade Magazine. She won the 2005 Pulitzer Prize for Commentary for columns that judges praised for providing “a voice for the underdog and the underprivileged." Also in 2005, Schultz won the Scripps Howard National Journalism Award fo...

The 8th annual Poynter KSU Media Ethics Workshop will be Thursday, Sept. 20, 2012 in JMC's state-of-the-art First Energy Auditorium in Franklin Hall. Theme for this year is political media ethics. Plan to join Poynter faculty, media professionals and others for this daylong training opportunity. See last year's sports media ethics Workshop...