The keyboard is mightier than the sword.
Bloggers banded together to challenge certain San Francisco talk radio hosts at KSFO-AM for making insensitive racial & religious remarks. Led by Spocko, of Spockosbrain blog, they copied & distributed clips of the shows to advertisers, asking them to pull their ads from KSFO.
The radio station counter-attacked the blogswarmers as “crackpots with keyboards” using “guerilla tactics” to distort the truth. ABC Radio Networks (owned by Disney), which owns KSFO, hit back by contacting the blog’s service provider, demanding the audio clips be taken down for copyright infringement. The site provider complied & the blog was shut down, despite cries of fair use and the First Amendment. The radio show hosts then went on to play the clips themselves to defend their comments to their audience and critics. KSFO saw it as a liberal-backed attack on their right to free speech.
Here is a caller-host exchange published by The New York Times, which covered the story here. (subscription may be required or check out BugMeNot for a way in):
Mr. Stark: “You’ve spoken of the number of apologies you have tried to make. How many apologies does a professional get before they realize they are an incompetent and move on to another line of work?”
KSFO’s Lee Rodgers: “Well I haven’t apologized for anything and I am not going to start with you. How the hell do you like that, creep?”
Can’t we all just blog along?
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