Editors To Meet With MLB To Discuss New Media Restrictions

Editors To Meet With MLB Over New Media Restrictions In Place This Season

A group of news and sports editors today will meet with MLB officials to "discuss a string of new restrictions on media credentials that editors contend are an unfair limitation on Web-related reporting," according to Joe Strupp of EDITOR & PUBLISHER. The restrictions take effect at the start of the season and include a 72-hour limit on posting photos after games, a seven-photo limit on pictures posted online during a game, a 2-minute limit on game-related video and a "ban on live or recorded audio and video from game-related events posted 45 minutes before the start of a game through the end." AP Sports Editor Terry Taylor, who is among the group involved in the meeting, said, "This is all about limiting what any of us can do on the Internet with our property. It is no different than telling a newspaper what it can print." MLB VP/PR Pat Courtney said that the league is "open to meeting with the editors," but that the restrictions are "aimed at providing some rules for the Internet age." Courtney: "The whole area of the Internet has had no rules, no rules as there are if someone is putting something on TV or radio. You would have people setting a recorder down when a manager is speaking and post 12 to 15 minutes of unedited audio online." Courtney also "cited instances of foul language being posted, as well as other images MLB objects to" (EDITORANDPUBLISHER.com, 3/3). The online restrictions were first reported by SportsBusiness Journal (THE DAILY).

ONLINE OBJECTION: MLB's new restrictions on the use of online photo images has "drawn a protest letter from the Online News Association, a 1,200-member group of Web journalists." ONA President Jonathan Dube in a letter sent yesterday to MLB Commissioner Bud Selig wrote, "These terms interfere with our members' ability to do their jobs as journalists and cover news of public importance'' (EDITORANDPUBLISHER.com, 3/4).