Committee Corner: The Digital Question

To write history

or re-write history

By ROGER SOENKSEN, Media Law Committee Chair

The May 15 edition of The Chronicle of Higher Education contained an article that has provoked lengthy discussion on the College Media Advisers e-mail discussion group. The article addressed the growing concern among alumni that student press Web sites should eliminate past stories that capture former students in a less-than-positive light when they were attending school.

It seems that employers and others are conducting Google searches to evaluate potential employees, present workers being considered for promotion, etc. In many instances the student press Web site appears rather prominent in the search, revealing various “sins” of the past. This article will address the legal side of this issue, options that student press editors should consider before receiving such alumni requests, and a quick plug for a media law session to be held in Austin, Texas, at the fall convention.

In many locations former students have threatened suit if the potentially damaging material is not removed. As the Chronicle noted, a lawsuit was attempted in 2007 by a Cornell University alumnus. The story concerned his involvement in a burglary as a student in 1983. The ex-student claimed in court documents that the article caused him “mental anguish” and “loss of reputation” when he ran across the article in an online search of himself. Ultimately, a California court threw out the litigation because the report was accurate. The legal picture is, therefore, pretty clear: If the story is truthful and accurate, the student press is not in danger of losing a lawsuit. At this time, it is usually a standard policy of most student press organizations to correct provable factual errors. These corrections can be linked to the original story and respond to any reader’s call for truthful and accurate information.

One obvious suggestion is for news offices to anticipate an increase in these requests as archives become digitized. The staff should have an extensive discussion and then codify the policy that the paper will follow in a staff handbook. I cannot stress enough the need to address this growing issue before you receive your first request to rewrite history at your institution. The CMA discussion list is a great place to ask for “best practices” of other student media institutions. I’m all for not re-inventing the wheel when a student media organization may have a policy that you like.

If a staff does have a policy to handle Web site requests, it may state that the student press will not remove any material from its Web site. If the story does contain factual inaccuracy, the student media will run a correction or an update. The burden of proof is on the individual requesting the material be removed to demonstrate the information posted is not correct.

Another suggestion is to consider “darkening” specific pages to Web searches. This process allows the material to stay on online, but most search engines do not index it. The Chronicle did report that such a technique has been employed by some student press organizations. It should be noted that the material can still be found by examining the past issues of the student paper, but it does make retrieval more difficult.

This issue is growing at such a rate that at the Fall Convention in Austin, Texas, the Media Law Committee will sponsor a session addressing how to handle these requests. James Tidwell, department chair at Eastern Illinois University, will be the presenter and answer any questions you may have on handling a Web site revision request. When you get to the conference, make sure you schedule this session into your day. The best thing you and your staff can do is to prepare for the inevitable requests your online site is bound to generate among alumni.

Roger Soenksen is a professor at James Madison University, and he is chairman of the College Media Advisers' Media Law Committee.