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Former news editor here. Perhaps the biggest danger in this and other similar policies is not how it is applied today -- removing the names of people accused o
by jawns 8y ago
Former news editor here.
Perhaps the biggest danger in this and other similar policies is not how it is applied today -- removing the names of people accused of minor crimes that have had their records expunged seems like a compassionate policy, given the effects it can have on things like employment prospects -- but in how it may be applied in the future.
The idea that a newspaper archive is a collection of living documents, capable of being amended, rather than fixed snapshots of the past, is a fundamental shift.
My concern is that down the line, more alterations will be permitted to be made, and potentially for less reasonable reasons, and then it's only a matter of time before archival information cannot be trusted, because there may be no way to determine what, if anything, has changed.
That didn't used to be the case. When print copies of newspapers were used for library archives, it was practically impossible to alter all extant hard copies.
But nowadays, unless this content gets indexed and preserved by numerous outside entities, it would be very easy for a newspaper to silently modify its own archives.
I would be more comfortable if the newspaper included, as part of its policy, a requirement that a versioning ledger be published along with any altered archival stories, such as:
* On 2018-10-19, this story was edited to remove the name of the suspect, under our "Right to Be Forgotten" policy. A copy of the original story is available for inspection at our office.
That, at least, would allow people perusing the archives to know whether a story had been altered long after publication, and it would give people who really need the information to acquire it (albeit not easily).
- smrq 8y agoParanoid response: if such a versioning ledger were to exist, how could you trust it? The feasibility problem still remains (it is feasible to alter archives that were formerly infeasible) and you now rely on trust that (1) all alterations are accompanied by a versioning notice, and (2) the summary presented in the notice is accurate and complete.
- dsfyu404ed 8y ago>Paranoid response: if such a versioning ledger were to exist, how could you trust it? Blockchain to the rescue (for real this time, I think, I'm not an expert or a blockchain fanboy). A publicly ledger that anyone can verify hasn't been tampered with is the whole point.
- cribbles 8y agoWhy not just provide a hash for each version of the document?
- rwcarlsen 8y agoBut that just changes the problem to one of archiving the hashes immutably.
- fuzzybeard 8y agoWhich is what blockchain does. We're experimenting with using it to create audit logs of data, which can't be tampered with.
- reubenmorais 8y agoThat's essentially what a blockchain is, except you also include the previous hash in the version you're hashing, so that changing one record invalidates all future hashes.
- RileyJames 8y agoThat’s exactly how this kind of this is done, using a blockchain. Here is an example of using Tierion (blockchain) to stores hashes of accounting documents, in order to create a probable audit log. https://medium.com/tierion/xero-integrates-with-tierion-to-secure-accounting-data-using-chainpoint-5ec6b2a1a5c6 https://medium.com/tierion/xero-integrates-with-tierion-to-s... It seems like the same concept would apply to storing hashes of any other document, such as a newspaper article.
- koverstreet 8y agoReally, git is a blockchain, and it's exactly what you want for this.
- slededit 8y agoIt’s far to easy to rewrite history in git.
- whycombinater 8y agoUpvoted one thousand nine hundred eighty four times.
- slededit 8y agoI think there needs to be some balance to the ease of research. Like if you want the original unmodified version you have to actually go to the newspaper archives. In the past you could always do this research. But it was expensive so you wouldn’t just to check up on your new neighbor.
- gowld 8y agoAny archival library is free to save a copy of newspaper articles. Throughout history the standard method of reading an old newspaper edition was to go to a library, not ask the newspaper for a copy. This doesn't need to change.
- pasbesoin 8y agoArguably the largest "archival library" today, with respect to current and recent (last few decades) online (and some other) content, is archive.org . Where retroactively blocking a source URL (via robots.txt) causes archive.org to make its archival copies of/from that URL inaccessible. Supposedly, this is going to change. But it's obvious that lawyers will continue to explore and push the boundaries of this. The Web ('Net) is not a library. And datahoarders have a point, beyond just the stereotype of compulsive collecting. (I'm not one, but I'm increasingly regretting not having grabbed some resources while they were up.)
- Shivetya 8y agoI guess we are entering a realm where the reverse of what happened in the Soviet states, you can remove yourself from history. I am certainly not keen on archival systems or original stories being modified but search engine searches I can see being masked without too much issue. like a local no robots clause. the library/papers own search should not be affected.