Ben Goldacre of Bad Science Threatened by Lawyers for LBC and Jeni Barnett
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- Jeni Barnett, Ben Goldacre, LBC and M’Learned Friends: Spartacus is Back
- Ben Goldacre of Bad Science Threatened by Lawyers for LBC and Jeni Barnett
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- Lord Mandelson is losing his touch: his smokescreens used to HIDE the facts
Hey ho, here we go again. In this case we have lawyers sending letters to prevent public debate.
Jeni Barnett is a presenter for LBC who did a three hour programme where she had an extended segment about the MMR vaccine, why she had not given it to her children and asking for reasons from members of the public why they had done the same.
Ben Goldacre of Bad Science took exception in strong terms, and posted a 44 minute segment from the broadcast on his blog:
It is my view that in this extended broadcast Jeni exemplifies every single canard ever uttered by the antivaccination movement.
I invite you to document the rest below (the bit about empirical experience is particularly enjoyable) and maybe we can get the full list of canards together for the definitive numbers set of Bad Science Bingo. In fact, if there is an anti-vaxxer canard in existence which is not in this broadcast, I want to know about it, signed copy of some book for the best one.
Jeni Barnett did not like the vigour:
I am interested in the debate not a witch hunt.
Should anybody from BAD SCIENCE read this I urge you to continue the debate, and if it gets too heated there is always the option of turning me off.
But within a day Ben Goldacre received contact from lawyers alleging copyright violation. That doesn’t sound to me to be “interest in the debate”.
Criticism, review and news reporting
The Copyright, Designs and Patent Act 1988 states:
30 Criticism, review and news reporting
(1) Fair dealing with a work for the purpose of criticism or review, of that or another work or of a performance of a work, does not infringe any copyright in the work provided that it is accompanied by a sufficient acknowledgement.
It seems to me that:
a) The material is now thoroughly available to the public, firstly because it was broadcast by LBC to the whole of London, and because it is now posted on Wikileaks (among other places).
b) The programme was posted by Ben Goldacre for “Criticism or Review” – which he did extensively.
c) The segment he posted was less 25% of a three-hour programme.
And that the segment presented by Ben Goldacre should therefore fall under Fair Dealing.
My Comment
It seems to me highly irresponsible to attempt to suppress material that is needed to inform a public debate, especially when you have stated that such a debate is what you would like to see. This is the segment:
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Categories: All WW, Comment, Media, News - Current Affairs, Political Blogging
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