…the White House routinely excluded news photographers from sessions with the president and then released photographs of the events, usually taken by Mr. Souza. “You are, in effect, replacing independent journalism with visual press releases,”…
via NYTimes.com.
1 Comment
This policy has caused several of our clients who formerly “made a living” as White House regulars, to give up. The denial of access to the President was a distinct departure from the policies of every White House since at least, FDR. Whether Republican or Democrat, no president in the last 70+ years has restricted photo access to the press and photojournalists working for the wires, news weeklies or others like Mr. Obama.
As usual, the independent photographers most affected were not the ones to take action. They grumbled about lost licensing income and for the most part were forced to depart in order to make a living doing something else. Kudos to the AP, The NYT and the larger press organizations who after years of being closed out, decided to act.
Final point – when I brought this complaint up several years ago it was dismissed as purely “partisan politics”. The public hardly knew because the main stream media thinking this was an “inside baseball” type story, barely covered it. Even now the public is so desensitized to what is or is not quality reportage, that it really does not understand the significance of the administration restricting access.
Access equates to value. No access, means no images, which means no income.
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