This is maddening, but it doesn’t change the fundamentals of the profession as I see it: if a court ordered us to reveal the name of a source we wouldn’t. https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/judge-rules-seattle-media-companies-must-hand-over-protest-images-to-police">https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-n...
In Oregon, I’ve always been asked to hand over footage since day 1(justice center fire) I always have and will respectfully decline.
When people leak to me they are trusting me with their career or their life, in return I offer them the same: an outlet can fire me or a court can hold me in a contempt, but as a journalist you don’t reveal sources.
I’ve had to clean SD cards while working in certain countries, journalists have been at this junction already. Covering protests in Seattle may require the kind of precautions we’ve taken overseas, but the profession will continue to work in environments hostile to them.
It’s dissapointing that we have to add Washington, for now, to the list places where it takes extra prep/post work to document; but we work in arenas with no press freedom at all sometimes. We know how to protect info we capture e.g. setting signal messages to “disappearing”
We don’t let police, or protestors, look through our cameras.