ABC News on Friday 26 November 2010:
The editor-in-chief of The Australian is threatening to sue a journalism academic over claims published on Twitter that he told a staff member what to write in regards to the paper's coverage of climate change.
In an article published on The Australian's website, Chris Mitchell says he will sue Julie Posetti for defamation because of tweets she made purporting to quote a former rural reporter for The Australian.
Ms Posetti tweeted alleged quotes made yesterday by Asa Walhquist at a journalism conference at the University of Technology, Sydney.
Ms Posetti posted: "Walhquist: 'In the lead up to the election the Ed in Chief was increasingly telling me what to write.' It was prescriptive."
In another tweet Ms Posetti claims Walhquist said: "'It was absolutely excruciating. It was torture': Asa Walhquist on fleeing The Australian after being stymied in covering #climate."......
ABC News has now published audio of a relevant section of Walquist's presentation to the 2010 JEAA Conference (on what I think is Day 2) which appears to support Julie Posetti:
Audio Part One
Audio Part Two
Since those tapes surfaced The Australian appears to be backing down from its hardline stance with this admission on its Media Diary Blog:
Her Tweets are a fair summary of what Wahlquist said.
Sadly (and probably due to those legal threats) the Twitter account julie_posetti appears to have been deleted by its owner, however I'm sure that this incident will make for great reading in Ms. Posetti's work-in-progress thesis The Twitterisation of Journalism.
Julie blogs at http://www.j-scribe.com/ and will be tweeting in future at JounTweet.
* Jonathon Holmes writing on this situation in 140 characters of legal nightmare
Update:
Julie Posetti's original Twitter account appears to be online once more.
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