Journal Sentinel Online Metered Paywall: The Tier that Made Milwaukee Pay Us?

Image via WikipediaBeginning January 4, The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel (JSOnline.com) will introduce a paywall requiring online readers to pony up once they exceed their 20-free-article limit, the paper announced today.

Digital-only access subscribers will pay $2.35 a week in monthly, semi-annual or annual installments. Readers who subscribe to the print edition will have free access to the electronic version. Subscribers to the Sunday-only print edition can pocket an extra nickel by paying $2.30 a week while enjoying full access to the digital version.

The daily is calling its digital version  JS Everywhere, which should help those who sometimes confuse journalism with creative writing. Sports results, section indices, classified ads, home page, videos and the TapMilwaukee channel offerings on JSOnline.com will remain free to all online visitors, the paper announced.

Wisc. Daily Sues Police Dept. for Alleged Open Records Law Abuses

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The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel has sued the city's police department for allegedly violating Wisconsin's Open Records Law ("WORL") [Wis. Stat. Sec. 19.31-19.39 (2003] by foot-dragging in producing documents and charging excessive fees.


As reported by the Web site of the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press (www.rcfp.org), Journal Sentinel reporters Gina Barton and Ben Poston  were informed by the police department that their respective requests for selected incident reports would cost $3,500 and $600. The paper also complained that their independent probe of police department crime statistics would be unduly delayed by the police department's purported claim that the records sought could take as long as nine months to retrieve because of time and manpower limitations.


Under Sec. (3)(A) of WORL,  an authority may impose a fee on a requester of a copy of a record that "may not exceed the actual, necessary and direct cost of reproduction and transcription of the record, unless a fee is otherwise specifically established or authorized to be established by law."

'On Wisconsin': State to Protect Journalists from Govt. Badgering

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Wisconsin is poised to become the 39th state to enact a shield law to protect journalists from having to reveal confidential sources following state senate voice vote approval of 2009 Assembly Bill 333, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reports.

Democratic Gov. James Doyle Jr. is expected to sign into law the Whistleblower Protection Act sponsored by Sen. Pat Kreitlow (D-Chippewa Falls), which confers a qualified privilege on journalists against having to disclose newsgathering information or confidential sources. A government entity seeking such information from reporters would have to demonstrate its relevance, unavailability elsewhere, and an overriding public interest to overcome the shield law.

The Wisconsin Newspaper Assn., Wisconsin Broadcasters Assn., and Wisconsin Freedom Council all had a hand in the legislation. The District of Columbia and 38 states have passed shield laws. "TUOL" believes it only fitting that a state whose capital, Madison, honors the drafter of the First Amendment, should join the ranks of states protecting journalists.

U. Wisc. Sued for Alleged Public Records Law Violations

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The Univ. of Wisconsin's Medical Foundation's refusal to make public faculty comments concerning a proposed conflict of interest law violates the state's public records law, alleges The Milwaukee Sentinel Journal in a lawsuit filed last week in Dane County(Case No. 2009cv006372).

The lawsuit seeks to make the faculty comments public under the Wisconsin Public Records Law (Wis. Stat. secs. 19.31-19.39.).