August 13, 2006
Readers are the new paparazzi
The IHT reports on the press' growing dependence on citizen reporters and how some celebrities are fighting back - citing human rights violations. Picture left from Scoopt.
German Tabloid "Bild's "Leser-Reporter" feature, introduced during the World Cup, brought its readership daily shots of celebrities, politicians and soccer stars - taken from the cellphone cameras of quick-thinking passers-by. The photos were either uploaded onto the Bild home page or sent as e-mail attachments or multimedia messages to a special number the tabloid set up.
The paper paid €500 to €1,000, or $638 to $1,270, for photos printed in the Reader-Reporter pages, and by the end of the World Cup soccer tournament, as many as 1,000 photos were streaming in daily.
... "Amateur photographers are omnipresent, and that's an interesting development," said Nicolaus Fest, who sits on the Bild editorial board.. "Whether you see them with fear or hope, that depends on your point of view."
Christian Schertz, a lawyer to the stars, is clearly in the first camp. "I'm reminded of George Orwell. The normal citizen is encouraged to watch a fellow citizen," said Schertz, who counts Bild among his most consistent sparring partners. "And he even gets money for it."
... "The restriction in the private lives of celebrities is already at the point where you can talk about a human rights violation," said Schertz, the walls in his elegant office decorated with gifts from his prominent clients.
Indeed, lawyers like Schertz have the legal backing of the European Court of Human Rights in their quest to preserve the private lives of their clients".
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