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Blogger Snubbed by City Public Information Officer
He goes by the name 'frazgo' and he had an encounter with a Monrovia Public Information Officer that left a sour taste in his mouth. In a post on blogging.la, he ventures into that new media gray area that still is fuzzy... is a blogger considered media?
I attended the city press conference regarding the gang warfare here. The city Principal Information Officer was giving transcripts of the mayors speech. Several of us asked for a copy and he replied "it is for media only". I said, that's fine "I am the media, I am frazgo at blogging.la and I happen to live here". He said" I am familiar with your work, you are not media you do not get one" He turned around and walked away from me I said, "oh, can I quote you on that?". He stopped for a second and then walked on. [blogging.la]
In our new media experience here at LAist, each organization, each city department, each council office has a different take on new media and bloggers. Here in Los Angeles, Councilman Eric Garcetti's office has traditionally been new media friendly, the Mayor's Office is extremely careful, maybe overly cautious, which may cause more harm than good, the Department of Transportation is getting better, but mysteriously sometimes moves as slow as traffic, the LAPD is pretty damn good and the Fire Department is on its way to earning some kind of national award. And Los Angeles is the second biggest city in the nation! We can't even begin to think why a smaller city like Monrovia would be not want as much accurate information out there to the public as possible. Gang warfare was the topic at the press conference.
Photo by Living in Monrovia via Flickr
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