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FEC Characterizes Blogs As Media

The Federal Election Commission today unanimously voted to give a political Web log a media exemption from the law on reporting campaign finance activity, National Journal's Technology Daily reports.

The decision for Fired Up -- a Missouri-based company that runs pro-Democratic Web sites in Maryland, Missouri and Washington -- is a major victory for bloggers and puts the commission firmly in favor of a broad media exemption for online news sites.

FEC Chairman Scott Thomas said his review of Fired Up found that its Web sites "fall within the legitimate press function." His only concern is whether such sites could change in the future to become political committees.

"Where would a group like this cross the major-purpose line?" Thomas asked. "This is not a totally clean bill of health that anything that appears on a blog is exempt."

Tech Daily subscribers can get the full story here.

Blogs also are happily, albeit sometimes cautiously, reporting the news. "The current FEC commissioners apparently understand that any rational understanding of how the media exception has been applied means that generally blogs and similar [online publications] would be covered under it," noted Duncan Black of Eschaton, who testified before the FEC in the summer. "Though that's no guarantee that a future set of commissioners would feel the same."

In addition to Fired Up, other blogs that are reacting to the news include Comm Law Blog, Daily Kos and RedState.

Posted by | 04:38 PM

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Comments

Finally some good news on the 1st amendment front. It would be a major blow to American freedoms if the FEC tries to regulate blogs. Hopefully this is the first step in a general pull back of McCain-Feingold restrictions.

Michael Pusatera | 11.21.05 07:59 PM

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