Inside Politics

Negative Option Messaging

by Chris Rands Posted: November 24, 2009 12:25 PM Last Updated: November 24, 2009 1:04 PM
The executive of the parliamentary press gallery is stopping the automatic distribution of photos taken by the Prime Minister's official photographer.
 
Instead, gallery members will have to opt in to a new distribution list, rather like negative option billing.
 
The photos taken by the PM's official photographer have been controversial in the past.
 
They feature the PM out and about, meeting various folks or taking in the sights.
 
Some of these photos, like ones from last summer's Arctic trip of the Prime Minister standing on a submarine, or his cabinet ministers eating seal meat, were taken when no members of the media were there.
 
The official reason behind the gallery's move is that these .jpg photo files are huge and they are clogging up journalists' email inboxes.
 
It's especially a problem when a reporter travels for a few days, and depends on their Blackberry for communication. On the road it's not always possible to manage emails, or to delete them from the main system.
 
Different media outlets have different sizes of email capacity. Those with smaller capacity limits per person have born the brunt of this problem.
 
One reporter from a regional daily newspaper found his inbox so cluttered with these large photo files that his Blackberry couldn't be used. Another scribe with a national paper found his email full and unable to receive any new mail, after the PM photo files quickly filled up his system.
 
This move by the gallery should help some journalists manage their email, but it won't solve everything.
 
Many journalists subscribe to the Prime Minister's Office email distribution list as well.
 
So these folks will receive only one photo of the Prime Minister meeting someone, instead of two.
 
I should mention that I am currently the vice-president of the press gallery executive and was a part of the decision.