Ever heard of  James O’Keefe III?   If you care about journalism, you owe it to your occupation to find out more about him.

 O’Keefe has been sullying the good reputation of our craft by invoking the efforts of investigative journalists to justify his actions on behalf of conservative political causes.

 The 25-year-old Rutgers University graduate first entered the public consciousness last September when he and a female friend posed a prostitute and her pimp and secretly videotaped meetings with representatives of the community organizing group, the Association of  Community Organizations for Reform Now. The video tapes appeared to capture ACORN representatives advice on how to break the law.

Then last month, O’Keefe and three associates were caught inside the office of Louisiana Senator Mary Landrieu. The men were posing as telephone repairmen and O’Keefe contends the reason they were in the office was they were intent on exposing Ms. Landrieu’s supposed inability to respond to constituents’ call

In both cases, O’Keefe claims his actions are in the best tradtions of investigative journalists.

If O’Keefe had majored in journalism at Rutgers instead of philosophy, he’d know that while investigative journalists are interested in exposing the truth, they don’t break the law doing it.

Here are two other views on O’Keefe and his misappropriation of investigative journalism; one  from National Public Radio and another  from Boston Globe columnist Renee Loth.

Linda Hall, SPJ’s national membership coordinator. e-mailed me today with the weekly update of membership numbers at the national level. As of Dec. 17th, SPJ had 7,985 members.

That’s up slightly from the 7,971 people that were members a month ago, but it’s way down from 9,130 folks that were part of our organization a year ago.

Hall warns that historically, December and January are two of the biggest months for membership drop off. The memberships of 586 are ending this month and last year SPJ lost 570 when the calendar turned from Dec. 31 to Jan. 1.

To combat the significant decline in membership, the organization is launching a campaign to add 2010 members in the year 2010. As part of that campaign, our national office conducting a contest to see which chapter gets the most new members.

The contest will have three categories: large, small  and campus chapters. Anyone who signs up from a chapter’s geographic area will be awarded to that chapter.

New and renewing members count toward a chapter’s standing in the competition. And finally, applications and payment  must be received at headquarters by Dec. 31, 2010 in order to be counted in the contest.

The chapters who finish first in each category will win three complimentary convention registrations for 2011 (no travel or meal costs included). Second place chapters in each of the three categories will earn two complimentary registrations for the 2011 convention.

Chapters that come in third in each category will get  one complimentary convention registration for 2011.

And while you don’t have to have new members sign up at chapter events, you do need to make a concerted effort to promote the value of being part of our organization, particularly at a time when our business is under siege.

This one time when each and every SPJ member can really make a difference in our organization’s future. Take the time and bring someone new into the fold today.

The Internet doesn’t have to be the down fall of print journalism, but it will present challenges for those publications and journalists that are unable to adapt, according to panelists at forum sponsored by the Quinnipiac University chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists on April 15^th.

“The thing that I think that’s exciting about it (the Internet) is that the cost is so low,” Joel Rawson, the former executive editor of the Providence Journal, told a crowd of about 30 people who attended the forum, “Journalism’s Next Chapter,” “Newspapers spend  more on paper than they do on news these days.”

But Rawson was critical of the lack of foresight on the part of newspapers.

“Nobody had any inkling of  how fast the crash would cone in revenue,” he said. “But when they had the chance earlier, newspapers did not reinvest in the web. And now they respond to it by cutting reporters, cutting pages.”

Joining Rawson on the panel were K. Lee Davis, motorsports editor for ESPN.com and  Melissa Bailey, managing editor of the New Haven Independent, an online newspaper. Davis said that while he’s skeptical that newspapers can survive in a print form, “good information, quality information has always had a value in society.”

Some readers of the New Haven Independent see that value and have made donations to the online publication, which will celebrate its fourth anniversary in September.

“We are thriving on line,” Bailey said.

The New Haven Independent is an ultra-local publication focuses solely on that city. Contrast that with ESPN, which bills itself as “The Worldwide Leader in Sports,” but is now developing web sites that tailored toward specfic major cities like Dallas and Chicago, Davis said.

“We’re branching down,”Davis said.

Leave it to one of my all-time favorite journalists – Terry Gross, host of NPR’s Fresh Air – to offer up an interesting perspective on the quagmire the newspaper business is in. Gross interviewed Stanford University Law Professor and Wired columnist Lawrence Lessig about “the changing landscape of intellectual property in the digital age.”

Here’s the link to the broadcast: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=98591002 Once you get to the web page, click on the “Listen Now” icon

Though much of the nearly 38-minute interview is devoted to the nation’s copyright law, Lessig does have some interesting things to say about print journalism in an Internet age. You may not agree with him – and at one point, Gross steps up to defend the beleaguered newspaper industry – but Lessig provides anyone in the business with some things worth considering.

To borrow a line from Martha Stewart, “And that’s a good thing.”

SPJ members looking to gain a better understanding of Pennsylvania’s revamped open records law should consider attending a speech by Terry Mutchler at Penn State University’s Foster Auditorium at 7 p.m. on Wednesday. The speech is being sponsored by Penn State University’s chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists in cooperation with the school’s College of Communications.

Mutchler, a Penn State graduate and former reporter, is the first-ever Executive Director of Pennsylvania’s Office of Open Records. Her office is being created as the result of Gov. Edward Rendell’s signing a bill into law earlier this year.

The new law takes effect in January 2009

Mutchler, who held a similar position in Illinois in 2003, will field appeals from media, citizens, and others who believe state and local government agencies have withheld documentation. She previously worked as a reporter for The Morning Call in Allentown, Pa., and with the Associated Press in Harrisburg, Pa.; Atlantic City, N.J.; and as the first female AP state Capitol bureau chief in Springfield, Ill.

to the new Region 1 blog.

I’m your new Region 1 Director, Luther Turmelle. I’m hoping this blog will offer SPJ members in the region – both pros and college students – the opportunity to exchange ideas and opinions about journalism. I also plan to use it to make you aware of training opportunities that are available.

One such opportunity is coming up on Oct. 17th and 18th in New York City, where the Association of Health Care Journalists is hosting an Urban Health Journalism Workshop. The workshop will include a hands-on computer-assisted reporting program on how to use spreadsheets to analyze health care data. There will be nine special topic sessions and Los Angeles Times Columnist Steve Lopez will deliver the keynote speech for the event. Lopez will talk about how a series of columns on a homeless, mentally ill musician he passed on the streets each day became a moving book, “The Soloist.”

For more information on the workshop, go to http://www.healthjournalism.org/urban08

Any questions, call me at (203) 789-5706 or e-mail me at lturmelle@ctspj.org