Free Press reports on the new DOJ guidelines:

Last Friday, the Justice Department released revised guidelines governing the Department’s interactions with the press. President Obama had ordered Attorney General Eric Holder to conduct the review in response to the news earlier this year that the DoJ had obtained the phone records of Associated Press reporters and editors and the emails of a Fox News reporter.

One of the main issues is whether citizen journalists (e.g., many serious writers/reporters/investigators who run their own websites to report the new) will have any protection at all. This article warns that the federal government is moving in the direction of declaring an “official press,” deeming who is a journalist and who is not. This, in the digital age where citizen journalists are making a tremendous impact on news gathering.