“Whether you’re a blogger or whether you’re The New York Times or CBS or The Wall Street Journal, if what you are doing is aimed at informing the public, then you’re a journalist, whether you get paid for it or not.”

Safire is quoted in this CNet story about a proposal in the U.S. to create a federal “journalist shield” law that would protect reporters — and possibly bloggers as well — from being forced to reveal their sources and/or testify in court. There are state laws that protect journalists, but not federal ones, which is why Josh Wolf wound up in court for refusing to testify and turn over his videotape of an anarchist demonstration.