IV. Who is covered

The Ninth Circuit applies a liberal standard when determining who has standing to invoke the reporter's privilege. Instead of focusing on the professional affiliation of the person invoking the privilege, the Ninth Circuit focuses on whether the privilege-claimer had an intent to disseminate information to the public at the time he or she was gathering the information. Hence, the critical question is whether the person seeking to invoke the privilege had the intent to use material--sought, gathered or received--to disseminate information to the public and whether such intent existed at the inception of the newsgathering process. See Shoen v. Shoen , 5 F.3d 1289, 1293 (9th Cir. 1993) (Shoen I) (reversing and remanding an order that held an investigative reporter in contempt for refusing to divulge information that was gathered for use in his book). The Shoen I court adopted the reasoning of the Second Circuit when fashioning the above test, stating "the journalist's privilege is designed to protect investigative reporting, regardless of the medium used to report the news to the public." Id. The Ninth Circuit panel addressing web journalist Josh Wolf's appeal of a civil contempt order did not explicitly address whether or not Wolf was sufficiently a "journalist" to have standing to invoke the reporter's privilege, though it did suggest that the California state law protection would not apply because "Wolf produced no evidence this videotape was made while he was" connected with or employed upon a newspaper, magazine, or other periodical publication, or by a press association or wire service. 201 Fed. Appx. at 432 n.1 (citing Cal. Const. art. I, § 2(b)).