A startling photo of the King of Pop taken at James Brown’s memorial service yesterday.
It highlighted, I think, the real reach of James Brown’s life more than any other photo taken that day.
Archive for December, 2006
Jackson Mourns
December 31st, 2006Updated: ‘We won’t show you any more footage’
December 30th, 2006
It’s happened. Saddam has been executed. Gotta admit, I was shocked at the timing of it all…but then I guess there’s never a good time to hang a murderous dictator.
I’ve been at work all day, so haven’t been able to follow the coverage too much. What I did notice, though, from the Six O’Clock news, was the great care taken to ensure good reporting didn’t override good taste. In other words, how much of this execution should be shown?
Sadly I don’t have Al Jazeera back at home. I wonder if their content was any different from the BBC report, in which veteran reporter (and the receiver of Dave-Lee-worship) John Simpson uttered the words “we won’t show you any more footage” when it got to the, excuse me, exciting bit: the hanging itself.
I guess it was just right though. The vision of a man about to meet his death was harrowing to say the least. In this case at least, our own imaginations could never surpass what actually happened to Saddam today.
For the record – I don’t agree with the hanging. But that debate’s for another day…and another blog no doubt.
UPDATE:
I’ve changed my mind about the broadcast of the hanging footage.
2006 has been the year of the citizen journalist. This video* (of Saddam being executed) is the climax to a year where the public created the news in every sense of the word.
Many don’t agree with execution. I don’t. But I do think these clips should be seen. By shielding ourselves from images like this, we are shielding the reality. If it shocks us that much, and causes that much outrage, the question needs to be asked: should it have been done?
The clip signifies two contradicting triumphs of Cit-journos. The quality is woeful. It’s shaky, grainy, dark – but yet, more real than any news footage could hope to be. Some media outlets haven’t embraced citizen journalism very well yet. Well it’s time they did.
Today’s events have made it more important than ever.
*WARNING: The video does show Saddam being executed. This isn’t the faded out version that was shown on the BBC/Sky etc today. You will see Saddam Hussein dying – view at your own risk. But please do.
How important is the news?
December 29th, 2006
Over 160 journalists have died reporting in Iraq since the war began. 32 of the deaths were in 2006 alone, contributing over half the overall worldwide toll of 55 – the highest since records began. More information can be found here.
Reading all this mess made me wonder: how important is the news?
Knowing what is going on is one thing, but risking your life so that you can report live from the center of Baghdad for the Ten O’Clock news is another.
My Dad asked me the other day, Christmas day in fact, if I would take the opportunity to work in a warzone. I said yes, but now I’m not so sure. As the saying goes: “Today’s news is tomorrows chipwrap” … or something along those lines.
So is it worth it? Really?
Christmas Viewing
December 28th, 2006
So it seems the Vicar of Dibley topped the Christmas viewing figures this year. If that isn’t a sign of how shoddy the listings this year were, I don’t know what is.
On Boxing Day morning we surrendered to watching a Carry On film. It’s like torture…old gags, poor acting, boring innuendo. I may be slating a classic cast here – but I think it’s harder to make people laugh these days*.
Oddly, on Christmas Day, we did end up watching the news for quite some time. James Brown had died. I couldn’t believe it. Bring on the documentaries. This is the first time, that I can remember, where a celebrity has died from old age (sort of), but I’m old enough to have been affected by his career. Unlike, say, Charlie Drake – whom I’d never heard of.
It will be interesting to see, however, if anyone dares bring up the bad side of James Brown’s life: the drug addiction and spouse abuse. Perhaps Channel Four will give it a go, probably calling it something as subtle as “Papa’s got a brand new body bag”.
If I ever met the guy – or girl – who comes up with the titles for Channel Four documentaries, I would kiss them.
Alas, with all that said, I do think James Brown’s death is a sad and shocking loss to music. May he rest in peace.
* As if I knew what the old days were like…but you get what I mean.
Sun
December 24th, 2006Journo Blogs
December 24th, 2006With it being Christmas Eve, I fancied reading a little more than I did writing.
Lots of journalists blog – as you’d expect – so here’s some of my favourites:
Charles Arthur – editor of the Technology Guardian. I owe this man for giving my first fully paid up writing work, and his blog is a good read too.
Someone Else’s Life – I don’t know if this person is still blogging, sometimes there is over a month between postings. But when you read the quality of them, it’s a system that works will for him. I like to see photos in blogs. I don’t quite have the photographer’s eye, but he certainly does.
Stephen Pollard – This guy does the same sort of thing I do – finding bits that interest him in the day’s press and sharing them with everyone. He’s also a columnist for The Times too – but not one of those annoying ones.*
News Designer – I always rave about this one. It concentrates mainly on American journalism, but he always raises some interesting debates on page design.
Merry Christmas everyone!
* Something about columnists in The Times makes me itch.
Useless
December 24th, 2006Surely I’m not the only one to notice this.
Take a look at the BBC Weather page. On the right hand side, you have the choice to watch the latest bulletin. Handy, but there’s something infuriating about it.
You see that little rotating Christmas present? What’s that for? It goes at random, sprays some sort of firework out of the top every so often, and is generally bloody annoying.
Grrrr. Take it off!
Free chocolate!
December 23rd, 2006
This post was going to be quite good. But it isn’t. Sorry about that, but let me explain.
You see, it was going to include the front pages of the days tabloids. After my post last night about the Suffolk Murder case, I was hoping to review what the papers had done in response to the CPS’s request for responsible journalism. However, the website that displays the pages on the day they come out has now expired – meaning you have to pay. I don’t expect anyone to do this, so I’ll have to just go on memory from the day.
Turns out the red tops were very responsible indeed. The front pages were well behaved. A little too well behaved I think, to the point it was almost humorous to see. They were making it blatantly obvious that they were being good girls and boys, at least for today. Between you and me, I don’t think it will last.
The inside pages were an early reminder of what the tabloids might aim towards. The Daily Mirror’s report on the story had “RIPPER” written above the photo of Steve Wright – the accused. The careful balance of public interest v contempt of court/human rights is regularly crossed. At the moment, I think the coverage is a little sharp, but I’d expect it to take a tame turn when the trial of the defendant – possibly Steve Wright – draws near.
Keeping on the same subject, but deviating slightly, I want to talk about the media’s new found love of Myspace. When the Suffolk suspect Tom Stephens was arrested, all the media outlets – particularly the BBC – used his myspace page as their source of info on the man. Correct me if I’m wrong, but this is the first time that the web has been used to gather information on a subject in this manner. His page was swiftly deleted from myspace. I’m curious to who decided this. Was it Tom*? If so, fair enough. But if it wasn’t, I wonder who. If it was myspace themselves (i.e. good ol’ Rupert Murdoch), then I question their motivation. Innocent until proven guilty, of course, so why delete a profile that didn’t breach the T&C’s of myspace?
And that’s not the only story: Myspace is hitting the news in many ways this week. A poor man (left) from the North-East has been booted out of his new home in Barrow-in-Furness in Cumbria due to comments made on his Myspace page. Steve Beall called the town, bluntly, a shithole. The residents of the town trashed the Thorntons that he was taking charge of as manager.
Thorntons issued this rather cute statement:
“We wish everyone in Barrow-in-Furness a merry Christmas and a prosperous New Year. As a gesture of goodwill, anybody visiting our store until Christmas will receive a free chocolate.”
My brother defends his choice to not ‘jazz-up’ his myspace page because he says you never know when it will come back to bite you. I guess he’s right.
I’m still keeping mine though.
*Tom Stephens, I mean – not the annoying little Tom who is everyone’s ‘friend’ on myspace. The little punk. Friends of mine actually believe that lovely Tom runs the whole empire…blissfully unaware that it’s a great big corporate superpower run by Rupert. Grrr.
Compelling BBC, Seattle services, and a boring snuff movie
December 22nd, 2006
Despite all its annoyances (which I’ll no doubt talk about another time), you really can’t beat rolling news when a story is about to unfold. The Suffolk Murders reached a major point tonight with the announcement that a 43 year-old man named Steve Wright (left) has been charged with the murder of all five women.
Shamefully, I’ve forgotten the name of the BBC News correspondent that covered the press conference at 10.15 tonight, but he made it compelling viewing. A big rarity, in my opinion, as it’s hard to keep interest up when you’re essentially just a bloke in a room, waiting for more blokes in a room to turn up….to the room. Good viewing – and well handled by the BBC.
I have to say, though, that they poorly balanced the coverage of Richard Hammond’s interview. Yes, we’re all happy that he’s back and a-ok. But, it didn’t warrant the coverage it did. They went even further to suggest the “pictures” [of the interview] were exclusive. Well of course they were. The BBC giving the BBC an exclusive. Bravo.
The short news piece on the license fee increase was fairly balanced – which must be tricky for them – but ruined in a moment when the analyst on News 24 mistakenly said “we” when trying to be unbiased.
Tomorrow will bring countless reports on Steve Wright. Interesting to see how the tabloids handle it, considering the request by the Crown Prosecution Service to tread carefully. ‘Innocent until proven guilty’ isn’t a mantra that the red tops tend to stick to – but I’ll be cautiously optimistic that the wishes of the police are met.
This caught my eye too. Those poor folks in Seattle (as George Bush would probably say) have been without electricity for some while now. A day or two ago even the printing presses were shut down because of outages with the major publications, The Seattle Times and the Seattle Post-Intelligencer*, releasing the days pages on the web for free. Very noble, but then you could argue that without electricity, access to the web is rather tricky.
Anyway, today, the Seattle Times is back in action, and with it a very interesting front page. The top half of the front page is dedicated to public service messages for the affected public. Not only that, but the same messages are written in six different languages.
Often we look to photos or eyewitness accounts to fill pages in a disaster (who can forget the images on Sept 12th 2001, for example), but this for me remains equally as poignant.
Poynter Online discusses the design issues with the page here, if you’re interested. Even if you’re not, the Poynter set of sites is brilliant, and well worth a look.
In the mean time, I’m left watching Hollyoaks in the City. A horrible program. I love Hollyoaks – a hell of a lot, trust me – but something about this post-watershed version makes me cringe. It’s as if the Channel Four executives have said, “Right, everyone, it’s late night…what’s the most controversial thing you can think of?”
The synopsis of this episode (according to Tiscali’s guide) is, brace yourselves, that Lisa is taken to a warehouse, only to find that she is now in a snuff movie. Wow. And Troy, poor Troy, has now found that his family have witnessed his gay porn movie that has found its way onto the internet.
They’re trying to be imaginative – but it comes across as just, well, lazy.
Goodnight!
(Thanks to News Designer for information in this post)
*Intelligencer?! That’s a new one to me!
My Tornado Hell!
December 19th, 2006A week or so ago, a tornado swept through a London residential area. It was rather dramatic, but nothing too impressive. No Hurricane Katrina here.
The Evening Standard (London) have printed an eyewitness’ account of the day. It’s terrific, for all the wrong reasons.
You’d think they’d been hit by the worst natural disaster since the dinosaurs snuffed it.
See for yourselves at: http://mytornadohell.livejournal.com
My favourite passage has to be this gem:
“Since then I’ve been in an emotional cyclone. I already had a brilliant trauma specialist therapist. I went to see him on Thursday evebning [sic]. I’ve felt a desperate need not to be alone, to keep in touch. (We’ve stayed with friends rather than in a hotel because I want to be with people I love.) I haven’t slept much. I’ve shivered brutally. For three nights, I saw the tornado coming towards me whenever I shut my eyes. I’ve jumped at loud noises, panicked hearing sirens, cried endlessly. Sat in my car and screamed and screamed hysterically at such unfairness. Fought the desire for cigarettes and alcohol after 18 years’ abstinence. Despaired of my loss of earnings. Felt like never living in my house again.”
Blimey, that’s quite a tornado. Not only did it mangle a few roof tiles, but it seemed to make the author gain heroin-addict symptoms. Incredible.
(Thanks to Michael Hewitt at Journobiz.com)
