Archive for June, 2007

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Yes, their worries are quite different

June 28th, 2007

[REUTERS BLOG] Fancy having 500 newspaper editors as Facebook buddies?

Interesting blog by those chaps over at Reuters, the news agency. A bloody big news agency at that.

Thing is, the most interesting point arises from this quote, and then the comment after it.

One glimpse of the future I got was from Didier Pillet, Director of Information at Ouest-France, who believes bloggers are already moving into the heart of news coverage. He speaks for a daily with a circulation of 800,000 that gets something like half its material from so-called ‘village reporters’ — local bloggers. Reassuringly, he told us that they are not envisaged as substitutes for news journalists.

The commenter replies…

The Cairo example does not give a cross section of Egypt. You’re seeing what the technically-inclined population of Egypt worries about, not the other 10 million who don’t have access to a computer. Yes, their worries are quite different.

Exactly. It’s easy to get wrapped up in this blogosphere and think the world revolves around it. It doesn’t. People are going crazy over its 3.2 million members worldwide. That only leaves a few billion then.

Embracing blogs, social networking and other Web 2.0 trinkets is all well and good, but journalists can’t forget how we reach the overwhelming majority of our audience. That’s TV, radio and newspapers (in case you’d forgotten).

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Posted in Blogs, Citizen Journalism, General, Newspapers, TV, The Future, The Web

‘Think Alan Johnston’

June 26th, 2007

I haven’t commented on the kidnapping of Alan Johnston yet on this blog. I felt that I couldn’t add anything significant to the global debate, so I opted to keep quiet.

But, after seeing the clip of him released by his captors yesterday, I feel I must comment now.

If you haven’t seen the footage, you can see it here.
Incredible. Alan Johnston has been in captivity for over 100 days now. Somehow, he delivered that piece to camera with extraordinary professionalism, clarity and bravery. He even keeps his journalistic morals intact. “My captors say” and “what they describe as” are two phrases that stuck out for me. Alan is being impartial, even at a time like this.

A member on a journalism message board I frequent wrote that it “made me sit up a bit straighter at my cosy desk”. A feeling I certainly agree with today.

There are times when I’ve been working, as a student, freelance or work experience fellow, and I’ve been scared to death to do things. Interviews with people that might be slightly scary. But now I have a different attitude. Next time I find myself confronted with a frightening situation, I will ‘Think Alan Johnston’ — for nothing I will ever do can compare to the sheer terror that Alan must be feeling each and every day.

I must always remember that.

Sign the BBC petition to release Alan Johnston here.

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Posted in Ethics, General, TV, The BBC

Sir Wooden

June 24th, 2007

News Knight.

Oh Trevor, what have you done? Such a distinguished man — yet so foolish all the same.

At risk of sounding like a bored housewife writing to Points of View, I have to say I have never seen a program fail on so many levels.

Sir Trevor cannot present. Simple.

Yes, we like him, but that doesn’t excuse him from being rubbish at hosting this ‘comedy’ show (quotation marks very intentional). I’m almost 100 percent sure that it was entirely scripted from start to finish, with horrid canned laughter popping up relentlessly throughout. To make things worse, Trevor’s delivery of his pre-written gags was as wooden as the desk I’m sat at now.

The only highlights were when Clive Anderson — who looked embarrassed to be there — seemed to unintentionally slip himself into the role of presenter instead of just a mere panelist.

What a load of toss.

3 comments »

Posted in General, TV

Murdoch tries to leap off sinking ship

June 21st, 2007

I thought this may happen soon: Murdoch ‘in talks’ on Yahoo deal.

MySpace is a sinking ship. No doubt about it. It’s main rival, Facebook, has managed to eclipse everything MySpace is capable of — and then some.

Facebook is quicker, slicker and more useful than MySpace ever was and ever will be. A recent “major upgrade” from MySpace made me wonder if big changes were about to come our way. No, instead, there were a few font changes and a friends searching feature.

The very fact they felt like they needed to add a search feature tells me all I need to know. It should have been in from the very beginning. Facebook, on the other hand, allows you not only to search friends, but to sort them according to location, online status, activity and plenty of other things.

And then there is the spam and advertising. When NewsCorp bought MySpace, it was already brimming with ads. But now it’s just too much. On some days, the entire homepage will be different, completely rebranded to suit an upcoming film release. I don’t want my homepage to look like that. It’s my homepage. Get off!

Even worse is how MySpace have failed, miserably, to combat the growing phishing problem. If I go to my profile now, the latest ‘bulletin’ that someone has left is an advert. My friend, sadly, fell right into a phishing trap.

This article shows just how easily security flaws are exploited on MySpace.

The lovable ‘Tom’ keeps us up to date on all the things that are going on. Every so often he’ll throw in the odd “i” instead of “I” or “teh” instead of “the”, just to prove he’s human and friendly. Pah.

Anyway, we can now access MySpace on our mobiles, his last bit of news read. As long as we pay lots, and have a Vodafone contract. Another reason to desert MySpace for Facebook — their mobile service is more usable and, yup, free.

Another of Tom’s recent updates tells us that the bulletins are down for a little while. Why? What caused that to happen? The feeling that MySpace might just explode at any moment makes me uneasy. I’ve lost count how many times the “Sorry, and unexpected error has occurred” message appears. It’s a complete lie: They’re not sorry, and it’s not unexpected. It happens all the time.

The only trump card MySpace has left is music. Facebook doesn’t have the answer to that just yet. Rest assured, though, they will be working on it. The Facebook Platform has been a huge success, allowing developers to have enough creative freedom, but not too much as to ruin the ‘feel’ of the Facebook network. It was an intelligent upgrade, and it’s worked.

The same can’t be said about MySpace Video — YouTube does it much better — or, more to the point, MySpace News. The top story on the site today has a staggering six votes. Six! In the last six months, MySpace has unrolled failure after failure after failure… MySpace IM, MySpace Comedy, MySpace Weather (!!)… the list goes on.
If Rupert Murdoch has any sense, which I’m confident he has, he’ll abandon MySpace as soon as he can. In less than a year, I predict it will have less than a quarter of the users of Facebook. And what’s more, we’ll all be logging on to Facebook Music to discover new bands instead.

Hats off to MySpace for being the pioneers, but it’s time to move on. After all, do any of you search with Lycos on Netscape Navigator anymore? No, I thought not.

EDIT: As I was posting this, a new ‘Tom’ update appeared, reading:

We’re having some problems with slow logins and edit profile this morning. Sorry! We are working to fix it right now. If you see the ’safe mode’ edit next to your edit profile, you’re not going to be able to edit your profile. To fix it, you’ll have to logout and log back in.

We think we know what is causing this bug, so we’ll but [sic] we’re putting a bandaid fix on it this morning and will have a permanent fix later tonight! So sorry! :-/

Sums it all up, really. It was good while it lasted, Tom.

4 comments »

Posted in General, The Future, The Web

Apology

June 19th, 2007

Just a quick apology — to those who care — that this blog has been a little inactive lately. I’ve been busy, believe it or not, but I have plenty I want to talk about.

Check back soon.

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Posted in General

50,000 Guardians… how many more?

June 11th, 2007

Today marks the 50,000th edition of The Guardian.

It has, for the last two years or so, been my newspaper of choice for most days of the week.

That’s not important. What is important is that with anniversaries such as this, it gives us a chance to look back at the legacy of The Guardian.

Last Saturday, we were treated to a pull-out showing some of the major front pages in the paper’s long history. Looking at these, two things were apparent:

1. The Berliner wasn’t a success

Yes, it looks very pretty and is easier to read on the train; but now The Guardian looks like a cross between a parish newsletter and a lifestyle magazine. The look has had an effect on the content too. G2 seems to get fluffier by the day. I’m not asking for serious features everyday, but I can’t remember the last time I read a good hard-hitting feature.

When something shocking/important happens, I instinctively find myself reaching for The Times instead.

2. Tabloids act as a far greater chronicle of history, and will live on

For Christmas, I was given a really impressive looking book with replica copies of tabloids on the day major sporting stories broke. If there’s one thing the tabloids do well it’s reflect public opinion like no other medium — even the internet. It’s the newspapers’ trump card, maybe the only one they have left.

The ‘quality’ dailies need to learn how to do this. They can without dumbing down. They can without burying their opinions on page 20. Comment pages in the qualities are extremely poor. Sometimes two or three columnists will focus on the same issue of the day. While it’s good to have some great analysis on a major event, this seems to happen every time Gordon Brown/David Cameron makes a speech. The Guardian has plenty of comment out there, Comment is Free is evidence of that.

In my view, if quality dailies are going to survive, they need to take one course of action out of a possible two. These are:

Either…

- Do more of what they’re good at already. Media on a Monday, Technology on a Thursday, Film on a Friday. All fantastic sections from The Guardian. The Times’ football coverage on a Monday is exceptional. The New York Times pullout in The Observer is a bit odd, but still nice to read.

If they pick certain subjects and cover them in a way no other place can, then the readers will come flocking.

Or… 

- Not be afraid to say what they think. The Independent knows how get its views across. It’s effective. If you agree with the Indy’s point of view, you feel empowered. If you disagree, then you still read it anyway. The important point here is that you’re reading the thing regardless.

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Posted in Design, General, Newspapers, Tabloids, The Future, The Web

Is this a spoof?

June 7th, 2007

I can’t help think that somehow The Guardian has been fooled over this story.

It’s not the fact that the US Army may one day want to use robots on the battlefield, but more, I don’t know, this:

Bear’s round face and teddy ears are designed to be reassuring. Gary Gilbert, of the US army’s Telemedicine and Advanced Technology Research Centre, told New Scientist magazine that it was important when dealing with casualties to try to “maintain that human touch”.

Round face? Teddy ears? Human touch?! When was the last time a human had caterpillar tracks, metal arms and teddy ears? No man I’ve ever seen.

The picture is the real give away. It’s credited as a photo, but surely this has been manipulated:

Look at it! That’s not real.

This really can’t be true, can it? Please?! The story originated in New Scientist.

I’m gobsmacked. We might as well stick Johnny Five on the front line.

1 comment »

Posted in General, The Future

A sickening logo, and a [sic]kening response

June 5th, 2007

There; much better. I love how people get overly worked up about things like this. I’m especially happy now that I have a place where all those idiotic comments can be published for the whole world to see.

Here’s some of my favourites:

“Do the decent thing and give us a logo we can be proud of and not this national embarrassment.”

It’s not really that embarrassing, is it? No.

“The logo lacks elegance and style; two British attributes we are very fond of. Its cheesy and not at all professional – we’ll be the laughing stock of all who see it!”

Hmmm. I think more people will laugh when they see how much of a fuss has been made over it.

The Olympic logo is just like Britain these days — second rate!! One we were a proud nation, proud of our herriatage and everything we stood for. I feel ashamed to say that I am British if that monstrosity is the best we can come up with! If this is going to be a symbol of Britains Olymics, then I truly don’t want to be British any longer. “

I mean honestly — what a complete nonce. They’re not my spelling mistakes by the way. I just can’t be bothered being [sic] all over it.
Gotta love this one though:

“400 grand? I could have achieved the same thing with 10 pints of lager and a kebab.”

Ha!

Sure, I don’t like the logo. It’s naff. But I’m not losing sleep over it. I’m not packing my bags and un-Britishing myself because some designer got it wrong. If there’s one thing that this logo tells us all, it’s that British people are just completely silly.

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Posted in Design, General, Sport, The BBC

The Big Bloated Corporation

June 3rd, 2007

Anyone who reads jBlog regularly will know that I’m a big fan of the BBC. As a nation we should be proud that we have an organisation that is so well respected across the world.

So I’m naturally disheartened to hear of imminent job cuts at the BBC.

The license fee settlement has, according to the Beeb, meant that journalists will be facing redundancy. It’s always a sad state of affairs to see this happen, but part of me wonders if the BBC simply employs too many people?

Take Five Live as an example. If you ever listen to their football coverage, you’ll notice how a ‘team’ of reporters covers every match. Is it too much to ask a team of one commentator and one analyst to do the whole match? I’ve heard some games covered by no less that six different people. Pure wastage, and I fail to see how it improves coverage in the slightest.

On a local level, radio coverage from the BBC is very good. Although, again, it could be cut back without hindering quality. On my local radio station, I enjoy listening to Mark Johnson’s commentary on Cambridge United’s games. It’s good — Mark is a long time United fan, so there is a sense of shared joy when the mighty U’s do well.

But our opposition, whoever it may be, will have their own commentary team covering the match too. Two BBC commentary teams commentating on the same match, at the same time. Why not combine the two? If Cambridge are playing Torquay, why not have Mark Johnson and his Torquay-based equivalent commentating together? Already you’ve saved on two analysts.

Apply this to Premiership games, when there will be no less than three commentary teams covering (each local station, and Five Live), and you’ve saved an absolute packet over the season.

And that’s just one example. I could go into the money-spending exercise that was changing the BBC idents to the ridiculous ones with the Hippos (how much did that cost?), or how pointless it is having a shivering Nick Robinson standing outside Downing Street, in the dark, telling us all that nothing has changed since the 6 o’clock bulletin.

I sympathise with the BBC. It’s not nice having to get rid of journalists. No doubt the NUJ will be on their back about this as well. Rightly so, those journalists affected need to be represented. But we should really be looking into how the BBC came to employ these surplus journalists in the first place.

Once that’s done, they can then start looking at how to earn more money from what it does already. Will an advert on BBC.com really be that bad? BBC.com is an attractive prospect for advertisers because it is a well-respected news source that people trust. So, with that in mind, I can’t see the advertisers offering much in the way of pressure on content. They’d want the BBC to stay exactly as it is.

What’s more, why should overseas internet users gain advertising-free access to a website that we — the license fee payer — have paid for?

If the BBC directs its efforts into trimming the excess, and maximising the assets it already has, this change need not be so drastic. We shouldn’t even notice it happening.

Thoughts?

3 comments »

Posted in General, TV, The BBC, The Future

Goodbye to Royalty

June 2nd, 2007

[THE GUARDIAN] Goodbye to Royalty – Peter Tatchell

He who blogs about abolishing the royal family is a brave blogger indeed. Thankfully, this writer manages to assert his argument in such a way that even supporters of the Queen would be forced to think carefully about the use of a monarchy in the UK.

In my opinion (which you didn’t ask for, but you’re getting anyway), I see the royal family as no bad thing. The points raised in Peter’s post about them having no place in a democracy are true in theory, but in practice there has never been an occasion in modern-day Britain where the Queen has overruled the will of parliament.

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Posted in Blogs, General, Newspapers