Andy Murray today

Which is Andy Murray after today's heroic loss?  Is he the plucky Scottish loser, or the noble Brit?

You see, whenever Murray has lost in the past, the London-dominated press has almost always described him as Scottish, but whenever he has won he has been British - odd, isn't it?

Anyway, after today one thing is clear, he isn't a Henmanlike bottler.  Tim, by the way, was almost always British.  Of course, had he ever won anything of note then I'm sure he would have been England's own!

Funny old world.

Colouring your judgement?

I read that some football pundit is having to apologise for referring to 'coloured' players.  However, today I saw a woman from a social enterprise on Sky News, talking about the work that they do with 'women of colour'.

Can anyone explain why 'women of colour' is an OK term, but 'coloured' isn't?

It makes you proud to be a journalist - NOT!

There's something rotten at the heart of Sky News.  They've pushed the boundaries beyond reasonable limits in recent high-profile court cases, and they plumbed a new low today with their coverage of the death (murder?) of Gadaffi.



As is my norm, I turned on Sky News as soon as I got up to see what was happening in the world.  What I got was film from a mobile phone of a clearly terrified and bloodied Gadaffi being dragged through the streets, and then summarily executed.  I didn't enjoy seeing it, and I strongly believe that it shouldn't have been shown before the watershed, and possibly not even after it.

I have no doubt that very young children across the land saw this coverage before they went to school.  The broadcaster can't rely on parents ensuring that their kids don't see the news, and if they did, then in this instance they may well have been traumatised - it was nasty, nasty stuff that would earn an 18 certificate at the cinema, and Sky showed it at 07:00!  Irrespective of what kind of a bastard Gadaffi was, and by all accounts he was a particularly nasty one, he shouldn't have met his end in that way - no human being should.  However, once that happened, it would have been possible to report it without showing the footage.  To me it smacks of lazy journalism, as so much television journalism is nowadays.  The obsession with images gets in the way of skilled journalists reporting the facts in a considered and enlightening way.

It's little wonder that journalism as a profession is now regarded as being on a par with merchant banking or stockbroking - the sort of thing you don't want to own up to doing for a living.

Thank God for radio and the quality press!

Cynic, moi? Oui.

I've just done three week's work at the BBC and it has been an eye-opener.  On my first day there I was asked to lock myself away and do a self-study programme on 'Trust'.  Here's where the cynicism comes in - I assumed that this was no more than a hoop that I had to jump through, a tick in the box, just like when IBM insisted we all read a stultefyingly boring document called Business Conduct Guidelines every year.  Once it was done, backsides had been covered, and life went on.

I was shocked, genuinely shocked, to find that it was for real.  I suppose that's a legacy of ITV's dodgy competitions, and the general malaise in the tabloid newspaper industry, but my respect for the Beeb grew hugely over those three weeks - my goodness that organisation has standards, and it tries to live by them.

Have a look at the BBC College of Journalism site - here's the link http://www.bbc.co.uk/journalism/ethics-and-values/trust-and-choices/trust-and-tv-documentary.shtml - it's a good read.

I learned the hard way.  I interviewed someone for a piece I was doing, and because the sound wasn't as good on my questions as I would have wished - that was 100% user error on my part - I recorded the same questions live back at the studios, and did the edit.  The questions were exactly the same - not a word was changed - but the producer made me do it again as it was written as an interview but the listener could tell the questions were recorded elsewhere.

I've always been a Beeb listener - I'm a Radio 4 man - but I'll do it with even more respect from now on.

Angry

Amy Winehouse is dead.  Hardly a surprise and, of course, it's terrible that anyone should die at such an early age.  That said, the reaction, especially on Sky News, was OTT.  When 93 - and counting - people who wanted to live are killed in Norway, and famine is striking Africa yet again, forgive me if I don't spend too much time mourning someone who for years had given a damned good impression of having a death wish.

Predictably, 'Legend' is being bandied about, and I suppose it will be used in the coming years, but someone who made two albums - one good, and one excellent - hardly earned that description in my book.

What a waste of talent: now excuse me if I think more about those who want to live but have had the opportunity taken from them - many of them would have loved to have got to 27!

Mauled by kittens

Having spent the afternoon watching the Murdochs and now Rebekka Brooks facing their parliamentary inquisitors, I've simply had my previous view confirmed: the gulf between people who succeed in business, and those who enter parliament, is huge. 

Most of the MPs didn't have a clue about how to tackle questioning powerful figures, and were, in the main, simply hamming it up for the cameras - I doubt the Murdochs could believe how easy it all was.  Any journalist or salesperson would have done a better job.  I'm staggered that the MPs generally seemed to believe that convoluted three- or four-part questions were the way to get at the truth: most of the time our elected representatives seemed to confuse themselves rather than worry the interviewee.

  I actually felt sorry for Young Mr Grace, as he didn't really seem to be fully engaged it matters at the start, and it came over as a bunch of bullies having a pop at a very old man.  Later on he got into his stride - well, it was more of a totter, but it was still too good for the committee.  Son James was simply too well briefed and too smooth - they didn't lay a finger on him.  It staggered me that the MPs believed that the men (and woman) at the top of a huge multi-national should have known every detail of what was going on - like all CEOs and Chairmen, they get told what they want to hear most of the time.

A self-publicising stand-up comedian throwing shaving foam in his face was a godsend for the octogenarian YMG - mugging old people offends British sensibilities.

Of the MPs, Tom Watson at least managed a decent imitation of being menacing, but the rest just huffed and puffed.

If you want it in footballing terms, I reckon it was probably something like 5-1 to the Murdochs and Ms Brooks, and to misquote  George Bernard Shaw, 'He can that can does. He who cannot, ends up on the Commons Media Committee'.

Are you being hacked?

I'm old enough to remember the extremely politically incorrect BBC show, 'Are You Being Served?'  It ran from the early 70s through to the mid 80s, and was set in a London department store called Grace Brothers. It featured John Inman as the effeminate, camp Mr Humphries, who would squeak every so often, 'I'm free!' as he minced around the menswear department, and Molly Sugden as the wisteria-rinsed Mrs Slocombe who spent the entire series referring to her cat as her pussy.  A prime example being "Animals are very psychic; the least sign of danger and my pussy's hair stands on end".  I kid you not - this was what the great British public watched and loved 30 years ago!



The store's owner was Young Mr Grace, an octogenarian who was pushed around in a wheelchair by two mini-skirted bimbos dressed vaguely as nurses.  Mr Grace would periodically visit the store and praise the staff by saying 'You've all done very well!', before collapsing into the arms of his nurses. 



So what has brought this unfunny show to mind?  It was Rupert Murdoch's comments to the Wall Street Journal that he and others in management had handled the hacking crisis "extremely well in every way possible" with just a few "minor mistakes."  What?

When you see the once all-conquering Murdoch dwarfed by his security men as they clear a path for him, and then you read comments such as those quoted, which border on delusional, then it's hard not to see him as Young Mr Grace.  If you're old enough to remember the show, I defy you to tell me otherwise. 

When he gives his evidence to the select committee next week, think Young Mr Grace, and then whatever he says and does can't possibly be scary.

Dave ducking and diving

Can someone please explian what David Cameron meant when he said that he gave Andy Coulson 'a second chance'?  My understanding was that Coulson denied (possiblly still denies) any knowledge of phone hacking or other illegality, and that Cameron appeared to accept that.  Surely then, there was nothing to forgive?

A very unusual phrase from our Prime Minister, and one that I suspect he'll come to regret.  One thing is clear, those who said that it was barmy to appoint Coulson have been proved right.  Even if Coulson walks away from this without a stain on his character, the furore has dragged Dave into the spotlight and made him look, frankly, a bit of a fool, and extremely light on good judgement.  How I enjoyed watching him squirm!

Clegg, Cable, Osborne and Cameron...what will become of this country?

Should we be shocked?

The suggestion that the voicemail of Milly Dowler, and quite possibly those of other murder victims or their relatives, have been hacked into, seems to have shocked the nation.  Why?  I would have been more surprised had it not been going on.

We have a tabloid press that has got itself into a spiral where each paper has to try to outdo its rivals in terms of scoops, exclusives, or sleaze.  They do it for one simple reason and that's because people want to read it, so a lot of the mock indignation doesn't sit comfortably with me.  There are only two things that can stop the sort of nonsense induged in by the NotW (and, more than likely, some of its rivals):  either people stop buying it, which isn't going to happen, or advertisers stop spending.  It seems that the latter might just be happening, but forgive me if I'm cynical about that too.

Are the companies that are considering taking their advertising away doing it for honourable reasons, or for commercial ones?  Do their managements really care about what's been going on, or are they simply trying to score a few brownie points with their customers, and perhaps an edge over their competitors by beating them to the punch ?  If it was the former they'd have done it years ago, but the truth is that they value access to the NotW's demographic much more than some sort of a moral stance. 

My bet is that those who stop advertising will hold a watching brief: if the NotW's readership levels hold up then they'll be back after a suitably decent interval - that will be precisely how long they think it takes for enough people to have forgotten about the current furore.

Principle?  Don't make me laugh!

The i's have it

I've like i, the Independent's concise, cheaper, and better younger brother, ever since it appeared.  It has now started to publish on a Saturday too, so hopefully that means it's doing well and will survive.

I've found something else to like about recently, and that's the 'Letter from the editor', Simon Kelner, that appears on page three.  On Friday he devoted it to some complaints that he'd received about the paper's coverage of the funeral of Olympic diver Tom Daley's father.  In its coverage the paper showed a picture of the funeral, and a number of readers asked whether that was truly necessary.

Kelner concluded that there hadn't been a need to do it - an editor listening to his readers and acting upon their suggestions?  He's clearly not cut out for the job!  He went on to make the distinction between the recent situation when they used pictures of Sir Henry Cooper's funeral: Cooper was a public figure and there was public interest, whereas Daley's father was not a public figure.  As Kelner put it, "The funeral of a national figure is a news event in its own right, but this was not that - it was the funeral of the father of a national figure".

Kelner concludes that the coverage that i gave the event was possibly 'prurient' and 'intrusive' - well done him for having the courage to admit that, and for telling his readers that in similar circumstances in the future, the paper will err on the side of caution.  Oh that other editors of nationals were half as brave and sensible.

  

Can anyone explain to me why the Archbishop of Canterbury's pronouncements get such wide publicity?  One look at the man tells you that he's as mad as a badger, but the press hangs on his every word.



I have no time for any brand of superstition, and therefore I tend not to listen to the brand managers when they decide to issue press releases, which is what Rowan Williams latest effort is.  Of course, if you spout often enough and long enough then it's inevitable that you'll be right once in a while, and the old duffer is on the money for once when he criticises the Coalition.  Don't you just love it when one establishment figure has a pop at another one - Dave v Rowan wrestling it out over three rounds, with Gideon and God as their respective seconds !

Williams is guest editing the New Statesman this week - what on earth were they thinking about when they invited him?  Who next, a White Witch or a member of the Flat Earth society?

Without fear or favour

Fascinating to see Sir Alex Ferguson trying to get a journalist banned from a press conference - let me say, by the way, that Ferguson can ban me anytime he likes, as based on his past utterances, I'm one of those who would rather stick pins in my eyes than be in his presence!



Apart from the obvious question, 'What on earth makes him think he has the right to do anything like that?', it raises questions about how we as journalists report.  It seems that if you ask a question he doesn't like, or say or write anything that hacks him off, then your access to him is withdrawn.  That shows a misunderstanding of his role in my opinion - it's not him as an individual that people want to interview, but him as the holder of the position of manager of a football club.  Once he retires I suspect journalists won't be queuing to hear his words of wisdom.  Shame on the management of the club for not spelling it out him that theyre the ones who decide what his responsibilities are - it's another example of the fairytale world that football inhabits.  He should have been told years ago that the BBC is the national broadcaster of the UK, and if he doesn't co-operate fully with them then he's in breach of the terms of his employment.

It happens in other sports too.  I once wrote about the now-retired racehorse trainer, Jenny Pitman, that she'd 'had a poor season by her own high standards' - that was my way of saying that it had been a disastrous year.  You see, I wanted to interview her again in the future, so I had to tone it down.  In that case it didn't work!

Sunday morning comes and I'm on the tennis court when the phone rings: 'Get home as soon as you can, I've got Jenny Pitman ringing me going apeshit!'  I did, and she was.  Apart from a lecture couched in terms that would make a trooper blush, my fax machine kicked into life, and a list of every winner Mrs Pitman had ever trained started to pour out...page after page after page.  She then rang me back to check that I'd received it and asked me - again in the bluntest of terms - what was I [expletive deleted] going to do about it, and told me I'd never interview her again.

In the end, I did nothing, and she calmed down - and I interviewed her again in the future.  But it makes you think doesn't it?  If you were the sports editor of a regional, or the editor of a specialist sports, paper, would you publish and be damned, or would you tread very carefully for fear of losing the access you require to do your job?

Think on this the next time you read the sports pages: are you getting the whole truth and nothing but the truth, or a sanitised version of it?  I think I know the answer to that one.     

The end of super-injunctions?

It looks to me as though social networking sites will sound the death knell for super-injunctions.  The rationale behind such legal moves is questionable anyway - does Article 10 recognising press freedom outweigh Article 8 which guarantees an individual's right ro privacy?  Eventually the courts would have made a decisive ruling, but the sheer number of challenges on Twittter, Facebook, and sundry blogs is such that the judges will, in future, be wasting their time granting injunctions - they don't buy privacy, merely an increasingly short amount of time.  It's one thing to pursue an individual for contempt of a court ruling, but can you pursue thousands of individuals?  It's Spartacus all over again

I won't repeat the names of those that have been granted super-injunctions - I don't yet feel brave enough to do that, and to be frank, the details of their peccadiloes doesn't much interest me - but anyone who wants to know simply needs 5 minutes and an internet connection.  Having now heard the names I wonder what all of the fuss is about.  If someone is in the public eye are they really daft enough to believe that martital infidelity or using prostitutes can be kept secret?  Anyone who does believe that deserves to be 'outed' on the grounds of rank stupudity!

In any event, the law has never been set in stone, and it has always changed with the passing of time and changes in social mores - what we're seeing now are changes driven by the digital age, and there are sure to be more yet to come.

Censorship, we all hate it, don't we?

Censorship is, the the words of '1066 and all that', a 'bad thing', isn't it?  Of course it is - there would be a justifiable outcry if any government tried to censor our free press.  However, it strikes me that a few editors are, in effect, censoring our news coverage.  Here are a couple examples from recent days.

How many Libyans are being killed by UN-backed air strikes?  I heard a BBC correspondent using the word 'obliterated' when referring to the pro-Gadaffi forces that had been attacking a Libyan town.  Obliterated by air power suggests to me that the casualty list might be rather high, but I haven't seen much of a furore being made about this.  In a totalitarian state, like Libya, will all of the troops described as being pro-Gadaffi, actually be supporters of the mad Colonel, or will they be regular guys who fancied a better-paid job?  I'd quite like to know how many are being killed and a bit more about their motivation.

How are things at Fukushima?  Again, it seems that the struggle to regain control of the nuclear reactors there is regarded as having gone on for far too long.  Why couldn't these pesky Japanese either fix it quickly, or have the decency to have a proper melt-down?  Don't they understand that this is getting boring?

It's an old cliche that editors understand their readers or viewers, but I'm not sure that it truly stand up to scrutiny.  What we get is what we're given, and the papers and television news channels all seem to be singing off the same hymn-sheet.  If a dozen or so individuals in the Home Office, the Foreign Office, or the Ministry of Truth decided what we could and couldn't see or read, the we'd all be up in arms (possibly literally), but it's OK for a few editors to adopt that role and we seemingly accept it meekly.  I wonder what motivates them to decide that some topics are just not right for you and me to read or view?  Funny old world. 

Fashion victims and the news

Fashion commentators say things like "Blue is the new black", but this week Libya is the new tsunami as far as the 24-hour news channels are concerned.  Can someone remind me please: wasn't there a magnitude 9.0 earthquake in Japan ten days ago, and didn't a massive wave sweep across swathes of the north-east of the country?  Wasn't there some sort of a problem with nuclear reactors too, and maybe I dreamt that more than 300,000 people were displaced and that tens of thousands perished?

Watching Sky this morning, it's as if it didn't happen, and the Beeb is making only the most occasional references to it.  Libya, Libya and even more Libya is what we're getting, with pointless pics of a black sky with anti-aircraft fire flashing through it.  There are some library shots of planes taking off, and submarines firing tomahawk missiles - I've seen it all before in Iraq and I'm bored with it.

Do these people really think that we're so dumb that we'll put up with this lazy and sloppy journalism, or is it me that's out of step with the general view?  More likely is that they simply overdid it so much last week that they believe we're all tsunami'd out, and need a change.  I fear that my journalism course is simply making me loathe televison news with a vengeance. 

The old adage that the pictures are what is important was absolutely true when the tsunami struck, but that was only because they were so 'good' (that's TV speak for horrific) that no-one who saw them will ever forget it.  However, in 90%+ of news reporting that isn't the case, and that means that the words become important.  The problem is that when news channels are stuck with their rolling coverage, the pictures - probably already unremarkable in most instances - are coupled with cliched, and not very good words.  The result is coverage that is occasionally wonderful, but usually pretty average.  That's why I turn on Sky News first thing to look at the breaking news ticker, but then immediately dump it for Radio 4 - maybe it's my age but I prefer my news to be of the grown-up variety (this morning, by the way, Radio 4 did cover the crisis at the nuclear plants - it's going better but there's still a long way to go - you wouldn't have got that from Sky!).

George Galloway the patriot.

I don't normally agree with George Galloway, but his interview on Sky News yesterday was spot on.  When Galloway spoke on Saddam Hussein he lost most people's respect by appearing to show a measure of sympathy for the tyrant, but speaking about Gadaffi he took a different view.



His argument is simple: the Arab states are predominantly ruled by dictators, of which Gadaffi is one, the King of Bahrain another, and President Ali Abdullah Saleh, the ruler of Yemen, a third.  All are currently killing their people, so why has the West become so exercised about Gadaffi?  Galloway's answer was 'a dirty little three-letter word, O-I-L'.  Bahrain, of course also has oil, but it also has its US naval base and is a vital land link into Saudi Arabia.  When the presenter tried to mock Galloway by saying that Libya only represented 2% of the world's oil, he looked incredulous, and said that was still a lot of oil - as BP's $15B dollar investment in Libya showed.

The Sky presenter, Anna Botting - goodness knows where they find these people - tried her best to put the counter argument but she was well out of her depth.  She said that the Arab League had supported the no-fly zone, and Galloway laughed - didn't she know that the Arab League was comprised of the representatives of dictators?  Suddenly Sky was putting the case for the tyrants, and Galloway was the democrat! 

He then went further.  What credible threat to British interests does Libya pose?   His answer was chilling: none at all, until we take military action.  Then, he went on, Gadaffi would revert to type and sponsor terrorism as he has done in the past.  Botting leapt on that - was Galloway saying that we should expect terrorist attacks as a direct result of military action?  The answer was a simple 'Yes'.

By then Galloway was well ahead on points, but he then delivered the knock-out blow.  You see, George said, he is a patriot, and he declared that if any country posed a real and credible threat to the UK, he'd be the first in the queue at the recruitment office, signing up to defend the nation!

As the seconds rushed in to revive Botting, Galloway smiled - it was a job well done.

Compelling viewing, in much the same way that a car crash is - I knew I shouldn't watch Botting being taken apart, but I couldn't take my eyes off it.  Mind you, what can you expect from a channel that believes that Eamonn Holmes has the necessary gravitas to present their breakfast news show?

How do you choose your friends?

There's a line in Randy Newman's 'Rednecks' about the segregationist Governor of Georgia, Lester Maddox, that goes 'He may be a fool but he's our fool', and we're seeing more than a touch of that this Arab Spring.

What's the difference between Colonel Gadaffi's use of violence against his people, and that of Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa, the King of Bahrain?  It's simple: Gadaffi is an outcast, a mad dog, and possibly mentally unstable, whereas Al Khalifa is our ally.

Bahrain is tiny with not many more than 1.25M inhabitants, and is connected to Saudi Arabia by a causeway - that's what makes it so important.  The US Fifth Fleet has its headquarters in Bahrain, and the King's Army, the Bahrain Defence Force is armed with US weapons.

At the heart of the troubles in Bahrain is religion - isn't it always thus?  Too easy to simply describe the demonstrators as 'Islamists' - what we're seeing is the Shia majority protesting against the Sunni minority who they believe have a disproportionate amount of access to government and military jobs.  Yes, it's the same old story: one brand of superstition proclaiming that it's 'better' than another!

So, when you hear Hillary Clinton criticising Gadaffi and Al Khalifa, note the different tone that will be employed - she and the US want Gadaffi gone (even if they don't know how to do it), but they want the ruler of Bahrain to stay.  He may be a totalitarian tyrant, but he's our totalitarian tyrant!

If you want a look at the King of Bahrain, you'll get your chance soon, as he's scheduled to be a guest at Will and Kate's Bank Holiday beanfeast - you see, I told you he was our public school-educated, Sandhurst-trained friend! 

Don't you just love Sky News?

I swear to you that Sky News has just interrupted its Pacific Tsunami coverage by going straight to the British Airways ad that starts: 'Lesson 24 - How to ride the wave', featuring a surfer!  Following on from their banner headline a few moments before that included the made-up word 'preperation' instead of preparation, they seem to be having a bit of a bummer of an afternoon.  Muppets.

The Christchurch earthquake

Why is some news more newsworthy than others?  What brought this to mind was the Christchurch earthquake which, while obviously tragic, seems to me to be attracting more headlines than other, bigger natural disasters.  Why should this be?

The answer is, I'm afraid, obvious.  Christchurch doesn't look like some odd foreign place with an unpronounceable name, and the people who live there look like us.  They don't live in poverty and their skin, by and large, is the right colour, so the news channels think we'll have a greater degree of empathy with them.  

Before you shout me down, reflect on the Haitian earthquake of 2010.  It too got sizeable coverage - for a while, before the West lost interest.  The estimate is that somewhere between 92,000 and 220,000 people died, and almost 2M were made homeless - the Christchurch death toll is likely to be less than 200.  Remember the Chilean earthquake of 2010?  Possibly not, because 'only' 500 or so died, and they were, well, Chileans.  Now how many Chilean miners was it that got saved?  Didn't that get much more coverage than the earthquake?

It's an unpalatable conclusion to have to draw, but it does seem to me as though race and affluence play a major part in the way news stories get covered.

Oh, and by the way, it is estimated that 15M children per year die of starvation.  That's 75,000 Christchurch earthquakes per year, or 204 every day?  Still think the coverage from New Zealand isn't a tad out of line?

The 90-day news cycle

The Slow Food movement started in 1986 as a response to the growth of fast food.  The planned opening of a branch of MacDonalds near the Spanish Steps in Rome was a step too far for its founder, Carlo Petrini.  To paraphrase their point of view: good food requires good ingredients, skill in preparation, and it takes time.  In their view all that fast food has going for it is the speed with which it's delivered.  Since then the concept has expanded into a wider Slow Movement covering such areas as Slow Parenting, Slow Gardening and so on.   We can now add Slow Journalism to the list.

Delayed Gratification sounds like some sort of sexual practice, but in fact it's the UK's newest magazine, retailing at a princely £12 per issue.  It's published by the Slow Journalism Company, and just as the Slow Food movement was a response to the growth in fast food, its remit is to act as 'an antidote to throwaway media' and it seeks to make a 'virtue of being the last to breaking news'.   Founded by Marcus Webb, Time Out's International Editor, it is run from Time Out's London offices.

The cover of the first edition of DG

The other underlying principle behind Delayed Gratification, DG to its friends, is that print isn't dead.  They hope that readers like to possess, touch, and feel their magazine, so its design and production values are outstanding - the hope is that there's still a market for high quality printed material.  This isn't a mag that you will find in your local newsagents, it's available from the DG website, in independent bookshops, and in luxury hotels and on airlines - presumably not in economy!

Its aim is to take the main news stories from the previous three months and subject them to review and analysis; as Webb says, "Our idea is to play up to print strength – we're not anti-internet but we wanted to create something pretty which readers would enjoy consuming slowly. We wanted to let writers return to stories with a bit of hindsight."

It's a fascinating idea, and you have to hope that it will succeed - a review of the first edition of DG will follow in due course.