UK news (archive)
- Amanda Farnsworth
- 26 Sep 06, 03:15 PM
We've had a few comments about our coverage of , after she was mauled by two Rottweiler dogs.
Did we vilify Rottweilers? Did we create panic amongst dog owners? I think the answer to the latter point is no, judging by the responses from the audience I've seen, but it's a fair point, and a good thing for us to take a look at our coverage and see what we said.
Looking back I really don't think we demonised the dogs. They did kill a child, and it's news exactly because it is very unusual. Every broadcast outlet and national newspaper covered this story for this reason. But we didn't refer to them as "devil dogs".
I think it would have been irresponsible for us to speculate on the exact circumstances that led to the dogs attacking the child, because we simply didn't know them and we couldn't blame parents, friends or family - we had no information.
We did however put some context about controlling dogs in the coverage from the local councillor (watch the report here).
Personally, I am a big animal lover, and know two Rottweilers. I wouldn't want our coverage to imply any blanket assertion about any breed. I hope in this case we didn't.
Amanda Farnsworth is editor, Daytime News
- David Kermode
- 22 Sep 06, 04:51 PM
Richard Hammond . His doctors are apparently "cautiously optimistic".
When news of his accident broke on Wednesday night, details were sketchy. It had an, "oh god, that's awful" factor, and I was in doubt that it should lead Thursday morning's Breakfast.
Decisions over which story should get most prominence are often very difficult. Thursday morning's news agenda was relatively quiet and this story stood out to me, and the rest of the team working on the programme.
Was it the right lead? There's definitely a debate to be had. Quite a few viewers got in touch, either by email and text during the show, or by the more formal complaints procedure route, to suggest it was the wrong call.
"Is there nothing more important going on in the world?" was one view. "The coverage was excessive," was the view of many others. One person even complained that the accident "was self inflicted and should not be news".
At the same time, we had a big response from people who wanted to relay their shock and pass on their best wishes for Richard's recovery. We use a panel of viewers to monitor which news stories have the most impact and which stories viewers want to know more about. The answer, on both counts, was 'Richard Hammond's accident'.
We don't always get the choice of lead story right and the clarity provided by hindsight is powerful. However, on this occasion, I would stick with our choice of lead. He is a well known and much loved presenter, he was attempting something extraordinary and, as we now know, there was a huge amount of interest in what happened and in his condition.
I share my thoughts on this not because I think they are necessarily particularly important (self important journalists annoy people) but because I think it's important to try to shed light on our decision-making process.
What's much more important is that he recovers - and there are clearly so many people out there who want to see him back on screen as soon as possible.
David Kermode is editor of
- Jamie Angus
- 22 Sep 06, 04:11 PM
So just how do you get Abu Izzadeen, the man who at a speech on Wednesday, to appear on the Today Programme? And should he even have been on in the first place?
Today reporter Zubeida Malik has had some dealings with the firebrand protester in the past, and when she finally caught up with him on Thursday afternoon, she was able to persuade him that an 0810 encounter with John Humphrys would be the best way to ensure that his motives for making the protest were heard and scrutinised.
Of course, that's just the beginning of the story... there was an editorial judgement to be made both about whether he should appear in the first place, and if so where in the programme. The Today team discussed some of these issues and decided that this was an 0810 interview, not least because the kind of views Izzadeen holds are exactly those that Reid was seeking to confront in his speech.
There is a powerful argument to be made that presenting the most extreme voices on air actually damages the process of integrating the Muslim community into the fight against terrorism. The 麻豆社 has a duty to balance voices, and to present a representative range of views from within communities. A number of listeners were quick to remind us on e-mail of the damage we were risking:
"He is a nobody. Don't give air to these people: it doesn't help our perception of muslims, it can only be damaging."
But others disagreed: "The young man you spoke to was understandably very angry - he made a lot of points which I think we should be listening to. All John Humphrys could say was 'If you don't like it here, why don't you leave?' The young man said more than once that he loves Britain, but that he hates the way his people are being treated, and warning that if things don't change, there will be an eruption which we will have difficulty dealing with. Instead of reviling him and ignoring his message, perhaps we should listen to him and his people and see how to find a way to coexist."
We have in recent weeks set up an interview panel of young Muslims, precisely to counter the bias towards established and known Muslim voices on our output. They'll be on the programme on Saturday morning and we'll be asking them what they made of what they heard (and you can hear their first outing here).
Izzadeen and his companion were polite in person... confident and boisterous, and he came off air believing that the interview (which you can hear here) had not overly taxed him, and indeed that some of John's questions were ill-framed. An argument about whether Muslims who found themselves completely at odds with the rule of law here should move to Saudi Arabia was, he felt, more worthy of the white van driver than the 麻豆社.
And thanks to an eagle-eyed staff member, we managed to avoid a potentially awkward green room meeting between Izzadeen and that morning's Thought for the Day guest, Chief Rabbi Dr Jonathan Sacks. Would they have found some common ground over the soggy croissants? Some things I feel are beyond even 麻豆社 patisserie.
Jamie Angus is planning editor, Today
- Peter Rippon
- 21 Sep 06, 04:28 PM
I saw a fascinating vision of the future (or do I mean the present?) on the seafront in Brighton this week.
It happened on the day Charles Kennedy addressed the Liberal Democrat party conference. Our reporter, Sean Curran, went to capture the atmosphere as Mr K walked the hundred yards from his hotel to the conference centre. He found it harder than normal because the media scrum was huge - and despite having a fine set of elbows Sean struggled to get near the man himself.
Watching the TV pictures of our man getting bumped and buffeted I realised why. The usual TV crews, snappers, scribblers and radio hacks are having to contend with a new tribe. In the scrum there was Michael White from the Guardian trying to record a few words with Charlie for .
Later in the hall there was Matthew Parris from the Times recording his own thoughts for , and bizarrely at one point the appeared to be being followed by a TV crew.
I think it was Greg Dyke who commented that when it comes to the new media world we are all eating each others' lunch. Given I am now writing this blog I guess he means me too. Bon appetit.
Peter Rippon is editor of PM and Broadcasting House
- Gary Smith
- 12 Sep 06, 12:57 PM
Should the 麻豆社’s political editor, Nick Robinson, have asked about UK politics during press conferences over the last three days given by Tony Blair with the Israeli, Palestinian and Lebanese leaders?
Nick’s questions - used in his reports on TV and radio bulletins - have sparked a heated debate on his blog. Some contributors feel they were totally inappropriate - “an embarrassment to his profession.” - one says that asking about important domestic issues is valid “anywhere at any time.”
It’s a tricky issue. On foreign trips like this, a group of newspaper journalists, broadcasters and agency reporters travels with the prime minister, and - often to the bemusement of foreign leaders - takes every opportunity to pester Mr Blair about what’s going on back in the UK.
At the 麻豆社 we try to do more than this. We have huge numbers of different programmes and platforms and audiences with different interests, and we try to cater for everyone.
So yes, of course we ask about domestic politics; but we cover the diplomatic story as well, allowing editors back in London to decide which angle is the right one at a particular time for their audience.
In the Middle East over the past few days, we’ve had Nick Robinson and Five Live’s John Pienaar in place to pursue domestic politics; but we’ve also had the Middle East editor Jeremy Bowen, and correspondents based in the region such as James Reynolds, Matthew Price and Alan Johnston on the diplomatic story.
The reporting across three days has reflected different aspects of the developing stories.
So for example the 麻豆社 One Ten O’clock News on Sunday night led with Gordon Brown’s interview with Andrew Marr, and included Tony Blair’s reaction to it, which Nick Robinson then talked about from Jerusalem. But the programme also included a report by Jeremy Bowen on the substance of what the prime minister had discussed with Mahmoud Abbas.
Would it have been right for Nick Robinson NOT to have taken the opportunity to ask Mr Blair about what his Chancellor had said? Surely not – domestic politics can’t be put on hold while the prime minister travels abroad.
Political junkies will remember only too well Margaret Thatcher’s performance on the steps of the British Embassy in Paris in November 1990 after she’d failed to beat Michael Heseltine outright in the first vote for the Conservative Party leadership.
The 麻豆社’s fearless chief political correspondent, John Sergeant, pounced with his killer question: “Mrs Thatcher, could I ask you to comment?”
Her spokesman Bernard Ingham then brushed Sergeant to one side to allow Mrs Thatcher to declare her intention to fight on. Two days later, she resigned.
Who remembers now that she was actually attending a meeting about European security? I’m sure John Sergeant was right NOT to ask about that.
When the history books are written about this past weekend, will Mr Blair’s Middle East trip be remembered as a moment when negotiations restarted between the different sides in the Middle East, or as a significant staging post on Mr Blair’s way out of Downing Street. As the old reporting cliché goes, only time will tell.
But at least Nick Robinson’s questions opened up the possibilities for alternative versions of history.
Gary Smith is editor of political news
- Rod McKenzie
- 12 Sep 06, 10:36 AM
Recently, we interviewed the leaders of the three main parties on environmental policy - we called our two weeks of journalism 'The Global Challenge'. All of them talk a good game but our listeners are far from impressed with the actions that match the words.
They may have a point.
Ming Campbell, questioned by our terrier-like political reporter Rajini Vaidyanathan, told us that we should fit energy-saving light bulbs. How many in your household then, Rajini shot back. "Er, I don't have any," was the Lib Dem leader's reply. Rajini knows a jugular when she sees one, pointing out that how can he expect us to save the planet if he doesn't follow his own advice?
David Cameron's view on the subject was that if more of us cycled to work and employers fitted more showers, we'd all be better off. Not much point in doing that if you have an official car following behind with all your paperwork in though is it Mr C? That's not true, said the Tory leader, before admitting, well yes it had happened a couple of times but wouldn't again.
Tony Blair told us he'd turned down the temperature in Downing Street by one degree and enthused about the energy saving lightbulbs that Ming doesn't have… whilst clocking up more non-environmentally friendly air miles on his Caribbean holidays. But our listeners wondered why he is building more airport runways if he's so committed to the environment - and what about doing more to encourage green cars?
But to be fair - how green are the rest of us? Isn't it up to us to save the planet in little ways with a bit of recycling or switching off lights rather than expect the Government to do it for us?
Over on Radio 1's sister station 1Xtra, presenter G-Money had his home carbon energy audited - he scored a pathetic 3 out of 10. He's a big fan of power-hungry gadgets on standby - which, let's face it, doesn't help. And what's he doing about it? "Switching everything off," he told me - hmmmm, call me a sceptic but habits/lifetime/changing spring to mind.
Our reporters have travelled the world - Rajini again, to notorious high polluter India, and our US reporter Heather Alexander to check out green cars in New York - and get a 4x4 petrol head to drive one in Manhattan. We were inside the arctic circle to check on the big melt and Tulip Mazumdar went to Ireland to see how well a tax on plastic bags was working.
We did it all for journalistic reasons but we did a fair bit of polluting ourselves with all those fumes - travelling and flights. You can't win can you - so maybe politicians feel the same. But before you ask - yes, I am paying to make our reporters flights carbon neutral!
Rod McKenzie is editor of Newsbeat and 1Xtra TX
- Kevin Marsh
- 11 Sep 06, 12:07 PM
When we asked 麻豆社 journalists - a lot of them - what they most wanted to do for them, one answer dominated the list: "Make me more confident about the Law".
All conscientious journalists care about contempt and defamation - the journalist who puts a foot wrong in either area can find him or herself personally liable for damages, a fine or even a spell in prison. And self-interest aside, it can never be the aim of any journalist to spread an untruth or interfere with the processes of the courts.
Hence the College's recently launched legal online course for staff covering defamation and contempt - modules on copyright and contract follow next year - supplemented by face-to-face courses for all and sessions aimed at senior journalists.
But however excellent, detailed and interactive a course is, it's only the beginning. Journalists also have to become confident in applying the principles they learn, absorb and practice on the online and face-to-face courses - and as any media lawyer will tell you, all cases are different. Perhaps the most important thing for a journalist to take away from any law course is an ear more finely tuned to the alarm bell that alerts them to the need to seek expert legal advice on the specifics of their piece - to avoid being too cautious as much as too reckless.
Take an example. Last week, Raphael Rowe presented raising important questions about the scientific evidence used in the trial of Barry George, the man convicted for the murder of Jill Dando. Raphael also interviewed two of the jurors in George's trial - revealing uneasiness about the scientific evidence and suggesting that some members of the jury had ignored the trial judge's instructions not to discuss the case outside the jury room.
Those interviews will have sent many journalists scurrying to find their copy of the legal bible "McNae's Essential Law for Journalists" to confirm their - possibly vague - memory that there is a blanket ban on interviewing members of a jury; that it is a clear contempt of court.
As it happens, that's not quite the case... though as a rule of thumb, it's not a bad one; the 1981 Contempt of Court act makes it an offence to "seek or disclose information about statements made, opinions expressed, arguments advanced, or votes cast by members of a jury in the course of its deliberations". And a 1994 House of Lords ruling made it clear that the intention of the act was to keep "the secrets of the jury room inviolate". Plus, some lawyers believe that the identification of any juror is itself a contempt.
So what to do when a careful, lengthy investigation uncovers evidence that the conduct of the jury in a case might have rendered a conviction unsafe? And that evidence is voiced by the jurors themselves?
I wasn't privy to the discussions between Raphael, Panorama and the lawyers; but it's clear that the decision to broadcast the juror interviews was made in the specific context of the programme and on very precise grounds. As a humble viewer, I was able to detect no questions were put or offered concerning the deliberations in the jury room - and any conversations outside the jury room were contrary to the judge's express instructions; Raphael pointed up more than once in his script that he was aware of the legal restrictions; and, of course, the matter was one of great public interest.
The challenge for the College is to make sure that our journalists are aware of the way in which the law is applied in cases like this - and don't draw the wrong conclusions. It would be wrong, for example, to conclude from this Panorama special that interviewing jurors was now fine in all cases.
The Panorama decision also illustrates another truth about the application of the law - and another challenge for the College. In very few cases where there's a legal risk is the decision to cut or broadcast a clear one. Almost always, the editorial team has to make its decision based on the balance of risk - and since most defamation cases, for example, are settled out of court, there are often too few similar precedents to be a clear and unequivocal guide. In the end, though, it is always should be an editorial decision informed by precise legal advice.
The College can do two things; provide the knowledge that no journalist should lack through online and face-to-face courses; and second, to provide awareness of important cases and decisions. In the end, though, the most important lesson is that all cases are different and there is no substitute for detailed, specialist advice.
Kevin Marsh is editor of the 麻豆社 College of Journalism
- Peter Barron
- 8 Sep 06, 02:21 PM
There's always been a debate about what is and isn't acceptable on TV news programmes, and now that we have blogs, forums and podcasts it's only getting more complicated. And should Newsnight's on-line persona be exactly the same as that on TV? Here are a few of this week's posers.
• Our Ethical Man Justin Rowlatt caused a degree of outrage when, in a film about cycling proficiency (watch it here), he asked a youngster if he was "pissed off". By today's standards that's hardly obscene and I'm sure the minor in question had heard, and probably said, much worse, but I must admit I spluttered into my cocoa watching at home.
On the other hand, when I used the term "crap prizes" in a response on this blog, I was surprised that some viewers thought that was inappropriate language for the editor of Newsnight, even in an obscure corner of the blogosphere.
• A few of you have been writing on the blog complaining that some of your comments have been censored and asking why. In short, I don't know. On Newsnight, we censor nothing that appears on the site, but we do employ an outside moderating company who check for, among other things, "profane, abusive or threatening language" (full guidelines here).
So, in response to a question about graffiti scrawled on his abandoned car, the foul-mouthed Justin's strictly factual response was barred from publication. I'm not going to repeat it here, but it begins with "w".
• Where does informality end and falling standards begin? Yesterday on the website, we asked you - as a diverting pastime while we waited for Mr Blair - to construct a statement which might get the PM off the hook. About 300 hundred of you obliged, but one bridled: "I find this exercise pretty stupid for the level that 麻豆社 and Newsnight traditionally were holding and still claim to hold."
• I enjoyed the fact that when Laura Kuenssberg said that Jack Straw had been talking in the past tense some of you pulled her up, pointing out he was actually talking in the present perfect (the operative phrase was "has been"). Then again - as some of you have also raised - the standard of spelling and grammar among viewers' contributions to the blog is sometimes pretty appalling. Not what we would expect from Newsnight viewers.
• Two quick ones which raised eyebrows inside and outside the programme. Tony Blair portrayed as Christ at the Last Supper as an illustration of . Blasphemy or genius? And what about Kirsty's description of Gordon Brown's command and control network as Al-Qaeda-like? One of our own programme editors thought that was appalling.
Peter Barron is editor of Newsnight
- Gavin Allen
- 21 Aug 06, 05:36 PM
Cricket is only a game! The e-mailer, complaining to us at the Today progamme that the ball tampering row was our lead item, wanted us to be crystal clear about this - as if the exclamation mark wasn't emphasis enough - and demanded we give him, and our other listeners, a break! (Two exclamation marks in one sentence is a surefire shorthand for You're Wrong!).
And this listener wasn't alone. Or, indeed, wrong himself. It IS only a game. But that doesn't mean it can't, just occasionally, qualify as general news too. Some blokes booting a ball into a German net four times 40 years ago was also only a game, but I'm assured it grabbed a few headlines at the time, and rightly so. Running orders don't always have to be solely about events that alter society for decades to come, or retain significance beyond the notoriously stunted news cycle (although Moore & Co did pretty well by that standard too, as it happens).
Sometimes, a news story is a news story - even a headline news story - because it fires passions or generates debate or is just inexplicably interesting. And that's it. The father who threw himself and his children off a balcony in Crete, killing his son and injuring his daughter, is only a bloke. But he's news. As is that Gunter Grass SS-soldier-turned-author chap. It makes us curious, makes us want to find out more, makes us ask questions and try to crawl towards some tentative answers in our humble mission to explain. Oh - and entertain.
In the case of Tampergate - yes, I know it won't catch on, but someone's going to grasp wearily for the cliche, so it may as well be me - there was no shortage of entertaining questions. How do you tamper with a ball? What does a ball do once tampered with? Why doesn't rubbing it against your groin qualify as tampering? In fact why doesn't rubbing it against your groin qualify as illegal?
But, protests another listener, it is not the most important thing that's happened in the last 24 hours. Perhaps not. But then, what was? Another military death in Afghanistan? New selection procedures that could propel more Conservative Party women and ethnic minority candidates into Parliament? Saddam Hussein's genocide trial? Well, yes to all that, which is why they were all lead items today - with Saddam occupying the main 0810 slot.
But cricket was important too. Not life-threatening, not career-enhancing, not nation-building, sure - but just good old-fashioned interesting to a swathe of listeners who wanted to know how, why and whether this was cricket's blackest day ever, whether the Pakistan team had cheated and what would happen as a result. Events were moving in our time - we interviewed a representative from cricket's world governing body, and an umpire from the ECB clarifying the rules - and even Pakistan's President Pervez Musharraf was moved to ring his cricket team captain to pick up a few pointers on what was going on.
And isn't that what news should be all about - learning about something new? Something that matters - to him and her if not to you. Finding out something you didn't know before? This was the first Test match in history to be abandoned due to cheating, or at least - according to the umpires - to a reaction to being caught cheating. Why shouldn't we help our audience understand how it had all come about and what its consequences would be? Because, chorus the complainants, it's only a game. "You have ghettos for overpaid men's 'sport' at around 25 past the hour," bellowed one. "Please confine all such items to these slots."
In other words, I don't care, I don't want it and I don't care if other listeners want it. But that's the odd thing about sport - our listeners tend not to take it or leave it so much as love it or hate it. There's very little indifference. To the chuck-it-in-a-ghetto-ers, sports fans tend to be tiresome stattos forever fretting about a pig's bladder or slab of willow or ping pong thing, while many sports fans label the ghetto-ers news snobs who are out of touch with the effort and vigour and heroism that sport provides.
Snob or statto: which are you? And which is right? Luckily, it doesn't matter - both are characterised by opinionated self-confidence. As is news. It's not an art. It's certainly not a science. It's just a judgement about what matters and what interests and what bears further analysis. News, in the end, is really only a game. And, like cricket, what a beautiful maddening game it can be.
Gavin Allen is deputy editor of the Today programme
- Rod McKenzie
- 18 Aug 06, 03:06 PM
It's like picking your nose with a rubber glove on.
That was one Radio 1 listener's description of having sex wearing a condom. We've been involved in carrying out the largest ever survey into the sex lives of young Britons - more than 30,000 people took part and the findings were widely reported , on TV as well as on Newsbeat and other 麻豆社 radio programmes.
People have expressed their shock to me at the findings on underage sex, one night stands, the relationship between drink and sex and of course the dramatic rates of STI infections and unwanted teenage pregnancies - on which Britain pretty much leads the western world.
The experts tell us that the sex safe message isn't getting through like it did at the start of the HIV/AIDS era in the 80s. The figures certainly bear that out - more than a third of those who took part in the survey said they didn't wear a condom with a new partner.
But it's the anecdotes from our audience that are the most eye catching as a snapshot of sexual attitudes today.
Many young men say they hate wearing them - "it spoils the feeling" was a common sentiment - that they prefer to risk making their partner pregnant or catching an STI rather than wearing a condom. Nathan told us "condoms are for scaredy cats".
Many young women told us they hate them, too - we heard how when men produce condoms, their lovers snatch them and throw them away - and this came from the girls by the way.
So those infection and pregnancy rates shouldn't surprise us - however much they might depress you or worry doctors.
We found politicians largely unwilling to get involved in this issue - the dangers of prying into people's sex lives and preaching show the political risks are as real for them as the sexual risks are for young lovers.
So what are the tips for those wanting to protect their health at the moment of truth in the bedroom?
Our audience came up with some sharp 'condom comebacks' to help those struggling with the dilemma of a partner reluctant to "strap up". Kate says, "if there's no rubber I ain't your lover" while Jess prefers, "it looks like I'm dealing with one baby, I don't want to have to deal with two". LouLou says simply, "no balloons, no party" but the favourite one is this simple, yet direct approach - "sorry, no glove, no love!"
Rod McKenzie is editor of Newsbeat and 1Xtra TX
- Amanda Farnsworth
- 14 Aug 06, 06:41 PM
It's all been pretty confusing for passengers - just exactly what can you take as hand luggage on a plane?
So some bright spark on the Six O'Clock News came up with the idea of making our own baggage size checker, and taking it to passengers so they could find out on the spot whether their bag would pass muster.
So we did it - in fact our friends at C麻豆社 made it for us for free. Not quite sure why they did, but they did...
It turns out lots of passengers are still bringing the old size hand luggage and getting told to repack - perhaps every check in desk should get one of our size checkers - we could start our own business!
Amanda Farnsworth is editor, Daytime News
- Peter Barron
- 11 Aug 06, 01:15 PM
On Newsnight we've long hankered after our own website forum. With an opinionated, argumentative, computer-literate audience it's a marriage made in heaven. So, as we launched Talk about Newsnight this week our correspondents queued up to expose themselves to your views.
First up: Justin Rowlatt - already a successful multi-media figure as and the recipient of around a thousand clunky old emails this year. A bright new age beckoned.
"This 'ethical man' crap has got to be one of the worst ideas Newsnight has ever had. An entire year? That's not serious journalism, that's moronic daytime-magazine-programme s***e. Good luck with the blog though." wrote Kate, rather charmingly by the end.
"Welcome to blogging Justin", added our business correspondent Paul Mason, in what I think was solidarity.
We launched the forum properly on Thursday and the timing - coinciding with the huge news of the foiled alleged terror plot - could hardly have been better. As our deputy editor, Daniel "King of the Blogs" Pearl, spends his evenings discovering, the great attribute of the blogger is scepticism. Sceptics duly flocked to his posting (also here), Peter Simmons summing up the mood.
"It now transpires that bottles of pop are suspect, MI6 must have just seen the Tango ads and thought 'whoo, that looks dangerous'. This is sounding more and more like a farce, dressed up by the government to frighten old ladies into not flying. Meanwhile, in Lebanon...".
Don't the trusting or the gullible ever go blogging?
As I write I've just noticed this, from the improbably named Gully Burns of California. Is Gully gullible, or just sensible?
"I live in Los Angeles. People here respond to the news with immediate relief and support for the security services. There is almost no thought of the secondary implications, or having any sort of suspicion that the timing of the event is in any way related to Lebanon, Iraq or any other theatre of conflict. I personally feel that congratulations are in order to the police for this coup. All the complainants on this post would certainly be shocked and horrified if the events described today had come true, and they would then probably be complaining that the police didn't do their jobs."
In truth, one of Newsnight's aims in life is to be heartily sceptical, so we can hardly be surprised at our viewers' demeanour. But personally my favourite piece of the week displayed no edge, no cynicism, no controversy. It was the rediscovered gem of Harold Baim's travel film showing the beautiful place that Lebanon was in the more innocent age of the 1960s (watch it here) - now a tragic and poignant document.
Perhaps you hated it?
Peter Barron is editor of Newsnight
- Steve Herrmann
- 10 Aug 06, 02:40 PM
One of our concerns in covering has been to make sure traffic load to the News website doesn't cause problems for our users.
So far our technical team have successfully made sure it hasn't, but traffic certainly has been heavy. By lunchtime we'd already had about the same number of page views as we'd normally get across a whole 24 hours. The top story alone had over three million page views, several times more than on a normal day.
According to , the second most read story so far has been our round-up of travel advice and information from all the main airports. We've given this a lot of prominence and had people dedicated to updating it all morning, helped by all the readers' on-the-spot accounts which we are getting - it looks like that has paid off as our users are clearly looking for this information.
UPDATE 1530: Anthony Sullivan, who helped develop our traffic stats monitor, adds that it has been showing traffic levels between 60% and 70% above average today - the largest volume since July 7th last year.
UPDATE, Friday morning: Yesterday turned out to be one of our two or three biggest days on record for traffic, with 6.8m unique users and 50m page views. The most read stories were , and . Audio Video usage was also very high - particularly the live stream of News 24 coverage - and we received about 10,000 emails from users.
Steve Herrmann is editor of the
- Daniel Pearl
- 10 Aug 06, 12:01 PM
So - we awake to news that a major terror plot has been thwarted. Security sources claim that the group, who have been under surveillance for months, wanted to explode as many as 10 planes, probably somewhere over the Atlantic.
Thousands of travellers are stranded, planes have been cancelled and the country's security threat has been raised to its highest level. There are a lot of questions we'll be trying to answer during the course of the day, for example:
• 1 - How close were we to "mass murder on an unimaginable scale"?
• 2 - Have the security services found any explosives?
• 3 - Why did the police decide to swoop today?
• 4 - Were they members of a foreign terror cell or were they British-born?
• 5 - How will this change the way we fly? Will we have to get used to flying without any hand luggage?
There are plenty more - let us know what questions you'd like answered, or if you can answer any of these.
Daniel Pearl is deputy editor of Newsnight
- Ben Rich
- 8 Aug 06, 08:13 AM
If we're not careful, it's going to become something of a theme.
Last week the Six O'Clock News ran a piece showing a dangerous game being played by teenagers on a playground roundabout - in which a motorbike engine was used to drive it around at ever greater speeds, with two teenage girls hanging on grimly in the middle. Yesterday it was a fireman who got spun round inside an industrial tumble-dryer to the vast amusement of his friends, and the horror of fire service bosses (watch it for yourself here).
In neither case was anyone injured, but they might have been. Why did we do these stories?
Well, one discussion we've had recently concerns what we should do about things that a large number of people are clearly interested in, but which do not have some political or other wider significance. These are the kind of items that get filmed these days and end up being passed around, sometimes to literally millions of people, via e-mail, or are watched by huge numbers via internet sites.
Many are just curiosities, but sometimes a particular piece of human folly strikes a chord and has that shock factor that makes people want to see it - and we've decided that at least sometimes they should be able to even if they do not have access to the web.
What made these two more relevant is that they were cautionary tales that happily did not end in tragedy and could serve as a warning.
Now that's all very well, but what about the risk of copycats? Of course that is something we have to consider (for example 麻豆社 guidelines make it clear that we should never show in detail the way people prepare and take illegal drugs) but you could argue that we might actually stop a few people doing these things too.
It's a difficult calculation to make and a potentially troublesome one for a journalist. Should we show people driving dangerously? What about film of anti-social behaviour?
I believe that as editors we have to have a fairly high threshold for censoring something just because it might lead to imitators. So long as we point out the dangers, we then have to leave it to people's own good sense, the control exerted by parents and, in this particular case, the difficulty of finding industrial-sized tumble dryers.
Ben Rich is deputy editor, One and Six O'Clock news
- Tim Bailey
- 2 Aug 06, 03:48 PM
A correspondent filed a piece on the reopening of the Bath Spa after a series of delays. She opened her dispatch with this sentence - "Many Bath residents will be having a sense of déjà vu". She went on to explain that there had been a ceremony to reopen the Baths three years ago. At the last minute the decision had been taken not allow the public in. Until now.
The correspondent used the word déjà vu to mean that the people of Bath would be reliving something they had already experienced.
However, according to the dictionary, déjà vu does not mean that at all; in fact rather the reverse. It means the experience of thinking you are reliving some event or feeling when you have not; you are experiencing it for the first time.
But this raises the question - when does a word change its meaning? Words are for conveying understanding, never more so than in radio reports when the audience has only one chance to hear what is being said. So if most people use a word to mean one thing, does that become its true meaning?
Tim Bailey is editor of the Radio 4 Six O'Clock News
- Fran Unsworth
- 1 Aug 06, 10:30 AM
You would have had to have been in hibernation for the past few years to have missed the ascent of the environment up the news agenda. We have been suffering a heat wave this week that many people have found unpleasant, the south east is crippled with drought and the UK apparently now produces award-winning wine because we can grow vines successfully in this country.
Many are questioning whether climate change is responsible for all this; others argue these events are cyclical.
There is a huge responsibility on us to be a trusted and reliable source of information. But to report the subject properly we have to look not only at the science, but also the impact of environmental issues on economics, business and politics. Like all journalistic organisations we tend to have difficulty doing joined-up reporting.
That's why we have decided to appoint an environment analyst to try to pull together some of these threads. Roger Harrabin has covered the environment for two decades, largely for radio where he has reported the story as it appears through energy, transport, housing and politics.
In his new post he will spread this approach across a wider range of 麻豆社 outlets offering original stories and new perspectives, and tackling such subjects as...
• What is a safe level of climate change?
• Can technology provide the solution?
• How much would we need to spend to stabilise the world's climate?
• Can we adapt to climate change?
Hopefully through his work (such as this report on last night's Ten O'Clock News), audiences will be armed with more information to help better understand controversial and complex issues surrounding the subject.
Fran Unsworth is head of Newsgathering
- Daniel Pearl
- 21 Jul 06, 01:38 PM
It's become a cliché that new technology has changed TV, for ever.
In some ways the biggest change is how much closer we, as programme makers, are to our audience. If you email us during the programme the chances are that, if I'm editing, I'll read your message almost instantly. So on Wednesday night Ian emailed me during the programme to say: "Why is your interviewer standing while Menzies Campbell is sitting?"
Now unfortunately for Ian, the item (watch it here) was prerecorded, so even if I had agreed with him that should sit, which I didn't, there wouldn't have been much I could have done. None the less, it's much easier for you all to tell us what you like and dislike, and the truth is we do read it. I recently found slumped in front of his computer. He looked despondent and when I asked why, he briefly showed me his email inbox.
Let's face it, it's not that difficult to guess 麻豆社 email addresses - and a hell of a lot of people take a punt on his. I didn't read any of his messages but I can reassure you all that, from the look on his face, he had.
Anyway, communication from you to us is not new. What I think is new is that we can now know what you are talking about and interested in without you ever telling us. Sounds sinister but it's not really. It takes seconds on a site like to discover what people are talking about and searching for. This has begun to make an impact on the programme.
So, for example, late on Monday night the most talked about subject was 's appearance on America's , in which he said that we are in the midst of a Third World War.
The next day we contacted Gingrich and that night he repeated his claims on Newsnight (watch it here). So in that sense blogging had an immediate impact on Newsnight's running order.
Also, we know what you are saying about us (really, we do).
If you write anything about Newsnight, or about me, on a blog, I'll probably find it via Technorati. So for example, I know that there's a whole debate going on about Ming Campbell's performance on Newsnight - the question being asked is whether Ming is the Lib Dems' Iain Duncan Smith... see or .
The thing I find strange about all this is that often people who write blogs, or contribute to them, somehow think that they are involved in a private forum.
I recently came across a comment claiming Jeremy disliked recording . I posted a response and the blogger seemed appalled - "the 麻豆社's watching us - spooky" was his reply. But if you write something about us on the internet surely I have every right to read it and respond - that's not spooky.
I had to confront this the other day. We often have students with us on work experience. Twice in the last 6 months I've come across blogs in which people trailing the programme have written things about the team. When I approached one of these people, her reponse was that the blog was supposed to be just for her and her friends!
It wasn't the confidentiality issue that bugged me, but that anyone would think that we as programme makers don't have as much right as everyone else to read what you're all writing, especially if you are writing about us. So, what do you think? Stick it on your blog and I'll respond.
Daniel Pearl is deputy editor of Newsnight
- Richard Porter
- 21 Jul 06, 11:05 AM
Consider these two items:
• "The sight of a huge flotilla of ships carrying thousands of foreigners out of harm's way has only served to highlight the plight of those left behind. Civilians - mostly, but not exclusively, Lebanese - are the main casualties. There is now a rising chorus of experts who have raised the question of international humanitarian law."
• "British navy warships and helicopters are in Beirut this lunchtime - to rescue more British nationals - trapped by the fighting in Lebanon. They're being loaded on to two Royal Navy vessels - which will take them to Cyprus later this afternoon."
Clearly two news organisations with vastly different views on the main story at midday (UK time) Thursday.
Actually, they're both the 麻豆社. One was 麻豆社 World, broadcasting to audiences outside the UK. The other was 麻豆社 News 24, the domestic news channel. And at lunchtime today we had very different ideas about what we wanted to concentrate on. It's a great thing about the 麻豆社 that we have sufficient editorial independence to be able to make these decisions. Both, in their own way, are very focused on the audiences served by the programmes. Neither (in my view) is more correct than the other.
At 麻豆社 World we have devoted a lot of time to the international operation taking people out of Lebanon. And it's true that we have looked at it more through British eyes - partly because for safety reasons we're sharing a lot of resources with domestic 麻豆社 outlets in Beirut.
But we've also reported on what nations like India, Sri Lanka and Canada have been doing. And we keep coming back to issues facing the people who can't leave the country. One of our longest-serving Middle East correspondents, Jim Muir, is in Tyre in southern Lebanon, which has been very badly hit by the bombardment. Gavin Hewitt has reported on Lebanese people trying to escape to Syria. And of course this is a story with two sides - so our correspondents in northern Israel have been reporting on the consequences of the missile attacks there. News 24 has covered the same issues - and at times we've been "simulcasting" - ie both channels carrying the same coverage, presented from both Beirut and Haifa.
The challenge for us - whether we be serving domestic or international audiences - is not to lose sight of all the issues. It's complicated; it's changing rapidly; opinions are strongly-held on all sides and need to be properly reflected. So even if we spend a few hours of one day focusing on one aspect - such as the British evacuees - we must make sure that over time we keep coming back to the core questions. What's happening now? What caused this? What's going to resolve it? And many others...
Richard Porter is editor of
- Mark Wray
- 20 Jul 06, 02:56 PM
It's always great to get a scoop - and even nicer to get two for the price of one.
So, last week, when Anita Anand managed to convince Sir Gulam Noon to respond to (about the curry tycoon having been told by Lord Levy not to reveal his ?250k loan to the Labour Party), I was pretty chuffed.
Using her own contacts and some good old-fashioned persuasion Anita encouraged a pretty reluctant Noon to put his side of the story (hear the interview here). He refused to implicate his Lordship directly but did go as far as is decent for a Knight of the Realm in venting his not inconsiderable displeasure with the whole farrago.
We're not great at blowing our own trumpets on these occasions. But I did alert the Press Association newsdesk, other 麻豆社 programmes and the 麻豆社 press office.
The world and his dog started chasing Sir Gulam to see if he would throw them a bone too but he'd said his piece. So Anita's was the only interview they had to go on and there was great pick up in the papers the next day. Some mentioning Anita and her programme, others mentioning Five Live, some just the 麻豆社 and others, well, giving no credit at all (it's annoying when that happens but which of us can hold our hands up and say we haven't used others' storylines without a proper plug?).
The icing on the top of the Levy/Noon cake was hearing Sarah Montague introduce Anita's interview, in full, on the following morning's Today programme. At the end of the interview she gave Anita another name-check.
There was a time, not too long ago, when internal rivalries meant that if a 麻豆社 programme used material from other 麻豆社 outlets, an interview like this would have been filleted for the best clips, cutting out the 'rival' talent. And on those rare occasions when a credit was given it would have been barely audible as it was spat out through the presenter's gritted teeth.
We're not quite One 麻豆社 yet, but we are getting there.
Mark Wray is editor of the Anita Anand programme on Five Live
- Amanda Farnsworth
- 19 Jul 06, 12:52 PM
Exodus - it's not a word we've really been using on the evacuation of foreign nationals from Beirut... but what we were saying was that it was akin to .
This, of course, isn't really true.
Why did we say it ? Because ... but as our Middle East editor told us this morning, in Dunkirk around 340,000 soldiers were taken off the docks and the beaches over nine days under heavy fire - and big though the Beirut evacuation is, it's not Dunkirk.
There are so many strands to this crisis that it's hard to get the balance right between covering it comprehensively and reporting other news. There's what's going on in Beirut, what's happening in the south of Lebanon where most of the bombing is, the North of Israel where Hezbollah rockets are landing, the international efforts for a diplomatic solution and the role of the US in the region.
Some have asked if we are doing too much on the British evacuation and not enough on other aspects. We are constantly asking ourselves this question and at the moment I think we're getting it about right - but we need to keep asking.
Amanda Farnsworth is editor, Daytime News
- Jamie Donald
- 18 Jul 06, 04:46 PM
‘Sweets for my sweet, sugar for my honey...’
Everyone at The Daily Politics is humming after hearing of George Bush and Tony Blair chatting informally at the G8 summit.
‘Yeah, he is sweet’ says Bush at one point. ‘He’s honey’, Blair replies.
We don’t know who they’re talking about – is it President Assad of Syria – and we’ve had a big argument in the office over whether Blair says ‘he’s honey’ or in fact says ‘he’s had it’. Our reporter Giles Dilnot, no mean hand with a mike, is convinced only the later interpretation makes sense of the whole exchange. Click here to listen and make up your own mind.
Is 'Yo! Blair' a friendly greeting from Bush to an equal, or patronising and disrespectful? Our linguist – Dr. Colleen Cotter from the University of London and an American to boot – thought it was just what you’d expect of two old mates kicking back at a summit. Some of the British papers this morning are more sceptical.
And is ‘shit’ a good way to sum up what’s happening in Lebanon? Bush uses it (though on air we bleeped it out) and our linguist thought it was exactly the kind of language you’d expect in private conversation between friends. Again the papers disagree, some believing it say more about the American president’s grasp of diplomacy than the Middle East.
And then there’s the sweater. Or should that be jumper. Nick Clegg, the great Liberal Democrat hope, thought Tony had made a classic fashion mistake by picking out knitwear for George when the weather is so hot here and in Texas. But in the office we reasoned that if an American billionaire give John Prescott cowboy boots and a Stetson then Burberry is the only riposte.
Open mike cock-ups are legendary, and make fantastic talking points. Remember calling half his cabinet ‘bastards’ when he thought the tape wasn’t rolling – or thinking he was too far away for reporters to hear him describing the 麻豆社’s royal correspondent Nicholas Witchell as an awful man.
The Blair-Bush exchange tops them both in my view, because it will be picked over for weeks for meaning, and for clues about one of the most important relationships in the world.
Jamie Donald is editor of live political programmes
- Pat Stevenson
- 18 Jul 06, 03:15 PM
Nipple clamps, group sex and swingers' clubs. Grist to the tabloids' mill perhaps, but the 麻豆社?
Covering was always going to be a challenge in terms of taste and decency.
The Scottish Socialist MSP is fighting a series of claims made in the newspaper about his sex life. Allegations that he denies but the paper contends are "substantially true".
The first question, given the likely content of the evidence - should we be covering the court proceedings at all? is arguably one of only a few Members of the Scottish Parliament who people in the street would recognise. His high profile stems from his career in challenging the establishment. He was jailed for his actions in fighting the poll tax and taking part in blockades at Faslane nuclear submarine base. He was the founder member of the Scottish Socialist Party, and as leader, raised its profile to such an extent in the first term of the Scottish Parliament that the party picked up five additional seats in the 2003 elections.
Eighteen months ago his resignation from the leadership topped the news. So, a major character in Scottish politics, and as an editor a case I think we should be covering. Having made that decision, how much detail should we broadcast? Radio literally has a captive audience of children. Strapped in the backseat of a car, kids are tuned into whatever their parents are listening to.
As a parent I'm aware of the kind of questions that are asked. And a ten year old probably isn't going to buy the line "Mr Sheridan was just having a sleepover". But as a broadcaster it is the 麻豆社's legal and editorial duty to report a case both fairly and accurately, both from a defamation and contempt point of view. "Enough" pled one text to the programme, but leaving out large chunks of evidence could leave us in legal difficulties.
That's not to say every detail is picked over. In practical terms, radio just hasn't got the time to go into the minutiae in the same way as newspapers. I did make the decision not to broadcast the word "b****rd" when a witness swore at an advocate during the case. Why? It wasn't part of the evidence and so I thought it could be left out. The word has however been used in the programme before (John Major's outburst of frustration over eurosceptics, for example). But every story throws up different challenges and every decision can be challenged. That's what being an editor is about.
And we did decide not to use the nipple clamps.
Pat Stevenson is editor of Radio Scotland's Newsdrive programme
- Daniel Pearl
- 14 Jul 06, 12:10 PM
Peter's on holiday this week. We sent him to an isolated cottage in south-west France with his family. He has no internet access and we confiscated his mobile phone.
So in his absence I thought I'd write a few thoughts this week. I'm probably way behind the internet curve, but I only recently discovered the joys of ...
Here at the 麻豆社 we're obliged to take copyright issues extremely seriously. Producers are constantly in fear of broadcasting uncleared pictures, or discovering, as we did the other day, that five seconds of archive was to cost us over ?1000 (you can imagine how that went down with Peter when he found out). Well, on Wednesday morning I came in to find an email from the agent of rock photographer - he'd spotted an uncleared picture we'd used in Robin Denselow's obituary of Pink Floyd's .
Mick was extremely gracious and only charged us a small fee. However it got me thinking - how does YouTube get away with it? Newsnight's Syd Barrett film is on YouTube for anyone to find - and for anyone to judge whether Mick's photo was worth paying for (I'd argue it was). So, who put our film up there? Has Mick seen it and if so, who has paid him his small fee for the use of his picture? So far 1,125 people have viewed the film via YouTube, admittedly a small number, but none the less, surely copyright is copyright?
On Tuesday the producer of the item, Rebecca, had great difficulty in finding clearable pictures of Syd that she could use. In fact the film came close to not being broadcast - at 11pm they were still looking for shots of the rock recluse. But had Rebecca looked on YouTube and searched for Syd she would have founds reams of footage - everything from homemade tributes to a stalker movie someone made discreetly following Syd around Cambridge.
Now how much of this material is infringing copyright? And what would have happened if we'd just taken it and reused it on Newsnight? I guess I would have received a load of emails asking for money. So why is there one rule for us and another for YouTube? Perhaps someone could explain.
In fact if you search for Newsnight on YouTube you'll find a whole range of our films and discussions. Currently, over 20,000 people have watched Kirsty's interview with Pete Doherty - a smaller number (71) have watched Peter Marshall's expose of British corruption in Saudi contracts - or as described on YouTube: "An exclusive and gutsy report from the beebs flagship news programme." As more and more people get their TV over the web, these questions are bound to become more important.
Mick's agent is about to get very busy.
Daniel Pearl is deputy editor of Newsnight
- David Kermode
- 13 Jul 06, 04:27 PM
The 麻豆社 Chairman Michael Grade joined us on the Breakfast set this morning. Thankfully his visit wasn't unannounced.
Hugo Rifkind, in his Times diary, smells a rat. "It helps to own the airwaves when you have a case to make," says Hugo.
It's certainly true that stories about the 麻豆社 are tricky, when we are the 麻豆社. But I don't think anyone who watched this morning's interview with Michael (watch it here) will have thought that he'd popped in for a cup of tea and a tickle.
Dermot launched straight into the licence fee negotiations, then Sian put him a question about Jonathan Ross's salary - "why so much?". This had nothing to do with her personal predjudices and everything to do with the volume of email and texts this morning on the issue.
Michael told Dermot and Sian they could be earning a lot more in the commercial sector. Then came executive pay - why, when jobs are going, are pay packets getting stuffed at the top? "We need top people" was the Chairman's response.
There were further questions on the kind of programmes the 麻豆社 chooses to make. Are we celebrity obsessed? Are there too many repeats? After around six minutes of grilling, we let him go. To suggest that Michael got an easy ride would be nonsense. He was treated just like any other public servant being held to account.
Hugo will know that journalists tend to respond very badly to being told to stick to a particular line, or giving someone an easy ride. The 麻豆社's newsroom is robustly resistant to corporate interference, to the extent that no-one really bothers to try as far I can tell. Ordering 麻豆社 journalists around is like trying to herd cats. And anyway, I'm sure Michael Grade would have been horrified if we'd suggested he might like to tell us what to ask him.
That said, I did have a twitchy moment, watching this morning's interview. I was convinced he'd been knighted a while back - and thought we'd neglected a 'Sir' (it turns out he got a CBE). Had I got my hands on the introductory script, I might have knighted him. I fear that might have undermined all of the above.
David Kermode is editor of
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