The Buffalo Blog

The Olympics - Destined for trouble some say...

Front pages today continue the noble pessimistic tradition in the UK press of boldly publicising failure. The relish with which this task is approached is truly astounding.

Today’s particular mishap comes courtesy of funding problems at the Olympic park. We’ve already had various budget reassessments from the Culture Secretary but this one comes from the private sector side of the fence. The private arm of the funding arrangement for the park is having trouble raising funds due to those increasingly reticent financial markets.

I can only cross my fingers and hope that this isn’t the start of another high profile government project gone wrong and that the media don’t get too accustomed to Olympics bashing as we approach 2012. Sad it would be to see the initial vigour and optimism about the Olympics crushed by continued focus on failure to meet deadlines, funding targets, dodgy logos and the like.

The Olympics is a momentous event and we should be proud that it’s coming to our wonderful city. It is a chance for Britain to show that it can still cut it on a global stage, that is can get things right from time to time

However, as the worldwide media prepares to scrutinise China, in 2012, all eyes will be on us. What we need is a healthy dose of optimism and a liberal helping of the highest quality management we can deliver to ensure we don’t end up with a stadium sized egg on our faces while the world looks on.

A sign of the times?

Last week saw another milestone in the changing face of offline news with The Times’ big revamp. The move sees the paper continue to distance itself from its broadsheet past, but is it headed in the right direction?

From the new opinion columns on page 2 it’s obvious where the editorial direction is going. The paper is moving towards the much maligned ‘viewspaper’ model putting its writers’ opinions above its traditionally impartial news coverage.

Declining readership and consequently ad revenues continue to drive these radical newspaper overhauls in an attempt to slow this irresistible decline. The trouble is that the decline can’t be stopped and that papers might be going about this the wrong way.

The exodus of many paper readers to the internet and the wealth of opinion to be found there has made many outlets think that views are all that readers want. But it isn’t, and the consequences are bad for the health of the UK media and bad for those of us who like to make up our own minds.

Yes blogs are popular as many people love to write, hear about and debate different views but people also value unbiased and neutral coverage of the happenings of the day. People aren’t moving online because they only want opinion - it’s just the way things are going – smart phones, laptops and so on have made it much more easy to simply log on than go any buy a paper.

Rather than chasing that unachievable format that is going to reverse the offline media’s fortunes, papers must recognise there will be no return to the good ol’ days. However, they should continue to cater for those that still want a hard copy whilst respecting the fact that most still want the opportunity to make up their own minds.

Media unsympathetic to Prescott 'suffering'

"I sympathise with bulimics but I’m deeply suspicious of Mr Prescott’s lurid soul-baring". Thus screams Stephen Glover’s headline in the Daily Mail of the somewhat astonishing news that Britain’s most (in)famous pie-eater has in fact been suffering from a serious eating disorder.

One of the best known and most vilified politicians of recent times, Mr Prescott has always courted controversy, never more so than by exclusively telling the Sunday Times of his bulimia ordeal in a move which coincided with an impending book launch.

The ever-cynical British media have faced a dilemma as to how to react to the announcement – they can’t be seen to be unsympathetic to a life-altering disease, while sudden affection for Mr. Prescott would only be viewed by the public as disingenuous.

The Guardian sympathetically began their article by claiming that "John Prescott was praised by eating disorder experts yesterday", although their headline, "I took refuge in stuffing my face" belies genuine sympathy. The Times, one feels, is kinder to Prescott, focusing on the message that Prescott presents to fellow sufferers that they should get help.

The Sun, somewhat predictably, ridiculed the "Fat Controller". Trevor Kavanagh’s lurid claim that Prescott has been misdiagnosed attempts to shift the issue to Prescott’s "greedy incompetence". A Q&A of bulimia and the phone number of a bulimia helpline cover up their flagrant disrespect for any suffering felt by Prescott.

The Telegraph was always unlikely to be kind to Prescott, although their approach is cleverer and more subtle than the tabloids’ full frontal attack. They lead with the question of whether Prescott kept his bulimia from Blair, focusing on the negative political implications that the story could have for the Labour party rather than the human aspect utilised by other papers.

Sarkrazy

Never before has the UK media’s celebrity obsessed nature been as apparent as today. For on this momentous, though rather bleak weather-wise, Wednesday, Britain heralds the arrival of, not a leading European President on important international business, but of Lady Sarkozy and all the supposed interest she brings. While thankfully some of the nationals decided people might be interested in reading about why the President was in the UK, most thought the fact that Carla, his lovely wife, once posed naked was the core issue and obviously warranted lengthy discussion (and of course the relevant photo, ooh la la!).

I can only salute the quality of today’s reporting both in print and broadcast whilst waving a melancholy bon voyage to any hope of working out exactly why Monsieur Sarkozy is actually here.

While part of the British media retains the quality, hard-hitting journalistic integrity for which it is famed; others, it seems, have regrettably lost something along the way…ah for the good ol’ days…

A sign of the times?

I read an unsettling piece in the Media Guardian on Monday on Gawker’s ‘pay-per-page view’ system of remunerating journalists.

If you didn’t read it here’s a summary: Nick Denton, founder of Gizmodo and other US-based blogs, has developed a system where journalists are paid advances for a set number of page hits. Failure to make the grade leaves the hapless hack out on his ear.

While it sounds logical enough, for why shouldn’t journos be paid on their results, this insidious scheme has some profound implications for both journalism and PR.

The main problem conveyed in the article is the creation of a sensational, dirt digging, muck-raking culture, that results from the system. Rather than go after stories on merit or interest, journalists are locked in an endless fight over the story most likely to get page views. What’s left is a sensationalist junk-news machine where nothing decent gets a look in.

What the article fails to latch on to is the company’s crass assumption that this system gives readers what they want. Surely readers have to read something before they know if they want to read it? This is a chicken-egg scenario leading to a spiralling decline in quality content. The hacks will continue to dole out sensationalist crud while readers happily addle their brains by reading the most ‘shocking’ or ‘scandalous’ story on the site.

God forbid this type of remuneration gain any foothold in the UK or we could also see a major change in PR payment metrics. What if remuneration was tied not only to getting coverage but to obtaining a certain number of page views regardless of the quality of readers?

This would inevitably drive the sort of sloppy, dangerous and downright deceitful kind of PR practice which perpetually tars the industry. Dodgy research, over-egging of results, sensationalist pitches would all be exacerbated.

What can be done about this – well the power is in your fingers…

'Some' people think...

A recent article in the Guardian stated that ‘Israel has a 20% Arab minority who are citizens and can vote, although they are frequently discriminated against and are described by some as a "demographic threat".’ The political beliefs of this blog are neither here nor there, but what we really opposed was last phrase (5 words) of this paragraph.

I believe that these ‘some’ do exist. Some people think the Arabs give a valuable boost to the economy whilst some believe that they are a demographic threat. The problem that I have is to directly quote, using quotation marks, an unnamed source - a mystery ‘some’. It strikes me as extremely lazy journalism to quote a general belief as if it is a stated opinion. I’d have expected better from The Guardian.