Shilpa wins Big Brother

This post is the start of a belated new year resolution. I want to resurrect this blog and certainly did not expect to do so on the subject of something I hate so much!
Shilpa Shetty, the Bollywood actress, has come out of the Big Brother house victorious. I think this is an excellent outcome after the furore which has surrounded the show over the past week or so. But have the media made too much of this controversy?
Rather than concentrating on low-grade celebrities I don't feel the media have really made a strong attempt to address the issue in its wider context.
Whilst I'm not Jade Goody or Jo O'Meara's greatest fan I think they might suffer from a lack of education rather than being racist. Maybe the plan by the government to initiate citizenship classes isn't such a bad idea after all and we can begin to eliminate ignorance in all forms.

Jack of all trades

Our speaker today was more up-beat about the future of newspapers. Sarah Radford told us how the newspaper she works for, the Newsbury Weekly News, uses its website in harmony with the newspaper. It is not seen as a method of killing off the newspaper as seems to be the trend these days. While the website publishes more often than the newspaper and beats it to stories, the paper will then be used to follow the story up or add more depth to it. The paper has not seen a significant fall in its 25,000 weekly circulation either, unlike its national counterparts.

I think this is great news. It is the way newspapers should be. They should encourage people who read the paper to look at the website and vice-versa. This would surely galvanise their audience and insure the future of both platforms. It would also insure more jobs for journalists. When the Telegraph converged their newsroom recently, jobs were lost. It was deemed that one editor was sufficient to edit both the paper and the online site and one reporter was able to get the story, write it and put it into a Contant Management System, rendering some production staff obsolete.

The argument of multi-skilling is a wide open debate, but surely if journalists are to have the skills previously spread between 3 people, then jobs are going to be lost. I don't think this is a good thing. I am all for learning a new skill and being more employable but should we as journalists be doing the job of four people adequately or should four people be doing those jobs and producing a stronger product?

I believe the quality of news should reign over how many skills you can squeeze into one person but I am sure the people bank rolling these big media organisations would disagree with me.

2 anonimous Dutch Girls

These are the girls we have to be so afraid of! (See below for blog entry)

Apocolypse Newspaper

The latest 'nightmare inducing' forecast for us trainee journalists was brought to us by award-winning journalist Nicholas Brett, former editor of the Radio Times. His interest with new media and its power was, he thought, going to be a threat to journalists everywhere. I have to say that two Dutch girls miming karaoke doesn't scare me but apparently this is what people want to watch. That may be, but I hardly see the threat this will have to newspapers.

Mr Brett spent most of his time 'ribbing' us newspaper journalists. Apparently it was a joke he let us know at the end. A device to keep our attention away from texting.

So YouTube presents the greatest threat to newspaper journalists was the line he took. Everyone is becoming a producer now, he told us, and continued by saying that one day journalists may just be glorified proof-readers. It is hard to know who is right about the future of the media. Newspaper stalwarts maintain this is the most exciting time to be involved in journalism and that our future careers are not under threat.

Others, such as Nicholas Brett, espouse so highly the new generation of UGC, or User Generated Content, they believe it is the end of news gathering and all news will become a product where users send information or stories in and we as journalists edit it.

So should we be scared? I don't think so and truly believe newspapers will be around for a long time yet - in a tangiable form not just as organisations.

Metro Madness

Reading the front page story of the Metro today (Monday) made me think about something our guest speaker for Reporters and Reported mentioned this week. Rodney Pinder from newssafety.com spoke about the need for newspaper reporting to become more respected.

He said this could be done if journalists paid more care and attention to accuracy. Well, the story in the Metro about Dyfed-Powys Police Chief Terry Grange's comments with regard to paedophilia bear little reflection to what he said in an interview on Radio 5 Live. The debate on Radio 5 focused on the 'grey area' of, for instance, a 17-year-old boy sleeping with his 15-year old girlfriend. The sex in consensual but she is under-age. Is it fair to call him a peadophile? No, I don't think so.

I think many parents would prefer their 14/15-year-old daughter to be sexually active with someone who is still a teenager compared to someone above 20. Mr Grange commented that "the 16 age thing is an artificial barrier." I think he is right and we have to accept that teenagers are becoming sexually active at a younger age. Whether this is to do with lack of sex education or what, I don't know, but it has to be accepted and the law needs to take this into account.

"If you can't spell, you can f@*^ off basically!"

Too right! I fully agree with Pete Clifton. If a job application is sent to the BBC with a spelling mistake in it, as Pete might say, it deserves to be thrown in the f'ing bin!

Pete Clifton is the Head of BBC News Interactive and explained to us how he is gearing the BBC website up to be more interactive. User Generated Content (UGC) was again mentioned but Pete pointed out that this was not a new concept. Someone has always wanted to tell their local paper about the latest bit of gossip they know. It makes them feel important and gives them power - they know something that you, as the journalist, want to know. The difference now is these 'users' have far more platforms with which to communicate what they know to news outlets.

One of the most interesting things Pete spoke about, which I did not know the BBC was doing, is the aggregation pages. These are pages that focus on one country, say Argentina, and give statistics about it, tell you about the weather there and even give links to useful websites and blogs which will help the reader to find out more about said country.

This not only makes the site more accurate but makes it more inclusive of the online world rather than being exclusive. It means that people can navigate to other sites through the BBC rather than having to search for something through google. It looks like the future of the online world will become more of a collaboration than a competition and this signals how important the 'user' now is and maybe demonstrates a step towards democratisation of the media by the user having an influence of what goes on to the BBC site.

*Idea for online feature

I have had an idea which was inspired by reading a blog by Andrew Grant Adamson. He wrote about the plethora of blogs out there in cyber-space and debated their worth. He looked at the national papers and how many blogs they have linked to them. He said: "One can almost hear some editors shouting: 'We need more of these blog things. Everyone has them my daughter tells me.'"

The Times has 40 blogs, the Telegraph has 32 and the Guardian 12. Can all of these honestly hold top quality content that should attract readers? Are blogs even meant to attract readers or are they merely a space for our thoughts where, someone, might, maybe, stumble across them and take note? Or are they merely platforms for journalists to publish work that isn't good enough to go in the proper publication?

Richard Burton said of blogs: "They should be interesting and offer an insight into unusual lives. If you have something interesting to say then say it, but if you don't, then don't." Obviously this is Richard's opinion and neither he nor anyone else has the right to say who can blog and who can't.

But I want to investigate whether the mass of blogs is leading to a distortion in what a blog is supposed to be. Are the conventions being twisted with the ever increasing demand of newspapers to keep up with trend and technology?

I will first explain what the conventions of a blog are, what functions a blog should fulfil and how many of the blogs written by national newspapers keep to these conventions. I will also try to find out from these bloggers why they began a blog and if the idea of doing one is being pushed upon them. I may then look at the problems of large organisations encouraging their staff to blog and then placing restrictions on them about what they can say.

*It's democracy, stupid!

This week Daniel Meadows, a lecturer at the university, spoke to us about the democratisation of the media and what he sees as the future for the online world. For the past four years he has been working on a project called Capture Wales for the BBC, which involved helping people record digital stories about an aspect of their life.

He felt this was democratisation of the media as the public could tell their stories and yet there was no money to be made from it. While I appreciate the premise of the project, "The age of 'doing' media to people is over", I did not see its worth in the information sphere. I think the project would be more beneficial for community development than anything else.

While Daniel may argue Capture Wales is the essence of a free media, I would question its ability to keep up with the pace of today's online world. There has only been 1,000 stories archived from the projects six-year history and it has been confined to Wales. Therefore, I would question whether this type of project has a home at the BBC when there are so many other better known sites providing a similar service.

Daniel would argue that the other players in this field of "scrap-book TV" are doing the exact opposite of media democratisation. YouTube was recently sold for $1.5b and was premised on the idea of attracting advertisers to its young audience. MyTV, Trouble Television's user generated show, might claim to be "Your TV - You made it, you watch it", but Trouble are no doubt making money from advertisers attracted to the show. However, I would disagree with Daniel that making a profit from these sites somehow affects their content. People are still able to voice their opinions and post aspects of their lives as they are in Capture Wales.

So will there ever be democratisation of the media as Daniel sees it? I don't think so. While User Generated Content may be on the rise, big media organisations will always find a way to make money out of it. I think most independent producers would find it hard to turn down a big sum of money if they were on to the next big thing.

Superman... that's what I wanted to be!

Believe it or not ex Telegraph Online editor Richard Burton was inspired to become a journalist by watching Superman. Clark Kent is what he wanted to be. Energetic and enthusiastic about his work and career thus far (no bad feelings apparent with the Telegraph either even though he's just jumped ship), he told us of the strengths of the web as a platform for news. Its instant, you can see what is being read and by how many people, you can let your reader know you are going to add more when it becomes available and it is accessible at any time.

The issue of reader loyalty came up again too. The importance placed on a site's usability in relation to maintaining a loyal audience is huge. Online readers are unlike those who dogmatically buy the same newspaper from their corner shop day in, day out. This took the discussion on to the subject of other news platforms, such as mobiles and blackberries.

I personally think, and I expect users of these do too, that it is undesirable to read a whole article from your mobile. While it might improve access to news, could the culture of writing for a platform actually damage journalism as we know it? I think it could and believe it would be very dangerous if tangiable newspapers did die out as many issues often need wider explanation.

A world where news was only available online and on portable devices would for me signify the potential dumming down of news, which would be a catastrophe. Whilst online has its advantages, lets keep the good old fish and chips wrapping.

Journalism matters

The impact that journalists can have on the world is quite profound, whether it be alerting the world to a major crisis or temporarily entering someone's life and getting them to recount the worst day of their life in order for you to get a story. We had Mark Brayne from the DART centre come to talk to us for our Reporters and Reported module last week.

He was an extremely interesting man as he has had many years on both sides of the war journalist/counsillor coin. Few people I imagine would be better placed to comment on the impact of journalism and on the flip side, the impact the story can have on the journalist. Mark helps out many journalists now whose careers have adversely affected their lives. We were told that if you were a war correspondant you were most likely divorced and addicted to something, generally alcohol. Mark showed us two clips of two recent events, 9/11 and the riots in Italy at the G8 summit in 2004.

The latter clip showed riot police over zealously beating demonstrators. One of Mark's clients had been at the event and witnessed the beating, but so bad was it that he had repressed the memory and forgot he was there until Mark had shown him the clip. It is easy to forget that every picture you see of every event, big or small, was taken by someone and they have to live with seeing the real event.

Journalism matters and it should not be taken lightly. Our potential careers have the capacity to show us the world and let us meet people we would never normally meet. But they could quite possibly push us to the edge of what we are able to cope with. Last year thirteen journalists spoke to the DART Centre about their experiences. Read the article here.

Ay-Caerau-umba

I went for the second walk around my patch, Caerau, yesterday and found it much better than the first. On the first walk around I didn't speak to anyone, I just wanted to get a feel for the place - and it felt a bit scary!

The doctor's surgery had two smashed windows and the people walking around the street either had a dangerous looking dog with them or a can of Oranjeboom. I daren't think what I was in for when I had to start talking to people.

Most people, though, have been extrememly helpful and covering the ward looks like it will continue to get easier with time. I have made some good contacts so far and hopefully they will help me to get a fuller, deeper and more truthful picture of the area than that painted in the press, which can focus more on the negative than the positive where Caerau and the neighbouring Ely are concerned.

*Discussion is revolution

Our speaker this week seems to have provoked controversy among the ranks. Iain Dale spoke mainly about his internet TV station, 18 Doughty Street. Being a Conservative candidate, however, opened him up to criticism before he had even started with some people branding his show Tory TV.

Something that Iain talked about was "giving the little guy a voice." Obviously, Iain having been in politics is not necessarily a 'little guy' but he did show that most people could do the same thing. This is what I want to concentrate on.

Post lecture opinion was that his view of letting pretty much anyone, although reservedly in some cases, host a TV station and talk about whatever they want unrestricted was dangerous. The worry was that jihadists could have a TV station, so could the BNP and so could anyone else with an axe to grind against another group of society. I don't see this as a problem - it is already happening - (see BNP TV).

If something is so extreme then I believe anyone who has a problem with it will ignore it. Others who sympathise with it may already be part of a group who endorses it. What harm would it do if Bin Laden had an internet TV station? Would it make terrorism worse? Probably not. Would it help recruit more terrorists? Maybe. But something it would do is promote discussion and discussion is revolution.

Amanda Powell lecture

Today we had our first guest speaker, editor of BBC Wales online, Amanda Powell. It was an interesting talk and brought to light some of the issues with online journalism and the rise of user generated content.
Someone asked whether the role of a journalist would one day turn into that of an editor of user generated content. She said she could see that trend but I'm not sure this will happen. I think there will always be a need for trained journalists who know how to report the facts properly rather than total user generated content that cannot always be substantiated.
Something I had not thought about with regard to online news is the time that people spend reading it online. Amanda told us the average time per visit was 3.12 minutes. She said that she felt that she was not doing her job if visits in general were too long. It has to be wondered if this is a good thing. Are people truly becoming informed with visits which are so short. It might be argued with such short visit’s, the aim of the BBC and as a result the use by its users, means that people believe they are informed on the world by reading a few short paragraphs on the BBC site. This boom in internet news could in fact be breeding ignorance by encouraging people to read only a small amount on each news event. Alternatively, (I hope) people use the BBC as one of many news outlets to help gain a better understanding of the world.

My first post!

Just set up my blog. This is my first posting on it. I have joined the 21st century! Hopefully my exploration into this new world of blogging will be successful and interesting. The content will mainly be based on issues brought up by our visiting speakers so as long as they pull through I should have something informative, enlightening and maybe even provocative to say!