The BBC rolled out its new-look BBC News website redesign today amid much fanfare. It’s attracted a lot of comment, not just on the site itself but also across the media-reporting media. Taking out all the “if it ain’t broke, why fix it” remarks, of which there were very many, there still seemed to be [...]
Disability Living Allowance – a personal experience
Published in June 24th, 2010
Tuesday’s Budget contained the not-entirely-unexpected announcement of cuts to benefits. There was a general expectation that Incapacity Benefit (IB) and its new incarnation, Employment and Support Allowance (ESA), both of which are claimed by many disabled people, would be targeted. IB is frequently in the news for its renown as a benefit that is relatively [...]
Hyperlocal war breaks out in Manchester
Published in June 18th, 2010
David Ottewell, chief reporter of the Manchester Evening News, used his day off today to launch an attack on hyperlocal news websites on his MEN blog. He singled out Salford Star Online but didn’t mention any of the other half-dozen or so hyperlocal ventures currently publishing in Manchester. One wonders why not, given his claim [...]
Future of Manchester under the microscope
Published in May 18th, 2010
A couple of recent events have thrown the future of Manchester into sharp focus as pundits and citizens both look at ways to develop the city in a fitting manner for the future. Manchester is the UK’s third city in terms of size but its second in many other respects. Culturally, it’s been a major [...]
The sale of MEN
Published in February 10th, 2010
Several zillion words were written yesterday on the sale of the Manchester Evening News to Trinity Mirror – the details, the commentary, and the rest of the speculation. I’m not going to rehash what’s already been said.But, as a freelance journalist working in my adopted city of Manchester, I’ve had time to ponder what it [...]
Why local news will always matter
Published in January 8th, 2010
At risk of stating the obvious, we’ve had a lot of snow this week. News coverage of the cold snap generally has been at saturation levels, often at the expense of more important stories such as the Robinson scandal – I’m surely not the only person fed up of news footage of people telling us [...]
The learning curve
Published in December 8th, 2009
My thirst for knowledge never seems to diminish. There are always things I’m curious about, want to know more about, pique my interest enough to go exploring further. Much of my curiosity is transient – I’ll read a blog and look up something on Wikipedia or remember something someone mentioned in passing and do a [...]
Cross ticks my boxes
Published in October 14th, 2009
Image via Wikipedia It’s election time at the NUJ and my vote was long decided before the ballot papers were issued. At stake is the editorship of the union’s publication, the imaginatively titled The Journalist. Unlike most such jobs, where you fill in an application form, get through a couple of interviews then negotiate terms [...]
TEDx Manchester – some thoughts
Published in October 3rd, 2009
I attended TEDx Manchester yesterday – a half-day of presentations and debate on technology, entertainment and design (the TED of the title). I’m still digesting much of what was put out, because there was an awful lot packed into the five-hour programme. Apparently, too, this was the biggest TED event in Europe to date – [...]
Newspaper sales – a way forward?
Published in September 23rd, 2009
I read an intriguing article in today’s Media Guardian about a London scheme for selling more newspapers. News International has started offering top-up publications alongside subscriptions for some of its own stable – the Times and Sunday Times. The free delivery scheme actually started last July but has now been expanded to include non-NI publications [...]
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