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 [...]
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 [...]
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 [...]
JEEcamp 09 – some thoughts
Published in May 9th, 2009
I took part in the second JEEcamp in Birmingham yesterday. Last year, it was very much an experiment to see what might happen if you stuck 50 journalists in a room and let them unconference for a day about how to create a new journalism for the future. I’d been mapping plans for an online [...]
Press Gazette: I'm not mourning
Published in April 7th, 2009
When Wilmington announced yesterday that it was closing Press Gazette permanently, quite a few of my colleagues blogged about how sad they felt at its demise. Dave Lee, Alison Gow, Kristine Lowe and even Roy Greenslade all wrote at length about what PG had meant to them and why it would be missed. I’m going [...]
Local news, local action
Published in March 28th, 2009
Anyone who pays any attention to the news cannot have failed to hear of the swingeing cuts in staff being made at newspapers and magazines up and down the UK. Thousands of journalists jobs have disappeared over the last year. Some papers and magazines have been closed down. Over the last couple of weeks, people [...]
Ivan Cameron – a death not in vain
Published in February 26th, 2009
Yesterday, when there was a fatal plane crash in Amsterdam and several British soldiers were killed on duty in Afghanistan, one other story dominated UK headlines – the death of six-year-old Ivan Cameron. Normally, I’d consider it inappropriate for such a private tragedy to be given priority over other news that is arguably far more [...]
Schiphol plane crash – news and green views
Published in February 25th, 2009
Shortly after 9.30 this morning, I learned – via Twitter – of the plane crash at Schiphol Airport in the Netherlands. A Turkish Airlines Boeing 737 came down short of the Polderbaan runway, where it promptly broke into three pieces. It was a miracle that it didn’t turn into a fireball and that so many [...]
Aid Zimbabwean journalists
Published in December 2nd, 2008
Press Gazette and the NUJ have started a very worthy appeal. To help journalists get the news out of Zimbabwe, they are asking for hacks here to donate any kit such as laptops and cameras to their counterparts. If you can donate anything – an old mobile phone, an outmoded (for the UK) laptop – [...]
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