Do two w..ell, whatver they are, make a right on story?

I am a tad intrigued by stories in the Guardian that seem to have comments closed before they start.

Sort of 'we're listening...la..la.la...'

Tory PR machine targets local paper's online poll

Other than noting how most news media would take any poll they are offered to prove or disprove anything if it suited, I can't help but recall a certain paper that took it upon itself to try and rig an election in another country by getting its readers to write to the voters and tell 'em how to vote the right way.

Worked a treat.

Plus ca change

Against all odds we can still win, on a platform for change

Change? Must have seen that meaningless word borne by too many flat surfaces lately. Plus the walls and aircraft they like to stand in front of... on platforms.

To me it's now just the stuff that rattles around in my pocket until it makes a hole and falls from my grasp, only to be eagerly picked up as well by those who also turned my crisp notes into only so many loose promises.

Plus ca change.

BBC - Miliband in Labour rallying call - Change!

Telegraph - David Miliband is clearly enjoying the continuing speculation - I am glad some aspect of our country's governance and its impact on the people is being enjoyed by some. His name is tricky to spell, too, isn't it?

Guardian - Brown's courage and vision deficit knows no borders - As I still cannot post, I must reply on others to speak in proxy:

'David Miliband is a man of integrity. I know this for a fact.'

'Perhaps but just because he did you a favour and let you in the building doesn't translate into full integrity.'

Indeed. What a truly daft thing to write. And a glaring example of how those who have access via the media credentials can miss how things play from our political 'leaders' more directly to us.

You say tomato, I say a red fruit-like thing that is not the same thing

An interesting exchange on the Newsnight news blog (the distinction is, apparently, now significant), as opposed to the other news published/broadcast by the national entity we fund.

Bank balance sheets become focus of scrutiny

Look at 13, 14 & 15 and then the reply from a rather defensive reporter in 16... and wonder about the mindsets at work.

'...if this were "reporting" then you would have a point. As it is, it is blogging. It is not meant to be award winning journalism.

And I am not reporting "unsubstantiated gossip" - I am reporting a...

Not sure I can get my head around this, not just as a possible official insight into national media broadcasting/publishing editorial definitions, but also consistency...:

'...if this were "reporting" then you would have a point[ie: not reporting]. As it is, it is blogging.... I am reporting [or...] a...'

So... is it reporting... or blogging, and what then is the difference as it still appears in print, for public consumption, from a BBC reporter on a BBC organ of news sharing?

I am to in future ignore all I read on these pages?

Addendum: I have had a reply:

21. At 11:15pm on 29 Jul 2008, PaulMasonOfNewsnight wrote:
In on-screen reporting you can pursue bar stool intelligence and try to stand it up as fact. With blogging, I think it's legitimate to explain what people are saying if it's relevant and plausible and doesn't libel anybody, and especially when as "sentiment" it is a material factor in events. If people are beginning to act on an idea it becomes relevant even if not true. I'm trying to help people understand the scale of private concern in the financial sector, is all.

I could ask what the heck he is trying to say, as it is almost Rumsfeld-Clintonian in not clarifying, at least to my satisfaction, how onscreen is different to blogging when it is from an official, national media reporter, and how he in nay case seems to have contradicted himself on this distinction on one sentence anyway.

I think it best to leave that masterpiece of doublespeak as its own epitaph. Then again...

Just walk away, Renee

Seems I am not the only one who is thinking the number of 'laws' where the definitions of what is legal or not are vague at best is getting out of hand:

More nonsense laws

No one is doubting the severity of what is being talked about, and the need to address it, where possible, but I have seen a definition of manslaughter as the following and have no reason to doubt it:

"the unlawful but not deliberately planned killing of one human being by another"

And it's hard to reconcile that with a '...but it's OK if...' in the manner proposed.

Indy - New murder laws 'may send wrong message'

Stepping stones

Indy - * The editor of the BBC’s Newsnight programme has resigned his position to join Google as head of PR for the UK. Peter Barron has spent 12 years at the BBC2 programme, as well as time at Channel 4 and with Tonight with Trevor McDonald

Gaurdian - Newsnight editor Peter Barron to join Google in communications role

BBC - Newsnight editor moves to Google - Interesting to see how he goes into the commercial world as Google's head of PR for the UK, Ireland and Benelux, following a career straight into the BBC, using "...creativity and brilliant journalism...'.

I clashed with him a few times, especially on matters of the latter, and never did get adequate answers, even when having him dead to rights. Maybe the BBC's loss is Google's gain. But then, maybe Cuil have a chance as well, then.

Addendum: Eventually got an answer to my on site question from Paul Mason, who also answered my question on his odd phrasing in defence of reporting online vs. blogging.

I have replied:

Thanks for that. I see the topic was raised the day before by Midnight Pantsman but missed his reference as it had initially been referred to the moderators (why?), so I had no idea what his subsequent comment was about.

Nice to have confirmation here at last; these days it's hard to trust much of anything in the news unless it is direct from the horse's mouth.

As we have discussed elsewhere, blog gossip is often of less value than the energy used in the keystrokes.

How would one define such a move from news journalism to PR? Poacher turns gamekeeper? Or vice versa? Surely politics can only beckon more brightly now.

Well, as a kind of shareholder, and one with an interest in well-researched, objective reporting and editorial, I too will await with interest the next content visionary who will be appointed to fill Mr. Barron's shoes, and what he/or she will be doing to maintain the standards we have come to expect from one of the few national news programmes left that can often be relied upon to try and discuss matters that are newsworthy.

Brand Republic - Google v Cuil round two

Newsnight - Farewell

Have fun at Google.

I do. It gives me all sorts of varied options around topics on top of immediate answers.

And I trust them to be balanced and objective in how it all gets sourced, delivered and presented. At least to date. Unlike most sources.

How Cuil is that?

Gaurdian - NEW - Barron: why I'm leaving Newsnight... With friends like these? Poacher turns gamekeeper? Or vice versa? Surely politics can only beckon more brightly now. Be a nice change (big theme here) to get someone from the BBC who did pop out of the cosy club for a wee while at least at try to survive in the real world. At least we know where the ad for the next 'content visionary' (I, for one, live to have the latest episode of our foremost political interviewers' undies aired asap) will be placed.

Plus ca change

I share this - Saint Bob suffocates in African protocol - not because of my initial eyebrow-cock on 'When the Band Aid plane landed...' but how I read all the way through without once registering the date to which it referred... over 20 years ago.

Damning sentence

Hard to know who’s the real villain of this doomed canoe trip

'John and Anne Darwin, who last week began sentences of more than six years each for having defrauded insurance companies. That’s roughly what you’d get, on average, if you raped someone and 19 times longer than the average sentence for people convicted of knife crime.'