Blurred Keys

The Gazette Group Newspapers,
partly owned by the Irish Times, is to launch the Dundrum Gazette next week.

The new newspaper is being advertised as a ‘new quality newspaper’ for the
D14 and D16 areas of the Dublin.

With a €1.50 cover price, the weekly Dundrum Gazette will be the third localized Dublin newspaper in the
Gazette stable. It follows the launch of the Clondalkin Gazette in 2005, with the first papers the Lucan Gazette and the Blanchardstown Gazette first published the year before.  

The Irish Times Ltd recently bought 43.8 percent of the Gazette Group for
around €2.5 million. According the Irish Times (paid sub required), the terms
allow the them to increase their investment to 53 percent in three years, 75
percent in five years, and the remained after that.

We’re hoping to get an interactive thing going with the audience. It would be better, we could have a two-way thing… I think that would be great because it would be a community of people having a discussion rather than a monologue”.

- commented outspoken Irish broadcaster Eamon Dunphy when asked by Irish tech site siliconrepublic.com if he would be interested in blogging (vie blogorrah.com).

While not trying to
get too caught up in the controversy over a blogger code of conduct, an open forum
in Dublin tomorrow (Monday) night will look at the question ‘do the same standards
apply to journalists and bloggers?’.

Everybody is welcome,
and the event is reasonably informal, for more information see our previous post
on the forum.

Blurred Keys takes the view that both groupings are more alike
then they would generally like to admit.

Ballistic has a bit of a review/rant of Mongrel, the Dublin-based magazine that according to one if its blurbs is "everything but placed directly in the hands of its intended reader due to its bespoke selection of distribution"…

Like most right thinking Dubs the first and only freesheet with bite
has and always will be The Slate which for three glorious years between
200-2003 meshed the sarkiest of wit and decent listings with an
investigative edge helped in no small part by an unpretentious
editorial team (unpretentious by Trinners standards anyway) who weren’t
afraid to rock the boat. By contrast Mongrel is boutique fare about
fashion, trendy liberalism and the razor-sharp wit involed in saying
‘everything is crap’ at the business end of your 20s.

Anyway, Mongrel have an interview with the cheeky devil, the Bert, Bertie Ahern online here… 

“MARY HARNEY IS A TOTAL GEEBAG!” …and other outrageous observations Bertie Ahern was not persuaded to make to Mongrel Magazine.

It’s hard to believe that poor old Bertie only
managed to squeeze in about 500 words in direct quotes in an interview article
of over 2,000 words. ADDED: There are some reasons behind this…

But whenever the Taoiseach’s press
guy doesn’t like one of my questions, he pulls me
aside and reminds me that its just a conversation.
“It’s a getting-to-know-you session” he says. “If
this goes well we can do something else down
the line.” Don’t hold your breath.

The news section of RTE.ie appears to be suffering somewhat of ‘tabloidization’ or dumbing down recently, so-far it is mainly limited to opening paragraphs of news articles (vie Maguire and boards.ie).

Examples posted below include stories opening with unaccredited dictionary definitions and questions. The author or authors appear to be trained more in creative writing then news reporting.

There may be a number of reasons for not having a byline of a journalist attached to reports on the websites of Irish media outlets. However, the question needs to be asked - are these reasons justified?

There are a number of exceptions to the offline media not including the name of the author, straight reporting on straightforward news is not an exception often seen. So, why do users accept it online?

wilf [WILL-f]… -verb the act of becoming distracted while browsing the world wide web, often at work; from the acronym for What Was I Looking For?… Are you a wilfer? - RTE News

Looking to explore Europe by train this summer? The rail pass scheme open to all European residents can now be purchased via the web, the group that runs InterRail announced today. - RTE News

Growing marijuana does not usually end with a bang, but one Miami, Florida man was critically injured when his hydroponic lab exploded. - RTE News

Truckers and road-trippers take note: 12 countries agreed today to create a 7,500 km ‘ring road’ around the Black Sea. [changed at time of publication, also found in a Google catch file here] - RTE News

A blog is after all only a publishing system, although digital and versatile their content can vary in similar ways to newspapers or magazines…

There’s nothing stopping a local newspaper using blogging software for publishing news, as what is been done at the Buckinghamshire Advertiser in the UK (vie BuzzMachine). In Ireland, that role is somewhat being filled by bloggers like the Limerick Blogger, but no local newspapers are at it yet.

Meanwhile, the Economist use their ‘the Inbox‘ blog to publish readers’ letters “soon after receipt”.

In off-line conversation somebody questioned the importance we attached to the recent news that the Irish Times are the first national Irish newspaper to start blogging.

There are two reasons to highlight the story; the Irish media are miles behind the media in the UK and other countries when it comes to blogging (partly understandable due to Ireland’s low broadband penetration) and the Irish Times look to be serious about their new project with journalists Jim Carroll, Conor Pope, Shane Hegarty and more to be announced blogging on Ireland.com.

An article (reg reqd) in yesterday’s Sunday Independent includes word-for-word sections and other similarities to an Irish blog post at fatmammycat.blogspot.com.

The striking likeness was discovered by anonymous Irish blogger Twenty Major.

“Read the two pieces and the comments to see the bigger picture. It’s fairly obvious that Andrea Byrne has used the original piece, sometimes word for word, and passed it off as her own work,” said Twenty Major.

(found vie kathyfoley.net)

In what started with a mulley.net post against a blogger code of conduct, the Guardian’s Organ Grinder blog has misrepresented what a prominent Irish blogger has said.

While writing about ‘content labels’ for blogs, Organ Grinder stated, “A few bloggers have already rather predictably rejected the idea already before it has even begun. Sunday Tribune columnist Damien Mulley said, "fuck off" to content labels for blogs”.

Damien Mulley, however, did not say “fuck off” to content labels, he clearly said “Blogger code of conduct? Two words - Fuck off”, and that was just the headline.

Read the rest of this entry »

‘Do the same standards of professional integrity apply with bloggers and traditional media?’ will be the question of the next Cleraun Media Forum on Monday, April 23, at 8-pm.

The organises are openly inviting bloggers, journalists, students, lecturers, or anybody interested in the media. The open forum will be moderated by Sunday Tribune business editor & columnist Richard Delevan.

The topic is a spin-off from a session given by Sunday Times Columnist and blogger Sarah Carey, at the Cleraun Media Conference last October. Her paper ‘Blog etiquette’ is now available at cleraun.com.

Read the rest of this entry »

Independent News & Media is apparently Sir Tony O’Reilly’s cash cow…

O’Reilly alone took €110m in payments from Independent Newspapers since 2000, while jobs are being cut and outsourced to make way for even more largesse - Village.ie