Blurred Keys

Paul Cullen in The Irish Times today writes of The day Ireland stood up, but couldn’t be counted, a tale of differing counts of protesters and hyped to sober coverage.

The NUJ Dublin freelance branch annual Freelance Forum is to take place on Monday May 24 in Buswells Hotel, Dublin.

Sessions include: The business of being a freelance, Pitching and commissioning print and broadcast for writers and photographers, New Media, Old Media, or Just Media? and Keeping Count: Taxes, VAT, and accounting records.

It’s €10 (tax-deductible) to NUJ members, and €20 for non-members.

More details and registration at Gerard Cunningham’s blog.

RTE.ie go with “Risk of new UK airspace closures” (Saturday, 15 May 2010 14:16) and the IrishTimes.com with PA copy on “Risk of UK airspace closures” (Saturday, May 15, 2010, 13:14).

It’s left to BreakingNews.ie to more correctly, and far more relevant to a Irish viewers, lead with “New ash cloud threat to Irish flights” (15/05/2010 - 13:58:32).

I’m open to correction, but the most recently published Volcanic Ash Advisory from London shows Ireland almost covered by 7am tomorrow morning — covered more than the UK. This is the data the Irish Met Office have been using.

Edit: In the last paragraph above, we originally said 6am. However, the time given in the advisory is in Zulu Time / Coordinated Universal Time, which does not include summer time adjustments, so 0600Z is 7am Irish Summer Time.

A reader sent us this a link to this Independent.ie story, and they commented:

Look at paragraph 10 - since when is there a county Belfast?! Saw this in the printed edition this morning and thought they may have fixed it online but no, the error is still there. [Par 10, as we found it says: "It is still not clear whether the trial will be held in Co Belfast or Co Antrim."]

Even more amazing than that (and I can’t believe they didn’t even mention this) is that a ghost turned up to court! If you look two pars down from the above, you’ll see it says “Ms. Howell’s elderly father Sam…sat at the opposite end of the gallery”. Now how could he have done that if, as according to the last par, “he had collapsed and died at his son-in-law’s house in Coleraine 12 days earlier”? Freaky stuff!

Even if the Irish Independent were not implying a ghost turned up in court, it’s very hard to know who the paper is referring to in the fourth last paragraph, which says: ”Ms Howell’s elderly father Sam, his two sisters Pauline and Maud, and his brother Jim sat at the opposite end of the gallery” when the last paragraph includes: “…where Ms Howell’s father lived. He had collapsed and died at his son-in-law’s house in Coleraine 12 days earlier.” There’s currently nothing in the online copy which explains this.

Elaine Larkin over at Journalist.ie has written about getting paid as a freelancer, what to do if your copyright is infringed, and, maybe most interesting, what freelance journalism rates are like.

The NUJ’s London freelance branch’s has also collected rates paid to journalists, including some Irish publications.

(thanks to @brian_foley for pointing out Elaine’s twitter account)

RTE News online are continuing to show a low standard of reporting, today the site are talking up the property market.

“A survey by property website MyHome.ie indicates that two out of three intending first-time buyers say they plan to buy a property in the next year,” says RTE.

Myhome.ie says, the finding were “based on survey of 539 first time buyers who were surveyed between 8/03/2010 and 15/03/2010.”

Why did RTE not mention the survey numbers?

Was the poll random? What method was used? Was it just an internet poll? We know who the poll was for, but who conducted it — a polling company or somebody on staff? If it was a polling company, who are they and are they well known?

In any case, surely a group of “ intending first-time buyers” would highly like be people who are intending to buy soon?

Here’s some recent examples this site knows of. Yesterday, The Sunday Times reported:

“The number of cyclists in the capital is now at its highest level since Dublin city council began recording figures in 1997. About 6,853 people cycled through the city on a given day last year — an increase of 11.6% on 2008 and 74% on 2004.”

The Canal Cordon Count shows 6,853 people cycled into the city core in 2009 between 7am and 10am. But far, far more people are likely to have “cycled through the city on a given day last year.” While also searching archives Blurred Keys found that RTE.ie thinks students don’t commute (”commuters and students”) and, at The Irish Times, 30km/h sometimes becomes 30kph and — quite wrongly — is sometimes replaced with ‘30km’ (a distance rather than a speed).

On figures on people’s modes of transport, The Irish Times reported:

“But Fine Gael Cllr Edie Wynne said the move would have to be given some thought. She said at 3 per cent of commuters cyclists were not very representative in Dublin. “Ninety-seven per cent are choosing another way,” she said.

Cllr Gerry Breen (FG) said councillors should remember the 34 per cent of people who chose to use their car, or those who used rail, buses, “or the 9 per cent of people who chose to walk”.

The numbers of commuter cycling in the Dublin City Council area was, according to the 2006 census, 5.4%.

Cllr Edie Wynne represents Pembroke / Rathmines areas of Dublin. According to the 2006 census, in Pembroke cyclists accounted for 5.6%  of commuters, and in Rathmines the figure jumps to 9.4%. In Cllr Gerry Breen’s area of Clontarf, cycling was at 6.5% of commuters. Cycling in Dublin has — according to the Canal Cordon Count — grown by a large amount since the census, there was a 74% increase in the last four years.

Gerry Breen should also note that in his area, almost 18% of commuters simply walked. The Dublin City Council area was even higher at 27.5%. And for Pembroke / Rathmines walking accounted for 26.4% / 30.6%.

And not just to bash print media: Radio shows also allowed advocates against the heated issue of the Bus Gate to quote national rather than Dublin City — or even Dublin County — public transport and car usage figures. Why were none of these stats challenged?

Articles have made fun out of some ‘Your Country, Your Call’ entries, but there’s little sign of questioning coverage of the competition, who’s behind it, and, maybe most importantly, who’s funding it. What State involvement is there? And what State funds are to be used?

Some blogs have, however, being asking these questions, including tuppenceworth.ie:

• Your Country, Your Call; Further Questions, Parliamentary and Otherwise
• Whose Country, Whose Call?
• Your Country, Your Call: A Tuppenceworth Perfect Storm

And valueireland.com:

• Your Country, Your Call – the promised website updates are not forthcoming
• Ideas Campaign and Your Country, Your Call – deja vu all over again

The longlists for the Smedias National Student Media Awards were published late last week. These can be found here.

As usual for the Smedias, the longlists are called “shortlists” — confusing many student journalists and likely needlessly getting people’s hopes up. As a note on the awards’ site says: “Shortlists for the awards are now available, see below. Final nominations will be posted in the week April 5-9.”

It is wrong gardai are lining up to pressure Evening Herald journalists to reveal the source of its story of a junior minster’s wrong doing. However, at the same time, the newspaper makes it very hard for people to take it seriously.

In a cover story yesterday afternoon, the newspaper highlighted how gardai are asking journalists for interviews, as well as requesting documents. It was a predictable move by the gardai.  There was also at least three comment articles on the issue.

The newspaper, however, makes it hard for people to take it seriously. The city final edition on Tuesday led with a story about an ex-lover’s argument on a street. The ex-lovers are a TV presenter and former model and high-profile developer, but the argument was nothing more than a noisy row. This is the kind of non-story with no possible public interest that the Evening Herald deems fit for its lead front-page story. How can this newspaper be taken seriously?

Entertainment or gossip stories also featured in all of the top four places on the paper’s website at different times when it was checked yesterday and today. What do I expect from the Herald? Is some solid Dublin news too much to ask for? Not too long ago the paper was at least good for that, you could over look it’s tone for some solid news not found elsewhere. This is not to say there is there is no place for entertainment stories, but rather a newspaper should be putting solid news first. And the paper’s editorialising and sensationalism seems to be getting worse.

This may all be viewed a ivory tower commentary. But the Evening Herald is losing circulation on a scale not seen at any other paper tracked by the ABC.  The downward trend at the Herald has also being more constant than most other. The average net circulation for the newspapers is down to 69,351  last year, compared to 104,137 just eight years ago in 2002. People may be reading the paper but fewer and fewer are willing to buy it. Furthermore, only an average of 61,438 people last year picked up the paper at its full price.

Within yesterday’s edition the paper covered the issue of a 30km/h speed limit in Dublin City Centre. The monthly Dublin City Council meeting was held on Monday. A Fine Gael councillor wanted the whole 30km/h zone scraped — even for small streets — so he tabled an emergency motion. Labour Party council members were willing to compromise reverting back to 50km/h on wider roads that were further away from the most pedestrian heavy areas. An amendment was attached to the Fine Gael motion. Both failed to reach the required amounts of votes.

Amazingly the first paragraph of the story covering this council vote in the Evening Herald, read: “A majority of city politicians want to revert the divisive 30kph speed limit — but it is here to stay because they can’t agree on how to change it”. This is nonsense, and clearly an inaccurate account of a highly contentious issue  (It should be noted that the online edition for some reason has a more accurate intro to the same article).

A comment article which appeared below the news story in the print edition was equally twisting of reality. It said: “The one bit of positivity last night was that Mr Slow finally bowed to public pressure when he tabled a motion for an amendment that would allow certain zones to revert to a 50kph limit. But it ended in failure when the number of votes fell short of the required majority.” No context or mention that those councillors who wanted the whole zone removed would not go along with the compromise. This is ill-informed or unbalanced commentary, it’s unclear which, maybe both.

Another thing you miss by not seeing the printed paper is the use of photos. One politician at the centre of the story is pictured, fine. One happy female journalist is shown in a byline photograph, fine. But then you have another female journalist (no byline on the page) in a photograph posing under a 30km/h sign, why? What’s the need for female journalists to be pictured like this? This practice is common at the Evening Herald, among others. How can a paper be taken seriously if it treats one section of its journalist like this?

Then there is also another woman pictured under a list of councillors voting — who is she? There’s no caption. But looking at the list of councillors, one name is followed by “(pictured)”. This councillor is not mentioned in the news or comment article on the page, and is has not being anyway notably vocal on this issue. Can anybody really take the Evening Herald seriously?

Gardai are very likely to have used current data retention laws to look at the phone records of the journalists in questions. Like the new wider Data Retention Bill which in its final stages before the Houses of the Oireachtas, no court order is need for this. So where do the paper stand on this? We were expecting to find nothing on the Evening Herald’s website about data retention, but there was a telling article about the paper’s position.

An opinion article without a byline – possibly an editorial — is headlined “Cack-handed Greens have made themselves look wobbly on crime” (Thursday, July 16, 2009). It said: “Eamon Ryan then let it be known that he’d fought bravely with the minister for justice to secure “significant changes” to the crime legislation on data retention published earlier this week”. This type of law has being passed in recent years in the name of tackling gangland crime and terrorism.

Of course the problem with this cheerleading of the Data Retention Bill and the then criminal justice bill, which the article also mentions, is that these types of laws have too wide of a scope to be abused. The Herald said, “all the evidence suggests that this is a bill the public wants to see passed right away.” But it’s this kind of law which now allows gardai to look at journalists phone records without court orders. The cheerleaders of bad laws do not have the moral right to cry when the kind of laws they promote are turned on them. Should anybody have any sympathy for them now?

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