Blurred Keys

- Press Ombudsman says plagiarism is covered
- We get legal threats from an Irish Independent journalist

As examples of plagiarism are mounting against newspapers in the group, Independent News & Media seem to be unable to keep their hands off the copy and paste function of their PCs.

Read the rest of this entry »

Vincent Browne’s Village magazine is to cease publishing, he called the process a "suspension," and said to the Irish Independent that he hoped to resume printing in future. The magazine’s website, Village.ie, will continue, although it is currently off-line for updating.

After previous cuts in the workforce, the three remaining staff will be let go.

He told the Irish Times the move is due to "a significant downturn in advertising and the cancellation of special
contract publications we were undertaking for third parties."

Village was expecting to make a small profit this year, but the contract publications were central to this. In a recent interview with Marketing magazine Browne said: "My only backer, Michael Smith, lost about €260,000 and I lost in the region
of €1.2 million. Village is going to be a marginal exercise but we can
make money on contract publishing and we should make significant money on the
website".

The Broadcasting Complaints Commission has said ‘Biffo’, the nick name for the Taoiseach Brian Cowen, does not insult him and was "highly unlikely to cause widespread offence”.

Complainant, Charlie McGrory, objected on the grounds of fairness, objectivity and impartiality, and taste and decency, after presenter of RTE Radio 1 News at One, Sean O’Rourke (pictured), said "did Biffo blink?".

According to the BCI: "McGrory states he is not a Fianna Fáil member or activist but finds this reference to the office of Taoiseach disrespectful, lacking objectivity and in poor taste.  He wonders how we can encourage our young people to become active in politics when the national broadcaster refers to the Taoiseach as ‘Biffo’"

The acronym, depending on your point of view, can mean ‘Big Intelligent Fellow From Offaly’ or ‘Big Ignorant Fucker From Offaly’. RTE said it "has as much to do with a boy’s comic character from the 1950’s as it has to do with any reference to people from County Offaly. Indeed, the term has been used by Mr Cowen himself in a humorous context".

The broadcaster added that, generally speaking, it does not and will not use the term ‘Biffo’ when referring to the Taoiseach and this was used as a ‘headline’ to attract listeners to stayed tuned in before an ad break.

MORE: Decision in full (MS Word doc)
MORE: List of decisions of July 2008

A round-up of news, comment and other info from news sites blogs, and message boards etc…

Cardinal challenges the media’s ‘dominant’ secular view
Sunday World top of the pops as it avoids musical marketing
Ireland’s papers defy downward trends
JNLR July 07-June 08 Survey results issued (PDF)
ABC IofI report (PDF, link replaced when new report released)
Tom Dunne to Newstalk
Today FM to preserve Pet Sounds
Ray of sunshine
Muzu makes music pa
Media world: Too Late Late for Pat Kenny?
RTE promises ’spectacular’ first Late Late Show despite Kenny’s delay in signing up
Lung cancer under reported in Irish media - report
Sunday Times to launch monthly Irish edition of Style magazine
South Ossetian man angered by Irish media coverage
MediaBite Email Re: The €11m ‘gas bill’
Media ought to beware groups bearing surveys
Belfast Telegraph relaunched website sees huge traffic spike
Myers and Nigerians
RTE Television unveils new season
Sponsors fail to check in to Failte Towers
The Big Switch over
BCI National Conference Asks ‘Does the Medium Matter?’
O’Brien group told January DTT launch is a ‘fantasy’
Digital terrestrial TV available from autumn next year
Adverts rate alert for Channel 6
TV3 to buy Channel 6 for €10m
Is RTE Radio 1 being dumbed down?
Mandy and the Irish Media

A boards.ie user spotted the above story this morning on RTE.ie News where a map outline of the US state of Georgia was being used on a story about the country of the same name.

Regular Blurred Keys users will be aware of some their past errors and tabloidisation, regular readers of RTE.ie are probably even more aware of such. The online news section should not to be confused with the general RTE News, which is a different operation.

Read the rest of this entry »

Bit late with this one… Entry to Newstalk’s Emerging Voices Student Documentary Competition closes this Thursday. And this is what it’s all about:

"The judges will be looking for work that is original, relevant and
produced to a high standard. The winning entry will be broadcast on the
station, the winner will receive a placement at Newstalk and a cash
prize of €500".

For more see newstalk.ie.

Fintan O’Toole in the Irish Times today talks about "the hyping-up of the ordinary into the extraordinary". In the article he mentions journalism’s part in the in the hyperbole…   

Journalism, of course, has a lot to do with all of this. The tabloid
thesaurus in which every murderer is a monster, every rapist a beast
and every piece of celebrity tittle-tattle a sensation, is becoming the
vocabulary of the mainstream media too.

Of course, tabloids are not the only culprits by any means. For one local newepaper we read, an aim to cut road deaths is hyped to "frightening number of deaths", and new trains which don’t have reclining chairs, don’t have a first class carriages, and don’t currently have any dining carriages, some-how are “luxurious” trains. We’re surprised when there isn’t superfluous words in their news.

I’ve heard excuses along the lines of it makes content more interisting, but nonsense hyperbole slowly chips away at people’s fate in journalism. Is saying this hyperbolic in its self? No, because what are too often brushed away as just a little mistake and, in this case, just a little bit of hype is exactly what erodes the public’s confidence in journalism. 

The Sunday World has relaunched their website, sundayworld.com, recently.

The content includes columns, gossip, and reviews. They also have online-only content from gossip site PerezHilton.com. And there’s video from Balcony TV, along with other video clips of games and films, and ‘funnies’.

But no news.

The roll over banner advert currently running across the site shows Paul Williams, the newspaper’s crime editor, saying - as ever - he’ll be watching the criminals. That’s entertaining at least.

Vincent Browne talks to Marketing magizine about getting sacked by RTE, his Nightly News show on TV3, the Sunday Tribune, what he thinks of Independent News & Media and much more. Read it here. (vie Fergus Cassidy)

The DPP is appealing a High Court finding that former Evening Herald editor Gerry O’Regan and journalist Anne-Marie Walsh were not in contempt of court.

The move could possibly end in the jailing of Walsh and the now Irish Independent editor O’Regan and fines for Independent News & Media.

MORE: DPP bids to jail editor, reporter for contempt

« Older Entries