BBC CoJo: In defence of Mark Thompson’s visit to Downing Street

Last week several news outlets, including the BBC, reported on a visit to Downing Street by the BBC’s director general Mark Thompson, who was allegedly there to discuss BBC news coverage of the government’s spending review.

It was suggested that such a visit may risk damaging the impartiality of the broadcaster, with Thompson reportedly trying to ensure a good relationship with the government in light of a licence fee review on the horizon. Others indicated that the meeting was on the order of senior government figures who wanted to “quiz” Thompson on content.

Commenting on the press coverage, Kevin Marsh, editor of the BBC College of Journalism criticizes what he regards as a promotion of appearance and impression over the facts in a post on the College of Journalism discussion blog.

Is it really a surprise for example, to learn that David Cameron’s press chief, Andy Coulson, had lunch with the BBC head of news, Helen Boaden, and that the subject of spending review coverage came up? Or that Mr Coulson would press for more ‘context’?

(…) Now, I have no special knowledge or insight here – but certainly when I was running Today or World at One it wasn’t that unusual to recruit senior executives to put in a good word when you were trying to fix big interviews.

And it’s easy to see that with a huge, high-profile season on the horizon – and the spending review season will run across all of the BBC’s national and regional programming as well as the news website – a bit of shoulder work from the chaps at the top is no bad thing.

See his full post here…

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#Tip of the day from Journalism.co.uk – adding maps to websites

Mapping news blog Mapperz offers instructions on how to add MapQuest maps to a blog or website. Tipster: Rachel McAthy.

To submit a tip to Journalism.co.uk, use this link – we will pay a fiver for the best ones published.

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‘The silence is almost eerie’: press holds back on phone hacking scandal

Allegations of phone hacking at the News of the World resurfaced this week following an investigation by the New York Times which looked at past allegations as well as a new case being legally pursued by a third party. This has led to calls today for a judicial review from industry bodies and politicians.

But coverage of the event by the rest of the media has come under criticism by numerous publications and bloggers.

Caroline Crampton at the New Statesman reflected on the issue the day after the story broke, when she claims the Guardian was the only national newspaper to have reported on the NYTimes article at the time.

The Times, the Telegraph, the Independent, the Daily Mail, the Sun and the Mirror all failed to cover the story at all. Considering that the investigation uncovers a widespread culture of phone-hacking at a major Sunday paper, with one source saying “Everyone knew. The office cat knew”, I would have thought that Fleet Street would have more to say about the low tactics employed by one of its number.

But the silence on the Coulson story from the rest is almost eerie. Papers are usually desperate to expose each other’s failures. Why are they holding back?

Online media watchdog Tabloid Watch makes the same points, while editor of the Liberal Conspiracy blog Sunny Hundal wrote on the Guardian website that while he expected News International publications to avoid the topic, he was disappointed by a lack of coverage on BBC radio early on.

It comes as little surprise News International subsidiaries and other tabloids have avoided it. But the BBC’s radio silence also speaks volumes: not just about their deference to the new administration, but of unwillingness to investigate their peers. It needed the New York Times to blow the story wide open again.

(…) The conscience of our country is determined more by Rupert Murdoch’s private interests than is healthy, already. These controversies say less about rightwing bloggers (whose smears are used as a proxy) and more about the collusion that takes place among the media establishment.

However the BBC has since followed up on the Time’s report, including an interview on Radio 4′s Today programme with Lord John Prescott this morning discussing his own concerns of being targeted by phone hackers while BBC Surrey’s Nick Wallis yesterday discussed the report, admitting that the BBC had only touched on the issue “from time to time” but said he would be writing to every Conservative MP in Surrey and asking them if they are happy that David Cameron kept former NOTW editor Andy Coulson as his PR man.

The article by the New York Times is due to be published in its Sunday magazine this weekend.

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Paywall subscribers worth a quarter of print counterparts, claims survey

With TheTimes.co.uk and SundayTimes.co.uk still not releasing traffic figures through the Audit Bureau of Circulations, we can’t yet see the impact of the paywall in terms of browser figures. But according to research published by Enders Analysis, the value of a paywall subscriber is only a fraction of a print reader.

The research, carried out by Benedict Evans, compared annual incomes from subscribers for paywalled newspapers TheTimes.co.uk and WSJ.com with those for UK quality daily papers.

The main findings quoted online are as follows:

A newspaper paywall subscriber is worth only a quarter to a third of a print buyer: even if every single print buyer is successfully converted to the paywall, newspapers will still face a basic problem of scale.

Paywalls will not be able to compensate for lower revenue per reader by expanding the audience for paid news, due to the long term decline of circulation, free online news, 24-hour broadcast news and free-sheets.

Future change will be radical: publishers may need to consider producing a newspaper its loyal readers recognise and value with just 200 rather than 500 journalists.

Hatip: paidContentUK

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BBC to revamp travel news site with added mapping

The BBC is launching a new-look version of its travel news site later this year, with the sneak preview now online.

On the BBC’s website, it says the new site will improve presentation and introduce maps for the first time. Data-handling processes will be better so it will take less time for site visitors to get information.

The new site will have a wider page layout and larger text, as well as improved navigation and interactive mapping, which can be minimised if you prefer to see traffic incidents as just a text list. There will be clearer time-stamping of incidents and still images will be frequently updated from traffic jam cams showing conditions on motorways and trunk roads. The local weather forecast from the BBC Weather Centre will also be available on the site for the following six hours.

For fans of the old site – the BBC insists that travel and traffic information will still be updated round the clock, and the map can be minimised, which will put the functionality of the site back to the way it used to be.

The door-to-door journey planner remains a feature, but has been made more prominent, and in the final version of the site, it will be possible to see a country-wide overview of motorways or major roads from every page.

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The Upshot: Washington Post forms new ‘leadership team’ for mobile

The Washington Post has put together a mobile leadership team to develop the availability of its content on portable devices with a new app for the iPad currently being created, according to a report on The Upshot.

The latest developments which were allegedly detailed in a staff email sent out earlier this week and a statement given to The Upshot are part of the Post’s ongoing attempts to increase access to its content through mobile and open up new revenue streams.

Commenting on the news Dawn Osakue advised on the Editors Weblog that newpapers do not simply aim to offer access to their content on as many platforms as possible but remember to be creative.

Going mobile is a bold step for newspaper publishers, but they have to keep in mind that creativity remains very important. Recent research confirmed that newspapers still have a long way to go in exploiting the potential of mobile platforms.

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#jpod: The week’s biggest news stories from Journalism.co.uk, 3 September 2010

Listen below for this week’s news round-up from Journalism.co.uk sub-editor Joel Gunter and sign up to our iTunes podcast feed for future audio.

Podcast: Download

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William Hague and the power of the political blogger

David Higgerson, head of multimedia at Trinity Mirror, has posed some interesting questions on what the William Hague and Christopher Myers story means for the power, image and responsibilities of the blogging community.

The fact Hague felt the need to release the statement he did, and that Myers felt the need to stand down, shows the influence political bloggers have within the Westminster village. (…) Does Hague’s response suggest that he and his colleague over-weighed the true impact of what is written on blogs for the wider public? It’s certainly the mother of all statements, and there’s a danger it sets a new precedent for denying rumours. Will we now see a glut of rumours around the internet in the knowledge that a denial is likely to follow?

And, he adds, if recent events do show political bloggers are becoming increasingly influential, should we now be addressing the introduction of greater responsibilities for such a powerful online community?

See his full post here…

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The 100 most influential news media Twitter accounts

Daniel Romero, a PhD candidate at Cornell University in the US, has produced some fascinating research into news organisations and sources’ influence on Twitter.

Using a study by HP Labs’ Social Computing Lab, which attempts to measure influence on Twitter, Romero has created a list of the 100 most influential news media accounts.

The BBC’s breaking news account, the Wall Street Journal, ESPN and the New York Times all rank within the top 25 most influential. But as our visualisation below of the top 25 accounts in the list shows (click to interact with it), a large number of followers doesn’t always guarantee you more influence – the quality of links and how they are shared also count.

(via Memeburn)

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Why the US and UK are leading the way on semantic web

Following his involvement in the first Datajournalism meetup in Berlin earlier this week, Martin Belam, the Guardian’s information architect, looks at why the US and UK may have taken the lead in semantic web, as one audience member suggested on the day.

In an attempt to try and answer the question, he puts forward four themes on his currybet.net blog that he feels may play a part. In summary, they are:

• The sharing of a common language which helps both nations access the same resources and be included in comparative datasets.
• Competition across both sides of the pond driving innovation.
• Successful business models already being used by the BBC and even more valuably being explained on their internet blogs.
• Open data and a history of freedom of information court cases which makes official information more likely to be made available.

On his full post here he also has tips for how to follow the UK’s lead, such as getting involved in hacks and hackers type events.

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