Copyright Lewis Whyld/PA

The Guardian has reported today that an updated biography of the prime minister claims David Cameron texted Rebekah Brooks before she quit as News International’s chief executive.

An article on the Guardian‘s website reports that Cameron allegedly texted Brooks “to tell her to keep her head up” days before she resigned from News International.

It has also emerged that he agreed to meet her at a point-to-point horse race so long as they were not seen together, and that he also pressed the Metropolitan police to review the Madeleine McCann case in May last year following pressure from Brooks.

The prime minister then sent an intermediary to Brooks to explain why contacts had to be brought to an abrupt halt after she resigned. The authors say the gist of that message was: “Sorry I couldn’t have been as loyal to you as you have been to me, but Ed Miliband had me on the run.”

The revelations were made in the updated version of Cameron: Practically a Conservative by Francis Elliot and James Hanning. Brooks is due to appear before the Leveson inquiry on Friday.

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Economist cartoonist Kal has animated excerpts from the news outlets “punctilious in-house style guide”.

It features wracked sheep, racked (and wracked) brains and Dr Frankenstein and his monster.

It was posted on YouTube a month ago but it is worth a watch if you have not yet seen it.

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The NYU has released a list of “the 100 outstanding journalists in the United States in the last 100 years.”

In March 2012 the faculty at the Arthur L Carter Journalism Institute at New York University, together with an Honorary Committee of alumni, selected “the 100 outstanding journalists in the United States in the last 100 years”.

The list was selected from more than 300 nominees and was announced at a reception “in honour of the 100th anniversary of journalism education at NYU”, held yesterday.

The list, which can serve as a ‘who’s who’ of US journalism, is at this link.

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Today the Guardian reports that ITV is under investigation by broadcast regulator Ofcom after news reporter Richard Pallot called black footballers “coloured” – while reporting on a racism in football summit held at No.10 Downing Street.

According to the Guardian:

ITV News apologised shortly after the broadcast on its Twitter page and the word has been removed from all future catchup editions of the broadcast, including an edited clip on the ITV News website.

The ITN-produced programme is now investigating how the pre-recorded report that included the word was allowed to be broadcast.

An ITV News spokesman said: “ITV News apologises for the inappropriate use of the word ‘coloured’ in a report on racism and football in today’s News at 1.30pm. We take this error very seriously and we regret any offence caused.”

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• #news2011: Hong Kong chief executive calls on media to ‘take advantage of what we have to offer’
• MediaGuardian: France24 to supply English language content to Independent.co.uk

Another development in the News International/Metropolitan police story has emerged today – with the Evening Standard reporting that the Metropolitan police loaned Rebekah Brooks a police horse for two years.

The paper says it raises questions about the force’s links with Rupert Murdoch’s UK newspaper empire. A friend told the paper: “Rebekah acted as a foster carer for the horse. Anybody can agree to do this with the Met if they have the land and facilities to pay for its upkeep.”

The Metropolitan police said in a statement:

“When a police horse reaches the end of its working life, Mounted Branch officers find it a suitable retirement home.

Whilst responsibility for feeding the animal and paying vet bills passes to the person entrusted to its care at its new home, the horse remains the property of the Metropolitan Police Service.

Retired police horses are not sold on and can be returned to the care of the MPS at any time.

In 2008 a retired MPS horse was loaned to Rebekah Brooks. The horse was subsequently re-housed with a police officer in 2010.”

• Phone hacking: Rebekah Brooks’ lawyer’s statement
• Select committees: Reaction to appearances by police, the Murdochs and Brooks
• Media Guardian: Rebekah Brooks asked for police payment details
• Guardian: Biography claims David Cameron texted Rebekah Brooks before she quit NI
• Independent: Rebekah Brooks has some explaining to do, says Burrell

Copyright: Martin Rickett/PA Archive/Press Association Images

Ryan Giggs has been named in court for the first time as the footballer behind an injunction taken out against the Sun, the Guardian reports.

According to the news site, the footballer “agreed to lift the anonymity injunction” in a hearing at the high court in London earlier today.

Giggs took out the injunction in order to prevent the tabloid revealing an affair.

Thousands ignored the court ruling and named him as the footballer in question on Twitter, leaving journalists in a “strange situation” concerning the reporting of his name.

The Guardian states:

Hugh Tomlinson QC, counsel for Giggs, told the court that the footballer had been subject to “large scale breaches of the order by malign individuals”.

“The claimant’s name is in the public domain contrary to court orders,” he added. “The claimant has consented to the removal of the anonymity order completely.”

Mr Justice Tugendhat said: “Anonymity no longer applies and has not applied since 1 February.”

According to the Guardian, Mr Justice Tugendhat is considering “a claim by Giggs for damages for alleged misuse of private information by the Sun”.

Giggs is also seeking an injunction “to restrain future publication of private information”, according to the report.

The court heard that the anonymity order that prevented the media from naming Giggs was lifted on 1 February. However, an “administrative error” by Giggs’s solicitors meant the Sun was not informed.

The counsel for News Group Newspapers, the publisher of the Sun, reportedly told the court the injunction claim should be thrown out.

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Newsquest title the Northern Echo has announced an investment of £10,000 as part of a campaign to try and ‘save’ Darlington Football Club.

The newspaper reports that “the money will be used to buy shares in new company, Darlington FC 1883 Ltd, which hopes to purchase the Quakers and prevent it from being liquidated”.

Peter Barron, editor of The Northern Echo, said: “The paper has been at the heart of the campaign to save Darlington Football Club from the outset and we have decided to make this investment as a further demonstration of our support.

“These are challenging economic times for all businesses and we recognise the sensitivities of making this investment. However, as Darlington’s local paper, we felt it was something we had to do. Darlington Football Club is an important part of our business, supporting sales of the paper, and it is an investment on behalf of our readers.

“The £10,000 will be split over the three phases of the appeal and I sincerely hope we get that far. It certainly won’t be for the lack of effort.”

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BBC insiders have spoken out about “endemic problems” with technology at the new MediaCity facilities in Salford, which have led to a series of errors including one unfortunate captioning mistake that saw a child being labelled as a recovering alcoholic.

“Once a mistake has been entered into the computer, the director in the TV gallery can do nothing to stop it. The software won’t allow it,” a source told The Register.

Other problems include failing clocks and non-responsive robotic cameras. The problems have so far affected BBC North West programmes, but BBC Breakfast is also moving into the studio complex shortly.

The BBC response is: “It wasn’t a technical error but rather just a simple case of people getting used to the new systems. With the introduction of any new systems, teething problems are to be expected.”

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After Sky News’s crackdown on Twitter use – and specifically retweeting non-Sky journalists – was revealed last night, it’s the BBC’s turn to clarify its position.

In a post on the BBC editors’ blog today, social media editor Chris Hamilton says the corporation has distributed some revised breaking news guidance to correspondents, reporters and producers.

It says that, when they have some breaking news, an exclusive or any kind of urgent update on a story, they must get written copy into our newsroom system as quickly as possible, so that it can be seen and shared by everyone – both the news desks which deploy our staff and resources (like TV trucks) as well as television, radio and online production teams.

We’ve been clear that our first priority remains ensuring that important information reaches BBC colleagues, and thus all our audiences, as quickly as possible – and certainly not after it reaches Twitter.

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The Guardian has launched a new liveblog in its next development of its open newslist trial, which it started last year to facilitate greater discussion around the given topics.

According to a blog post by UK news editor Dan Roberts, Newsdesk Live was prompted by “limitations” with the open newsdesk which became apparent, “chiefly the difficulty of using a simple grid and 140 characters to communicate all the complexities of the day’s news with an outside audience”.

Newsdesk Live will “incorporate the open newslist, but will also feature a live comment thread allowing readers to discuss what’s going on directly rather than having to do so via Twitter”.

Journalist Polly Curtis is overseeing the project, Roberts adds:

For the period of the experiment, Polly is joining the national newdesk to work alongside other UK editors to help feed ideas from readers back into the newsgathering process.

Hat tip: 10,000 Words blog

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The AFP has issued a release to say its photographer John MacDougall won the Rueckblende (flashback) award in Germany for 2011.

The agency says this is the first time the award, which is for political photography and cartoons, has gone to one of its photographers.

The winning picture of a German female soldier embracing a relative of one of three victims at a military funeral brought home the human aspect of the tragedy of Afghanistan, judges of the Rueckblende award for political photography said.

MacDougall first started work at AFP in 1989 as a photo editor.

According to the AFP release “his photo was chosen from among 247 entries for the Rueckblende, which was created in 1995 and carries a 7,000-euro ($9,200) prize, and which also awards a prize for political cartoonists.”

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The National Union of Journalists, Bectu and Unite have jointly issued a pay claim for BBC staff for 2012 to 2013, which according to union statements, asks for a rise “of RPI plus two per cent, with a minimum increase of £1,000″.

The NUJ says this would apply to BBC staff in bands two to 11. In a statement the NUJ’s broadcasting organiser Sue Harris said they consider it “a fair claim”.

According to the unions the claim “also seeks the reinstatement of a previous right for staff to lodge pay appeals” and “encourages BBC management to agree to the inclusion of elected staff representatives on the Executive Remuneration Committee”.

Read more on the pay claim on the NUJ and Bectu websites.

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InPublishing has a revealing interview with Johnston Press’ new chief executive, a former technology boss with no newspaper experience.

Ray Snoddy interviews Ashley Highfield, who was former head of technology at the BBC and later in charge of Microsoft’s online and consumer operations, on his plans for the newspaper group.

It is worth reading the whole interview to find out why Highfield took up the challenge of joining the company, which seen its share price fall from 480p to 5p.

Here are a couple of extracts:

The new Johnston chief executive also points out that while not a newspaperman, he has run two of the largest online news portals in the UK, MSN and BBC online, where he was editor-in-chief responsible for several hundred online journalists.

Then of course there is the money, which included a welcome package of £500,000 worth of seriously deflated Johnston Press shares.

If the new chief executive can conjure up a little alchemy, find a better model for linking the print and digital world and get the share price on the move then he could become seriously rich.

Those however who expected Highfield to come in to Johnston Press and wave a magic digital wand on his first day at the beginning of November have already expressed disappointment.

Highfield insists he has a digital strategy but says it would be “premature” to say in any detail how he is going to implement it.

Highfield discusses content dissemination via iPads and other devices (incidentally, JP title the Scotsman launched a £7.99-a-month iPad edition earlier this week), but was less forthcoming about paywall plans (JP dismantled its trial walls in April 2010).

And what about paywalls and charging for online content?

“Watch this space”, is all Highfield will say but, clearly, increasing digital revenues is a central part of the emerging strategy.

The full InPublishing interview is at this link.

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Toni Knevitt, London College of Communication

Channel 4 News presenter Jon Snow gave the annual Hugh Cudlipp lecture last night, in which he gave a powerful speech on what he views as the advent of “journalism’s golden age”.

Snow has published the full version of his speech on his Snowblog, but here are some highlights from the lecture.

Much of his speech discussed how new technology and real-time news across platforms has an impact on the work of journalists:

Contrast therefore my first reporting from Uganda in 1976 and my most recent foreign assignment in 2011.

That first report on the ground in Uganda dealt with the horror of Amin, it was graphic, and because I was not constrained by immediate “live” deadlines and the rest, I had time to hang about to try to grab an interview with the tyrant: that’s the upside. But I had little mechanism for developing any sense of how the story connected with the outside world – the UN, Westminster and the rest.

… Contrast that with my last major foreign assignment in Cairo’s Tahrir Square where I tweeted, blogged, reported, fed the bird, and then anchored that night’s Channel 4 News live from just outside the Square. Mind you, with the pressures of time, some of the fun has gone out of it all.

For journalists, he said, the “liberation” of the media gives way to a new “golden age of journalism”:

We are in the age of answer back, better still we are in the age in which “we the people” have their greatest opportunity ever to influence the information agenda … But above all we are in the age of more. More potential to get it right, to get it fast, to get it in depth. We have that illusive entity “the level playing field”, we can compete on equal terms and yet be the best.

He also passed comment on some of the biggest issues facing the news industry today, from regulation to the phone hacking scandal:

I think it is absolutely right that there is a regulator that people can go to. Who are we to be above the opportunity for people to review what we’ve done? Furthermore I do not want to find my own editors somewhere in the mix. I want an objective regulator.

… Of course, papers and TV are entirely different beasts, and they work in entirely different ways, but I see no reason why print journalism wouldn’t benefit from a credible regulator in the same way TV has.

And not forgetting the Leveson inquiry, which is currently looking at the culture and ethics of the press:

Leveson should recommend many of the people and institutions that have been before him find a way of allowing their staff to get stuck into the real world, it will vastly improve and deepen their journalism. We journalists are not a breed a part – we must be of the world we report. The hacking scandal reveals an echelon of hacks who removed themselves from the world in which the rest of us live – they took some weird pleasure in urinating on our world.

But finally, he called for journalists to be given more time and space wherever possible:

The speed and pace of what all of us is doing is starving, television journalists in particular, of the opportunity to develop the stature and presence of our forebears.

These were people who had days in which to prepare their stories, dominated a tiny handful of channels, and became iconic figures in the medium. It is much, much harder for journalists today to ascend the same ladder and preside with their kind of authority and we need to afford talent the time, the space and the working experience to develop the authority that our medium depends upon.

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