Please use this thread for off-topic, but preferably BBC related, comments. Please keep comments on other threads to the topic at hand. N.B. this is not an invitation for general off-topic comments – our aim is to maintain order and clarity on the topic-specific threads. This post will remain at or near the top of the blog. Please scroll down to find new topic-specific posts.
Open thread – for comments of general Biased BBC interest:
Bookmark the permalink.
Wonder whether now that BBC report Yusuf Garaad’s Islamic chums are on the run whether he will be on the end of a “bloody good hiding” from the people who were on the end of a “good lashing” from his Islamic Courts pals.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world…ica/ 6106398.stm
Somehow I think he won’t be. Instead he will be broadcasting London as a refugee paid for no doubt by us as another BBC staffer.
Cockney Asks:
“Where exactly is there any evidence of the beeb favouring the Islamic Courts in Somalia?”
HERE IS JUST ONE EXAMPLE
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/6106398.stm
Hmmmm
The tone is rather over cheerful, but the fact that (even highly restrictive) stability has been largely welcomed after years of horrific war matches reports from other respected sources – I’ve yet to see anything much contradicting this. Unless you know better?
This report reminded me of an old complaint about the BBC • the tendency to report press releases by left wing groups as if they were news :
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/6204457.stm
Pupil tests ‘should be replaced’
Tests for primary school pupils and 14-year-olds in England should be replaced with teacher assessments, a think tank says. The Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR)……
and not mentioning that the left wing group is a left wing group, even when the group is quite willing to admit it themselves :
The Institute for Public Policy Research is the UK’s leading progressive think tank
However, the BBC does sometimes mention the leftiness of the IPPR • on the BBC news website, a swift google revealed about fifty mentions of the IPPR’s leftiness in about 1400 mentions (a rate of a little under 5%) of the “Institute of Public Policy Research” or “IPPR.” Interestingly the vast majority of these mentions refer to the IPPR as “left leaning” or “centre left” rather than “left wing.”
So I thought I’d compare it with Civitas. I had assumed the rate of mentions of “right wing” would about 50%, but in fact it isn’t • it’s more like 15% (about 30 “right wing”s in about 190 mentions of Civitas. ) The “right wing” mentions are almost always “right wing” though, rather than “centre right” or “right leaning.” Even so it wasn’t quite as bad as I had expected.
But what was noticeable in this googlling was that Civitas tended to be mentioned as one of a number of contributors to a story rather than having the field to itself. Whereas the IPPR not only gets to chip in its views on many stories but gets lots of opportunities to take centre stage and have its press releases reported as news. And of course it finishes up with seven or eight times as many mentions as Civitas.
The proof of the pudding is to look and see what happens when Civitas puts out a press release and a report on a public policy question as it did in August 2006.
http://www.civitas.org.uk/press/NHSBriefAug06.php
Extra billions for NHS largely wasted
The massive increase in government expenditure on the NHS has not resulted in anything like the level of improvements in the service which might have been expected, according to a study from independent* social-policy think-tank Civitas.
Google reveals no evidence that this was ever reported on the BBC’s news pages.
On the rare occasions that a Civitas report does make it to the news pages, however, its political leanings are to the fore :
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4295318.stm
The concept of multiculturalism is divisive, encourages racial hatred and may have helped to produce the 7 July suicide bombers, a new report argues. The report from right-wing think-tank, Civitas……
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4576528.stm
Britain’s institutions are infected with political correctness which is damaging society, according to a book published by a right-wing think-tank. Civitas says …..
Note that Civitas’s self identification is “independent” • which it is, though it leans to the right. That does not prevent the BBC from identifying it as right wing; something which the BBC seems unable to do for left wing US groups which identify themselves as independent or non partisan.
Sometimes you get reports in which the views of both Civitas and IPPR are mentioned, and the former is identified as right wing, and the latter is not identified as left wing :
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/vote_2005/frontpage/4487707.stm
A “quantitative” approach to bias-mongering is not always appropriate, as the Beeb’s defenders will often tell you. But IPPR and Civitas are pretty comparable beasts • both are fairly civilised, both are genuine policy researchers rather than mere advocacy pressure groups, one is identifiably left leaning and the other is identifiably right leaning to a similar extent. Neither is remotely “extreme.” So you’d expect the BBC if it was genuinely a balanced public broadcaster, even one which leans against what it perceives as extremism, to treat the two groups pretty even handedly.
But it doesn’t.
In this case, the BBC didn’t know the ages of the injured when version one went out. Had they relied on the Israeli medics and run with a headline saying ‘Israeli children…’ – they’d have got it wrong.
Putting ‘children’ (in quotes) would look daft.
Besides – this wasn’t a human-interest story.
John Reith | 27.12.06 – 2:00 pm
Can we expect an update now?
http://www.israellycool.com/blog/_archives/2006/12/26/2598662.html
The Islamic Jihad claimed responsibility for the Kassam attack on Sderot that wounded two ninth-grade boys, one critically, on Tuesday evening. The rocket was the seventh to have been fired at Sderot since Tuesday morning.
Shortly after 10 p.m., the Red Alert alarm sounded throughout Sderot; 10 seconds later, the rocket landed near a group of schoolchildren who were headed for the nearest shelter. Ninth-graders Matan Cohen and Adir Bassad, however, had no time to reach the shelter and were hit by shrapnel.
The two were evacuated to Barzilai Hospital in Ashkelon, where doctors began operating.
—-
Doctors told an Israel Radio interviewer shortly after 11 p.m. Tuesday that Bassad, who suffered hits to his chest and stomach, was not yet stabilized, and a surgical team was battling to save his life.
Cohen, whose major wound was to his leg, was reported stabilized.
A number of other people were reported in shock.
One of the medics who treated the boys reported that one of them was likely to lose his legs. One of the boys had a bone sticking out of one of his legs, he said, and the other’s ankle was completely twisted.
thought not…
Two unrelated subjects.
1. “The Happy Prince” by Oscar Wilde was read on the children’s programme GO4IT on 17 December. The word “God” was replaced by “the Supreme Being”, and a happy ending was added to the story.
2. The signature tune Lilliburlero was dropped from the World Service for being imperial and militaristic; it was popular with listeners all over the world but not with the producers. First they exchanged the military band for a chamber orchestra, then virtually stopped playing it altogether. The original military band version can be downloaded from http://myweb.tiscali.co.uk/torrington/files/Lilli.wav
I have installed it to play when my computer is switched on.
Rather bland reporting from the BBC here on “Academics for Academic Freedom”. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/6202877.stm
Academics seek right to offend
I would not have framed the subject in such a way as “right to offend” but we get the drift of the headline. Besides, the BBC are one of the chief culprits here for creating this same climate sanitizing political debate and going overboard in the promotion of a politically correct climate (the appointment of a diversity Tsar for one, interfering in the ethnic balancing of all programming, from weather reporting to Dr Who, soaps, etc.) Only raising the case of Frank Ellis here in this story, giving the impression that such “offence” only concerns racism! The THES is much more balanced
http://www.thes.co.uk/current_edition/story.aspx?story_id=2034603
“The statement would also offer backing to Andrew McIntosh, professor of thermodynamics at Leeds, who has been sharply criticised for claiming that the world is only 6,000 years old and that evolutionary theory is wrong.”
Bryan
Going back to the analogy of Irving and Dawkins that I raised before, I’m curious if Dawkins would actually support Professor McIntosh or press for a Berufsverbot?
“It’s probably fair to say that many Germans and Austrians live with a profound sense of shame over their past and dread a popular resurgence of the attitudes that facilitated the Holocaust.”
I don’t agree, and think that what you see as a “dread” is itself a myth in both these vibrant political democracies. I think they resent the feeling of being placed “on parole”(how long?), and see it nowadays like an historical asbo- and a form of discrimination. Race, gender, religion, age- all discriminations that have been looked at closely- the lingering discrimination of historical time, not at all! Just think back to the BBC HYS on Blair and us apologising for slavery- should we simply say to all those people that had nothing to do with it(and there are equally generations of Germans who do), we should accept this historical guilt anyway as part of our collective history and identity?
Having told me on repeated bulletins that “7 persons” were suspected killed when a helicopter crashed – the BBC dared to use the word “men”………..I believe only the DG can permit the use of the word “men” which are apparently a form of bipods considered freaks of nature in Broadcasting House and have been emoved from association with Chairs, Police, Post and other functions as the new “person” species of indeterminate bipods have taken over
US accepts threat to polar bears
BBC1 News report at 1pm stated that President Bush had not accepted that pollution caused climate change.
The BBC online report does not tell this whopper, instead saying
President George W Bush has steadfastly refused to back mandatory controls of emissions of carbon dioxide – believed the main gas behind global warming.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/6213179.stm
But how can the BBC perpetuate this myth about the attitude of Bush, & the US in general? Easily googled is this statement by the president dated June 11, 2001
There is a natural greenhouse effect that contributes to warming. Greenhouse gases trap heat, and thus warm the earth because they prevent a significant proportion of infrared radiation from escaping into space. Concentration of greenhouse gases, especially CO2, have increased substantially since the beginning of the industrial revolution. And the National Academy of Sciences indicate that the increase is due in large part to human activity.
http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2001/06/20010611-2.html
Now Voyager
Are you sure you aren’t making this up?
The BBC style guide explicitly discourages the kind of PC newspeak you cite.
‘Persons’ for instance should be ‘people’.
The BBC never describes someone as the ‘chair’ of a meeting or an organization (unless they expressly request it).
The BBC does, however, use ‘Police officers’ and ‘fire crews’ but never ‘-persons’.
Which seems fair enough – and not inelegant.
Spain cathedral shuns Muslim plea
The Roman Catholic bishop of Cordoba in southern Spain has rejected an appeal from Muslims for the right to pray in the city’s cathedral, a former mosque. Juan Jose Asenjo rejected the request made by Spain’s Islamic Board in a letter to the Pope. It had asked that the cathedral become an ecumenical temple where believers from all faiths could worship.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/6213665.stm
So there you have it folks from the BBC the Spanish are nasty for not allowing Muslims to pray at a former mosque. Has anybody ever heard of a Christian (other than the pope) praying at a former church but which is now a mosque? Nah me neither. I’m sure the BBC clones have thousands of examples… I wait with baited breath.
@ John Reith:-
270 million homes in 200 countries – bags of advertising…all helping to keep the licence fee down for the UK residents who pay it.
Sky, CNN and Fox News all do a damn fine job of using advertising to keep the Sky, CNN, and Fox licence cost down, too.
Oh, hang on though. There is no Sky, CNN, or Fox licence fee. Somehow, they’re all able to survive without a compulsory tax. They never send people to jail for refusing to be their customers, either. They survive by convincing people they’re good enough to be worth paying for.
Strange way to run a news agency, but hey, that’s crooked businessmen for you, I guess!
the_camp_commandant | 28.12.06 – 2:22 pm
They survive by convincing people they’re good enough to be worth paying for.
Do they?
I’ve never met anyone who actually paid to receive Sky News, CNN or Fox News. Most people get them thrown in free with Sat packages or cable deals.
Can you actually subscribe?
Thank you for your position John Reith – I find the use of “people” also to be peculiar, and letting anyone say “Chair” instead of “Chairwoman” or “Chairman” is bizarre.
We never hear the term “Bundeskanzlerin” for Frau Merkel but always “Teashop” for an Irish Prime Minister. We never hear “postman” or “policeman” nor do we hear the word “soldier” but “people”.
It is a simple fact that combattants are soldiers and usually men. The way someone yesterday described the GOC in Afghanistan as “Head of the Army in afghanistan” made him sound like an office manager.
It has gotten to the point where you go straight to a Blog to check facts rather than the film of opacity the BBC puts over its reports. I am reminded of the old days of Radio Peace & Progress which had similar traits.
As for making it up I wouldn’t waste my time.
I’ve never met anyone who actually paid to receive Sky News,
No because you know that Sky News is unencrypted and ergo free to air so long as you pay for a TV licence to fund the BBC
On a related topic to that of the request by muslims to pray in a Spanish cathedral, the fall of Constantinople was the topic for discussion on Melvin Bragg’s 09.00 program on Radio 4 this morning. I thought, “Oh my God”, and I was not disappointed.
When the Turks (50,000 soldiers plus 400,000 support) finally defeated the Christians and broke into the city, they ” were careful to preserve the multi-cultural nature of Constantinople” etc etc. This sh*t was doubtlessly carefully prepared and rehearsed to remind us Christians/post-Christians that even back in 1453 there was nothing to fear from having your main city stormed, pillaged, women raped en masse, men and children butchered over three days festivities. I mean, there are enough facts at the tip of a keyboard on the fate of the inhabitants of Constantinople for the BBC’s BS to be shown for the BS that it is, and yet they still have the effrontery to broadcast it – that’s what really gets me!
And when will Christians be allowed to pray in the Hagia Sophia?
When the Turks (50,000 soldiers plus 400,000 support) finally defeated the Christians and broke into the city, they ” were careful to preserve the multi-cultural nature of Constantinople” etc
So now return it to us and retreat back to the borders of 1069 AD
So what are you saying then, Mr Reith? Nobody actually pays for Sky, CNN, or Fox? I wonder what pays the wage bill, then?
Will. Bush has never accepted that pollution is the driving factor behind recent climate change.
“So there you have it folks from the BBC the Spanish are nasty for not allowing Muslims to pray at a former mosque. Has anybody ever heard of a Christian (other than the pope) praying at a former church but which is now a mosque? Nah me neither. I’m sure the BBC clones have thousands of examples… I wait with baited breath.”
So let us all rush off to Constaninople/ Istanbul and have an Our Father inside St Sophias/The big blue mosque thingie – after all nothing will happen to us if we try to have the same rights as the Muslims….. will it?
And if it does, don’t expect the Beeb to keep the story on the front page for more than 10 seconds at 0200am before moving it to ‘file under politics, North east England’ or somewhere exotic! After all how many nuns and priests have been murdered in and outside of Turkey for example? All of which were fully reported in the same way that the odd incident or two involving Muslims were by the BBC….
the_camp_commandant | 28.12.06 – 2:41 pm
So what are you saying then, Mr Reith? Nobody actually pays for Sky, CNN, or Fox? I wonder what pays the wage bill, then?
Advertising pays for CNN. It pays some of Sky News and Fox News’s running costs too. Mr Murdoch and his fellow shareholders pay the rest.
Maybe you should consider how viewers • given a choice • actually behave.
Fox’s highest rated show is The O’Reilly Factor. In the US it reaches about 2.5 million viewers per week. That’s in a country of 300m people.
Newsnight in the UK (population: a mere 60m or so) reaches 6.5m per week.
On a good day, Sky News will reach 1.2 million viewers • a tiny fraction of the population.
Fox has about 58,000 viewers per day in the UK. Even tinier.
Taken together, all BBC News outlets reach about 80% of the adult population of the UK.
It’s clear whose news the overwhelming majority prefer.
“Taken together, all BBC News outlets reach about 80% of the adult population of the UK.
It’s clear whose news the overwhelming majority prefer.”
Err, no it doesn’t.
The fact that “all BBC News outlets reach about 80% of the adult population of the UK” does not indicate preference if Fox news does not reach the same people to whom the BBC is available.
What is happening to education these days?
Spain cathedral shuns Muslim plea
pounce | 28.12.06 – 2:16 pm
Nasty Christians eh, shunning those heart-rending pleas from the religion of Peace™?
No loaded judgmental words in that headline eh John Reith?
I saw the head of Spain’s Islamic Board, Mansur Escudero, on Spanish TV at lunchtime as he held a lone pray-in at the door of the cathedral. He said that the cathedral, as a place of worship, should be open to all faiths to pray as they wish.
As a Jew I doubt very much if I’d be allowed into a mosque to celebrate Shabbat and doubt that a Catholic could celebrate Mass in a mosque either.
The BBC helpfully informs us that, “… security guards often stopped Muslim worshippers from praying inside the old mosque…”
More relevant and revealing is that the synagogue in Madrid, like most in Europe, is guarded against attacks by Muslim fanatics. As a Jew even I am unable to pass security unless somebody in the community can vouch for me – thanks to the RoP™
Will. Bush has never accepted that pollution is the driving factor behind recent climate change.
Anon | 28.12.06 – 2:59 pm
Anon, I gave you the link to Bush’s words, but like the BBC, you ignore them & choose yourself what you consider his views to be. From the above link
While scientific uncertainties remain, we can begin now to address the factors that contribute to climate change.
There are only two ways to stabilize concentration of greenhouse gases. One is to avoid emitting them in the first place; the other is to try to capture them after they’re created.
I like the RoP™. There’s a marketing opportunity in there somewhere, and a BBC collaboration through product placement.
Those nasty Ethiopians are upsetting the Islamists:
Somali troops ‘enter Mogadishu’
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/6214379.stm
“Courts administering Islamic law restored order in a city bedevilled by anarchy since the overthrow of former President Mohamed Siad Barre in 1991.
The UIC assumed control of the whole capital in June, driving warlords out and rapidly extending their influence to much of southern Somalia – with the exception of Baidoa, the seat of the transitional Somali government.
Sounds good, but how exactly did the Islamists ‘assume control’ and ‘restore order’? The BBC don’t say…..
The BBC wouldn’t want to upset their (non-paying) ‘customers’ now, would they?
BBC Somalia
http://www.bbc.co.uk/somali/index.shtml
(Enjoy the above link. If you’re a UK taxpayer, you’re paying for it!)
“… security guards often stopped Muslim worshippers from praying inside the old mosque…”
I just read that again. The “old mosque” is an actual cathedral BBC!
In the East End of London what was once a convent became a synagogue, then when the Jewish population moved out and the Muslims moved in it became a mosque.
I don’t believe either the Jews or the Christians have ever attempted to reclaim the building. However, what the BBC fails to explain to us is that for a Muslim any place that at any time has been under Muslim control is considered to be forever Dar-es-Salaam.
JIM, surely reporting on the Royal Family and upholding the nation’s history and tradition should be amongst the prime motives of a national broadcaster if we’re going to have one.
I disagree. There is obviously a need to comment on the Queen’s role as Head of State – giving royal assent (when was the last time you heard about a bill being given Royal Assent on the news?), diplomatic visits, Queen’s speech, The Christmas Message (although, that one is debatable). However, I don’t think it is a duty of the BBC to report on Harry and William’s parade through Sandhurst, or did the BBC need to repeatedly plug the fact that Zara Phillips was a member of the Royal Family, instead of simply an equestrian (is that the word?)
At times the open threads do tend to get dominated by the Middle East, but there are always several threads devoted to other aspects of BBC bias.
I did have a quick look through the site for a post about the monarchy, but I couldn’t find one, so I posted it in here. And I admit, I was only looking at the comments on this open thread.
I personally think that having a well funded broadcaster able to push decent stuff rather than needing to play commercially safe has pretty much single handedly saved the British music industry from the evils of Cowell and Pap Idol.
I don’t think R1 does enough to prevent the Simon Cowell whitewash of the charts – especially considering the influence they have over the single-buying public (ave. daytime listenership of 7m.). Look at the playtime they give to Westlife, or the Pop Idol winners for the week leading up to Christmas. And while it may have been true that R1 breaks new music through with the likes of Steve Lamacq etc, the daytime DJs are pretty much proscribed what ever is on the A-List and then the B list.
And what, James I Mc Anespy, is so wrong in being a ‘person whose tastes begin and end with classical music’??
There is nothing wrong with it, and I didn’t imply that there was, I was making the point that R4’s Desert Island Discs seems to always have someone whose discs are classical recordings, no pop, no jazz, no world music etc. It gets boring after a while I think.
Allan@Aberdeen:
I caught that too, didn’t Melvin Bragg made an emotional meal about how Venice had “looted” the Hippodrome of Constantinople of many of its art treasures. What hope for the Elgin marbles at the BM when a politically correct point is made for treasures taken during the Fourth Crusade in 1204.
However, it was excellent stuff, one of the best programmes on Radio 4.
UnBiased Baghdad Update:
Christmas has come and gone – thanx everyone for the mulled wine tips, it worked a treat.
I drive the streets of Baghdad daily in unmarked vehicles and work very closely with Iraqi’s and despite the many headlines and BBC bleatings, there is not civil war here and life carries on amazingly close to normal.
However, my local sources tell me that after Eid, the Sunni are going to take a major offensive against the Shia. Even striking alliances with Kurds in order to take the fight to them – Expect a high rise in bloody casualties in the second week of Jan.
More later on life in Baghdad without having it skewed through the BBC biased left wing prism.
Sorry, that should be Dar al-Islam, not Dar-es-Salaam
Desert Island Discs seems to always have someone whose discs are classical recordings, no pop, no jazz, no world music etc. It gets boring after a while I think.
James I McAnespy | 28.12.06 – 4:08 pm
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/factual/desertislanddiscs_20061119.shtml
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/factual/desertislanddiscs_20061126.shtml
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/factual/desertislanddiscs_20061105.shtml
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/factual/desertislanddiscs_20061029.shtml
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/factual/desertislanddiscs_20061008.shtml
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/factual/desertislanddiscs_20060716.shtml
Plenty more where they came from…
Allan@Aberdeen | 28.12.06 – 3:35 pm
Forget about Fox – it’s an American channel anyway.
All UK residents can choose between Sky News and BBC news.
80% or so choose BBC.
A tiny fraction opt for Sky.
Thank you John Reith for your comments on the BBC policy regarding the use of “Chair” instead of “Chairman” or “Chairwoman”. Yesterday I was driven mad by Hazel Blears being continuously called a chair. Today on PM she is referred to as “Chairman”.
If, as Reith says, the BBC only use the awful word “Chair” if specially requested, I hope this is a sign that the BBC has at last regained its senses and struck a blow for the sensible use of the English language – and not before time!
The BBC is a wart on the arse of humanity…….a last dying ember of the British Empire, when Britian thhought it ruled the world…
The BBC thinks that it still does rule the world…..but ever more people are switching off……..50 Million people in the UK don’t bother with TV any more……
The BBC is an old dinosaur…….due to become extinct.
Lee Moore | 28.12.06 – 12:32 pm
{IPPR}finishes up with seven or eight times as many mentions as Civitas.
IPPR and Civitas are pretty comparable beasts…
Wrong. The IPPR is about seven or eight times the size of Civitas and does about seven or eight times as much original research.
Your quantitative comparison might be more robust if you were to factor in these from Policy Exchange:
http://www.google.co.uk/search?as_q=&hl=en&num=10&btnG=Google+Search&as_epq=policy+exchange&as_oq=&as_eq=&lr=&as_ft=i&as_filetype=&as_qdr=all&as_occt=any&as_dt=i&as_sitesearch=news.bbc.co.uk&as_rights=&safe=images
+ these from the Centre for Policy Studies:
http://www.google.co.uk/search?as_q=&hl=en&num=10&btnG=Google+Search&as_epq=centre+for+policy+studies&as_oq=&as_eq=&lr=&as_ft=i&as_filetype=&as_qdr=all&as_occt=any&as_dt=i&as_sitesearch=news.bbc.co.uk&as_rights=&safe=images
and these from Politeia
http://www.google.co.uk/search?as_q=&hl=en&num=10&btnG=Google+Search&as_epq=Politeia&as_oq=&as_eq=&lr=&as_ft=i&as_filetype=&as_qdr=all&as_occt=any&as_dt=i&as_sitesearch=news.bbc.co.uk&as_rights=&safe=images
Annie Mouse | 28.12.06 – 5:42 pm
a sign that the BBC has at last regained its senses and struck a blow for the sensible use of the English language – and not before time!
I’m not sure the BBC ever lost its senses.
Here’s the style book entry from six years ago:
chair
We should never describe someone as being the “chair” of a meeting. Re-write the sentence so as to say XX, in the chair or The meeting, chaired by XX, or similar. This technique might also help you to avoid not only the … ugly term “chairperson”, and the almost equally unattractive “chairwoman” (which is a mere vowel away from “charwoman”). If you cannot sidestep the problem, then you will have to use chairwoman if that is known to be the lady’s preference. For all males, of course, chairman will do nicely.
.
Tell the BBC
“Nature, not humans, blamed for Australia drought”
Australia’s devastating drought is far more likely to be part of a natural cycle than a result of the man-made greenhouse effect, an Australian climate scientist has said.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20061228/wl_asia_afp/australiaclimatedrought
.
While we are on the subject of the use of “chair” and politically correct English usage, can anybody explain the BBCs tacit acceptance of referring to the Somalian born athlete,
Mohammed Farah, as “Mo”. I think it wonderful that the BBC shorten the name of the prophet Mohammed PBUH like this.
But what exactly are the guidelines here when writing and speaking of Moslems? How long before the complaints come in that it is disrespectful to refer to the prophet’s name as “Mo”?
The latest headlines from 26 December have
Farah in fine form on Irish roads
Mo Farah equalled Rob Denmark’s British 5km road running record in County Donegal, Ireland, on Boxing Day.
The BBC doesn’t even bother with providing apostrophes here such as ‘Mo’ so that it would at least indicate it is an abbreviation from Mohammed. Definitely one to watch on the dhimmi BBC.
All UK residents can choose between Sky News and BBC news.
80% or so choose BBC.
A tiny fraction opt for Sky.
John Reith | 28.12.06 – 4:28 pm | #
Let’s compare like with like shall we John Reith. BBC One is a mainstream channel while Sky News is available only by purchasing extra boxes and dishes etc.
How does BBC News 24 compare with Sky News eh? Are their respective ratings commensurate with their respective budgets perchance?
Taken together, all BBC News outlets reach about 80% of the adult population of the UK.
It’s clear whose news the overwhelming majority prefer.
John Reith | 28.12.06 – 3:23 pm | #
Taken together includes RADIO where the BBC seems to hold most of the licences………..when Radios 1, 2, and 5 are privatised and the local radio stations spun off to private companies this nice little monopoly will end.
Actually having been visited by your pollsters to compile a list of viewing/listening for a week I can see how easily you over-estimate your market presence.
BBC does not have News – it has 4 stories it pummels to death throughout the day in a repetitive example of rote-learning for the listener/viewer
BBC supplied free feed of News into the cable networks to displace Sky which charged the cable operators
What i don’t understand is why BT has to keep prices below inflation because of digital technology but BBC had expected to inflate costs.
A digital station should be very lean on personnel costs and a very slim organisation
All UK residents can choose between Sky News and BBC news.
80% or so choose BBC.
A tiny fraction opt for Sky.
John Reith | 28.12.06 – 4:28 pm | #
Don’t forget, the ‘opinion formers’ prefer Sky as the Beeb admits…
http://observer.guardian.co.uk/business/story/0,6903,1646419,00.html
JR: “On a good day, Sky News will reach 1.2 million viewers • a tiny fraction of the population.”
How many viewers watch News 24 per day?
JR: “Fox’s highest rated show is The O’Reilly Factor. In the US it reaches about 2.5 million viewers per week. That’s in a country of 300m people.
Newsnight in the UK (population: a mere 60m or so) reaches 6.5m per week.”
Which means that Newsnight is somehow better or the BBC should feel vindicated about their editorial choices for Newsnight? Don’t forget that Hancock used to reach about 20m I think for each show that he did. Does this mean that he was any funnier than
modern day comedians who would struggle to get a quarter of that figure? No, it’s just in Hancock’s time there was less competition.
Also, isn’t Fox News only available to cable subsribers?
I don’t think that a raw 2.5m vs 6.5m necessarily proves much.
Allan@Aberdeen: “The fact that “all BBC News outlets reach about 80% of the adult population of the UK” does not indicate preference if Fox news does not reach the same people to whom the BBC is available.”
But I bet BBC News 24 gets more viewers than Fox News out of all UK Sky subscribers (which I think is the only way to get Fox News in this country).
(ave. daytime listenership of 7m.).
I confess to getting irritated by BBC constantly promoting Wogan has having 8 million listeners and I suppose by implication we are supposed to feel that BBC is providing a popular service.
Of course this figure refers to the E&OE guesstimate that his five shows generate an audience of 8 million over the week not per show.
Of course the headline Terry Wogan has 1.6 million listeners is not quite as exciting.
8 million is a deliberate attempt to mislead – a lie in fact.
Thu 28, twas the day after Xmas, and what does the BBC dish up? Snapshot of the way 2007 will progess: BBC News includes story and pics of the Muslim Haj party. London News excels itself with news and pics on sick goats in Kenya. Yoh! and on BBC Anthea Turner comes across as a do-gooder middle class meddler humilitaing and patronising a working woman who can’t handle Xmas.
May the BBC burn in Hell.
Since when was it news that millions of muslims went to Saudi for the Hajj? BBC news seems to think it is of great importance to all of us and repeatedly shows them walking round the black box, with a typically reverential voiceover.
IT’S NOT NEWS!!
Always keen to muscle in on any area of the media, I’m sure the BBC will soon produce its own version of
The New Pocket Casualty Counter From The Associated Press
you need the new Associated Press Pocket Iraq Casualty Counter! Now the information you need to make bizarre, extraneous points about the Iraqi War is at your fingertips, 24 hours a day! The Pocket Casualty Counter uses satellite technology to wirelessly provide instant updates on casualties, as they happen. And the Pocket Casualty Counter links the death toll with a historical database to provide you with the factual ammunition you need to battle those crazy neo-cons, on the go! So you’ll be able to say, “I hate to be the one to tell you this, but George Bush has now murdered 10 times the number of people who are eaten alive in an average decade by the Spotted Siberian Tiger.”
http://www.thenoseonyourface.com/the_nose_on_your_face/2006/12/the_new_iraq_po.html
via LGF
JR wrote:
“Newsnight in the UK (population: a mere 60m or so) reaches 6.5m per week.
On a good day, Sky News will reach 1.2 million viewers • a tiny fraction of the population.”
Having a public broadcaster funded by license fees distorts the competition.
If you have a satellite dish, you can get BBC World and Sky News for free almost anywhere in the world.
Sky News output concentrates more on the UK issues but the quality of their coverage is generally better IMO.
Besides, a 24 hour news channel is only useful when there is a major event going on in the world.
And you cannot compare European tv market to the American, because in Europe the public broadcasters tend to dominate in every country.
In the early days of broadcasting there maybe was a justification for public service broadcasting. This is not the case any more, but people continue to pay the license fees anyway. It is because goverment-created organizations are not likely to make themselves redundant but always seem to be able to invent an excuse for their existence.
BBC, like any other public broadcasting company in Europe, only have history on their side. The reason for their existence has long since disappeared.
Vote for John Turner
Here is his posting on HYS:
“Added: Thursday, 28 December, 2006, 19:49 GMT 19:49 UK
My wish for 2007?
A The return of impartial reporting by the BBC
B A return of news reporting by the BBC and an end to snide commentary by so called interviewers
C The end of BBC adverts for digital, online, regional and so on services. We all know what you do!!!
John Turner, Barry, United Kingdom ”
Find it here:
http://newsforums.bbc.co.uk/nol/thread.jspa?sortBy=1&edition=1&ttl=20061228204114&messageID=2025734�