is an interesting article in Saturday’s Times, about the conflict of interest for the BBC created by the Labour Party’s unsubtle scheduling of the Hartlepool by-election for the last day of their annual conference in Brighton: Senior corporation figures had offered to balance coverage of the last day of Labours conference – the day of the poll – after the Tories complained, The Times understands. But Liam Fox, the Tory … Continue reading →

 The people behind Radio Forth are hoping to be granted the new Scottish east coast license: A COMMERCIAL broadcaster is promising to challenge the BBC’s “boring” and “leftish” current affairs coverage by launching a rival radio station. Scottish Radio Holdings, which already owns a number of stations north of the Border, will apply to media regulator Ofcom this week for the new FM licence covering Edinburgh, Fife and Lothians. It … Continue reading →

Private Eye magazine’s regular Lookalikes feature this fortnight highlight’s the striking resemblance between Vladimir Putin and Andrew Marr of the BBC, rather in line with the observations of BBBC aficionados: Sir, Have you noticed the sinister similarities between these two? I have heard that one has his roots in a subversive organisation involved in the dissemination of enemy propaganda. The other is a former head of the KGB. Should we … Continue reading →

is a featured article in BBC News Online’s Magazine section, concerning the disturbing oppression of gay people in Jamaica. Taking this as inspiration for a new BBC News Online Magazine ‘Growing up in’ series, here are some suggestions for future instalments: Growing up female in Iran – exposing the feudal oppression of girls and women, including cases like that of Atefeh Rajabi; Growing up agnostic in Saudi Arabia – the … Continue reading →

How awful if we were to become distracted from concentrating our attention on the contents of fake documents! Here it is at last – the Beeb reports on those Bush memos. Click through to read and contribute comments on this post.

A short excerpt to whet your appetite: Later in the programme (8.31) there was an item about why John Kerry’s presidential campaign has gone pear-shaped. The assumption here was that, since no sentient individual could possibly support President Bush, and since therefore it was inconceivable that Kerry would not win the election, there had to be some extraordinary reason why Kerry was mysteriously doing so badly. The fact that he … Continue reading →

– or so it seems. On 25AUG04 (the week before the last bank holiday), News Online published a story with the needlessly emotive headline Refugee ‘robbed’ of Oxford place. The story is about a Kosovan refugee, Vildane Berani. She came to the UK five or six years ago with her parents, went to school here and managed to gain an impressive six grade A results at A level. Not surprisingly, … Continue reading →

is unfolding at another media outlet (as this blog has noted here and here), the once respected CBS News. Andrew Sullivan explains how the curtain of ‘big media’ has been yanked by the many Totos of the blogosphere. I have a feeling that the biggest news of last week had nothing to do with politics and everything to do with the media. We are in the middle of an insurgency … Continue reading →

is a typically incisive posting by Laban Tall, concerning a namby-pamby Radio 4 Today programme report on (failures in) youth justice. Well worth a read, especially for the ‘happy’ ending. Click through to read and contribute comments on this post.

– Martin Stanford was interviewing today’s guest, dear Polly Toynbee. Referring to Polly’s switch from print journalism to the seven years she spent reporting ‘social affairs’ for the BBC and her subsequent return to print journalism at The Guardian, Polly said that she enjoyed the extra space afforded in the newspaper and the freedom to express opinions therein. Polly then added: “And of course, on television, we never express opinions.” … Continue reading →