Newspapers and blogging…a bit more

Not much to add about this issue at the moment as I’m still in a bit of a post-birthday weekend fog, but a few interesting pieces have cropped up in recent days.
Firstly, The Birmingham Post’s editor has blogged about “ownership” of the title’s blogs.
Marc Reeves poses five intriguing questions regarding the role of blogs on [...]

The meaning of (modern) life

Global warming, the Bush administration and Piers Morgan’s rising media profile.
We’ve only got ourselves to blame for not tackling any of these things head on, especially as all three have the potential to destroy us.
So says Charlie Brooker, in a slight departure from his usual Monday morning musings.
Life, the universe, everything and our own place [...]

Blogging in “our” newspapers

No blinding flash of revelation here, just a decision to write down what has been in my head for quite some time regarding journalism, newspapers and blogging.
It has been brought into sharper focus in recent days by the storm in a check-out queue created by one of The Birmingham Post’s guest bloggers.
I wondered on my [...]

Blogging for The Guardian

I have done my bit for The Guardian’s week of work-life balance articles and blogs.
Have a look at what juggling self-employment and caring means for me, for Rachel and for us, on the Guardian’s site.
Feel free to leave a comment over there if you want.

Work-life balancing like a demon

I feel like patting myself on the back.
It has been quite a morning for the old work-life balance malarky.
I’m feeling vaguely smug about the whole thing and will remain so right up to the point something I think is ticking over nicely goes utterly pear-shaped - I’m a typically optimistically pessimistic Welshman.
Now I read that [...]

The BBC’s muddled view of cyberbullying

Another day, another discussion item on BBC Breakfast that failed to deliver what the introduction promised and largely missed a very important point.
The item under discussion this time was cyberbullying.
The BBC decided to base the discussion around the furore that was generated by The Guardian’s ill-advised decision to carry a somewhat superficial travel blog by the 19-year-old son of [...]

“Churnalism” has a familiar ring

A new book claims that national newspapers mainly recycle newswire copy and PR puff for their home news sections.
Describing this trend as “churnalism”, the book’s author says research shows that around 80 per cent of news stories in the quality UK national newspapers is not original copy generated by in-house journalists.
Nick Davies, a journalist with [...]