The deaths of two children in Carshalton at the weekend was a truly terrible story.
The first I knew of it was when I woke up on Saturday and read the news on our own website.
It quickly emerged that we had taken a picture of a third child injured in the incident at the time of her birth six months ago, and it had appeared on our regular Celebrations page.
This was the shot that appeared on our website on Saturday and the national press on Sunday.
Elsewhere over the weekend, I was interested to read some of the web comments about the school closure story. I'll repeat one below precisely as it appears underneath the article.
"Well done, Advertiser!! I know you're in the news business, but - even assuming your schools closure story is true - did it ever occur to you the damage you are doing to the (already rock-bottom) morale of the staff, students & governors allegedly concerned. The LA had micro-managed it to ensure heads of affected schools should tell staff & students before the details hit the press. I don't know how accurate your 'exclusive' is, but I do think your council 'source' should hang his/her head in shame.
A school governor, croydon
This is the kind of message that leaves me banging my head on the desk in frustration.
The author starts off by acknowledging we're in the business of breaking news stories, then berates us for doing just that in case it upsets somebody at the council.
Do people really, really think we're going to sit on a story for a week so it fits in with a stage-managed announcment? My staff would lynch me, and the readers should as well.
As for how accurate it is, well - we'll find out at 11.30 when the plans are officially unveiled. Obviously I'm confident it's entirely accurate or else we would't have printed it, but all editors know that feeling you get in the pit of your stomach when you are waiting for an exclusive story to be offically confirmed.
Finally, a few years ago there were reports in the press about how the growth of text messaging would kill off the English language as we know it. Looking at some of the contributions from pupils, it seems that time is already with us.
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6 comments:
The Carshalton killings is a modern day horror.
Yet most of your post is about your schools story.
Get over it Carter!
Your blogging correspondent does not protest on behalf of the council, as you state. They specifically mention the feelings of staff, pupils and governors.
Who knows, it just may be that your report (which for once looked like a decent piece of journalism) cuts through the spin BS and forces the council's hand to make them come forward with more detail than they might overwise do.
A modern day horror that I don't know the ins and outs of. Even if I did, I don't think adding my opinion would be particularly appropriate. At least with the schools story I'm confident about the background.
"anonymous": your complaint was about the carshalton killings, yet most of your comment was on the schools story.
Get over it!
And it's rich for someone like you to be commenting on "decent journalism" because decent journalism is all about being open and transparent rather than hiding behind anonymity to say something useless.
Dear Beth Caine: Mr Carter had written a blog entry about his paper's schools story, but had entitled it "Carshalton child deaths". That was my only reason for mentioning the Carshalton deaths. It would be facile to pass any sort of comment on that tragic story.
But the rest of Carter's blog entry was one of his usual whinges about how hard done by he and his paper was because people were complaining about the way they had covered the story (and which he used to complain about their sympathy for the council, which his correspondent had never expressed).
Hence my "Get over it Carter" remark, which you and Carter have misconstrued, perhaps because you think it refers to the child deaths. My fault. Apologies.
So, to explain again: my point was that Carter's blogger was not defending the council, but explicitly mentioning the staff, pupils and governors of the school. Yet Carter (deliberately?) opted to misrepresent that comment.
And as for my identity (which Carter knows well because of my digital footprint on this page), I opt for anonymity here (a) because I can; and (b) because I can't be asked to sign up for this blog software's registration process.
That in no way invalidates my opinions or expertise on what is good or bad journalism.
I, like all readers of this blog, are effectively invited to comment on the blog entries by Carter. We have no journalistic responsibilities in the sense of openness and accountability, as you seem to suggest. Please don't confuse blog entries with "real" journalism.
But, Ms Caine, be sure that should I conduct myself in a professional journalistic capacity, I would of course behave in an manner of the highest ehtical standards, including declaring any interest I may have.
Glad to see, though, Caine, that my comment is seen by you to be sufficiently useless for you to go to the time and trouble to comment upon it.
Do let us all know when you have something useful to say.
Hmm, I seem to have hit a nerve. The point I wanted to make was that I like the blog and think it is suitably defensive about the way the paper covers stories.
FYI, you don't have to sign up to blogger to leave a comment.
Beth Caine wrote:
>>>
"suitably defensive"
<<<
What is that supposed to mean?
If you mean that this blog is simply a litany of excuses from Ian Carter over the errors and mistakes he and his staff makes in producing a lacklustre weekly offering, you would have a point.
Which is more than could be said for your previous post.
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