For journalists working on Sundays, it’s just too easy to run a tape over Insiders or Meet the Press or whatever other political iprogram is filling the airwaves, writes Mr Denmore, a journalist for 26 years.
Journalism
Journalists: now just hyped-up lazy typists
How easy it has become for journalists to fail to mention the source in the headline in order to keep the story juicy, or to rely on an Opposition press release to say a government is ‘under pressure’. Time to fix journalism, one active voice at a time, says Mr Denmore.
Should journalists be trained in mathematics?
A recent article published in the Columbia Journalism Review emphatically argued the importance of journos being trained in maths, particularly statistics. That argument has more than a little currently here, writes Jeremy Sear.
Note to The Australian: Twitter is not a newspaper
When Oz editor Chris Mitchell complains that Julie Posetti didn’t contact him to get his side of the story before tweeting, he completely misses the point.
Mark Scott: Journalism’s Golden Era
Lots of journos like to harp on about the old days of journalism, when deadlines were few and money was plentiful. But, says ABC managing director Mark Scott, journalism today is a more democratic, in-depth and thrilling affair than the days of yore.
Crikey Says: The lie that travelled halfway around the world…
How far ahead of his time Mark Twain was when he said a century before the internet: “A lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes.”
Has the ABC lost its way?
One of the things that we should demand from our media is that it hold all of our elected representatives up to scrutiny, but you don’t achieve that by outsourcing your line of questioning to one of our political parties, notes Dave Gaukroger .
A first for Aussie crowd-funded journalism
A story on chronic fatigue syndrome sufferers is the first YouCommNews — an initiative to crowd-fund journalism — story to be published today. But many pitches still wait with thousands of funding dollars still needed for the story to get written.
How to talk to journalists
Dealing with journalists can be a tricky business, particularly if you’re trying to crisis-manage a problem in your workplace. Remember, they are going to write a story anyway, so you might as well get your views heard, says PR man Jonathan Bernstein.
Better than online, TV in courts … under oath, the camera doesn’t lie
Law academics are divided over a proposal for courts to publish their own newspapers. But one expert says transparency of legal proceedings should go even further — with television broadcasts.
Come in Spinner: What a minority government means and why it won’t stay on the front pages for long
AFL and NRL finals are in train, the spring racing carnivals are near, Christmas is coming, so the political election hysteria might get pushed off the front pages in coming months, writes Noel Turnbull.
What is excellence in online journalism?
It seems to me that winning an online Walkey requires the creation of a complex web of multimedia elements that scrutinise a single issue from a variety of angles, says Mel Campbell.
Warning! This article contains unsourced, unverified information from Wikipedia
Just what every discerning newspaper reader needs: hilarious warning stickers. They help distinguish between stories based on an unverified, anonymous tipoff and those written too close to deadline to check facts.
Twain: Journalistic interviews are like a cyclone — they blow
During the course of Mark Twain’s career, he was interviewed frequently by reporters. Here, in a newly published essay, the celebrated author reveals his true feelings on the journalistic interview.
Pacific solution — freelancers in uproar over new copyright edict
Freelancers providing copy to Pacific Publications are up in arms over a new standard contract that requires them to assign all copyright to the company.
Want to be a slave journalist?
It’s easy for young people wanting to work in journalism. All you need to do is work your arse off chasing stories, come up with pithy tweets, sell your soul and then not get paid.
Memo to ABC journos: how to file 24/7
More news, or the same news spread more thinly? That is the question ABC watchers are asking about the new 24-hour news service. Crikey has the leaked internal memo to journos.
Holmes: Quest for truth is more important than ‘balance’
Journalism shouldn’t just be about reporting what two opposite sides think about a topic. That doesn’t make a journalist “balanced” and it doesn’t give the reader enough information, writes Jonathan Holmes.
Holmes: The good old days of boozing, smoking and sexism
All the mythology of journos in the 70s covered in a haze of smoke and getting boozed at lunchtime is absolutely 100% true, writes Jonathan Holmes. That is, if you are a man. Women’s memories aren’t so rosy.
Beecher: Why Murdoch defies gravity while other owners have to play by the rules
The fact that News Corp loses a great deal of money on its flagship newspapers doesn’t necessarily mean this is not a profitable formula.
How to be a political journo in Sudan
A Reuters journo offers a quick guide to reporting in Sudan: add two hours on to any official press conference time and realise that politicians will constantly contradict themselves.
Don’t shoot me, I’m only the paintball journalist
Just when you thought there were no jobs left in journalism, along comes McSweeneys with an interview with a full-time paintball journalist. Yes, that weird shooting game has a professional league with media coverage.
Your Say: Daily Mail readers' feedback: The lack of good journalism
Crikey readers weigh in on lazy summer journalism, hate groups of Facebook — how can they be stopped? — and the PR abuse of science.
Your Say: Daily Mail readers' feedback: Tax and the family home
Crikey readers weigh in on tax and the family home, the idea of community-funded reporting and the continual fight for equal pay for women.
Love/hate: Liberals and the media
The Liberals aren’t media savvy, although they long to be media darlings. Liberals need to be wiser in their dealings with journalists, writes Gerard Henderson.
