In reply to Wiley Coyote:
right, back in now, so some responses to your late night post. Firstly, to note the irony of a post about how you used to ruthlessly edit other peoples' verbosity being so verbose...
Now, re the online vs print versions of the story- the print one was considerably longer, so the absence of the quotes from Hacked Off in it cant be explained by space factors. And yes, it did carry the funding connection to the report, but as i said, in para 19- as a journalist you'll be well aware that the number of readers getting to the last paragraph of a long article is a fraction of those that start reading it, so it is a form of hiding the information in plain sight. Most will take the impression that this was an independent report backing the Mail's position.
would they care if they knew it had been bought by the Mail? of course, neither of us have any idea. but judging by the public's reaction to other situations where a financial interest hasn't been disclosed, they may do. Perhaps they'd just set it aside as likely to be ghost written by the people that paid for it; perhaps they'd be irritated enough to decide that the press do need regulating after all. Like i said, the Mail obviously thought it worth having an 'independent' report backing their position; else why go to the trouble of creating a sock puppet to write the report?
> As for reader response to the two versions, I suspect it would be exactly the same, ie they could not give a monkey's. This is a subject about which most readers can scarcely contain their indifference. It's boring, technical and sod all to do with the price of fish or houses or the benefits bill, immigrant numbers, the size of Jordan's boobs, Jeremy Corbyn's latest gaffe or indeed any of the 1001 other things which so exercise Mail readers. It does not even drag itself into the graveyard category of 'worthy but dull'. It's just a squabble between papers, Hugh Grant. Steve Coogan and a few politicians trying to make a name for themselves in Commons committees or curry favour with the papers. How dull is that! Nobody else much cares. Even I don't care.
this is not true. the public does indeed care about the ethics and integrity of the media. editing the parents of Millie Dowler, and Christopher Jeffries, out of the list of 'interested parties' you give is verging on dishonest. News International cared enough they euthanased a major title. local press may be a beacon of good practice and integrity, but many of our major national newspapers appear to be quite the opposite. ok many people dont give a toss about steve coogan's privacy being intruded in, but when they went after 'ordinary' people they lost whatever scrap of integrity they had; and the fury and disgust at them was real. Leveson came out of that, not out of bugging alan partridge. If the press really believes that this is just a celeb and politician thing, that would be a misjudgement that the may regret.
but they don't- or rather the Mail don't- hence the report in story that triggered this thread... you do yourself an injustice if you say that newspapers just reflect the opinions of the people that already buy the paper; they can clearly lead opinion too. and thats what they're trying to do here.
> Moving on to your second post re regulation. I did not argue they should not be regulated just like other professions. In fact I was trying to say that their wish not to have an outside regulator made them exactly like every other profession, all of which think they can handle such matters far better by self regulation than by outsiders who, needless to say, they believe do not really understand their particular profession/industry. Nobody, absolutely nobody, wants an outside regulator for their own fiefdom though they usually think it would be a jolly good idea for everybody else. My daughter, a teacher, for example, is absolutely convinced of the need to get rid of OFSTED. Her attitude is that teachers know what they are doing and should be left to get on with their job without this interference from a bunch of idiots, theorists and ivory tower dwellers who have no idea what front line teaching or education should be about- so not a million miles from the view held by newspapers re their regulation or the police re theirs etc etc.
well, your daughter is wrong. if all teachers were as hard working and talented as i'm sure your daughter is, then she'd be right. but they aren't. nor are all doctors, nurses, police, lawyers, bankers, politicians, or journalists paragons of ethics and technical competence. some are useless, some are frankly corrupt, some are actually criminals. in that situation, some form of regulation is necessary. i certainly have no problem with being regulated- as i said last night. the alternative is damage to people who come to us for help, and damage to the reputation of the profession.
only the naive would reject regulation; if journalism actually performs and important function for society, rather than just salacious gossip and pushing proprietors' agendas, then journalists would be calling out for it.
> My only interest in this whole thread was to correct the initial scattergun assertion that the 'entire press' had engaged in hacking when it was a tiny, albeit high profile, proportion - namely the national tabloids of News International and it now seems the Mirror Group - who did so. The initial post carelessly accused thousands of honest papers and journos of criminal acts of which they were entirely innocent and I wanted to correct that error.
> Beyond that I really don't care. That's not being tetchy, by the way, just honest. Compared to trying to find something as small as my interest in this the hunt for the Higgs Bozon was childsplay.
Wiley, this just isn't true- i corrected my hyperbole in the second post i made on day one of the thread. since then you've made multiple (and lengthy!) posts... that's not the behaviour of someone that's not interested!
anyhow, hope you've had a good day, and that this doesnt keep you up as late as it did last night...
best wishes
gregor