“Embarrassing”, “humiliating” and “depressing” - reaction to Guardian’s Big Brother coverage

Posted by Dominic Ponsford on 6 February 2006 at 12:40
Tags: Nationals, Newspapers

The sound of draws dropping to the floor resounded around the Press Gazette offices last week when news emerged that according to The Guardian’s own research – it and sister paper the Observer wrote more about the latest series of Big Brother than any other national titles.

When Big Brother first came on the scene back in 2000 eyebrows were raised when red-tops put the antics of housemates on the front page and the series was largely ignored by the broadsheets.

Who would have predicted back then that in 2006 news values would have changed so much that The Guardian would not only lead the nation’s Big Brother coverage – but put a picture of the winning contestant on its front page.

Guardian readers editor Ian Mayes today revealed the reaction of some of the paper’s journalists to the Guardian’s decision to become THE Big Brother paper (a title previous held by The Star).

Mayes reports that “embarrassing”, “humiliating” and “depressing” are some of the responses he received after conducting an informal poll,..

But editor Alan Rusbridger is undaunted by the critics. He told Mayes: “Do you want us to report the world as it is, or the world as you would like it to be.”

Discuss.

Tags: Nationals, Newspapers