Constructive Criticism…
Posted by
Julie Tomlin
on 3 May 2006 at 14:44
Tags: Ashley Cole, BBC, Blogs, Journalism, Libel, Newspapers, Sources, Television
Blogger Guido Fawkes has been on the case of BBC political correspondent Nick Robinson. Last week he picked up on his claim in his blog that the Mirror’s Prescott story was a “bombshell”.  This week he sets out some questions in response to Robinson’s 29 April entry “I’m not covering up for Prescott”
Firstly, he asks does Robinson know now of any other Prescott mistresses?
Secondly, if he does, what is the public interest in witholding her name from the public if she turns out, like Tracey, to be paid out of the public purse?
Thirdly, if he doesn’t know of any other mistresses and another subsequently comes out of the woodwork, will he feel he has done his best for the British public?
Robinson does seem to be partly entering into the spirit of blogging - unlike some newspaper (Trevor) correspondents who have launched their own blogs, Robinson does allow comments to be posted. And in his blog he does respond to allegations that ave been made that the BBC censored the Prescott story and that the reward was an exclusive with PM Tony Blair
Guido notes with satisfaction that Robinson is a reader of this blog and that he “took the hint” and clarified his “bombshell” comments. But he committed a “major breach of netiquette” says Guido for failing to link to the site despite quoting from it liberally.
“Since the Ashley Cole Case the Dead Tree Press (and the broadcast media) have become nervous about referring to, or directly linking readers and listeners to writ-risky websites,” writes Guido. “Hence the vague references to “political websites” rather than Guido or Iain Dale. Journalists are actually ringing Guido up for quotes, which they then attribute to an unnamed “controversial political website”.
Guido blames media lawyers for scaring media executives into restricting journalists from referring to risk taking bloggers. As with the Ashley Cole case it seems the relationship between “msm” and new media needs working on.
