Guardian now live-blogging... itself

And so it came to pass. The Guardian, which has never knowingly left a topic un-live-blogged - an episode of Countdown, really? - has now started live-blogging itself.

After opening up its newslist at the end of last year, the Guardian yesterday set up a 'Newsdesk Live' blog, which sees reporter Polly Curtis guide us through a day of news-gathering.

There are a lot of meetings - 9.15am web meeting, 10am conference, 12pm afternoon meeting and so on - and for young journalists interested in how a national works there's a certain amount of interest in the mechanics.

But the weakness, of course, is in the nature of the news that is actually discussed in the supposedly 'open newsroom'.

One point I wanted to clarify is that the newslist above and the stories I cover in this blog will be breaking and live news. An extended newslist, which isn't available publicly, has all our exclusives and plans for the next day's paper in it.

Which kind of sums up the problem with the whole project. Exclusives and embargoed stories are what makes the next day's paper different from yesterday's website (the top three stories on today's front page, for instance, received no mention in yesterday's blog). And without being able to discuss them, what are you left with? Well, really it's a blog commenting on all the web stories you've already published that day. Live-blogging will eat itself.

There is an argument, of course, although one that's anathema to Fleet Street hacks, that in the world of digital-first, embargoes and even exclusives are anachronisms. If you have a story, publish it, immediately.

We can quite understand why the Guardian doesn't want to go there, yet, for all Alan Rusbridger's talk of being digitally-led. But ironically, the project supposed to crown the Guardian's transformation into a web 2.0 organisation highlights just how far it still has to go...

News Editor - North-West Evening Mail

The North-West Evening Mail, a three-edition daily based in Barrow-in-Furness, in south Cumbria, is looking for a new news editor.

You'll be leading a team of 11 reporters across print and online, doing what it is that good news editors do best - single-mindedly chasing the next exclusive. You'll need prior experience of working on a news desk and must be a 'strong, fair manager of people'. The last incumbent, we're told, is off to Australia - make of that what you will...

Apply via the website. Deadline Friday 10 February.

'Reading the paper is the bare minimum any journalist can do'

We posed a simple question on Friday: 'Do you read the paper you work for?' And the response from readers in our snap poll suggests that, on balance, a surprising number of you do.

Beyond that though, we've had a mixed response - and first up is FT property writer Emma Mahony:

I read the FT every day because I write and have a column for them which I share in the House and Home section of the FT Weekend. 

As a former Property Editor for the Times, I do not consider myself a specialist financial journalist, and therefore some of the more technical economic and markets analysis are - perhaps too frankly - baffling. However, I feel it is the BARE MINIMUM any journalist should do that is writing regularly for a paper. Why? Because the worst thing as a journo is to be caught out Not Knowing a big story that your paper is covering regularly, and if you do go into the office - it is definite courtesy to be able to bump into someone and tell them you liked/disagreed with their piece the other day on something.

My husband, a lawyer, is amused to see me (often last thing at night) sitting reading the FT, and this week decided to test me on how deep my understanding of the reading was. 

As I tossed aside a supplement on Davos and the World Economic Forum (it's important to know it is happening), and said that one of the columnists was remarking that all the Big Shots were not attending this year, he asked: 'Where is it taking part?'

'Ummm.. not sure this year.' "

'Well darling, Davos is a ski resort in Switzerland - not some strange acronym - and it happens in the same place every year.' 

Ouch. More reading from cover to cover needed.

Want to write for FleetStreetBlues? Email us today at fleetstreetblues@hotmail.co.uk.

'Hester la vista, bonus'

As usual, the Sun sums up the story of the day perfectly in four short words:

MailOnline photo caption hits Stephen Hester where it hurts

The Daily Mail's front page this morning had a simple message: 'Hand back that £1m, Mr Hester'. And as Royal Bank of Scotland chief Stephen Hester attracts criticism from all sides, the Mail's website picked up the theme beautifully with the following photo.

The caption, if you can't see it, reads as follows:

The notoriously thin-skinned Stephen Hester remains annoyed whenever any newspaper prints the much-published photograph of him astride a horse dressed in full hunting regalia

Pity that...

Subhead boob at the Farnham Herald

We haven't had a really good subbing fail in a while, so thanks to the reader who sent this in from earlier this week. Clearly the subs at the Farnham Herald have only one thing on their minds....

Facebook demands journalists sign non-disclosure agreement before press conference

Here's an irony: you're one of the world's biggest new media companies with a slight PR problem around the issue of other people's privacy, and you invite a bunch of a journalists to a press conference at your offices. What's the stupidest thing you can do?

KPLU News in Seattle reports:

After announcing that Facebook and the State Attorney General’s office would announce a “joint legal strategy" this morning, the AG’s office followed up with an email requiring journos sign a non-disclosure agreement.

Dan Sytman, the AG’s Deputy Communications Director, wrote in an email sent out to news agencies at 8:10 a.m.:

“Facebook asked me to pass this on to you. They require it of all visitors to their facilities. It only applies to things that you might accidentally stumble upon while you are there and covers nothing discussed during our news conference. Please either bring a signed copy or be ready to sign upon arrival.”

We've all been subject to ridiculous requests from PRs, of course - but somehow this seemed a request too far. Eventually, two hours later, the penny dropped and the request was withdrawn.

Sadly, KPLU News says, it seems the incriminating plans for world domination were smuggled out of sight in the meantime.

We didn't see anything. Our reporter said they let her and the others in the front door and the press conference was directly on their right. Other than that, nothing to see, she said. No diagrams outlining Facebook's future growth plans, no employees ... just the officials.

Features journalist - Cavendish Press

Manchester-based press agency Cavendish Press is recruiting a features writer.

You'll need to be NCTJ-qualified, have newsroom and preferably agency experience, a full, clean driving licence and your own car. You'll also need to be hungry - the ad sternly warns that 'workshy, shrinking violets and clock-watchers need not apply'.

Apply with CV, covering letter and examples of/ideas for human interest stories to managing editor Jon Harris at jon@cavendish-press.co.uk. Deadline Thursday 23 February.

Do you read the paper you work for?

Here's an interesting question posed by John Robinson and then Adam Tinworth. Why don't reporters read the paper they work for?

Obviously, every journalist is quick to read one part of the paper - the bit they wrote.

But once you've finished admiring your own byline, what about the rest of it? Other reporters' stories, comment pieces, the sports section, even the supplements?

Adam Tinworth writes:

Sadly, that's been the case in pretty much every big magazine I've worked on. News reporters are particularly notorious for never bothering to read the features, in my experience, leading to the occasional embarrassment when they run something in news that was published in a feature a month before…

It's worth pointing out, of course, that reading the rest of the paper isn't always possible for those who have fifty calls to make and five stories to file before lunch. One Fleet Street Sunday newspaper editor used to be famous for reading every word in the entire paper each week - which given the size of the paper's supplements, must have taken him most of each week.

But what about nowadays? Should reporters be making the effort to at least skim through the rest of their paper? It is largely a waste of time given other pressures? Or is the whole question redundant in the world of online anyway? Let us know what you think in the comments, by email and in the poll on the right.

Attack of the chocolate oranges

FleetStreetBlues doesn't do politics - but even to the casual newspaper reader it's been obvious that since Christmas, according to received wisdom in the Westminster bubble at least, Ed Miliband is in Big Trouble.

Somehow, though, we can't help feeling that the difficulties the Labour leader now faces are summed up best not by the acres of worthy broadsheet comment churned out on the subject, but instead by the headline on this story which has just popped up on the po-faced BBC website:

Not the kind of headline befitting a Prime Minister-in-waiting, surely?

Reporter - Local Government Chronicle

The Local Government Chronicle - an Emap social policy magazine, which is much more exciting than it sounds - is hiring a reporter.

You'll need to a be a 'top-notch story finder' who's willing to both crunch data and build contacts, and while the ad's not explicit, it sounds like some experience at least would be helpful.

Apply with CV, covering letter and salary expectations to jobs@emap.com. There's no closing date on the ad, so best to apply asap.

Blue sky thinking in Nova Scotia

What if journalists built the internet?

The great paywall debate aside, there's a presumption these days that we know more or less what the future of online journalism looks like. There were be social media. There will be copious data analysis. There will be content aggregation, more links than you can shake a stick at and some whizzy interactive tools we haven't even dreamed up yet. (Computer games to tell news stories. Really?)

But a fascinating article over at the Nieman Journalism Lab looks at one news organisation which is breaking all the 'rules' and yet still proving a real success. AllNovaScotia.com, a website now 10 years old, is tightly paywalled, has no multimeeja content to speak of, doesn't bother with social media and even publishes all its pages on Flash as the ultimate anti-copying and pasting device.

Instead of relying on advertising, it charges a $30 monthly subscription to a small but loyal audience of 5,950 readers, who tend to be 'opinion-formers' - bigwigs in local politics or business. A team of 14 - including 11 reporters - then focus on finding and writing must-read stories, described as a 'mixture of hard news and betcha-didn’t-know information about the province’s movers and shakers'.

It's the ultimate niche publication - but it works:

Ask 10 people on the street about AllNovaScotia and it’s likely eight will say they’ve never heard of it.

“I think it might be nine people,” says Parker Donham, a former journalist for the now-defunct Halifax Daily News, communications consultant, and blogger. “But the one who did would be an assistant deputy minister or a regional manager. Between people paying for it and a limited amount of advertising, they’ve got a business model that seems to work.”

“On the whole, I think they are the paper of record now,” adds Donham. “I don’t think there are many serious business or political people who don’t see that every morning.”

Starting with content people want to read, then delivering it to them in the simplest way possible which ensures they have to pay for it. It shouldn't be revolutionary, but it is.

And while the AllNovaScotia.com model clearly won't work everywhere, and probably couldn't be scaled up for a national publication, it would be nice to see more examples of journalists genuinely exploring new options, and publishers worrying less about the bells and whistles on the delivery system and more about what they're actually delivering.

'Content is king', is the favourite mantra of the future-of-journalism types. They're right - and AllNovaScotia.com proves they should start acting like they believe it.

Reporter x 2 - Edinburgh Evening News

The Edinburgh Evening News is recruiting two reporters for its Holyrood offices.

One position is to cover the city council, the other seems to be a general news reporter vacancy. The requirements are short and to the point - you'll need a proven track record on a daily newspaper and 'a good local knowledge'.

Send your letter of application and CV to hr@scotsman.com. Deadline this Friday 27 January.

Telegraph subs heading for a fall

Telegraph subs beware. Northern Irish jockey-turned-newspaper columnist Tony McCoy has seen the way you headlined his column on Saturday - and it's fair to say he was not impressed.

What a stupid headline in my telegraph column today "I can't bear the thought of another fall" What a load of s..t as I never saidSat Jan 21 09:51:12 via Twitter for iPhoneAP McCoy
AP_McCoy

Really not impressed...

I never said anything like that in the article obviously some other bright spark writes the headlinesSat Jan 21 09:55:27 via Twitter for iPhoneAP McCoy
AP_McCoy

Online, it's been replaced already, with the far-from-catchy 'Thursday return may be a bit too soon', but if there hasn't been one already, a phone call and word of apology is probably in order. Maybe you could give him some advice on how to ride horses while you're on...

Hari quits

It's taken 207 days since he first admitted copying and pasting interview quotes, but yesterday Johann Hari finally quit.

I’d like to thank the Independent for the privilege of working for them over the past nine years, and for offering me my job back, starting in a few weeks. But after nearly six months living in New York City, and plenty of time to reflect, I’ve decided to not take them up on their kind offer.

There are two reasons. I’m willing to take the flack for my errors myself: when you screw up, you should pay a price. But I’m not willing to see other people, who are played no part in those errors and are unimpeachably decent people, take the flack too. It’s not fair on them. The Independent has been great to me, and we need its principles in the public arena without distractions.

Secondly, while doing some journalistic retraining in the US, I’ve started working on a book on a subject I believe is important and requires urgent action. To be done properly it needs international travel and the kind of in depth focus that’s not possible when you are writing a heavily researched column at the same time. So, while I’ll be writing occasional articles elsewhere, I’ll be mainly delving deeply into this one subject for now.

Fair play to him for falling on his sword, and he can now get on with the rest of his life. But for the Independent, which was indeed 'great' to him, one question remains. Just what does one of your journalists have to do to get fired?

More cruise ship clangers

We're not entirely sure what it is, but something about the Costa Concordia cruise ship disaster earlier this week seems to have prompted a rash of unwise juxtapositions among every kind of journalist.

First there was the Guardian's headline/picture combo. Then the Belfast Telegraph's unfortunate ad placement.

Now a reader sends in this, from The Star in Johannesburg, South Africa.

Worst of all, though, is this - much close to home, and as the reader who pointed it out said, it's really an unfortunate ad placement within an unfortunate ad placement.

What we can we say? It happens to the best of us. Bloody Google ads...

Reporter - Health Service Journal and Nursing Times

Top health trade titles Health Service Journal and Nursing Times are recruiting a reporter to work across both titles.

You'll need at least two years' reporting experience and a track record of breaking exclusive stories - knowledge of the NHS and data journalism expertise is preferred but not essential.

Health Service Journal and Nursing Times are Emap titles and are based at Mornington Crescent tube in central London.

Apply with CV and covering letter to news editor Nick Golding at nick.golding@emap.com. Deadline Thursday 2 February.

Win an all-expenses paid trip... with our preferred stationery supplier: The worst staff competition in newspaper history?

In the age of widespread job losses and plummeting circulations, it's reassuring that some publishers are still finding the time to treat their employees.

But journalists at Johnston Press have been somewhat underwhelmed by the latest competition in the company's weekly internal newsletter 'The Word', which boasts that the lucky winners of a FREE TRIP TO SEE A PAPER MILL will be revealed next week.

Admittedly, said paper mill is in Portugal - but the whole thing has the definite ring of a corporate freebie.

No we haven't forgotten, promise! 

The winners of the competition to win a free trip to visit a paper mill in Portugal will be announced next week. 

Two members of staff will join other delegates on a three-day all-expenses-paid trip in March or April courtesty of Commercial, our preferred stationery supplier. 

The trip will include a visit to Commercial’s offices and a flight to Portugal on the first day, a visit to the paper mill on the second day, and a flight home on the third day. Time off will be provided so the winners do not need to take any of their holiday entitlement. 

Watch for the announcement and winners' pictures next week.

Seriously, asks our man inside Johnston Press, is this the worst staff competition in newspaper history? Oh no, we're sure FleetStreetBlues readers can do better...

Quote of the Day: 19 January 2011

Well, quote-from-earlier-this-week actually, but this is one worth saving for posterity. Yesterday saw Heat, OK! and Hello! magazines give evidence to the Leveson inquiry, and while they're all obviously happy to do their thing and the readers seem to like it... well, it's fair to say they didn't cover themselves in journalistic glory.

Hello and OK! said that 70% and 80% of copy respectively is pre-agreed, and the following - from Hello! editor Rosie Nixon - pretty much summed it up:

'If somebody doesn't want us to run something, we don't run it.'

The ridiculous stock photos you will never, ever use

Every production journalist knows the importance of stock photos - you have an obscure feature to illustrate, no photos commissioned, and then hey presto, turns out Getty Images does have the perfect snap of a chess-playing mother of four who lives in Timbuktu, works as a dairy farmer and is struggling to cope while her husband's in prison for a crime he didn't commit.

But with the pressure on photo libraries to cover every eventuality, what about the photos which just never make the cut? Well, BuzzFeed has helpfully pulled together 60 completely unusable stock photos for your viewing please - and there's some classics in there.

View the full set here. Now come up with the features to use them with.