The submerged part of the impartiality iceberg?

There is an interesting debate on Adrian Monck's blog on the fact-opinion dichotomy / continuum. The unsurprising consensus is that editorial opinion, culture and professionalism do - of course - influence the selection of news items and the slants taken on them (albeit to differing degrees in different newsrooms), and that the key to avoiding bias is accountability. This need is the oft-unremarked, but always necessary counterpart to other, ex post checks on the objectivity (quality?) of media content, such as those requiring accuracy or impartiality (qualitative / quantitative, however measured).

The real quandary here is just how to encourage or impose such accountability. One option mentioned in the debate is the reflective editors' blog, another is the responsive readers' editor. Ultimately, however, this oversight is difficult to effect because the influences that shape editorial decision-making are often sub-merged or even sub-conscious (this is, of course, the crux of the propaganda model critique - 1,2).

It may be that the central regulatory mechanisms can only ever be socio-cultural: an openness to criticism (with the flip-side of watchfulness on the part of consumers of media, bloggers and others), or lines in the sand for journalistic staff (on which today's papers offer two most fantastic examples: the Wall Street Journal staff's stay-at-home protest, and Mika Brzezinski's moment - 1,2).

Commentaire négatif - c'est interdit?: subtle forms of censorship in France

Also in the Times this morning is an interesting comment by Charles Bremner on the arguably over-weened, but subtly achieved, power of M. Sarkozy over elements of the French media. The President is said to rely on friends in high places - such as the controllers of magazine Paris Match, TV network TF1, and the only national Sunday newspaper Le Journal du Dimanche - to purge unflattering or critical commentary. The article cites a number of instances of such interventions to date. Will this become a new cause celebre for European media watchers?

Red is the new black...

There's a funny, if sometimes disturbing, piece on gingerism by Ginny Dougary in the Times today. She's recently completed a choral piece entitled Ginger Chorale, the story of a bullied ginga (or gingette) who ends the song feeling triumphantly special, after hearing the rollcall of all the amazing redheads who have existed throughout history, and a paean to the wonders of diversity. I heard something similar on the radio recently: a boy who had just started wearing glasses was taunted by classmates on the novel - and inverted - basis that he didn't really need them and was just trying to be cool like Harry Potter...

There's a media law angle here somewhere.

Regulatory window-dressing?: PCC announces revision to Code

The Press Complaints Commission has announced that there has been a series of revisions agreed to the Editor's Code of Practice against which it assesses the behaviours of much of the UK press (1,2,3). The move comes in the wake of the Clive Goodman royal phone-tapping scandal and concerns raised by the Information Commissioner, and follows on from the more specific guidance published by the PCC in May after its review of the case.

In particular, the amendments involve the insertion of explicit reference to the prohibition of accessing digitally-held private information without consent (paralleling or perhaps extrapolating from the pre-existing references to the unauthorised removal of documents or photographs), or engaging in misrepresentation or subterfuge by agents or intermediaries. Further changes to the Preamble emphasis the centrality of the Preamble itself and the public interest exceptions to the proper interpretation of the Code, and reflect the exclusion of user-generated and non-edited online material from the regulator's purview.

Strangely, these amendments were reported in MediaGuardian under the headline "PCC tightens code to ban phone hacking". The first paragraph continued, "the Press Complaints Commission has agreed to explicitly ban the use of phone hacking and intercepts in its code of practice in response to the Clive Goodman royal phone hacking scandal". This isn't what has happened. The ban on phone hacking, which was already covered, remains subject to the public interest override just as before. To my mind, it looks like the PCC (or rather, the editors' committee) has simply been engaged in a process of tinkering to make its pre-existing positions more evident, or in its words "for the avoidance of doubt". I wonder whether the PCC intends to correct the Guardian in order to avoid any suggestion of 'misrepresentation by agent'...

Empires of the future?: Richards on tomorrow's regulation yesterday

Ed Richards, the Chief Executive of Ofcom, delivered a speech at the IEA yesterday in which he had much to say on the future regulation of linear / on-demand delivery of audiovisual content, public service content provision, and public service broadcasting.

On the first of these points he highlighted the fact that Big Brother can currently be received in four different ways: on Channel 4, E4 or E4+1 (embarassingly - although for whom I'm not sure - I had to have my mum and dad explain to me last weekend how the 'live' BB coverage on the latter two channels was able to show the same people doing different things at the same time. Before the enlightenment I'd just thought, "its a really weird place that House!"), live on the Ch4 website or Four on Demand, clips online off YouTube etc, or clips on mobile phones. His point was that while the middle two options were unregulated, the first was regulated by Ofcom, while the last was subject to self-regulation.

Richards' view was that "it is quite a challenge trying to explain this logic to an average member of the general public". Its a point well-made. His conclusion: the recent agreement on the A-VMS directive is "a sensible evolution of the current model" but one that is "likely to be only a stepping stone on a journey, because it’s far from clear that the current settlement represents a long term sustainable solution to the future of content regulation".

So, following Tony Blair earlier this month (on this aspect of Blair's speech, see this), we have a second notable suggesting the need for further regulatory reform in the media sector (or rather a third, given that Viviane Reding has been mooting something akin to a European FCC). Very much a 'watch this space' scenario...

Regarding the PSB and PSP elements of his speech, Richards announced that the second review of PSB was to be brought forward in order, first, that its analysis might inform the government's intended review of the case for distributing public funding beyond the BBC, and secondly that the uncertainty facing existing PSBs isn't prolonged. He saw this review as a 'once in a generation' opportunity to revisit and revise our system of broadcasting, and highlighted a number of key points that should inform the consideration.

Beyond this, Richards threw a few crumbs of comfort to those involved in developing HD for Freeview, although he also reiterated the regulator's view that the existing spectrum should allow the development of multiple HD channels (not just the single one currently mooted). There was no promise, however, that the existing PSBs would get any fillip from the switchover dividend. Russ from OfcomWatch makes an important point on this: "it’s not exactly a great prize to think that in 2012 there will only be 4 HD channels on Freeview. In fact, that’s under-serving the public by a wide margin if you consider that by that time, nearly everyone will have an HD television and want to receive all their programming in HD... HD won’t be regarded as HD in the future — it will simply be the television quality everyone expects at all times... the real challenge for the regulator is what steps can it take now to ensure that in five years time the DTT platform is not considered some third-rate service".

Shooting the messenger?: more defamation suits against critics

Eoin O'Dell has posted a couple of interesting notes on the veritable riot of defamation actions that have been brought by disgruntled subjects against critics of one sort or another across a number of jurisdictions in recent months. In the first, he explained that the action brought - in John Fairfax Publications Pty Ltd v Gacic [2007] HCA 28 - by an Australian restaurant (echoing that brought successfully against the Irish News by Goodfellas in Belfast earlier this year) is far from over, and that the stage reached to date certainly doesn't warrant the exclamatory headlines that it has generated.

In the second, he comments on the decision of the UK Court of Appeal regarding the application of the fair comment defence to a review in the Evening Standard of the Burstein and Edwards opera Manifest Destiny (see Associated Newspapers Ltd v Keith Burstein [2007] EWCA Civ 600). He's also had a response from the composer himself, confirming the intention to take the case to the House of Lords.

Lords Committee to investigate the impact of media ownership on news

The House of Lords Communications Committee chaired by Lord Fowler has announced that it is to conduct an investigation into the impact of concentration in media ownership on news output (1,2). This chimes with concerns raised by Ofcom (but not the OFT) over the acquisition by BSkyB of shares in ITV. The Committee has called for evidence on the following questions:

- How and why have the agendas of news providers changed? How has the content of news programmes and newspapers altered over the years?

- How is the way that people access the news changing? The Committee is interested in national and regional trends and figures for television, radio, newspaper and on-line news consumption.

- How has the process of news gathering changed? The Committee is interested in the process of news production, the prioritisation of budgets and the deployment of journalistic resources.

- What is the impact of the concentration of media ownership on the balance and diversity of opinion seen in the news? Does ownership have an impact on editorial priorities and on news values such as fairness, accuracy and impartiality?

- How should the public interest be protected and defined in terms of news provision? Are the public interest considerations set down for Ofcom in the Communications Act 2003 enough to ensure a plurality of debating voices in the UK news media?

The Committee plans a second call, focusing on the concentration of media ownership, on cross-media ownership and on the regulation of media ownership, for later in the year.