On Page 22 of today’s Times sits a series of articles in contrast with the rest of the paper’s coverage of Team GB’s record Olympics haul. A bold headline emblazoned with the Chinese flag praises “China Heroes” such as weightlifter Long Qingquan and table tennis champion Ding Ning. A far cry from the front page headline of “Demand for new honours as Team GB beat China”…
Upon closer inspection, the gushingly patriotic articles are the efforts of a full page advertisement from the Chinese state’s official Xinhua News Agency. Xinhua today declared China “second in the overall standings”, despite Team GB coming second via the traditional tally of gold medals. Odd choice of paper for the bragging propaganda, since the proprietor has really gone off Chinese…
Independent staff, banging ourselves out pic.twitter.com/gcn7HQNAQv
— Matthew Moore 🇺🇦 (@mattkmoore) March 25, 2016
The deadest of the dead tree press…
Evgeny Lebedev is expected to close the Indy and Sindy print editions as soon as tonight. Of the 150 full-time staff, just 20 or so look like they’ll moving over to the i paper. It will not be difficult for the owners to find voluntary redundancies. Many journalists at the Indy will be loathe to work for the much-derided, clickbait-obsessed online offering.
Meanwhile the Guardian is imposing 20% cuts, with staff warned in an email this morning that “As our staff costs are by far our biggest overhead, one outcome of the budgeting process may be that redundancies are proposed”. They are looking at 100 redundancies, and according to Beth Rigby they want to start with their “on leave” columnist Seumas Milne. He is in line for a £90,000 payout.
Media sources tell Guido that the Telegraph is set to announce a jobs cull next week. Print journalists there are furious at the dumbing down of content for their own ‘digital first’, Indy-style clickbait-based website. You will often find the exact same traffic-farming stories on the Telegraph site as you will on the Indy online. See the Telegraph’s “Man with two penises writes tell-all memoir” and the i100’s “The man with two penises has now written a tell-all memoir”.
The FT have some killer numbers:
“Fleet Street’s large newsroom may be unsustainable. The Times had 454 editorial staff at last count, The Sun 525, the Daily Telegraph 662 and The Guardian, following expansion overseas, 925.”
Online-only is the only option. The question now is how proprietors and executives will reconcile the trend for traffic-driving churnalism to the pay the bills with actual, old-fashioned journalism in the digital age. The future of journalism is specialism, the most profitable online media operations have focus, that generates specific audience demographics that can be packaged for advertisers at premium prices.
Read Guido’s column in the Sun on Sunday to discover the fate of Labour’s 20 discarded chicken suits. Don’t miss out on:
- Just what the junior doctor ordered… tax deductible Val d’Isere Doctors Winter Conference
- Why UKIP are Uber flip-floppers
- Theresa May swerves the opportunity to back Britain staying in the EU
- The Labour MP who heckles Commons opponents by telling them they’ve been blocked on Twitter
- Why the Tories are telling the LibDems to pack their bags all over again
- Labour’s never-ending hypocrisy on zero hours contracts
- Minister Sniffed Poppers at Cabinet Table
You can read it all today, for free, here…
See Guido’s column in the Sun on Sunday for the BBC’s refusal to deny that they chauffeured Jihadi Sid to interviews so he could spout his pro-ISIS views on national television. Don’t miss out on:
- RED ON RED: Labour MPs say they are victims of a Corbynista revenge plot
- How George Osborne is menacing Tory ministers and MPs
- Why armed police were called to a Tory minister’s office this week
- BRUM BUNFIGHT: Radical left-winger Salma Yaqoob DID try to join Labour, decision now with NEC
- Mark Reckless’ Dirty Secret
You can read it all today, for free, here…
Read all about Keith Vaz and the Russian glamour models in Guido’s column in the Sun on Sunday. Don’t miss out on:
- Security Shocker: Jeremy Corbyn in his own words, wants an “end to Nato”
- Despite complaining when Zac Goldsmith called him a “radical“, Sadiq Khan called himself radical 19 times
- Mystery of the Reshuffle Cauliflower Solved
- Something of a fallout between Corbyn and McDonnell
- High-Friers: Meet the Tory Two Who Worked Together at McDonald’s
- “I’ve no idea what you’re talking about, but you’re probably after my sister” – Awkward Eagle Reshuffle Moment
You can read it all today, for free, here…
