Published July 4th, 2008
in Politics, Journalism, Media and France.
Not much action on here recently. I must be busy or something. Had some fun this week doing some writing in French for Politis - don’t seem to spend that much time speaking the language these days, so I am always glad to get some practice. The story is that Sarkozy wants the government to be able to choose the director of public broadcaster France Televisions, raising fears of a return to the bad old days when French public TV was seen as the propaganda arm of General de Gaulle. As part of the Politis coverage, I’ve contributed a section on “La BBC”, outlining its structure and how the key executives are chosen. I think you have to subscribe to read the whole thing though. Media independence is an especially touchy subject in France, as Sarkozy is reputed to enjoy a close relationship with the owners of private media groups. If he gets his hands on public broadcasting as well - so the theory goes - will there be any truly independent voices left?
UPDATE: The current boss of France Televisions has been criticising Sarkozy. Here’s what the President would like to do with him… (from Placide)
Published June 17th, 2008
in Politics and Journalism.
Alan Beith was described as a Labour MP in the print version of this article on Saturday. Hideous. It’s now been corrected in the online version, but it’s the kind of basic error that makes you wonder whether the Graun can get anything right.
Published June 7th, 2008
in Business.
If I ever get around to ordering business cards, this is definitely the illustration I want on the back:
Perfect for taking to conferences. Cartoon from gaping void (as seen on Alan Reiter some time ago) . I did add the gapingvoid widget to my sidebar, but removed it when I saw it was displaying a picture of a chap with an enormous schlong accompanied by the caption “Yay! My penis is mighty!” Not really the kind of thing I want potential clients to see when they visit this site. And not the kind of thing I would want on the back of my busines cards either - might be OK for Alan Sugar, but not for me.
Published May 30th, 2008
in Drink and France.
This is how to start your day (as well as being a good way to dispose of all those pesky little Eurocents).
Published May 24th, 2008
in Journalism.
Ever missed a deadline? Here’s how to deal with your editor. Way to go, The Pitchers.
Published May 20th, 2008
in Books.
Interesting to read about the auction of a folio of poems by William McGonagall last week. Reminded me of a day at school many years ago when one of our English teachers gave us a McGonagall poem (this one) to read. This was very early on in our teenage attempts to get the hang of lit crit, so none of us had heard of him. We dutifully set about analysing the poem, carefully working out what was being said and how. Only at the end of the lesson did the teacher reveal that it had been written by the worst poet in the world. We felt completely and utterly humiliated. Don’t think I’ll ever be sure what the point of the exercise was. I wonder if that guy is still teaching. I sincerely hope not.
Published May 18th, 2008
in Politics and France.
I can’t believe France’s centrist politicians were considering changing the name of their party to “Solid”. I guess it wouldn’t have been much worse than “MoDem”, which is the name fellow centrist Francois Bayrou came up with for his new party last year following his unsuccessful bid for the presidency. In the end, they decided to stick with the more prosaic (but more logical) “Nouveau Centre”.
Published May 15th, 2008
in Uncategorized.
Mistakes like this really get my goat:
Over the past year the number of cyclists in London has grown by 83 per cent and many London boroughs offer free cycle training to residents, so there’s never been a better time to get peddling.
Yuk, yuk and yuk.
Published May 14th, 2008
in Journalism.
It’s easy to see why so many people have linked to Matthew Stibbe’s article on How to blog like a pro. All good stuff. He’s also just added a fiendishly useful post about how to make money writing from the web.
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