Comments on: Who says it’s grim up north?

By: Lazy journalist

Lazy journalist — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 20:52:36 +0000

FR: Your comment is much appreciated. I am currently working bloody hard… on trying to get out of journalism.

I’ll let you into a secret – I hate court reports too.

By: yankunian

yankunian — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 10:53:39 +0000

Ooh Tim, are you getting a shed? That’s quite exciting.

By: Fat Roland

Fat Roland — Thu, 23 Oct 2008 20:21:48 +0000

LJ: I was speaking as a former journalist myself, and, um, well, yes my comment was unfair. Journalists work bloody hard.

I still hate court reports, though.

The particular overpaid tosser to which I was answerable had, I recall, an alarming number of curry stains on his chair. Oddly, I never saw him eating the stuff.

By: Lazy journalist

Lazy journalist — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 20:46:27 +0000

Granted, not a great selection of stories at that particular snapshot of that particular day. But comments like Fat Rolaand’s makes my blood fucking boil. I’m sure someone who works on a news website would love to sit around pondering their next big journalistic investigation, but this isn’t the 70s and the chances are there will be some overpaid tosser in an office somewhere asking why they haven’t written their 10 stories for that day…

By: Mancubist

Mancubist — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 09:21:34 +0000

But surely in a city of this size, some news is good news… (See what I did there?)

By: Tim

Tim — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 09:13:38 +0000

“Lancaster resident’s shed to be delivered ahead of schedule. Resident reports feelings of mild excitement.”

Good news somehow doesn’t have the same ring of newsworthiness, does it?

By: Fat Roland

Fat Roland — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 07:28:23 +0000

It’s not that they want to print bad news: they’re just being lazy.

This is slightly understating things, but all you’re looking at is:

Phone call to police press office.
Court report from court reporter.
Phone call to police press office.
Phone call to police press office.
Court report from court reporter.
Court report from court reporter.

It’s the lack of journalistic variety that offends me, not the tone.

By: Steve Connor

Steve Connor — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 05:16:12 +0000

With you on this one. Both on NW Tonight and the ‘original modern’ radio station of BBC Manchester there’s just nothing of substance, just crime and titillation. Maybe that’s why Manchester Confidential, in between the promos and the reviews, has made such a good play of including intelligent commentary, features etc…