Words Dept.

Hopefully nobody noticed that until this morning I had a new post about the media’s coverage of Alfie Patten on this site. I really should have been aware that the reporting of new details of this case is forbidden thanks to a court ruling, something that was helpfully pointed out through the comments section. In my defence, the [...]

Nice to see someone is daring to divert from the Daily Mail party line over Russell Brand. Unfortunately that someone is… the Daily Sport. Russell Brand resigned yesterday following thousands of complaints about his Radio 2 show… But the Daily Sport is backing the long-haired weirdo…Forget all that Political Correctness Shite and BRING BRAND BACK!!! The [...]

One of the most enlightening pieces of journalism re the Russell Brand/Jonathan Toss incident was when the BBC’s David Sillito solicited the views of people queuing to watch the filming of the Alan Titchmarsh Show and compared them with the views of people queuing to watch Never Mind the Buzzcocks. The former group (old people) [...]

I may have created the impression the other day that I think Robert Peston is a tosser. This wasn’t my intention at all because, notwithstanding his numerous presentational faux pas, I actually deeply admire his ability to get up the noses of the Daily Mail (“Does this man have too much power?”), various bloggers and, [...]

The Daily Mail apparently wants to charge freelance journalists to write for its newspapers. Yes, that’s right: the Mail thinks freelancers should pay £175 in order to be added to a list that will permit them to supply work. After that, a simple brown envelope containing £120 will suffice each year thereafter in order for the freelancer to remain on “the list”. This comes from [...]

Just in case you were struggling to imagine what a child hidden in a drawer under a bed looks like, the Daily Mail is pleased to help out. Next week in the Mail: a delightful cutaway diagram showing how asylum seekers prepare swans for the oven. Mmm. Swans. [Dribble.]

It’s just struck me while watching Question Time that Sarah Sands, the “consulting editor” (whatever that means) of the Daily Mail is the reincarnation of Sally Smedley from Drop the Dead Donkey. Same clothes, same hairstyle, same jewellery, same voice, same disconcerting stare. Sally Smedley, Globelink News (left); Sarah Sands with colleagues from the Daily [...]

Is it fair to say that coverage of the outbreak of foot and mouth disease in the South East has been overblown as a result of the so-called “silly season”? According to Peter Wilby in the Guardian yesterday, the excitable tone of coverage, especially in the Daily Mail – which, a fortnight ago described a [...]

Marks & Spencer is launching a £150 suit that allows you to control your iPod using a controller hidden in the lapel and wires concealed within the lining, reports the Daily Mail. I can’t possibly imagine why anyone would want such a thing, other than to mark themselves out as the biggest prat in the [...]