Articles: April, 2009

FT Readers to Write Leaders. Sort of

April 29, 2009

In times in crisis, there are innovations which help your business to survive, and there are daft ideas which simply create more work for everyone. In which category is the FT’s plan to involve readers in the creation of its Monday leader column? Here’s the deal. The FT’s new Arena blog is billed as recreating [...]

She who dares, wins?

April 29, 2009

Blade notes, with considerable interest, that steamy scribe Deidre Dare has elected to sue her former employer, Allen & Overy. Readers will recall that Dare, author of poems such as ‘Chinese Frogs’, ‘Ethereal Conversations III’ and ‘A Correspondence’ as well as a tome entitled Expat, was given the heave-ho by A&O back on 30 January. [...]

That Gordon Brown Video Nasty

April 29, 2009

The FT, among others, opines on Gordon Brown’s recent dalliance with YouTube. Along with all media, the FT seems to take the view that the Prime Minister’s decision to announce on YouTube that he was planning to introduce a daily allowance for MPs was not a clever one, not least because there is now a [...]

The IndyStandard?

April 28, 2009

What price Alexander Lebedev, the Russian oligarch who bought the Standard in January, as the Independent’s new owner? He’s wealthy enough to acquire it, has an appetite for newspapers and long-suffering Indy hacks are presently in the process of moving in to the same premises as those who toil in the name of the Standard. [...]

The (Family Division) Revolution Will Not Be Televised

April 28, 2009

Much was made of the recent change in the law enabling the media access to hearings in the Family courts. Much was also made, by the media, of the fine print underlying the change. Would it really serve the interests of open justice, if individual judges could continue to restrict what reporters were able to [...]