Jonathan Ross to follow lead of Scott Turow?

January 8, 2010

plane window view

All media are full of reports of Jonathan Ross’s resignation from the BBC. One of the most perceptive pieces is by Mark Lawson in the Guardian, who, in chronicling the events leading up to Ross’s departure, suggests that the well-remunerated if linguistically louche broadcaster was the author of his own misfortune. Lawson argues that ever since Sachsgate, the Mail’s Public Enemy No. 1′s days were numbered and, indeed, it doesn’t take the forensic lawyerly skills of, say, Scott Turow to wonder whether Ross’s hand was forced by what legal professionals know as the ‘omission to act’. If, as Lawson implies, the BBC’s silence in the face of the renewal date for Ross’s contract sounded ever more clearly, resignation would have been the most dignified option available.

But whither Ross now? Perhaps he might take a leaf out of none other than Mr Turow’s book. The ‘Guide to Frequent Flying’ one, that is. As Legal Blog Watch reports, Turow, a successful writer and lawyer, recently spent an entire day flying around America on a 5,400 mile ‘mileage run’ to keep his Executive Platinum status on American Airlines intact. The man who penned Presumed Innocent wrote about the experience in the New York Times, and, it seems, thoroughly enjoyed his 16 hours in transit: “Three connections made. Four meals, three ramekins of mixed nuts and a full day of work, some as a lawyer, some as a writer, and some good reading — James McManus’s Cowboys Full.”

Perhaps Ross, who must have an executive airline card or two, not to mention a small nation’s worth of air miles, might care to take to the skies?

Pictured courtesy of Hum200_8a: the view from an aeroplane window. Note the absence of paparazzi.

 

Comments

Please submit comments to Swordplay below.

Good work by Rusbridger

February 10, 2012
scissors

The headline says it all: ‘Guardian editor Alan Rusbridger takes pay cut‘.

Dan Sabbagh’s piece says a bit more: said editor ‘emailed staff at the newspaper to say that his salary in the upcoming 2012-13 financial year will be £395,010, compared with £438,900 in the current financial year’.

Some voices say: ‘How worthy.’

Others opine: ‘Well, he would, wouldn’t he?’

But we say: good work by Mr Rusbridger. For the sake of the media’s survival, we hope that others in senior positions in the industry will follow suit.

Image of toolkit allegedly deployed by Alan Rusbridger courtesy of Flickr user LollyKnit.

From the inside of the maze, ethically outwards

February 9, 2012

Curious times in the media; strange days at The Times.

Would ‘Dacre Cards‘ – the system of licensing journalists proposed by Daily Mail editor Paul Dacre – have prevented the embarrassment now palpable at the Times over the NightJack story?

Times editor James Harding’s evidence to the Leveson Inquiry seemed heartfelt and contrite, albeit that the paper’s former long-serving and much-respected lawyer, Alastair Brett, seems to have been, er, rather dropped in it. Clearly, mistakes were made with regard to NightJack by young reporter Patrick Foster who, once he had hacked into NightJack’s account and thus discovered his identity, then embarked on a quest to expose it via legitimate methods. This, as Inquiry counsel Robert Jay QC put it, was “rather like working from the inside of the maze out”.

But had Foster been licensed via a Dacre Card, would this unsavoury episode in the Times’s history have been avoided?

We suspect not. A raft of laws were in existence at precisely the time when many News of the World journalists seemed to believe that they were entitled to hack any phone they liked. Those laws forbade them from doing so, and yet made no difference. Aside from the obvious objection to them – that they will squeeze out freelancers and citizen journalists – Dacre Cards would simply amount to something to circumvent.

What is really required is an ethical shake-up, from top to bottom. Society generally – not just journalists – needs a sense that some things are just plain wrong.

Supreme Court on Twitter

February 6, 2012

Something remarkable happened today. Yes, the Supreme Court launched its Twitter feed. It even has a Twitter policy, one of caveats, disclaimers and little by way of illumination but regardless: who would have thought that the successor body to the House of Lords would stoop to engage with the world of tweets, hashtags and retweets?

We look forward to the day when court business will be conducted via Twitter. Meantime, check out this link for an excellent blog on the Supreme Court.