Can we be your friend?

It reminds me of the last time the ITV regional franchise for Wales was up for grabs (and how long ago does that seem!). Rival bidders seeking to get Cardiff's Centre for Journalism Studies on-board to demonstrate their commitment to journalism and training.

This time it's the second regional radio franchise for South Wales that's at stake. Two of the consortia seeking the nod from Ofcom (bids have to be in by December 12th) are knocking at the door. Both are planning heavily speech based bids - UTV (big in Swansea quite apart from Talksport etc.) are apparently going for an all speech format. Town and Country Broadcasting (who own stations from Pembrokeshire to Bridgend) are going for an 'older audience' but still with a predominantly speech mix.

I would have thought the BBC's Radio Wales already had the older audience pretty well sown up but maybe they don't mean quite that old.

Nonetheless the stakes could be high. There's a north and mid Wales regional licence coming along soon so the possibility opens up of an all-Wales commercial radio operator.

Now that would be competition for BBC Radio Wales which has alone, since its inception over 25 years ago, been able to claim to be a national voice (along with Radio Cymru of course).

I hope the eventual winner does have a strong commitment to quality speech and news. It can only broaden and deepen democratic processes in Wales. And along the way, I'd hope, provide employment for a few more young Welsh journalists.

Oh - and when HTV did win the ITV franchise all those years ago, they set up a couple of scholarships for young journalists to study at Cardiff - I think the first of the ITV regional companies to do such a thing. Sadly, but not surprisingly, today's ITV News has seen fit to delete the Welsh language one.

It's happening everywhere

Last week in our online lecture series in Cardiff, Pete Clifton - Head of BBC News Interactive, aired some of his thought about how his online journalists might in future get closer to the rest of the BBC's journos. He's apparently developing a strategy for future integration which might, quite conceivably, be a strategy for deleting his empire; subsuming it into the general run of what BBC journalists do.

How interesting that today's speaker, Sarah Radford from NewburyToday - the award winning web presence of a weekly Berkshire newspaper, brought along a video of her boss, Martin Robertshaw, describing almost exactly the same organisational, managerial issue.

From one end of the online spectrum to the other - the issue is the same. And I'm sure neither Sarah nor Martin, with their twenty or so journalists, would mind being described as being from the other end of the spectrum to the BBC with its thousands of hacks.

How do you integrate the online operation into the traditional "day-job"? Those who get it right will have a profound impact on the working lives of all today's journalism students.

HAIR

I think I've found my first niche TV channel. Someone shaving all the hair off an endless stream of willing victims. Fascinating stuff. Why are the victims allowing this to happen? What do they think this is doing for them?

It appears to be BBC3's contribution to Children in Need. And it's miles better than Wogan on some sort of souped up embalming fluid.

I'm interested because I know I recognise people by their hair rather than their face. It may seem odd but psychologists tell me I'm not alone, lots of us rely on hair for our primary recognition algorithm.

As a journalism teacher, every year I need to get to know fast a large number of faces. Every year I get fooled once they start pulling on beanies etc. when the cold weather sets in.

When I was 20-something hair mattered, it defined you. There was even a musical called "Hair".

One of the most iconic images of 'loosing your personality' comes in the opening sequence of Kubrik's "Full Metal Jacket" as recruits are given a #1.

So you see why I do find it hard to understand why so many men today wish to voluntarily surrender this 'pride and joy'.

As a child I was regaled by family stories about how my father was bald by the age of 21. As it happens I survived obvious baldness till about 50.

These days old freinds don't recognise me when I wear a hat.

The 'newsroom of the future'

Thanks to Richard Sambrook for drawing attention to an interesting memo from Gannett CEO Craig Dubow posted on one of the Poynter forums outlining the company's plans to roll out 'information centres' - or probably centers.

It pays to follow the 'continue' links which lead to much more informative FAQ style pages.

It would be interesting to try a pan-diploma experiment with something like this in Cardiff. Given the will, and the co-operation of all (including the PR people), I think we could make it work.

On a not very different note, I was interested in what Kevin Marsh had to say to the Society of Editors this week (reported in the Press Gazette) on the subject of blogging. 'Replace columnists' - well maybe. He's reported as saying:

"The future journalist - if such a thing exists, and I very much hope it will - will be distinct from the ordinary citizen armed with the same publishing tools."

And he said the distinction journalists will have is "trust".

Absolutely. Plus, I would hope, the good professional skills that we teach in Cardiff which are the source of that trust.

Convergence

So the National Council for the Training of Journalists (NCTJ) and the Broadcast Journalism Training Council (BJTC) are to work more closely together (couldn't find an equivalent article on the NCTJ website).

In many ways not before time. The trick will be for each body to learn from the best aspects of the other.

Here in Cardiff we have a problem with the NCTJ and could possibly give up NCTJ accreditation for our newspaper Postgraduate Diploma. As Peter Preston wrote in last Sunday's Observer.

It’s basically a question of exemptions, from the public admin and legal bits of the courses. Why should long-suffering students be required to sit exams twice over, with a pile of shorthand thrown in? And why should the finest academic essayists have to play tick boxes and short, sharp answers to start on a local weekly at £13,000 a year? If Cardiff, say, were to go it alone, would any of their students really suffer?

City University have already abandonned the NCTJ and the University of Central Lancashire are also close to pulling out too.

The BJTC has so far not attempted to introduce its own qualifications. It has based its accreditation of courses on observed outcomes along with a set of guidelines to which it expects courses to conform.

This approach suits the wide variety of academic institutions which offer BJTC acccredited courses though, most agree, cracks are beginning to show.

A wider variety of courses from a wider range of course providers seriously challenges the BJTC's approach which was developed in response to a handful of pioneering University based postgraduate courses.

Now similar University courses are challenging the NCTJ approach which comes from a very different starting point.

There is massive room for a meeting of minds here.

Cats and dogs

Much the most striking analogy that has emerged from our 'Online' guest speakers this year has come from ex-editor of the Telegraph online, Richard Burton.

He characterised traditional newspaper readers as loyal 'dogs' and online users as fickle and cynical 'cats'.

Probably been around for years - but I haven't heard it before.

Jon Snow and those poppies

Is sporting a red poppy in the run-up to remembrance day really something that compromises the impartiality/objectivity of a journalist?

That seems to be what Jon Snow is saying.

Interestingly the BBC's Controller Editorial Policy got himself into a right tangle on Radio 4's PM this evening when asked to defend what appears to be a long-standing and, importantly, unquestioned policy of allowing (encouraging even?) newsreaders and reporters to wear poppies - a more or less unique privilege allowed to this charity.

World War One has now passed out of living memory, it won't be long before the 2nd World War follows it into the history books. How long can it be before the whole paraphanalia of official remembrance on November 11th each year follows?

It will be a while yet I suspect. But as the parades of veterans diminish, the question has to be asked.

The trick is going to be to find a new way to honour the sacrifices made by members of the armed forces in smaller and less universally popular causes.

"Project North" - has the BBC gone mad?

On the one hand this is pretty esoteric stuff - of interest only to broadcast journalism educators and their accrediting body, the Broadcast Journalism Training Council (BJTC).

On the other, it seems to be a case of some folks (as Dubbya would say) in the BBC following some new regional initiative right out of the window and into realms that would probably be illegal if proposed in Wales or Scotland.

What the BBC is apparently saying is that only people born or educated in the North can be considered for work placements - the key to entry level jobs - in BBC North (the area north of a line from Liverpool to Grimsby - not including Scotland, they add helpfully). But to most people living in north east Wales Liverpool and Manchester ARE their natural big city hinterland - is north Wales also 'not included'?

If this just covered the BBC's local journalism in the North it would be bad enough. But it goes wider.

Manchester is already home to UK-wide BBC production units - religion is the most obvious example. There are plans to move many more vital bits of the BBC's national remit north. I thought this was a good idea - once. If it's going to be subject to this kind of shoddy chauvanism - better stay in London.

Even more alarming is the promise that this nonsense is to be 'rolled out across the country'. So - if you're born in the West and want to work for the BBC, best train as a natural historian.

For the record, here's the full text of the email about this I received from BJTC secretary, Jim Latham.

Dear all - another issue on placements which may cause some short term problems but potentially could bring massive benefits and reduce the grief you get from your students over BBC placements.
This will take some explaining so bear with me and just 'cos you're not in the North Region don't think this won't affect you - if this pilot works it could roll out across the BBC
The BBC will launch Project North in February - in effect redefining the relationship between the Corporation and its customers, particularly in education.
The Region stretches from Liverpool to Grimsby, south of the Scottish border (but not including Notts, Staffs etc. There are deals being struck with every institution producing people from every occupational sector the BBC might be interested in for the future.
Ethnic and Social diversity are very big headlines, there's a big premium being placed on institutions doing outreach work to improve their diverse intakes - placements are an important part of this.
Project North will control placements in this region - for broadcast journalists it means the region will opt out of our central agreements with the BBC - and this starts at Christmas.
The tutors from the accredited courses in the North and myself met Margaret McLelland, the Project development exec in Manchester last week and cleared a lot of air.
The headlines are: placements not just in local radio but in tv, programming (entertainment, reliigion, politics) - agreed numbers of places for each of our accredited courses in the North - agreed numbers of places for students from the North who are on courses elsewhere in the country and who want to return home for their placement - these numbers may be modified by the level of commitment and outreach work being done by individual institutions and courses - no mention of any 50/50 deal - nominated BBC staff to become first-call liaison between our accredited courses and the nearest BBC newsroom - a need to get a clear idea of streaming placement demand across the year (we need to watch the Customs and Revenue stuff on this as well).
This could take a lot of pressure off the remaining central agreement placements and it has to be said will probably replace the personal contact arrangements which have survived thus far.
Clearly those courses early in the placement year - City and Westminster could be affected by this - whether to apply to the central scheme or to the North.
My view is that they should continue to apply to the central scheme if only because full staffing on Project North is clearly not yet in place.
I also think though that by Feb/March we should have the new scheme in place and I will pursue detailed arrangements on that and will arrange a briefing for the January plenary.
We obviously need information now from the institutions OUTSIDE the North region - apologies, I know this will be a pain - could you please give me numbers of students in their placement year (ie PG's and whichever year of the UG courses go out on placement) with home addresses in Cumbria, Northumberland, Durham, Yorkshire, North Lincolnshire, Lancashire, Merseyside, Cheshire.
Armed with these figures I can go back to Margaret to get the numbers she's allocating per course.
Many thanks
Jim

Jim, I believe you're losing the plot here. It is NOT the BJTC's job to do the BBC's bidding, even if you do think there are 'massive benefits' and it makes placements easier.

This is a bad idea which a body like the BJTC should be resisting on behalf of those for whom it exists - its academic members.

But their influence has been weakened in recent years - the last BJTC meeting I attended was a vast table lined with industry representatives plus a pathetic cluster of academics in one corner.

The whole thing is out of kilter and the craven "it's all for the best" line doesn't convince me for one moment.

The BJTC has got to learn how to stand up to the industry bully - the BBC.