Newspaper regulation: blog tasks
Task One: Media Magazine article and questions
Read the Media Magazine article: From Local Press to National Regulator in MM56 (p55). You'll find the article in our Media Magazine archive here. Once you've read the article, answer the following questions:
1) Keith Perch used to edit the Leicester Mercury. How many staff did it have at its peak and where does Perch see the paper in 10 years' time?
130 staff - he thinks that it'll be extremely hard to run print weekly because of the increasing costs, online allows for a much more cost effective method
2) How does Perch view the phone hacking scandal?
2) How does Perch view the phone hacking scandal?
"The biggest single issue is that something
illegal was going on which obviously
should not have been, and which
wasn’t dealt with by the police, and
unfortunately the resulting actions
have been disproportionate"
He thinks we need something harsher and more impactful than regulation
3) What does IPSO stand for and how does it work?
Independant Press Standards Organisation
A newspaper has 28 days to deal with a complaint which after that point ISPO will intervene and assess if the editors code of conduct has been broken
4) What is Perch's view of newspaper ownership?
4) What is Perch's view of newspaper ownership?
He believes there should be a wider spread of newspaper ownership so that one person's ideologies don't get spread to a majority of the country's papers
5) Do you agree with his view that broadcast news should have less regulation so that TV channels can support particular political parties or people?
5) Do you agree with his view that broadcast news should have less regulation so that TV channels can support particular political parties or people?
no because channels like the BBC are not meant to have a bias. I think that if political parties used certain channels in their favour, it could manipulate the audience to vote for the party that appears on the channel they watch mots; despite there being no correlation to their actual political beliefs.
Task Two: Newspaper regulation essay
Write an essay on your blog answering the following question:
What are the arguments for and against statutory regulation of the newspaper industry?
The UK newspaper industry has been the centre for a lot of press coverage ironically due to the way it regulates and controls the content which is being printed. Between Rupert Murdoch and Lord Rothermere, they own over 50% of the UK's newspaper brands. This includes newspapers such as The Sun, Metro, and The Times. So it's no surprise that the influence of these extremely rich men could have a vast impact on the way content is written nationwide. Certain political bias may also occur due to the capitalist nature of newspaper ownership. This is where regulation comes in - it's needed right now. We need to regulate our newspapers because without the statutory significance, we would simply repeat the evens of 2011 where The News of The World shut its doors due to the controversial phone hacking scandal. This incident brought around the Leveson inquiry, a process in which over 100 journalist and newspaper owners were interviewed by court to delve deeper into the regulation of the newspapers. The result of this enquiry was the creation of two new statutory regulatory bodies - IPSO and Impress. Although presented with firms IPSO and Impress, all newspapers chose IPSO as a regulator as it's not backed by any legal punishment, IPSO is merely a front for the same offences, just under another name. Accoprding to IPSO, The Daily Mail has only received two complaints since IPSO's establishment in 2014. Therefore, I can confidently say that the newspaper industry required a sense of regulation because the manipulative measures taken by certain accountability journalists were tarnishing the reputation of the newspaper industry. As I have mentioned before, the editors and owners of a certain publication can significantly impact the political bias and the content it puts out. For instance, The Daily Mail is owned by Johnathan Harmsworth, 4th Viscount of Rothermere, this already tells us he comes from a line of wealthy aristocrats so it's certain that there is no shortage of money. The political bias of TDM has always leaned to the right wing as suggested by their special edition Brexit edition which celebrated the "liberation" of Britain, harking back to a wartime-like front cover. This is just one example that shows you that if newspapers aren't regulated enough, they could be used as fuel for hate groups with an agenda.
Task Two: Newspaper regulation essay
Write an essay on your blog answering the following question:
What are the arguments for and against statutory regulation of the newspaper industry?
The UK newspaper industry has been the centre for a lot of press coverage ironically due to the way it regulates and controls the content which is being printed. Between Rupert Murdoch and Lord Rothermere, they own over 50% of the UK's newspaper brands. This includes newspapers such as The Sun, Metro, and The Times. So it's no surprise that the influence of these extremely rich men could have a vast impact on the way content is written nationwide. Certain political bias may also occur due to the capitalist nature of newspaper ownership. This is where regulation comes in - it's needed right now. We need to regulate our newspapers because without the statutory significance, we would simply repeat the evens of 2011 where The News of The World shut its doors due to the controversial phone hacking scandal. This incident brought around the Leveson inquiry, a process in which over 100 journalist and newspaper owners were interviewed by court to delve deeper into the regulation of the newspapers. The result of this enquiry was the creation of two new statutory regulatory bodies - IPSO and Impress. Although presented with firms IPSO and Impress, all newspapers chose IPSO as a regulator as it's not backed by any legal punishment, IPSO is merely a front for the same offences, just under another name. Accoprding to IPSO, The Daily Mail has only received two complaints since IPSO's establishment in 2014. Therefore, I can confidently say that the newspaper industry required a sense of regulation because the manipulative measures taken by certain accountability journalists were tarnishing the reputation of the newspaper industry. As I have mentioned before, the editors and owners of a certain publication can significantly impact the political bias and the content it puts out. For instance, The Daily Mail is owned by Johnathan Harmsworth, 4th Viscount of Rothermere, this already tells us he comes from a line of wealthy aristocrats so it's certain that there is no shortage of money. The political bias of TDM has always leaned to the right wing as suggested by their special edition Brexit edition which celebrated the "liberation" of Britain, harking back to a wartime-like front cover. This is just one example that shows you that if newspapers aren't regulated enough, they could be used as fuel for hate groups with an agenda.
Conversely, you have the side that supports free speech. With the common sense of the newspaper's editors and it's loyal reader base, you already have the basis for no regulation. If newspapers are regulated. you silence and suppress the freedom of speech which countries like the UK heavily pride itself on. If readers do not like a certain newspaper for its values, they could stop reading it, this minimises the need for regulation because the public won't be exposed to that specific ideology. Furthermore, the regulation of newspapers might suppress the accuracy of the information that is being given - it could also demoralise the writers at the newspaper because their work might not be included, reducing the quality of the content.
To conclude, I think that the newspaper industry SHOULD be regulated but not to an extent where freedom of speech becomes a social/political device.
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