TNA Doubles it's iMPACT!

Some very interesting news for the pro-wrestling industry was announced at TNA's No Surrender pay-per-view last night in the US. From October 4th, TNA Impact! becomes a two-hour show on Spike TV on US cable.

It is anticpated that UK satellite channel Bravo 2, which is currently airing Impact in the UK and Ireland will also expand their slot at around the same time. Whether EuroSport will do the same with their airings is not yet known.

This will prove to be quite troubling for WWE. Until now, TNA's 1 hour shows were not regarded as serious competition by WWE. But with the expansion of Impact! to 2 hours, WWE cannot afford to take the newcomer lightly. Now, it can truly be said that TNA has arrived. It has monthly pay-per-views, it has it's own World Championship, as it now no longer has use of the NWA world Heavyweight Championship, and now, its main show, Impact!, is expanding to 2 hours weekly.

Let the new wars begin! WWE vs TNA. The battles are just beginning...

Dubious Awards for Dubious News!

I have some awards to hand out to "newsmakers" and organisations, who have the dubious distinction of creating some very dubious news stories.

The Backpedalling Bicycle Award goes to Idaho Senator Larry Craig (Republican) for stating that if he can get the disorderly conduct case overturned in court in Minneapolis, he will NOT resign his Senate seat. Of course, once you've pled guilty, getting that plea overturned is very, very difficult indeed.

The Award for the Most Desperate Attempt at Momentum Scuttling is shared between Newsbusters, the blog of the Media Research Center, and The Mark Levin Show for the desperate attempt at stopping MSNBC's Countdown with Keith Olbermann's current momentum, which resulted in a week of great numbers, including the most total viewers who have ever watched the show, and the first victory ever for Countdown against The O'Reilly Factor in the key 25-54 advertising demographic.

Newsbusters uses the Mark Levin Show site as proof that Keith Olbermann, or as Mark Levin seems to like to call him, Keith Overbite, is a mysoginist. The trouble is that the links on the page, the links that Newsbusters seem to highlight as being proof of his mysoginy, are in fact on the New York Post website, which is owned by the same person who owns Fox News. Yes, you've guessed it, your friend and mine, Rupert Murdoch. And guess what, the stories highlight what is said against him, and are treated as fact, when in actuality, all we really have in those articles, is one person's side of the story. No hard and fast facts here for the Truthseeker to find.

So, possible lies, and nothing offered in the way of proof. Can we believe the stories to be undeniable fact? No, plainly we cannot, because of the lack of proof, and because the New York Post, much like it's broadcast cousin Fox News, has a definite agenda against Keith. It was the New York Post, if you recall, that trivialised the story about the white powder that was sent to Keith Olbermann's home. Keith later set the record straight on his own newscast.

So, why did Newsbusters highlight this? Simple, to try and slow down the momentum that has built up since NBC aired a live edition of Countdown with Keith Olbermann on a Sunday Night not too long ago. Nothing more than that.

Congratulations to our rather dubious award winners!

Luciano Pavarotti 1935-2007

Last night I recieved an email news alert which said that Luciano Pavarotti had been taken seriously ill. This morning, I woke up to breaking news from Classic FM, that he had just died. He was 71, and was perhaps best known for two things. Nessun Dorma, from Puccini's Turnadot, and the Three Tenors, which he performed alongside Jose Carerras and Placido Domingo.

As a tribute, courtesy of YouTube, we feature two videos here featuring Pavarotti in some of his greatest performances. The first is a recording from Spanish television channel TVE1 of Pavarotti performing Nessum Dorma in concert.



The second and final video is a performance of La Donna e Mobile by Carerras, Domingo and Pavarotti, from a Three tenors concert.



Enjoy the performances.

BBC News has more on the tributes being made to one of opera's brightest burning stars ever.

Dorma eterna, Pavorotti.

PVC clothing popular in celebrity circles?

It wasn't long ago I was talking about Girls Aloud and their latest look for their new video, called "Say No No No", PVC Catsuits.

But it seems as if they were following a trend that has been noted elsewhere. Fashionising's blog highlights the fact that at Glastonbury, Kate Moss was wearing a pair of PVC pants and highly inappropriate boots for the muddy surrounds. Then at the relaunch of the Spice Girls, Posh Spice aka Victoria Beckham was wearing a decidely un-posh pair of PVC jeans too.

Then Hilary Duff made an appearance in some faux-leather leggings.

Perhaps it is merely PVC's time now. When PVC was first introduced as the fabric of the future back in the 1960s, parafin heaters were the norm, and caused the PVC to melt or catch fire. Now, with central heating and air conditioning, PVC maybe finding it's mark as more than just a fetish fabric.

For more possible evidence that PVC is making something of a comeback, let me direct you to the Greta Constatine site, where the pictures of their latest collection show models wearing PVC gloves. Maybe there is something of a revival just beginning to happen.

WWE suspends 10 superstars, maybe more!

I've said it before, it's rare for a wrestling story to get any traction in the mainstream news. So with MSNBC reporting on 10 WWE superstars being suspended by the company for violations of it's "Wellness Program", well, I get interested.

The story reveals that no names have been released by WWE but that the suspensions were...

"...based on independent information from the Albany County, N.Y., district attorney’s office, which has been investigating sales of steroids and growth hormones through Internet and phone-order firms."

Wrestlezone.com is amongst many other sources with more information, although I cannot completely verify the accuracy of some of their stories. In this case however, they seem to be relying on information released by the mainstream media. Of the various other mainstream media outlets that are reporting the story, three seem to be more up on it than the rest.

The New York Daily News is on the case, thanks to the fact that the investigation is being carried out through Albany County, NY Distict Attorney's Office. They were the first people to list names connected with the investigation.

ESPN also listed names, though a different set. They too seem to be well on-top of this story.

Sports Illustrated seem to be the most clued up though, with a story that reads very authoritatively, and gives a more complete list of names. It has to be said that all the names in NY Daily News and ESPN lists also appear in this list. This is why I have said thatb I feel both of the other sources are well on top of this story. There are more details here though, including drugs listed and dates of supply. All of them are between September 2004 and February 2007.

Amongst some of the other reports I have seen for this, are reports that one of the pharmacies involved in the investigation is a company called Signature Pharmacy in Orlando, FL, and that a Florida doctor is apparently helping with the DA's enquiry.

There are also reports that say that stars from Major League Baseball and the National Football League could also be involved in this scandal, so this may not be a WWE exclusive problem.

WWE are known to be facing congressional hearings soon, so this information could not have come at a worse time for them.

This is one of those stories that will probably take a long time to go away, and will be followed by many media sources with interest. Wrestling fans too will want to follow this story, even if they don't like the result of it. One thing I know for sure is that TNA, WWE's best known rival in the wrestling world, will be looking at this as a major oppourtunity. I doubt they will be completely silent on this for long.

Tony Snow - Leaving the White House, back to Fox News?

MSNBC reports that Tony Snow is to step down from his post as White House Press Secretary on September 14th 2007, to be replaced by his deputy Dana Perino.

He obviously feels hard-up cos he said he needs more than his White House salary of $168,000. Ah diddums!

I wonder if he'll be heading back to the old Murdoch dollar at Fox News. He might be able to come close to being able to ask for top dollar now he is well known worldwide.

On a more serious note, Tony Snow is still ailing with cancer after having had a reoccurance of the disease back in March, and underwent another course of chemotherapy, which has only recently concluded. I wish him well in his continuing recovery from cancer.

US Cable News Ratings: Countdown's best figures!

This is a post that I am cross posting on both Viewpoint and EMC MediaBlog. For those of you who read one blog but not the other, a brief intro. Viewpoint is my own personal blog where I cover an eclectic mix of subjects. EMC MediaBlog is a blog I contribute to along with many other Transdiffusion colleagues about the media, predominantly in Britain, but we also cover overseas media as well. So, with the introduction to new readers out the way, it's time to talk about the growing Countdown.

No, this is nothing to do with the Channel 4 game show which started on the same day that the channel did, but a news programme on US cable network MSNBC. Countdown with Keith Olbermann is one of MSNBC's most popular shows, and is in many ways, the ratings flagship of the network. However, it is ususally behind many other shows on both Fox News Channel and CNN.

All that could be changing, because last Sunday (26th August 2007), MSNBC's parent company, NBC, aired a live Sunday version of the show, before a pre-season NFL game. Preliminary ratings indicate the show was watched by around 4.1 million viewers, which is around 6 times the usual audience for the programme on MSNBC (around 600-700 thousand), which for a show that wasn't advertised heavily, except on the political blogosphere,is a pretty decent performance.

Now, the numbers for Wednesday night's cable news ratings have just been released, and they reveal some interesting facts.

In what is seen in advertising circles as a key audience demographic, the 25-54 demographic, Countdown was only 6000 viewers behind their big rival in the 8pm timeslot, The O'Reilly Factor on Fox News Channel (299,000 for Countdown, 305,000 for the Factor). However, the bigger story lies in the total viewer numbers, where Countdown recorded what must be its best performance ever, 974,000 viewers.

This doesn't beat the Factor, in a week where Bill O'Reilly is on holiday, but it did emphatically take second place, behind the Factor's 1.641 million, but well ahead of third place CNN (527,000). Maybe O'Reilly being off this week does help, but I think the greater factor here is the live Sunday edition of Countdown which has definitely brought new viewers, to the show, and in the long run, could bring new viewers to MSNBC. Only time will tell.

On that wednesday, Countdown was watched by more viewers than any of the following programmes on US cable news.

The Big Story with John Gibson (Fox News Channel)
Lou Dobbs Tonight (CNN)
Anderson Cooper 360 (CNN)
Glenn Beck (Headline News)
Nancy Grace (Headline News)

Add to that that it was less than 100,000 viewers behind these programmes...

Lary King Live (CNN - 1,029,000)
On The Record with Greta Van Susteren (Fox News Channel - 1,071,000)

...and you have an idea of just how good a performance it was. Larry King Live was the only programme on CNN to rate higher and nobody on Headlines News could even get glose. In fact, even combining the ratings of any two Headline News shows that day wouldn't help them beat Countdown with Keith Olbermann.

Is this the start of a trend? We'll have to wait and see, but there is definitely signs of an upturn, and expect these numbers to be heavily celebrated by MSNBC.

The Weather In Leather - Joanna Rice

The web has a funny way of allowing you to dig up things that you may have forgotten or had not known about. I found one such incident on YouTube, when we had a weather forecaster dressed pretty much exclusively in leather on Sky News some years ago.



Hopefully my HTML skills are up to scratch and the video in question should be seen above. If not or if you're reading this blog via an RSS reader which doesn't work with video, the link to the video is here.

This got me searching for more, and turned up this slideshow of other occasions when the same forecaster, Joanna Rice, appeared in leather outfits. There's one outfit in particular in that slide show which looks like a catsuit of sorts!



Again, hopefully the video slideshow should be above, if not, or for those on RSS readers without video, the link is here.

I did some further digging around. Unfortuantely I couldn't come up with an official site for her, nor an agent's site, more's the pity. But I did dig up this site, which has 10 pages of her myriad outfits for weather forecasting, most with leather in them somehwere.

I also turned up information about her here and here, which also has a limited selection of images.

It just goes to show, you never know what you can find on the net. Go forth, my friends and explore

Trade-off rescuers lives for the Utah Miners???

Some of the press can be completely stupid sometimes, and in his latest Washington Times column, Thomas Sowell proves that point by suggesting that there was no point in rescuing the trapped miners in Utah.

A whole nation following the tragedy of a Utah mine cave-in was struck by the further tragedy of another cave-in at the same mine, killing men who had gone underground to try to rescue the miners trapped there.

The second tragedy was avoidable — but only if we were willing to talk about human life in terms of tradeoffs. But our society has become too squeamish to do so.

He then tries to justify his callousness by resoundingly condemning any thought that it might be compassion.

Tradeoffs are inescapable in every aspect of life. But anyone who talks about tradeoffs when life is at stake is likely to be denounced as lacking compassion, if not cruel. Squeamishness is too often confused with humanity, but the consequence of squeamishness can be needless suffering and needless deaths

Thomas Sowell, how can you know what compassion is, if you have none? How can you write that, utterly condemning every fireman, policeman, doctor, coastguard and every other member of the emergency and medical services for whom compassion is not an option, it's a way of life.

The only thing that was needless here, was your inane rantings about a tragedy. Rantings, which will cause more hurt and suffering to the families of those who have died in that mine. Sometimes, just sometimes, for the greater good of the human race, it is better that views like yours, Thomas, are not published, thereby not causing further unnecessary and needless suffering, the very thing you claim to want to save people from.

Thomas Sowell's column is worthy of nothing but a nomination on MSNBC's Countdown with Keith Olbermann's Worst Person In The World segment. Heck, it could even win it.

Newsbusters actually reports factually, whilst trying to insinuate bias!

Newsbusters is a blog from the right wing Media Research Center which supposedly highlights liberal media bias. However, this time, they actually managed to report something completely factually, whilst trying to insinuate that bias was involved.

The entry by Brent Baker highlights comments by syndicated columnist Mark Shields, on the programme Inside Washington, produced by Washington DC ABC affiliate WJLA. Mark Shields describes how right wing radio attacks will make Hillary Clinton somewhat as a sympathy figure, in the same way, as NPR's Nina Tottenberg pointed out, as she was elected to the New York Senate seat in her first Senate run.

The whole entry is written with lots of quotes, to insinuate that there is bias in the statements, whereas in fact, what was stated was factual. We have seen it happen before, we could see it happen again.

Olympic Park Security Guard Dies

MSNBC is reporting the death of the security guard who was wrongly accused in the 1996 Olympic bombings in Atlanta. Richard Jewell was 44 and had had kidney problems since the end of February 2007.

I remember that incident all too well. Surprisingly, some original reporting from that incident still exists on the web, courtesy of CNN.com, or as it was known back then, CNN Interactive.

But it is amazing that that event has been politicised by some on the right. Amazing and shameful. I've located an article on right wing news website WorldNetDaily, which claims,astonishingl, that Democraitc President Bill Clinton covered up the bombings! It's from about 3 years ago now, but the ridiculousness of it beggars belief. It's part of a series of articles about a so called 'political deciet' that led us to September 11 2001.

This is why I am against the news being politicised, by any and all sides. To me News = Fact and I know that politics and facts are not exactly comfortable bedfellows at the best of the times. Keep the personal political viewpoints in the opinion columns and blogs, not in the news.

The Castro Rumour-Mill Returns!

Wikinews is reporting that two websites are reporting the rumour of the death of Fidel Castro. ONe even reported that an official announcement would come at 4pm ET. Well, no such announcement came.

I always have my doubts when it comes to rumours, but just occasionally,as in the Sky Sports 3 case back in 1996, the rumours can be proved to be true. However, as is usual in these situations, I will believe it when it is reported by a trustworthy and reliable news source.

I believe that some of these rumours are started by those who would like to see him dead. They are the ones who believe that a Cuba without Fidel Castro could be won back from the "commies". These were probably the same people who thought that we would be welcomed with open arms in Iraq and that Iran would back down fromthe might of the United States. There is no reason to believe they would be any more correct now than they were previously.

Newsbusters bust their own guts!

Okay, now if THIS is not the most biased, egotistical, unscientific poll I've ever seen, I don't know what is.

I feel like adding a fourth option to the list... Stupid Conservative!

Ratings Review: JNLR year ending Jun 07

The Joint National Listenership Research (JNLR) figures for Jun 06-Jun 07 have been released by Ireland's media regulator, the Broadcasting Commission of Ireland (BCI). These are the figures for radio stations in Ireland.

Of interest to me is the fact that little has changed in the past 6 months. RTE Radio 1 still holds a 23% national reach with RTE 2FM just behind on 18%. RTE Lyric FM also holds a consistent 3% reach.

Commercial music station Today FM is only just behind 2FM with 16% reach, whilst commercial talk station NewsTalk 106-108 struggles with just 5%.

It is very interesting to note that the local stations in Ireland tend to have much larger reach than the national stations. Highland Radio has a 64% reach in their listneing area. By contrast, the two local Dublin stations 98FM and FM104, both score 12.7% in their area, which is lower than RTE Radio 1's equivalent number in Dublin (31%).

It will be interesting to look at the next set of numbers, when they next come out.

Welcome to the backwards society!

Imagine living in a society where guns are freely available and it is a constitutional right to bear arms, but sex toys are banned! It would be legal to carry a lethal weapon, but not legal to carry something that does no physical harm to anyone.

Say hello to Alabama!

Society really does have it backwards!

And now, the non-news, about the newscaster!

Hot on the heels of one piece of bad journalism from the Daily Star yesterday, comes a very different journalistic boo-boo from the ultra-conservative Daily Mail. This time, making a news story out of nothing.

The story is basically that during a trailer for Monday's 10 O'Clock News on BBC1, newscaster Emily Maitliss was caught showing rather too much leg!

Apprantly there have been 30 complaints to the BBC's message boards. Note, not the complaints department, but the message boards!

The picture is there on site, and you can quite frankly see how much the Daily Mail is talking through its hat, a hat that incidentally, I hope they soon have to eat, preferably with a hot sauce!

Repackaged 18 month old news? Must be the silly season!

Stories may go in and out of news bulletins and newspapers depending on how much has happened in the meantime, but rarely do you get stale news. Today, you did, from the Daily Star!

The story is about new X-Factor judge, Dannii Minogue, and pictures of her enjoying "...lesbian romps with a naked lapdancer." at a London nightclub.

Now, originally, the crux of this post would have been that what celebrities do in their off hours is really not our business. Even now, I still believe this.

However this blog post has become a rant at a lazy media.

You see, when I checkout a story that I'm going to comment on, I do it the honour of a little research beforehand. This way, I find out if a story is pure hyperbole, or actually has something a little more factual about it. In this case, I simply typed in the words "Dannii Minogue Lesbian" into Google, and I found the story straight away, with the incriminating photgraphs.

However, what struck me about the story was not the pictures, but the date!

The story is reported on the site, dated February 2006!

This material is 18 months old!

Furthermore, just a little way into the story itself, the site reports that the story was originally reported in the News Of The World!

So, just because she is now a judge on the X-Factor, this story is dredged up from a competitor, repackaged it and branded it an exclusive!

Quite frankly, this is the ultimate in bad journalism! We see it far too much these days, but this is possibly the worst example of journalism I have seen in a very long time.

A little research told me just how bad this was and proved to me just what these so-called tabloid journalists will do to get their paper to sell more copies. This should give you all the reasons you need to AVOID these kinds of charlatans. Stick to reputable news sources.

Networking women with new boobs!

MSNBC's News Blog points to a Yahoo! News piece about a company which "networks" women with implants for their breasts!

Is it me or is the world getting just a little bit wierder?

Lego Man found off Dutch Coast!

Saw this on Wikinews, and am stunned.

What I want to know his, did he have any swimming lessons???

Girls Aloud in PVC catsuits!

I've been a fan of Girls Aloud ever since their debut single, Sound Of The Underground. But now, they've stepped up to a new level by wearing PVC catsuits in their new video "Sexy! No, No, No..."

I've loved catsuits since first seeing them on Julie Newmar when she played Catwoman in the 1966 Batman TV series, and with the popularity of the films The Matrix and Underworld, the catsuit is now moving well and truly into the mainstream.

No sexy woman should be without one in her wardrobe.

Big Cats on Dartmoor? here we go again!

There seems to be a pretty never ending run of Big Cat stories in the South West of England. Whether it's Bodmin Moor, Dartmoor or Exmoor, there's more talk about big cats on the moors than I think is really healthy.

And now, BBC News is reporting another big cat sighting, this time on Dartmoor. I'm starting to get a little fed up of all the stories that keep cropping up about big cat sightings. It's getting as pathetic as the Loch Ness Monster sightings.

Big Surprise! Another Republican under investigation.

ABC News is reporting that Republican Senator Ted Stevens of Alaska is under investigation by both the FBI and IRS.

Another story of Republican political corruption that Fox News will probably gloss over. But you can guarantee that they wouldn't do that if it was a Democrat being investigated. It would be all over every programme they could.

US Cable News Numbers: Friday 27 July 2007

I only talk about the numbers when there is something interesting to report. Otherwise, if you're particularly interested in finding out, there's always Inside Cable News. But this time, I find it particularly interesting to note that Fox Noise, Faux News, call it what you will, but Fox News did not dominate Friday's Numbers.

Fox won every hour from 6pm to 10pm, but unusually lost the 11pm hour, to MSNBC's Doc Block!

MSNBC won the 25-54 Prime Time figures too, with strong showings for the Doc Block, and a 2nd place for Countdown, which of recent times has languished in 3rd, usually just behind Nancy Grace.

Bill O'Reilly usually likes to brag that the second nightly airing of The O'Reilly Factor, gets more viewers than Countdown's first airing at 8pm, but not this time. Countdown at 8pm had 662,000 viewers whilst the 11pm repeat of the Factor only got 509,000.

Friday was strong for MSNBC and unusually weak for Fox News. Even CNN languished.

Rupert Murdoch's Dow Jones bid might not continue

The Australian Broadcasting Corporation is reporting that Rupert Murdoch is 'highly unlikely' to proceed with his US$5bn bid for Dow Jones.

I bet that will please the News Hounds!

The Bill O'Reilly house of buffoonery!

There are so many stories that are complete non-events, that to call them news is a disservice to the public and the world of journalism. And it's not just your National Enquirers, Daily Stars and OK! magazines that are worst culprits. There are more sources of non-event non-news stories than many people realise. These include popular so-called news programmes, such as Fox News Channel's The O'Reilly Factor.

The Factor has been caught before getting it's facts wrong, but now, it seems to have gone over the line. Bill O's current target of his brand of bluster is the website DailyKos, which is a blog that was created back in 2002, at a time when all criticism of the 'War On Terror' was branded unpatriotic, or even treasonous. With it's distinctly liberal/democratic agenda, it has become a target for the Conservative media of talk radio and now the Falafel guy is promising an expose on DailyKos on tonight's show that he says will destroy the site.

Except, that once again, Bill O'Reilly is being less than truthful. DailyKos themselves have seen the evidence, and rather than print the photo on the site, they have separately linked to it. And when you look at the photo, it is clear as day, that the photo is a piece of photoshopping! As a subscriber to the DailyKos RSS feed, I've checked back through the archives, and I cannot find the photo having been used anywhere on the site. If anybody can find it being used, I would like to know.

So, as far as my own investigations have revealed, this wouold appear to be a story, made up by Bill O, out of his fear or possibly paranoia, so as to denegrate or discredit this popular internet site, because of it's liberal agenda. This latest Falafel-fatwa is totally, ridiculous.

This is a total, non-event non-news story, that deserves only ridicule, and believe me, this story is as ridiculous as the loofah-wielding buffon gets. There seems to be no truth here for the truthseeker, just a lot of dark, sad unfunniness that should be attempting to pass for comedy, not news.

Expect "Bill Orally" to pick up another World's Worst gold medal either tonight or tomorrow on MSNBC's Countdown with Keith Olbermann. At least that segment is satirical, unlike the Bill O ballon of bluster and buffoonery that is "The O'Reilly Factor"

SaberCats wins ArenaBowl 21!

Congratulations to the San Jose SaberCats, who defeated the Columbus Destroyers 55-33 in ArenaBowl 21 in New Orleans. For the Destroyers, it was just one upset too far. But well done to them for getting to the ArenaBowl, which is no mean feat in itself.

Iranian International News Channel highlights story about Impeaching President Bush. Surprised?

Well,I can honestly say I'm not surprised about the decision by Press TV to highlight this story on their front page.

It's well known that George W Bush is not exactly the most popular US President in the world at large, except of course to American conservatives and Republicans. But remember this is a state-funded media organisation, much like the BBC and Voice Of America. The head of Press TV claims that they maintain editorial independence from the government, though this is disputed.

Whether they are independent or not, ultimately how they will be judged is on the stories they cover and how they cover them.

Arena Bowl 21: This Sunday!

Well, I certainly didn't predict that the team that would take the last play-off spot would go on to appear in ArenaBowl 21 in New Orleans. But this Sunday, the Columbus Destroyers, who have pulled off upset after upset to make it through, face the San Jose SabreCats in New Orleans, just across the road from the Superdome.

Live coverage is on the US network ABC, in High Definition, and in the UK and Ireland, NASN will air the final live as well.

Why am I so surprised to find the Columbus Destroyers in ArenaBowl? Well, they are in the same conference and division as the team who dominated the season with an incredible record of 15 wins to just the one loss, the Dallas Desperados. By contrast, the Destroyers scraped in with record of 7 wins and 9 losses. But come the Divisional Playoffs, it was the Destroyers meeting the Desperados, and winning out 66 to 59. You just wouldn't have predicted it. But then, that is why the games are played on the field, not on paper.

Editorialising The News

I have a confession to make. I would call myself something of a news junkie. I regularly have one of the 24 hour news channels on in the background, and I download lots of news podcasts from different broadcasters all over the world. The reason for this is simple: it gives me a wide variety of different perspectives on the news, and on how the media itself reports the news.

But I do have another motive for my possible over-consumption of news programming. It gives me a better chance to separate the facts of a news item from any unintentional or deliberate bias that might be injected into a story, and also allows me to eliminate the ‘tabloid’ hype and clichés that are used to ‘sell’ you the story. It gives me a purer, more factual perspective on the news, and it has shown up a trend that started in newspapers, but is showing through in broadcasting and the new media.

I call it “Politicising” or “Editorialising” the story. Like so many trends, this one seemed to start in the United States a number of years ago, quite probably around the time when the media regulator there, the Federal Communications Commission, decided to do away with an ‘equal time’ rule, which allowed aggrieved parties equal time to respond. This rule was done away with in 1985, during the Republican administration of Ronald Reagan.

Now let me get one thing straight. You had conservative talk show hosts prior to 1985, and they did not give equal time to all issues, but there was far less difference between perspectives than there is now. But in 1994, the political world in the USA was turned upside down by the election of a Republican Congress, under the political leadership of House Speaker Newt Gingrinch Gingrich, Majority Leader Dick Armey and Majority Whip Tom Delay aka “The Hammer”.

In 1995, this triumvirate of Republican leaders managed to get not only Conservative radio talk show hosts, but Conservative newspaper editors to all speak with one voice rather than many voices, in opposition to the Democratic President, Bill Clinton. Clinton was incredibly popular with both Democrats and Independents, but Republicans hated him, with a greater vengeance than had ever been seen against any Democrat before.

It was around this time that the Republican message about the so-called ‘Liberal Media’ first became really widely known, and even slightly considered to be even possibly accurate. In 1996, Rupert Murdoch launched Fox News Channel to be a conservative news network, as opposed to CNN, which got labelled the Clinton News Network by some conservatives. It was the first time that the news itself was becoming well and truly politicised in the broadcast medium.

Until this time, in broadcast news at least, the news was the news and that was it. You may have had bulletins created for a younger audience for example, but targeting the news with a particular political bias was regarded as an absolute no-no. However, conservatives felt that the mainstream media, or as conservative radio talk show host Rush "Limburger" Limbaugh calls them, the ‘drive-by media’, were not being critical enough of the Clinton administration, hence the idea that the mainstream media had a liberal bias. Of course, few anticipated the story that was going to engulf the news media in 1998.

Before news of the Monica Lewinsky scandal broke, Republicans had been so desperate to pin anything on Bill Clinton, that they were practically begging the media, especially Fox News, to throw them even a small bone to gnaw on. But when the story broke in January 1998, both Republicans and the media realised that they hadn’t been given a small bone to gnaw on, but a huge, meaty, 8 course feast to gorge on - and gorge on it they did!

For over a year, the media became more and more divided over the Lewinsky scandal, and whilst Republicans did not get the impeachment that they wanted, the real result of this effort came in 2000, with the most politically divisive election that there had ever been between Democrat Al Gore and Republican George W Bush. It ended in the ‘hanging chads’ debacle in Florida, and a win for George W Bush, a win that Fox News had declared on the night, only to have to retract it later the same night.

What had really been happening was that the conservative media had been moving further and further away from the rest of the media. But that seemed to be over, on September 11th 2001.

Almost every media outlet around the world was united in shock and outrage at the deliberate crashing of two planes into the World Trade Center in New York City. This single act managed to do what had hitherto seemed impossible, uniting the conservative and mainstream media in the US. For about 2 years, these two arms of the media would act as one.

However, a new media form, which had been coming together since 1994, would be partially responsible for the re-separation of the conservative and mainstream media: the weblog, aka blog. Bloggers had been around for quite a few years, but in 2002, this new internet media format, which had been used for years as a rebroadcast, and latterly a new broadcast medium, suddenly started to make itself widely known on both the US and world stage.

This new medium has become as politically divided as the rest of the media, and in some ways is still finding its feet. Some proposals to regulate the format, such as a Blogger’s Code Of Conduct, have been regarded by some political bloggers as tantamount to censorship.

Blogging grew from being a text-only medium, to an audio and then video medium. Blogs can be exclusively text, exclusively audio, exclusively video, or any combination of all three. Some bloggers have crossed over into other media, such as Michelle Malkin and Ariana Huffington. But there are many more out there for whom the blog is perhaps as close to fame as they will ever come.

With blogs being liberal, conservative, and all political points in-between, we have seen the development of true ‘liberal media’. Liberal Blogs now sit alongside the liberal talk radio network Air America Radio and Sirius Left on sateliite radio and liberal newspapers as being the real ‘liberal media’. Conservative media is representated by conservative newspapers and blogs, conservative talk radio, and of course, the ever-controversial Fox News Channel.

The rest of the news media, mainly radio news and most TV news, including the public /public-service media, try to maintain going down the political centre, even if they cannot claim to be unbiased. But of course, the politically biased dislike any media that do not agree with them.

There are a number of blogs that attack the public media for not being biased in their direction. Most are politically conservative, but one, surprisingly perhaps, is Liberal.

Today, through ‘user-generated content’, such as blogs, podcasts, public access TV channels, and Current TV, there are millions of voices out there. And while some have suggested that this would lead to democratization of the media, it could be argued instead that something like the opposite is happening - something that none of us ever dared imagine. We are seeing the news media as a whole, and individual news stories, used as political pawns, rather than as something that we use to base solutions on. This process of politicisation is only going to get worse, until the media get their act together en masse, stop trying to promote political viewpoints, and go back to doing what they do best: just reporting the facts and getting to ‘the truth’.

Chris Benoit: 1967 - 2007

It's very rare when a story about professional wrestling makes major news. It happened a couple of years ago with the untimely demise of Eddie Guerrero, and now it has happened again with the death of Chris Benoit, in more suspicious circumstances.

CBC News and the WWE both have the story about what happened, but I will not remember him that way.

I will remember him as "The Canadian Crippler", who was incredibly intesne in the ring, and gave it his all every time. I will remember him as the man who retired "The Taskmaster" Kevin Sullivan in WCW, because of a storylined affair with Sullivan's manager, Woman. Ironically, life would imitate art as Woman eventually divorced Sullivan and married Benoit!

I will remember him as a former WCW World Heavyweight Champion, winning the title the night before he defected to WWE. I will remember his amazing victory over Triple H at Wrestlemania 20 by submission to win the WWE's World Heavyweight Championship, and to be joined in the ring by his good friend Eddie Guerrero, who held the WWE Championship at the time, and the celebration they had that night was incredible.

Rest In Peace, Rabid Wolverine.

Arena Football: Final Week before the Playoffs!

I dunno how many of you have been following the Arena Football regular season, but this one has been a doozy. If you don't know it, you don't know what you're missing!

Arena Football League is similar to it's National Football League gridiron counterpart, but in an indoor arena 50 yards long, half the length of an NFL pitch. AFL 101 has the complete rundown on all the changes.

Last week was Week 16, the penultimate week of the regular season, and to look at the week's results, it shows you that Arena Football is much higher scoring than it's NFL counterpart. One game during week 16 saw a combined score of 129 points between the two competing teams, with 9 teams scoring 60 points or more, annd two of those were on the losing end of the equation.

Looking at the standings, three teams have dominated their respective divisions with 100% divisional win records. They are the Dallas Desperados in the National Conference Eastern Division, who have only lost 1 game all season, Georgia Force in the National Conference Southern Division, and the San Jose SaberCats in the American Conference Western Divison. I have to say that despite their only loss coming in week 8 against the Georgia Force, I think it would be a very brave man or woman who wouold bet against the Dallas Desperados at this stage making it all the way through to a sold out ArenaBowl 21 on July 29th in New Orleans. The game will be shown live in the US on the ABC television network at 3pm Eastern/Noon Pacific.

In the UK and Ireland, NASN and EuroSport 2 have coverage of the Arena Football League and as soon as I know who will be showing Arena Bowl 21 live, I will let you know.

Meanwhile, the final week of the regular season, Week 17, will see the Dallas Desperados @ Colorado Crush (8-7), trying to make it a 15-1 regular season, which is pretty astonishing stuff. Georgia Force will be trying to make it a 14-2 season when they host New Orleans VooDoo (5-10), whilst the San Jose SaberCats will go to fellow Western Division team Las Vegas Gladiators (2-13) looking not just to end on a 13-3 record, but also to get a perfect 8-0 divisional record.

The battle for playoff positions is not over though, and with 12 teams making it through to the palyoffs, 6 in each conference, it means there are many other interesting matchups.

In the National Conference, New York Dragons will host the Columbus Destroyers, with the winner taking the final wildcard playoff spot, whilst in the American Conference, Nashivlle Kats (6-9)must win against the Grand Rapids Rampage (4-11), whilst hoping that the Utah Blaze(7-8) slip up against the Los Angeles Avengers(9-6), who are already in the playoffs.

Should be a fasicanting week of high scoring, top class football action. I would recommend that you find out where you can watch it, and stock up on the beer and crisps, and not miss a moment!

Alberto Gonzales: The fuse is lit...

C-SPAN is providing it's usual gavel to gavel coverage online from C-SPAN2. Bob Geiger points out there is an amendment to the no-confidence vote from Republican Senator Dr Tom Coburn from Oklahoma, which says that the Seante has no confidence in Congress! Right! That's never gonna happen!

Blog Browsing: The extra penny.

Have a look at this post from the Reunion blog.

That's my Thought for the Day

Newsbusters don't get the joke!

Newsbusters, the blog of the conservative Media Research Center, show once again why conservatives have no sense of humour.

On NPR's On The Media, Host and Managing Editor Brooke Gladstone joked that they go from "...sort of left to very left..." in an interview with Jeff Sharlet of The Revealer. Now it was an obvious joke, but Newsbusters humourless correspondent Tim Graham, took that joke and translated it to being NPR's motto!

I'm sure NPR Check would love that!!!

Atlantis ready for launch

If you want to watch the NASA launch live, may I suggest NASA TV. They are already webcasting live coverage of the countdown.

Paris Hilton will appeal.

TMZ.com is reporting that Paris Hilton will appeal the judge's re-sentencing of her to prison.

This story is getting weirder by the hour.

Breaking News: Paris Hilton Back To Prison.

MSNBC has the story from the Associated Press.

CIA prisons in Europe 'confrimed' by investigation

BBC News is reporting that an investigator for the Council of Europe has confirmed the existence of CIA prisons in Poland and Romania, which were used for the interrogation of suspects in the USA's 'war on terror'.

Well, it's nice to know that the proof is there, but let's be honest, anybody who has been following the presidency of George 'Dubya' Bush would have 'known' that the CIA would have been running secret jails in places where they were not likely to be found out.

I wonder if this will make Keith Olbermann's Countdown tonight on MSNBC in the US. He'll be spoilt for choice tonight. CIA Secret Prisons, Paris Hilton, the US Secretary of Defense replacing his Chief of Staff, the G8, there's tons of stories out there, and it will be an interesting edition tonight

Pyjama Mamas???

BBC News has a story about women who are taking their kids to school at a school in Northern Ireland in their pyjamas!!!

There's even a syndrome for this, according to the story. All Day Pyjama Syndrome. You know what I call it? Laziness.

Paris Hilton; Back to Prison?

TMZ.com is reporting that Paris Hilton has been ordered to return to court to find out if the judge wants to order her back to prison.

Whilst it's rare for me to agree with Bill O'Reilly on anything, it's even rarer for me to agree with Bill O, John 'Gobby' Gibson AND Rev. Al Sharpton!!! I think Paris Hilton got preferential treatment, and maybe, just maybe, the judge might do something good and overturn it, even if it does put him on shaky legal ground.

Viewpoint Extra: Problems at the UK's Capital Life?

Well,we've just had the 5am news from Independent Radio News in London, two idents and fianlly a different tune. This one is Love Today from Mika. So whatever the problem was, it seems to have been solved.

Problems at the UK's Capital Life?

It might sound strange, especially with the way radio stations are criticised for high rotation of tracks, but this is real and is happening right now on UK digital radio station Life.

They have been playing the same two songs repeatedly for about 30 minutes and possibly longer. The songs are Big Yellow Taxi by Counting Crows featuring Vanessa Carlton and Sewn by The Feeling. No idents, no sign of any extra tracks. I think the computerised playlist has thrown a wobbly!!!

Fox News = Al Qaeda!!!

Daily Kos and Crooks and Liars both have this story, but Daily Kos has the funnier angle!

Since, Fox News is the official Republican party/Bush administration news channel, and since Fox News = Al Qaeda, does that mean the Bush administration is fighting itself???

Flooding in British Columbia

I just read this on the CBC News site and I'm worried. I have friends in British Columbia, pretty near to where all this flooding is taking place, and I hope everything's all right with them.

US stock markets in the red

Well, I had a look at CNBC and the markets in the US do not look great. Everything in the red by around 1% with Dow Transports the worst performer down 1.76%

There were no climbing sectors today, as far as the Dow Jones sector indicies went, but the best performers were Automotives and Parts which were only slightly in negative territory. Worst performer was Construction and Materials, which fell alomst 2%.

The AMEX Composite actually did better than the major markets, being down just over 0.5%.

In Toronto, the stock exchange there didin't fare any better, with their composite index down alomst 1.5% on the day.

Police catch Japanese underwear thief in schoolgirl uniform!

Of all the crazy stories to find, this one has to be the craziest!

I found this on the Australian ABC News Online site. As far as news stories go, they don't get much crazier!

There isn't much more I can say about it, just read it...

Fox News Channel = National Enquirer + Weekly World News!!!

Raw Story has a great story about a Fox News Political Analyst, Tammy Bruce, who claimed that she wanted to find "...the space aliens that kidnapped the President I grew to admire after September 11 and left this tool behind..."

I'm not kidding! There's video to prove it too.

Style sense out of the window?

I will often look at particular pages for a laugh or a bit of fun, and AOL UK's Fashion Police is one of those pages that is a nice pick-me-up.

Have a look at this batch of fashion faux-pas and style slip-ups and vote for the worst.

My choice out of this bunch, definitely Sharon Stone. You need sunglasses just to look at the outfit!!!

News Roundup: Monday 04th June 2007

Al Jazeera English: Pakistan's broadcasting regulator has been given increased powers to close stations down.

Al Jazeera English: Former Liberian President Charles Taylor has refused to attend his war crimes trial, saying he wouldn't get a fair trial.

Australian Broadcasting Corporation: US research indicates that people eat more when watching entertaining television.

1010 WINS - New York: Would you live on the Moon? It's being discussed at a conference in New Jersey!

Comment: I think my answer would be no, there's no atmosphere up there!!!

National Nine News, Australia: Labor have announced plans for a bi-partisan board for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation if Labor wins the Federal election.

BBC News: The Ministry of Defence is to carry out a jamming exercise on GPS Satellite Navigation systems in Cornwall this week.

WBZ NewsRadio 1030, Boston: 3 minor earthquakes were detected in New Hampshire last weekend.

Lottery Update: Monday 04th June 2007

In the UK, every day from Monday to Saturday is a lottery day, thanks to the Daily Play draw. Today's results are now online, and unfortunately no-one has won the top prize on the Daily Play, which is £30,000.

Viewpoint Extra: New York airport terror plot thwated

Well, two days into this story, developments get stranger and stranger!.

NPR reports that a twice-convicted drug dealer was the informant. It's a long way down the story, but it is worth reading all the way through.

MSNBC has an Associated Press story about how in fact the damage that would have been caused by an explosion would in fact have been quite limited, because it would not travel up and down the pipeline.

I have already seen blog articles call the timing of the announcement somewhat suspect, coming just a day before the Democratic Candidates Debate on CNN. Noel Sheppard of the Newsbusters blog even predicted this would happen, whilst the story was still fresh.

Plus, on ABC's This Week with George Stephanopoulos, Democratic respresentative John Murtha, stated that he felt we were getting more of these plots BECAUSE the US invaded Iraq, not in spite of it.

Confused??? So is the Tardis!!!

London unveils logo for 2012... sheesh!!!

BBC Sport are reporting on the new logo for the London 2012 Olympics, and it has to be said that on BBC News 24 and BBC.co.uk, the overwhelming reaction to the logo is a negative one.

Just take a look at it, and you will understand why! Whoever thought this was a good idea seriously needs their head examined!

When I cast my vote on the BBC website, I discovered that over 82% of over 8,500 voters, had agreed with me. If this is meant to be hip and trendy, it represents the typical stereotype of hip-ness! It may have cost a lot of money, but it was not well spent.

Newsbusters shows conservatism sinking to a new low

Just when you think that humanity cannot sink any lower, you discover something which pulls the rug out from underneath you.

Newsbusters, the blog of the Media Research Center which supposedly exposes liberal bias in the media, uses an interview on MSNBC's Hardball with Chris Matthews, as an excuse to blatantly promote a so-called children's book called "Help, Mom! There's A Liberal Under My Bed!"

Childhood, especially early childhood, should not be a time to indoctrinate your kids in political bias, but a time to let them find their own way, but no, conservatives do not want anybody, especially yooung kiddies, to make up their own minds on anything.

*sigh* Why oh why???

From the 22nd Amendment, to Hilary-bashing!

It strikes me just how afraid the conservative/republican movement in the USA is of Hilary Clinton, when I read this commentary from David E Marion at the conservative Washington Times.

Basically, the 22nd Amendment is the one that prohibits any President from being in office for more than 2 terms of office. David E Marion uses this idea to suggest that Hilary Clinton's candidacy may be in violation of the spirit of the amendment, even if it isn't literally in violation of it.

Now, David E Marion is not your average political pundit, he's a college professor of Political Science, so he has some decent grounding, but the trouble is, his article has the definite pro-republican/anti-democrat undercurrent that Fox News and the rest of the conservative media love.

For instance, in one paragraph he says...

"... In all fairness, the wisdom of limiting presidents to two terms is open to debate. Ronald Reagan, among a group that has included Bill Clinton, believed there was much practical wisdom in Alexander Hamilton's assertion in the Federalist Papers that unlimited terms advance the cause of both effective and accountable government. But the important fact as we look ahead to 2008 is that the Hamiltonian side lost the debate on the 22nd Amendment. What won out was the argument that the benefits of institutionalizing change and curbing excessive ambition in the executive department outweigh whatever undesirable consequences Hamilton might have conjured up."

Note the positive spin is in Reagan's favour, more than Clinton's. How can we know whether a third Reagan term wouldn't have been more damaging to both the US and the Republicans than the Bush 41 term turned out to be.

The article raises some good points, but all spoiled by the definite pro-republican stance, and the opportunity to take a seemingly desperate constitutional pot-shot at Hilary Clinton, which quite frankly, would legally hold about as much water as a tea-strainer!

New York airport terror plot thawted.

CNN has been reporting about a plot to bomb fuel lines at JFK International Airport in New York. It is also being reported right now on BBC News 24 and Sky News. There is more developements constantly being reported on CNN US and you can hear the coverage at CNN.com.

However, skepticism about the timing of the announcement has already been noted from Newshounds, saying...

"Here we go again. Another "aspirational" fantasy plot by yet another home-grown "cell" of Muslims angry about Bush foreign policy, uncovered by good police work and revealed just when the Bush administration has had a bad week."

I'll keep an eye on how the blogosphere reports this story.

Webstream Of The Week: Voice Of America News Now

International news on the radio is actually a dying breed, especially after the disappearance of Swiss Radio International, as more and more local stations go online. One source that is available is VOA News Now, from the Voice Of America.

Whilst it is a US Government owned and operated operation, run as it is by the Broadcasting Board Of Governors, it actually seems to manage to retain a greater degree of editorial independence than other state owned radio and TV stations, which is actually quite a feat in itself.

At 32kbps, for the Real Media stream, the quality is sufficient for clear listening, even on dial-up connections. But remember, this service was designed for an international audience, so don't expect to be too US centric, even though it does seem to cover more US news than other international outlets, although not by much.

I rate this a 7.5 out of 10.

Doctor Who rumour shows newspapers struggling for scoops

ITN is reporting that the BBC is denying rumours Doctor Who will be axed after 4 seasons. The basis for this specualtion is a story in a newspaper that Russell T Davies wants to free up time for other projects.

Well, there's no reason why another executive producer with a vision for the show couldn't be brought in to guide the show on past season 5. In the original run of the show, producers seemed to change every 2 or 3 years, until John Nathan Turner took over and basically ran the show for 9 years til it was put on it's "extended hiatus", which lasted until 2005,minus one made for TV movie in 1996.

This is the usual tabloid way of hyping something to make it successful, which Doctor Who has become, and then taking pot shots at it until they make it fall. I'm sure I'm not the only person who dislikes this tabloid obsession with building people and things up to knock them down when they get bored with them, which they seem to do incredibly quickly.

Politics and Religion: Too explosive to combine

Part of me hates the idea that in Northern Ireland, a minister of the cloth, Rev. Ian Paisley is the First Minister, and that he has been politically active for so long. It always seemed wrong to me to mix politics and religion.

But after this story today, as reported by BBC News, it seems even more wrong now. The head of the church in Scotland, Cardinal Keith O'Brien, has told catholic politicians who support abortion to rethink whether they should be accepting holy communion.

You know what he's really saying here, don't you? The translation that comes out of the Universal Translator and Decryptographical Analyser says, 'Recind your support for Abortion or you won't enter Heaven!'.

HOW DARE HE!

He is doing what I abhor seeing happen in newspapers, where the papers tell the readers what to think. In Christianity, the priest or vicar tells the congregation what to think, only they call it 'preaching'. In reality, it is brainwashing!

I am a human being, with a perfectly good mind of my own, one which I intend to use to the best of my ability, and I do NOT allow ANYONE to tell ME, what to think. It's called having an independent mind. I am a lone wolf who goes my own way and makes my own deicisions, not a sheep, who gets guided to his pen.

News Roundup: Tuesday 29 May 2007

We start this roundup with coverage from the Big Apple...

WABC - Channel 7 Eyewitness News: Two coyotes have struck again in Leonardo, killing a pet dog.

WCBS - CBS 2 News: A man with a rare form of Tuberculosis has been quarantined at BelleVue Hospital.

WNBC - News Channel 4: Police in Long Island are warning people about a travelling group of scam artists targetting homeowners.

NY1: Invesitgators in Manhattan are searching for a robber who targets taxis.

1010 WINS: Former Mayor and current Republican Presidential Candidate Rudy Guiliani was accused by a protestor in the Bronx of being one of the "criminals of 9/11).

WCBS NewsRadio 880: Martha Stewart is attempting to copyright the name "Katonah", a move that is not doing a lot to increase her popularity.

And now, onto other news...

CBC News: A man has been found guilty of second-degree murder of his next door neighbour.

BBC News: A Dorset seaside town has been turned into California for a new movie.

RTE News: A suspicious device found by Gardai during a search in Dublin has turned out to be harmless.

Australian Broadcasting Corporation: Wet weather is hampering efforts to contain an incursion of exotic bees in Queensland.

Al Jazeera English: The Venuzelan Government has accused news channel Globovision of "inciting murder", just hours after taking opposition station Radio Caracas Television off the air.

France 24: French President Nicolas Sarkozy is threatening to veto farm trade negotiations if they hurt French farming interests.

News Roundup: Friday 25th May 2007

Whilst Ireland has been learning the results of the General Election, other stories have broken, and the roundup reports on the more interesting stories of the day...


BBC News: Rhodri Morgan is elected as First Minister of Wales, as leader of a minority government.

MSNBC: Fans are celebrating the 30th anniversary of the original release of Star Wars.

KCBS All News 740AM: Another attempt to get two humpback whales back to the ocean has failed.

BBC Sport: Michael Vaughan marks his return to Test action with a century against the West Indies.

TVNZ: New Zealand’s government is accused of going too far, too fast on new rules for car emissions.

This is Cornwall: Sleepless in Penzance, with a new world record for lack of sleep.

Ireland Votes 2007: Declarations

Well, we have full declarations in Wexford, where Fianna Fail has 2 seats, Fine Gael has 2 seats and Labour has 1.

We also have a full declaration in Sligo-North Leitrim and in Roscommon-South Leitrim, which seems to be pretty well split straight between FF and FG.

The more you look at the fully declared results, as there are others too, the more you realise that, as I said earlier, this was a polarised election, rather than a diversified one. Labour, in third place at the moment with 11 seats, could well be the balance of power in Ireland, but as we have seen in Elections in Scotland and Wales, deal-making between political parties is extremely difficult, and it would not surprise me if we had a minority government situation.

Don't forget though that there are constituencies where counts continue as they have yet to fill all the available seats, and some of these will go into Saturday, so we won't know the full story for a while yet.

Just to prove the point, Dublin Central is going into it's seventh count!

Ireland Votes 2007: Coverage

Oh dear. RTE has pretty much been the sole provider of coverage, both in broadcast and online. BBC Parliament planned to relay coverage from 1900 to 2130. They didn't start properly until 1915, and finished at 2055, and just left a slide on screen for the whole duration of the RTE News: Nine O'Clock bulletin.

TV3 has no ability to provide online coverage, as it has no news section on it's website. And the only other Irish news provider is Independent Network News, which has no website of it's own.

Outside of Ireland, BBC News seems to be the only other news provider to have covered the election at all, and that is mainly online.

Sky News seems to have barely touched on it at all, and not so long ago, they would have had their own coverage anchored from Dublin on Sky News Ireland. Now, barely anything. It's disappointing.

Ireland Votes 2007: First wheelchair user TD

RTE News is reporting that Sean Connick (FF) has been elected to Wexford on the fifth count. This is significant because Sean has been in a wheelchair since he was 12 years old, and is the first wheelchair user ever elected as TD.

Ireland Votes 2007: Update

Well, the results so far are looking promising for Bertie Ahern who looks like gaining a third term as the Taoiseach. Currently the state of the parties is...

Fianna Fail - 54
Fine Gael - 25
Labour - 10
Green Party - 3
Sinn Fein - 2
Progressive Democrats - 1
Others - 2

Ireland Votes 2007: The Taoiseach is Re-elected

In the Dublin Central constituency, they are on their 3rd count, but elected after the first count was the Taoiseach, Bertie Ahern, so he is safe and at the moment,looks like returning to the equivalent position of Prime Minister, after this election.

Nearby in Dublin South East, another Progressive Democrat TD, Michael McDowell has been ousted, and he has announced that he is leaving politics as a result. The polarisation of Irish Politics continues, as Fianna Fail and Fine Gael gain the seats that smaller parties would normally have gotten. It looks like Ireland is returning to what was known as the "2 and a half party system".

Ireland Votes 2007: Cork North West

Well,it took them 5 counts to determine their 3 seats. Together with Clare going to a 4th count without electing a single TD, it does seem that the Single Transferable Vote system does takes a long time to sort out what under First Past The Post, would be a relatively simple task.

Ireland Votes 2007: Quirks of Single Tranferable Vote

In the Single Transferable Vote system there is a certain quota of votes that you need to be elected. Now in the Clare constituency, they are into their 4th count, for the 4 seats that are up for grabs. But so far, nobody has made it over the quota for that seat of 11,278. One candidate is within 5 votes of being elected, but hasn't made it yet.

Ireland Votes 2007: Fast Start for Fianna Fail

So far, out of the 44 seats declared, 31 have gone to Fianna Fail. Now, because this is STV (single transferable vote), everything can still change, because every constituency has 3, 4, 5 or more seats available, not just one as it is in the UK. This means that Fine Gael can still beat Fianna Fail if enough transferable votes in either 2nd or 3rd preference was cast.

So, whilst the indications are currently good for Bertie Ahern, they may not stay that way. However, the turnout is reported to be up on the 63% turnout in 2007.

Ireland Votes 2007: The Voting System

The voting system in Ireland is not the same one used in UK General Elections, which is First Past The Post. Ireland uses the Single Transferable Vote system, which is a little complicated for me to explain here, but there is a good guide at RTE's Election 2007 site, which explain it far better than I can.

However, to give you a real life example, in Dublin North, Fianna Fail candidate Michael Kennedy has been elected. Now, there are 4 seats available in Dublin North, and since so far only 1 candidate has been elected, the second preference votes for Michael Kennedy will now be counted and added to the totals for the other candidates, and this will go on until all 4 Dublin North seats are filled.

Ireland Votes 2007: Story So Far...

Well, I'm joining the coverage late, due to having to do other work today but the story so far seems to be that the major parties are doing well and the minor parties not so well.

All indications are pointing to the Taoiseach, Bertie Ahern, gaining a record third term in office.

At the moment, Fianna Fail have 26 seats, Fine Gael have 5, the Labour Party (nothing to do with Tony Blair) have 3 seats, whilst Progressive Democrats, Sinn Fein and the Green Party all have one seat each, as well as one 'other' party. I'll try and find out if that is an Independent or not as I go on.

Coverage continues on RTE One, if you can recieve it, or live online at www.rte.ie/live/ . In the UK, RTE's coverage can be seen on BBC Parliament. There is also radio coverage on RTE Radio 1, and if you can understand Gaelic, also on TG4 and RTE RnaG.

CNN Pipeline goes free...soon!

It looks like the subscription model for online news could soon be dead in the water. Inside Cable News and Media Bistro's TV Newser are both reporting that CNN.com's Pipeline service will change from a subscription model to an advertising model when CNN.com gets enhanced on July 1st 2007.

I'm hoping that CNN take this idea a bit further and offer CNN, CNN Headline News and CNN International as video streams. They already offer an audio stream of CNN, and whilst this is a return to something that they used to do many years ago, they haven't brought back Headline News and CNN International as audio streams, which they used to offer as well as CNN.

The streams don't have to be mega high quality. An 80-150 kbps stream would be generally viewable and listenable, where as BBC News 24's 34kbps stream is just dire.

But this will be a good start for CNN. Now, perhaps this will show to other news channels around the world that the subscription model for online news just isn't sustainable, as people just won't pay for this online, in just the same way, they wouldn't spend £3/$5 to subscribe to a news channel via their cable or satellite provider. That is why news channels tend to be FTA/FTV or Primary subscription at most, not premium, which is what a £3/$5 subscription is considered to be.

News Roundup: Thursday 24th May 2007

WCBS 880, New York: An investigation has begun into how an apparent suicide victim in New Haven, CT was mistakenly declared to be dead.

This is Bristol: Builders are to strip a new building in Bristol of all of it's windows, because the panes are too thin.

SBS World News Australia: News Corp chief executive Rupert Murdoch has denied allowing pressure from Beijing to influence his business decisions.

CCTV International: The Divorce rate in China increased in 2006 by 7%.

BBC News: Cabinet Minister Alan Johnson has accused Industry Minister Margaret Hodge of using the language of the extreme right British National Party.

BBC News: Jersey's Chief Minister Senator Frank Walker is appealing to the US government not to include Jersey in any laws that could damage it's financial industry.

Al Jazeera English: French President Nicolas Sarkozy says he remains opposed to Turkey joining the European Union.

Presdient Bush gets bombed in the Rose Garden...by a sparrow!

No, this is not some late April Fools Joke, this really happened, at a News Conference in the Whitehouse Rose Garden.

You can insert your own joke tagline here, I have rather too many to choose from!!! :-)

Crooks and Liars has the details.

News Roundup: Wednesday 23rd May 2007

BBC News: Local motorists in Dorset are being asked by a local council to sign up to a pledge to keep within the speed limit.

CBC News: Quebec's government has ordered the Montreal Transit Commission and the maintenance workers union until Friday to sort out their industrial dispute.

CNN: A town in New Hampshire has fired 4 women for allegedly gossiping about their boss.

RTE News: The European Court of Justice has backed trade unions in rulings about lower paid workers from Eastern Europe.

MSNBC: Vice President Cheney now has a sixth grandchild... thanks to his lesbian daughter!

NY1: New York is to test smart card technology on city buses.

News Roundup: Tuesday 22nd May 2007

BBC News: A cornishman is 8 days in to an attempt at a world record for staying awake and says he feels fine. World Record attempt website.

Comment: I have enough trouble staying awake for 24 hours, never mind 264 hours! And this guy has managed 8 days... so far...

France 24: Top British Civil Servants have been given video iPods with training videos on to help improve management techniques.

This Is Plymouth: A St John's Ambulance crew who had driven a patient from Plymouth to a hospital in Hampshire then discovered they had been the victim of sat-nav thieves.

Comment: It saddens me but it no longer surprises me. I've known of charity shops being burgled, so this really isn't new, just even more shameful than normal.

NineMSN, Australia: A 12 year old boy has been charged by Police in Sydney after pulling a replica gun on a teacher.

SABC News: A man who claims to have been told by his ancestors to paint his house bright pink, claims that he and his family have become a target for racial attacks.

WPLG - Local 10, Miami, FL: A drawbridge in Miami which was stuck open, caused major traffic snarl-ups.

News Roundup: Monday 21st May 2007

WJLA - ABC7 Washington DC: An alleged madam of a high end prostitution ring has appeared in court.

This Is Dorset: Off Peak rail passengers between Weymouth and Waterloo are facing their second price rise this year.

News 1130, Vancouver, BC: Vanouver Police criticised for posing as media to make an arrest.

KNX 1070, Southern California: NASA Rovers find more evidence that water has been on Mars.

CTV News: Daytime TV hosts Regis Philbin and Kelly Ripa lend their help to the rebuilding of a New Orleans playground.

NHK, Japan: Governing party considers introducing Daylight Savings Time to Japan.

The long wait is coming to an end...

Hell, it's about time!

News Roundup; Friday 18th May 2007

Yahoo! News US: British Lottery chiefs have turned down some strange requests for funding.

WTOP 103.5: An "alleged dominatrix" has been found in Maryland and returned to Virginia to face sharges of Prostitution and Crimes Against Nature.

Voice Of America: World AIDS Vaccine Day; May 18th 2007.

MSNBC: Two Iraqi jounalists working for US network ABC News have been killed in an ambush whilst driving home from work. From MSNBC's Worldblog: Is it still safe to report from Iraq?

This is Plymouth: Four women who recieved suspended prison sentences for forcing two toddlers to fight and filming it, will not have their sentences reviewed.

SwissInfo: Swiss government refuses negotiations with European Union over corporate tax system.

Reuters: Third Party White House bid could shake up the race to 2008.

CBC News: Opposition parties in Ottawa are demanding that the Conservatives make public a 200-page parliamentary dirty tricks manual.

Al Jazeera: A former CIA detainee has been arrested and sent to a psychiatric hospital for attacking a wholesale market in Germany.

BBC News: A man wanted in Italy on suspicion of four murders connected to the Naples Mafia has been arrested in Lancashire.

Webstream Of The Week: WABC Eyewitness News Now

Every week, I'm going to recommend a web media stream to either watch or listen to. This week, I'm going to point you in the direction of ABC's New York station, WABC and their digital service, Eyewitness News Now.

Despite the name, this is not a 24 hour news station, although it does cover live breaking news. At other times, it is a localised weather channel, powered by Accuweather.com.

Whilst this is not the best web stream around, it is a great example of how digital TV in the US works differently to in the UK. Whether the US system is better than the UK system is debateable, but at least, you have to chance to make up your own mind.

I rate this stream 7 out of 10, as the technical quality is good, and the text readable at the size on the screen, but I think that the content could be better.

Breaking News; Wolfowitz Resigns!

Well it took a little bit longer than expected but Paul Wolfowitz will resign his post as President of the World Bank on 30 June 2007.

BBC News has more.

News Roundup: Thursday 17th May 2007

BBC News: Police in Cornwall are warning motorists to watch out for deer on the roads.

680 News, All News Radio, Toronto: A man was shot by police in Scarborough, Ontario, after charging at them with a sword.

National Nine News, Australia: Soccer teams in Sydney and Melbourne are battling it out to win a key match with David Beckham's new club, LA Galaxy.

United Press International: A cat in Boston is recovering after becoming part of a car's engine.

Public Radio International: A topless Britney Spears posts new message on her website thanking her fans. Link to the letter.

WCBS - CBS 2 New York: Middletown Police are hunting a man who sexually assaulted a woman in a church, which was caught on surveillance cameras.

Alan Johnston's 45th Birthday

You may have noticed that I have added a button on the blog sidebar to show my support for Alan Johnston, the BBC correspondent for Gaza who was kidnapped on 12th March 2007.

Today is Alan Johnston's 45th brithday. Like so many other journalists around the world, I wish to add my own birthday greetings to the many that are being expressed today.

Alan, you will not know me. We have never met face to face. But with your reports from Gaza, I let you into my living room as a trusted source of reliable information. I would love to see you back in my living room again, seeing you bring the facts from Gaza to us all around the world.

From one journalist to another, Happy Birthday, and may your god speed you home.

Ratings Review: BARB 5th June 2007

I haven't been following the ratings too much recently, but I do notice in the latest publicly available figures on the BARB website, some very interesting stats.

It is noticeable that Sky One has lost a lot of ground and is now pulling in it's lowest viewing figures ever. Just a 1.1 share / 15.7 weekly reach. It is even more noticeable, that whilst Sky Three has a lower share than Sky One (0.7), the weekly reach figures are better (17.9). Obviously the Sky vs Virgin Media incident is doing Sky One a great deal of damage.

In terms of share of viewing this week, Sky One is now behind the likes of BBC Three (1.2), CBeebies (1.2), E4 (1.2), ITV3 (1.4), ITV2 (1.8) and Sky Sports 1 (2.4). Sky One has never fallen this low and it remains to be seen just what will be done, particularly in regards to Sky Three's prescence on Freeview and the Sky / Virgin Media situation.

Now, for the worst performers of the week. These channels rate so low on share that it's between 0 and 0.1, so we rank them by weekly reach instead. The worst of the worst is Setanta Sports 2, which only broadcasts on Saturdays and Sundays, in a similar way to Sky Sports 2's early years. They rank just 29,000 viewers this week. Then comes MUTV (48,000), The Business Channel (50,000), Legal TV (90,000) and Rockworld TV (92,000).

Setanta may be making a big deal out of the fact that they have Premiership Football from August, but their current ratings are incredibly low. In fact, Setanta Sports 1, which now broadcasts on both Sky and Digital Terrestrial (note: Digital Terrestrial, not Freeview, as you have to pay a subscription), only gets 205,000 viewers per week, and doesn't score high enough on the share of viewing table to get a 0.1, but does at least avoid a complete 0. Out of all the Sports channels that we can track on the BARB ratings, only the Golf Channel UK comes in with a worse performance than Setanta Sports 1 (159,000) and the next worst above Setanta Sports 1 is the now defunkt Prem Plus, which scored 252,000 for one of the last matches they ever showed. Setanta Sports have their work cut out.

News Roundup: Wednesday 16th May 2007

ABC Australia: Australia's Bureau of Meteorology does deal with UK Meteorological Office regarding climate modelling system.

ABC News USA: A New York millionaire couple have been arrested on federal slavery charges.

Al Jazeera English: Chinese Premier denies China is stripping resources from Africa without aiding indiginous industries.

BBC News: Alex Salmond makes history as the first Nationalist as Scottish First Minister.

CBC News: Air India Trial: Witness testifies that a full baggage search would have been too costly.

CBS News: A burglar who claimed to be a 'werewolf' has been sentenced to 6 months in jail.

CCTV International: Russian President Vladimir Putin and German Foreign Minister Frank Steinmeier play down difference before major Russia-EU summit.

CNN: 10 month old baby gets gun permit in Illinois.

CTV News: Canadian Government to ban foreign exotic dancers.

FOX News: Hong Kong authorities want to label the Bible as "Indecent".

France 24: New French President Nicolas Sarkozy visits German Chancellor Angela Merkel in Berlin and calls for an end to EU paralysis.

ITN: Bollywood star Shilpa Shetty will not face legal action over public kiss from Richard Gere.

MSNBC: Lindsay Lohan is the hottie atop Maxim's Hot 100 list.

Wolfowitz a goner at the World Bank?

This is being reported, not on a news page of a news site, but on a blog page. Brian Ross, ABC News Chief Investigative Correspondent reports on The Blotter that the World Bank and their President Paul Wolfowitz are working on a strategy to allow him to resign and yet still save some face.

Full story is here. Stay tuned to your prefered news services, either radio or TV, for more on this story as it develops.

Comparing Scotland to Florida.

NPR Check are really heading out to the liberal fringes!

In one of their latest posts, they comment on a commentary from NPR Weekend Edition essayist Diane Roberts. I have issues to take up with her too! But first, to NPR Check.

They end their commentary by saying...

"...Really the offense of calling the Scots election Floridaesque is that it belittles the accomplishment of the Bushists in Florida. Scotland was a bungle, a snafu - Florida was a democracide."

What happened in Scotland was not a mere bungle or snafu. I was blogging this live at the time, the posts are still here for anyone to read. AT THE TIME, I dreaded to think that we were going to have an electoral incident like the Florida "hanging chads" debacle, but as the night and day wore on, it became clear to me that this was the British equivalent of "hanging chads".

However much extreme liberals like to say that the election was stolen from Al Gore, what happend back then, CANNOT be changed now. It is history, consign it to there!

And in terms of the size of the bungle, the hanging chads debacle only affected one state in an election that was run nationwide. However much you tabloidize it, it did not affect the 49 other states, because it did not HAPPEN in those states. The Scottish Spoilt Ballots debacle affected the WHOLE Scottish Parliamentary Election! We will have no idea how those 142,000 spolit ballots would have affected the election had they not been spoilt. And perhaps, it's better for our collective sanity, that we don't.

Now, for Diane Roberts!

I understand she is in the UK for the summer, and I understand that she is a Florida native. She felt offence that the Scottish debacle should even be compared to the Flordia one. As she herself described it on her commentary, "...it has become a byword for Electile Dysfunction!", primarily by the 24/7/365 media that we have in this world today. Diane, wake up and smell it! She tried to turn it against us by saying "...we faced our voting demons, we got help!".

WHAT THE HELL DO YOU THINK THEY'RE DOING NOW???

The real offence you should be feeling, is that something as bad as the hanging chads debacle even HAPPENED in the first place. By taking out your anger on the comparisons, you are doing nothing more than defending the debacle! Hey, it might have been a debacle, but it was our debacle and don't you ever compare your piddling little incident which will only affect 6 million people to something which affected the entire world! is the attitude I got from the commentary.

Diane, if BBC analysts were comparing it to Florida's hnaging chads, then there IS a comparison to be made. LIVE WITH IT!

Now, back to NPR Check...

If you find her commentaries out of place, why don't you have a go at the commentaries and shows of rabid conservatives, such as Rush "Limburger" Limbaugh, Bill O'Reilly and Sean Hannity. THESE are the people you really need to be commenting on, rather than a public service like NPR.

But as usual, it's one rule for the public broadcasters and no rules for the commercial ones. I've said it before, and I'll say it again. IF you are going to hold public broadcasters like NPR, CBC and the BBC to one high standard, then you MUST hold the commercial broadcasters to the SAME high standard. Otherwise, don't bother.

The Accu-Wrath Weather Forecast!!!

Apparently this was on HBO's Real Time with Bill Maher. I didn't see it, but the 'skit' is on Crooks and Liars.

Personally, that wig looks crap!