media | Steve Woods

Bristol invents the bup

25/08/2014 Steve WoodsBristol, Language, Media, Oddities

Bristol likes to regard itself as a place of innovation.

Bearing this inventive spirit in mind, contractors working in Old Market Street for Bristol City Council have invented a new public conveyance vehicle – the bup.

A spokesperson for Bristol City Council said: “We take the misspelling of road marking very seriously and will soon be appointing an expensive CONsultant to advise us of the best possible solution.” (That quotation was made up, wasn’t it? Ed.)

Hat tip: Bristol Post.

Update 27/08/14: the orthographical gaffe was corrected yesterday, according to the Bristol Post.
West Country confusion

17/08/2014 Steve WoodsBristol, Language, Media, Oddities
The Western Daily Press is a stablemate of the Bristol Post and seems to share many of the latter’s afflictions – the same ugly Brutalist building on Bristol’s Temple Way, poor English, dodgy photo captions and the like.

It was therefore no surprise to encounter a prime example of confused reporting this morning, as illustrated by the screenshot below.

If one examines the article to which the news page above relates, three disparate elements seem to have been combined by reporter Geoff Bennett (who also writes for the Bristol Post. Ed.) and his associates, i.e.:
- a headline referring to widespread outbreaks of salmonella food poisoning in hospitals in England;
- a cuddly kittens picture and apposite caption; and
- a report on the court case of the alleged groping barber (who was cleared by the court. Ed.) which gave rise to Friday’s sexist Bristol Post front page (posts passim).
There is nothing like good, unambiguous reporting of the news – and the Western Daily Press is capable of nothing like it!
Bristol Post Balls – bad punning and sexism

15/08/2014 Steve WoodsBristol, Language, Media

Regular readers will be aware that the Bristol Post is not renowned for the quality of its journalism.

However, the dreadful pun and sexism of today’s front page of the dead tree edition marked a new low in the paper’s already woeful standards.

Bad puns are annoying in headlines at the best of times and sexism is tolerated far less than when the fifty-something males in charge of producing Bristol’s daily work of fiction first started out in what was then called journalism.

There has been a steady stream of criticism of the Bristol Post on Twitter throughout the day.

However, the paper has not sought to respond to any of its critics, presumably because the person in charge of the Twitter account has yet to notice the ‘reply’ button.

In addition, some of Bristol’s Twitterati have also been alerting the national media to The Post’s disgraceful front page seeking to trivialise a sexual assault.

With front pages like the one above, is it any surprise that the Post’s circulation figures (as measured by ABC) are falling by nearly 11% per year? Not to me it isn’t!

Update 18/08/14: Bristol 24-7 is reporting today that Bristol City councillor Naomi Rylatt has written to the Press Complaints Commission (PCC) over the above front page headline, describing it as a “disgusting attempt at humour“.
Telegraph on prolonged peace mission

01/08/2014 Steve WoodsMedia, Oddities

A typographical error in a headline on the Telegraph’s website envisaged a long lull in the present conflict between the Palestinians in Gaza and the state Israel which has now been raging for more than 3 weeks.

The error has since been corrected to read Gaza conflict: 72-hour ceasefire agreed by both sides.
Cricket explained

30/07/2014 Steve WoodsLanguage, Media, Oddities

The second Test series between England and India is currently taking place in Southampton (it’ll be day 3 today. Ed.) and my radio is tuned to the epic poem that is the BBC’s Test Match Special from 10.25 until the close of play each day, with the likes of Aggers, Blowers, Tuffers and Geoffrey Boycott (posts passim) filling the air with their wise words and wit.

Cricket is a complex game that can take a long time to understand fully and I’m still occasionally baffled by the commentators. For the uninitiated, the many different laws and the strange names for positions on the field can seem overwhelming. For instance, which other game has a position on the field called ‘cow corner’*?.

Below is a simple explanation for the uninitiated, which I originally heard at school decades ago as a brief summary of the game for foreigners.

You have two sides, one out in the field and one in. Each man that’s in the side that’s in goes out, and when he’s out he comes in and the next man goes in until he’s out. When they are all out, the side that’s out comes in and the side that’s been in goes out and tries to get those coming in, out. Sometimes you get men still in and not out. When a man goes out to go in, the men who are out try to get him out, and when he is out he goes in and the next man in goes out and goes in. There are two men called umpires who stay out all the time and they decide when the men who are in are out. When both sides have been in and all the men have been out, and both sides have been out twice after all the men have been in, including those who are not out, that is the end of the game.

For those who need help with fielding positions, Wikimedia Commons has helpfully provided the following graphic.

Note that the fielding positions would be reversed for a left-handed batsman.

* Cow corner = the area of the field (roughly) between deep mid-wicket and wide long-on. So called because few ‘legitimate’ shots are aimed to this part of the field, so fielders are rarely placed there – leading to the concept that cows could happily graze in that area.
Swansea news exclusive

28/07/2014 Steve WoodsBristol, Language, Media

Over in Swansea, Bristol Post owners Local World have a local news title – the South Wales Evening Post, which describes itself as “Wales’ largest selling newspaper“.

As such, one would have thought that such a boast was based upon hard-hitting stories and investigative journalism.

However, this is not so.

Just like its Bristol counterpart, the South Wales Evening Post also has an approach to what constitutes news and headlines which could be described as parochial, i.e. narrow in outlook or scope.

Hat tip: Marjory Smith
The Department of Dirty: coming soon to UK government?

23/07/2014 Steve WoodsMedia, Tech
The Open Rights Group has launched the Department of Dirty website to draw attention to the filtering (also known as censorship. Ed.) of internet content by UK ISPs, particularly mobile providers.

To find out if you can access the Dirty Internet via your mobile, phone your provider’s Department of Dirty customer services. Your mobile phone normally has internet filtering enabled by default.
- 02 – 0800 977 7337
- EE – 0844 381 6301
- Vodafone – 08700 700 191 or 191
- Three – 0333 300 3333 or 3333
- Giffgaff Access adult content
#tidyBS5 in the Bristol Post

17/07/2014 Steve WoodsBristol, Politics

This blog has previously highlighted the problem of fly-tipping in the Easton and Lawrence Hill areas of Bristol (posts passim).

The move to get more people involved in reporting and combating this menace that blights the inner city took another step forward two days ago when it was featured in the Bristol Post, as shown by the following screenshot.

I was contacted by the Post’s Sophie Prideaux and we exchanged emails that went on to form the basis of the article and, as I’m feeling charitable, I’ll even forgive her for changing my surname from plural to singular halfway through the piece. 🙂

Sophie also contacted my local councillor, Marg Hickman, who’s been a great support from the outset.

Another purpose of the article was to publicise the #tidyBS5 hashtag, which is being used to highlight the scourge of fly-tipping in the BS5 postal area on social media, such as Twitter.

As regards Marg’s involvement, the Post states:

Mrs Hickman, a Labour councillor for Lawrence Hill ward, is urging residents to get behind #tidyBS5, saying it’s an “important initiative to improve the quality of life of residents living in BS5”.

Read the Post’s report.
Companies House to make all of its digital data available for free

16/07/2014 Steve WoodsMedia, Open Data, Politics

Yesterday, while David Cameron was rearranging the deckchairs on his governmental re-enactment of the SS Titanic, one significant piece of news (apart from the DRIP Bill. Ed.) seems to have escaped the personality-obsessed British media.

The news was the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills announced that Companies House is to make all of its digital data available free of charge. It has hitherto charged users for anything but the most basic company information on its website.

This will make the UK the first country to establish a truly open register of business information.

As a result, it will be easier for members of the public and businesses to research and scrutinise the activities and ownership of companies and their directors. Last year (2013/14), users searching the Companies House website spent £8.7 million accessing company information on the register.

The release of company information as open data will also provide opportunities for entrepreneurs to come up with innovative ways of using the information.

This change will come into effect from the second quarter of 2015 (April – June).
Ministerial photo opportunity

07/07/2014 Steve WoodsMedia, Oddities, Politics

Last Friday, the Bedfordshire News website published a story of a visit by Defence Minister and Tory MP for Ludlow Philip Dunne to the hangars at Cardington, one of the major British sites historically involved in the development of airships.

From the screenshot below, the visit provided a photo opportunity.

The ministerial party looks like it’s been excreted from or is about to be crushed by a giant bottom. Don’t ministers and their civil service minders ever check behind them before smiling for the camera?

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