The Media Blog

The 10 biggest news stories of 2010

As we draw towards the end of another year, it's worth looking back on some truly momentous stories that dominated the UK media through 2010. (The charts of online news coverage, below, are all generated by Google Trends. They show only the timeline of each story as it developed and waned through 2010, they are not directly comparable to one another in terms of volume.)

1. Haitian earthquake
The earthquake which hit Haiti on 12 January claimed the lives of around a quarter of a million people and dominated headlines, creating a level of media coverage that was unmatched by any other single story during the year:

 
2. BP oil spill
The second biggest story of the year, dominating the summer months, was the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico which made a worldwide hate figure of BP CEO Tony Hayward whose botched handling of the crisis became almost as big a story as the natural disaster unfolding off the US coast.

 
3. The World Cup
England's poor performance in the World Cup provided plenty of ammo for the media as they filled pages with news from South Africa 2010 during the first half of June before tailing off during the latter, England-free stages of the competition.

 
The star of the World Cup, for the UK media at least, was undoubtedly the 'vuvuzela' a hitherto unheard of plastic trumpet which dominated both the airwaves and the lexicon of World Cup coverage. It speaks volumes of England's performance that the vuvuzela commanded more coverage than England captain Steven Gerrard during June 2010, as the following graph shows:

 
How the top three stories compare
The Haitian earthquake (blue line below) generated by far the greatest spike of news coverage although the greater longevity of the BP spill story (red line) in the minds of the media means it will have generated a greater volume cumulatively. The bulk of the BP spill coverage coincided almost exactly with the World Cup, though the latter event never managed the same spike of coverage as BP's natural disaster over the summer months. 
4. Snow hits the UK
The British weather is the gift that keeps on giving for the UK media. Rolling news and pages upon pages of online and print coverage reliably informed us in both January and December of this year that winter is cold, ice is slippery and snow remains the Kryptonite of the transport network:

 

5. The General Election
A change of government, a coalition, an elderly "bigot"in Rochdale, the first ever televised leaders' debates and a questionable advert for 'tactical voting', the general election generated acres of media coverage in the Spring. But when a general election plays second fiddle in a list of the year's big news stories to snow, we have an answer to explain the low turnout at the polls:

6. The Pope visits the UK
The Pope's visit to the UK in September generated swathes of media coverage on everything from the tacky merchandise it inspired to the allegations of institutionalised child abuse within the Catholic church that it once again brought to the fore:

 

7. The Ash cloud
Travel disruption, stunning sunsets and a volcano nobody could pronounce (Eyjafjallajkull) made headline news for much of May. Airports across Europe ground to a halt for days on end as everybody in the media became an expert volcanologist:

 
8. Chilean Miners
Buried deep underground the 33 Chilean miners will have been largely unaware of the media circus which grew around their incredible story and ultimate rescue during the autumn:

 

9. The Apple iPad
The media's love affair with Apple gadgets reached a head in early 2010 when the iPad hit the shelves, sending editor's into a frenzy of multipage picture stories and SEO-driven iPad-inspired headlines:

 

10. Wikileaks
The release of thousands of US government cables provided the media with an all-you-can-eat buffet of news all washed down with gallons of intrigue, insinuation and scandal around Wikileaks' founder Julian Assange:

 

Oh dear... what have we started?

Since asking whether this is the best headline of the year we have been inundated with the best double entendre - or in some instances worst single entendre - the local press can manage. So far this is the best of a bad bunch, from Wales Online:

They knew what they were writing... (Thanks to Matt Rosser for flagging)
 

Is this the best headline of the year?

Want proof that you can be arrested for anything these days? Are we not all guilty of this crime?

 

(With the utmost hat tippage to Jon Slattery for the original spot)

Top 10 Media Blog posts of 2010

1. BBC calls its own Facebook fans "saddos"

2. Ooops! The Daily Mail falls victim to spoof Steve Jobs iPhone recall Tweet

3. Gazza and Moat: The radio interview

4. ITV News slams Nigella Lawson as unattractive

5. A "first class" performance by Cameron and ITV

6. The Daily Mail song

7. Boston Globe shamed by Hillsborough slur

8. And The Media Hero of 2010 is...

9. Rain with a chance of obscene gestures: Weatherman gives anchor the finger

10. Sun shakes its fist at 'posh wank' scandal

There will be Sun on Christmas Day

The Sun has hatched a plan to capitalise on the 'how exciting I got an iPad for Christmas' market.

The paper will publish a digital edition on Christmas Day.

Of course in publishing terms there's nothing particularly clever about getting a digital version live these days, not least because much of the content will already be sat waiting to go. But The Sun is clearly using this as a recruitment tool to get its normally £4.99 iPad app onto people's new toys on Christmas Day with an introductory 30 day free trial. The Sun then has a month to convince users it's worth having and paying for.

Dominic Mohan, editor of The Sun, said:

"Throughout The Sun's 41-year history we have always respected the agreement amongst newspaper publishers in not publishing a Christmas Day edition of The Sun [a claim Roy Greenslade disputes]. However, this year we have seen dramatic innovations in the way that we deliver news to our readers and couldn't resist the opportunity to break with tradition and produce this dazzling digital edition of the paper - direct to readers' sofas on Christmas Day."

And in case you're wondering, The Sun was apparently able to circumvent Apple's nudity ban (which thwarted the Playboy app earlier this year), in order to get Page 3 onto the iPad, by requiring downloaders to claim - or confirm - they are over 17. 

Is the BBC revealing the first signs of Tesco's Denmark invasion?

This BBC report about tonight's edition of Panorama, covering the growth of the four main supermarkets, features some interesting yet disturbing graphics.

Forty seconds in the report features computer graphics of branches of Tesco, Sainsbury's, Asda and Morrisons unfolding out of nowhere and setting up shop (screenshot, right).

What is disturbing (apart from the whole business of supermarket expansion) is that these animated sequences seem uncannily similar to scenes from Armando Iannucci's futuristic sketch show Time Trumpet which reported that in 2012 Tesco had invaded Denmark. Is this a warning from the future? Judge for yourself from this YouTube clip (around 1minute 20 seconds in).

 

"You're sending Jeremy Hunt? Shiiiit that's all you had to say!"

Remember that moment in Pulp Fiction where, having seen Vincent make a Marvin-sized mess on the inside of his car, Jules is reassured by his boss Marsellus Wallace that he's sending his best guy to sort out the situation:

"You're sending' The Wolf?... Shiiiiit... That's all you had to say!"   

Now imagine how Rupert Murdoch feels knowing Jeremy Hunt will now be presiding over whether or not he'll be allowed to acquire the controlling stake in BSkyB.

Not so much a Wolf, more a lapdog, but his arrival on the scene will surely bring with it the same sense of relief and assurance that everything is going to be OK.

Top 10 Media blunders of 2010

2010 has seen an array of gaffes and blunders by those in and around the UK media, from accidental on-air profanity to social media faux pas. Here we present a top 10, starting at number 10:

10. Still, could be worse, she could have been singing...
Pop star Cheryl Cole is knocking on the door of national treasure status nowadays, so when she broke wind on live television during the X Factor, it probably smelled of roses.  

9. With obscenity over much of the country...
BBC weatherman Tomasz Schafernaker was enjoying a joke with the newsreaders in the studio when he decided to try his hand at a little sign language. Unfortunately he was caught on camera. 

8. Nigella? I've seen better...
Just this week the official @ITV_News Twitter stream told us that Nigella Lawson is not as fit as she thinks she is. Big news indeed. We think somebody logged into the wrong account. 

7. 'Social media is for saddos'...
According to the BBC, everybody who uses Facebook is "a saddo". According to web developers you should always use dummy text when testing a new website and never develop on a live site.   

6. Who dropped the C-bomb...
Part 1: The BBC turned the airwaves blue earlier this month when first James Naughtie and then Andrew Marr accidentally mispronounced culture secretary Jeremy Hunt's name, swiching the 'H' in Hunt for a 'C'. Part 2: During the General Election ITV News showed screenshots from Facebook of people discussing the Leaders debates. One poster in particular was no fan of David Cameron.

5. A Dyer attempt at ghost writing
Ghost written columns are a mainstay of the UK media but one went badly wrong earlier this year when Danny Dyer's advice column in Zoo went a little too far and advised a reader to take a knife to his ex girlfriend's face. Dyer was probably as surprised as anybody to see that moronic piece of advice in print.

4. Imaginary computer game causes outrage
Back in July the Daily Star wrote a totally fictitious story about a violent video game based on the final days of the murderer Raoul Moat. The source of the story had been a poor taste joke in an online chatroom. The Star later issued an embarrassing apology, admitting no attempt had been made to verify its story.

3. Ill-advised World Cup jolly...
Guardian writer Louise Taylor clearly had a wonderful trip to Qatar as the guest of the emirate's World Cup delegation. Unfortunately the one-sided piece of marketing puff which resulted from the trip brought much criticism upon The Guardian for its poor judgement in 1) publishing the piece, and 2) taking an uncomfortable length of time to admit Taylor's trip had been a jolly. 

2. Ill-advised World Cup coverage...
The only team to perform worse than England at the 2010 World Cup was the ITV Sport team. From Edgar Davids' ambush marketing to Robbie Earle's disappearing ticket allocation, the broadcaster staggered from one blunder to the next. The low point however, was undoubtedly the broadcaster's failure to show England's first goal in the competition, choosing instead to show an advert on its HD channel. 

1. But he said his name was Steve Jobs...
Not everything you read is true. You'd imagine the Daily Mail would know that better than anybody but one of the paper's legion of reporters was fooled this year by a spoof Twitter account in the name of Steve Jobs, CEO of Apple. The Twitter account clearly admitted to be being a spoof, but when it claimed iPhones were being recalled, the Mail took the story and ran with it.

What have we missed? Think something else should have been on this list? Email us and let us know.

And The Media Hero of 2010 is...

The competition for Media Hero of the Year could hardly have been closer with just 15 votes out more than 3,000 cast separating the top two.

So before crowning our winner, some well-deserved praise for second place which went to Dan & Dan for the truly brilliant 'Daily Mail Song'. At the time of writing it has gained nearly a million views on YouTube for its peerless satire on the UK's most controversial tabloid. So congratulations to Dan & Dan, who but for a handful of votes would have been our winner.

But there can be only one winner and the recipient of this year's Media Hero of the Year honour is not only a thoroughly deserving winner, he is also unquestionably Proud Of The BBC.

Take it away Mitch Benn:

So congratulations to Mitch Benn whose anthemic I'm Proud Of The BBC reminded us all why the Corporation should be allowed to outlive us all.

That any media brand can engender the kind of pride that makes a person want to sing and dance about it is a reason for us all to feel grateful. That Benn did it in a way that sparked an almost instant viral effect on social media was a timely warning to those who would stamp out the UK's independent media and cultural heritage in the name of political point-scoring. (We're looking here particularly at our newly crowned Media Villain of the Year).

The full result of the voting for Media Hero of the Year looks like this:

Thank you again to everybody who took time to vote for your 'Media Hero Of The Year 2010'.

Meet your Media Villain of the Year...

Thank you to everybody who took time to nominate and vote for the Media Villain of the Year. The winner appears to have been a hugely popular choice.

Because while there has been no shortage of Media Villains through 2010, it soon became clear, once the votes started flooding in, that there was only ever going to be one, runaway winner.

And so it proved.

Step forward David Cameron who readers of the Media Blog have rewarded for his poorly disguised grudge against the BBC by voting him Media Villain of the Year 2010.

It was his comment that cuts within the Corporation are "delicious" that has stuck in the minds of media watchers this year, so perfectly did it betray his desire to derail the BBC in the pursuit of short-term political favour among its commercial rivals.

Cameron scooped a massive 42.5% of the vote - or more than 1,300 of the votes cast over the two days the poll was open. Second place went to toothless media watchdog the Press Complaints Commission for its unfaltering ability to turn a blind eye to almost any indiscretion among the ranks of UK journalists, while third placed was FIFA for its apparent belief that the independent media should quieten down in the face of political or commercial pressures.

The full result looked like this: 



(Picture courtesy of MyDavidCameron.com)

ITV News slams Nigella Lawson as unattractive

BONG! ITV News twitter slams Nigella Lawson. BONG! Someone probably logged into the wrong account. BONG! Hastily deleting it hasn't stopped it being retweeted. BONG! At least they didn't call her a silly bint.

And here's the original (thanks to Bruce Martin):

If you liked this, you may enjoy:
BBC calls its own Facebook fans "saddos"

Non-sequiturs: Coming to a television advert near you

You may have seen a TV advert recently for Cow & Gate baby formula. It includes a giant beaker of milk being put down in front of a baby (right).

Cow & Gate has been in trouble previously for misleading claims, but now it is the non-sequitur which really offends.

Did you know your child would have to drink a whole bath tub full of cow's milk to get as much iron as there is in one serving of Cow & Gate baby formula?

Well did you?

Whether a parent did or not (and there is no reason they should) it's likely they don't simply keep forcefeeding their child cow's milk until they've hit all of the recommended daily amounts.

For all I know, I'd probably have to eat a whole water buffalo to get as much calcium and vitamin C as I'd get from a Berocca but that doesn't make me think "hmmm, I don't want to eat a water buffalo, so I'd better buy me some Berocca". Because there are more relevant comparables.

I may have to eat 300 Christmas party hats to get as much fibre as I'd get from one Shredded Wheat, but again these aren't my only choices.

You'd hope consumers would be impervious to this kind of nonsense advertising but it seems to be the direction advertising is going.

For example: "You wouldn't clean your teeth without a brush, so why treat your skin any differently?" asks and advert which is currently trying to convince us that mankind has been remiss for not scouring our skin all these years with the kind of self-foaming brush contraption we're more familiar with as a dispenser of shoe polish.

Consumers may notice however, that teeth and skin are not identical.

I wouldn't clean my paintbrushes without white spirit but I would heartily recommend against using it to clean your salad leaves before sitting down for lunch.

And then there's the advert for Susan Boyle's album.

Here's the problem: young children, we are told, want some crazy stuff for Christmas like a whale. But it's really hard to buy whales down the shops (damn you Greenpeace!). How awful then to let somebody you love down by not buying them what they really want for Christmas. But fear not, you can buy Subo's album.

Huh?!

Comedy: The 'new rock n' roll' or the 'new licence to print money'?

There has been an angry reaction online to pricing for US comedy legend Jerry Seinfeld's one-off UK show next year at the O2. Fans are claiming that £111 per ticket is ludicrous. They may well have a point.

It's certainly a phenomenal amount of money to pay to see a stand-up comedian. 

But consider the wider context into which such a one-off show falls: Bill Bailey's current tour comes in at £53 per ticket for a comedian who must surely have cloned himself such is his ubiquity on both tour and television; Ricky Gervais, £32.50 to see a short set from the over-exposed creator of The Office; John Bishop, £29.40 for a comedian whose appeal has been outlived by his interminable appearances on every panel and stand-up show going; Russell Howard, £28.75 to see a man you can see at any time of day simply by turning on your television for repeats of Mock The Week or his own weak BBC3 comedy vehicle.

There's certainly an easily-won argument that those ticket prices are over-expensive, because of the near commodity fans are paying for.

Seinfeld

Jerry Seinfeld meanwhile hasn't performed in the UK for 12 years and we should assume may not again.

His stand-up is limited to a few US shows per year, where tickets are marginally cheaper at between $75 and $150, but visiting Brits would of course need to first stump up air fare and accommodation if they really wanted to see him. His television and movie work is even more infrequent, in part because he almost certainly doesn't need the money. Everybody has a price, of course, and in order to see him perform in the UK, promoters have had to guarantee that price.  

There is no escaping the fact that £111 is a lot of money for any stand-up comedy gig, but a Seinfeld show, while not quite a once-in-a-lifetime experience is certainly a rare collector's item among a flooded market of predominantly BBC produced commodity.

Fans of stand-up comedy would only have to sit out the next two Russell Howard tours to make back the difference. And that sounds like a win-win to me.

At least that's how I'm rationalising the fact I just shelled out £224.50, the week before Christmas, for stand-up comedy tickets.

Vote for your Media Hero & Villain

Below is the shortlist of individuals and organisations most commonly selected by readers of TheMediaBlog.co.uk for our Media Hero and Villain Of The Year awards. Read the nominations of fellow Media Blog readers and then have your say by voting, via the link at the bottom of this post - voting closes at midnight, Friday 17 December. 

The Heroes:

• Private Eye: For proving it is still possible for print publications to grow circulation through a commitment to quality editorial.
• Julian Assange: For "showing the power of the open internet", according to readers, and failing to be cowed by the threats of governments with a vested interest in silencing Wikileaks' revelations.
• Mitch Benn: He's proud of the BBC and reminded us all this year why we should be too.
• Dan & Dan: The brilliant 'Daily Mail Song' became a web sensation and perfectly satirised the editorial obsessions of the UK's most discussed newspaper.
• MyDavidCameron.com: This social media phenomenon was a creative, crowd-sourced victory for satire and humour that left traditional media playing catch-up.
• BBC 6Music Listeners: The online campaign to save 6Music not only advertised the plight of the station, it recruited enough new listeners to save it. You can't buy advertising like that.

CLICK HERE TO VOTE NOW

The Villains:

• The Press Complaints Commission: It sadly comes as no surprise when newspapers break their codes of conduct but the toothless nature of the industry's watchdog is both a cause for concern and a poor advert for self-regulation.
• Alex Beam: Poorly written and researched, an article by the Boston Globe columnist criticised the friends and families of those who died in the Hillsborough stadium disaster. If the content wasn't insulting enough, the total failure of professionalism was a dark day for journalism.
• John Witherow & AA Gill: BBC presenter Clare Balding understandably took offence when described as a 'Dyke on a Bike' by Gill and her offence was compounded when his editor, Witherow offered the clumsiest of defences.
• David Cameron: The Prime Minister has barely concealed his dislike of the BBC or his plans to limit its powers in favour of commercial, more on-message competitors. It came to a head when he described job cuts at the BBC as "delicious".
• FIFA: It's quite plausible, of course, that England failed in its bid to host the World Cup because the bid simply wasn't good enough. However, Football's world governing body has made no secret of its distaste for an independent media unwilling to bend to the will of political and commercial interests. 
• Panorama: The BBC's flagship current affairs programme raised eyebrows and ire when it further exposed the levels of corruption within Fifa on the eve of its vote on who would win the World Cup. The programme was branded "an embarrassment" by England's bid team. 
   

CLICK HERE TO VOTE NOW

Mirror has a nose for a classic front page

Hats off to The Mirror whose front page today is a tabloid classic of its kind:

 

Name the Media Hero & Villain of 2010

It's been another turbulent 12 months in the media and for the second year running The Media Blog is calling for nominations for your Media Hero and Villain Of The Year. It could be an individual, an organisation or a publication or broadcaster.

Just drop us an email, or post a comment below with your suggestions and a brief line on why they deserve either award (unless it's screamingly obvious). We will then create a shortlist and throw it open to a public vote in time to announce the winners before the end of the year.

In last year's awards the Hero crown was won by The Telegraph for its relentless exposure of abuses of Commons expenses, while the Villain of the year was Daily Mail columnist Jan Moir for her poisonous piece about the death of pop star Stephen Gately. Big shoes to fill.

Wanted: Journalists, must like vodka

There's a very upfront offer circulating via Response Source this morning, that could prove an 11th hour saviour for at least one hard-up Christmas party planning committee. It comes from PR agency Slam PR: 

"Due to an event being cancelled at the last minute we have a number of cases of Russian Standard Vodka available for a press event dependant on location and number of people in attendance, we can offer this in exchange for strong media coverage and brand mentions in materials covering the event."

In case you missed it, that's Russian Standard vodka, which unless we're very much mistaken is actually Russia's number one premium vodka and is recognised in its homeland as a benchmark for excellence.

Boston Globe shamed by Hillsborough slur

Every now and then a journalist comes along who writes something so ignorant it actually stops you in your tracks.

Step forward Alex Beam, columnist at The Boston Globe, who has been writing about the acquisition of Liverpool Football Club by New England Sport Ventures: 

"Two months ago, Red Sox owner John Henry and his partners in New England Sports Ventures purchased Liverpool FC, historically one of Europe’s greatest soccer teams... For now, the Red Sox PR machine is pumping out happynews about Henry’s visits to grotty Liverpool... Even by the deranged standards of European soccer, Red fans are totally bonkers. Their excitable Internet fan sites are still agonizing over a 21-year-old soccer riot that killed 96 people."

If some Americans choose not to embrace the intricacies of the offside rule or refuse to see the beauty of the beautiful game then so be it. If they want to call Liverpool "grotty" simply because it has history, heritage and culture but no WalMart, then that's their opinion. 

But to refer to the Hillsborough Stadium disaster, a result of serious policing failures that resulted in the death of 96 innocent football fans, as a "soccer riot" is shameful and ignorant.

Beam could have done two minutes research and that would have been all he needed to understand how such a dismissive and hugely disrespectful comment would cause genuine hurt and heartache to a great many people still awaiting justice for the deaths of their loved ones.

UPDATE: The Globe has now published a correction stating "a reporting error" was to blame for the Hillsborough stadium disaster being "mischaracterized...as a riot". It adds: "The official investigation into the disaster, which cost 96 lives, placed the blame primarily on poor crowd control and inadequate stadium design."

The Globe is yet to issue an apology.

Chris Evans: 'Daybreak team don't speak to me' any more

Chris Evans has spoken out about rift between him and former BBC presenter Adrian Chiles which opened up when Evans stepped in to present the One Show on a Friday. This despite the fact Chiles didn't even want to do the Friday slot, according to Evans.

Evans has told Heat magazine:

"Adrian told me he didn't like doing Fridays. He told me this directly... Soon after... I got a phone call from the then One Show boss. She said: 'How do you fancy Fridays on The One Show?' Which I totally understood, because I'd just had that conversation with Adrian.

"Two or three months later, there was the bolt from the blue – Adrian had signed to ITV. And by the way, Adrian hasn't spoken to me since…"

In the interview, Evans also questions whether Chiles and co-host Christine Bleakley made the smartest career choices moving to ITV.  

But now Chiles and Bleakley present Daybreak. So it just shows what Chris Evans knows... oh, hang on.

Dave Gorman's Daily Mail origami...

See what he's done here...

(Hat tip: Mark Sunner)