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Indeed, the Guardian's coverage - and Paul Lewis in particular - through Twitter and its own website has been exemplary. It's an impressive testament to the way that newspapers have adapted to shift from generating content for only one print edition a day, to a model of creating continuously updated digital content in addition to the print edition. The news channels could learn a few lessons from this. BBC News, Sky News and others make a lot of noise about social media, but when it comes down to it, they often rely most heavily on the tradition of 'correspondent + camera', and seem to flounder if they're not able to provide that.
When a camera can't be deployed, the newsroom operations need to be flexible enough to shift to the resources that are available - whether that's correspondents on the ground giving voice or videocall reports, reporting on tweets from reliable sources (even if those sources aren't BBC reporters), reporting information from sources which aren't Reuters or AP newswires (The Guardian confirmed almost an hour ago that there's looting and violence in Lewisham - this still hasn't been mentioned at all on the BBC News Channel, and it was only mentioned by BBC London 94.9 around a half hour after The Guardian and others were putting that information out).
It's not good enough when coverage of a major story falls apart purely because you don't have live footage from a camera on the ground or a helicopter in the air. You don't have to read every single tweet from anyone with an opinion and try to corroborate each and every tweet; that's notion is either disingenuous or just plain stupid. There are plenty of reliable sources on Twitter and elsewhere to sustain continued coverage.
Also, to those who were suggesting last night that coverage should be limited to avoid encouraging copycat activity - just as I pointed out last night, those with a thirst for this kind of violence and looting were not sitting at home tuned to news channels waiting for just the right imagery to incite their criminality; it's becoming very clear that the spread of these activities was planned and communicated via Twitter, texts and calls, and it also seems that BBM (BlackBerry Messenger) did indeed play a very big part in it too.
Evidently, the failings in BBC television coverage have been down to an inflexilibity or unavailability of newsroom resources (rather than any sort of mandated blackout), and that may come down to a similar inflexibility in schedule obligations (such as the overnight simulcasts) or in editorial guidelines (where the means to deliver news in a developing situation may be too restrictive to fully take advantage of all of the available resources). There needs to be flexibility in a major breaking news situation to break the rigid limitations of the schedule and to make better use of non-broadcast sources to sustain coverage of a story as it's developing. The last couple of nights - where the status quo seems to have been "we don't have a camera on the ground, so it might as well not be happening" - have been very poor indeed.
The News Channel has just broken away from the Six to bring live aerial footage; this isn't all that unusual, and evidently some level of flexibility does exist in the daytime schedule - but it's not good enough to provide a more limited, second-rate service overnight, especially when the circumstances demand more comprehensive coverage.
London/UK Riots Coverage (Sky News/BBC News Channel)
Quite surprised to read people here talking about a possible media blackout.
It's ignoring the work of the Guardian and may reporters on twitter, and the live coverage on the radio.
First they can't fly the helicopters at night, only the police helicopter flys over london at night, so there's the quickest way of covering a fast moving situation like this gone.
Second it's the middle of the night, even with the second night there still aren't as many journalists working as there would be during the day.
Do you want them to broadcast every rumour on twitter with out checking and verifying it? For all the true accounts theres lots of rumours and exaggerations. Then there's getting the crew to the scene and setting up safely..
It's ignoring the work of the Guardian and may reporters on twitter, and the live coverage on the radio.
First they can't fly the helicopters at night, only the police helicopter flys over london at night, so there's the quickest way of covering a fast moving situation like this gone.
Second it's the middle of the night, even with the second night there still aren't as many journalists working as there would be during the day.
Do you want them to broadcast every rumour on twitter with out checking and verifying it? For all the true accounts theres lots of rumours and exaggerations. Then there's getting the crew to the scene and setting up safely..
Indeed, the Guardian's coverage - and Paul Lewis in particular - through Twitter and its own website has been exemplary. It's an impressive testament to the way that newspapers have adapted to shift from generating content for only one print edition a day, to a model of creating continuously updated digital content in addition to the print edition. The news channels could learn a few lessons from this. BBC News, Sky News and others make a lot of noise about social media, but when it comes down to it, they often rely most heavily on the tradition of 'correspondent + camera', and seem to flounder if they're not able to provide that.
When a camera can't be deployed, the newsroom operations need to be flexible enough to shift to the resources that are available - whether that's correspondents on the ground giving voice or videocall reports, reporting on tweets from reliable sources (even if those sources aren't BBC reporters), reporting information from sources which aren't Reuters or AP newswires (The Guardian confirmed almost an hour ago that there's looting and violence in Lewisham - this still hasn't been mentioned at all on the BBC News Channel, and it was only mentioned by BBC London 94.9 around a half hour after The Guardian and others were putting that information out).
It's not good enough when coverage of a major story falls apart purely because you don't have live footage from a camera on the ground or a helicopter in the air. You don't have to read every single tweet from anyone with an opinion and try to corroborate each and every tweet; that's notion is either disingenuous or just plain stupid. There are plenty of reliable sources on Twitter and elsewhere to sustain continued coverage.
Also, to those who were suggesting last night that coverage should be limited to avoid encouraging copycat activity - just as I pointed out last night, those with a thirst for this kind of violence and looting were not sitting at home tuned to news channels waiting for just the right imagery to incite their criminality; it's becoming very clear that the spread of these activities was planned and communicated via Twitter, texts and calls, and it also seems that BBM (BlackBerry Messenger) did indeed play a very big part in it too.
Evidently, the failings in BBC television coverage have been down to an inflexilibity or unavailability of newsroom resources (rather than any sort of mandated blackout), and that may come down to a similar inflexibility in schedule obligations (such as the overnight simulcasts) or in editorial guidelines (where the means to deliver news in a developing situation may be too restrictive to fully take advantage of all of the available resources). There needs to be flexibility in a major breaking news situation to break the rigid limitations of the schedule and to make better use of non-broadcast sources to sustain coverage of a story as it's developing. The last couple of nights - where the status quo seems to have been "we don't have a camera on the ground, so it might as well not be happening" - have been very poor indeed.
The News Channel has just broken away from the Six to bring live aerial footage; this isn't all that unusual, and evidently some level of flexibility does exist in the daytime schedule - but it's not good enough to provide a more limited, second-rate service overnight, especially when the circumstances demand more comprehensive coverage.
