news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8141300.stm

I rather expect John Whittingdale MP and his party would have been in rather more trenchant form.

John Whittingdale, Conservative chairman of the Commons culture committee, said it would consider the alleged revelations tomorrow.
"I have to say I'm extremely surprised if it is the case that a payment of a million pounds has been made by News International to people who allegedly have had their phones intercepted by an investigator," he said.
"We were given an absolute assurance when we carried out an inquiry that only one journalist on News of the World had any knowledge of interceptions - Clive Goodman," he said.

Allegedly? No comment about arrogance or the lack of standards today? No calls for resignations?

Can someone tell me why we aren't told who these jailed journalists are? Or have I got the wrong end of the stick?

Enjoying the cricket?

Something seems fishy about this story. The Grauniad claims to be basing it on Scotland Yard evidence, yet the police have shown no interest in further prosecutions. I don't buy the Graun's claim that they didn't want to piss off News Corp, given that they actually did bring the Goodman prosecution, which caused them considerable embarrassment. On the other hand, Coulson's and Murdoch's quotes are classic non-denial denials. I guess we'll find out soon enough one way or the other.

That's good comment, GY.

I slept through Swann's innings, GO. Otherwise, enjoying it indeed.

Regardless of what comes out of this, it does show once again how utterly useless the PCC is. Also, a reading between the lines question: A very senior executive of the paper is recorded directly commissioning illegal access to records from a mobile phone company.


That has to be Hinton, doesn't it?

I was listening to the guardian guy talking about on the news. he said that a senior policeman said that there's evidence that they hacked the phones of over a thousand people, another told him that there was nearly 3,000 people. and once the parliamentary inquiry is over there'll be a lot of pressure for prosecutions.

The journalist had been writing a book about how newspapers go about their business, how they get stories, and ultimately how newspapers wind up printing so much stuff that just isn't true. In the course of this he came across what the NOTW were involved in.

The NOTW had been running stories, and it occurred to 3 people in football that these stories were coming from their phone messages, It was then found that their messages were being hacked. Gordon Taylor of the PFA got nearly £700,000 from them I think.

How typical of Taylor (who is one of the best paid union officials in the world anyway) to take the money instead of taking them to court.

Instead of taking them to court? Where he would be award damages, i.e. money.

And also where News International would suffer huge damage to its own reputation and (theoretically) be deterred from doing this to thousands of other people.

But then, perhaps Taylor had a very good reason for not wanting this to go to court himself.

How about the same reasons that most people have when they choose to settle out of court?

All this will, of course, stick in the craw of the dozens and dozens of people that News International have made redundant in the past few years for reasons of 'economic necessity' while this sort of money was being spunked about.

E10 - can you help me out here? What I'm struggling to get around is the sheer lack of ethics of these people. When I hear about this, it makes me yearn for the death of newspapers, not want to fight for them. I know that many good journalists will get laid off and they deserve better, but does the NUJ have an ethics code it seriously polices? I mean, it'd be easier to defend the journalistic profession if the union said defending that profession didn't include cunts like Goodman, Coulson, Wade and the many others who indulge in this scum practice.

The magic of Google:The NUJ Code of Professional Conduct stipulates that journalists must acquire information by “honest, straightforward and open means”, except for “investigations that are overwhelmingly in the public interest.”


The stories produced by the News of the World were “emphatically not in the public interest,” said General Secretary Jeremy Dear.


He added: “The use of surreptitious means to obtain information must only be used for really important stories of the greatest public interest, not for gossip about footballers or the royal family.


“The Telegraph’s acquisition of the data about MPs’ expenses is a rare and classic example. To have these revelations just a few weeks after that story does a lot to undermine quality journalism.


“The more journalists use illicit means for inconsequential stories, the harder it will be the justify their use when it really matters and is really justified. That’s the danger the News of the World is putting us in.”


Jeremy went on to highlight the way this scandal has exposed the failures of the Press Complaints Commission to act as an effective regulatory body.


The NUJ has campaigned for many years for the existing system to be overhauled. Jeremy said: “This is yet another example of the failure of the PCC, and further underlines our long-standing demands for effective self-regulation of the press."

The death of newspapers to be replaced by - what? A dedicated army of fearless independent web start-ups dedicated to forensic exposure of the truth - exists more in techie-evangelists' frenzied imaginations than fact. It's the economic model that's wrong, not the method of delivery.

We discuss this sort of stuff a lot, particularly with regard to the PCC's uselessness, and of the delicate balance between opposition to this sort of tawdry journalism as well as the privacy laws that people would seek to use this case to railroad through.

E10 Rifle wrote:
It's the economic model that's wrong, not the method of delivery.



Well, that kind of completely negates the shift, over the past 15 years, in the way people choose to receive their information, doesn't it?

I agree the economic model is wrong. It's also important to recognize that the days of people sitting around for two hours, smoking a pipe and reading a broadsheet of day-old news is long gone.

Replace the words "pipe" with "cup of coffee in a cafe on a day off" and you could be describing my life, now. And what a pleasure it remains - and I'm under 40.

windowlicker wrote:
How typical of Taylor (who is one of the best paid union officials in the world anyway) to take the money instead of taking them to court.

He was probably well advised to accept the offer. If the offer is not accepted and the matter proceeds to a trial and the claimant recovers less than the amount offered by the defendant, the claimant will generally have to pay the defendant's costs from the date of the payment into court of the offer money. And that can get really expensive.

Not to mention the fact that if your lawyers advise you to settle, your insurance won't cover you if you go to court (I presume he was using the PFA's lawyers and insurance).

E10 Rifle wrote:
Replace the words "pipe" with "cup of coffee in a cafe on a day off" and you could be describing my life, now. And what a pleasure it remains - and I'm under 40.

Oh, I'm with you. Trust me. The door-stop Saturday paper is one of my greatest pleasures in life. But is is an indulgence rather than the necessity it once was.

I think many papers failed to recognize the dramatic shift in how people wanted to receive their information. First, they want it promptly, and that's a drawback of the printed medium. And where they slit their throat in the online world was charging outrageous subscriptions instead of going with micropayments, which was widely advocated in the early days of the web.

As well, I don't think people recognize the value of genuine journalism and editorial insight. These have never been adequately marketed, in my opinion. Perhaps there's still an opportunity.

Final thought: papers need to stop trying to cover all areas for everyone. Drop entertainment and lifestyle and sports and whatnot. Concentrate on areas where insight and opinion matter most, and where you can genuinely compete. Let Perez Hilton et al have fashion and Michael Jackson gossip. I think readers will still pay where they see true value.

What I was trying to say poorly is that is there any provision for the NUJ to expel members for being unethical to the point of betraying the trust the public need to have in the profession if the profession is to survive?

I can well imagine the view that behind every shitbag of a reporter, there's a superior forcing them to be a shitbag, but TBH, that's not good enough for some of these twats.