Auntie’s bloomers

If you're interested in following the machinations of the BBC’s online news editors as they twist and turn in response to righteous criticism from bloggers and informed readers, you might like to read through this post at Monkey Tennis Centre about the BBC’s coverage of one of President Bush’s recent speeches.

It’s a long post but worth the read - trying to clearly demonstrate an example of media bias often requires a level of detail which might at first glance seem inappropriate, not to say obsessive.

Having said that, I think MTC may be overestimating the quality of journalism at the BBC when he suggests (in regard to the BBC’s initially distorted coverage of the speech): “The journalists who edited the report knew exactly what they were doing.”

Unfortunately, it has become glaringly obvious over the past five years that some journalists at the BBC don’t have the slightest clue what they’re doing. They make so many mistakes (even when reporting on events in British history) and oftentimes, it’s difficult to tell the difference between compound error and calculated bias.

Also, I have to say, I think it’s a good thing when the BBC amends its online content to correct an error, even if they don’t own up to it. The BBC’s stance when it gets found out is pretty clear: amend the story but don’t acknowledge the fact and never, ever apologize.