Guardian's live Countdown blog-digital journalism in danger of being a parody of itself

The live blog on the Guardian website yesterday attracted a fair amount of criticism across the journalistic twittersphere.

The Guardian had decided in its infinite wisdom that Nick Hewer taking over hosting duties at Countdown was such a significant event that it required a live commentary.

But has digital reporting taken a step too far?

Now I applaud many things that the Guardian does as many readers of this blog and those that follow my twitter stream know.

However the danger to me is that the organisation,and it is not on its own, is being slowly taken over by the good intentions of journalists who have been schooled in the idea that the many tools of this digital age are the salvation of the profession whilst forgetting who they are actually trying to connect with.

Yes,live blogging as one such too has demonstrated its usefulness but yesterday's choice of event to me endangers it to being a parody of itself.

As a tongue in cheek Mike Rawlins of Talk about local tweeted to me earlier on the very subject

" Next time I see a live blog like that I think I'll live blog the live blog, hopefully someone will live tweet the....."


There is a danger that journalism and journalists spend far too much time navel gazing and forget whom their real audience is,Ready to jump on tweet and blog about about what they consider the next best thing which will come to their salvation,be it data journalism,geotagging,cover it live and whatever the next dreamed up hashtag will be(anyone remember Quora which was going to solve all our problems?)

Meanwhile the Leveson enquiry continues to rumble on.In much the same way as the Countdown blog,it is in danger of becoming a navel gazing exercise.Covered in depth by the Guardian and the Independent,I speculate on whether anyone outside the profession is really that interested in its outcome.

Indeed by the time it reports,the heady days of last summer when we actually thought the world was going to change will be long forgotten to be replaced by,well who knows?

So as I prepare to live blog my expedition to the kitchen to make a cup of tea and some toast,here is an appeal to some in the journalism community-get real please.

Networked journalism gone mad or the future as the Guardian unveils its latest digital idea

The Guardian's leap from being into its all digital future continues unabatted with its announcement that it plans to make parts of the daily newslist available in a new blog and encourage readers to get in touch via Twitter to crowdsource which stories it should follow up.

Obviously says Dan Roberts announcing the move yesterday evening,

we're not planning to list all our exclusives or embargoed content and we'll also have to be careful not to say anything legally sensitive or unsubstantiated. Nonetheless, we think there are lots of routine things that we list every day which might provoke interesting responses from readers: everything from upcoming press conferences, to stories we need help uncovering. If readers can see that we've got a reporter looking into the police killing of someone with a Taser – to use a recent example – they might be able to direct us to other recent deaths or the definitive report on their safety risks

Some will say that this is the concept of networked journalism gone mad,others that it is the only way that journalism will survive in this ever connected world.

What this crowdsourcing exercise does is further blur the lines between the journalism profession and the general public,contributing further to the loss of value of content.

We have seen some bold moves by the Guardian in recent times,often it seems led by "digital journalists" who have no concept of the business model that they are unleashing.

It's a brave move and let's hope it isn't just another initiative that will get the plug pulled on it after a few months.

Cameron the new Obama? And is the Guardian behind him?

What can be made of David Cameron's exclusve to this morning's Guardian?

Perhaps he is trying to set himself up as the Barack Obama of the Uk.

referring to Obama's speech, in which the US Democratic presidential candidate warned that absent black fathers were behaving like teenagers and shirking their responsibilities to their children, Cameron said: "I think he's absolutely right. I mean I think it's a very brave thing to do. And it will have a huge influence that he has said it. I've had a number of meetings with black church leaders who make the same point. They are concerned about family breakdown and social breakdown, and want to see what I call a responsibility revolution take place."

reports the paper.

Another item to add to his responsiblity agenda no doubt and the choice of the Guardian to air them?

Under its leader entitled Cameron 2.0 the paper says

There is a dimension of politics, David Cameron observes in his Guardian interview today, that is a bit like completing the first level of Tomb Raider. Get past level one of the 1990s computer game, says Mr Cameron, and in political terms you have persuaded the voting public that you are a normal person who inhabits the same world that they do. Now you can move on to level two, where you can speak - and be listened to - about the issues that really matter.

adding that

Not even Mr Brown, who can still be strangely complacent about Mr Cameron's persuasive skills, should doubt that the Tory leader, with his steady 20-point opinion poll leads, is now firmly installed on level two

Is the paper coming out in favour of Cameronism?

Mr Cameron has also decided to take the calculated political risk of upping the ante on the social agenda

but

most households and most communities in this country are not broken - and most voters know it. This argument over welfare and poverty has barely begun. Labour's record on social justice and communities may not be perfect, but it is not abject either

Two years is a long time

Boris gets the usual endorsements

Not suprisingly the Evening Standard in London has endorsed Boris as its candidate today.

Here is a little snippet

This paper believes that the key issues in this contest are honesty and
competence. On both, Mr Livingstone falls down badly. His broken promises and
the irregularities surrounding some of his closest associates - exposed by our
reporting - show that he cannot be trusted to maintain the standards of
integrity that his office demands.

Meanwhile if you want the alternaitive view,have a look at the Guardian in an article by Zoe Williams which says

He is no more honest than any other philanderer before him. He has lied flagrantly, flamboyantly, to save his marriage, and given how little else he's prepared to do for it, one must conclude that he doesn't put a very great premium on telling the truth. So if he gives out these apparently harsh truths about gay people or Liverpudlians or the people of Congo, it is not because the fire of truth burns so brightly within him that he can't snuff it out. It is because he genuinely despises these people. He despises gays and he despises provincials (you are all right with Boris if you come from Liverpool but don't sound like a Liverpudlian. Once you've been to public school, then you are from postcode POSH), and he despises Africans. He despises them, and he despises those of us who would hold such judgments to be bigoted and inhuman.