journalism – Page 6 – Rob Mansfield: Content-ment

Sod Giles Coren: A hurrah for sub-editors everywhere

So Giles Coren has been exposed for being the complete and utter arse that he always appears when on TV.

Disappointingly, the Guardian chose to allow Lucy Mangan to get away with championing the writer and not putting in a good word for subs.

As someone who has been on both sides of the fence, I have sympathy for writers and subs, but I find myself siding with the unsung workhorses of any publication.

While the, often semi-illiterate, writers take all the plaudits, the general public are often unaware that many a scribe’s turgid prose has been cleaned up and made publishable by a sub.

Sadly their trade is being undermined by being the first ‘group’ of journalists to be thinned out when budgets get tight – a big shame.

As for Coren himself, if his ‘joke’ was so abstruse that he really felt the need to explain it, then it clearly can’t have been a very good one.

Mum’s the word

What is the world of celeb endorsement coming to? In the same week, we have not one but two Celeb Mums of the Year!

Kym Ryder was unveiled as Celeb Mum of the Year for her ability to have a job and bring up kids – blimey, don’t any other mums do that!?

And last week, Suzanne Shaw was revealed as the La Redoute Celeb Mum of the Year – note the sponsorship angle of this gong.

I’m not knocking the recognition of mums, although the fact that two female members of Hear’Say are the only two celebs in the running is rather worrying, rather the fact that there are now two ‘competing’ awards. Why? How many celeb mums do you need to honour every 12 months?

This is the kind of pointless promotion that will put the proverbial nail in the coffin of celeb journalism – a demise that is again high on the prediction list.

The signs that celeb journalism is starting to fade have been all too evident in the past week or two. ABC figures released last month showed a sharp drop in circulation of 3 of the biggest celeb weekly titles (Heat, Now and Closer), while last week Mark Frith announced he’s leaving Heat (the magazine that spearheaded the celeb boom) after 10 years.

Clearly, there’s life in the genre for a while longer, but if sales of these magazines decline further, something else will inevitably come along and take its place. What will it be? Watch this space…

Front page dudlines!

Last night I watched the BBC Ten O’Clock News and they were confidently running the story that Barack Obama had continued his winning streak by defeating Hillary Clinton in the New Hampshire poll.

So you can imagine my confusion when the radio came on this morning with the news that Clinton had actually won the vote.

It means that all the UK newspapers look very silly this morning with pictures of Obama on their front pages, having assumed that pollsters had got it right.

It’s not exactly on a par with the 1948 US election, but it’s the same principle. Back then, Harry Truman was aiming to be re-elected, following WW2 and there was widespread speculation that his use of the H-bomb would end up derailing his campaign.

The vote went down to the wire and the pro-Republican newspapers were so sure that Truman’s opponent, Thomas Dewey, was going to win that they ran front pages like: “Dewey Defeats Truman”. Needless to say, they ended up with egg on their faces.

These sort of mistakes rarely happen nowadays, although the Daily Mirror produced a corker back in 2003.

Before their marriage descended into a public slanging match, you may remember that Heather Mills and Paul McCartney had a baby together. The Mirror, keen to get the scoop ahead of its rivals, proudly proclaimed “It’s A Boy” on its first print run, having got some ‘insider news’.

How silly did they look just a couple of hours later, when the Press Association reported that Paul and Heather were celebrating the birth of their new baby, Beatrice. Yup, that’s right, a girl!