News International scandal - first stone, anybody?
Yesterday I wondered aloud if anyone else was feeling bemused by the media frenzy over The News Of The World (of not-so-blessed memory) and its associated publications and personnel. Apparently not. The general consensus is that this is one of the most important events this year and deserves every micro-second of media coverage that is being devoted to it. We are told that we live in a new media culture, where the news agenda is set, not by editors sitting in a darkened room somewhere, but by the people, the millions of bloggers and tweeters and whatever who get hold of a story and force the powers that be to take notice. This is obviously true, and has in many ways increased the transparency and accountability of public life, in this country at least. The downside of this, though, is that news media tends to be more knee-jerk reactionary than ever, less given to analysis, and dare I say it, more and more likely to initiate huge bandwagons that ever...