Don’t moan, do som
ething r, Media Standards Tr
Martin Moore, Directo
F
or those who missed 2007, it was the year mainstream media realised they were in the midst of a revolution – that if they didn’t embrace change it would engulf them. The upshot? You have much greater opportunity to challenge mainstream media than you ever did. Unhappy about an article? Leave a comment beneath it. Too indirect? Then e-mail the journalist directly. The BBC, Daily Mirror and other news organisations regularly print e-mail addresses below articles, and if they don’t it doesn’t take a genius to guess them (for The Times try firstname.lastname@thetimes.co.uk). Response not published? Publish it yourself. Blog about it, link to the offending article and refer to the news organisation and journalist. Better yet, prevent bad reporting from happening in the first place by giving news organisations the information they need before they publish. Most journalists are under so much time and money pressure these days they’ll gladly talk to someone who really knows about a subject – or look at a piece of well-written research into a topic. The Independent would be half the size it is without its many articles based on research conducted by NGOs or PR companies. There is still an awfully long way to go. Indeed the Media Standards Trust
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has been set up explicitly to find ways to promote accuracy and good reporting – particularly by fostering transparency and accountability. And despite just launching in 2007 it is already making headway. Take a look at www.journa-list.com, a website that gives the public information about journalists rather than vice versa – sort of freedom of information in reverse. But misrepresentation still happens – frequently. Last October The Sunday Times accompanied a big article about unhygienic conditions at Maidstone NHS Trust with a photograph of a nurse in a shockingly dirty uniform. Yet it subsequently turned out the nurse did not work at Maidstone. Nor was her uniform dirty. The newspaper had used Photoshop to splatter grime over her clean apron to give the story more impact. Manipulating images, misusing data, exaggerating stereotypes – none of these will disappear in this brave new media world. Indeed, they will almost certainly get worse. But this makes it all the more necessary that charities not only realise they have the opportunity to encourage accurate reporting, but that they now have a responsibility to. Dr Martin Moore is director of the Media Standards Trust, a new independent not-for-profit organisation that promotes high standards in news. www.mediastandardstrust.org