On the eve of a Commons debate on the Government’s plans to water down the Freedom of Information Act, Roy Greenslade has a timely reminder to sign the Press Gazette’s petition. There is another petition on the Downing Street web site.
As an example of the weakness of the Act in its present form, Greenslade [...]
Tribune, the left wing weekly, which quietly passed its 70th anniversary this month, is under threat from the internet according to a former editor, Paul Anderson.
It has always been a shoe-string operation and the threat is not immediate: but the string is getting rather frayed as distribution and sales become more difficult and the potential [...]
A novel idea for politicians, stand up to Rupert Murdoch, is put forward by Stephen Glover in today’s On the Press column in The Independent. He writes:
Hardly a week goes by without David Cameron coming up with a new idea that astounds his critics and discomforts some of his friends. May I suggest one that [...]
Emily Bell, the Guardian’s director of digital content, takes a look at political blogging and viral video in the media sections opinion column today under the heading “separating the bloggers from the tossers”.
Her conclusion is: “No doubt between now and the next election the increase in politicians blogging will be like lemmings falling off a [...]
Journalist Tom Griffin has taken advantage of the newly introduced “petition the prime minister” service on the Downing Street website to ask Tony Blair not to go ahead with restrictions on the use of the Freedom of Information Act.
I have signed. You can sign here.
Griffin’s full text for the petition is:
We the undersigned petition the [...]
Government plans to restrict Freedom of Information Act requests is “brazen” David Leigh and Rob Evans write on the front of Media Guardian today. They do not simply attack the proposals, they demolish the “think tank” report which is being used by Lord Falconer, the constitutional affairs secretary, to justify refusing requests.
Frontier Economics [...]
About 85 MPs have signed an early day motion expressing fears that the Government is planning to restrict information released under the Freedom of Information Act by changing the charging arrangements.
Holdthefrontpage says the motion is being promoted by and all-party group of MPs and the Campaign for Freedom of Information. The Government is considering [...]
On the grounds that internet trends in the UK are frequently similar to those in the United States, politicians will be poring over evidence that the number of people using the web to get political news and information has increased nearly two-and-a-half times in the past four years.
The latest report from the Pew Internet Project [...]
If the Conservatives’ plan was to set the news agenda on the eve of their conference, they scored a spectacular success this morning. The Guardian leads with a puff for the party’s new website, webcameron.
But if webcameron does turn out to be a significant step in moving political debate away from the mainstream media agenda, [...]
“The political party that can harness blogs to its cause is the one that will win the internet campaigning war,” says Tory blogger Iain Dale in today’s Observer.
He argues that blogs provide a chance for the parties to “market their message without the filter of mainstream media reportage and comment”. Blogs, he believes, are the [...]
