Proof Read all about it – When the local press goes wrong... My tale of when the local press goes wrong

n the past couple of months apart this blog I have also been writing for my local daily newspaper, the Portsmouth News in their weekend television pull-out, sharing a TV Nostalgia column with a another writer looking at programmes past. Now I have been enjoying doing this and do it just for the love of writing, maybe naïve you might say to do something like that. But something occurred within the past week which has maybe made me think again about this.

Last Saturday, an article was posted of my work on the subject of Van Der Valk. Now for the past couple of weeks they have been using another writer Nick Collins who also works for the paper and printed his articles in the slot for the past few Saturdays. So I was relieved to finally see my work in the paper. But was shocked to read that Mr Collins had been created with my work, my intellectual copyright given to him over what I had written. So naturally, you can understand I was not happy with this. That is why I have taken to my blog to explain what has gone on.

On Monday, I contacted the editor about this matter to complain in a polite way that I should be owed an apology for this. With getting this reply, he said that the byline of the column was not changed as it was a template and “that an apology would be issued underneath this week's column in the pull-out this Saturday.” and that it doesn't make it less disappointing and he copied his features editor into the email so he could see the reply. OK, I thought. But I didn't think this go far enough at all, I suggested that an apology could go in the weekend pull out but also an apology maybe in the editor’s column in the main paper as well.

Then on Tuesday, I received an email from the man temporally in charge of the TV pages as his colleague is on leave. He said “It was my fault. I can only apologise. No excuses. I am standing in for the person who normally does the page and the page itself was templated with Nick's byline and I didn't change it.” he continued “I'm doing this week's TV pages too and running your column on This Is Your Life. I'm putting a correction on the bottom about the error last week and of course, changing the byline.”

Again I emailed the editor about this asking once again for an apology in the weekend pull out, but also in the main paper as well. This being a satisfactory conclusion as far as I was concerned to this matter. This is still an ongoing situation, I am still awaiting their reply to this... If I need to I will come back to the subject to update you what is happening, but it maybe a case of the little guy against the might of the local press. But no matter what, I shall not give up until I get the right conclusion.

In this of all week with the Leveson report coming out and with such serious issues with the press, it begs question about thing being checked before they go to print. This itself went to print in the paper itself, but in such serious times things like that can spiral out of control leading to confusion totally. I am not saying that the press should be heavy regulated or left free, that is your mind to make up. But if the smallest thing can be allowed to get through the net without checking, then something could snowball into a situation. We rely on the press to bring us the stories especially which are local to us which may not get a look in to the national press, it may seem to others that it is just full of council meetings and non-news. They do serve a purpose, with them informing communities of what is going on. Their focus is on maximising their local coverage, by organising campaigns. Though where does crusading stop and influence starts?

In some ways these campaigns are good, allow the people to have their say but when the paper wants to put an agenda on a people it can seem difficult for some people. Local papers have been a start for some of our best journalists, but like anything there's the good and the bad. The good writers rise and the bad ones fall, the careful line which is tread by them is something which the national press has fallen off by a few bad apples. Though, do we know the local press is still balanced on that line or are they are close to falling off themselves.

Leveson may have an effect on the national press, but with anything, the repercussions will surely felt in the local press too. From what has happened, we have seen the News of the World closed down because of what has happened and generally local newspapers are struggling to keep afloat as the smaller ones either go weekly or drop by the wayside. Its interesting to see what direction it all goes in, but once thing will be sure that the local press maybe never be the same again.

I have put this out there to highlight my case of what has happened, it is up to you to decide what you think about The Leveson Report's finding. This maybe a tiny part of what happens when you are a writer, but certainly I think it is a key part.

A wide world of sport and a whole new world for me...

In the past couple of weeks I have decided to spread my wings somewhat by trying to write for the local Portsmouth News, by doing a piece for their Saturday TV Nostalgia column. It may not be an in-depth piece, that it is not the style of the column at all, but its a start a I suppose... Here it is..

In today's world of multiple sports channels, its hard to forget there was a time when two shows dominated Saturday afternoons, the BBC had Grandstand whilst ITV's version was World of Sport. Though the two could not have been more different at all, if Grandstand was like  a luxury sofa, then World of Sport was like a beanbag.

It was presented by Dickie Davies for all of its life, a man who looked like a cross between a badger and a used car salesman whilst all the time helming a mixed bag of sports from the sublime to the ridiculous titled including the World Clown Diving Championship. Which was basically men in fuzzy rainbow coloured wigs diving into a paddling pool for entertainment.

On Christmas Eve 1977, Eric Morecambe brought his brand of comedy to help Dickie Davies present the programme. Even leading to Morecambe commenting on Davies' trademark moustache whilst Dickie was introducing the next with the line "The last time I saw anything like that they kill a whole herd of buffalo to make it!" With Davies trying to keep a straight face throughout this chaos happening around him!

In the end with ITV wanting to head in a new direction with its sports coverage, World of Sport was axed in 1985. But for a programme which was going to be called 'Wide World of Sports' originally, it did pretty good by covering events more close to home.

2012 (c) Rob Williams

Write-ly or wrongly...

For my sins through life and waffling about nonsense, I have been many things. Some would say I was something still, but in my 32 years I've fitted in being a disability swimmer, a football mascot, someone who's written letters to stars and television executives, a mature student who's retaken his GCSE's plus also a hospital radio DJ. Most of which I've failed at of course, but one thread has run through my life and still does and that is comedy.

The old school - Hardly inspiring isn't it?

Now, its easy to watch and pick it apart with such precision to look at the nuances of it all. From an early age I have enjoyed alternative comedy, even before maybe I fully understood it. But it was a language to get through school with that 1990 to 1995 period being dominated by Bottom of course. Not everyone would have understood it with majority looking on at East 17 or Take That as their main course of action, especially the girls. Otherwise it was football for the boys, but entertainment dominates in my mind as wanting to be a continuity announcer when I left school. Though after realising that dream had gone when I sounded like Mr Bean, never the less I turned my attention to getting into writing comedy scripts. They were just put down on A4 paper, I didn't know what it all meant most of my ideas usually would end on television not by my own hand.

"Eddie, there's people looking at us..."
"Blimey, Ritchie... You're right!"

Whether that was my luck or not I don't know, but it was never off-putting and eventually I wrote sketches that and they were sent off for appreciation to people like Danny Baker and Iain Lee, never got a reply back but by putting them out there it would show I was here and not going to go away, even showing them to other people who had a better grasp of the English language. They said they were alright but if that was just to puff me up a bit I don't know. I chose to write still by doing an article for 'Off The Telly' about a programme  I had seen on daytime on Channel 5 and for them to publish it on the site was something to behold. OK, it had needed changes both from my brother and also from others at the site. But I felt justified in what I was doing and I could feel proud that something I wrote was being read by people all over of the world.

So where's the News at One music then?

Maybe it was a case of 'Go Me!' but it felt like there was a freer spirit coming out of me and that rather then speaking words could flow forth on the page or the screen about what was going on in my mind. By this I had tickled my own funny bone and there was something to be said about it all. In terms of everything I might not be a journalist or a novelist, the expression of the word can never be any truer then something spoken by somebody.

The scripts? Well, they are hidden away for a rainy day, so who knows? The words come forth and so do the ideas...