Study: U.K. trust in press drops following the phone-hacking scandal

09/22/2011

 
Hardly surprising but worth chronicling: A new United Kingdom study has found a decline in public trust of the broadsheet and tabloid press.

With the extent of the phone-hacking scandal much more evident, the poll suggested that only five per cent of Britons trust the tabloid journalists, while 41 per cent trust the broadsheet journalists. That level is down from seven per cent and 54 per cent, respectively, last November.

The YouGov survey for the University of Nottingham found that trust in British members of Parliament rose in the same period to 24 per cent from 17 per cent.
 

The New Yorker on the tabloid ethics scandal

07/26/2011

 
This week, The New Yorker adds two voices to the extensive discussion on the phone-hacking scandal and its implications for journalism.

Nicholas Lemann, the dean of the Columbia School of Journalism, hopes the scandal causes journalists to reflect upon their relationship to power. No matter that important information is often brought forward by unorthodox means, "a press pass is not a moral unlimited-ride card," he writes.

Anthony Lane, one of the paper's arts writers and a former Fleet Street journalist, looks at the culture of News Corp. and its British publications in particular. It is a sharply critical and unflattering portrait, replete with many of the anecdotes in wide circulation about the Rupert Murdoch newspapers.
 

The Guardian's Alan Rusbridger on how it broke the Murdoch ethics scandal

07/18/2011

 
Newsweek.com features an extensive account by the editor in chief of The Guardian that provides some insight into how it persisted on the News of the World phone-hacking case.

Alan Rusbridger coherently identifies the series of events, some of his newsroom's setbacks and challenges, and the ultimate turning points that gave rise to the public awareness of the journalistic scandal.

Among other things he reveals how The New York Times helped his newsroom pursue the story and how those efforts encouraged others to report on it.

Meanwhile, The New York Times today chronicles the handling of the scandal and the efforts by parent company News Corp. to deal with it.
 

Ken Auletta of The New Yorker on what Rupert Murdoch faces

07/17/2011

 
The week ahead includes a pivotal appearance Tuesday before a British parliamentary committee of News Corp. chairman Rupert Murdoch and his son James, a leading executive of the company, along with Rebekah Brooks, the former News Corp. executive arrested Sunday.

In his latest blog post, media writer Ken Auletta looks at what Murdoch faces in the way of legal and regulatory challenges. He clearly believes the American consequences stand to be severe in the phone hacking scandal, even without direct activity in the U.S.
 
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