Channel 4 clickable cartoon coming soon…
One of my old places of employment is really showing the strain now. There used to be an office joke that there were more ex-Express employees in Fleet Street than almost anyone else. Looks as if it will be true now too.
What is going on and what does it mean. You can tell it’s serious because of this.
There is another remarkable project from Google, which you can read about here. Inspiring though this idea is, it is also, potentially awful news for print institutions like the national newspapers who had been hoping to find new money-making opportunities in digitising their archived content. The archived history of The Times is a good example of this in the UK. Skepticism suggests Google’s archives will always be found first, but, perhaps the promise of ‘partnership’ in the Google blog will offer some hope to beleagured newspaper business managers.
Drawn in April of this year
The US federal government has had to nationalise the two biggest holders of home mortgages to prevent them both going bust. It’s the least the government could do after not regulating the over-ambitious selling of mortgages to millions of poorer US citizens over a prolonged period. The enormous state guarantee of finance to these two private enterprises comes after previous, apparently, inadequate attempts to prop up both companies involved, Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae. The sums involved (taxpayer provided of course) are eye-watering as the C4 report, linked above, indicates. We might expect similar action here too, especially as the short-term ask-no-questions-guv, loan facility provided by the Bank of England to our major mortgage brokers is to come to an end on October 20th. There has been much lobbying in the newspaper business pages for an extension of this provision, we will see whether the bank, and its bosses, Mr Brown and Mr Darling, think they can afford not to do so.
Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae – what are they? From The Guardian.
And from The Telegraph
Bill Emmott – former editor of The Economist on what the Federal government has done, in bailing out the two financial institutions, and why.
New York Times narrative on collapse of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae
John McCain’s speech to the Republican national convention was much criticised across many media outlets for being uninspiring and dull. I’m not sure I agree. I thought it was a rather cleverly judged piece of positioning in the wake of all the excitement about his colourful running mate Sarah Palin. In deep contrast to her extremely high-profile debut in political society, McCain offered a measured marketing exercise stressing his apparent strong point, experience. He and his advisors knew the eyes of the media world were on them (because of Palin) and it was important to look measured and presidential. He set out to do that in his speech. Steadiness and boredom can be a highly effective part in the selling of a politician. (I live in a country which elected Conservative John Major as prime minister largely because of his steady-eddie image which played well against his opponent Neil Kinnock’s tendency to windbaggery.) McCain’s campaign appears to think this is the way to beat Obama’s up to now, racier campaign. Traditionally, a safe pair of hands plays well with voting electorates, who do tend to be conservative in their choices, even when economic times are hard. Lloyd Shepherd at I’ve said too much thought so too – and produces some interesting evidence to support it.
Published at Channel 4 News.
Sarah Palin’s speech as a wordcloud – which words, exactly, were buzzing
And for dessert, The Onion.
You might be needing a stiff drink afterwards, this one has a certain shocking value…
