Comments on: Crisis in local news deepens as seven London titles close

By: John

John — Fri, 28 Jul 2017 10:03:10 +0000

Many local newspapers have turned into advertisement hoardings.
They carry little real local content and increasingly use “franchised” columnists.
They avoid controversial reporting and seem to side with the local powerful and mighty.
No wonder their support has been ebbing away!
It is not the fault of the journalists but the fault of the owners, who have no local loyalties.
The national newspapers are going the same way.
Donald Trump has a point when he refers to the “fake” news media.
So much content is allocated to nonentities who – we are told – are “celebrities”.
Quite what they are to be celebrated for is never made particularly clear!
All media in this country largely fails the truth test.
We were not told the truth about Iraq or Libya and we are not being told the truth about Syria.
Why should I – or anyone else – actually be expected to pay good money to read lying articles?

By: patrick newman

patrick newman — Fri, 28 Jul 2017 09:49:22 +0000

OK it’s a shame but I just cant get worked up about it. On the other hand it would be nice to see the demise of one or two national newspapers biting the dust as long as it evened up the political ballance when the BBC reds out ‘a look at the papers’!

By: Will

Will — Fri, 28 Jul 2017 06:44:44 +0000

We don’t have capital punishment anymore or conscription although child labour is on the increase.
The internet is the way forward but it is a shame not to be able to have a good local to leaf through anymore.

By: Dave Roberts

Dave Roberts — Fri, 28 Jul 2017 03:14:11 +0000

A sign of the times and not just for local papers. Nationally all the print media is in trouble with rising costs and the internet. The Indy is on line and still functions as a source of investigative journalism.
A good example of how it’s the net that is shaping local politics is the investigations into Lutfur Rahman and his corrupt regime in Tower Hamlets. The local paper the East London Advertiser wouldn’t touch the matter with a barge pole until events were post facto. It was a former ELA journalist Ted Jeory who exposed the whole rotten mess in his blog Trial by Jeory. The rest of the media with the exception of Andrew Gilligan were too afraid of Rahman’s lawyers paid for by the taxpayers of Tower Hamlets.