The BBC has seen its fair share of criticism in its 90-year history. After becoming the world's first national broadcasting organisation in London 1922, it began experimenting radio services bringing the public different ways to listen to music and news - the latter unfavoured by newspapers. Then in 1923, BBC launched Radio Times magazine showing people what is on in their stations, a feature boycotted by newspapers. But much to the displeasure of papers in the UK, BBC were busy expanding to its maximum force with stations added in Birmingham, Newcastle-Upon-Tyne, Cardiff and Glasgow before its magazine's launch. The expansion of the BBC was so big the papers performed a walk-out in protest to the broadcasting company on the 4th May, 1926.
News bulletins became what BBC were all about in the 1920s but by 1927, sport became an instrumental part of the medium's coverage, broadcasting live commentaries for rugby union and football. BBC licence application levels soared with 12 million having such package by 1930. It was enough for them to consider television as a new form of broadcasting. On 2nd November, 1936, that was made a reality from Alexandra Palace. In its first twelve months, it boasted its first outside broadcast, the coronation of King George VI and its first of many Wimbledon tennis coverage.
The launch of BBC TV brought newspapers in a crisis during the 1930s. This problem became global as American paper proprietor William Randolph Hearst had to sell some of his stocks and used his own personal funds to keep his publications alive. In the UK, Viscount Randolph sold his shares in The Mirror while The Daily Herald (now The Sun) thrived after ownership shift in 1929, after their slip in sales in the 1920s. The outcome in the press was mixed but the BBC's impact on papers at the time was massive.
But newspapers had to get used to the rise in broadcasting. In 1955, ITV was formed to compete with the BBC while Channel 4 was launched in 1982, to simply "expand the monopoly", according to Rupert Murdoch, a media mogul who defied all odds and owned both papers and television platforms with the introduction to Sky in the 1980s. And with the recent internet revolution on steroids, newspaper circulation levels haven't stopped decreasing. Even if investigative journalism has excelled in papers with the MP expenses scandal in 2009 and so on, it still failed to attract the amount of readers it used to. Crisis in newspapers mounted when papers attacked other publications. The Guardian for example, told the world that News of the World phone hacked murdered girl Milly Dowler's mobile device leading on her devastated parents to believe she was alive, listening to her messages. News of the World has shut down and some of its previous editors are being arrested and charged on dotted occasions.
With the hacking crisis happening, and Sky being scrutinised by the press because News of the World and Sky share the same owner, the BBC were left untouched. Their content in the first nine months of 2012 was been praised, particularly during the Olympic Games where their performance was almost worthy of a gold medal. Journalism on the BBC was possibly at its peak.
However, once Olympic fever vanished, things turned sour for the broadcasting giant and the press found out about one of BBC's main assets unimaginable actions. Sir Jimmy Savile (yes, he's still a "Sir"), the man behind the very popular show "Jim'll Fix It" has been revealed as a child molester. He passed away over 12 months ago so he can't have any say on the allegations but it hasn't stopped the tabloids saying explicitly that Savile abused children in his BBC dressing room and hospitals where he volunteered.
The Savile case is unravelling by the weeks as, according to the police, there are 450 links suggesting the TV star abused children. Worse still for the BBC, papers are finding that Savile was not the only one in the broadcasting company to have done this during the 1970s and 80s. Gary Glitter and DJ Dave Lee Travis have been arrested in the last couple of weeks. Even the adult staff members including top presenter Sandi Toksvig said she was groped on more than one occasion.
Why wasn't anyone told about Savile's wrongdoing beforehand, when he was alive? It's difficult to explain but in hindsight, the BBC allegedly knew about Savile's whereabouts but kept it quiet and told their staff to do the same - which they did. "Jim'll Fix It" lasted 19 years on BBC One and after Savile's passing in October 2011, the channel showcased a one-off Christmas episode in his honour. 286 episodes and recent Christmas episode celebrity promotions with the likes of Kimberly Walsh, Lewis Hamilton and Shane Ritchie, yet the victims and BBC kept quiet. Surely someone of the 450 links could have broken the silence before? There isn't any need to ponder and reflect on BBC's role in this as what happened, happened. We cannot change the past and the BBC's reputation has been squandered because of it.
However, once the Savile story died down a little, further embarrassment occurred at the BBC. There was a similar case of child abuse occurring in a care home in Wrexham, North Wales during the 1970s and 80s. One alleged victim, named Steve Meesham tried to reveal all on BBC Two's Newsnight and said Conservative Peer Lord McAlpine abused him while he was a resident there. It became clear later that this claim was false as the Tory slammed the BBC for not talking to him first before having to accuse him on national television of something he didn't do. Even Mr. Meesham noticed he made a mistake and apologised after wrongly identifying McAlpine as a culprit. The news programme also apologised but considering they knew about Savile's child abuse claims a year before everyone else, you can understand people's anger towards the show which has previously been praised for its journalistic excellence since its launch in 1980.
Despite making two obvious catastrophic faults, Newsnight and the BBC haven't technically broken the law. Many have been upset that they pay £145.50 a year on TV licence fee and aren't told everything to their interest but Ofcom are investigating the show's recent episode which wrongly accused the Conservative peer as well as ITV's This Morning, in which presenter Phillip Schofield revealed the politicians who are speculated to have been involved with child abuse to current Prime Minister, David Cameron.
The recent revelations left George Entwistle to answer all the tricky questions. He was part of Newsnight's production team between 1994 and 1999 and in the past two months, was Director General of the BBC. During his two month stint at the top, both sex abuse allegations were revealed. Entwistle seemed powerless and simply couldn't cope with all the criticism facing him. He resigned from the role on the 10th November, 2012.
Entwistle received sympathy from those who know him well and a smaller amount of people are critical of him now compared to his performance at the MPs Select Committee meeting which saw him described by one journalist as a "helpless fish". Now he's left, BBC Trust are the ones answering all the questions. Its Chairman, Lord Patten promises that the recent events will not happen again.
The press must be revelling in BBC's recent misfortunes, but the only thing they have proved is that the BBC isn't perfect. The press are right to say the management system needs to change - if you ask me, there needs to be more than one Director General, with one to focus on television and the other on radio and online coverage. With one Director General, it's easy to keep they eyes off the ball. What BSkyB have done so well in the past to laugh off their criticisms was to keep it at their stride and their PR has been very good at doing that. BBC needs to learn to play the same tricks as Sky. Tell the world their journalism is among the best the planet has seen and that Newsnight has made two disastrous mistakes that will not happen again. The BBC is probably the best thing that has happened to Britain in recent memory. Not many other broadcasters can boast their journalism broadcasting and translated into different languages and aired in different countries opening up to many cultures. It will take time to supposedly move on from recent happenings and we can let the police and Ofcom focus on the Savile/Newsnight case without any intervention. That is now out of the BBC's hands. Let's focus on the excellent content it provides 24/7.
News bulletins became what BBC were all about in the 1920s but by 1927, sport became an instrumental part of the medium's coverage, broadcasting live commentaries for rugby union and football. BBC licence application levels soared with 12 million having such package by 1930. It was enough for them to consider television as a new form of broadcasting. On 2nd November, 1936, that was made a reality from Alexandra Palace. In its first twelve months, it boasted its first outside broadcast, the coronation of King George VI and its first of many Wimbledon tennis coverage.
The launch of BBC TV brought newspapers in a crisis during the 1930s. This problem became global as American paper proprietor William Randolph Hearst had to sell some of his stocks and used his own personal funds to keep his publications alive. In the UK, Viscount Randolph sold his shares in The Mirror while The Daily Herald (now The Sun) thrived after ownership shift in 1929, after their slip in sales in the 1920s. The outcome in the press was mixed but the BBC's impact on papers at the time was massive.
But newspapers had to get used to the rise in broadcasting. In 1955, ITV was formed to compete with the BBC while Channel 4 was launched in 1982, to simply "expand the monopoly", according to Rupert Murdoch, a media mogul who defied all odds and owned both papers and television platforms with the introduction to Sky in the 1980s. And with the recent internet revolution on steroids, newspaper circulation levels haven't stopped decreasing. Even if investigative journalism has excelled in papers with the MP expenses scandal in 2009 and so on, it still failed to attract the amount of readers it used to. Crisis in newspapers mounted when papers attacked other publications. The Guardian for example, told the world that News of the World phone hacked murdered girl Milly Dowler's mobile device leading on her devastated parents to believe she was alive, listening to her messages. News of the World has shut down and some of its previous editors are being arrested and charged on dotted occasions.
With the hacking crisis happening, and Sky being scrutinised by the press because News of the World and Sky share the same owner, the BBC were left untouched. Their content in the first nine months of 2012 was been praised, particularly during the Olympic Games where their performance was almost worthy of a gold medal. Journalism on the BBC was possibly at its peak.
However, once Olympic fever vanished, things turned sour for the broadcasting giant and the press found out about one of BBC's main assets unimaginable actions. Sir Jimmy Savile (yes, he's still a "Sir"), the man behind the very popular show "Jim'll Fix It" has been revealed as a child molester. He passed away over 12 months ago so he can't have any say on the allegations but it hasn't stopped the tabloids saying explicitly that Savile abused children in his BBC dressing room and hospitals where he volunteered.
The Savile case is unravelling by the weeks as, according to the police, there are 450 links suggesting the TV star abused children. Worse still for the BBC, papers are finding that Savile was not the only one in the broadcasting company to have done this during the 1970s and 80s. Gary Glitter and DJ Dave Lee Travis have been arrested in the last couple of weeks. Even the adult staff members including top presenter Sandi Toksvig said she was groped on more than one occasion.
Why wasn't anyone told about Savile's wrongdoing beforehand, when he was alive? It's difficult to explain but in hindsight, the BBC allegedly knew about Savile's whereabouts but kept it quiet and told their staff to do the same - which they did. "Jim'll Fix It" lasted 19 years on BBC One and after Savile's passing in October 2011, the channel showcased a one-off Christmas episode in his honour. 286 episodes and recent Christmas episode celebrity promotions with the likes of Kimberly Walsh, Lewis Hamilton and Shane Ritchie, yet the victims and BBC kept quiet. Surely someone of the 450 links could have broken the silence before? There isn't any need to ponder and reflect on BBC's role in this as what happened, happened. We cannot change the past and the BBC's reputation has been squandered because of it.
However, once the Savile story died down a little, further embarrassment occurred at the BBC. There was a similar case of child abuse occurring in a care home in Wrexham, North Wales during the 1970s and 80s. One alleged victim, named Steve Meesham tried to reveal all on BBC Two's Newsnight and said Conservative Peer Lord McAlpine abused him while he was a resident there. It became clear later that this claim was false as the Tory slammed the BBC for not talking to him first before having to accuse him on national television of something he didn't do. Even Mr. Meesham noticed he made a mistake and apologised after wrongly identifying McAlpine as a culprit. The news programme also apologised but considering they knew about Savile's child abuse claims a year before everyone else, you can understand people's anger towards the show which has previously been praised for its journalistic excellence since its launch in 1980.
Despite making two obvious catastrophic faults, Newsnight and the BBC haven't technically broken the law. Many have been upset that they pay £145.50 a year on TV licence fee and aren't told everything to their interest but Ofcom are investigating the show's recent episode which wrongly accused the Conservative peer as well as ITV's This Morning, in which presenter Phillip Schofield revealed the politicians who are speculated to have been involved with child abuse to current Prime Minister, David Cameron.
The recent revelations left George Entwistle to answer all the tricky questions. He was part of Newsnight's production team between 1994 and 1999 and in the past two months, was Director General of the BBC. During his two month stint at the top, both sex abuse allegations were revealed. Entwistle seemed powerless and simply couldn't cope with all the criticism facing him. He resigned from the role on the 10th November, 2012.
Entwistle received sympathy from those who know him well and a smaller amount of people are critical of him now compared to his performance at the MPs Select Committee meeting which saw him described by one journalist as a "helpless fish". Now he's left, BBC Trust are the ones answering all the questions. Its Chairman, Lord Patten promises that the recent events will not happen again.
The press must be revelling in BBC's recent misfortunes, but the only thing they have proved is that the BBC isn't perfect. The press are right to say the management system needs to change - if you ask me, there needs to be more than one Director General, with one to focus on television and the other on radio and online coverage. With one Director General, it's easy to keep they eyes off the ball. What BSkyB have done so well in the past to laugh off their criticisms was to keep it at their stride and their PR has been very good at doing that. BBC needs to learn to play the same tricks as Sky. Tell the world their journalism is among the best the planet has seen and that Newsnight has made two disastrous mistakes that will not happen again. The BBC is probably the best thing that has happened to Britain in recent memory. Not many other broadcasters can boast their journalism broadcasting and translated into different languages and aired in different countries opening up to many cultures. It will take time to supposedly move on from recent happenings and we can let the police and Ofcom focus on the Savile/Newsnight case without any intervention. That is now out of the BBC's hands. Let's focus on the excellent content it provides 24/7.
Comments
Post a Comment