If I may comment about the Groklaw interview, since I know a thing or two about it.
We had been in contact with the BBC press service for some time prior to Tim's comment, but we were of course pleased when the interview was arranged, no doubt due to the uproar following the unfortunate Linux comments. We would love to be able to force interviewees to come in and sit down for an interrogation (joke), but it doesn't work like that. People talk to us because we try to be fair. We aim to be complete for the historical record, always providing transcript + recording when we can, but most of all to be fair. That means interviewees are invited to express themselves, not treated as an enemy - as Pamela Jones told me once, as if we were inviting a guest. If they announce a change, it's only reasonable to provide the benefit of the doubt in the interim. If there is an apology, it's only decent to accept it, then ask what steps will be taken to address the problem. In this case, the months following have shown movement to more openness (although perhaps still too slow for many), but of course we hold everyone accountable to their public statements if they don't follow through (Dave take note :-). I often tell my wife that citizen journalism is a tough job, but somebody's got to do it, since there are many subjects of importance passed over and poorly covered by the mainstream media. I am an avid daily listener of the BBC World Service radio, but I must say I was disappointed at the level of reporting on the BBC last September the day the European Court of First Instance handed down its ruling on the Microsoft case. Groklaw is a resource for journalists too, although often enough it is an unattributed source :-) I wouldn't be so hard on the BBC interviewer, it's not a simple task to interview a colleague on such a controversial subject. Remember at that point Ashley Highfield had not yet published his first blog post; some communication was far better than none at all. I do regret however that this backstage interview and the one with Mark Taylor and Becky Hogge do not have transcripts, which renders what was said effectively invisible to the search engines. Sean. - Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group. To unsubscribe, please visit http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html. Unofficial list archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/
