There'll be a significant proportion of the population with their fingers crossed hoping that the government extends the advice to WFH where possible.
Interestingly though the proportion of people who want to WFH permanently is in a minority and has actually fallen since the pandemic began, at least according to the surveys I have seen. Most people favour a mix.
I favour a mix, but I also favour not being asked to go back to the office until two weeks after my second dose - which could mean working from home until the start of September.
That’s fair enough. I’m fairly relaxed about Covid generally, but see where you are coming from. I’ve already been in a few times because I’m bored at home every day. As it is, my second jab is this week so I’ll be inoculated by 21 June in any case - realise that’s not the case for younger people.
The pfizer gap can be as little as 3 weeks if supply allows. That's important.
Looking into it further, my health board did 11170 vaccinations in the week ending 28th May. That'd have been the UK equivalent of about 750k/day solidly for a week and if there were no supply, demand or timing between doses constraints would be a pace that allows Bassetlaw to have 100% of adults done with both doses by July 18th.
Bassetlaw already has a minimal rate of infection plus there are zero covid patients in Doncaster and Bassetlaw hospitals.
It's a disease that is evaporating out of rural areas tbh. Every single msoa in Bassetlaw is now clear (Data suppressed, cases < 3). Ryedale got down to 0 infections last week, though a single one has sprung up again.
"Scientific modelling has been crude and unreliable at predicting the pandemic, NHS leaders have said, as they warned against using it to decide whether to release restrictions on June 21."
Telegraph.
Hallelujah! Fantastic news. Has the light finally started to be seen on SAGE modelling fiasco?
Good morning
Kay Burley is back on Sky and the first subject was lifting lockdown, what an irony
She then has three guests, Lisa Nandy, Gordon Brown and David King of the so called Independent Sage
All attacking HMG and David King, on one long rant demanding lockdowns until covid is eradicated from the country
Not one was challenged by Burley
GBNews starts next Sunday and I expect their breakfast programme next Monday will see many defection from Burley and Sky
Britain's own Fox News! Just what we need for balanced reporting -not!
Watching GB News will make the angry, angrier, just like Fox.
To be fair that cannot be assumed when not one programme has been broadcast
I do recognise it is an accusation from the left, but time will tell and it has to comply with the same regulations BBC and Sky come under
The latter point is true, but it seems a little suspicious to me that GB News has been set up just as the government is trying to strong arm someone as head of OfCom who wants to get rid of the impartial rules i.e Dacre.
The committee set up to recommend OfCom chair has been disbanded iirc because they came up with the wrong answer as far as Johnson was concerned.
Having said that I think while Andrew Neil is running the show it will be fine. We will see. But long term I think there could be a 'Fox News' problem.
Andrew Neil is one of the many many people on right and left who have been driven bonkers by Twitter.
He’s no longer a very credible commentator (let alone network chief).
Being driven bonkers as you say by twitter makes someone no longer a credible commentator seems a strange analysis
He’s on Twitter every day making non-credible commentaries.
To be honest I do not engage on twitter though I do follow some tweets
David Cameron's comments on twitter was one of he most succinct things he has said
Boris could single handedly vaccinate the whole developing world and the NYT would only credit the pilot that flew him around.
Being a pretty regular reader of NYT have thought - and still do think -that their alleged rampant Anglophobia is a myth - a symptom of of neo-Little Englander angst.
For one thing, they actually report on the doings of your obscure off-shore island, which is more that 99.46% of the rest of US media. Indeed, they have the general reputation on THIS side of the Atlantic (and the Pacific) of being Brit-lovers!
Douglas Murray nails the Gray Grey Lady quite well here:
The trend has been going on since 2016, when the NYT seemed to have decided that the Brexit vote led the way for the election of Donald Trump. Since then the paper’s desire to attack Britain has appeared insatiable. A fact that leads the paper’s readers to be woefully ill-informed about this country. I for one have been fairly regularly struck by the number of otherwise intelligent and subtle Americans I know who seem to think that Boris Johnson is (at best) president Trump’s evil twin and (at worst) a demagogic populist on a par with the great dictators. Invariably the cause is the NYT.
No, I do NOT recognize myself.
What I am seeing, is Tory angst at ANY critique of Brexit or the Blessed Boris. Along with a strong dose of old-fashioned Brit condescension. Which is a hearty perennial, not the least here on PB.
I think you mean a hardy perennial.
As an extra, the "man in the street" quotes from people in the UK started to use US idiom in their language.....
When people went "down to the local creek" for relaxation.....
Mr. Sandpit, aye, Vettel had a great race after a strong performance in Monaco. Unlucky for Stroll, but Aston Martin's faith in the veteran is being repaid (and Red Bull now look like they probably have a capable number two to Verstappen). Both men said to judge them after five races, and they finished 1-2, with Gasly also punching well above his weight.
Politically, there's risk/reward here either way: 1. Open as planned, we beat (at least most of) Europe on getting life back to normal. No significant third wave, no more lockdowns: all hail Boris 2. Open as planned. Significant third wave, lockodnw later in the year: Boris the bungler with blood on his hands, people will look again at the earlier cock-ups too 3. Delay opening, we fall behind (bits of) Europe and they don't have a significant third wave and it's clear we were too cautious: Boris in hock to the mad scientists, vaccine bounce disappears as it all looks a bit pointless if we didn't unlock any quicker 4 Delay opening, we fall behind (bits of Europe) but those bits of Europe have a big third wave and lock down again late summer/autumn while a short delay here means no more lockdowns: Boris called this one right, good job
Opening as planned has both the biggest upside and biggest downside, politically. I still think we can open now if we agree (and it's made clear to the country) that the lockdowns were to prevent NHS collapse - if that's not a real risk (it seems unlikely) then we open up. Now does Johnson have the cajones for it?
I think the before Christmas situation is a bit different - Johnson eventually took the route of lockdown, but well after most scientists were warning about imminent doom (increasing cases, with increasing hospitalisations and very little immunity in the population - different to now!) and even then it was only a partial lockdown of the country.
You missed 1.5
Open most of the restrictions that piss people off (masks indoors, rule of 6 indoors) keep WFH guidance and masks on public transport. Vaccination continues. Something of an increase in cases but nhs not overwhelmed.
Is anyone running a book on how long GB News will last?
Fox News makes money.
Pretty much every other news channel loses money. Most of the losses are hidden as part of larger organisations, or there are deep pocketed sponsors.
Viewership of cable/satellite news is in precipitous decline. And the UK market simply isn't very big.
GB News has raised £60m (including - it is said - £10m from a old friend of mine).
But running a 24 hour news organisation is not inexpensive.
I give in nine months before they announce that they will be shutting up shop.
Isn't GB News backed by Discovery (well now whatever that merged company will call itself)?
Discovery, Liberty and a couple of hedge funds, according to their Wiki page. They’ve raised £60m so far, which is presumably at least a couple of years’ running costs.
I just want to put the fundamental financial challenge of GB News in context for a second. Back in the depths of history (1992), Sky News averaged 2% of viewing in the UK.
Which is not a bad number at all, albeit one boosted massively by it being the default played in hotel rooms and airports.
It now averages 0.5%. (Despite still being boosted by deals to be the default channel in hotels etc.)
That would merely be bad. But you need to add to this the fact that broadcast TV is in terminal decline.
So, GB News has to carve out a niche of a niche in a dying industry.
£60m sounds like a lot, but they have 30 presenters already signed up. 30. And some of the will be quite expensive. Plus the offices. The marketing. The technology. The cost of the spectrum itself. The inevitable web and mobile presence. Etc.
I'd be staggered if their monthly operating expenses came to less than £5m.
And what will they average for viewership? 30,000 people during popular shows, and under 10,000 most of the time.
There's no business there. That's a massive financial black hole.
Control of GIUK is far too strategic important for that to be a good outcome
NATO controls it now and NATO will control it after Scotland becomes independent through either an air policing mission or, less likely, the Scottish Defence Force or whatever it's called.
Iceland gets to be a full member of NATO and have all the benefits accruing therefrom despite not having any armed forces. A similar accommodation will be made with Scotland due the strategic value of the GIUK gap.
I wish I had your optimistic view on the rationality of Scottish nationalists
"Scientific modelling has been crude and unreliable at predicting the pandemic, NHS leaders have said, as they warned against using it to decide whether to release restrictions on June 21."
Telegraph.
Hallelujah! Fantastic news. Has the light finally started to be seen on SAGE modelling fiasco?
Good morning
Kay Burley is back on Sky and the first subject was lifting lockdown, what an irony
She then has three guests, Lisa Nandy, Gordon Brown and David King of the so called Independent Sage
All attacking HMG and David King, on one long rant demanding lockdowns until covid is eradicated from the country
Not one was challenged by Burley
GBNews starts next Sunday and I expect their breakfast programme next Monday will see many defection from Burley and Sky
Britain's own Fox News! Just what we need for balanced reporting -not!
Watching GB News will make the angry, angrier, just like Fox.
To be fair that cannot be assumed when not one programme has been broadcast
I do recognise it is an accusation from the left, but time will tell and it has to comply with the same regulations BBC and Sky come under
GB News is there to make money. The best newspaper in the country is the Daily Mail who make a killing from whipping up the angry. GB News aren't going to be treading an inoffensive neutral line as there's no money to be made doing that.
The news industry is an industry - as in it needs to make money. That means the most successful are the ones that have the most views for their advertisers and that almost always means being the pied piper and whistling a welcome and familiar tune.
The solution isn't to neuter news outlets from doing so, it is simply to allow an open playing field where different tunes can be whistled so that everyone gets the news they want. Fux News is embarrassingly bad but its what many people want. Other news outlets are available in the US market, the same is about to be true here. Good.
Except that it turns out that an open playing field for “news” outlets is debilitating to the public sphere.
We retain regulation on news broadcasting for very good reason.
Absolutely. I'm not remotely making an argument against regulation - otherwise what is to stop a rich person funding Icke TV where the David gets to tell everyone the "news" about Leon's aliens who are already amongst us.
The challenge is to where the bar has to be set that all news outlets have to limbo under without all of them being utterly neutered. It is impossible to have neutral news, especially when its a public broadcaster.
All media is mediated - processed by humans. Which means it is biased. Accepting that and allowing for multiple flavours of bias as we have with newspapers is the only viable solution for TV.
Is anyone running a book on how long GB News will last?
Fox News makes money.
Pretty much every other news channel loses money. Most of the losses are hidden as part of larger organisations, or there are deep pocketed sponsors.
Viewership of cable/satellite news is in precipitous decline. And the UK market simply isn't very big.
GB News has raised £60m (including - it is said - £10m from a old friend of mine).
But running a 24 hour news organisation is not inexpensive.
I give in nine months before they announce that they will be shutting up shop.
Fox News of course predates social media, and rancid as they are they seemed to have played the rise of that alternative media pretty astutely. The GB News model seems to be based on appealing to that section of the population that has largely rejected the MSM. Are there many precedents for a new conventional platform pulling back consumers that have already rejected other versions of that conventional platform?
This is pretty significant, if you're following the Source of Covid story
One of the main virologists defending the "natural origins" thesis is K G Anderson
Weirdly enough, he mentioned a possible "engineered" aspect to the virus to Anthony Fauci, in a FOIA'd email back in January 2020. Four days later he was on board with natural zoonosis, 100%, with no obvious data interim to change his mind. Why?
Who knows. But ever since he has been furiously denouncing "lab leak" and presenting concepts for "wet market" - or whatever
Until this week. For the last few hours he has been deleting tweets en masse, and now he has deleted his entire account, as citizen journalists probe what he has said
It's a cover up. It came from the lab. Enough
"Kristian G. Anderson in a January 31, 2020 email to Anthony Fauci:
“…Eddie, Bob, Mike and myself all find the genome inconsistent with expectations from evolutionary theory.”
The hypocrisy of these people is simply stunning."
I don't think that we will ever know the origin, as there is no objective source of information that is credible to the world. Even when there is, it is hard to prove causation eg ebola, HIV or BSE. Some things are just unknowable.
Personally, I would like to see Chinese wet markets closed down. They are an offence against animals, and particularly against threatened species. If the Chinese were serious then they should do that.
Close the wet markets, AND prohibit "gain of function" research
I shan't bore PBers understandably obsessed with the recent polling in Bodmin West, and a possible shift of Mebyon Kernow to fifth place to fourth, BUT the latest news on Lab Leak suggest Anthony Fauci might go to jail
Why might he go to jail?
The evidence now is this:
1. Fauci funded gain of function research in Wuhan on bat coronaviruses (he admits this), he gave it directly to Daszak who has explicitly said Wuhan was manufacturing new, more virulent SARS-like viruses
2. Fauci did this without telling Trump (because Obama had banned it, as dangerous)
3. When the news of the virus broke, Fauci was told: in an email: this virus was very possibly engineered, in Wuhan (via "gain of function")
4. Fauci convened, over the next weekend, everyone he knew, to come out with a different story: it had to be natural zoonosis, not the lab (personally inverting the evidence of his scientists).
Now, it is possible Fauci believed this, but he had no new evidence to suddenly say this, other than his desire to get a different narrative "out there"
5. Fauci thereafter contradicted Trump, and Fauci said "lab leak" was clownish, even as the evidence of lab-leak remained, and then surged
6. Fauci in the last week suddenly changes his mind. Lab leak is possible
He PAID for the gain-of-function research, Fauci is culpable for Covid, and he knows it
Glad to see PB catching up with LS and related sites after 15 months of this utter shit-show. WHO/pharma corruption in the H1N1 outbreak was documented in a 2010 report, which was received but never acted on.
GB News is there to make money. The best newspaper in the country is the Daily Mail who make a killing from whipping up the angry. GB News aren't going to be treading an inoffensive neutral line as there's no money to be made doing that.
The news industry is an industry - as in it needs to make money. That means the most successful are the ones that have the most views for their advertisers and that almost always means being the pied piper and whistling a welcome and familiar tune.
The solution isn't to neuter news outlets from doing so, it is simply to allow an open playing field where different tunes can be whistled so that everyone gets the news they want. Fux News is embarrassingly bad but its what many people want. Other news outlets are available in the US market, the same is about to be true here. Good.
Fair comment
I agree with RP's analysis of the current situation, but not with the solution. There are two snags. There's the leftist one that if you have a contest of broadcasters putting one-sided views, the right-wing one will win because it has more money (so they'll pay £xxx to employ popular non-political stars to draw people over). That's one reason that the right-wing press tends to do better.
But a more important one is the cohesion of democratic dialogue. We've seen what polarised broadcast media do in the States. People opt for channels that say what they like to hear, and dismiss alternative versions of truth as simply lies. Trump really won the election. All capitalist businesses are corrupt. The middle ground disappears. You need broadcasters who attempt to be neutral or at least to give alternative views a hearing. Otherwise we end up with 50% of the country watching GBNews and 40% watching C4 News, and nobody believing anything the others think.
The problem Nick is that the BBC and especially Sky are not seen as neutral by a large number of the populace
GBNews may or may not survive but it will be a very different broadcaster to the other two and should widen dialogue
On topic, Labour says it could support the government if it keeps some restrictions beyond June 21st.
Leaving the way clear for ReformUK to be the only main party committed to keeping June 21st as 'Freedom Day' if Boris retains some restrictions beyond that date
What on earth is wrong with the Labour Party? Boris and Co keep leaving the goal open with the ball gently rolling unattended past the penalty spot, so up rushes KS and gracefully boots it hard into the stand somewhere near the corner. Again and again.
The government has squandered almost all of the lead the vaccines gave us - cheered on by the fools in the Labour Party. If they took a stance that we should unlock faster, they might actually have found a popular cause that's worth getting excited about, and also finally manage hold the government to account on something. Instead they are taking about wallpaper and wondering why their poll ratings are slightly further underwater the Titanic. Morons the lot of them.
I don't think you are correct to say they have squandered the lead.
They are still following the unlocking plan set out in (was it?) April.
Wrt to EU, the EU pivoted to one jab = vaccinated to hide their 8 week lag, and imo may be about to hit a problem with the Indian variant needing 2 jabs active for proper protection.
EuroGoon twitter's latest lot of kittens is about "how dare the USA keep us from going there when we have nearly caught them up". The last 4 words are a lie.
"Scientific modelling has been crude and unreliable at predicting the pandemic, NHS leaders have said, as they warned against using it to decide whether to release restrictions on June 21."
Telegraph.
Hallelujah! Fantastic news. Has the light finally started to be seen on SAGE modelling fiasco?
Good morning
Kay Burley is back on Sky and the first subject was lifting lockdown, what an irony
She then has three guests, Lisa Nandy, Gordon Brown and David King of the so called Independent Sage
All attacking HMG and David King, on one long rant demanding lockdowns until covid is eradicated from the country
Not one was challenged by Burley
GBNews starts next Sunday and I expect their breakfast programme next Monday will see many defection from Burley and Sky
Britain's own Fox News! Just what we need for balanced reporting -not!
Watching GB News will make the angry, angrier, just like Fox.
To be fair that cannot be assumed when not one programme has been broadcast
I do recognise it is an accusation from the left, but time will tell and it has to comply with the same regulations BBC and Sky come under
GB News is there to make money. The best newspaper in the country is the Daily Mail who make a killing from whipping up the angry. GB News aren't going to be treading an inoffensive neutral line as there's no money to be made doing that.
The news industry is an industry - as in it needs to make money. That means the most successful are the ones that have the most views for their advertisers and that almost always means being the pied piper and whistling a welcome and familiar tune.
The solution isn't to neuter news outlets from doing so, it is simply to allow an open playing field where different tunes can be whistled so that everyone gets the news they want. Fux News is embarrassingly bad but its what many people want. Other news outlets are available in the US market, the same is about to be true here. Good.
Except that it turns out that an open playing field for “news” outlets is debilitating to the public sphere.
We retain regulation on news broadcasting for very good reason.
Besides, there have always been two sorts of news media; those that have to turn a profit, and those whose losses are tolerated for reasons of kudos or pulpit purchasing.
We don't know which one GBN will be. But it feels noteworthy that there aren't any profitable UK channels in that space now. The UK isn't the USA; the market is smaller, we don't have the culture of making news channels pay-TV, the BBC is massive. Maybe there's a profit to be turned on adverts alone, but it's blooming hard to see how.
And if turns out to be not intrinsically profitable, how is Brillovision different to Russia Today?
I just want to put the fundamental financial challenge of GB News in context for a second. Back in the depths of history (1992), Sky News averaged 2% of viewing in the UK.
Which is not a bad number at all, albeit one boosted massively by it being the default played in hotel rooms and airports.
It now averages 0.5%. (Despite still being boosted by deals to be the default channel in hotels etc.)
That would merely be bad. But you need to add to this the fact that broadcast TV is in terminal decline.
So, GB News has to carve out a niche of a niche in a dying industry.
£60m sounds like a lot, but they have 30 presenters already signed up. 30. And some of the will be quite expensive. Plus the offices. The marketing. The technology. The cost of the spectrum itself. The inevitable web and mobile presence. Etc.
I'd be staggered if their monthly operating expenses came to less than £5m.
And what will they average for viewership? 30,000 people during popular shows, and under 10,000 most of the time.
There's no business there. That's a massive financial black hole.
The rapid decline of TV was highlighted by last night's BAFTAs. Only a few years back we were talking of a "golden age". Even the inclusion of Netflix did nothing to mask the shocking state of what we are being offered.
Is anyone running a book on how long GB News will last?
Fox News makes money.
Pretty much every other news channel loses money. Most of the losses are hidden as part of larger organisations, or there are deep pocketed sponsors.
Viewership of cable/satellite news is in precipitous decline. And the UK market simply isn't very big.
GB News has raised £60m (including - it is said - £10m from a old friend of mine).
But running a 24 hour news organisation is not inexpensive.
I give in nine months before they announce that they will be shutting up shop.
Isn't GB News backed by Discovery (well now whatever that merged company will call itself)?
They are investors, along with Paul Marshall, but it's not part of the Discovery group.
Fair enough, I haven't really been following other than what I read here. It's not going to be successful, Sky News is a huge money loser For Comcast and the BBC is taxpayer funded. I don't see how an independent news channel survives in the UK, the market isn't big enough.
I just want to put the fundamental financial challenge of GB News in context for a second. Back in the depths of history (1992), Sky News averaged 2% of viewing in the UK.
Which is not a bad number at all, albeit one boosted massively by it being the default played in hotel rooms and airports.
It now averages 0.5%. (Despite still being boosted by deals to be the default channel in hotels etc.)
That would merely be bad. But you need to add to this the fact that broadcast TV is in terminal decline.
So, GB News has to carve out a niche of a niche in a dying industry.
£60m sounds like a lot, but they have 30 presenters already signed up. 30. And some of the will be quite expensive. Plus the offices. The marketing. The technology. The cost of the spectrum itself. The inevitable web and mobile presence. Etc.
I'd be staggered if their monthly operating expenses came to less than £5m.
And what will they average for viewership? 30,000 people during popular shows, and under 10,000 most of the time.
There's no business there. That's a massive financial black hole.
The interesting decision is to go with being a broadcast channel, at a time when many other news shows are launching on a web-only platform.
Presumably they decided they needed the prestige of being regulated by OFCOM, because the ad revenue from a tiny broadcast audience is barely going to cover their hosting fees with Freeview, Sky and Virgin.
Maybe they’re hoping for several million hits a day for clips on Youtube.
GB News is there to make money. The best newspaper in the country is the Daily Mail who make a killing from whipping up the angry. GB News aren't going to be treading an inoffensive neutral line as there's no money to be made doing that.
The news industry is an industry - as in it needs to make money. That means the most successful are the ones that have the most views for their advertisers and that almost always means being the pied piper and whistling a welcome and familiar tune.
The solution isn't to neuter news outlets from doing so, it is simply to allow an open playing field where different tunes can be whistled so that everyone gets the news they want. Fux News is embarrassingly bad but its what many people want. Other news outlets are available in the US market, the same is about to be true here. Good.
Fair comment
I agree with RP's analysis of the current situation, but not with the solution. There are two snags. There's the leftist one that if you have a contest of broadcasters putting one-sided views, the right-wing one will win because it has more money (so they'll pay £xxx to employ popular non-political stars to draw people over). That's one reason that the right-wing press tends to do better.
But a more important one is the cohesion of democratic dialogue. We've seen what polarised broadcast media do in the States. People opt for channels that say what they like to hear, and dismiss alternative versions of truth as simply lies. Trump really won the election. All capitalist businesses are corrupt. The middle ground disappears. You need broadcasters who attempt to be neutral or at least to give alternative views a hearing. Otherwise we end up with 50% of the country watching GBNews and 40% watching C4 News, and nobody believing anything the others think.
The problem Nick is that the BBC and especially Sky are not seen as neutral by a large number of the populace
GBNews may or may not survive but it will be a very different broadcaster to the other two and should widen dialogue
You can’t criticise the BBC’s apparent lack of neutrality whilst plugging a new news channel which will is obviously not going to be neutral. Either you’re in favour of neutral news broadcasting, or you’re not.
GB News is there to make money. The best newspaper in the country is the Daily Mail who make a killing from whipping up the angry. GB News aren't going to be treading an inoffensive neutral line as there's no money to be made doing that.
The news industry is an industry - as in it needs to make money. That means the most successful are the ones that have the most views for their advertisers and that almost always means being the pied piper and whistling a welcome and familiar tune.
The solution isn't to neuter news outlets from doing so, it is simply to allow an open playing field where different tunes can be whistled so that everyone gets the news they want. Fux News is embarrassingly bad but its what many people want. Other news outlets are available in the US market, the same is about to be true here. Good.
Fair comment
I agree with RP's analysis of the current situation, but not with the solution. There are two snags. There's the leftist one that if you have a contest of broadcasters putting one-sided views, the right-wing one will win because it has more money (so they'll pay £xxx to employ popular non-political stars to draw people over). That's one reason that the right-wing press tends to do better.
But a more important one is the cohesion of democratic dialogue. We've seen what polarised broadcast media do in the States. People opt for channels that say what they like to hear, and dismiss alternative versions of truth as simply lies. Trump really won the election. All capitalist businesses are corrupt. The middle ground disappears. You need broadcasters who attempt to be neutral or at least to give alternative views a hearing. Otherwise we end up with 50% of the country watching GBNews and 40% watching C4 News, and nobody believing anything the others think.
Its a fine to tread, I absolutely accept that. For me, the internet and the switch away from broadcast to webcast for so many consumers of news has both balanced out teh risks you raise and diluted the impact of big money.
It is perfectly possible for your hard left friends in the likes of Skwarkbox, The Canary and Novara Media (and soon Unite TV if Beckett "wins") to offer radical left voices, as well as state-funded agitators like Al Jazeera, RT, Iran Today etc to platform the like of Corbyn and Galloway.
The middle ground you speak of absolutely is there - the BBC, Sky News, ITN and most of radio. We don't have a problem with a lack of centre ground voices - the problem is that the political centre has been hollowed out so that millions on both sides believe their position to be righteous and the truth and the other side to be traitorous liars and woe betide any outlet that dissents. That isn't a media problem, its a body politic problem.
There'll be a significant proportion of the population with their fingers crossed hoping that the government extends the advice to WFH where possible.
Interestingly though the proportion of people who want to WFH permanently is in a minority and has actually fallen since the pandemic began, at least according to the surveys I have seen. Most people favour a mix.
I favour a mix, but I also favour not being asked to go back to the office until two weeks after my second dose - which could mean working from home until the start of September.
That’s fair enough. I’m fairly relaxed about Covid generally, but see where you are coming from. I’ve already been in a few times because I’m bored at home every day. As it is, my second jab is this week so I’ll be inoculated by 21 June in any case - realise that’s not the case for younger people.
The pfizer gap can be as little as 3 weeks if supply allows. That's important.
Looking into it further, my health board did 11170 vaccinations in the week ending 28th May. That'd have been the UK equivalent of about 750k/day solidly for a week and if there were no supply, demand or timing between doses constraints would be a pace that allows Bassetlaw to have 100% of adults done with both doses by July 18th.
Bassetlaw already has a minimal rate of infection plus there are zero covid patients in Doncaster and Bassetlaw hospitals.
It's a disease that is evaporating out of rural areas tbh. Every single msoa in Bassetlaw is now clear (Data suppressed, cases < 3). Ryedale got down to 0 infections last week, though a single one has sprung up again.
Covid is going to become a disease of the inner cities in Britain.
Control of GIUK is far too strategic important for that to be a good outcome
NATO controls it now and NATO will control it after Scotland becomes independent through either an air policing mission or, less likely, the Scottish Defence Force or whatever it's called.
Iceland gets to be a full member of NATO and have all the benefits accruing therefrom despite not having any armed forces. A similar accommodation will be made with Scotland due the strategic value of the GIUK gap.
I wish I had your optimistic view on the rationality of Scottish nationalists
Scotland will find itself in an interesting position. Outside the EU they could get the first EU air policing mission. After Lisbon NATO is responsible for the territorial integrity of member states in EU and the EU military service is responsible for police actions outside the EU.
NATO will not want to cede partial control of the GIUK gap to an EU controlled Franco-Belgian-Dutch (for example) air policing mission based in Lossiemouth and will therefore be very accommodating to Scotland.
Rose Gottemoeller (US ex Deputy SecGen of NATO) went into this in some detail in a recent interview. NATO (which means the US as it exclusively serves US strategic interests) is relaxed about Scottish independence but very keen to prevent EUMS/PESCO emerging as a Eurocentric alternative to NATO.
On topic, Labour says it could support the government if it keeps some restrictions beyond June 21st.
Leaving the way clear for ReformUK to be the only main party committed to keeping June 21st as 'Freedom Day' if Boris retains some restrictions beyond that date
What on earth is wrong with the Labour Party? Boris and Co keep leaving the goal open with the ball gently rolling unattended past the penalty spot, so up rushes KS and gracefully boots it hard into the stand somewhere near the corner. Again and again.
The government has squandered almost all of the lead the vaccines gave us - cheered on by the fools in the Labour Party. If they took a stance that we should unlock faster, they might actually have found a popular cause that's worth getting excited about, and also finally manage hold the government to account on something. Instead they are taking about wallpaper and wondering why their poll ratings are slightly further underwater the Titanic. Morons the lot of them.
I don't think you are correct to say they have squandered the lead.
They are still following the unlocking plan set out in (was it?) April.
Wrt to EU, the EU pivoted to one jab = vaccinated to hide their 8 week lag, and imo may be about to hit a problem with the Indian variant needing 2 jabs active for proper protection.
EuroGoon twitter's latest lot of kittens is about "how dare the USA keep us from going there when we have nearly caught them up". The last 4 words are a lie.
Worth remembering, though, that the EU is pretty much all Pfizer and Moderna now, whose efficacy comes on pretty quick. Plus, they are putting 15 million or so vaccines in peoples' arms every week now. And, the effect on transmission is perhaps the most important bit.
My bet is that the EU - which fucked up vaccine purchasing - is getting reopening spot on.
Shame we can no longer see what the people of the region of England feel about the matter.
Not sure that question would work here. "The country" would be coded as the UK and "the region" coded as the particular county lived in. Not sure many would place county above country. Cornwall maybe?
I think obviously the country is the UK, but the region is surely England/Scotland/Wales/NI?
Does anyone in England think of England as a region?
Either Counties, or North West/South East etc are typically used as regions, never England.
It is the first subnational division of the country, which is surely what the survey is trying to find out. Of course you can Balkanise England further, as Labour were desperate to do in the 2000s. But the survey would then be a little redundant, as very very few will identify with "North West" compared to England or UK. The question of English vs UK identity, however, is a live and important one.
(Although I'm surprised that they haven't gone for the Lander as the subnational regions in Germany).
The question of English vs UK identity is a real one, as is Scots vs UK, but that's a question of national identities. England and Scotland are recognised as nations within a nation, not regions.
The question is about "country" not nation, which is a much vaguer term. The UK is a country, like the United States, Canada or Australia, recognised as such by foreign countries (see e.g. https://www.state.gov/independent-states-in-the-world/ or here https://www.nationsonline.org/oneworld/states.htm) and the United Nations (https://www.worldometers.info/united-nations/). Our four members are the first subnational regions, like states in America or Australia or provinces in Canada. England isn't a country in any generally accepted sense - the OED defines a country as "an area of land that has its own government" and England doesn't even have that.
Mr. Sandpit, Red Bull said they had zero warning of any problem so they were worried about multiple failures.
I think I read on Twitter that it's now thought debris caused both incidents.
I predicted lots of the race right (Leclerc's tyre-chewing giving Gasly the chance) but the timing of the safety car (first one) compromised Gasly. Little bit unlucky, but there we are.
Agreed on the title race. Though worth noting Perez's fantastic performance has turned a tiny lead for Red Bull into a reasonably 26 point margin. Bottas looked like a man ready to retire.
They noticed damage to one of Lewis’s tyres too, when they changed it at the red flag. What was unusual was the location of Stroll’s accident closed the pit lane until the cars had bunched up, otherwise they’d have all come in at that point I think. Seb did well faith the strategy, leading on the hards and moving to the softs at his stop for some pace in the later stages.
Feel quite sorry for Valtteri, they split the setup strategy and he ended up with the high-downforce option, he didn’t have the top speed needed to make progress. He’s not having a great season, but hasn’t really done anything wrong.
It was a spectacular race weekend - eventful and interesting FP sessions, red flag mania in qualifying and then the race itself. Love the Baku track, it does seem to produce classics.
Don't feel sorry for Bottas, he is a surly child who is incapable of overtaking unless he has a massive power / aero advantage. We have repeatedly seen Lewis able to scythe his way through from the back, Bottas always gets stuck unable to make progress.
He'll be gone at season end, I just wonder whether he'll find the motivation to take a step back into a Haas or Alfa drive or whether he'll find something more worthwhile to do with his life.
I just want to put the fundamental financial challenge of GB News in context for a second. Back in the depths of history (1992), Sky News averaged 2% of viewing in the UK.
Which is not a bad number at all, albeit one boosted massively by it being the default played in hotel rooms and airports.
It now averages 0.5%. (Despite still being boosted by deals to be the default channel in hotels etc.)
That would merely be bad. But you need to add to this the fact that broadcast TV is in terminal decline.
So, GB News has to carve out a niche of a niche in a dying industry.
£60m sounds like a lot, but they have 30 presenters already signed up. 30. And some of the will be quite expensive. Plus the offices. The marketing. The technology. The cost of the spectrum itself. The inevitable web and mobile presence. Etc.
I'd be staggered if their monthly operating expenses came to less than £5m.
And what will they average for viewership? 30,000 people during popular shows, and under 10,000 most of the time.
There's no business there. That's a massive financial black hole.
And whilst it won't be the same 30,000 people all the time, I think we can all imagine people who will have it on a lot (no names, no packdrill). It's an awful lot of money to spend preaching to a tiny congregation who are largely converted already.
Someone has pulled off the blag of the century here.
Is anyone running a book on how long GB News will last?
Fox News makes money.
Pretty much every other news channel loses money. Most of the losses are hidden as part of larger organisations, or there are deep pocketed sponsors.
Viewership of cable/satellite news is in precipitous decline. And the UK market simply isn't very big.
GB News has raised £60m (including - it is said - £10m from a old friend of mine).
But running a 24 hour news organisation is not inexpensive.
I give in nine months before they announce that they will be shutting up shop.
Isn't GB News backed by Discovery (well now whatever that merged company will call itself)?
They are investors, along with Paul Marshall, but it's not part of the Discovery group.
Fair enough, I haven't really been following other than what I read here. It's not going to be successful, Sky News is a huge money loser For Comcast and the BBC is taxpayer funded. I don't see how an independent news channel survives in the UK, the market isn't big enough.
Yep: that's pretty much my view.
There's one other problem - advertising revenues for broadcast TV are dropping faster than viewership. because you simply can't get the targeting with Freeview and Sky you can with streaming.
I just want to put the fundamental financial challenge of GB News in context for a second. Back in the depths of history (1992), Sky News averaged 2% of viewing in the UK.
Which is not a bad number at all, albeit one boosted massively by it being the default played in hotel rooms and airports.
It now averages 0.5%. (Despite still being boosted by deals to be the default channel in hotels etc.)
That would merely be bad. But you need to add to this the fact that broadcast TV is in terminal decline.
So, GB News has to carve out a niche of a niche in a dying industry.
£60m sounds like a lot, but they have 30 presenters already signed up. 30. And some of the will be quite expensive. Plus the offices. The marketing. The technology. The cost of the spectrum itself. The inevitable web and mobile presence. Etc.
I'd be staggered if their monthly operating expenses came to less than £5m.
And what will they average for viewership? 30,000 people during popular shows, and under 10,000 most of the time.
There's no business there. That's a massive financial black hole.
Exactly. Their only hope is to copy the Daily Mail / GNN and tell people what they want to hear. Whammy!
GB News is there to make money. The best newspaper in the country is the Daily Mail who make a killing from whipping up the angry. GB News aren't going to be treading an inoffensive neutral line as there's no money to be made doing that.
The news industry is an industry - as in it needs to make money. That means the most successful are the ones that have the most views for their advertisers and that almost always means being the pied piper and whistling a welcome and familiar tune.
The solution isn't to neuter news outlets from doing so, it is simply to allow an open playing field where different tunes can be whistled so that everyone gets the news they want. Fux News is embarrassingly bad but its what many people want. Other news outlets are available in the US market, the same is about to be true here. Good.
Fair comment
I agree with RP's analysis of the current situation, but not with the solution. There are two snags. There's the leftist one that if you have a contest of broadcasters putting one-sided views, the right-wing one will win because it has more money (so they'll pay £xxx to employ popular non-political stars to draw people over). That's one reason that the right-wing press tends to do better.
But a more important one is the cohesion of democratic dialogue. We've seen what polarised broadcast media do in the States. People opt for channels that say what they like to hear, and dismiss alternative versions of truth as simply lies. Trump really won the election. All capitalist businesses are corrupt. The middle ground disappears. You need broadcasters who attempt to be neutral or at least to give alternative views a hearing. Otherwise we end up with 50% of the country watching GBNews and 40% watching C4 News, and nobody believing anything the others think.
The problem Nick is that the BBC and especially Sky are not seen as neutral by a large number of the populace
GBNews may or may not survive but it will be a very different broadcaster to the other two and should widen dialogue
You can’t criticise the BBC’s apparent lack of neutrality whilst plugging a new news channel which will is obviously not going to be neutral. Either you’re in favour of neutral news broadcasting, or you’re not.
They are regulated by OFCOM. They legally have to be neutral, just as much as any other news channel.
Shame we can no longer see what the people of the region of England feel about the matter.
Not sure that question would work here. "The country" would be coded as the UK and "the region" coded as the particular county lived in. Not sure many would place county above country. Cornwall maybe?
I think obviously the country is the UK, but the region is surely England/Scotland/Wales/NI?
Does anyone in England think of England as a region?
Either Counties, or North West/South East etc are typically used as regions, never England.
It is the first subnational division of the country, which is surely what the survey is trying to find out. Of course you can Balkanise England further, as Labour were desperate to do in the 2000s. But the survey would then be a little redundant, as very very few will identify with "North West" compared to England or UK. The question of English vs UK identity, however, is a live and important one.
(Although I'm surprised that they haven't gone for the Lander as the subnational regions in Germany).
The question of English vs UK identity is a real one, as is Scots vs UK, but that's a question of national identities. England and Scotland are recognised as nations within a nation, not regions.
The question is about "country" not nation, which is a much vaguer term. The UK is a country, like the United States, Canada or Australia, recognised as such by foreign countries (see e.g. https://www.state.gov/independent-states-in-the-world/ or here https://www.nationsonline.org/oneworld/states.htm) and the United Nations (https://www.worldometers.info/united-nations/). Our four members are the first subnational regions, like states in America or Australia or provinces in Canada. England isn't a country in any generally accepted sense - the OED defines a country as "an area of land that has its own government" and England doesn't even have that.
Control of GIUK is far too strategic important for that to be a good outcome
NATO controls it now and NATO will control it after Scotland becomes independent through either an air policing mission or, less likely, the Scottish Defence Force or whatever it's called.
Iceland gets to be a full member of NATO and have all the benefits accruing therefrom despite not having any armed forces. A similar accommodation will be made with Scotland due the strategic value of the GIUK gap.
I wish I had your optimistic view on the rationality of Scottish nationalists
Scotland will find itself in an interesting position. Outside the EU they could get the first EU air policing mission. After Lisbon NATO is responsible for the territorial integrity of member states in EU and the EU military service is responsible for police actions outside the EU.
NATO will not want to cede partial control of the GIUK gap to an EU controlled Franco-Belgian-Dutch (for example) air policing mission based in Lossiemouth and will therefore be very accommodating to Scotland.
Rose Gottemoeller (US ex Deputy SecGen of NATO) went into this in some detail in a recent interview. NATO (which means the US as it exclusively serves US strategic interests) is relaxed about Scottish independence but very keen to prevent EUMS/PESCO emerging as a Eurocentric alternative to NATO.
On the Gove ‘We Hold All The Cards’ scale, how many cards would that be?
On topic, Labour says it could support the government if it keeps some restrictions beyond June 21st.
Leaving the way clear for ReformUK to be the only main party committed to keeping June 21st as 'Freedom Day' if Boris retains some restrictions beyond that date
What on earth is wrong with the Labour Party? Boris and Co keep leaving the goal open with the ball gently rolling unattended past the penalty spot, so up rushes KS and gracefully boots it hard into the stand somewhere near the corner. Again and again.
The government has squandered almost all of the lead the vaccines gave us - cheered on by the fools in the Labour Party. If they took a stance that we should unlock faster, they might actually have found a popular cause that's worth getting excited about, and also finally manage hold the government to account on something. Instead they are taking about wallpaper and wondering why their poll ratings are slightly further underwater the Titanic. Morons the lot of them.
I don't think you are correct to say they have squandered the lead.
They are still following the unlocking plan set out in (was it?) April.
Wrt to EU, the EU pivoted to one jab = vaccinated to hide their 8 week lag, and imo may be about to hit a problem with the Indian variant needing 2 jabs active for proper protection.
EuroGoon twitter's latest lot of kittens is about "how dare the USA keep us from going there when we have nearly caught them up". The last 4 words are a lie.
Worth remembering, though, that the EU is pretty much all Pfizer and Moderna now, whose efficacy comes on pretty quick. Plus, they are putting 15 million or so vaccines in peoples' arms every week now. And, the effect on transmission is perhaps the most important bit.
My bet is that the EU - which fucked up vaccine purchasing - is getting reopening spot on.
But we'll see soon enough.
We're only doing Pfizer and Moderna first doses as well but the government is frit about reopening. Boris needs to hold his nerve and just do it. If a few thousand over 50s vaccine refusers die then that's the cost of doing business. I think what would really help is for the government to add a vaccine status filter to all of the case, hospitalisation and death statistics so the public can differentiate between the two and see that the vaccines are the way out, not lockdown.
Shame we can no longer see what the people of the region of England feel about the matter.
Not sure that question would work here. "The country" would be coded as the UK and "the region" coded as the particular county lived in. Not sure many would place county above country. Cornwall maybe?
What's interesting is how many of the orange bits correspond to regions which feature in the history books - Alsace, Burgenland, Tyrol, Eastern Roumelia, Transylvania, Teschen, Bavaria, Saarland, Schleswig-Holstein, Belgium, Veneto, Aland Islands.
I just want to put the fundamental financial challenge of GB News in context for a second. Back in the depths of history (1992), Sky News averaged 2% of viewing in the UK.
Which is not a bad number at all, albeit one boosted massively by it being the default played in hotel rooms and airports.
It now averages 0.5%. (Despite still being boosted by deals to be the default channel in hotels etc.)
That would merely be bad. But you need to add to this the fact that broadcast TV is in terminal decline.
So, GB News has to carve out a niche of a niche in a dying industry.
£60m sounds like a lot, but they have 30 presenters already signed up. 30. And some of the will be quite expensive. Plus the offices. The marketing. The technology. The cost of the spectrum itself. The inevitable web and mobile presence. Etc.
I'd be staggered if their monthly operating expenses came to less than £5m.
And what will they average for viewership? 30,000 people during popular shows, and under 10,000 most of the time.
There's no business there. That's a massive financial black hole.
The interesting decision is to go with being a broadcast channel, at a time when many other news shows are launching on a web-only platform.
Presumably they decided they needed the prestige of being regulated by OFCOM, because the ad revenue from a tiny broadcast audience is barely going to cover their hosting fees with Freeview, Sky and Virgin.
Maybe they’re hoping for several million hits a day for clips on Youtube.
It could be a hedge I suppose. If the BBC were to have their wings clipped and have the licence fee removed, might there be more space for competitors?
Having an existing service might be an advantage were that to happen.
Mind you, I'd expect BBC News to be treated differently to the rest of the organisation in that scenario, so perhaps not a very good bet...
This is pretty significant, if you're following the Source of Covid story
One of the main virologists defending the "natural origins" thesis is K G Anderson
Weirdly enough, he mentioned a possible "engineered" aspect to the virus to Anthony Fauci, in a FOIA'd email back in January 2020. Four days later he was on board with natural zoonosis, 100%, with no obvious data interim to change his mind. Why?
Who knows. But ever since he has been furiously denouncing "lab leak" and presenting concepts for "wet market" - or whatever
Until this week. For the last few hours he has been deleting tweets en masse, and now he has deleted his entire account, as citizen journalists probe what he has said
It's a cover up. It came from the lab. Enough
"Kristian G. Anderson in a January 31, 2020 email to Anthony Fauci:
“…Eddie, Bob, Mike and myself all find the genome inconsistent with expectations from evolutionary theory.”
The hypocrisy of these people is simply stunning."
I don't think that we will ever know the origin, as there is no objective source of information that is credible to the world. Even when there is, it is hard to prove causation eg ebola, HIV or BSE. Some things are just unknowable.
Personally, I would like to see Chinese wet markets closed down. They are an offence against animals, and particularly against threatened species. If the Chinese were serious then they should do that.
Close the wet markets, AND prohibit "gain of function" research
I shan't bore PBers understandably obsessed with the recent polling in Bodmin West, and a possible shift of Mebyon Kernow to fifth place to fourth, BUT the latest news on Lab Leak suggest Anthony Fauci might go to jail
Why might he go to jail?
The evidence now is this:
1. Fauci funded gain of function research in Wuhan on bat coronaviruses (he admits this), he gave it directly to Daszak who has explicitly said Wuhan was manufacturing new, more virulent SARS-like viruses
2. Fauci did this without telling Trump (because Obama had banned it, as dangerous)
3. When the news of the virus broke, Fauci was told: in an email: this virus was very possibly engineered, in Wuhan (via "gain of function")
4. Fauci convened, over the next weekend, everyone he knew, to come out with a different story: it had to be natural zoonosis, not the lab (personally inverting the evidence of his scientists).
Now, it is possible Fauci believed this, but he had no new evidence to suddenly say this, other than his desire to get a different narrative "out there"
5. Fauci thereafter contradicted Trump, and Fauci said "lab leak" was clownish, even as the evidence of lab-leak remained, and then surged
6. Fauci in the last week suddenly changes his mind. Lab leak is possible
He PAID for the gain-of-function research, Fauci is culpable for Covid, and he knows it
Glad to see PB catching up with LS and related sites after 15 months of this utter shit-show. WHO/pharma corruption in the H1N1 outbreak was documented in a 2010 report, which was received but never acted on.
GB News is there to make money. The best newspaper in the country is the Daily Mail who make a killing from whipping up the angry. GB News aren't going to be treading an inoffensive neutral line as there's no money to be made doing that.
The news industry is an industry - as in it needs to make money. That means the most successful are the ones that have the most views for their advertisers and that almost always means being the pied piper and whistling a welcome and familiar tune.
The solution isn't to neuter news outlets from doing so, it is simply to allow an open playing field where different tunes can be whistled so that everyone gets the news they want. Fux News is embarrassingly bad but its what many people want. Other news outlets are available in the US market, the same is about to be true here. Good.
Fair comment
I agree with RP's analysis of the current situation, but not with the solution. There are two snags. There's the leftist one that if you have a contest of broadcasters putting one-sided views, the right-wing one will win because it has more money (so they'll pay £xxx to employ popular non-political stars to draw people over). That's one reason that the right-wing press tends to do better.
But a more important one is the cohesion of democratic dialogue. We've seen what polarised broadcast media do in the States. People opt for channels that say what they like to hear, and dismiss alternative versions of truth as simply lies. Trump really won the election. All capitalist businesses are corrupt. The middle ground disappears. You need broadcasters who attempt to be neutral or at least to give alternative views a hearing. Otherwise we end up with 50% of the country watching GBNews and 40% watching C4 News, and nobody believing anything the others think.
The problem Nick is that the BBC and especially Sky are not seen as neutral by a large number of the populace
GBNews may or may not survive but it will be a very different broadcaster to the other two and should widen dialogue
You can’t criticise the BBC’s apparent lack of neutrality whilst plugging a new news channel which will is obviously not going to be neutral. Either you’re in favour of neutral news broadcasting, or you’re not.
Is it clear that GB News won't be impartial? All I see is that they're USP is to be much more sceptical of public figures on the left and question them more thoroughly than the likes of Sky and the BBC who are happy to let some independent Sage person spout a bunch of bullshit without being questioned.
Shame we can no longer see what the people of the region of England feel about the matter.
Not sure that question would work here. "The country" would be coded as the UK and "the region" coded as the particular county lived in. Not sure many would place county above country. Cornwall maybe?
I think obviously the country is the UK, but the region is surely England/Scotland/Wales/NI?
Does anyone in England think of England as a region?
Either Counties, or North West/South East etc are typically used as regions, never England.
It is the first subnational division of the country, which is surely what the survey is trying to find out. Of course you can Balkanise England further, as Labour were desperate to do in the 2000s. But the survey would then be a little redundant, as very very few will identify with "North West" compared to England or UK. The question of English vs UK identity, however, is a live and important one.
(Although I'm surprised that they haven't gone for the Lander as the subnational regions in Germany).
The question of English vs UK identity is a real one, as is Scots vs UK, but that's a question of national identities. England and Scotland are recognised as nations within a nation, not regions.
The question is about "country" not nation, which is a much vaguer term. The UK is a country, like the United States, Canada or Australia, recognised as such by foreign countries (see e.g. https://www.state.gov/independent-states-in-the-world/ or here https://www.nationsonline.org/oneworld/states.htm) and the United Nations (https://www.worldometers.info/united-nations/). Our four members are the first subnational regions, like states in America or Australia or provinces in Canada. England isn't a country in any generally accepted sense - the OED defines a country as "an area of land that has its own government" and England doesn't even have that.
Wales was recognised as a country in its own right and not a principality in 2011.
Its the differential between what is a nation and what is a state. Most countries are both, a few states are multi-national (Belgium as a non-UK example). some nations are not states (Navajo, Kurds etc).
EWSNI are simple. The exciting bit of our post UK settlement will be the status of the Isle of Man and the Bailiwicks of Jersey and Guernsey...
On topic, Labour says it could support the government if it keeps some restrictions beyond June 21st.
Leaving the way clear for ReformUK to be the only main party committed to keeping June 21st as 'Freedom Day' if Boris retains some restrictions beyond that date
What on earth is wrong with the Labour Party? Boris and Co keep leaving the goal open with the ball gently rolling unattended past the penalty spot, so up rushes KS and gracefully boots it hard into the stand somewhere near the corner. Again and again.
The government has squandered almost all of the lead the vaccines gave us - cheered on by the fools in the Labour Party. If they took a stance that we should unlock faster, they might actually have found a popular cause that's worth getting excited about, and also finally manage hold the government to account on something. Instead they are taking about wallpaper and wondering why their poll ratings are slightly further underwater the Titanic. Morons the lot of them.
I don't think you are correct to say they have squandered the lead.
They are still following the unlocking plan set out in (was it?) April.
Wrt to EU, the EU pivoted to one jab = vaccinated to hide their 8 week lag, and imo may be about to hit a problem with the Indian variant needing 2 jabs active for proper protection.
EuroGoon twitter's latest lot of kittens is about "how dare the USA keep us from going there when we have nearly caught them up". The last 4 words are a lie.
Worth remembering, though, that the EU is pretty much all Pfizer and Moderna now, whose efficacy comes on pretty quick. Plus, they are putting 15 million or so vaccines in peoples' arms every week now. And, the effect on transmission is perhaps the most important bit.
My bet is that the EU - which fucked up vaccine purchasing - is getting reopening spot on.
But we'll see soon enough.
We're only doing Pfizer and Moderna first doses as well but the government is frit about reopening. Boris needs to hold his nerve and just do it. If a few thousand over 50s vaccine refusers die then that's the cost of doing business. I think what would really help is for the government to add a vaccine status filter to all of the case, hospitalisation and death statistics so the public can differentiate between the two and see that the vaccines are the way out, not lockdown.
That's very much my view.
The reality is that the pandemic is over in Israel, the US and the UK. Sadly, too many people haven't realised it yet.
GB News is there to make money. The best newspaper in the country is the Daily Mail who make a killing from whipping up the angry. GB News aren't going to be treading an inoffensive neutral line as there's no money to be made doing that.
The news industry is an industry - as in it needs to make money. That means the most successful are the ones that have the most views for their advertisers and that almost always means being the pied piper and whistling a welcome and familiar tune.
The solution isn't to neuter news outlets from doing so, it is simply to allow an open playing field where different tunes can be whistled so that everyone gets the news they want. Fux News is embarrassingly bad but its what many people want. Other news outlets are available in the US market, the same is about to be true here. Good.
Fair comment
I agree with RP's analysis of the current situation, but not with the solution. There are two snags. There's the leftist one that if you have a contest of broadcasters putting one-sided views, the right-wing one will win because it has more money (so they'll pay £xxx to employ popular non-political stars to draw people over). That's one reason that the right-wing press tends to do better.
But a more important one is the cohesion of democratic dialogue. We've seen what polarised broadcast media do in the States. People opt for channels that say what they like to hear, and dismiss alternative versions of truth as simply lies. Trump really won the election. All capitalist businesses are corrupt. The middle ground disappears. You need broadcasters who attempt to be neutral or at least to give alternative views a hearing. Otherwise we end up with 50% of the country watching GBNews and 40% watching C4 News, and nobody believing anything the others think.
The problem Nick is that the BBC and especially Sky are not seen as neutral by a large number of the populace
GBNews may or may not survive but it will be a very different broadcaster to the other two and should widen dialogue
You can’t criticise the BBC’s apparent lack of neutrality whilst plugging a new news channel which will is obviously not going to be neutral. Either you’re in favour of neutral news broadcasting, or you’re not.
Why is it obvious GB News is "not going to be neutral"?
Some might consider it to be more neutral than the BBC, Sky and C4 which are not neutral.
GB News is there to make money. The best newspaper in the country is the Daily Mail who make a killing from whipping up the angry. GB News aren't going to be treading an inoffensive neutral line as there's no money to be made doing that.
The news industry is an industry - as in it needs to make money. That means the most successful are the ones that have the most views for their advertisers and that almost always means being the pied piper and whistling a welcome and familiar tune.
The solution isn't to neuter news outlets from doing so, it is simply to allow an open playing field where different tunes can be whistled so that everyone gets the news they want. Fux News is embarrassingly bad but its what many people want. Other news outlets are available in the US market, the same is about to be true here. Good.
Fair comment
I agree with RP's analysis of the current situation, but not with the solution. There are two snags. There's the leftist one that if you have a contest of broadcasters putting one-sided views, the right-wing one will win because it has more money (so they'll pay £xxx to employ popular non-political stars to draw people over). That's one reason that the right-wing press tends to do better.
But a more important one is the cohesion of democratic dialogue. We've seen what polarised broadcast media do in the States. People opt for channels that say what they like to hear, and dismiss alternative versions of truth as simply lies. Trump really won the election. All capitalist businesses are corrupt. The middle ground disappears. You need broadcasters who attempt to be neutral or at least to give alternative views a hearing. Otherwise we end up with 50% of the country watching GBNews and 40% watching C4 News, and nobody believing anything the others think.
The problem Nick is that the BBC and especially Sky are not seen as neutral by a large number of the populace
GBNews may or may not survive but it will be a very different broadcaster to the other two and should widen dialogue
You can’t criticise the BBC’s apparent lack of neutrality whilst plugging a new news channel which will is obviously not going to be neutral. Either you’re in favour of neutral news broadcasting, or you’re not.
Not quite. It is perfectly possible to want a national public broadcaster with unique rights to a form of funding and a charter to be officially neutral, while thinking that other broadcasters can be more like newspapers and have opinions.
The BBCs problem is that it so obviously deals in opinion, and its idea of balance so clearly reflects a particular range of opinions that it is part of the ideological baggage of the nation.
In my opinion the Economist, for all its faults, is far closer to an idea of neutrality than the BBC.
"Scientific modelling has been crude and unreliable at predicting the pandemic, NHS leaders have said, as they warned against using it to decide whether to release restrictions on June 21."
Telegraph.
Hallelujah! Fantastic news. Has the light finally started to be seen on SAGE modelling fiasco?
Good morning
Kay Burley is back on Sky and the first subject was lifting lockdown, what an irony
She then has three guests, Lisa Nandy, Gordon Brown and David King of the so called Independent Sage
All attacking HMG and David King, on one long rant demanding lockdowns until covid is eradicated from the country
Not one was challenged by Burley
GBNews starts next Sunday and I expect their breakfast programme next Monday will see many defection from Burley and Sky
Britain's own Fox News! Just what we need for balanced reporting -not!
Watching GB News will make the angry, angrier, just like Fox.
To be fair that cannot be assumed when not one programme has been broadcast
I do recognise it is an accusation from the left, but time will tell and it has to comply with the same regulations BBC and Sky come under
GB News is there to make money. The best newspaper in the country is the Daily Mail who make a killing from whipping up the angry. GB News aren't going to be treading an inoffensive neutral line as there's no money to be made doing that.
The news industry is an industry - as in it needs to make money. That means the most successful are the ones that have the most views for their advertisers and that almost always means being the pied piper and whistling a welcome and familiar tune.
The solution isn't to neuter news outlets from doing so, it is simply to allow an open playing field where different tunes can be whistled so that everyone gets the news they want. Fux News is embarrassingly bad but its what many people want. Other news outlets are available in the US market, the same is about to be true here. Good.
Except that it turns out that an open playing field for “news” outlets is debilitating to the public sphere.
We retain regulation on news broadcasting for very good reason.
Besides, there have always been two sorts of news media; those that have to turn a profit, and those whose losses are tolerated for reasons of kudos or pulpit purchasing.
We don't know which one GBN will be. But it feels noteworthy that there aren't any profitable UK channels in that space now. The UK isn't the USA; the market is smaller, we don't have the culture of making news channels pay-TV, the BBC is massive. Maybe there's a profit to be turned on adverts alone, but it's blooming hard to see how.
And if turns out to be not intrinsically profitable, how is Brillovision different to Russia Today?
May be a bet on BBC reform shaking things up? They are established and with a brand… in that context may be £60m is option value?
This is essentially GB News' model to copy I err... think.
Well: let's start with the fact that Fox News also owns a bunch of other essential channels. They can therefore lean on satellite and cable companies to promote Fox News, because otherwise they won't get access to Fox Sports, FX, etc.
Fox News also doesn't have to compete with incumbents like the BBC and Sky. Indeed, in much of the US, it is the incumbent. Oh yeah, satellite and cable viewership is much, much bigger in the US than in the UK.
There'll be a significant proportion of the population with their fingers crossed hoping that the government extends the advice to WFH where possible.
Interestingly though the proportion of people who want to WFH permanently is in a minority and has actually fallen since the pandemic began, at least according to the surveys I have seen. Most people favour a mix.
I favour a mix, but I also favour not being asked to go back to the office until two weeks after my second dose - which could mean working from home until the start of September.
That’s fair enough. I’m fairly relaxed about Covid generally, but see where you are coming from. I’ve already been in a few times because I’m bored at home every day. As it is, my second jab is this week so I’ll be inoculated by 21 June in any case - realise that’s not the case for younger people.
The pfizer gap can be as little as 3 weeks if supply allows. That's important.
Looking into it further, my health board did 11170 vaccinations in the week ending 28th May. That'd have been the UK equivalent of about 750k/day solidly for a week and if there were no supply, demand or timing between doses constraints would be a pace that allows Bassetlaw to have 100% of adults done with both doses by July 18th.
Bassetlaw already has a minimal rate of infection plus there are zero covid patients in Doncaster and Bassetlaw hospitals.
It's a disease that is evaporating out of rural areas tbh. Every single msoa in Bassetlaw is now clear (Data suppressed, cases < 3). Ryedale got down to 0 infections last week, though a single one has sprung up again.
Covid is going to become a disease of the inner cities in Britain.
I think it already has. I've thought that for a while now. Out in the sticks, many still do not know of anyone who has been hospitalised or died due to Covid.
GB News is there to make money. The best newspaper in the country is the Daily Mail who make a killing from whipping up the angry. GB News aren't going to be treading an inoffensive neutral line as there's no money to be made doing that.
The news industry is an industry - as in it needs to make money. That means the most successful are the ones that have the most views for their advertisers and that almost always means being the pied piper and whistling a welcome and familiar tune.
The solution isn't to neuter news outlets from doing so, it is simply to allow an open playing field where different tunes can be whistled so that everyone gets the news they want. Fux News is embarrassingly bad but its what many people want. Other news outlets are available in the US market, the same is about to be true here. Good.
Fair comment
I agree with RP's analysis of the current situation, but not with the solution. There are two snags. There's the leftist one that if you have a contest of broadcasters putting one-sided views, the right-wing one will win because it has more money (so they'll pay £xxx to employ popular non-political stars to draw people over). That's one reason that the right-wing press tends to do better.
But a more important one is the cohesion of democratic dialogue. We've seen what polarised broadcast media do in the States. People opt for channels that say what they like to hear, and dismiss alternative versions of truth as simply lies. Trump really won the election. All capitalist businesses are corrupt. The middle ground disappears. You need broadcasters who attempt to be neutral or at least to give alternative views a hearing. Otherwise we end up with 50% of the country watching GBNews and 40% watching C4 News, and nobody believing anything the others think.
The problem Nick is that the BBC and especially Sky are not seen as neutral by a large number of the populace
GBNews may or may not survive but it will be a very different broadcaster to the other two and should widen dialogue
You can’t criticise the BBC’s apparent lack of neutrality whilst plugging a new news channel which will is obviously not going to be neutral. Either you’re in favour of neutral news broadcasting, or you’re not.
Shame we can no longer see what the people of the region of England feel about the matter.
Not sure that question would work here. "The country" would be coded as the UK and "the region" coded as the particular county lived in. Not sure many would place county above country. Cornwall maybe?
I think obviously the country is the UK, but the region is surely England/Scotland/Wales/NI?
Does anyone in England think of England as a region?
Either Counties, or North West/South East etc are typically used as regions, never England.
It is the first subnational division of the country, which is surely what the survey is trying to find out. Of course you can Balkanise England further, as Labour were desperate to do in the 2000s. But the survey would then be a little redundant, as very very few will identify with "North West" compared to England or UK. The question of English vs UK identity, however, is a live and important one.
(Although I'm surprised that they haven't gone for the Lander as the subnational regions in Germany).
The question of English vs UK identity is a real one, as is Scots vs UK, but that's a question of national identities. England and Scotland are recognised as nations within a nation, not regions.
The question is about "country" not nation, which is a much vaguer term. The UK is a country, like the United States, Canada or Australia, recognised as such by foreign countries (see e.g. https://www.state.gov/independent-states-in-the-world/ or here https://www.nationsonline.org/oneworld/states.htm) and the United Nations (https://www.worldometers.info/united-nations/). Our four members are the first subnational regions, like states in America or Australia or provinces in Canada. England isn't a country in any generally accepted sense - the OED defines a country as "an area of land that has its own government" and England doesn't even have that.
Wales was recognised as a country in its own right and not a principality in 2011.
They are ceremonial countries, the only sovereign country in GB is the UK
As GB is in the UK (of GB and NI) you might want to reconsider your grasp of our country before making such strident and confident statements. "Great Britain" is the amalgam of England, Wales and Scotland. The United Kingdom adds Norther Ireland to Great Britain.
Again, its about the difference between a nation, a state, and a nation-state. "Great Britain" is none of these.
And whilst it won't be the same 30,000 people all the time, I think we can all imagine people who will have it on a lot (no names, no packdrill). It's an awful lot of money to spend preaching to a tiny congregation who are largely converted already.
Someone has pulled off the blag of the century here.
I read somewhere (I think it was when I was in hospital having been smashed to fuck in an MTB accident last year) that advertising is very ineffective with young people. Their brains are trained to filter them out and they often have no recollection of seeing online adverts, etc. So if you're in an advertising based business then you're probably better off appealing to an older demographic. Hence Gammon Boomer News.
Shame we can no longer see what the people of the region of England feel about the matter.
Not sure that question would work here. "The country" would be coded as the UK and "the region" coded as the particular county lived in. Not sure many would place county above country. Cornwall maybe?
I think obviously the country is the UK, but the region is surely England/Scotland/Wales/NI?
Does anyone in England think of England as a region?
Either Counties, or North West/South East etc are typically used as regions, never England.
It is the first subnational division of the country, which is surely what the survey is trying to find out. Of course you can Balkanise England further, as Labour were desperate to do in the 2000s. But the survey would then be a little redundant, as very very few will identify with "North West" compared to England or UK. The question of English vs UK identity, however, is a live and important one.
(Although I'm surprised that they haven't gone for the Lander as the subnational regions in Germany).
The question of English vs UK identity is a real one, as is Scots vs UK, but that's a question of national identities. England and Scotland are recognised as nations within a nation, not regions.
The question is about "country" not nation, which is a much vaguer term. The UK is a country, like the United States, Canada or Australia, recognised as such by foreign countries (see e.g. https://www.state.gov/independent-states-in-the-world/ or here https://www.nationsonline.org/oneworld/states.htm) and the United Nations (https://www.worldometers.info/united-nations/). Our four members are the first subnational regions, like states in America or Australia or provinces in Canada. England isn't a country in any generally accepted sense - the OED defines a country as "an area of land that has its own government" and England doesn't even have that.
Wales was recognised as a country in its own right and not a principality in 2011.
Its the differential between what is a nation and what is a state. Most countries are both, a few states are multi-national (Belgium as a non-UK example). some nations are not states (Navajo, Kurds etc).
EWSNI are simple. The exciting bit of our post UK settlement will be the status of the Isle of Man and the Bailiwicks of Jersey and Guernsey...
Another amusing thing is the defintion of "state".
In Australia, the USA etc the "State" is a sub-tier below the country of the USA. In the UK the "state" of the United Kingdom is a tier above the countries England, Scotland and Wales - plus NI.
New York, Texas, California, Victoria, New South Wales etc are "States" but they are not independent states.
Excellent, as ever from Tom McTague - well worth a read.
Yet Johnson understands the art of politics better than his critics and rivals do. He is right that his is a battle to write the national story, and that this requires offering people hope and agency, a sense of optimism and pride in place. He has shown that he is a master at finding the story voters want to hear.
On topic, Labour says it could support the government if it keeps some restrictions beyond June 21st.
Leaving the way clear for ReformUK to be the only main party committed to keeping June 21st as 'Freedom Day' if Boris retains some restrictions beyond that date
What on earth is wrong with the Labour Party? Boris and Co keep leaving the goal open with the ball gently rolling unattended past the penalty spot, so up rushes KS and gracefully boots it hard into the stand somewhere near the corner. Again and again.
The government has squandered almost all of the lead the vaccines gave us - cheered on by the fools in the Labour Party. If they took a stance that we should unlock faster, they might actually have found a popular cause that's worth getting excited about, and also finally manage hold the government to account on something. Instead they are taking about wallpaper and wondering why their poll ratings are slightly further underwater the Titanic. Morons the lot of them.
I don't think you are correct to say they have squandered the lead.
They are still following the unlocking plan set out in (was it?) April.
Wrt to EU, the EU pivoted to one jab = vaccinated to hide their 8 week lag, and imo may be about to hit a problem with the Indian variant needing 2 jabs active for proper protection.
EuroGoon twitter's latest lot of kittens is about "how dare the USA keep us from going there when we have nearly caught them up". The last 4 words are a lie.
Worth remembering, though, that the EU is pretty much all Pfizer and Moderna now, whose efficacy comes on pretty quick. Plus, they are putting 15 million or so vaccines in peoples' arms every week now. And, the effect on transmission is perhaps the most important bit.
My bet is that the EU - which fucked up vaccine purchasing - is getting reopening spot on.
NYT ($) Yellen Won a Global Tax Deal. Now Comes the Hard Part. The Treasury secretary worked with finance ministers from the G7 to win support for a global minimum tax. But selling the idea to Republican lawmakers will not be easy.
Treasury Secretary Janet L. Yellen secured a landmark international tax agreement over the weekend, one that has eluded the United States for nearly a decade. But with a narrowly divided Congress and resistance from Republicans and business groups mounting, closing the deal at home may be an even bigger challenge.
The Biden administration is counting on more than $3 trillion in tax increases on corporations and wealthy Americans to help pay for its ambitious jobs and infrastructure proposals. Republicans have expressed opposition to any rise in taxes and have warned that President Biden’s big spending plans are fueling inflation and will deter business investment. Business groups have complained that higher taxes pose a threat to the economic recovery and will put American companies at a competitive disadvantage.
Persuading members of the Group of 7 advanced economies to agree on Saturday to a global minimum tax of at least 15 percent was intended to help the Biden administration win support for its U.S. tax increases. If enacted, the global minimum tax would require that companies pay at least a 15 percent tax on income, regardless of where they are based, making it less advantageous to relocate operations to countries with lower tax rates. . . .
SSI2- Strange, zero mention of Rushi Sunak in this story. Did Janice Yellen get much (or any) mention in UK stories about the deal?
Not saying that UK CoE was NOT an important player. Just maybe NOT as important as some on PB were saying? OR is this NYT story just Americans taking credit where it's not due?
The Democrats control the Presidency and both chambers of Congress, it does not matter want the Republicans think, the tax agreement will be rammed through. Even if Republican Senators try and filibuster it the Democrats will use cloture to push it through as they rammed through Obamacare in 2010 before the midterms.
Sunak as one of the few centre right Treasury Ministers left in the G7 was not pushing the minimum corporate tax plan and ensured it was not set any higher than 15%
Is anyone running a book on how long GB News will last?
Fox News makes money.
Pretty much every other news channel loses money. Most of the losses are hidden as part of larger organisations, or there are deep pocketed sponsors.
Viewership of cable/satellite news is in precipitous decline. And the UK market simply isn't very big.
GB News has raised £60m (including - it is said - £10m from a old friend of mine).
But running a 24 hour news organisation is not inexpensive.
I give in nine months before they announce that they will be shutting up shop.
Isn't GB News backed by Discovery (well now whatever that merged company will call itself)?
They are investors, along with Paul Marshall, but it's not part of the Discovery group.
Fair enough, I haven't really been following other than what I read here. It's not going to be successful, Sky News is a huge money loser For Comcast and the BBC is taxpayer funded. I don't see how an independent news channel survives in the UK, the market isn't big enough.
Yep: that's pretty much my view.
There's one other problem - advertising revenues for broadcast TV are dropping faster than viewership. because you simply can't get the targeting with Freeview and Sky you can with streaming.
Indeed. They'd have been better off doing this on YouTube, maybe that's the ultimate plan. Pivot this into a YouTube channel that has enough of a brand that YouTube can't takedown for going against woke orthodoxy.
In support of what you're saying Sony just sold their UK TV channels and I'm reliably informed that all of their broadcast channels are on the chopping block because the returns aren't there compared to selling/licencing content to Netflix and other big streaming platforms.
And whilst it won't be the same 30,000 people all the time, I think we can all imagine people who will have it on a lot (no names, no packdrill). It's an awful lot of money to spend preaching to a tiny congregation who are largely converted already.
Someone has pulled off the blag of the century here.
I read somewhere (I think it was when I was in hospital having been smashed to fuck in an MTB accident last year) that advertising is very ineffective with young people. Their brains are trained to filter them out and they often have no recollection of seeing online adverts, etc. So if you're in an advertising based business then you're probably better off appealing to an older demographic. Hence Gammon Boomer News.
Brains? I suspect many young people have their computers designed to filter them out, let alone their brains. AdBlock does the job for online, and the fast-forward button for the TV if watching a recording rather than a stream. 🤷♂️
Shame we can no longer see what the people of the region of England feel about the matter.
Not sure that question would work here. "The country" would be coded as the UK and "the region" coded as the particular county lived in. Not sure many would place county above country. Cornwall maybe?
I think obviously the country is the UK, but the region is surely England/Scotland/Wales/NI?
Does anyone in England think of England as a region?
Either Counties, or North West/South East etc are typically used as regions, never England.
It is the first subnational division of the country, which is surely what the survey is trying to find out. Of course you can Balkanise England further, as Labour were desperate to do in the 2000s. But the survey would then be a little redundant, as very very few will identify with "North West" compared to England or UK. The question of English vs UK identity, however, is a live and important one.
(Although I'm surprised that they haven't gone for the Lander as the subnational regions in Germany).
The question of English vs UK identity is a real one, as is Scots vs UK, but that's a question of national identities. England and Scotland are recognised as nations within a nation, not regions.
The question is about "country" not nation, which is a much vaguer term. The UK is a country, like the United States, Canada or Australia, recognised as such by foreign countries (see e.g. https://www.state.gov/independent-states-in-the-world/ or here https://www.nationsonline.org/oneworld/states.htm) and the United Nations (https://www.worldometers.info/united-nations/). Our four members are the first subnational regions, like states in America or Australia or provinces in Canada. England isn't a country in any generally accepted sense - the OED defines a country as "an area of land that has its own government" and England doesn't even have that.
Wales was recognised as a country in its own right and not a principality in 2011.
They are ceremonial countries, the only sovereign country in GB is the UK
As GB is in the UK (of GB and NI) you might want to reconsider your grasp of our country before making such strident and confident statements. "Great Britain" is the amalgam of England, Wales and Scotland. The United Kingdom adds Norther Ireland to Great Britain.
Again, its about the difference between a nation, a state, and a nation-state. "Great Britain" is none of these.
Northern Ireland is also a mere ceremonial province of the UK.
However obviously Ireland as an island includes Ireland which is a sovereign nation separate to the UK so my statement only applied to Great Britain
This is essentially GB News' model to copy I err... think.
Trouble is that a lot of Fox News's income is fees from cable firms paying to carry Fox News. And another chunk is political campaign ads. Neither of those works in the UK.
Is anyone running a book on how long GB News will last?
Fox News makes money.
Pretty much every other news channel loses money. Most of the losses are hidden as part of larger organisations, or there are deep pocketed sponsors.
Viewership of cable/satellite news is in precipitous decline. And the UK market simply isn't very big.
GB News has raised £60m (including - it is said - £10m from a old friend of mine).
But running a 24 hour news organisation is not inexpensive.
I give in nine months before they announce that they will be shutting up shop.
Isn't GB News backed by Discovery (well now whatever that merged company will call itself)?
They are investors, along with Paul Marshall, but it's not part of the Discovery group.
Fair enough, I haven't really been following other than what I read here. It's not going to be successful, Sky News is a huge money loser For Comcast and the BBC is taxpayer funded. I don't see how an independent news channel survives in the UK, the market isn't big enough.
Yep: that's pretty much my view.
There's one other problem - advertising revenues for broadcast TV are dropping faster than viewership. because you simply can't get the targeting with Freeview and Sky you can with streaming.
I suspect this is about visibility while they make their money online. Presumably as a broadcast channel they have more rights than just a web service?
GB News is there to make money. The best newspaper in the country is the Daily Mail who make a killing from whipping up the angry. GB News aren't going to be treading an inoffensive neutral line as there's no money to be made doing that.
The news industry is an industry - as in it needs to make money. That means the most successful are the ones that have the most views for their advertisers and that almost always means being the pied piper and whistling a welcome and familiar tune.
The solution isn't to neuter news outlets from doing so, it is simply to allow an open playing field where different tunes can be whistled so that everyone gets the news they want. Fux News is embarrassingly bad but its what many people want. Other news outlets are available in the US market, the same is about to be true here. Good.
Fair comment
I agree with RP's analysis of the current situation, but not with the solution. There are two snags. There's the leftist one that if you have a contest of broadcasters putting one-sided views, the right-wing one will win because it has more money (so they'll pay £xxx to employ popular non-political stars to draw people over). That's one reason that the right-wing press tends to do better.
But a more important one is the cohesion of democratic dialogue. We've seen what polarised broadcast media do in the States. People opt for channels that say what they like to hear, and dismiss alternative versions of truth as simply lies. Trump really won the election. All capitalist businesses are corrupt. The middle ground disappears. You need broadcasters who attempt to be neutral or at least to give alternative views a hearing. Otherwise we end up with 50% of the country watching GBNews and 40% watching C4 News, and nobody believing anything the others think.
The problem Nick is that the BBC and especially Sky are not seen as neutral by a large number of the populace
GBNews may or may not survive but it will be a very different broadcaster to the other two and should widen dialogue
You can’t criticise the BBC’s apparent lack of neutrality whilst plugging a new news channel which will is obviously not going to be neutral. Either you’re in favour of neutral news broadcasting, or you’re not.
They are regulated by OFCOM. They legally have to be neutral, just as much as any other news channel.
Government shuts down GBNews!! Headlines aren’t great
This is essentially GB News' model to copy I err... think.
Trouble is that a lot of Fox News's income is fees from cable firms paying to carry Fox News. And another chunk is political campaign ads. Neither of those works in the UK.
I give it no more than 18 months. Enthusiasts on social media won’t be enough.
GB News is there to make money. The best newspaper in the country is the Daily Mail who make a killing from whipping up the angry. GB News aren't going to be treading an inoffensive neutral line as there's no money to be made doing that.
The news industry is an industry - as in it needs to make money. That means the most successful are the ones that have the most views for their advertisers and that almost always means being the pied piper and whistling a welcome and familiar tune.
The solution isn't to neuter news outlets from doing so, it is simply to allow an open playing field where different tunes can be whistled so that everyone gets the news they want. Fux News is embarrassingly bad but its what many people want. Other news outlets are available in the US market, the same is about to be true here. Good.
Fair comment
I agree with RP's analysis of the current situation, but not with the solution. There are two snags. There's the leftist one that if you have a contest of broadcasters putting one-sided views, the right-wing one will win because it has more money (so they'll pay £xxx to employ popular non-political stars to draw people over). That's one reason that the right-wing press tends to do better.
But a more important one is the cohesion of democratic dialogue. We've seen what polarised broadcast media do in the States. People opt for channels that say what they like to hear, and dismiss alternative versions of truth as simply lies. Trump really won the election. All capitalist businesses are corrupt. The middle ground disappears. You need broadcasters who attempt to be neutral or at least to give alternative views a hearing. Otherwise we end up with 50% of the country watching GBNews and 40% watching C4 News, and nobody believing anything the others think.
The problem Nick is that the BBC and especially Sky are not seen as neutral by a large number of the populace
GBNews may or may not survive but it will be a very different broadcaster to the other two and should widen dialogue
You can’t criticise the BBC’s apparent lack of neutrality whilst plugging a new news channel which will is obviously not going to be neutral. Either you’re in favour of neutral news broadcasting, or you’re not.
Why is it obvious GB News is "not going to be neutral"?
Some might consider it to be more neutral than the BBC, Sky and C4 which are not neutral.
There was an interesting quote from a C4 spokesman over the weekend in which they said their mission was to “promote diversity”. I thought it was to provide a venue fir minority voices, not to promote them?
The other issue with GB News is that they're launching a year too late. They're literally launching a news channel just as the nation stops paying attention to the news because we're on the way out of COVID. Last year they could have been a serious contrarian voice against lockdowns and more generally restrictions. It's difficult to do that now, especially if the government ploughs on with June 21st as I think they will.
GB News is there to make money. The best newspaper in the country is the Daily Mail who make a killing from whipping up the angry. GB News aren't going to be treading an inoffensive neutral line as there's no money to be made doing that.
The news industry is an industry - as in it needs to make money. That means the most successful are the ones that have the most views for their advertisers and that almost always means being the pied piper and whistling a welcome and familiar tune.
The solution isn't to neuter news outlets from doing so, it is simply to allow an open playing field where different tunes can be whistled so that everyone gets the news they want. Fux News is embarrassingly bad but its what many people want. Other news outlets are available in the US market, the same is about to be true here. Good.
Fair comment
I agree with RP's analysis of the current situation, but not with the solution. There are two snags. There's the leftist one that if you have a contest of broadcasters putting one-sided views, the right-wing one will win because it has more money (so they'll pay £xxx to employ popular non-political stars to draw people over). That's one reason that the right-wing press tends to do better.
But a more important one is the cohesion of democratic dialogue. We've seen what polarised broadcast media do in the States. People opt for channels that say what they like to hear, and dismiss alternative versions of truth as simply lies. Trump really won the election. All capitalist businesses are corrupt. The middle ground disappears. You need broadcasters who attempt to be neutral or at least to give alternative views a hearing. Otherwise we end up with 50% of the country watching GBNews and 40% watching C4 News, and nobody believing anything the others think.
The problem Nick is that the BBC and especially Sky are not seen as neutral by a large number of the populace
GBNews may or may not survive but it will be a very different broadcaster to the other two and should widen dialogue
You can’t criticise the BBC’s apparent lack of neutrality whilst plugging a new news channel which will is obviously not going to be neutral. Either you’re in favour of neutral news broadcasting, or you’re not.
Why is it obvious GB News is "not going to be neutral"?
Some might consider it to be more neutral than the BBC, Sky and C4 which are not neutral.
There was an interesting quote from a C4 spokesman over the weekend in which they said their mission was to “promote diversity”. I thought it was to provide a venue fir minority voices, not to promote them?
They mean what Dan Hannan described as “BBC Diversity” - people who look different but all think the same.
They’re looking to hire black, Asian and Northern people, who all read classics or English at Oxford or Cambridge.
As opposed to GB News, who have hired people with a wide diversity of viewpoints.
GB News is about setting the agenda not making money surely?
Maybe, but how do they survive without money? £60m is going to last them all of 9 months.
Its worth noting they're substantially backed by Discovery, which has launched its own streaming service. We have Discovery+ but only because it was free for 12 months with Sky - can't imagine currently paying for it when that 12 month period expires. Though my wife likes it for Discovery's many true crime documentaries.
The interplay of Discovery and GB News will be interesting. Currently I don't see Discovery+ really taking off in the way Disney+ has.
Shame we can no longer see what the people of the region of England feel about the matter.
Not sure that question would work here. "The country" would be coded as the UK and "the region" coded as the particular county lived in. Not sure many would place county above country. Cornwall maybe?
I think obviously the country is the UK, but the region is surely England/Scotland/Wales/NI?
Does anyone in England think of England as a region?
Either Counties, or North West/South East etc are typically used as regions, never England.
It is the first subnational division of the country, which is surely what the survey is trying to find out. Of course you can Balkanise England further, as Labour were desperate to do in the 2000s. But the survey would then be a little redundant, as very very few will identify with "North West" compared to England or UK. The question of English vs UK identity, however, is a live and important one.
(Although I'm surprised that they haven't gone for the Lander as the subnational regions in Germany).
The question of English vs UK identity is a real one, as is Scots vs UK, but that's a question of national identities. England and Scotland are recognised as nations within a nation, not regions.
The question is about "country" not nation, which is a much vaguer term. The UK is a country, like the United States, Canada or Australia, recognised as such by foreign countries (see e.g. https://www.state.gov/independent-states-in-the-world/ or here https://www.nationsonline.org/oneworld/states.htm) and the United Nations (https://www.worldometers.info/united-nations/). Our four members are the first subnational regions, like states in America or Australia or provinces in Canada. England isn't a country in any generally accepted sense - the OED defines a country as "an area of land that has its own government" and England doesn't even have that.
Wales was recognised as a country in its own right and not a principality in 2011.
They are ceremonial countries, the only sovereign country in GB is the UK
As GB is in the UK (of GB and NI) you might want to reconsider your grasp of our country before making such strident and confident statements. "Great Britain" is the amalgam of England, Wales and Scotland. The United Kingdom adds Norther Ireland to Great Britain.
Again, its about the difference between a nation, a state, and a nation-state. "Great Britain" is none of these.
Northern Ireland is also a mere ceremonial province of the UK.
However obviously Ireland as an island includes Ireland which is a sovereign nation separate to the UK so my statement only applied to Great Britain
"Great Britain" is not a "sovereign country". Your statement was plain wrong.
GB News is about setting the agenda not making money surely?
Maybe, but how do they survive without money? £60m is going to last them all of 9 months.
Its worth noting they're substantially backed by Discovery, which has launched its own streaming service. We have Discovery+ but only because it was free for 12 months with Sky - can't imagine currently paying for it when that 12 month period expires. Though my wife likes it for Discovery's many true crime documentaries.
The interplay of Discovery and GB News will be interesting. Currently I don't see Discovery+ really taking off in the way Disney+ has.
You and me baby ain't nothing but MAMILs. Let's view life like they do on the GB News channel
Talking of news, this one launches today in the US.
The two hosts of The Hill’s breakfast show, Krystal Ball and Saagar Enjeti, have quit to go it alone and web-based. The show will be on YouTube and podcast platforms, and they’re selling $10/month subscriptions to get it early and with some bonus content.
They had a good reputation for being equal opportunity bashers of politicians, in a sea of hyper-partisan news channels, and have got 200k youtube subscribers before they even launch.
GB News is about setting the agenda not making money surely?
Maybe, but how do they survive without money? £60m is going to last them all of 9 months.
Its worth noting they're substantially backed by Discovery, which has launched its own streaming service. We have Discovery+ but only because it was free for 12 months with Sky - can't imagine currently paying for it when that 12 month period expires. Though my wife likes it for Discovery's many true crime documentaries.
The interplay of Discovery and GB News will be interesting. Currently I don't see Discovery+ really taking off in the way Disney+ has.
Discovery has just merged with Warner Media, the owners of CNN and CNN international. I can't imagine that there is much appetite to have two independent news channels.
What's interesting is that the new merged company may not renew with Sky which means Sky Atlantic loses all of the HBO content and they push it all through Discovery+ making it a legitimate competitor to D+ and Netflix.
I am surprised the government haven't taken a hit for the Portugal Hokey Cokey and rising case numbers*....what we have learned over the past year, the public are willing to accept very strict rules if they are seen to be working and they hate them in / out / shake it all about changes.
* yes I know here on PB we have a slightly more informed and nuanced view of these.
---
Edit - bulk of polling probably done before I think the above might have had an effect.
GB News is about setting the agenda not making money surely?
Maybe, but how do they survive without money? £60m is going to last them all of 9 months.
Its worth noting they're substantially backed by Discovery, which has launched its own streaming service. We have Discovery+ but only because it was free for 12 months with Sky - can't imagine currently paying for it when that 12 month period expires. Though my wife likes it for Discovery's many true crime documentaries.
The interplay of Discovery and GB News will be interesting. Currently I don't see Discovery+ really taking off in the way Disney+ has.
Discovery has just merged with Warner Media, the owners of CNN and CNN international. I can't imagine that there is much appetite to have two independent news channels.
What's interesting is that the new merged company may not renew with Sky which means Sky Atlantic loses all of the HBO content and they push it all through Discovery+ making it a legitimate competitor to D+ and Netflix.
Ouch. Sky Atlantic shorn of HBO wouldn't have very much left would it?
Talking of news, this one launches today in the US.
The two hosts of The Hill’s breakfast show, Krystal Ball and Saagar Enjeti, have quit to go it alone and web-based. The show will be on YouTube and podcast platforms, and they’re selling $10/month subscriptions to get it early and with some bonus content.
They had a good reputation for being equal opportunity bashers of politicians, in a sea of hyper-partisan news channels, and have got 200k youtube subscribers before they even launch.
GB News is about setting the agenda not making money surely?
Maybe, but how do they survive without money? £60m is going to last them all of 9 months.
Its worth noting they're substantially backed by Discovery, which has launched its own streaming service. We have Discovery+ but only because it was free for 12 months with Sky - can't imagine currently paying for it when that 12 month period expires. Though my wife likes it for Discovery's many true crime documentaries.
The interplay of Discovery and GB News will be interesting. Currently I don't see Discovery+ really taking off in the way Disney+ has.
You and me baby ain't nothing but MAMILs. Let's view life like they do on the GB News channel
Very good
Is there anything decent on Discovery any more? I don’t think I’ve watched it since Mythbusters finished.
GB News is about setting the agenda not making money surely?
Maybe, but how do they survive without money? £60m is going to last them all of 9 months.
Its worth noting they're substantially backed by Discovery, which has launched its own streaming service. We have Discovery+ but only because it was free for 12 months with Sky - can't imagine currently paying for it when that 12 month period expires. Though my wife likes it for Discovery's many true crime documentaries.
The interplay of Discovery and GB News will be interesting. Currently I don't see Discovery+ really taking off in the way Disney+ has.
Discovery has just merged with Warner Media, the owners of CNN and CNN international. I can't imagine that there is much appetite to have two independent news channels.
What's interesting is that the new merged company may not renew with Sky which means Sky Atlantic loses all of the HBO content and they push it all through Discovery+ making it a legitimate competitor to D+ and Netflix.
That would be the only other thing outside of the footy that really drives any subscriptions for Sky. I wouldn't want to have any money in Sky, it is only a matter of time before either the clubs themselves launch EPL+ or they do a deal with a Disney (like the UFC did, where UFC get to earn a s##t tonne and Disney, via EPSN, get some fight cards and points on the PPVs, which they drive by hyping up).
Then what have they got, nobody gets it for the movies now, no Sky Atlantic, means no top tier US telly and no football, means you pay £100 a month for some golf and cricket (provided the likes of the golf don't do the same, and they already have a deal with Disney stream tech company to stream loads of the extra coverage e.g. "follow this group" online).
GB News is there to make money. The best newspaper in the country is the Daily Mail who make a killing from whipping up the angry. GB News aren't going to be treading an inoffensive neutral line as there's no money to be made doing that.
The news industry is an industry - as in it needs to make money. That means the most successful are the ones that have the most views for their advertisers and that almost always means being the pied piper and whistling a welcome and familiar tune.
The solution isn't to neuter news outlets from doing so, it is simply to allow an open playing field where different tunes can be whistled so that everyone gets the news they want. Fux News is embarrassingly bad but its what many people want. Other news outlets are available in the US market, the same is about to be true here. Good.
Fair comment
I agree with RP's analysis of the current situation, but not with the solution. There are two snags. There's the leftist one that if you have a contest of broadcasters putting one-sided views, the right-wing one will win because it has more money (so they'll pay £xxx to employ popular non-political stars to draw people over). That's one reason that the right-wing press tends to do better.
But a more important one is the cohesion of democratic dialogue. We've seen what polarised broadcast media do in the States. People opt for channels that say what they like to hear, and dismiss alternative versions of truth as simply lies. Trump really won the election. All capitalist businesses are corrupt. The middle ground disappears. You need broadcasters who attempt to be neutral or at least to give alternative views a hearing. Otherwise we end up with 50% of the country watching GBNews and 40% watching C4 News, and nobody believing anything the others think.
The problem Nick is that the BBC and especially Sky are not seen as neutral by a large number of the populace
GBNews may or may not survive but it will be a very different broadcaster to the other two and should widen dialogue
You can’t criticise the BBC’s apparent lack of neutrality whilst plugging a new news channel which will is obviously not going to be neutral. Either you’re in favour of neutral news broadcasting, or you’re not.
I am in favour of balanced news to be fair
Yes but we aren't getting it from the BBC, Channel 4 or Sky.
Shame we can no longer see what the people of the region of England feel about the matter.
Not sure that question would work here. "The country" would be coded as the UK and "the region" coded as the particular county lived in. Not sure many would place county above country. Cornwall maybe?
I think obviously the country is the UK, but the region is surely England/Scotland/Wales/NI?
Does anyone in England think of England as a region?
Either Counties, or North West/South East etc are typically used as regions, never England.
It is the first subnational division of the country, which is surely what the survey is trying to find out. Of course you can Balkanise England further, as Labour were desperate to do in the 2000s. But the survey would then be a little redundant, as very very few will identify with "North West" compared to England or UK. The question of English vs UK identity, however, is a live and important one.
(Although I'm surprised that they haven't gone for the Lander as the subnational regions in Germany).
The question of English vs UK identity is a real one, as is Scots vs UK, but that's a question of national identities. England and Scotland are recognised as nations within a nation, not regions.
The question is about "country" not nation, which is a much vaguer term. The UK is a country, like the United States, Canada or Australia, recognised as such by foreign countries (see e.g. https://www.state.gov/independent-states-in-the-world/ or here https://www.nationsonline.org/oneworld/states.htm) and the United Nations (https://www.worldometers.info/united-nations/). Our four members are the first subnational regions, like states in America or Australia or provinces in Canada. England isn't a country in any generally accepted sense - the OED defines a country as "an area of land that has its own government" and England doesn't even have that.
Wales was recognised as a country in its own right and not a principality in 2011.
They are ceremonial countries, the only sovereign country in GB is the UK
As GB is in the UK (of GB and NI) you might want to reconsider your grasp of our country before making such strident and confident statements. "Great Britain" is the amalgam of England, Wales and Scotland. The United Kingdom adds Norther Ireland to Great Britain.
Again, its about the difference between a nation, a state, and a nation-state. "Great Britain" is none of these.
Northern Ireland is also a mere ceremonial province of the UK.
However obviously Ireland as an island includes Ireland which is a sovereign nation separate to the UK so my statement only applied to Great Britain
"Great Britain" is not a "sovereign country". Your statement was plain wrong.
No, my statement that the UK is the only sovereign country in GB was absolutely correct.
It is not the only sovereign country in Ireland though as Ireland also includes the Republic of Ireland as well as Northern Ireland
GB News is about setting the agenda not making money surely?
Maybe, but how do they survive without money? £60m is going to last them all of 9 months.
Its worth noting they're substantially backed by Discovery, which has launched its own streaming service. We have Discovery+ but only because it was free for 12 months with Sky - can't imagine currently paying for it when that 12 month period expires. Though my wife likes it for Discovery's many true crime documentaries.
The interplay of Discovery and GB News will be interesting. Currently I don't see Discovery+ really taking off in the way Disney+ has.
You and me baby ain't nothing but MAMILs. Let's view life like they do on the GB News channel
Very good
Is there anything decent on Discovery any more? I don’t think I’ve watched it since Mythbusters finished.
In all honesty, I'd forgotten it even existed until Philip's post.
The reference dates me too, of course. Probably first heard/saw it on MTV, another blast from the past...
Comments
Presumably the idea is not to make money but to push opinion in a way that favours the sort of people who have £10m spare.
Westminster voting intention:
CON: 44% (+4)
LAB: 35% (-2)
GRN: 7% (+2)
LDEM: 6% (-2)
via @IpsosMORI, 28 May - 03 Jun. Chgs. w/ 22 Apr
https://twitter.com/BritainElects/status/1401809290445443079?s=20
Open most of the restrictions that piss people off (masks indoors, rule of 6 indoors) keep WFH guidance and masks on public transport. Vaccination continues. Something of an increase in cases but nhs not overwhelmed.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/GB_News
Which is not a bad number at all, albeit one boosted massively by it being the default played in hotel rooms and airports.
It now averages 0.5%. (Despite still being boosted by deals to be the default channel in hotels etc.)
That would merely be bad. But you need to add to this the fact that broadcast TV is in terminal decline.
So, GB News has to carve out a niche of a niche in a dying industry.
£60m sounds like a lot, but they have 30 presenters already signed up. 30. And some of the will be quite expensive. Plus the offices. The marketing. The technology. The cost of the spectrum itself. The inevitable web and mobile presence. Etc.
I'd be staggered if their monthly operating expenses came to less than £5m.
And what will they average for viewership? 30,000 people during popular shows, and under 10,000 most of the time.
There's no business there. That's a massive financial black hole.
The challenge is to where the bar has to be set that all news outlets have to limbo under without all of them being utterly neutered. It is impossible to have neutral news, especially when its a public broadcaster.
All media is mediated - processed by humans. Which means it is biased. Accepting that and allowing for multiple flavours of bias as we have with newspapers is the only viable solution for TV.
Just the 38%.
GBNews may or may not survive but it will be a very different broadcaster to the other two and should widen dialogue
They are still following the unlocking plan set out in (was it?) April.
Wrt to EU, the EU pivoted to one jab = vaccinated to hide their 8 week lag, and imo may be about to hit a problem with the Indian variant needing 2 jabs active for proper protection.
EuroGoon twitter's latest lot of kittens is about "how dare the USA keep us from going there when we have nearly caught them up". The last 4 words are a lie.
We don't know which one GBN will be. But it feels noteworthy that there aren't any profitable UK channels in that space now. The UK isn't the USA; the market is smaller, we don't have the culture of making news channels pay-TV, the BBC is massive. Maybe there's a profit to be turned on adverts alone, but it's blooming hard to see how.
And if turns out to be not intrinsically profitable, how is Brillovision different to Russia Today?
But he's also not going to write checks indefinitely. Not because he can't afford it, but because he wants to be associated with success.
Bonus fact: one of Paul's children is a member of Mumford & Sons.
Presumably they decided they needed the prestige of being regulated by OFCOM, because the ad revenue from a tiny broadcast audience is barely going to cover their hosting fees with Freeview, Sky and Virgin.
Maybe they’re hoping for several million hits a day for clips on Youtube.
It is perfectly possible for your hard left friends in the likes of Skwarkbox, The Canary and Novara Media (and soon Unite TV if Beckett "wins") to offer radical left voices, as well as state-funded agitators like Al Jazeera, RT, Iran Today etc to platform the like of Corbyn and Galloway.
The middle ground you speak of absolutely is there - the BBC, Sky News, ITN and most of radio. We don't have a problem with a lack of centre ground voices - the problem is that the political centre has been hollowed out so that millions on both sides believe their position to be righteous and the truth and the other side to be traitorous liars and woe betide any outlet that dissents. That isn't a media problem, its a body politic problem.
NATO will not want to cede partial control of the GIUK gap to an EU controlled Franco-Belgian-Dutch (for example) air policing mission based in Lossiemouth and will therefore be very accommodating to Scotland.
Rose Gottemoeller (US ex Deputy SecGen of NATO) went into this in some detail in a recent interview. NATO (which means the US as it exclusively serves US strategic interests) is relaxed about Scottish independence but very keen to prevent EUMS/PESCO emerging as a Eurocentric alternative to NATO.
My bet is that the EU - which fucked up vaccine purchasing - is getting reopening spot on.
But we'll see soon enough.
Wales was recognised as a country in its own right and not a principality in 2011.
Don't feel sorry for Bottas, he is a surly child who is incapable of overtaking unless he has a massive power / aero advantage. We have repeatedly seen Lewis able to scythe his way through from the back, Bottas always gets stuck unable to make progress.
He'll be gone at season end, I just wonder whether he'll find the motivation to take a step back into a Haas or Alfa drive or whether he'll find something more worthwhile to do with his life.
Someone has pulled off the blag of the century here.
There's one other problem - advertising revenues for broadcast TV are dropping faster than viewership. because you simply can't get the targeting with Freeview and Sky you can with streaming.
This is essentially GB News' model to copy I err... think.
Having an existing service might be an advantage were that to happen.
Mind you, I'd expect BBC News to be treated differently to the rest of the organisation in that scenario, so perhaps not a very good bet...
https://twitter.com/LozzaFox/status/1401662521208098817?s=20
EWSNI are simple. The exciting bit of our post UK settlement will be the status of the Isle of Man and the Bailiwicks of Jersey and Guernsey...
The reality is that the pandemic is over in Israel, the US and the UK. Sadly, too many people haven't realised it yet.
Some might consider it to be more neutral than the BBC, Sky and C4 which are not neutral.
Race direction penalised him 3 seconds.LOL.
The BBCs problem is that it so obviously deals in opinion, and its idea of balance so clearly reflects a particular range of opinions that it is part of the ideological baggage of the nation.
In my opinion the Economist, for all its faults, is far closer to an idea of neutrality than the BBC.
Fox News also doesn't have to compete with incumbents like the BBC and Sky. Indeed, in much of the US, it is the incumbent. Oh yeah, satellite and cable viewership is much, much bigger in the US than in the UK.
Again, its about the difference between a nation, a state, and a nation-state. "Great Britain" is none of these.
In Australia, the USA etc the "State" is a sub-tier below the country of the USA.
In the UK the "state" of the United Kingdom is a tier above the countries England, Scotland and Wales - plus NI.
New York, Texas, California, Victoria, New South Wales etc are "States" but they are not independent states.
Yet Johnson understands the art of politics better than his critics and rivals do. He is right that his is a battle to write the national story, and that this requires offering people hope and agency, a sense of optimism and pride in place. He has shown that he is a master at finding the story voters want to hear.
Yes, we'll see.
Sunak as one of the few centre right Treasury Ministers left in the G7 was not pushing the minimum corporate tax plan and ensured it was not set any higher than 15%
In support of what you're saying Sony just sold their UK TV channels and I'm reliably informed that all of their broadcast channels are on the chopping block because the returns aren't there compared to selling/licencing content to Netflix and other big streaming platforms.
However obviously Ireland as an island includes Ireland which is a sovereign nation separate to the UK so my statement only applied to Great Britain
I guess it makes up for his “arm pump” excuse at Jerez.
...
They’re looking to hire black, Asian and Northern people, who all read classics or English at Oxford or Cambridge.
As opposed to GB News, who have hired people with a wide diversity of viewpoints.
BoZo pissed £9m up the wall on 3 podiums and some flags.
So it looks like Darren will have to continue making social media videos from his bedroom
#GBNews https://twitter.com/Politics4AlI/status/1400933976945070083
The interplay of Discovery and GB News will be interesting. Currently I don't see Discovery+ really taking off in the way Disney+ has.
The two hosts of The Hill’s breakfast show, Krystal Ball and Saagar Enjeti, have quit to go it alone and web-based. The show will be on YouTube and podcast platforms, and they’re selling $10/month subscriptions to get it early and with some bonus content.
They had a good reputation for being equal opportunity bashers of politicians, in a sea of hyper-partisan news channels, and have got 200k youtube subscribers before they even launch.
https://youtube.com/c/breakingpoints/videos
What's interesting is that the new merged company may not renew with Sky which means Sky Atlantic loses all of the HBO content and they push it all through Discovery+ making it a legitimate competitor to D+ and Netflix.
* yes I know here on PB we have a slightly more informed and nuanced view of these.
---
Edit - bulk of polling probably done before I think the above might have had an effect.
Any idea how the numbers work with a news channel?
Is there anything decent on Discovery any more? I don’t think I’ve watched it since Mythbusters finished.
Then what have they got, nobody gets it for the movies now, no Sky Atlantic, means no top tier US telly and no football, means you pay £100 a month for some golf and cricket (provided the likes of the golf don't do the same, and they already have a deal with Disney stream tech company to stream loads of the extra coverage e.g. "follow this group" online).
It is not the only sovereign country in Ireland though as Ireland also includes the Republic of Ireland as well as Northern Ireland
The reference dates me too, of course. Probably first heard/saw it on MTV, another blast from the past...