Zoos again
According to Aunty, nothing has happened at all in Cheshire over the last 10 days. Monitoring of the Merseyside pages, where news from the west of our county is routinely dumped (if the BBC bothers to report anything at all), shows that only Liverpool stories have been published.
Until today, when we have yet another zoo story...
There's no doubt that Chester Zoo does amazing work, but there's a lot more going on in Cheshire than research into mandrills.
Here's just a few of today's lead stories in the Chester Chronicle:
- Post-box bomber jailed for possessing child porn (child porn stories are normally hot fodder for the Beeb). There are two other major child porn news items in the Chronicle today.
- speculation over the future of Chester City Council's chief executive officer (lots of rumours and whiffs of conflict with the new Tory administration - usually good for BBC coverage).
- announcement of planned visit by Charles and Camilla to Chester, including itinerary (wonder if the BBC will report this after the fact?).
- University of Chester defends its reputation after The Guardian accuses it of being on a secret list of educational establishments at risk of financial failure (Aunty normally loves stories like that).
posted by Unknown @ 5:06 pm
2 Comments:
You'd be surprised how disinterested our own homegrown Cheshire media can also be, though. I kept an ear on recently-launched Northwich radio station Cheshire FM this week, thinking any post-launch teething problems would be all but over and I'd hear some local news on air.
No such luck; the entire output appears to be national news from London-based IRN, international showbiz waffle and music. There've been very few mentions of local happenings other than a party at Arley Hall, who happen to be sponsoring the station. Even when the "bin Laden's wife" tabloid-fest story broke in Moulton, about three feet from the station's transmitter mast, there was just the briefest of brief reports that consisted of the tabloid headlines being read out.
You'd think, since the BBC can't be bothered to cover the county, that Cheshire FM would make at least some effort to cover news. There's no point in the station whatsoever if they're just going to play pop music and London-based news all day long.
I did take this up with the station, only to be told by its MD to "put up or shut up"! Charmed.
Yes we have heard this about Cheshire FM in Northwich before. Local stations do this because it is cheaper to buy in a feed of national headlines than to hire (even freelance) a local reporter to get the stories. Don't forget tiny stations like that are very localised and usually on a shoe-string budget - they do not have the resources of the mighty Corporation...
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