Jim Waterson

@jimwaterson.bsky.social

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Journalist at the Guardian.

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What happens to the anti-Tory FBPE media outlets, podcasts, and personalities that have sprung up in the aftermath of 2016? It feels as though there’s either audience collapse (due to people feeling able to switch off) or a pivot (to building up Reform and then hating on them).

As a kid there was a pleasingly cantankerous retired architect in our village, who bought me rejected chocolates from Rowntrees. He never mentioned the war. Why would he? Years later we learned he'd been first up at D-Day. I'll never forget the chat I had with him about it. So this makes me happy.

Patient is honoured with D-Day medal at Malton Hospitalwww.humber.nhs.uk The Fitzwilliam Ward at Malton Hospital recently hosted one of their patients as he was presented with the Legion D’honneur medal for his involvement in the D-Day landings.

I’ve been watching too much daytime TV during the election, which leaves me with one question: How many overpriced gold coins are sold to British pensioners on a daily basis to justify that level of advertising?

Sky News has sent a promo pack for its election night coverage and now my child is running around the house in a Rishi Sunak mask.

Having grown up near Rishi’s constituency I don’t think people grasp just how strong the Tory voting impulse is in those rural areas. Even among Tories who hate these Tories. And how those same people view Labour as Not Understanding People Like Us. But… they don’t suffer fools gladly. #analysis

If there’s one pervasive fake story where my interests collide perfectly, it’s this: Anthony Crosland never took Henry Kissinger to watch Grimsby Town. It’s just too good a yarn. It will never die, despite never happening, all because someone once stuck it on Wikipedia.

Oooh we’ve got a “Russian bot story” about people posting support in comments for Reform/Farage. As always it’s up to you whether you believe it’s 1) A clever overseas influence campaign 2) Absolute weirdo fanatics posting the same thing repeatedly because they’re weird www.itv.com/news/2024-06...

www.itv.com

I never cared for cricket but have got into it since the pandemic. But I cannot deal with a sport where your performance in a World Cup hosted in a hurricane area during hurricane season basically comes down to whether your country’s match coincides with a hurricane.

The thing this "Rishi Sky TV" story is lacking is analysis of the class significance and snobbery (because it's Britain, it's always about class) of the Sunaks having a satellite dish on their house in the 1990s before Sky became all about HBO buy-ins and Super HD streaming.

Well we’ve had a great summer but it’s almost time for the days to start getting shorter!

Overheard in the Tesco queue: “What’s Rishi’s latest thing? Bringing back conscription?”

Just two days until 40,000 Leeds fans start chanting about Rishi Sunak during the Wembley playoff final and create an iconic British political moment.

You gonna call an election in the middle of this, mate?

An interesting thing about Paul Marshall (owner of Unherd, GB News, potentially the Telegraph) is he’s a rare prominent Anglican in public life. And in the same way his media outlets act as insurgents, he funds evangelical factions within the Church of England. www.theguardian.com/politics/art...

How faith drives bidder for Telegraph who wields growing influence on Torieswww.theguardian.com Sir Paul Marshall, a co-owner of GB News, is building a media empire and accumulating political power

The BBC's Eurovision audience was down a quarter on last year due to [insert your favoured justification here].

Here’s a thread on how I cut household bills by £240/month. When I was on parental leave I had the time to research and switch every contract to cheaper and better services. It’s a bank holiday so if you’ve time, do any of these and save ££. (Referral codes included but I use all of these myself.)

Personally if I was a prime minister facing defeat at the next election I would just wake up every morning, cry, and refresh this Wikipedia list of longest serving PMs. Which is why I think the next election will be when Rishi hits Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman. en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...

List of prime ministers of the United Kingdom by length of tenure - Wikipediaen.m.wikipedia.org

There’s a lot of moaning about “why does London have to wait 48 hours to find out its mayor, stupid system”. Which is correct but they DO normally count it very quickly. By computer. With live tallies. They just went back to hand counting this year in case general election was called for same day.

Ahead of the mayoral election, I spent some time with the ex-Daily Star reporter who wants to be mayor of North Yorkshire - by applying his knowledge of what goes viral online to campaigning. www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

What happens when an ex-Daily Star journalist applies clickbait tactics to running for election?www.theguardian.com Keane Duncan is trying to win the mayorship of North Yorks with policies such as nationalising a hotel. But is there substance behind the headline-grabbing stunts?

This headline - about a local news boss banning reporters from rewriting press releases - sounds great! Then you read the content of the story. www.holdthefrontpage.co.uk/2024/news/pu...

National World bans reporters from writing up press releases - Journalism News from HoldtheFrontPagewww.holdthefrontpage.co.uk All PR material to be uploaded direct to websites

The Sun always said it never paid the parents at the heart of the Huw Edwards story. But the paper’s sister station talkTV did an interview with them, with talk of a fee in the tens of thousands of pounds. The interview has never been broadcast. www.theguardian.com/media/2023/j...

Parents in Huw Edwards case ‘offered tens of thousands for TalkTV interview’www.theguardian.com Interview with couple understood to have been recorded for broadcast on sister TV station of the Sun

The extra long episode of Bluey was lovely but unfortunately also left me with a series of questions about the house sales process in Australia and exactly when you complete a purchase in Queensland.

In some weird sop to the decaying remains of the British local newspaper industry, the BBC has agreed to includes links to commercial local news sources beneath its regional content. So you get to the end of an article and you get.... this?

This is an excellent BBC programme from seven years ago explaining how Australian bank Macquarie extracted enormous sums of money from Thames Water. It baffled me when I first heard it, it's infuriating now they're talking about hiking bills by 50%: www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b...

@bryceelder.bsky.social would you say advertising in alphaville is an indicator of a weak mid market watch brand

Europeans on Reddit are astonished by British supermarkets and how cheap they can be: www.reddit.com/r/europe/s/C...

People haven't clocked quite how much TV advertising you're going to see in the next UK general elections thanks to a loophole in the law and a massive increase in spending limits. Even ITV are considering whether to take political parties' money. www.theguardian.com/media/2024/a...

Political ads could be heading to UK TV screens due to legal loopholewww.theguardian.com Exclusive: ITV is considering taking paid ads from parties on its streaming platform where ban does not apply

MANY* PEOPLE ARE ASKING THIS. So SOME PROFESSIONAL NEWS: After six months on parental leave I’m back at the Guardian as “Political Media Editor” for the rest of the year, covering the election. Lexy Topping did such a good job covering me she’s going to continue as acting media editor. *just one

are you back on the beat soon jim

Want to be chief reporter for a local newspaper group in Surrey, running the news operation, and acting as regional editor when appropriate? You need to have already paid for journalism qualifications. In return you'll get.... £23k pa. Legal minimum wage. www.holdthefrontpage.co.uk/jobsboard/vi...

HTFP Jobs: Chief Reporter, Hybrid remote in Farnhamwww.holdthefrontpage.co.uk Latest UK journalism and PR jobs from HoldtheFrontPage

Does anyone on here have a working WeChat account? I'm trying to reactivate mine but I can't because, er, I don't have any friends with WeChat to verify my identity. The only friend who could is.... the person I'm trying to contact on WeChat.