BBC News 24 this evening has gone, antibathetically, from the ridiculous to the sublime. The ridiculous - deserving of ridicule - was footage of a parked car which might or might not have driven Kevin Federline, the estranged husband of Britney Spears, to a courthouse. Ms Spears might have been in the courthouse or, according to the commentary, might have been somewhere else. In other words, the BBC felt the need to report the fact that two people might or might not have been in a courthouse. Unless it was an attempt to educate the good people of Britain about quantum mechanics through the device of Schrödinger’s Celebrities, I think it is one of the weakest pieces of news I have ever seen. It was a build-up to a non-story about a trivial issue that was badly reported.

On the other hand, there was, on BBC News at Ten, a particularly brilliant piece of reporting. Reporting from within Zimbabwe, including from Harare, John Simpson covered opposition to Robert Mugabe from within Zanu-PF and the possibility of a challenger who could actually unseat him. It was investigative reporting of the first order from a country where any news comes at a premium.

Indeed from the ridiculous to the sublime.

xD.

Posted on Monday, January 14th, 2008 at 11:01 pm
Categories: Media.
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