Blogger and tech journalist Jeff Jedras has a good analysis of the moral panic that swept through the Parliamentary Press Gallery last Friday (and previously touched on here). The leading lights of Canadian journalism had had the news cycle snatched from their grasp not once but twice the day before, and not by the customary culprits in the PMO but by a pair of tweeters, one obscure (the PEI man who kicked off the wildly popular #tellviceverything meme) the other anonymous (@vikileaks30). After floundering unhappily for 24 hours in the turbulent wake of these citizen journalists, the gallery regrouped Friday for an...

20 February, 2012

Peter Barss thinks newscasters overuse puns. In a letter to CTV, he wrote: Like many news stations (radio and television) you seem inclined to use as many puns as you can fit into a story. The question I'd like to suggest that you ask yourselves is, "Why?" Does a pun help to elucidate a story? I don't think so. In fact, the use--overuse actually--of puns acts as a distraction from the news. Instead of helping to clarify a story, puns draw attention to the "cleverness" of the speaker. It's like "Hey, look at me. I just found another pun." Just because a...

10 February, 2012