As a BBC novice, I was unsure of what to expect from John Curran. Although I was once interested in becoming a reporter and getting into the news industry, I had only considered doing so in a sports setting. I have never been one to watch the news much, as I have found it to generally be depressing and divisive. However, I am coming to the age where I am beginning to become interested, and I intend to watch some BBC while here. As a neutral source, I think I will enjoy the BBC because I like when events are reported just as they happened. But I digress. I was excited to hear what John had to say about his experience; my hopes were for him to give me insight into the news industry, which would, in return, support my intention to invest more time into it. He did not disappoint.
John emphasized the difference between reporting news today and reporting news from the past. Of course, I know the speed at which events are reported has changed enormously with the invention of widespread internet and social media, but his anecdotes gave us a small look into it. As the nightly editor on the night Princess Diana had died, John explained the situation he was put in. He had received a tip off from Nick Witchell, who was working on diplomatic relations in France, that Diana had died from the car crash rather than having been injured. However, John needed a second source confirming this before reporting it, which ended up coming from the British foreign secretary (who was in the same group as Witchell, which technically did not make it a second confirmation, unbeknown to them at the time).
Still, even with this dramatic news, the system in which news was reported was wildly different. John showed us a clip from that night in which a movie program paused for a moment to report that Princess Diana had been in a car crash…then hopped right back into the movie. If this were to happen today, normal network programming would shut off and there would be reports for the next 48 hours at the least. Speed is the crucial aspect of reporting nowadays- everyone wants to get the story out first. However, there continues to be a two-confirmation check, as reputation is essential. If someone gets a story wrong and reports false information, their credibility and viewership will take a hit.
However, this is only the main rule for actual news sources. Today, anyone can post anything at any time with the click of a button. John referred to us as citizen journalists; with this, we should have a moral responsibility to use this power to provide factual information. Unfortunately, this is often not the case.
The combination of all the things he had talked about helped to prove how we have evolved as a society in terms of news. We receive something new every second of the day, which is an informative, but potentially dangerous, lifestyle. To test out the waters of the BBC, I watched their news at 10 the day after John came in to speak to us. There were 4 main topics discussed: Prince Andrew’s settlement with Virginia Giuffre, Russia and Ukraine, Novak Djokovic’s continual refusal to get the vaccine and Russian skater Kamila Valieva’s Olympic run despite a failed drug test. As you can see, three of these topics do not even involve the UK; however, each topic had up-to-date news and reporting from worldwide sources. Joe Biden claimed Russia’s removal of troops was unverified. Djokovic was interviewed about his intention to give up the chance for trophies because of his beliefs about the vaccine. Valieva’s routine was put on the screen as she had outshone her opponents (although, as of 2 hours ago, she did not end up medaling). As for Prince Andrew, I had read about it in the newspaper already, but that’s what happens now when news is at a set time.
I was interested in each of the topics discussed in the news segment. More importantly, I took the time to be amazed at the speed in which news is now reported. While John had to wait up to 24 hours to report some stories, news sources do not have that luxury anymore. I have a profound respect and admiration for people who risk their lives, work long hours and dedicate themselves to giving the public news. I think John helped to open up my eyes to a part of the media that I had not yet navigated.
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