BEGINS the trade website, holdthefrontpage.co.uk: “A weekly editor has hit back at ‘narrow-minded bigotry’ over plans to re-home Syrian refugees on his paper’s patch.
“The Scottish island of Bute is to become home to 15 Syrian asylum-seeker families due to arrive over the next few weeks.
“But the move has led to what Buteman editor, Craig Borland, termed ‘predictable grumbling’ among some local people.
“In an editorial in this week’s edition, Craig tackled the issue head-on, claiming the resettlement plan represented an ‘amazing opportunity’ for the island.”
Read more, here.
And the editorial has The Guardian’s media commentator, Roy Greenslade – here – ‘paying tribute’ to Borland.
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A CONTINUING investigation, by the UK government, into Scotland’s creative industries, is next meeting tomorrow.
And among those presenting to the Westminster committee is the chair of the Scots division of the Institute of Practitioners in Advertising.
Brian Coane is being joined – during the first session of the evidence-gathing by the Scottish Affairs Committee – by Jo Dipple, chief executive, UK Music, and Amanda Nevill, chief executive officer, British Film Institute.
A second session is to feature Ed Vaizey MP, Minister of State for Culture and the Digital Economy, DCMS and BIS.
Read more, here.
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BEGINS Kevin McKenna, in The National: “In those days when all I ever wanted to be was a football reporter, my heroes were Ian Archer, Hugh Taylor, Jim Blair and Gerry McNee.
“I had long known that my-laid back approach to playing football was never going to get me scouted and so writing about the game for one of our national titles seemed the next best thing. Sadly, I was never deemed to have quite reached the standard required for that and so had to settle for production journalism and current affairs instead.
“One of my most memorable stints though, when I was still trying to make sense of the world of newspapers, was a period of several months doing shifts on the Sunday Mail for Alex Gordon, the best sports editor of any newspaper in Scotland I have ever encountered.
“Alex retired from sports editing years ago but now writes football books, very good ones actually, that concentrate on facts and well-written anecdotes.”
Read more, here.
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AND also in The National, its leader column yesterday began: “The National is Scotland’s only daily paper supporting independence. That colours our editorial opinion, but not our approach to factual reporting.
“We can make mistakes ourselves, but know that some newspapers deliberately allow editorialisation into their pages. When it comes to Scotland’s First Minister Nicola Sturgeon, some London-based newspapers sacrifice facts in their obvious animus against her.”
Read more, here.
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THE website, BrandRepublic, reports: “Johnston Press, the local newspaper publisher, has launched a native advertising proposition after a three-month trial.
“Voice Local will create branded content for advertisers and will be staffed by a new team of commercial editors and product managers.
“During the three-month pilot, Voice Local delivered 59 content marketing campaigns, including for Waitrose. Johnston Press said its native content had already delivered high levels of engagement – in some cases offering eight times the click rate of traditional online advertising.
Read more, here.
And here, on the Johnston Press website.
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