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Boris scraps The Londoner

*Sighs*, Johnson has sweet fa to do with the free papers you numpty, apart from a vested interest in trying to ensure that associated newspapers bag the market so he can pay back his media supporters. What he's actually done with this is remove any method for communicating what the London Mayor is doing now, so you won't find out about the cultural events taking place (altho he'll probably scrap these next), you won't find out about any strategies that he undertakes unless you go search for them, its a clever move to remove a layer of scrutiny over what his activities are whilst in office imo.
 
Minnie_the_Minx said:
The London Paper's not the same as The Metro, London Lite is it? :confused:
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Yep, don't mind the Metro in the morning too much but we really don't need another 2 different ones at night as well - quite often there are still Metros left on the train from earlier.

God knows how much paper these bloody things waste.
 
Paulie Tandoori said:
*Sighs*, Johnson has sweet fa to do with the free papers you numpty, apart from a vested interest in trying to ensure that associated newspapers bag the market so he can pay back his media supporters. What he's actually done with this is remove any method for communicating what the London Mayor is doing now, so you won't find out about the cultural events taking place (altho he'll probably scrap these next), you won't find out about any strategies that he undertakes unless you go search for them, its a clever move to remove a layer of scrutiny over what his activities are whilst in office imo.
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Thats rather paranoid of you if you don't mind me saying.

I am pretty sure that most of the mayor's activities will be reported by the wider general media.

Even if the Londoner had not been scrapped, would you really trust the mayor's own vehicle to report truthfully on his activities?
 
Mitre10 said:
Yep, don't mind the Metro in the morning too much but we really don't need another 2 different ones at night as well - quite often there are still Metros left on the train from earlier.

God knows how much paper these bloody things waste.
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What really annoys me is the huge sacks of metros that get taken off the train every morning. They could be given right back to the distributors, but instead, every return journey on the victoria line sucks up its own load of newspapers. It's a discraceful waste.
 
Mitre10 said:
Thats rather paranoid of you if you don't mind me saying.

I am pretty sure that most of the mayor's activities will be reported by the wider general media.

Even if the Londoner had not been scrapped, would you really trust the mayor's own vehicle to report truthfully on his activities?
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Of course not, i don't trust most of what i read because anything in the media is driven by other agendas. But a free newspaper did at least give anyone interested the opportunity to read about what the Mayor (or his media staff) thought was worth reporting and form a view from there.

And give it 3 months and the national media will only be interested in Johnson if he reverts to type and falls into the Thames or something.
 
I try never to read the free papers but do occasionally succumb in the morning,
In fact I pretty much only pick up one paper per week.

Never really read 'The Londoner' before but can't see the point, just make the website better.
 
Paulie Tandoori said:
*Sighs*, Johnson has sweet fa to do with the free papers you numpty, apart from a vested interest in trying to ensure that associated newspapers bag the market so he can pay back his media supporters. What he's actually done with this is remove any method for communicating what the London Mayor is doing now, so you won't find out about the cultural events taking place (altho he'll probably scrap these next), you won't find out about any strategies that he undertakes unless you go search for them, its a clever move to remove a layer of scrutiny over what his activities are whilst in office imo.
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Exactly what I thought. Mitre obviously thinks it's one of these freebies that are handed out every night rather than the ones that are delivered through your front door
 
Paulie Tandoori said:
*Sighs*, Johnson has sweet fa to do with the free papers you numpty, apart from a vested interest in trying to ensure that associated newspapers bag the market so he can pay back his media supporters. What he's actually done with this is remove any method for communicating what the London Mayor is doing now, so you won't find out about the cultural events taking place (altho he'll probably scrap these next), you won't find out about any strategies that he undertakes unless you go search for them, its a clever move to remove a layer of scrutiny over what his activities are whilst in office imo.
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What would be handy if we had some kind of system where people with computers could send faxes via telephone lines. An electronic-letter, perhaps...

Or what about a central server that people could log into and see the latest news from Boris. Its Boris' log, so we could call it a b-log...
 
Paulie Tandoori said:
Of course not, i don't trust most of what i read because anything in the media is driven by other agendas. But a free newspaper did at least give anyone interested the opportunity to read about what the Mayor (or his media staff) thought was worth reporting and form a view from there.
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I never believe free newspapers - just seem like propaganda direct from the mouth of the administration in charge. For instance, the Londoner never dealt with things like Lee Jasper's handouts.
I'm also glad not to be receiving some bollocks from Johnson through my letterbox.
 
I very rarely saw the Londoner, possibly because I live in Croydon, or possibly even because I tend to recycle all the crap which gets put through my door, without paying much attention, so I may have missed it!

However, I do think it is important that the elected Mayor of London accounts to his electorate for what he is doing and proposing to do, so I look forward to finding out how Boris intends to do that.

And, as others have said, this has nothing to do with the free papers handed out on the streets, so can we leave that to another thread? :)
 
Minnie_the_Minx said:
Exactly what I thought. Mitre obviously thinks it's one of these freebies that are handed out every night rather than the ones that are delivered through your front door
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No I don't, although I do lump all free papers in the same category of "why is this crap produced when its such a waste of resources".

Wherever I've lived, be it in Nottingham, Newcastle, Harlow (a black spot in my existance), Loughton, Finsbury Park, etc there have been free papers shoved through the door from the Recorder (Nottm) to the Harlow Star (guess) to The Londoner to the Yellow Paper (Loughton).

They are all crap and go straight in the bin - getting rid of one is a step in the right direction imho.

Same with the free papers outside tube stations, only reason I bought it up in this thread was a glimmer of hope that if Boris could ban booze he could ban these bloody things too.



As it is, Guineveretoo is probably right - shouldn't have bought the free tube papers into this discussion at all.
 
Mitre10 said:
No I don't, although I do lump all free papers in the same category of "why is this crap produced when its such a waste of resources".
Same with the free papers outside tube stations, only reason I bought it up in this thread was a glimmer of hope that if Boris could ban booze he could ban these bloody things too.
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Ah, I thought you were getting them mixed up and thought the London Paper was responsible for heaps of rubbish (well, you'd be right but YKWIM) :D
 
Scrap all the free papers...the create a huge amount on waste and do nothing for the appearance of the tube or train.
 
Mitre10 said:
Same with the free papers outside tube stations, only reason I bought it up in this thread was a glimmer of hope that if Boris could ban booze he could ban these bloody things too.
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I think it probably is within his powers - they need permission to distribute, although there may be contracts signed that would make withdrawing it difficult.

Thinking there's even a slight chance he might want to is totally unrealistic though. One of those papers is from the same group that produces the Evening Standard...
 
Guineveretoo said:
However, I do think it is important that the elected Mayor of London accounts to his electorate for what he is doing and proposing to do, so I look forward to finding out how Boris intends to do that.
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Generally I agree. You can't have it both ways, ie. complain that government is distant, aloof and untransparent and also complain when it spends money on telling the public what it's doing.

Of course, each administration needs to make its own decisions on how much to spend on PR and how that budget is spent.

Despite what some here seem to think, there is still tremendous value in sending out printed material. Very large numbers of people have no access or extremely limited access to the Internet, and we cannot rely by definition on the media to link government to the citizenry without applying all its usual filters.
 
untethered said:
Generally I agree. You can't have it both ways, ie. complain that government is distant, aloof and untransparent and also complain when it spends money on telling the public what it's doing.
.
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I agree with you with one caveat. KL used the Londoner basically as a propaganda sheet paid for both his supporters and his opponents. If the Londoner was a genuine exercise in informing the popultion then it wouldn't be a problem but the Londoner was basically one long massage for KL's ego.
 
KeyboardJockey said:
I agree with you with one caveat. KL used the Londoner basically as a propaganda sheet paid for both his supporters and his opponents. If the Londoner was a genuine exercise in informing the popultion then it wouldn't be a problem but the Londoner was basically one long massage for KL's ego.
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As are all local-authority publications. I can't imagine a Boris replacement would be any different :(
 
KeyboardJockey said:
Agreed. This was one of the things that he promised way back. As long as he is hitting the former mayors slush funds then I'm in favour.
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Bloody Hell. You post on something that's quite reasonable to laud Boris for doing, and still manage to sound like a Ken-obsessed stalker. Could you not have left the second sentence out?
 
KeyboardJockey said:
I agree with you with one caveat. KL used the Londoner basically as a propaganda sheet paid for both his supporters and his opponents. If the Londoner was a genuine exercise in informing the popultion then it wouldn't be a problem but the Londoner was basically one long massage for KL's ego.
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Well I didn't like the tone of it either. But what are you suggesting? That it should be independently edited?

The main failing was trying to present it in a fake-newspaper style rather than it being absolutely explicitly the mayor's PR handout.

"Ken Livingstone's Newsletter" would have been a much better title, and I wouldn't object in principle were it replaced with "Boris Johnson's Newsletter".

The underlying issue is a tricky one - to what extent is government communications part of the essential unavoidable business of government and when is the line crossed to it becoming simply party political propaganda?
 
Good riddance. We won't have to read drivel like "support for olympics surges!" or whatever the wording was.

A bit less paper wasted. Thought most people on here woudl be glad of that?
 
poster342002 said:
Good riddance. We won't have to read drivel like "support for olympics surges!" or whatever the wording was.

A bit less paper wasted. Thought most people on here woudl be glad of that?
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How should the mayor communicate with the electorate? Should be bother, or would you just be happy for him to get on with it?
 
untethered said:
How should the mayor communicate with the electorate? Should be bother, or would you just be happy for him to get on with it?
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Did Pravda "communicate with the populace" of the USSR? Did it's existance hold the soviet government accountqable or was it just an uncritical mouthpiece?
 
poster342002 said:
Did Pravda "communicate with the populace" of the USSR? Did it's existance hold the soviet government accountqable or was it just an uncritical mouthpiece?
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You're not comparing like with like.

Pravda was pretty much the sole organ of a state-controlled media in a totalitarian society.

The Mayor of London putting out a free newspaper in a pluralistic society with a diverse and free media (not to mention the Internet, etc.) hardly seems to limit the accountability of government.

So I return to my previous questions. How should the mayor communicate with the electorate, or shouldn't he bother?
 
Crispy said:
What really annoys me is the huge sacks of metros that get taken off the train every morning. They could be given right back to the distributors, but instead, every return journey on the victoria line sucks up its own load of newspapers. It's a discraceful waste.
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I caught the piccadilly line last week to Heathrow around 11am and the bloody carriage was full of the rags. Every second seat was covered with parts of a freesheet or had part of it stuffed behind the seat. Not one person who got on with one in the seats near me bothered their arses to take it with them and bin it themselves :rolleyes:

As for the mayors propaganda rag, just whack it all on a website and only have hard copy in public spaces like libraries/GP & Dentist waiting rooms for those without net access.
 
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