Giotto, Giolitti, graft, Gramsci....
- 20 Jul 06, 10:03 PM
As of today the Idle Scraw becomes "lo scarabocchio ozioso", joining the British chattering classes' exodus to the land of the above. I have packed my paints, a pencil, Tolstoy and some Montecristos - but not the means to post regularly here. I am handing over to Stuart and Ian, the Newsnight web team, to do as they will with these pages....
In actual fact there is talk in the ranks of opening this blog up to the entire Newsnight team; some are chafing at the bit to get involved; others clawing at the walls to avoid being dragged in. What do you think? What would you like to see us do? My hunch is a "collective" Newsnight blog could start to get a bit editorial, but we are prepared to give it a try if you are. I have urged them not to do anything rash with the blog until we can make a big PR job out of it, getting huge column inches in the Guardian Media section and Broadcast on the basis of a decisive bold move into cyberspace (read yet another bodged stumble from one experiment to another).
Anyway readers, thanks for staying with me through the trials of Bolivia, Sven etc. Come August, it will be the dreaded time that all specialist journalists fear: the silly season. Suddenly our most arcane ideas become lead items. This year above all I hope I am doing a lot of utterly trivial techno stories on Newsnight: it will be a sure sign that people have stopped killing each other in Lebanon/Israel/ Palestine.
Use the comments button for this article to say what the heck you like: I would imagine our moderators are all on holiday as well.
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I haven't the faintest idea what the Italian for "Bon Voyage" is, but I'll wish you it anyway.
I'd prefer all the different Newsnight bods to have their own separate blogs. The number of hits they receive could be used to form league tables of popularity. You could have some sort of performance-related pay, where the wages took the form of Chianti.
Happy holidays!
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I think Emily or Kirsty should have it, on the proviso that your picture is swapped for one of theirs. Happy holiday.
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I quite like it the way it is. But perhaps you could have a photo put up where you're pulling a slightly less sarcastic face!
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I think there should be a blog from Newsnight (and many more) but the Idle Scrawl should remain your baby. I have been very impressed on a number of occassions. Insight remains the key to helping us all through the bog of conflicting stories.
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I think that your blog posts are often the most interesting and thought provoking of the whole Beeblogosphere(TM). I would hate to see them lost in a confusion of other Newsnighties.
In general, though, the Beeb has to concentrate on quality instead of quantity on the blogging side: where does it stop? Some sort of pruning is already required on the Blogs front page.
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Keep writing the Idle Scrawl. Even if you think that August is the silly season, there is always news.
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Tolstoy was a complex, tormented man: in the final renunciatory years, he concluded that "War and Peace" and "Anna Karenina" were too much implicated in the world, its passions and affairs, and came to value the paeasant Gerasim, with his simple and frank ways, in "The Death Of Ivan Ilyich," as well as the spiritual life much more. I for one find both Tolstoys fascinating. His work and thought were all the rage in some circles in England in the earlier decades of the 20th century. Mr. Gandhi and Tolstoy corresponded at some length.
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Take a laptop and wax lyrical about the wonders of Tuscany. OK we have all heard it before but, with the onset of the silly season, there won't be much of interest going on here. As for you colleagues, why can't they have their own blogs if they I so minded? Not that I care. I am off to Hungary on Monday.
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Having made my silly point, perhaps I can make a serious one. Blogging has the potential to be the 'new democracy'. If serious people are exchanging serious ideas in something close to real time, the politicians will need to be more responsive to subtle changes in public opinion and maybe the dialogue that results will encourage the public to re-engage with the democratic process. One can but hope.
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Have only just discovered broadband -have only thence discovered blog. I like this new world! Keep it coming for this novice.
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I think there is an advantage to a "Newsnight Blog", but not at the expense of individual blogs such as this one. Maybe just have a blog that contains the "best bits" of individual blogs. The choosing of best bits will of course add some editorial pressure to the blog as a whole, but so long as the individual blogs are still available, I's hope no individual writer felt any pressure to modify their style to fit some grander editorial scheme.
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No, please, not a collective blog. Blogs are individual, they are unique comments. Let everybody blog if they want to, it's our inaliable right, according to the INTERNET, but, a group blog. How would it be done? All the bright minds at the 主播大秀 fighting it out with sharp edged words to see whoes opinion will reign supreme? No, I want to hear all your comments not some watered down, lukewarm, grey porridge of a statement.
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I cant imagine what you might achieve with those paints etc... I suggest that you pack some potatoes with you... Just in case you're struggling for composition...
Have a great trip!!
P.S. Use a small sharp knife to make random cuts in the base of the potato. This will allow for an interesting abstract composition
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Don't you find blogs iritating? Particularly the medias almost histerical enthusiasm in keeping up with technology by blowing such things out of proportion.
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Please, before you go on holiday tell us where the PM of Britain is. Every time there is a crisis the Blairs are on holiday. Does Britain have a PM? From the news bulletins we get it seems that the country is in Bush's hands. It's him who tell us that the danger of terrorism is now stronger than ever. It is Bush who tells us that we must fight against the fascists. I must be a total cretin to have thought that the fascists were Blair and Bush. What's wrong with me? Have lost the plot?
Don't go on holiday, you may decide not to come to a country that has lost any sense of dignity.
Don't forget to take your bottle of milk.
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After watching Newsnight for the last two years straight as much as possible I have for the first time tonight become disolutioned with the questions asked of the guests.Their was not a honest answer from the hedge-fund managers and no hard questions put to them.Just the same old banter and apathetic answers and avoidance of important problems in the worlds economies.Nobody wants to answer the real questions or be responsible,like the politicians of this world everything is scewed to protect those at the top.The reasons why we have these problems in the world to-day is that those at the top don't know what thier doing.Ruth Kelly spends 5 million on a traffic solution that will not work,ask 10 million Los Angelenoes that have had this stupid traffic sceem for about 20 years.Most of the time these lanes stay empty when they could reduce traffic flow,obviously I cannot imagine how far she has driven on your motorways but I have driven over two million miles on U,S, roads.Further when are these nincompupes going to wake up.
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