User talk:Steven Harkins

Hi Steven,

good to meet you the other day. Here are some tips.

• Go to http://www.spinprofiles.org/index.php?title=User:Steven_Harkins&action=edit and add a brief bio
• To see the new referencing style go to A Guide to Referencing
• To leave me a message edit this page: http://www.spinprofiles.org/index.php/User_talk:David
• Let me know what subjects you are interested in on spinprofiles and I might be able to point you in the right direction.

Best

--David 22:31, 16 March 2008 (UTC) Hi Steven,

Long time no see. Welcome back!

good work on Bacardi. Well done.

Looking forward to what you do next!

--David 21:14, 20 August 2008 (BST)

The Times

Hi Steven

So glad you're taking on The Times and Murdoch in this great article.

Just a couple of points:

I seem to recall that opposition to Murdoch taking over The Times centered on some law that prevents monopolies emerging in the media? or does this law only apply in the US? Here, an MP tried to get the Competition Commission involved in the question. Would there have been a law involved, or was it something softer like some kind of precedent situation on ownership of the media?

Good starting points on this are articles at http://select.nytimes.com/2007/06/29/opinion/29krugman.html?_r=1 and http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2007/may/25/rupertmurdoch.bskyb

It's fine to quote articles like this to make the point for us. I think it's worth putting in a bit about this controversy.

Also, I know it is obvious to us Spin people why media monopolies are bad, but I think it should be spelled out in a sentence or two for the public who may not be so familiar with the argument. One of the articles above makes the point, with people thinking rubbish things about the war on terror etc because they heard it on one of Murdoch's channels.

Another point--please do give complete refs rather than just urls, as they tend to go out of date quickly and then the reader has no way of finding our sources. Have a look at

http://www.spinprofiles.org/index.php/SpinProfiles:A_Guide_to_Referencing

Section: How to format referencing

and do them like this. Can you redo the refs already in this article according to this format? If anything isn't clear in these "Help" pages pls let me know, as I want to make it easy to follow.

Many thanks! --Claire Robinson 11:31, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

Times

Hi Steven

just wanted to say well done on The Times and Murdoch. This is real public education and I think it's what SpinP should excel at (as well as providing material to journos of course).

--Claire Robinson 15:02, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Press pages

Steven

great stuff on the Times/Sunday Times and now the Mail. Are you planning to do all the papers?

Some tips: Can you try and make sure that the journalists you list are done alphabetically - I have tried to move the list in that dierction on the page on The Sunday Times. also, it would be good to use the format that is now on the S times page so that the list runs across the page?

It would also be useful if and when you have that data to add in after their names, their role at the paper and dates they were there... as this may become important later.

And - I wonder if you can ensure that you put in redirects so that all references to Daily Mail redirect to The Daily Mail etc?

And lastly I would love to see a stub p[age on the companies associated with the Mail: ie how is Associated Newspapers related to the Daily Mail and General Trust just so that people can check at a glance.

Keep up the good work. --David 09:32, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

PS on Sunday Times

PS Steve, a small point of style: we embolden the first instance of the name of the subject of the article (here The Sunday Times) but thereafter it is just in plain text. makes it easier to read. Your writing is a model of clarity! thanks --Claire Robinson 11:35, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

The press

Steven,

great work on the Mail etc. Fantastic!

On your queries:

1. Yes include the Daily and Sunday sport - though I would say a lower priority until we get the rest sorted 2. Yes include the magazines like the New Statesman and The Economist and The Spectator - perhaps also Fortune, Time, Newsweek etc. I am particularly keen on the Economist as it plays a key role on corporate lobby groups and is an elite magazine 3. Also v important to do work on the Financial Times for similar reasons. 4. I would very much like to see material on each of the company pages (ie the owners of the papers where appropriate) of their links with corproate lobby groups, particularly the global ones: eg World Economic Forum, Trilateral Commission, Bilderberg Group (the Economist provided the secretariat in 2008), LOTIS Committee etc. I see also that Rothermere is involved with BritishAmerican Business, Inc. as are lots of other corporate leaders.

Let me know what you will work on,...

Keep up the good work.

--David 11:36, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

points of style

HI Steven

some more points of style (seemingly they are endless but one eventually gets the hang of them)...

no need to make a header to begin article, eg if your page/article is called Joe Smith, then no need also to begin article

==Joe Smith==

--just plunge into your body text and embolden Joe Smith's name the first time you use it.

Also in refs can u give full refs to source, including publication name and article date, so in case of newspaper articles etc that would be <ref>Jim Bloggs, "[http://www.blahblah.org No end in sight for points of style]", The Guardian, 20 September 2006, accessed January 2009.</ref>

thank you and keep up the great work --Claire Robinson 14:10, 27 January 2009 (UTC)

PS

HI Steve, don't forget to add notes and category/ies to bottom of pages for your most recent journos

so you will have

==Notes== <references/> [[Category:Journalism]][[Category:Media]]

etc

thanks! --Claire Robinson 12:21, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

Media pages

Lots of good work on the press.

Do you think you could add the following to the bottom of each page that you do?

[[Category:Media Industry]]

Perhaps we could also create a category for newspapers? what do you think?

so: [[category:Newspapers]] ?

--David 09:33, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

categories

Hi,

to create a category just add it to the page: and then save and click on it and add a few lines defining the category. To make it a subcategory also add another category to the category page. ie add to the Newspaper category page.

To merge you will need to edit at the 'media' categorised pages and change the category that way.

Great work again!

--David 15:51, 22 February 2009 (UTC)