Thursday roundup: MasterChef, NUJ, old words

A Thursday roundup rather than the usual Friday one.

It's the final of cookery gameshow MasterChef tonight here in the UK, and anyone who's a fan of both the programme and language use might briefly enjoy the 'MasterChef: the best lyrics' gizmo on guardian.co.uk. Thanks for that one, Sarah.

Why would the chair of the National Union of Journalists' professional training committee write that "bloggers rejoice in low standards"? I'm still not sure, but you can track the discussion leading up to this comment on my colleague Adam Tinworth's blog, One Man and His Blog, or read the guardian.co.uk account. As an NUJ member and a fan of new and social media, I've been engrossed by the whole affair.

Lastly, another of my colleagues drew my attention to a BBC News article on the 'oldest English words'. All the talk of Indo-European languages made me flash back to my university days. Thanks, Ro!

Word of the day: churnalism

I came across the word 'churnalism' in this month's issue of the National Union of Journalists' magazine the Journalist. It was coined by union member Nick Davies, and it signifies 'the practice of regurgitating material, rapidly and under pressure, from outside sources without checking'. Davies says:

"Where once journalists were active gatherers of news, now they have generally become more passive processors of unchecked, second-hand material.

"Not journalists, but churnalists. An industry whose primary task is to filter out falsehood has become so vulnerable to manipulation that it is now involved in the mass production of falsehood, distortion and propaganda."

Putting aside the irony of me copying this almost verbatim from another source, I can completely relate to Davies' comments. On the magazine that I work for, we are relatively well staffed and resourced, but even so time pressures can often tempt individuals to cut corners, rely too heavily on press releases, and turn to sources such as Wikipedia without checking facts.

Comments?