Sorry we said you punched a taxi

An apology to Wayne Rooney which appeared in yesterday's Sunday Mirror (spotted by Regret the Error):

On October 16 we published an article reporting claims that Wayne Rooney had damaged a taxi after it arrived late to collect him and his party for a concert.

We're happy to make clear that Wayne did not punch the vehicle which was not late and we offer him our apologies.

'News'

An 'exclusive' from today's Sun:

Savaged to death by a dog...or natural causes?

This morning, both the Sun and MailOnline covered the death of Cassandra Smith in Nuneaton:

The Sun's article, written by Andrew Parker, goes into some detail:

A brave mum was savaged to death by the family dog in front of her five children as she tried to stop it attacking them.

Petite Cassandra Smith, 49, leapt in to fight off the frenzied Alsatian when it went for daughters Charlotte, 28, and Annette, 26.

But the snarling animal flew at her and sank its jaws into her face and throat.

Her five terrified kids — including Shelley, 25, Kayleigh, 21, and Jayson, 30 — looked on screaming in horror.

The first comment on the Sun's article seems to have been posted online at 7:49pm yesterday and the story was in today's paper. The MailOnline version went up this morning, suggesting it was 'borrowed' from the Sun.

Yet five hours before that comment, Warwickshire Police issued a statement saying such 'rumours' were 'unfounded':

She had told a family member that she was feeling unwell the night before her body was found.

At the current time there is no evidence to support rumours, circulating in the local community, that she died from injuries inflicted by the family dog.

A post mortem has taken place today and has found:

that she died from natural causes as a result of a pre-existing medical condition.

The examination established that injuries to the woman’s face were caused after she had died.

The woman was found in her bedroom by an adult member of her family on Tuesday morning. The woman had stated she had been feeling unwell the previous evening.

A juvenile dog, believed to be a bull mastiff, staffie cross, aged approximately five months old, which was found in the room with the woman, has been destroyed following consultation with the family.

An elderly German Shepherd dog, that was in another room in the house, was not involved in the incident.

A report into the woman’s death will now be prepared for the Coroner and an inquest will be held at a later date.

The Sun and MailOnline articles have now vanished.

(Hat-tip to Darryl Murphy)

Dacre, the Mail and cancer

In his evidence to the Leveson Inquiry today, Mail editor Paul Dacre said it was a 'caricature' that his paper wrote lots of stories about things that can give you cancer.

This claim came as he was being asked about the Mail story 'Cancer danger from that night-time trip to the toilet', which was dimissed as an 'eye-catching fabrication' by the University of Leicester, whose research was being reported.

Inevitably, there was a 'x causes cancer' story in the Mail today, based on soon-to-be-aired Government ads on drinking:

It begins:

Just two glasses of wine or two strong pints of beer a day can treble the risk of mouth cancer, ministers warn.

The news that two pints of beer could treble the risk of mouth cancer may come as a surprise to some Mail readers who saw this story two days ago:

This article included the claim that:

We have long been told that a glass of red wine is good for our health, but now an increasing number of clinical studies show that beer can have even greater benefits...

‘It needn’t be an expensive beer – just don’t drink so much you cancel out any of the benefits,’ adds Dr Philliskirk. ‘This means no more than a pint a day for a woman and between one and two pints, depending on the beer’s strength, for a man.’

Dr Philliskirk is, incidentally, from the Institute of Brewing and Distillery:

a members organisation dedicated to the education and training needs of brewers & distillers and those in related industries.

He might just be considered to be someone with an interest in promoting the benefits of alcohol.

But there it is: two pints of beer a day might be good for you or it might increase your risk of mouth cancer, depending on whether you read the Mail on the 4th or the 6th.

Just like last year, indeed, when a glass or two of red wine was reported by the Mail (and Express) to both prevent and increase the risk of breast cancer.

Similarly, the Mail reported that drinking wine with an evening meal was a 'deadly risk' that increases the risk of cancer (29 August 2011) and a good way to be 'free of the ills of oldage', including cancer (7 September 2011).

Dacre told the Inquiry:

I categorically dispute that we adopt an irresponsible stance on medical stories.

'The exact outfit she had on the day before'

As Mail editor Paul Dacre was telling the Leveson Inquiry that he was 'proud' of MailOnline, the website was publishing another of its blistering showbiz exclusives:

The article is typical MailOnline fare - get some photos of a celebrity, look at their clothes and the people they are with, describe what the photos show and try to make a 'story' out of it.

In this case, MailOnline hack Holly Thomas says Amber Heard was spotted wearing the 'exact outfit she had on the day before'. But the photos used in the article to prove this point suggest this may not be true. Look, for example, at the neckline:

But what of the claim that the pictures show that Heard has 'moved on' after a 'rumoured' split from her girlfriend and has been spotted with a 'mystery woman'?

Well, Thomas should have looked at this MailOnline article from 25 January 2012 in which Amber was out (in the same dress!) with what appears to be the same 'mystery woman' - who is identifed as...her sister, Whitney.

UPDATE: Within one hour of posting a link to the above on Twitter, the original article was removed from MailOnline (thanks Mike).

Sorry we said you sent 'bizarre 9/11 text'

An apology published by the Sun on 4 February 2012:

Graham Westley and Preston North End FC

An article on January 30 incorrectly stated that Graham Westley, Manager of Preston North End FC, had sent a bizarre late night text telling players to prepare for a 9/11 style terror attack and encouraging reaction to it.

We accept that Mr Westley sent no such text to players or otherwise. We are happy to set the record straight and apologise to Mr Westley and Preston North End FC.

(Hat-tip to @shoutsatcows)

'Much to the amusement of those watching'

A MailOnline story posted yesterday evening claimed:

The article by Simon Tomlinson - which amounts to: person with funny name gets photo shown on TV -  then publishes the picture:

This blog was contacted by an eagle-eyed reader who pointed out that the font doesn't quite look like the one the BBC News Channel uses.

A comment on the MailOnline article makes the same point, and also questions why they would include the 'LIVE' caption while showing photographs from viewers.

Further doubts were raised by other comments. One said:

Strange, I live 12 miles from Lutterworth and we haven't seen so much as a flake of snow all day. Maybe that should read FAKE instead of flake!

Another said:

I live 6 miles away and drove through lutterworth and there was no snow today!

And a third said:

Well I live in Lutterworth and we haven't seen as much as a snowflake during this recent cold snap! Someone was clearly yanking the BBC's leg!!

A comment left this morning sheds more light:

This is a photoshopped picture and a fake name, my friend did it. Can't believe it's made the news with people thinking it's real! Search Phlex Media :)

And, indeed, searching for Phlex Media finds this Facebook page where Jody Kirton is currently telling his followers how his 'photoshopped photo made the news'. And on Twitter:

He explains how he photoshopped the picture, put it on a USB, looked at it on his TV and then took the picture. He has posted a copy of his original photoshopped picture as proof.

He has now also posted another photo on his Facebook. It has the caption: 'Daily Mail 0, Jody 1'.

And this incident comes so soon after this...

(Hat-tip to Martin S)

UPDATE: Craig Silverman from Poynter has interviewed Jody.  

UPDATE (6 February): The article has now been deleted from the Mail's website. 

Do as we say, not as we do

From the Guardian's Media Monkey on 26 January:

"How Beeb downplayed its use of private eyes", thundered the Daily Mail on Thursday, as it accused BBC News of virtually ignoring evidence from director general Mark Thompson to the Leveson inquiry that the corporation had spent £310,000 on private investigators in six years. 

Strangely, when the Mail covered the inquiry on 5 December – when Lord Justice Leveson heard how the names of journalists had been found at private investigator Steve Whittamore's Hampshire home – it described the "veritable treasure trove" of material, yet failed to mention that it topped the list of title's using Whittamore's services, with 952 requests, involving 58 of its journalists. 

And in the Mail's Leveson coverage on 12 January, towards the end of a page 8 story "How Hugh Grant got his facts wrong, by the Mail's legal chief" were a few paragraphs about Mail on Sunday editor Peter Wright's use of Whittamore. So no downplaying the use of private eyes there, then.

'Not about cannabis, smoking or schizophrenia'

A Mail article about the dangers of cannabis has been awarded the 2011 Orwellian Prize for Journalistic Misrepresentation (of scientific research) by Dorothy Bishop, a professor of developmental neuropsychology at Oxford.

The Mail's story originally carried the headline: 'Just ONE cannabis joint 'can bring on schizophrenia' as well as damaging memory'. Although this headline was (slightly) modified later, Parker points out that the academic paper this article was 'based on' was:

not about cannabis, smoking or schizophrenia. Rather it is about an artificial compound that is not present in cannabis, which was injected into rats, and which led to changes in their brain waves.

The article was debunked at the time, including by Neurobonkers and Clear. In the latter, it says:

Dr Matt Jones, lead author of the study in question...told me that he was “disappointed but not surprised” at the Daily Mail’s coverage of his work. He gave me permission to quote him in saying that “This study does NOT say that one spliff will bring on schizophrenia”.

(Hat-tips to Craig Silverman and Kevin Arscott)

Not such a positive solution

George Monbiot's column of 26 January about Positive Weather Solutions (PWS) is well worth reading.

PWS had become favoured weather forecasters by certain tabloid newspapers - both the Mail and Express were quoting them up to a couple of weeks ago. As Monbiot wrote on 2 January:

PWS boasts that it "has made the front page of the Daily Express thirteen times; the Daily Telegraph seven times; and the Daily Mail and the Sun once". Between 26 September and 1 October, it says, it "was quoted every single day in the Daily Express".

In the earlier column, he talked about both PWS and another minor outfit, Exacta (source of the Express' '-20C to hit us in weeks' front page headline), and noted that the scorn poured on inaccurate Met Office forecasts by the tabloids was not repeated when these other forecasters got it wrong:

Unlike the Met Office, the alternative forecasters are neither roasted nor frozen out when they get it wrong. In 2010, for example, the Daily Mail announced that "the country really is on course for a barbecue summer". This time, it told its readers, the prediction "comes from a forecaster with a somewhat better record on the subject than the poor old Met Office". This was PWS – which has no published record at all. PWS told the Mail that "there will be stifling temperatures, making it possibly the warmest UK summer on record". In fact it was an unremarkable summer, but there were no "red faces" at PWS.

Yet it turned out that many of the 'staff photos' on the PWS website were stock pictures taken from elsewhere. When Monbiot asked PWS chief Jonathan Powell if he could speak to a couple of these other forecasters, Powell hesitated. Two hours later, he told Monbiot:

"Quite frankly, the filing system I have is a mess and I cannot put my hands of the information you require … Your column which was understandably critical of us at Christmas made me face a few things about the company and where it was going, and now as I can't find anything to back anyone up then quite frankly PWS is now more trouble than its worth and in debt. Therefore, I have taken the decision after six years to close the business forthwith."

These were not questions the tabloids that so favoured using PWS bothered to ask. And, for once, this is one PWS quote that the tabloids haven't bothered to repeat.

(Many thanks to Mark S)

'At Last'

As spotted by Simon Ricketts:

Recommended: A year of headlines

On 31 December 2011, Ned Morrell listed every front page headline published by the Daily Express in 2011.

Inspired by that effort, Scott Bryan has now done the same for the Daily Star.

The Express, the EU and plastic bags (cont.)

In May 2011, an Express front page headline claimed the EU had said 'ban shopping bags':

The sub-head clarified that this was plastic bags, not all shopping bags. But either way the EU hadn't actually 'said' this. They had, however, launched a public consultation 'asking the public how best to reduce the use of plastic carrier bags.'

The front page of today's Express carries a similar headline, albeit not as the main story:

'Daft EU want all plastic shopping bags made illegal'.

The article, by Dana Gloger, begins:

Plastic bags could be banned in Britain and across Europe in a move by the EU to cut pollution.

Ah: 'could'. How strange they didn't include that caveat in the front page headline.

According to European Voice, there were 15,500 responses to the two-month public consultation (500 from 'public authorities, industry associations, NGOs and academic organisations', the rest from citizens) and 70% of these favoured a ban on plastic bags.

So does the EU want all plastic bags to be 'made illegal', reflecting the results of its consultation? Well, it hasn't said - as the Express' article admits mid-way through when it quotes the EU's environment spokeswoman Monica Westeren saying:

“We are still discussing it internally and seeing what our next steps will be.”

The European Voice article echoes this:

A Commission official said the consultation will feed into an impact assessment planned for this year. But no decision has been taken on the way forward, and no new action is likely to be proposed in the forthcoming green paper.

So it appears that, not for the first time, the Express has, in a front page headline, attributed a point of view to the EU which it hasn't expressed, simply because it fits the paper's agenda to do so.

Yet it was only last week that editor Hugh Whittow told the Leveson Inquiry:

we don't twist anything. We just present the news of the day.

Drake/Leon Best

In an article in the 'sport' section of MailOnline, a headline claims:

Rik Sharma reports:

not many people will have harboured the desire to appear identical to Newcastle United footballer Leon Best.

Nothing against Best of course, but let's be honest, he's not what you would call a household name - although if he continues to score goals like his winner against QPR on Saturday, maybe that will change.

But this girl not only wants to look like Best, her 'favourite soccer player eva', but she'll show you how to as well. Just in case, you know, you ever wanted to.

Using a variety of cosmetics like hair lotion, eyeshadow and eyeliner, she talks you through her creepy transformation from a regular looking girl through to a carbon copy of the striker.

'Add a silver necklace if you wish,' she says. 'And then the transformation is complete.'

The Mail has embedded the video from YouTube at the end. What it hasn't done, however, is read any of the comments under it (or, it seems, any of the comments under its own article). The vast majority are pointing out this isn't really about Leon Best at all. This version of the video is a spoof.

The 'girl' in question is Promise Phan, who has posted lots of videos on YouTube of her using make-up to make herself look like other people - Angelina Jolie, Justin Bieber and Kim Kardashian among them.

Leon Best would certainly seem an unlikely addition to that list. Indeed, what Promise Phan was actually doing was transforming into a rapper called Drake.

Sharma would also have known this if he had read an article (about the 'real' video) which appeared only six days before on...MailOnline:

If Sharma hadn't read the Mail, it is possible he had read Mirror Football's 3pm Extra, which highlighted the video an hour or so before his article was published. It appears the Mirror hadn't realised it was a joke, either.

There is now a link to a second clip embedded in the video, in which someone pretending to be Best speaks to someone pretending to be a journalist about the coverage:

All because you couldn't spare some common sense to do a background check on where this video had come from.

MailOnline clarifies story on Dale Farm lawyers

In November, an article published by the MailOnline carried the headline:

Dale Farm lawyers scoop MASSIVE £6m of taxpayers' money to fund gypsies' legal battle

Last week, the PCC announced that following a complaint from Dr Keith Lomax of law firm Davies Gore Lomax, the Mail had added the following correction to the article:

A previous version of this article said that lawyers for the Dale Farm Travellers had "scooped" £6million of taxpayers' money to fund the Travellers' legal battle and that Davies Gore Lomax "pocketed more than £1.1 million in legal aid in 2008", and "then received a further £1.1 million last year". We also reported that Dr Lomax, the founding partner of the law firm, had stated that the work the firm did for Gypsies only made up a tiny "fraction" of their lucrative business.

We are happy to clarify that the £6million referred to was for the entirety of the firm's legal aid costs from 2006 until October 2011 including court fees, expenses, and VAT. The work the firm did for the Dale Farm Travellers was only a fraction of the firm's legal aid funded work. Dr Lomax did not say that the firm's work was a lucrative business. We regret any distress caused by the original story.

It has also changed the headline, which now reads: 'Revealed: How lawyers acting for Dale Farm gypsies have scooped £6m of taxpayers' money in the last five years'.