The Daily Telegraph (Australia)
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 Front page of The Daily Telegraph on 12 December 2005 |
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| Type | Daily newspaper |
| Format | Tabloid |
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| Owner | News Corporation |
| Editor | David Penberthy |
| Founded | 1879 |
| Headquarters | 2 Holt Street, Surry Hills, NSW, Australia |
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| Website: www.dailytelegraph.news.com.au | |
The Daily Telegraph is a tabloid newspaper published in Sydney, New South Wales, by Nationwide News, part of News Corporation.
The Tele, as it is affectionately known, was founded in 1879 and was a staple in Sydney print media right up until 1990 when it merged with its afternoon sister paper The Daily Mirror to form The Daily Telegraph-Mirror with morning and afternoon editions though the afternoon editions were later discontinued.
The new paper continued in this vein until January 1996 when reader pressure for a shorter title caused the name of the paper to revert to The Daily Telegraph, despite staff concerns that former Mirror readers would now feel disenfranchised. The circulation of the newspaper in the first half of 2004 was around 409,000 per day, the largest of a Sydney newspaper.
Its Melbourne counterpart is the The Herald Sun.
The Saturday edition is called The Saturday Daily Telegraph and the Sunday edition is called The Sunday Telegraph.
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[edit] Politics
The Telegraph's most high-profile columnists, among them Piers Ackerman, are politically conservative. The newspaper does, however, have some left-wing columnists, and its coverage does not consistently back one political party over the other. The Telegraph has a particular focus on issues such as crime, and primary and secondary education.
A Roy Morgan media credibility survey found that 40 per cent of journalists viewed News Limited newspapers as Australia's most partisan media outlet, ahead of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation on 25 per cent. The survey found that readers took a generally dim view of journalists. In response to the question "Which newspapers do you believe do not accurately and fairly report the news?", the Daily Telegraph came third (9%)behind the Herald-Sun (11%) and "All of them" (16%).[1]
[edit] Controversy
[edit] Brogden's sordid past
The Telegraph was widely criticised for its coverage of former New South Wales Liberal leader John Brogden. After Brogden resigned in 2005, the newspaper ran a front-page headline, "Brogden's Sordid Past: Disgraced Liberal leader damned by secret shame file," detailing past allegations of misconduct by Brogden. The following day, Brogden attempted suicide at his electoral office.
Rodney Tiffen, an academic at the University of Sydney, described the newspaper's coverage as an example of "hyena journalism", judging Brogden's personal life to be off limits following his withdrawal from public life.[2]
[edit] The class we failed
A January 1997 Telegraph headline, "The class we failed", was particularly controversial. The newspaper was reporting on the Year 12 class at Mount Druitt High School in which no student scored a Tertiary Entrance Rank above 50 (the top mark is 100). Although the article made clear that the newspaper believed that the state had failed the students, many accused the Telegraph of branding the students themselves as failures. The students successfully sued the newspaper for defamation.
The story led to a renewed focus on the quality of public schools in Western Sydney. But for many, the headline highlighted problems with interpreting Higher School Certificate results and the accompanying TER. The system was progressively overhauled soon after: from 1998, the TER was replaced with a new "University Admissions Index", and in 2001 the HSC itself was radically overhauled.
Later, criticising defamation laws, News Limited CEO John Hartigan said that "The words in the story pointed to deep-seated problems within the education system, but a barrister convinced the jury that, regardless of the words before him, what we really meant to say was that the entire class was too stupid to pass the HSC."[3]
[edit] Staff
The Telegraph is edited by David Penberthy. His predecessor was Campbell Reid, and prior to that the Tele was edited by Col Allan, who now serves as editor-in-chief at the Murdoch-owned New York Post.
High-profile columnists include Piers Akerman. Maralyn Parker comments on primary and secondary education issues. Journalists include Malcolm Farr and Luke McIlveen.
Past writers for the newspaper include Mark Day, Miranda Devine, Mike Gibson and David Luff.
[edit] Website
The Managing Editor Online is Ricky Sutton.
The Daily Telegraph website is the fastest growing online newspaper in Australia registering a 90 per cent growth year on year during 2006/7.[citation needed]
The Daily Telegraph is distributed in a number of online formats:
- Online Website - easily accessible and updated constantly. [[1]]
- RSS News feeds - updated every 15 minutes. [[2]]
- Email Newsletter - a daily snapshot emailed to subscribers each afternoon. [[3]]
- Mobile Edition - for wireless digital assistant. [[4]]
- Video - daily video clips. [[5]]
[edit] Blogs
The Daily Telegraph website hosts the blogs of several columnists.
- Piers Akerman - Political columnist since 1993.
- Anita Quigley - TV, radio and newspaper journalist for 16 years.
- Sydney Confidential - Local and international gossip, glamour and celebrity news.
- Maralyn Parker - Award-winning education columnists' blog.
- Luke McIlveen - Blog
- Steve Mascord - Rugby League reporter.
- Joe Hildebrand - Journalist Blog.
[edit] See also
[edit] References
- ^ Why Australians Don’t Respect The Media
- ^ The Daily Telegraph, John Brogden and hyena journalism
- ^ Press freedom under attack
