The media has polarised the views of England and Scotland

Newspapers and broadcasters have polarised views between Scotland and England in the digital era, which has led ignorance and hostility, according to a report by the Institute for Public Policy Research North.

The author of the report,Douglas Fraser, is also the political editor of the Scottish Herald.

This says the Institute can be illustrated in a number of ways

1.London based papers producing ‘Scottish editions’ subsequently strip Scottish news from English editions

2.The Scottish media has focused more of its attention on what is happening in the Scottish Parliament, and neither it nor the London-based media pay adequate attention to the English regions, Wales or Brussels.

3.A tendency of some London-based papers to treat Scotland as a foreign country and only cover “heroin or haggis” stories limits the understanding of Scotland south of the border

In addition the reporting of issues such as public spending disparities between the two nations has led to a further fueling of resentment

It's the news that's wrong stupid

An American survey has concluded that teenagers find reading online news stressful(Poynter Online via Roy Greenslade)

The survey carried out by Northwestern University found

While the 14- to 18-year-old study participants described time spent on YouTube or social networking and music downloading sites as a treat or time-out, they described their online news experiences as stressful or a reminder of the world's dangers.

And suggests that news organisations should

cultivate teen audiences by learning what appeals to them, diminishing their angst, going to the Web sites teens frequent and creating ways teens can communicate with one another about the news.

I worry what this message actually means to journalism and the providers of news."A reminder of the world's dangers",well surely we all have to be made aware of the dangers in the world in order to make decisions in the democratic society.Or perhaps today's youngsters are not interested any more.

The bug that never was.

Apparently the three million people that were confined to their beds over Xmas and New Year with the Norovirus was a figment of certian parts of the media.No prizes for guessing which ones.

The epidemic which regulary appears every winter and affects between 600,000 to a million people was no worse this year than in previous years.

So why did those certain parts ramp in up so much.Was it simply something to fill the empty pages over the holiday break or perhaps something more sinister.I think that we should be told