James King’s account of a year “ripping off the web” at DailyMail.com is the latest in an ongoing drip-drip of uncomfortable revelations about how publishers and broadcasters do their work.

The media may have been the Fourth Estate; but blogs have been performing their role as ‘Estate 4.5′ (as Jane Singer put it) for some time now, opening up publishers, journalists’ and editors’ working practices to public scrutiny on a regular basis.

Two things strike me about King’s account, however.

The Brits are coming

The first is to wonder whether a young UK journalist would ever have written the story that King did. Or, perhaps, why none ever has. Continue reading →