Malema, SAPA, and SA English media's wire copy problem

6 Oct 2010

As a story about Julius Malema supposedly stepping down as president of the ANC Youth League spread through the news media on late last week, South Africa's cash-strapped and resource-shy English press showed its readiness to accept SAPA stories as gospel. In the process, they are creating a sea of sameness that's essentially killing their newspapers.

The Malema story raises questions about the way the South African media in particular use SAPA; more specifically, the media's over-reliance on the press agency's copy.

"With ever tighter resources, stressed-out copy tasters and news editors and night editors trying to meet deadlines, if there happens to be a SAPA story sitting on the wires, waiting to be cut and pasted, slotted in, that's what happens," says SAPA editor Mark van der Velden. "It is a cop out to blame news agencies for the bland reproduction of wire agency copy. "

Read the full article on www.thedailymaverick.co.za.

Source: Daily Maverick

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Mandy de Waal

About Mandy de Waal: @mandyldewaal

Editor, writer and researcher. *Editor of #TheFutureByDesign & The Africa Annual *Published in Africa's Greatest Entrepreneurs *Published in Rolling Stone Magazine, The Guardian (UK), Daily Maverick, Finweek, Mail & Guardian, City Press, Rapport, Moneyweb, Noseweek; Brainstorm Magazine; ITWeb, and MarkLives. *Before becoming a full time writer, de Waal founded brand agency Idea Engineers, and led the Cape Town office of Text 100.