This is how to hold the attention of a room full of rocket scientists for ten minutes. It helps to have a pop star sitting next to you. Apologies for any typos - it was written on the hoof and meant to be read out loud.
Wed 6 Dec 2006, 3.50pm, 2nd Appleton Space Conference at the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, Oxfordshire."Good afternoon.
I would like to start by apologising if I appear to be nervous. This is easily the most intimidating audience I have ever faced, although my friend, who is training to be a teacher at an East London comprehensive, tells me I haven’t lived.
It is a privilege to be here. I am both grateful to have been invited, and honoured to stand before you. I am not entirely sure what qualifies me to be doing this over hundreds of other more experienced candidates, but when an international pop star invites you to address a room full of rocket scientists, it’s very hard to say no.
My experience, background and working life is broadcast news – so what I can tell you is how the millions of interesting and important decisions, achievements, crimes and tragedies, that happen to or are generated by the millions of individuals, teams, communities and corporate bodies on this planet, are funnelled into the mind of the ten o’clock news editor, the Five Live programme maker, the Radio 1 newsbeat journalist and filtered down into 6 or 7 key events that are considered to be of national importance.
First of all, and this is the key person in all of this, let us consider the news editor. The three fundamentals of journalism, as I see it, are:
1) writing,
2) the ability to spot a story and
3) a strange form of competitive cynicism which provides the motivation to get out of bed every morning.
I have seen a number of very successful news editors close up now, and it seems to me that as their experience grows, the cynicism matures into a kind of generalised anger and their editorial decision-making has become so acute they seem literally to be able to smell a story, sometimes way before it’s even actually happened.
After a while these creatures are separated from the general newsroom for the mutual safety of everyone, but occasionally they burst forth from their office with steam coming out of their ears and personally rearrange an entire programme in the space of five minutes according to their own personal prejudices or editorial genius (depending on your point of view) before disappearing back into their cage and deciding who to shout at next.
These are the people you need to bring your interesting, complex, and unique stories to.
But – as well as being monsters, these news editors are the guardians of, and the gateway to the minds of vast numbers of people, on a day in, day out basis. They can take a story, tell it to a million voters, taxpayers, MPs and in some cases change their views, permanently.
This is why, depressing though it might be, you cannot ignore the news.
If I had one piece of advice for anyone approaching a newsroom with a story they were hoping to get publicity for, I would say KEEP IT SIMPLE. REALLY REALLY SIMPLE. So simple even a ten year old can understand what you’re saying, providing they’re prepared to wait until you open your mouth before they decide to listen to you. But that’s another issue.
Then, filter and simplify that story time and time again, until you can say it in one sentence and make that sentence both attention-grabbing and true.
Now – rocket science, of all subjects, has a reputation for dealing with issues a little more complex than can be explained in one sentence, but this is your problem, not our news editors.
To give you an idea of how most people, and I am talking about the majority of the population, consume news, you need to know a few things about them. At Newsbeat, at BBC Radio 1, where I’ve worked for the last 3 years, we do a lot of research into our audience and we know a few things about them.
Most of them don’t have a single book in the house.
They don’t pro-actively watch, listen or read the news (although they are very news literate) – they absorb it.
The big issues are immigration, football, crime, Iraq (funnily enough) debt and cars.
They want to hear about things that matter to them, and affect them on a daily basis.
This is the news editors’ problem. And yours.
Now before this gets too depressing, I ought to point out a couple of things about what you are doing here that will get an audience going.
You are British. Britain, in the eyes of its inhabitants, is the greatest country in the world. If Britain is doing something that makes it a world leader in any field, especially science and technology, our audience wants to hear about it.
However, the audience feels very, very differently about Europe. They do not care what Johnny Foreigner is up to, unless it is no good. Nor will they listen to him or watch him without anything other than a negative frame of mind. I’ll leave you to consider the implications of that.
The other positive is Space. Space itself is cool. Space is up there with dinosaurs and war in the wow factor. There are difficulties with treating stories like this, but for a significant chunk of the population the word space will buy a few milliseconds more attention than words like hospitals, minister, and profits.
And of course, in comparison to many other worthy subjects – like poverty, human rights abuses and disease, space doesn’t have a problem making the news.
I clicked on to the BBC News website this morning and the top three stories in the science and nature section were:
“Probe spies landers on Mars” (not Beagle 2, yet)
Yesterday’s story - “US plans base on the moon”
and “Shuttle set for complex mission”
Which is the first time I’ve ever actually seen space get Bronze, Silver and Gold in the running order, but indicative of how space stories work for news editors, nonetheless.
BUT - if you want to get those stories out of the science and nature section and into millions of peoples living rooms on a daily or weekly basis, there is some work to do.
I HUMBLY PRESENT NICK WALLIS’S GENERAL RULES FOR MAKING A STORY WORK.
This is what I will think about before I dare suggest a story in the morning prospects meeting, where reputations can be made or broken in an instant:
1) Is it new? Is this information that people have never heard before? Is this the first time something has happened?
ie: First face transplant, first underground nuclear explosion, first man on the moon.
2) If it isn’t new, is it the biggest, furthest, most expensive, most accurate version of whatever it is we’re talking about?
Ie: Most expensive car, fastest ever hundred metres, biggest national budget deficit, highest number of ASBOs.
3) How does it matter to me? Otherwise known as the so what test. Usually, if you have to ask “so what” more than once, it’s not a story. This is very subjective, but crucial when knowing your audience.
Eg - Paedophile rehoused on your street; Council Tax up by 10%, Manchester United win FA Cup, SATNAV being switched off.
4) Is this happening right now? Not yesterday, not in 10 year’s time, but right now. Events.
Prison riots, our boys being killed in Iraq, robotic cars on the surface of mars beaming back pictures from another planet to my bedroom computer.
5) Where has this story come from? An official source or ambulancechasers.com
eg: The British Public is broadly in favour of easier access to abortions. If a government funded independent study came up with that, rather than an organisation whose name I can’t remember, but which just happened to be the largest provider of access to abortions in the UK, then it would be a bigger story.
If you can fulfil some, not necessarily all of the above criteria, then you have a news story. Which means the ultimate news story with regards to space would be:
Vast gold reserves found on Moon, declared treasure trove, space rocket leaves tomorrow, public lottery to fill final place.
Because I am lucky enough to work in a number of newsrooms, I to get access to a number or different news editors and planning operations. Since Alex kindly asked me to come along today, I’ve had a few casual conversations with a number or editors who work in national radio and television newsrooms, and asked them what they think of the British Space Programme and what would make them run a story about it. I have aggregated them and added my own views. This is very much a broad brush sweep, but I hope it has some value.
SPACE IS COOL – our audience like a space story
KEEP IT SIMPLE – one quote from an editor “I never understand what they’re doing or what the point of what they’re trying to do is.” Give me something really specific to hold onto. What will this achieve?
WHAT WILL IT MEAN FOR US? – and this is really the cost question – how will throwing millions of pounds up into the air ever benefit me, taxpayers, my cousin who has cystic fibrosis, national pride, the economy etc etc
Also – and this is from the TV people – WHERE ARE THE PICTURES? The graphics that can be made now need to be there, they need to be colourful, state of the art and they need to be made available in broadcast quality on demand.
And finally, with specific regard to the British Space industry, I heard this once or twice – “I don’t trust them. I do not believe what they are telling me. They don’t seem competent.”
This last point is very serious and is undoubtedly down to two things – Sheer Blind Ignorance, which we’ll get back to in a moment, and Beagle 2.
From the little that I have read about Beagle 2, it was just one of those things. Everyone did everything as right as they could, (without the benefit of hindsight), but the mission failed, presumably at vast expense to reputations and pockets.
Whatever the reasons for the failure, that failure is a vast collective stain on the entire British space industry and it has created a huge credibility gap, making the next major project even harder to win news editors, and the public, over with.
By example, and this is a controversial one but the only one I can think of at the moment – look at Hutton. A twinkly-eyed judge carrying vast experience and expertise with an excellent reputation and respected career behind him who will forever be linked with what many people will consider to be a whitewash of quite brilliantine proportions. That, unfortunately, is life.
I mentioned Sheer Blind Ignorance. This is an unfortunate failing amongst many journalists. I would that we were all as informed as we should be on every subject we are required to deal with and broadcast to the nation. Unfortunately that is impossible. Most national broadcast journalists know just about enough about anything to talk in a vaguely coherent manner about something for about five minutes.
I would like to finish by giving you my suggestions towards how the space industry can go about having more chance of getting positive news coverage.
1) WHO DO I CALL WHEN I WANT TO CALL THE BRITISH SPACE PROGRAMME? I DON’T KNOW.
Is there a British Space Agency? If it isn’t called that – why not? Calling NASA is a gift to a journalist. They run a 24/7 press operation with friendly helpful communicative scientists either picking up the phone to you or just another phone call away in seconds. They have their own broadcast facilities, to deliver TV pictures and radio sound in quality, they have graphics you can download. Everything is free. All we need is a reason to pick up the phone to them – like – a decent story – and everything else is smooth and beautiful. It’s a delight to talk to them. Journalists are immensely pressured under impossible deadlines – they will take the path of least resistance every time.
NASA are also very good at decent stories – if you can beat a manned mission to Mars, tell me about it.
2) LOBBY LOBBY LOBBY. LIKE HELL.
Does anyone think the billions being earmarked for Trident could be better spent on space technology? There must be a case to be made, surely. If a space scientist says something it might be news. If the prime minister stands up and says it on their behalf, it is de facto news.
3) HAVE ONE SIMPLE MISSION, STATE HOW MUCH IT WILL COST AND WHEN IT WILL BE ACHIEVED.
THEN, TELL US EXACTLY HOW IT WILL BENEFIT EACH AND EVERYONE OF US TAXPAYING INDIVIDUALS AND WHEN BY.
THEN – DELIVER IT.
4) AND FINALLY, IF YOU’RE GOING ON TELLY. NO BEARDS.
It is irrational and deeply prejudiced, but television doesn’t like beards. The public themselves may sport beards, but they don’t like seeing them on telly. They don’t trust their owners. I can’t remember ever seeing a newsreader or reporter with a beard. The last bearded mainstream television presenter I remember is Matthew Kelly, and look what happened to him – reputation traduced, career shattered, despite being completely innocent. And all because he had a beard. Possibly. Maybe it was something else.
You’ll note though, that he doesn’t have a beard now.
Thank you for your time this afternoon. I must stress again, these are personal views, not those of any organisation I work for. And remember – never trust an arts graduate."
