Distribution of Nouse sabotaged
On Tuesday afternoon, three thousand copies of Nouse were distributed around campus. Within the hour, what is believed to be close to a thousand copies of the newspaper were removed by people intent on preventing its distribution. Stacks of copies were found wedged in bins around campus; as for the hundreds of copies left in Vanbrugh for students to pick up, which disappeared within a matter of minutes, where they were disposed of is anyone’s guess.
Security services are currently studying CCTV tapes from all over campus in order to find out exactly what happened. Nouse has also been investigating all possible means of holding those responsible to account, including legal action.
This situation is totally unprecedented. Whatever your opinion of the newspaper might be, to prevent it from being published is an act of arbitrary censorship, and nothing less. It’s pathetic, immoral, and an act of utter disrespect to everyone who wishes to read Nouse and make their own minds up about what we publish. To deny anyone that right goes against the most basic principles of freedom of expression and opinion, and any attack on them must rest at the top of a very slippery slope.
As usual, we have posted PDF copies of the newspaper, and we encourage you to read it online if you were unable to pick up a copy yesterday. Contrary to the hopes of the individuals responsible, whatever they wished to keep from the campus community will not be suppressed. Finally, we’d encourage anyone with any information that might be helpful to get in touch, either by email to contact@nouse.co.uk, or anonymously in a letter addressed to our usual mailing address, Nouse, Grimston House, Vanbrugh College. For our part, we’re determined to get to the bottom of this, and we’ll be sure to keep you informed of any developments.
Many thanks,
Sam Thomas
Comment Editor
Nezih Savaskan
Sam,
“and an act of utter disrespect to everyone who wishes to read Nouse and make their own minds up about what we publish.”
I think it is outragous that this act occured. And by that I am reffering to the fact that you published two articles concerning groups I am involved in, BOTH of which had VERY inncorrect details and completly falsified the truth. Then on top of that you publish that people should be allowed to make their own minds up about your content… how can they if it is not the truth?! I hope the formal apologies requesed will be published in upcoming issues.
Oh, and I am sorry that your papers got detroyed, that shouldn’t happen….
Nezih
Neil Barnes
By destroying copies of Nouse, the culprits are insulting the intelligence of every student at York, including their own. It is irrelevent whether facts are incorrect or biased - national newspapers make mistakes every day. If people disagree with a publication they should do so through intellectual means, not assume that people intelligent enough to study at university aren’t capable of making their own minds up about what they read.
As someone formerly responsible for ‘checking’ the campus newspapers before publication - this act sickens me, and I would fully encourage legal action by Nouse against these culprits who must be big fans of censorship, big brother-style propaganda,and petty-mindedness.
The ‘truth’ as you describe it, Nezih, is no more than what you decide is the ‘truth’. Different people will interpret things in different ways - I’m sorry that you choose to interpret the ‘truth’ differently to the Nouse editorship.
Nezih Savaskan
“The ‘truth’ as you describe it, Nezih, is no more than what you decide is the ‘truth’. Different people will interpret things in different ways - I’m sorry that you choose to interpret the ‘truth’ differently to the Nouse editorship.”
What? I don’t think it is down to an interpretation when the YUSU Ents Committee openly agreed that EntsTech were in fact early to setting up for the event and not in fact 1 and a half hours late as you published.
How is it down to interpretation when you publish that Clip The Apex were “booed off stage” when in fact they had finished their set long before any booing occured.
Please do explain Neil….
“national newspapers make mistakes every day”
Yes, and they always publish apologies for them.
Lewis Bretts
Neil,
While I agree with what has been said above, and would fully support any action taken by Nouse against those that stole the paper; the cases that Nezih Is talking about are factual inaccuracies, which seriously damage the reputation of those involved. It’s not an opinion to say that a company was late to arrive when they weren’t. It’s just plain wrong. The philoso-journalistic idea of objective truth is fine for discussion in seminars, but when it comes to the printed page, perhaps those ‘checking’ the paper need to do a bit more research on their libel law. A simple phone call, or conversation to the right people would have ensured that the correct version was printed, rather than the perhaps more ‘exciting’ version that went forward for publication. I dearly hope that the articles in question will be altered on the website this week, and that a full retraction will be printed next issue.
Lewis Bretts
Sam Thomas
Nezih,
I’m not going to pretend we’re infallible. However, we do our best to offer all groups and individuals mentioned in an article right of reply, and when we don’t it’s usually due to pressures of time or difficulty contacting people: certainly we don’t ever intend to mislead or misrepresent anyone.
The fact remains, though, that the way to take issue with something we print is to put it to us in writing. We always print full retractions when we get something straightforwardly wrong, and when the facts are in dispute we try to offer right of reply in the next edition. I don’t think there’s anything unreasonable about that approach - stealing newspapers because you don’t like what they say, however, is a different matter.
Sam.
Guest
Nezih, I don’t really understand your post. What do the sabotage of Nouse’s distribution and your complaints about 2 stories have to do with each other?
Nezih Savaskan
Sam,
I have emailed you, the editor and the nouse contact address. My post here is secondary to that.
“stealing newspapers because you don’t like what they say, however, is a different matter.”
That sentance makes it sound like you think I stole the papers!!!!
Guest, because the sabotage is believed to be related to the BotB article, which I have complained about.
Ed
The sabotage is nothing to do with the Battle of the Bands article: it was, as far as we know, about the OTC article.
Sam Thomas
Easy now. I’m not accusing anyone of anything. What I was saying was that writing a letter of complaint (we’ve received yours, and it’ll be taken seriously, as will all other the comments that have been left) is different to throwing away newspapers, and it was a little unfair of you to suggest — even in jest — that it was a reasonable thing for whoever did it to do.
I should point something else out. The two articles which have caused so much anger — and I’m not saying that anger isn’t justified, because I’m not really in a position to say — were nonetheless two short pieces buried fairly deep in a very large news section. It’s in the nature of having deadlines that not everything will be perfect when it gets sent off — that’s why we run corrections, and that’s why we let people post comments which (as this whole thing shows) go for the most part uncensored.
I can understand why people get angry when we publish something they think misrepresents them, but I also think we take criticism pretty well. And that’s the last I’m saying on it.
Tom Wright
The BotB article is not such a big deal as the factual innacuracies do not really damage anyones reputation.
However the Entstech article was quite rediculous in the number of innaccuracies which WILL actually damage their reputation, and could have quite easily been checked with one phone call.
Surely even if you are late for the deadline then you should hold the article rather than printing something which is not even close to the truth just because you dont have time to check it?
Concerned Student
Printing a newspaper is a massive responsibility; something I don’t think you cowboys at Nouse appear to be taking seriously. It’s all good and well saying that letters of complaint will be “taken seriously” if errors have been made, but quite frankly, errors should not be made in the first place.
And if errors or inaccurate reporting does occur, you deserve nothing less than for your papers to be thrown in the bin.
Masquerading as ‘campus journalists’ whose ‘duty’ it is to ‘expose truth’ is absolute rubbish. You are nothing but students in a campus society who generally do a fantastic job, but are let down by the odd ‘reporter’ whose disloyalty to fellow societies is deplorable; blinded by the simple desire to have a story published by a local paper, or if they’re particularly lucky, the odd national.
I encourage Ms Blake to start taking charge of her team and make sure that we don’t see further reckless reporting.
Part of the above message was removed. Libellous comments are not relevant and do not add to constructive debate. Please read our disclaimer or email tech@nouse.co.uk if you have any queries about this.
Alan S
Having witnessed nearly four years now of campus reporting I can safely say it has become less and less accurate as the years have gone by. Gone are the days when stories were less sensationalist but more accurate - now all they want to do is scandalise things whethers it’s the uni, a society or the su…
shame on you.
Toby Green
Concerned student - Of course errors shouldn’t be made, but made they invariably are. As has been mentioned in the discussion, national papers make a string of errors each day. When they are made aware of this they are then corrected, just like Nouse has done before and will continue to do. This is part of the nature of newspapers and journalism and therefore not an issue specific to Nouse. When Nouse itself has been the subject of misrepresentation in Vision it has received and accepted printed apologies and retractions, and vice versa, so both newspapers live by the same rules.
“And if errors or inaccurate reporting does occur, you deserve nothing less than for your papers to be thrown in the bin.”
I’m a previous Editor of the paper and still work closely with the current team, and to suggest that because a couple of articles (although it seems that only the EntsTech article has anything factually wrong) means that at least 50 students hard work should be wasted is incredible - it’s not even as if the articles were key in the news section. Both had relatively minor positions, and although this doesn’t mean that there shouldn’t be inaccuracies it does (I believe) shows that Nouse wasn’t trying to purposefully blow up the stories so they could have a decent news section. Throwing the paper away would also massively reduce the opportunity for the paper to have a positive social effect which campus media has done on numerous times (I can give examples if you wish), which is surely the main aim of all newspapers, and which brings me on to the next point.
“Masquerading as ‘campus journalists’ whose ‘duty’ it is to ‘expose truth’ is absolute rubbish. You are nothing but students in a campus society who generally do a fantastic job, but are let down by the odd ‘reporter’ whose disloyalty to fellow societies is deplorable; blinded by the simple desire to have a story published by a local paper, or if they’re particularly lucky, the odd national.”
This comment I find very strange, and I would welcome some clarification. We’re ‘masquerading’ yet we ‘generally do a fantastic job’? Yes occasionally a story (not a reporter however as the reporters involved have previously written top-notch articles) can overshadow in some people’s minds a whole newspaper, but then so can a sub-editing mistake or a decision to print an obscene swear word. But you can’t be talking about the Battle of the Bands article or the EntsTech article if you think the reporters involved were attempting to have their story published in a local paper or national paper surely? The only story in this edition to which this has happened, and therefore I guess you’re referring to, is the OTC story, and if so I would love to hear your reasons as to why that reporter was being disloyal to student societies. The journalists on Nouse may well be amateurs, but this doesn’t mean we don’t have principles - the main people on the paper commit far too much time and effort for us to not believe in what we are doing, as I’m sure is the same with the majority of societies. Again I can point to us and Vision’s various national awards and nominations to show the newspapers at York are taken seriously, and we can also point to the Sunday Times who picked out the media (and specifically Nouse) as the sole reason to go to the University of York.
And finally, can I just point out that no-one connected to Battle of the Bands has commented on the fact that in the edition before this Nouse ran a fantastic preview of the final, with some really stunning photos. Not only that, but a lot of effort was made by the editorial team to get staff from top US music mag Blender to listen to and review efforts from the bands. The members of Nouse involved are far too experienced to expect any positive comments from instances like this as that’s not how it works, but it does show there’s no Nouse conspiracy towards student societies and Battle of the Bands specifically.
Nezih Savaskan
“And finally, can I just point out that no-one connected to Battle of the Bands has commented on the fact that in the edition before this Nouse ran a fantastic preview of the final, with some really stunning photos. Not only that, but a lot of effort was made by the editorial team to get staff from top US music mag Blender to listen to and review efforts from the bands. The members of Nouse involved are far too experienced to expect any positive comments from instances like this as that’s not how it works, but it does show there’s no Nouse conspiracy towards student societies and Battle of the Bands specifically.”
Its a shame you went and spoilt it with the shoddy article written post-final. But well done for the previous efforts.
Neil Barnes
Can I just point out that I don’t actually write for Nouse, and have only written one article in the past as freelance. I even used to write reviews for Vision!
I may have misinterpreted this - I assumed the paper might have been destroyed because of the front page headline. If people are destroying them because of a much smaller article with a few mistakes - then they seriously have some anger management issues!!
Make a nice bonfire.
Burn baby burn…..
Guest
It’s nice to see some people take such an enlightened attitude to freedom of speech, freedom of expression and freedom of the press. The people responsible for ‘disappearing’ Nouse should be ashamed of themselves; they are nothing better than spoilt children who can’t face the truth. I think the above comment illustrates my point very well.
Jamie Merrill
Concerned student- I just want to add a little to Toby’s comments. It seems from your remarks that you are referring to the UOTC article because as I’m aware is the only one that made it into the regional and national press. That then makes me the reporter whose “disloyalty to fellow societies is deplorable” and is as you put it “blinded by the simple desire to have a story published by a local paper, or if they’re particularly lucky, the odd national”.
Two quick points. Firstly the OTC, which I assume is the ‘society’ you are referring to, is not a society. It is part of the British Army. Are you suggesting that the Army is above criticism when it makes a mistake or some of its members behave badly?
Secondly I won’t deny I was very pleased to get a by-line in The Press and see the story go national but we didn’t solicit this. The regional and national press saw the story, accepted it as news worthy and ran with it.
Rinky Stingpiece
‘to prevent it from being published is an act of arbitrary censorship, and nothing less. It’s pathetic, immoral, and an act of utter disrespect’
That’s rich coming from a far left extremist rag that thinks nothing of censoring the contributions of students who want to write about issues from a different or conflicting perspective to the Nouse demagogues.
Staffed by an exclusive clique of condescending, irrational, morons who purposefully print sensationalist drivel in the vain hope it’ll help boost their CVs.
If Nouse was truly “inclusive” and “diverse” it would print the views of those they brand bigots and generally “wrong” in their view; it’s painfully obvious that this spamazine is just “party propaganda” for the far-left machine.
I don’t see any evidence that anyone deliberately binned this spampaper - it was probably innocently tidied into the bins by university cleaning staff - after all the people who distribute it tend to litter it all over the place in people’s bikes and all sorts.
It’s a monument the vanity and self-importance of the Nouse club that they think some shadowy terrorist group is wilfully sabotaging their righteous quest for truth and justice.
Grow up, and phuck off (in any order you like).
Sam Thomas
Thanks for that constructive contribution. I do have certain issues with being told to grow up by a rinky stingpiece, though.
Emma (Web Ed)
Rinky stingpiece ~
The existence of your ability to post comments to this website counters your claim that nouse censors the contributions of students. You are also free to write to the newspaper to express your opinions: nouse frequently publishes letters which disagree with previously published material.
You can also stand for a position on the editorial team at the annual AGM, or come along to one of our weekly meetings. There are articles written by about 200 people up on this website, which hardly qualifies as an ‘exclusive clique’. Have you ever even submitted an article to be published in the newspaper?
Rinky Stingpiece
“The existence of your ability to post comments to this website counters your claim that nouse censors the contributions of students. ”
So why did you remove my last post then?!