Phillip was the guest lecturer last night at City University’s Graduate School of Journalism in a talk titled Adventures in Journalism: Tall Tales and True Scoops.
The lecture was written up by Journalism.co.uk, a short excerpt of which is below (click here for the full story).
Journalists working in a digital age should not underestimate the importance of ‘off-the-street’ whistleblowing, investigative journalist and author Phillip Knightley has said.
The transformation of newspapers into commercial machines is strangling investigative journalism and leaving huge scoops uncovered, Knightley said…. It was a ‘great mistake’ for newspapers to move from city centre premises to cheaper out-of-town locations, making access more difficult for potential sources.
The migration had severed one of the fundamental links between investigative journalists and their informants, Knightley argued. “A newspaper has got to be in the centre of things,” he said. “Prospective whistleblowers used to be able to walk down the northern side of Fleet Street and go past three or four newspapers.”
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My two favourite autographed books are autographed by former Washington Post journalist Bob Woodward and by the former Editor in Chief of Waashington Post Ben Bradlee – need I say more ?
……….plus one by Chapman Pincher !!