Guardian Own-goal

I've written on many occasions about the Guardian and Observer - their inability to call the right shots on Apple, the MMR scandal of the Observer and a few other gaffes, but I had to write this one down for posterity demonstrating that their sports correspondents also seem to be a bit weak.

On Sunday in the last game of the season, Everton beat Fulham by 2-0, (well done Everton by the way and particularly congratulations to David Moyes and Bill Kenwright for an amazing year), and the Guardian report by Jamie Jackson on the match had the following gem (no doubt it's been fixed in the link UPDATE - yes it has, but here's the quote anyway):

Sir Alex Ferguson's Manchester United are Everton's opponents in Saturday's FA Cup final.

This will no doubt come as a shock to Everton, who felt that beating Manchester United in the semi-finals would have been enough to eliminate them from the competition. Chelsea may also feel aggrieved having been ousted after legitimately beating Arsenal in the other semi-final.

This is such a basic mistake, it's hard to imagine anyone even remotely qualified in football making it. But perhaps, Mr Jackson just wanted to get United mentioned a few times in the short report on the match? Perhaps the article gets more hits if this team is mentioned, even though the link to this game was tenuous at best?

Anyway guys, time for a root and branch clean up of your writers?

I'll be winding this blog down even further over the coming months as no one is really interested, and I'm so short of time nowadays (those that know me will understand why, those that don't are free to ask!). But I will try to take the opportunity to revisit some of the posts and see if Hobsblog called the shots better than the British press. (hint: I think we did!)

Tags: Guardian, Everton, Fulham

iTunes DRM-free 40 minutes BEFORE MacWorld!

Just spotted that a whole load of albums - TingTings, Duffy, etc are now all DRM-free on the UK iTunes store.

So, it looks like this one rumour is TRUE! Finally. I don't think the labels had much choice ultimately - it would have been severely anti-competitive to prevent Apple from having this option, when competitors had been given it.

Anyhow, I'm off on a spending spree. Oh, and the Ting Tings is just £3.95 and Duffy £4.99 - not bad prices either!

You heard it here FIRST!

Update: Albums from the Cure, Morrissey, Echo and the Bunnymen - all of which I'm sure previously were with DRM, now are iTunes plus. Labels include Sony BMG and Warner.


Tags: iTunes, DRM, Apple, iPod