0:00

This is the BBC. This

0:03

podcast is supported by advertising outside

0:05

the UK. BBC

0:09

Sounds, music radio podcasts.

0:12

Hello, I'm Ros Atkins. This is

0:14

the Media Show from BBC Radio 4. Now,

0:18

of course, we have to talk about that edited photo

0:20

of the Princess of Wales and her children. The

0:22

story has raised many questions about how

0:25

images in the media are sourced, how

0:27

they're checked, how they're distributed. We'll

0:29

get into all of that. But

0:31

first of all, there are two developing stories I

0:33

want to turn to. In the US, the House

0:36

of Representatives has passed a bill that could see

0:38

TikTok banned and assess how

0:40

likely that is to actually happen. First,

0:43

though, a major development in the saga of

0:45

Who May Buy the Daily Telegraph. Christopher Williams,

0:47

the Telegraph's business editor, is with us in

0:49

the Media Show studio. And Chris, just over

0:51

an hour ago, you posted a story. Tell

0:54

us what was in it. So this

0:56

afternoon, the government has told the House of Lords that

0:58

it's going to change the law

1:00

to effectively outlaw foreign state ownership

1:03

of British news organisations. This

1:05

is effectively a sort of death blow to

1:08

the Redbird IMI bid for the Telegraph as

1:10

it stands. We'll have

1:12

to wait and see what happens next. But it's a very

1:14

significant development. It's a result of massive

1:16

pressure on the government. And this is them

1:18

basically yielding to that. And Redbird

1:20

IMI was backed by the United Arab Emirates.

1:22

And that was the part of the bid

1:25

that was getting the most attention. Yeah, so

1:27

Redbird IMI is a fund that was 75%

1:29

funded by effectively the government of the

1:31

UAE. And that's a Rubicon that the

1:33

UK government decided they don't want to cross, which

1:37

is have a foreign state only a UK news organisation. And

1:40

the point is, it's a foreign state as opposed to

1:42

all foreign owners, because of course, already there are major

1:45

institutions in our media owned by foreign

1:47

companies or foreign individuals. Yeah,

1:49

and that's been one of the sort of turning points of

1:51

this debate. It's been quite hard to draw out, but there's

1:54

a philosophical and legal difference between a foreign state and a

1:56

foreign person. And in this

1:58

case, it's very much a foreign state. Is it

2:00

the end of the matter as far as this bid is

2:02

concerned? Well, I mean, there's a lot of uncertainty about how

2:04

these laws are going to be written up. So

2:07

we haven't seen the text of them yet. But we do know that

2:09

they're going to sort of outlaw control and influence, but there will be

2:11

a threshold below which you don't

2:13

say they've got control and influence. And that's going

2:15

to be a matter for the competition markets authority

2:17

to decide. So it's possible that Redbird

2:20

IMI could find a new partner, dilute the UAE

2:22

down to a level that they could have another

2:24

go. The alternative for

2:26

them is that they find a buyer for the whole

2:28

thing. And we go again. So

2:31

the saga kind of continues from here. And

2:33

if we go again, give

2:35

us who's on your list? Well, the names

2:37

are already out there that we know about.

2:39

So you've got interest from the owner of

2:41

Daily Mail, from support Marshall, the hedge fund

2:43

manager who backs GB news from even News

2:45

Corp, who own obviously the Times and the

2:47

Sun. And there are other names

2:49

out there that, you know, we probably don't know about yet. So

2:52

it could be anyone. There might be people

2:54

listening thinking, well, hold on, the Daily Mail

2:56

is already hugely influential. Would it be appropriate

2:58

for the same organization to own both the

3:00

Mail and the Telegraph? And they'd have the

3:03

same question about if the Murdoch's got involved,

3:05

they already own the Sun and the Times. Would it be

3:07

appropriate for them to own the Daily Telegraph

3:09

too? And then that's the really good question that

3:11

they'll be asking themselves as well. It's like, will

3:13

that would their bid get through

3:15

regulation because there are specific laws about media plurality

3:17

in the UK and they're both, as you say,

3:19

dominant players in the market already. So that would

3:21

be a big challenge for them. How

3:24

do you find reporting on where you're working? I've

3:26

been doing it for so long now. It started in June last year

3:28

that it was kind of, I've got two

3:31

jobs. So I enjoy them both.

3:33

And this one's fun. And have you been

3:35

surprised at first of all, the amount of

3:37

money that's being offered for the Telegraph, but

3:39

also just the amount of interest, how much

3:41

people care about who owns the Telegraph? I've

3:44

been surprised at the terms the debate has

3:47

taken. I'm not surprised at the price. I think if

3:49

they sell it on, it will be higher than the 510 that the Redbird offer

3:52

values at.

3:56

These are assets are really rare. They don't come off on

3:58

very often. One thing we've learned of the last 20

4:01

years of the internet is you can't build a digitally

4:03

native news brand that has influence, no one's managed

4:06

it. You think about the sort of failures of

4:08

BuzzFeed and things like that, it just hasn't been

4:10

done. So these legacy mastheads, while

4:12

they're obviously very challenged in print, are

4:14

the sort of vehicles of influence. Thank

4:17

you very much for the moment. You're staying with

4:19

us. You're covering that story. Let's bring in Christiana

4:21

Silver, senior culture reporter at Mashable, who's with us

4:23

from the US. You're

4:26

covering a different story, but

4:28

it's also seeing geopolitics and

4:30

media interconnect. Tell us about

4:32

the TikTok story you're covering.

4:35

Yeah, that's right. So the House of Representatives

4:37

just about an hour ago passed a bill

4:39

that could potentially ban TikTok in the US.

4:42

It was passed 352 to 65. But

4:46

to backtrack a bit, the bill started

4:48

in committee with unprecedented

4:50

bipartisan support, and

4:53

it went to the House, passed

4:55

there. And now it's going on to the Senate, where

4:57

it has a less

4:59

secure future. We're not really sure how the

5:01

Senate will handle this. The

5:04

bill is called Protecting

5:06

Americans from Foreign Adversary

5:08

Controlled Applications Act. But

5:10

basically, it gives TikTok, if it's

5:13

passed, five months to either divest

5:16

from its parent company, ByteDance, or

5:18

it'll be banned from US stores. I

5:21

hope there's an acronym or a nickname for

5:23

that bill, because that's a mouthful to use

5:25

every time you're referencing it. Just

5:27

help us understand then. So ByteDance,

5:30

a Chinese company currently owns TikTok,

5:32

to get the regulators and the

5:34

politicians off its back, it doesn't

5:36

have to necessarily lose the

5:38

presence of TikTok in the US, but

5:40

it couldn't have the controlling stake. Is

5:42

that right? Yeah,

5:44

that's correct. And a lot of the

5:46

lawmakers who support this ban are not

5:49

calling it a ban. They're just trying

5:51

to use this to get ByteDance to

5:53

sell its controlling stake in the US

5:55

app. The argument is that

5:58

TikTok poses a national security threat.

6:00

because its parent company is based,

6:02

like you said, out of China.

6:04

And so it's sort of subject

6:06

to Chinese intelligence laws and, hypothetically,

6:08

theoretically, the fear is that it

6:11

could force ByteDance to hand over

6:13

data of, there are 170 million

6:15

US users who use this app.

6:19

TikTok, for its part, has consistently

6:21

denied that claim. It says that

6:24

US citizens' data can't be accessed

6:26

by the Chinese state. And for

6:29

its part, it has partnered

6:31

with Oracle, the cloud infrastructure in

6:33

the US, to host all of

6:35

US data. But that's just not

6:37

enough for folks who want to

6:39

see more control here. I

6:42

was going to ask you about that, because

6:44

particularly keen listeners to the media show will

6:46

remember us talking about this, moves by TikTok,

6:48

to say, look, almost all of our data

6:50

from US users is being kept in the

6:52

US. Why is that not

6:54

enough to allay the concerns that we're hearing?

6:57

Yeah, so that was Project Texas, which

6:59

was a really, it

7:02

came a lot from US lawmakers. They really

7:04

pushed TikTok to do this.

7:06

But it's just not enough because the

7:09

Chinese government still holds that massive stake

7:11

in this US app. But

7:14

it's interesting, you know, we have Trump,

7:16

who once tried to ban this app

7:18

with an executive order, now saying he

7:21

doesn't support the ban of this app

7:23

because he thinks it'll give more power

7:25

to meta-owned Facebook, which he

7:28

called an enemy of the people

7:30

recently. And he is our presumptive

7:32

nominee for the Republican Party

7:34

for this presidential election. And

7:37

on the other hand, Biden, who is obviously

7:39

our president, says that he will sign this

7:41

if it crosses his desk. At

7:43

the same time, his campaign is using

7:45

TikTok to reach young voters. So there's

7:48

a lot going on here, blue. There is a lot

7:50

going on. I've got a statement here from

7:52

TikTok, which says this legislation has a predetermined

7:54

outcome, a total ban of TikTok in the

7:56

US. The government is attempting to strip 170

7:58

million... and Americans of

8:01

their constitutional right to free expression.

8:03

This will damage millions of businesses,

8:05

deny artists and audience, and

8:07

destroy the livelihoods of countless

8:09

creators across the country. And

8:12

listening to this Christiana talk is Chris

8:14

from The Telegraph, who's still here. And

8:16

Chris, what's interesting about both

8:18

the story you were describing, the different

8:20

bids for The Telegraph and what's happening in

8:22

the US, is it emphasizes how media has

8:25

become so important to geopolitics and to domestic

8:27

politics in lots of countries. Yeah, and I

8:29

think if you think about TikTok, it's had

8:31

a big role to play in the sort

8:33

of media coverage of what's been going on

8:35

in Gaza, and it's very dominant among young

8:37

people. So I think underlying those concerns about

8:39

data security are concerns about influence and the

8:42

type of stuff that people are consuming on

8:44

TikTok, which probably tends towards one side of

8:46

that debate. And The Telegraph, you know, as

8:49

I said, these legacy brands still carry the influence

8:51

in a lot of Western countries, so they're going

8:53

to be valuable and going to be of interest

8:55

to geopolitical players.

8:58

And as these arguments have been playing out, of course, the

9:00

media businesses are also letting

9:02

their positions be known. And

9:04

Christiana, in the case of TikTok, we have this

9:06

extraordinary situation, you can describe it,

9:09

where TikTok users in the US were getting

9:11

this pop up saying, get involved in this.

9:14

Yeah, that's exactly right. So when you logged on to the

9:16

app, a pop up came up, you couldn't x out of

9:18

it, the only way to get out of this pop up

9:21

would be to quit the app and restart it. And

9:23

it said, we're, the US is trying to

9:26

ban this app, stop Congress from doing this,

9:28

it's an infringement on your First Amendment right

9:30

to free speech. And

9:32

there was a little button that had you call

9:34

your congressman, you entered in your zip code, and

9:36

it connected you right there. Congress

9:39

was completely inundated with calls,

9:42

and asking with folks asking

9:44

if they could stop the ban, and some

9:47

people were crying on the phone to their

9:49

congressman. It this lobbying

9:51

effort has been very aggressive by TikTok. I

9:54

must just finally ask you Christiana, I see that the Senate

9:56

Majority Leader Chuck Schumer says he'll have to consult with relevant

9:58

people to get involved in this. committee chairs

10:00

to determine the bill's path. Is

10:03

that another way of saying this could get

10:06

stuck in the long grass and actually the

10:08

chances are it won't happen or is there

10:10

still a route through this? Yeah I

10:12

mean it might be. This isn't the first

10:14

time that the US has attempted to ban

10:16

the app. Like we said earlier Trump tried

10:19

to do this. Multiple states have attempted bans.

10:21

The app is already banned on government-issued devices.

10:24

TikTok has taken most of these bans

10:26

to court. The courts tend to side

10:28

with the app. Saying that an outright

10:30

ban is an infringement on First Amendment

10:32

rights to speech. So even if Schumer

10:34

and the Senate make this a

10:36

bit difficult to get through and it doesn't

10:38

make it to Biden's desk, even if it

10:40

does and Biden signs it, which he

10:42

says he will, there's still a lot

10:45

of room for

10:47

this to not go through. Thanks for

10:49

your help on this Christiana. We appreciate it. That's

10:51

Christiana Silver from Mashable. You can find her reporting

10:53

of that story on the Mashable

10:55

website. Now next on the media show we

10:57

have to talk about the picture of the

10:59

Princess of Wales and her children and the

11:01

fact that a day after it was released

11:03

on Sunday she acknowledged in a post on

11:06

X or Twitter as we used to call

11:08

it that she had in fact edited the

11:10

photograph and it raises a whole range of

11:12

questions about how photographs end up in the

11:14

media that we all consume. And we're going

11:16

to look at this from the point of

11:18

view of photographers, picture agencies and

11:20

also picture editors within newsrooms. And

11:22

first of all let's speak to

11:24

Phil Chetwin, Global News Director of

11:26

the AFP Agency. Phil, good

11:28

to have you back on the media

11:31

show. Help me understand what happens when

11:33

an image like this arrives

11:35

at the AFP. Thanks

11:38

Ross. I mean I think one thing immediately

11:40

that the question is posed is where

11:42

does it come from because it's

11:45

all about the source of the content. Is

11:47

it a trusted source? Is it somebody with whom

11:49

we work all the time? So in the case

11:51

of the Palace or Kensington Palace, these are people

11:53

that we work with all the time. So

11:57

they would be considered a trusted source? They

11:59

would because... because we've worked with

12:01

them repeatedly and because usually it

12:03

would be our own photographer doing

12:05

stories with them. And occasionally there

12:07

were handout photos of key moments

12:09

such as this, which we

12:11

would be used to dealing. So there's a level of

12:13

trust between us and them at that point. And

12:16

handout is a really important piece

12:18

of jargon that we need to

12:20

highlight because it's the practice of

12:22

an institution or an individual passing

12:24

on a photo that hasn't been

12:26

taken by a photojournalist. Isn't that

12:28

correct? That's correct. And

12:31

it's something that we really battle against

12:33

and try to do the minimum. We

12:36

push back a lot on the

12:38

quantity of handouts and

12:40

it's something that increasingly institutions, companies,

12:42

sporting organizations and so on are

12:44

repeatedly trying to impose on the

12:46

media to in a sense control

12:49

the narrative. So this picture arrives

12:51

and you think, goodness, well, this

12:53

is certainly a newsworthy photo. Do

12:56

you not have processes to check if a photo has

12:59

been manipulated in some way? We

13:01

do. And I think that this is something we've

13:03

spoken about internally. I think all the agencies have

13:05

validated the photo, which clearly

13:08

violated our rules because it's actually

13:10

not even very well photoshopped. You

13:12

know, it was clearly a lot

13:14

of problems with the photo. So

13:16

it shouldn't have been validated. I

13:19

think as soon as it was, all the photo

13:21

editors and all the major agencies immediately saw there

13:23

was a problem and got together and spoke about

13:25

it and say, what do we do? That's interesting.

13:27

So you actually you got on the phone with

13:29

each other or got on a Zoom and and

13:32

all talk coordinated. Exactly. Because

13:34

we're used to working together in what we

13:36

call the royal pool. So all the agencies

13:38

work together. And often there's just one photographer

13:40

who will be covering a royal event for

13:43

all the other agencies bearing in mind that

13:45

virtually the entire world's media subscribes to the

13:47

agencies. So it's a way of irrigating the

13:49

whole global media as it were. Well,

13:52

let's get you talking with our two other guests on this.

13:54

Just before I do, you said that Kensington Palace was a

13:56

trusted source for you at the AFP. Is it still a

13:58

trusted source? No, absolutely not.

14:01

Like with anything, when you're let down by a source, the

14:05

bar is raised and we've got major

14:07

issues internally as to how we validated

14:09

that photo. We shouldn't have done. It

14:12

violated our guidelines and therefore we

14:14

send out notes to all our team at the

14:16

moment to be absolutely super more vigilant about the

14:19

content coming across our desk, even

14:21

from what we would call trusted sources. Well,

14:24

Phil, you're from AFP, one of the best

14:26

known news agencies in the world and you're

14:28

telling us you don't consider Kensington Palace a

14:30

trusted source. Let's bring in Fiona Shields, Head

14:33

of Photography at The Guardian. Hi,

14:35

Fiona. Did you run this story? Did you run

14:37

this picture? Yes, we did actually.

14:39

The picture was issued by a number

14:41

of agencies to whom we subscribe and

14:43

again, we have good relationships, trusted relationships

14:45

with those agencies. We

14:48

didn't spot any errors in the

14:50

editing and we went ahead and published in our

14:53

first edition as a standalone image.

14:55

It was what we thought to be a

14:57

lovely picture of the

14:59

Princess of Wales and her family that she had

15:01

issued on Mother's Day. I think

15:05

what's really important to note

15:07

here is that it wasn't

15:09

just a picture about Mother's Day. It was also a

15:11

picture that was issued to illuminate

15:15

the Princess of Wales' good health.

15:18

It then transported it into

15:20

a different news category but

15:23

we didn't spot the error and

15:25

once it was

15:28

shown to us, we had to

15:30

run a story on exactly that, that this

15:33

image had been quite heavily manipulated and that

15:35

the agencies had withdrawn it, etc. And

15:38

what's interesting is we delve into the

15:40

chain really within the media that helps

15:42

a picture become distributed in the same

15:44

way that AFP saw Kensington Palace as

15:46

a trusted source. It sounds like you

15:48

at the Guardian, if one of the

15:50

main agencies gives you a picture, you

15:53

don't feel an obligation to go and double check

15:55

it because it's come from those agencies. Would that

15:57

be right? I mean in all honesty,

15:59

yes. We do have this

16:01

incredibly important relationship with the agencies

16:04

and I think probably Phil would

16:06

testify to that, that they indeed

16:09

kind of hold that in great value as

16:11

well. It's a kind of two-way relationship and

16:13

it is about trusting

16:16

the photographers, it is about trusting

16:18

the photo editors and trusting the

16:20

verification processes that they have in

16:22

place. Well, on

16:24

Monday we had this post on X

16:26

or Twitter as we used to call

16:29

it from the Princess of Wales saying,

16:31

like many amateur photographers, I do occasionally

16:33

experiment with editing. I wanted to express

16:35

my apologies for any confusion the family

16:37

photograph we shared yesterday caused.

16:39

Kensington Palace has declined to share any of

16:41

the original photos that may have been taken.

16:44

So we've heard from The Guardian, a media

16:46

outlet. We've heard from the AFP, one of

16:48

the big agencies. Let's speak to Jamie Lorriman,

16:51

a press photographer who's worked for an array

16:53

of high profile news organizations and is

16:55

chair of the British Photographers

16:57

Association. And Jamie, we've already

16:59

heard this phrase, handout. How

17:02

do you feel about handouts? Handouts

17:05

are not great. We

17:07

talk about trusted source and you usually

17:10

an organization trusts their photographers and you're

17:12

part of the team and you were

17:14

sent into situations where you're trusted

17:17

to take authentic, honest, real

17:19

images. When you take a

17:21

handout, you've got absolutely no say in that process.

17:23

You're just having to in

17:26

a position where you have to trust them. But actually,

17:28

can you trust them? And I don't think you can any

17:30

handout. Are there any situations Fiona

17:32

from a publications point of view like The Guardian

17:35

where you think, actually, I'm just not taking this

17:37

if this isn't coming from a photojournalist. I don't

17:39

want this handout. I mean,

17:41

this has been a really difficult kind of

17:43

line, I think, for most of the British

17:45

press, because in terms of the

17:47

types of access that we get, for

17:49

example, to our own government, often

17:52

photojournalists are kept out of events.

17:55

And the only imagery that we may have

17:57

is what's been supplied to us by Downing

17:59

Street Photography. for example. I mean Boris Johnson

18:01

had his own photographer and that kind of kick

18:03

started this sort of normalising

18:06

of the handout. Well, here's

18:08

an example. And Jamie, I'm keen to hear

18:10

your response to this. The Prime Minister Rishi

18:12

Sunak visited a mosque in London on Monday

18:14

and the photographer Dan Leal posted about this

18:17

on social media saying, number 10 invites us

18:19

to cover the visit. We're asked to leave

18:21

during the best moment. Government photographer stays and

18:23

gets the best shot. British papers use the

18:26

unverified government issued images. And

18:28

indeed one of those images was published

18:30

by The Times. And I should say

18:32

we invited number 10 to comment on

18:34

this and it declined our invitation. But

18:37

is that a situation you

18:39

recognise, Jamie? Absolutely. Yeah. The

18:42

amount of access that we get these days is

18:44

nothing compared to what it used to be. There's

18:46

definitely a shift towards government

18:48

departments having their own photographers and

18:50

access being restricted. But

18:53

isn't it quite normal for governments, organisations,

18:55

entertainers, lots of different people to have

18:57

their own photographers? And this is something

18:59

that governments not just in the UK,

19:01

but elsewhere have been doing for a

19:03

while. Absolutely. But more often than not,

19:05

that's not at the expense of the

19:09

press being invited in, having an actual

19:11

journalist in the room taking the pictures

19:13

at the same time. They often cite

19:15

space restrictions as the reason. There are

19:17

countless examples where looking back that isn't

19:20

actually true. And under that post by

19:22

Dan Leal about that particular situation, one

19:24

of the first replies Phil from AFP

19:26

was, stop playing along if you're unhappy

19:28

with it. The point being if all

19:31

of the different people in the equation

19:33

when it comes to photographer photographs don't

19:36

like handouts, well, perhaps start being a bit

19:38

more hardline about taking them or cooperating

19:40

in events that use them. Well,

19:43

I think that's a good point, Ross. So

19:45

we do not distribute

19:47

handouts that come, for example, from Downing

19:49

Street. And there's an interesting

19:52

parallel, actually, because this is quite

19:54

new that Downing Street has an official photographer,

19:56

the French president and the US president have

19:58

official photographers. And that's been. something has been

20:00

going on for some time. And

20:02

the media in France and the US have

20:05

been much more, you know, there's been much

20:07

more solidarity in not publishing handout

20:09

material. In France, they do not pick

20:12

up the official photographer material from President

20:14

Macron. And therefore, we are able to

20:17

negotiate much better access as a result. Because we can

20:19

tell Macron, if you don't, if you don't let us

20:21

in, you're not going to get the coverage. I

20:24

mean, I think it's fair to say that when

20:26

the Guardian publishes any kind of handout image, we are

20:29

really clear to signal that to our readers. And

20:31

that's incredibly important that we do so. You

20:33

know, otherwise, we're in a situation where we're using,

20:36

you know, a stock image, perhaps might be a little

20:38

bit more dull, it's not kind of of the moment,

20:40

and it won't illustrate the piece. But so

20:43

I think the clear signaling of handouts

20:45

is really critical. But we are also

20:47

part of the News Media Coalition, which

20:49

is an organisation of, you know,

20:52

British media, who put

20:54

pressure on the government and

20:57

the Royal institutions to allow us access.

21:00

Jamie, have you been involved in particular

21:02

situations where there's been attention between you

21:04

and other photojournalists and people who are

21:06

producing handout pictures? Absolutely. And on numerous

21:08

other photographers that have been in the

21:11

same kind of situations, the

21:13

last, the last rotor I did

21:15

was a solo rotor with

21:17

the Prime Minister. And you go

21:20

in, you plan everything out, you know, what's gonna happen,

21:22

you get told where he's going to come from, and

21:24

what's going to talk to people. What do you mean

21:26

by a solo rotor? That means you're there on behalf

21:28

of all of media. You're there on behalf of all

21:32

the rotor groups. So whether that's

21:34

the newspapers, the agencies internationally, the

21:37

various different pool organisations, if there's only space

21:39

for one photographer, then you are on

21:42

behalf of all of them. And then at

21:44

the last minute, in this particular instance, the

21:46

Prime Minister arrives and his photographer arrives with

21:48

him, they travel together, obviously comes in in

21:50

front of him and gets in the way

21:52

a bit. And then it's a very limited

21:55

amount of space in a lot of these

21:57

situations. But the priority is never for

21:59

the press. photographer because in that particular

22:01

instance the Prime Minister's photographer shoved my camera

22:03

out the way so that he could get

22:05

the the best angle. You

22:07

know, it wasn't violent. It wasn't it was just

22:09

uncalled for, you know, he was trying to get

22:11

the prime spot. Which is, you

22:14

know, we don't even do that with rival photographers, you

22:16

know, we all get on very well. So

22:19

that's not really on. So this

22:21

is one issue, the issue of handouts and

22:23

whether in some circumstances they're okay and how

22:26

the media interacts with institutions using handouts. There's

22:28

also a broader question that arises from this

22:30

story, which is a lot

22:32

of us in our personal lives are editing photos

22:34

in one way or another on our phones. A

22:37

lot of people within professional

22:39

photography circles will do things to

22:41

the photographs they've taken. So what

22:43

is an OK level of editing

22:45

and what is not acceptable, Phil?

22:49

Well, we are very clear rules for

22:51

all our editors and photographers about the

22:53

level of change you can have of

22:55

a photo. I think one thing that's

22:57

really important is you cannot be distorting

23:00

reality for the public. There's a

23:02

question of trust. The big issue here is

23:04

one of trust and the lack of trust

23:06

over the falling trust of the general public

23:08

in institutions generally and in the media. And

23:11

so it's extremely important that a

23:14

photo does represent broadly the reality

23:16

that it's seen. And

23:18

therefore it is not in a

23:20

sense telling some kind of lie or

23:22

some kind of false truth around an

23:24

event that happens. And

23:26

that means that you do

23:28

have to have rules that limit

23:31

the use of software that we use.

23:33

So part of the equation is rules,

23:35

but Fiona, presumably, especially with A.I. now,

23:37

just spotting the volume of manipulated images

23:39

coming the way of a news organization

23:41

like The Guardian must be a lot

23:43

harder now than it would have been

23:45

even a few years ago. Yeah. And

23:47

it's absolutely about to become much, much

23:49

more difficult. I mean,

23:51

this is a real concern. What's what's about to

23:53

happen, especially as we've got, you know, probably a

23:55

general election coming up in the U.K. and elections

23:57

in the U.S., the. of

24:00

concern around AI images

24:03

and they, you know, if

24:06

you're photoshopping a picture and you are able

24:08

to kind of forensically examine it, you tend

24:10

to be able to spot a footprint of,

24:13

you know, kind of where somebody's cursor

24:15

has been, but not so with an

24:17

artificially generated image. Do you have a

24:19

Photoshop at the Guardian? You must use

24:21

Photoshop in some circumstances. So we

24:23

have rules and regulations around,

24:25

there's no surprise, boundaries around our

24:27

news documentary, around reportage, that pixels

24:30

must not be moved around or

24:32

the facts of the image changed.

24:35

Just want to bring in Christopher from The Daily

24:37

Telegraph and also Christiana from Mashable as

24:40

well. Christopher, you were on our program not so

24:42

long ago and we listened back to it because

24:44

we remembered that you talked about the Prince of

24:47

Wales and the fact that Kensington Palace had told

24:49

us that she'd been, was going

24:51

into hospital. You said, the legacy media

24:53

will respect the request for privacy and

24:55

we'll see massive speculation online. That's largely

24:57

held to be true, but the tension

25:00

between those two things surely was part

25:02

of the reason why that photo was

25:04

shared on Mother's Day. Oh yeah, absolutely.

25:06

I mean, it was clearly an attempt to sort of tamp

25:08

down some of the speculation, which was sort of reaching a

25:10

fever pitch and from the States and all over the world

25:12

at that point, it sort of

25:14

backfired in a fairly spectacular way and they,

25:17

they seem to have kept on digging since

25:19

then. This is the

25:21

tension between privacy and the

25:23

media, which you can't control social

25:25

media. We talk about handouts while people are

25:27

still going to speculate or manipulate the photo themselves or

25:30

spec social media. So it's a big, it's a big

25:32

dilemma for them and they're clearly not in the right

25:34

place on it. And Christiana, what's the American media making

25:36

of this story? You

25:38

know, I haven't seen this amount of coverage

25:41

of the Royal Family since next. This is,

25:43

we are totally hypnotized by what's going on with

25:45

my, with, with the Royal Family right now. So

25:48

there's interest in this photo. Yeah,

25:51

in this photo and in all

25:53

of the, the

25:56

social media coverage of her, you know, not

25:58

being around right now. now. And

26:01

that was to some degree the pressure that Christopher

26:03

was describing. I just wonder finally as we head

26:06

towards the end of the programme, do you think it

26:08

would be helpful for Kensington Palace to release the originals

26:10

of this picture to demonstrate the

26:13

nature of the editing which Kate has said

26:15

that she did? Phil, would you like them to do that? That's

26:18

what we asked for. I mean, I think when we,

26:21

before we killed the photo, we all

26:23

sent a message saying, you know, could

26:25

you give us the originals? Could you

26:28

have a reply? We didn't get a reply, so

26:30

that's where we killed the photo. But I think

26:32

the maximum of transparency is really how you're going

26:34

to try and build trust. So yes, I

26:36

think it would help. And we've learned a few

26:38

phrases from within the photographer's world in the

26:40

last few days. A kill notice is one,

26:43

just people can guess what it means,

26:45

but just explain exactly what you're telling your customers

26:47

when you issue one. You're

26:49

basically saying, you know, take this photo

26:51

out of circulation, do not pass a

26:53

go, do not let it go anywhere,

26:55

make it disappear. Because,

26:58

you know, it's a big deal for an

27:00

agency to issue a kill. It feels like

27:02

a... How many would you issue on a photo?

27:05

In a week or a month? It

27:08

would be rare. We wouldn't like to issue

27:10

more than one a month, I would say,

27:13

you know. It depends on... Sometimes they can

27:15

be killed for reasonably banal reasons. They can

27:17

be copyright reasons or whatever it may be.

27:19

But to kill something on

27:22

the basis of manipulation, once

27:24

a year maybe, you know, I hope less.

27:26

The previous kills have been from, you know,

27:28

the North Korean news agency or the Iranian

27:30

news agency, just to give you some background

27:32

or context. Well, that's

27:35

quite an update. Thank you very much indeed,

27:37

Phil. I should mention that the excellent Radio

27:39

4 programme and podcast When It Hits The

27:41

Fan is all about this story, as you'd

27:43

expect from a PR and communications point of

27:45

view. You can find it right now on

27:48

BBC Sounds, as indeed you can find every

27:50

edition of the media show. And that is

27:52

it, I'm afraid, for this edition of the

27:54

programme. Thanks to Phil Chetwin from

27:56

AFP, Jamie Lorimer from the British

27:59

Press Photographers Association, Fiona shields from

28:01

The Guardian, Christiana Silver from Mashable

28:03

and Christopher Williams from

28:06

The Daily Tenergraph. Thanks also to all of

28:08

you for listening. We'll be back next week.

28:11

Bye bye. To

28:13

give us listeners for we have sinned.

28:15

And we want to know why. I'm

28:18

Becky Rippley. And I'm Sophie Ward. And

28:20

we're here to tell you about our

28:22

new podcast series, Seven Deadly Psychologies. Now

28:25

available on Seriously from BBC Radio 4.

28:27

So, ready? Born ready. Where we take

28:29

a cold hard look at the psychology

28:31

behind each of the Seven Deadly Sins.

28:34

We shouldn't discard them. We should ask

28:36

ourselves what they mean. It's as I

28:38

did if you give in to your love that

28:41

you are animal-like. We have to

28:43

let our minds have time to

28:45

free-wheel. Finding empathy is

28:47

probably the best tool to

28:50

manage anger. To hear the

28:52

whole series, just search Seven

28:55

Deadly Psychologies on BBC Sounds.