Your Noon Briefing: Schools mag win for Dollar Academy, Johnston Press rights issue, etc

A MAGAZINE produced by pupils at Dollar Academy has been named Magazine of the Year at awards celebrating the best of schools media in Scotland.

Seventeen schools were represented at the ImPRESS Scottish School Media Awards ceremony in Edinburgh, on Friday, all competing in 14 categories.

View the winners list, here.

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BEGINS Martyn McLaughlin, on the front page of Saturday’s Scotsman: “BBC Scotland was last night embroiled in a major row over its impartiality amid concerns it flouted its own editorial and commercial guidelines by allowing a Better Together cinema advertisement to be filmed at its headquarters using the Corporation’s in-house crew.

“The Scotsman can reveal that the advert – shown on screens nationwide as part of the pro-Union group’s campaign ahead of the independence referendum – was produced at a studio in the BBC’s Pacific Quay base in Glasgow normally used for quiz shows.”

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AN awards competition seeking to “identify best practice in levels of service that online media owners provide to agencies” is inviting entries.

A deadline of the fourth of next month has been set for entries to the IPA Media Owner Awards.

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IT’S got its own name, now, ‘Gunngate’ being the ongoing story of the political journalist-turned-Scottish Government special adviser, Campbell Gunn.

And ‘Day Four’ on Saturday had The Scotsman reporting the Labour Party calling for a civil servant-led inquiry.

The story is considered by Scotsman columnist, Brian Wilson, who also discusses the role of the website, WingsoverScotland.

Among the Sunday newspaper commentators, Euan McColm, in Scotland on Sunday, is emphatic that Gunn should go, while Iain Macwhirter and Alan Taylor, in the Sunday Herald, think differently.

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BEGINS Gareth Mackie, in Saturday’s Scotsman: “Newspaper publisher, Johnston Press [publisher of The Scotsman and several other Scots newspapers], has raised almost £140 million through a rights issue, under chief executive, Ashley Highfield’s refinancing plans.”

And Simon Bain’s take on the story, in The Herald’s Saturday edition, begins: “Johnston Press’s £138 million right issue has received a 92.25 take-up from shareholders who would otherwise have seen their holdings diluted more than 6.5 times.”

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SAYS The Scotsman today, the PR account for the Institute of Directors in Scotland has been won by Clark Communications and Ken McEwan PR.

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REPORT motors and motoring? Interested in it? You might want to follow twitter.com/allMotorsPR.

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THE Herald newspaper has been found to have breached a part of the Editors’ Code of Practice, overseen by the Press Complaints Commission, but – in the view of the PCC – has “offered sufficient action to remedy the breach”.

Says the PCC, it was a breach of the accuracy (Clause 1) part of the code, and involved a long-running case, stretching back several years. And in its adjudication, the PCC has recommended some follow-up action.

Meanwhile, the PCC has also reported that a complaint made against the Edinburgh Evening News has been resolved.

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AMONG the Queen’s Birthday Honours recipients: Ruth Connelly, head of broadcasting at the Scottish Parliament. She receives an OBE. There is an OBE also for Kenneth Angus MacIver, for services to Gaelic Broadcasting and to the community in the Western Isles. Receiving a MBE: Fiona Karen Ritchie, radio broadcaster, for services to broadcasting and traditional Scottish music.

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BEGINS the June edition of Televisual magazine: “Scottish broadcaster STV has bought 25 Sony PMW-400L cameras plus Sony wireless adapters and field production kit from reseller CVP.

“The XDCAM cameras and tools will be used across all of Scottish TV’s newsgathering operations.”

Read more, here.

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