The Spectator- How To Trap a Journalist
Nick Cohen How to trap a journalist Hacks love winning gongs – and lobbyists know it From magazine issue: 03 November 2018 Shortly before his death, the Marxist historian Eric Hobsbawm wrote that capitalism crushed the integrity of artists and intellectuals. Assessed only in terms of their commercial appeal, they became ‘a sub-department of marketing’. In a touching display of filial loyalty, Julia Hobsbawm seems to be proving her old dad right The former head of New Labour’s favourite PR agency, Hobsbawm Macaulay, now runs an outfit called Editorial Intelligence, ‘a tool for… bringing together key journalists and PR professionals through networking clubs’. Journalists once had a vague notion that their job was to tell the truth whatever the cost, while PRs believed they must protect their institution whatever the cost. There was a natural antipathy between them, which Hobsbawm has sought to break down under the guise of ‘networking’. For a mere £1,500 a year (£3,000 for corporate memb