No News is NO News

Those who know me well will, I hope, say that I am a difficult man to annoy, but well worth the effort. The news reporting establishment in general does something that really annoys me. It reports the lack of news as news.

More specifically take a story in which there has been a development, and in which there will be a long period before the next development. What often happens is that the story is kept current by reporting that there has been NO development. This means that the lack of news has become news.

Recent examples of this are:

The election has still not been called.
The Pope is still dead.
Camilla and Charles are still to marry.

Now, however, the ultimate in this sort of story has arrived, the election of the new Pope. Here we have a bunch cardinals locked up in a room with absolutely no contact to the outside and with one specific aim - to elect a Pope. However every now and then they'll light a fire and the world will be told that there is still no news. Take this story as a case in point.

As there is no contact with the cardinals inside there can be no news. Everything that can be said about the process can be said now, and nothing new can be said until we know who the new Pope is. Then there is great justification to crawl all over the story and to wring it dry - but not until the white smoke.