The column that has fun with the smaller mistakes and missteps of Australia’s mainstream mediocre; that pays homage to those sweet little fishes that individually don’t amount to a full meal but collectively can cause a tummy upset over the overall state of the once great and noble craft of journalism in this country.

Even thought this column is openly devoted to the smaller mistakes in the once great craft of journalism in Australia, its compilers sometimes get accused of carrying on about minor errors that perhaps should be forgiven and ignored.

Nah! we say. The little mistakes give us a snapshot of a bigger picture of the health of journalism in this country. Get the basics wrong and you’re liable to end up in the sights of this column’s older and more serious sibling, Media Glass House.

So here’s our first one, from ABC News online just yesterday. Our beef is simple: if whoever wrote this link could get the contraction “it is”, namely “it’s” right once, why not twice instead of the wrong use the second time round of the possessive “its”? Fair comment, we would think.

Let’s stay with Aunty and ponder how many Aussies have drowned over the years while sitting on a beach?

The first paragraph in this ABC News homepage pointer is correct; the second is not. That heroic woman did not pull the three men from a beach. Picky, picky? We don’t think so.

Staying with Aunty, here’s an Antony Green tallyboard graphic from the recent Brisbane City Council elections.

The Brisbane City Council is not a parliament, so why call the sitting councillor in this case the MP? Picky, picky? Oh, okay, maybe. Especially as it’s hard to come up with something that’s not a little big confusing. SC? For Sitting Councillor?

Still, call us picky if you must but isn’t journalism all about getting the facts right? Do the little stuff right and the whole craft benefits?

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