Amid all the controversy around the BBC, amid the claims of bias and the responses of presenters, one fact is undeniable.
According to the BBC's own research, more than half of Scots do not believe the broadcaster accurately reflects their country.
Why that should be remains less certain. Is it because the BBC does a worse job in Scotland than it does in Wales and Northern Ireland? Or is it because a country re-engaged with political and cultural debate now has higher expectations?
Whatever the answer the BBC is now under pressure to respond. If it believes the appointment of a Scotland editor announced last week is enough it is badly mistaken.
Nicola Sturgeon's blueprint for the future of the broadcaster has been described as radical and ambitious ... in fact it is a reasonable expectation of the service Scotland should receive.
Of course it has sparked the usual debate, which has generally taken the form of the question: 'does anyone really want MORE Scottish content'.
The answer is simple. We want more good, and less disappointing, Scottish content. We want to see our lives reflected in our national broadcaster, as well and not instead of the lives of those living elsewhere in the UK and the world. We want to see the talents of our writers given the care and attention lavished on those closer to London HQ. We want to see news broadcasts which place Scottish news in the context of world events and not consigned to a parochial segment stitched on at the end of a 'national' news programme.
It's not a lot to ask, really ... is it?
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It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
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We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
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