The most powerful person in British media during this election, in terms of having the most direct access to voters, is no longer the editor of BBC's News at Six or the person who chooses the headlines on Radio 2. Nor are they a newspaper editor, a TikTok influencer, or a podcaster. Instead, they're the anonymous on-shift editor of the BBC News app, making snap judgments on whether to make the phones of millions of Britons buzz with a breaking news push alert.
Craig Oliver, David Cameron's former director of communications, said influencing the BBC's coverage was the main objective for all political press officers. This used to mean phoning the editors of specific television news shows. Now the focus is shifting online: The sheer scale of the website alone and its breaking news alerts is huge. Once something gets into the water supply of the BBC, it's very hard to get it out.
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