How the Australian media reported the Sydney siege – and spared us the worst

The Seven newsroom, positioned directly across from the Lindt cafe, was evacuated early on in the siege but Seven cameraman Greg Parker and reporter Chris Reason were allowed back in by authorities later in the afternoon.

The Seven crew, which shared a vantage point with a sniper, had a direct line of sight into the cafe but there was much they were not sharing with viewers.

Similar restraint was shown by most of the media covering the siege on Monday and into the early hours of Tuesday morning. Police had asked that the gunman’s identity and the names of the hostages be suppressed and that chilling videos made by the hostages and uploaded to YouTube not be shown. Most outlets blurred the faces of the hostages who appeared at the window of the Lindt cafe.

The identity of the gunman was kept from the public until police media gave the go-ahead after midnight and some outlets chose not to air graphic footage of a victim receiving CPR. One Seven source said there was horrific vision of a woman being shot that never made it to air.

The Daily Telegraph’s special Monday afternoon edition has been criticised for its factual errors and tone. Among the errors in the Telegraph’s 2pm edition “IS takes 13 hostages in city cafe siege” were the number of hostages taken and the link to Islamic State, which had not been established.

Across the media there were erroneous reports early on Monday about raids in Lakemba and unrelated arrests, but in the main most journalists exercised caution. Some commercial networks interviewed dubious security experts and even psychologists who tried to read the gunman’s mind.

ABC head of news content Gaven Morris told Guardian Australia the most difficult part of covering the siege was the mystery around how it would be resolved and the lack of official information.

“There wasn’t a lot of official information and so were were left looking at the scene trying to interpret,” he said. “There was information that we knew from our own sources about who he was; there was information about the demands; we had some information on who the hostages were. We took the decisions not to report any of it.”

It is not the first time Australian networks have had rolling coverage through the night: during the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Centre, Nine went around the clock for three days straight.

Nine’s news director Darren Wick said all the networks provided good coverage. “This is not, nor should it ever be, a time for boasting about who was first, and who had what,” Wick said. “Australians lost their lives. It’s a terrible incident, whichever way we look at it.

“All the networks provided a good coverage as the hostage crisis unfolded. Television has a depth of well-trained, professional and intelligent reporters and producers. Many journalists were told information, and, in some cases, were even contacted by the hostages via mobile phone.

“Along with Ray Hadley and ABC TV, Nine News had conversations with two hostages on separate occasions. Yet everyone deferred to the police negotiators and did not broadcast the contents of their conversations. Everyone realised that there were lives at stake here. And that’s all that mattered.”

The journalist with the bird’s eye view on the tragedy was undoubtedly Reason from Seven. Seven sources said Reason and Parker – along with Seven’s top security agents – accompanied police back into the newsroom to help them find vantage points. Police then agreed that a high-powered camera lens trained on the cafe’s door would be a useful tool to monitor the operation and they were allowed to stay.

“I can’t think of another time a camera crew was a unique eyewitness to a hostage situation,” one source said. “They were in that newsroom with the sniper just metres from the gunman and saw it and filmed it all unfold.”

Reason tweeted: “Police have allowed me back into Martin Place newsroom – gunman is clear – white shirt, black cap, unshaven, holds poss pump action shotgun”.

The public’s appetite for information on the siege was huge. Just one statistic tells the story. There were 428,000 plays of ABC News 24 (on all platforms – geoblock lifted), up significantly on the estimated 2014 daily average of 12,000.

Seven may have had the best position but it chose not to stay live after midnight. While the ABC, Sky News and Nine Network stayed with rolling coverage after midnight, Seven switched to infomercials promising to come back at 5am. At 2am they had just started airing an episode of Harry’s Practice when they broke back into live coverage as the siege was coming to a head.

On Tuesday, the YouTube videos the police had asked the media not to air during the siege went up on Fairfax websites, before coming down amid howls of protests.

An editor’s note published on smh.com.au explained: “Fairfax Media has decided to cease showing YouTube videos that hostages were forced at gunpoint to appear in during the Martin Place siege … The decision to publish these videos was made in the immediate aftermath of the siege ending, as a way of providing our readers an insight into the ordeal suffered by those inside.”

Morris says the ABC would not under any circumstances show the videos. “Late in the evening there were videos on YouTube we chose not to show or refer to. It was a natural decision for us. They were clearly filmed under duress at a time when we were not identifying the demands or the hostages.” The videos were widely circulated on social media on Monday night before being removed by YouTube.

Editor of the Age, Andrew Holden was roundly criticised for tweeting about increased traffic to the Fairfax websites and having a swipe at his competitors at the Daily Telegraph. The tweet was later deleted.

But the tweet which has offended more than just a few people was sent by News Corp boss Rupert Murdoch. In it he congratulated the Telegraph for its coverage and claimed the newspaper’s crew was the only one on the scene at end of the siege.

As Julie Posetti noted in the Conversation, Guardian Australia hosted a live blog all night, and the live television never ceased. The SMH continued to update its website throughout the night, covering the siege as it happened in the early hours. The Guardian also had a photographer and a reporter on the scene all night, as did most media organisations.

The impact of the siege is widespread and any event which may appear insensitive has been cancelled.

“In light of the tragic events in Sydney this week, and out of respect to those who lost their lives, their families and those affected by this, we have decided to postpone tomorrow’s Gallipoli screening until January,” Nine publicity said in an email.