THE Northern Echo's late team did a great job in dealing with the breaking news about Michael Jackson's death last night.

The paper looks great this morning. The Northern Echo, The Sun, Daily Mirror and Daily Mail were all able to "splash" the story on their front pages. The others either missed it completely or squeezed it in at the last-minute without any impact.

I feel slightly uneasy about relegating the story about 400 North-East jobs being lost at Corus to Page 2. This is a really important story for our region and I made sure it is still flagged up on the front page.

Nevertheless, the Corus story broke much earlier in the day and had already been on radio, TV and websites - including The Northern Echo's - for several hours. The Michael Jackson story is huge. He is one of the most famous names on the planet - and we were producing a paper which will be kept as a souvenir...

WITH news stories of the magnitude of Michael Jackson's death, you have to tell it straight.

The headline in this morning's Northern Echo is simply: "Michael Jackson is dead."

The first paragraph - what we call "the intro" - says: "Pop legend Michael Jackson died last night."

No messing about - straight to the point.

Compare that to "the intro" from the Associated Press: "Michael Jackson, the moonwalking former child star who became known the world over as The King of Pop before his life and career deteriorated in a freakish series of scandals, died yesterday, a person with knowledge of the situation told The Associated Press. He was 50."

Budding journalists take note - that's how not to write an intro.