The 3 key parts of news stories you usually don’t get

http://www.newsless.org/2009/08/the-3-key-parts-of-news-stories-you-usually-dont-get/#

by joshwa • 17 years ago

70 11 17 years ago

These really fit into what is known as the Gatekeeper Theory of the media; that is, a journalist receives billions of points of information and has to decide which are the most important to share.

Formally, this is done through an Inverted Pyramid style of news story writing - the most important information is communicated first, and the further into the story you go the less important the information is. In theory (and like anything, in practice things like personal experience and bias come into play) this means the story can be ended at any point and the most important news will be conveyed.

Where the story ends depends on News Hole (also what a lot of bloggers probably call MSM journos). This is the amount of space that needs to be / can be filled with news. The beauty of the internet is that it removes many of the factors that traditionally limit newshole, primarily the amount of space that can be supported by advertising.

And ultimately, it's this final point which may address the '3 key parts' identified in this article. When space is abundant, that information can be shared. And since it's often easier to write a longer article than a shorter one, in many cases the information discussed exists in early drafts and is later cut for space, meaning a lack of cutting provides extra information while actually saving time.

Don't get me started on the Janus view of the press, and how it will influence online media, however.

Credentials - Australian Press Council Prize Winner 2000; University of Queensland Journalism Prize Winner 2002. Google or Wikipedia key terms to find links to more detailed papers.

olliesaunders• 17 years ago

Journalists could impart more information by writing more concisely.

jws• 17 years ago

"I didn't have time to write a short letter, so I wrote a long one instead." - Mark Twain

"Remember that time is money." - Benjamin Franklin

jollojou• 17 years ago

The author of the article has a good point on the limits of knowledge: journalists seldom ponder their argument's proneness to fallacy. The author also well emphasises that it is important to have at least a little bit of information about how the news story was created. This gives the reader a greater possibility to assess the plausibility of the story.

However, the author did not cover the issue of interpretation: the journalist always writes from her personal standpoint. This raises several questions: can the journalist write "neutral" news stories? how her political and cultural background affects the news story? how could she clarify the background for the reader?

Knowing how the journalists know what they know is not enough. I would like to know something about the journalist's scheme of interpretation in order to understand the news story she wrote.

JacobAldridge3• 17 years ago

Journalists, and particularly formal journalism training (eg, a Degree over a Cadetship) really plug Objectivity as being this skill that can be developed and an ideal that must be achieved.

As long as journalists are human beings, that theory is bullshit. Bias and censorship, usually unconscious, unintended, and not impacting on the story are natural parts of journalism.

Journalists should understand that (most don't). The public should understand that (and read everything skeptically as a result).

biotech2• 17 years ago

This is a great summary of the problems that I have with newspaper articles. I've had a problem with the way news was reported ever since I learned to do real research. usually, my argument revolves around two points:

- Lack of Context; this actually can be split into the first two points that this article makes: "The longstanding facts" and "How journalists know what they know".

- The Monopoly of the Associated Press. The argument against monopoly is hardly unique to the press, though.

When I read an article in the newspaper, there are many questions that come to my mind.

In the worst case scenario, I'm reading an AP article which omits the author's name. WTF? The author's credentials and background (including their history of previous articles) are very important in certain cases (and at the least gives me some idea of where they are coming from).

Any technical researcher who writes a paper must provide references to be taken seriously. Journalists should also have some obligation to cite background materials. If they take a quote out of context, they should tell me where I can find the full discussion. If there is some important historical background to the story, I'd like a reference to that information as well.

JacobAldridge3• 17 years ago

>In the worst case scenario, I'm reading an AP article which omits the author's name. WTF?

Would you also expect the sub-editor's name, both from AP/AAP or Reuters and from the publication which edited the wire story? The chief-of-staff probably assigned that story over the alternatives, which would have been biased (because she's human too) - so do you want her name? And don't forget the section editor, the primary editor, the publication's owner (or owners).

It's a nice suggestion in theory. In reality, having the author's name can be more misleading than having none at all, since it assumes they have more control than they really do.

biotech2• 17 years ago

You make two good points:

1. Yes, I would like to know the editors of each article.

2. "The chief-of-staff probably assigned that story over the alternatives, which would have been biased (because she's human too) - so do you want her name?"

I don't want only her name, I also want to know the reasoning she used to chose these particular stories over the others.

Although I realize that you are [probably] being critical, I do believe that you have some good suggestions. Even if this introduced more overhead per story, I believe the quality of each story would increase dramatically.

extension• 17 years ago

News is based entirely on novelty, which is much more closely tied to entertainment than it is to importance. Not only do you miss out on the all important background information for reported stories, but you miss out on very important stories all together if there doesn't happen to be anything new about them.

Tens of thousands of people dying of cancer or car crashes is not news, but a single person dying in a terrorist attack is not only front page news, but a reason to turn your life upside down.

Popular notions of what matters and what doesn't are really screwed up. That's largely human nature, but Journalism certainly reinforces it.

phil• 17 years ago

Seems like magazine journalism is much less susceptible to 1,2, and occasionally 3.

I wonder how much of the missing information he describes is due to the lack of time and words that journalists face when they're working in a short cycle.

The 3 key parts of news stories you usually don’t get

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