Tài liệu môn PR truyền thông - Chapter 12: News gathering and reporting

The Dynamics ofMass CommunicationJoseph R. DominickSeventh EditionPart 4Specific Media ProfessionsChapter 12News Gathering and ReportingDECIDING WHAT NEWS ISThere are five standards, called news values, which help editors decide what constitutes news:timelinessproximityprominenceconsequencehuman interest Economic factors also play an increasingly important role in deciding what stories get covered and to what extent.CATEGORIES OF NEWS AND REPORTINGNews stories can be broken down into three broad categories: Hard news (traditional “Page 1” stories)written in inverted pyramid formatstarts with the lead, answering who, what, where, why, when, and how questions of the news storybroadcast news uses the square formatCATEGORIES OF NEWS AND REPORTING2. Soft news, or feature news purpose is to inform, entertain, instruct, inspire not generally as time dependent as hard news3. Investigative reports purpose is to reveal significant information about matters of public importance through the use of time-intensive, non-routine news-gathering methodsNEWS FLOWThere are three main sources of news:staff reportingbeat reportersgeneral assignment reporterswire servicesauxiliary sources (government reports, public relation handouts, syndicates, columnists, news conferences etc.)News Gathering Technology ENG Electronic News Gathering allows portable cameras to capture live images at the story scene and beam them back to newsroom. SNG Satellite News Gathering allows live satellite feeds from anywhere on the planet to give local newsrooms global coverage ability.While these technologies allow live coverage, that same news is also shown “raw,” unedited and unfiltered, and therefore subject to elements of trivia, irrelevance, and inaccuracies.The Wire ServicesThe purpose of wire services is to provide newspapers with reporters and geographical coverage that newspapers couldn’t otherwise afford.Wire correspondents cover stories, then file them with a local bureau; if the story is important enough, it gets bumped up to the state level, perhaps then to a regional bureau, or even to a national or global bureau level.There are two primary U.S. wire services:Associated Press (AP)United Press International (UPI)The Wire ServicesThe AP and UPI do have other competition, most notably:The New York Times News ServiceLos Angeles Times-Washington Post News ServiceBritain’s Reuters news serviceFrance’s Agence-France servicespecialized services available on the Internet, such as the Internet Wire and CNetMedia Differences in News CoveragePrint news has a leg up on broadcast news in that print news is shown in space, not time, allowing papers to provide users with in-depth reporting and analysis.Broadcast counters that they have greater immediacy and can provide stories with both sound and video.Online new sites have an advantageous mixture of both print and broadcast, but critics charge that online reporters are often too undisciplined and untrained.Print, Online, and Broadcast JournalistsYet another difference between news reporters in these three mediums is public recognition.Both print and online reporters remain relatively anonymous, identified to the public, if at all, only by a byline under their news stories.By contrast, TV news anchors are so well known that they achieve star status, and their appearance and personalities often become as important to the public as the stories they cover.NEWS COUNSULTANTSThough all three news mediums use news consultants, the effect is most noticeable in the broadcast industry.Since TV station profits are so dependent on good audience ratings, news consultants often encourage owners to value news appearance instead of substance. This approach can give the public the types of stories and coverage they’re perceived to want rather than the stories traditional journalism guidelines might mandate.Similarities in the News MediaDespite their differences, professional journalists in all news media share common goals and values. They include:honestyaccuracyobjectivityfairnessbalanceintegrityWithout adhering to these values, journalists would surely lose their credibility and the trust of the American public.Online Journalism Recent studies show the public increasingly turning to online sites for news and information. News sites such as MSNBC, CNN, and CNET are visited most often. Archived, searchable story databases are valuable to the public. Journalists cite the Internet as the most important advance in news gathering tools since the telephone. Online journalists will need extensive tech training in Internet use as well as traditional journalism training.End of Chapter 12News Gatheringand Reporting