> Supplementary Notes

Introduction to Journalism
UNIT I

Journalism is the activity of gathering, assessing, creating, and presenting news and
information. It is also the product of these activities.

Journalism has been around “since people recognised a need to share information about
themselves with others”. However, the study of journalism is a more recent phenomenon. There
are several reasons why the study of journalism is a worthwhile endeavour for scholars. First,
news shapes the way we see the world, ourselves and each other. It is the stories of journalists
that construct and maintain our shared realities. Because of this, news can become a singularly
important form of social glue; our consumption of stories about current events large and small
binds us together in an “imagined community” of co-readers.

Through the rituals of consuming and discussing the texts of journalism we come to
understand and construct ourselves as subjects within local, national and, increasingly, global
contexts. In particular, journalism is seen as intrinsically tied to democracy. It plays a key role in
shaping our identities as citizens, making possible the conversations and deliberations
between and among citizens and their representatives so essential to successful
self-governance. In short, news is “the stuff which makes political action [...] possible”.

Much of the essential and useful information we require for our personal lives and livelihoods
comes from the news media. Our economy, our gov­ ernment, and our society would have
great difficulty functioning without the continuing flow of news and information—the lifeblood
of our body politic. An open, democratic society without independent news media is
impossible to imagine.

News can be defined as a diverse range of informative content about matters of importance. It
can often be defined by characteristics including timeliness, exclusivity, conflict, proximity,
prominence, relevance and scale. Within this definition, we include political reports, sports results
and celebrity updates; we do not, however, include social media posts by friends and family about
personal matters. This definition is deliberately elastic.

And we define ‘journalism’ as:

The practice of producing news by gathering information and using storytelling techniques. This
includes, but is not limited to, fulfilling the watchdog role and the practice of ‘public interest
journalism’. In this definition, we also include current affairs, comment and analysis that appear in
news media. We accept that not all such content is produced by journalists, but note that this
Inquiry explicitly seeks to encompass ‘journalistic content’.

Hence we define ‘news and journalistic content’ as:

A diverse range of informative content about matters of import that can be defined by
characteristics such as timeliness. This definition extends beyond the watchdog role and 'public
interest journalism' and also encompasses current affairs, comment and analysis. Deliberately
elastic, it extends beyond content produced by journalists. However, this definition does not
extend to social media posts about personal matters.

As a textual form journalism is, as Hartley put it, the primary “sense-making practice of
modernity.” It advances the key narratives of modernity and provides a store for our collective
memory. The texts of journalism constitute “the first draft of history.” It is primarily through
journalistic texts that historians and other observers of an age apprehend that age, in accounts
of and reactions to events and people. Journalism is the primary means for articulating and
playing out both consensus and conflicts in society; so news stories capture the ongoing
drama of the battles between the dominant ideology and its challengers.

If journalism plays such a central role in society, studying it is all the more important for anyone
wishing to understand contemporary culture. Doing so has become an increasingly popular
endeavour. Today, journalism studies is a fast-growing field within the communication
discipline. Over the past decades, the number of scholars identifying themselves as journalism
researchers has increased tremendously, helped along, among other things, by the foundation
of several new journals in the area, including Journalism: Theory, Practice and Criticism,
Journalism Studies, and Journalism Practice.

Journalism or what is often called the news business—the gathering, the processing, and
delivery of important and interesting information and de­velopments by newspapers,
magazines, or broadcast media— is inextrica­bly entangled in that giant, whirling entity often
referred to as "the media." Journalism, of course, is concerned with news, which is somewhat
different from information, because of its public nature.

By definition, news reports should be accurate and objective in order to be believed or to be

credible. Objectivity means that a news story should be free of a reporter's feelings or opinions
and should be based on verifiable facts. Careful verification of a news story is essential
because that report should be so convincing that there can be no argument about its truth or
accuracy.

Discipline of Verification

In explaining the meaning or importance of any event, a journalist runs the risk of being
considered biased or partial, hence, the need to be fair and evenhanded. (Many readers
consider news "biased" if it conflicts with their own views; objectivity, it has been said, is in the
eye of the beholder.) Ob­jectivity and fairness may be difficult, if not impossible, goals to
achieve but it is essential that the journalists try. News provides perspective by tell­ing the
public what is considered important and significant and what is not. Page location and size of
headlines can indicate this; any story placed on the right-hand column of page one of a
metropolitan newspaper is consid­ered important, usually what an editor considers that day's
major story. Most of the time, the first item on a television or audio newscast is consid­ered of
prime interest. The news, on whatever medium, is not all the news available but only a small
selection of it.

Journalists often describe the essence of their work as finding and presenting “the facts” and
also “the truth about the facts. ”They also describe using certain methods – a way of working
as a scientific-like approach to getting the facts and also the right facts.

Called the Discipline of Verification, its intellectual foundation rests on three core concepts –
transparency, humility, and originality.

Transparency means showing your work so readers can decide for themselves why they
should believe it.

> Don’t allow your audience to be deceived by acts of omission — tell them as much as you
can about the story they are reading.
> Tell the audience what you know and what you don’t know. Never imply that you have more
knowledge than you actually do.

> Tell the audience who your sources are, how they are in a position to know something, and
what their potential biases might be. Transparency signals the journalist’s respect for the
audience. It allows the audience to judge the validity of the information, the process by which it
was secured and the motives and biases of the journalist providing it.

This makes transparency the best protection against errors and deception by sources. If the
best information a journalist has comes from a potentially biassed source, naming the source
will reveal to the audience the possible bias – and may inhibit the source from attempting to
deceive you as well. The journalist’s job is to provide information in such a way that people can
assess it and then make up their own minds what to think. This is the same principle that
governs the scientific method. By giving the audience the background on how you arrived at a
certain conclusion, you allow them to replicate the process for themselves.

Humility means keeping an open mind. Journalists need to keep an open mind — not only
about what they hear but also about their own ability to understand what it means.

> Exercise humility.

> Don’t assume.
> Avoid arrogance about your knowledge.

Journalists need to recognise their own fallibility and the limitations of their knowledge. They
should be conscious of false omniscience and avoid just “writing around it.” They should
acknowledge to themselves what they are unsure of, or only think they understand – and then
check it out. This makes their judgement more precise and their reporting more incisive.

First, you have to be honest about what you know, versus what you assume you know, or think
you know. A key way to avoid misrepresenting events is a disciplined honesty about the limits
of one’s knowledge and the power of one’s perception.

Originality means do your own work. Information can be viewed as a hierarchy. At the top is
the work you have done yourself, reporting you can directly vouch for.

Journalists say the times they most often got something wrong was when they took something
from somebody or someplace else and failed to check it themselves.

Despite the strength of an empirical tradition that has held sway since the early years of
communication research, and the growing importance of global perspectives, the field is
heavily influenced by a particular set of normative presumptions that we could do well to reflect
on: We assume, as implied at the beginning of this chapter, that journalism is a benevolent
force of social good, essential to citizenship, and that it constitutes a “fourth estate” or plays a
“watchdog role” by providing a check on excesses of state power. As such, we also assume
that journalists understand themselves as defenders of free speech and as independent forces
for the common good. In this, contemporary journalism studies scholars of all stripes share the
concerns that drove the work of the pioneering German thinkers.

However, by drawing on these assumptions we ignore the fact that in many parts of the world
outside the liberal and often libertarian Anglo-American tradition, the press has, in fact, been
heavily instrumentalist. Totalitarian regimes around the world have shown a profound
understanding of the power of the press, from the use of journalism to advance national
socialist ideology in Nazi Germany to China’s “watch dogs on party leashes”. We should also
not ignore the fact that journalism has been used to facilitate genocide and fuel hatred and
intolerance, thus powering conflict. This has been well documented, for example in the cases
of Rwanda, Liberia, and Sierra Leone. Relatedly, ever since the Danish newspaper
Jyllandsposten’s controversial publication of cartoons featuring the Prophet Muhammad, it has
become apparent that claims of free speech universalism rub up against cultural and religious
sensibilities in a globalised world.

Journalism researchers aware of these complexities are increasingly interested in tracing the
consequences of profound transformations in journalism organisations, production practices,
content and audiences that have come about as a result of globalisation and political,
economic, social, and technological change.

HISTORY

The term journalism history is of relatively recent coinage, more recent than the term journalism,
of course. But the discourse now called journalism history has a longer history, one that tracks
the rise of news culture as a realm of first print culture and later media culture. As each new
formation of news culture appeared, new genres of doing the history of news developed.
Throughout this history of journalism, the boundary separating it from other forms of media
history has been porous and blurry. Since the 1970s, journalism history has been wrestling with
an identity crisis, one that in many ways anticipates the broader crisis in the identity of
journalism today.

Because journalism histories are so various, the best way to map them is to historicise them.
This strategy has the additional advantage of showing how the project of writing histories of
journalism has been part of a larger project of defining and disciplining news culture. For many
scholars today, history provides an indispensable tool for critiquing professional journalism by
showing its contingency and entanglements.

Journalism history emerged from two sources. The first was a kind of general intellectual
interest in the evolution of means of communication. Comprehensive histories often use the
introduction of new technologies, like the steam press or broadcasting, as narrative turning
points, and journalists’ autobiographies often dwell on the changes that occurred in newsroom
technology in the course of their subjects’ careers. The second source for journalism history
was more occupational. As news-work developed and professionalised, it constructed a
history for itself by projecting its identity backward into the past. So journalism history grew up
with journalism, and its historical awareness is a feature of its actual development.

GUTTENBERG etc.

The invention of Printing Press has contributed immensely in the development of Journalism. The
history of Journalism would have been something different without the invention of Printing Press.
Although newspapers were there before the invention of Printing Press, but, Printing Press ended
the wide spread gap between the mass and the class. It made books and newspapers available
for the masses, which earlier were affordable to the elite class because of the time and cost
involved in making it.

Johann Guttenberg is known as the father of modern printing. He invented the printing press in
1440 in Germany. Although much had been done by the Chinese and Korean people in the area of
printing, before the invention of the printing press, it was Johann Guttenberg who perfected the
printing press. Around A.D. 600, Chinese started printing with wooden blocks, which was mainly
done on textiles and later on paper. After a few years, movable metal typefaces came into the
market. But printing with this typeface was a daunting task, as for every new page, letters were
supposed to be arranged again. It increased the cost of printing and that is why earlier the books
were available and affordable for elite class only. It was Johann Guttenberg, who made books and
other printed material available for the masses.

Johann Guttenberg was born in Mainz in Germany. It is believed that he grew up learning the art
of goldsmith and blacksmith. He was a printer, who used to love metals. According to historians,
his family left Mainz due to some political reasons. As Guttenberg was skilled in metals, he
invented the printing press in 1440. His invention is considered as a very important invention of
the modern era, which helped in the transmission of knowledge, culture and heritage. His
invention revolutionised printing technology too, at a cheaper cost. He printed his first book i.e.
42-line ‘Guttenberg Bible’ around 1455. Guttenberg’s Bible is considered as the first modern
printed book in the World.

Back in the days printing of books, broadsheets, brochures and other printed materials was a
meticulous process. Thanks to Johannes Gutenberg’s invention of movable type in 1439, which
brought revolution in printing. By this time, it was widely known across Europe and America. The
movable type allowed a faster printing of books which in turn helped to spread knowledge and
education to many people.

Since then, printing has come a long way, because of the technological advancements made by
people in the respective field. Books and other publications today can now be mass produced in
a very short period of time while maintaining the quality of prints.

JOURNALISM IN POST-INDEPENDENCE INDIA

During the British period, there was an early demand for free press made by Raja Rammohan Ray
and British Journalists in India like James Silk Buckingham. As a result, newspapers were rooted
in the British territories by the administration, not allowing any criticism or inconvenient or
embarrassing news irrespective of the professional quality of the newspaper.

The 19th century marked the emergence of two other categories of newspapers. One started by
the Serampore (Shrirampur) Missionaries as the cultural arms of British imperialism, attacking
Indian religions and their philosophies and Indian culture. The other category consisted of
newspapers started by Indians.

Gradually these newspapers became the tools of the freedom movement and played an active
role-in India's cultural renaissance and reformation in the country. Indian newspapers grew in both
quality and quantity since the information and news needs of the people also grew due to
socio-cultural controversies of that period.

Even after independence, the legacy of anti-colonialism continued to influence Indian media. India
inherited from the British the combination of a private press and a Government-controlled
broadcasting system. Given the diversity of the press, it was critically aware and, by and large,
acted as a fourth estate in a fledgling democracy, while the electronic media was used for what
came to be known as 'nation-building. In a vast, geographically and culturally diverse country with
16 official languages and more than 800 dialects, and great disparity in the levels of development.
National media had a crucial role to play to develop a sense of Indian-ness.

In India, popular journalism grew from the revolt of the subject class. Newspapers were a vehicle
of the freedom struggle. Most media owners of the 50's had their roots in the freedom struggle.
Indian journalism after independence continued to carry the hallmark of missionary work, as
though the social responsibility associated with publishing outweighed all commercial
considerations.
The need for systematic changes in the format or design of the newspapers was not felt for a long
time. However, there were global technology shifts. In the '70s, hot metal printing gave way to
offset technology and colour printing became cheap.

Emergency and Press

It has now become a well- known fact that during the emergency Indira Gandhi had a firm grip on
the Indian mass media. This was especially true since radio and television in India are government
owned and operated; for Indira, there was the simple matter of controlling the newspapers in
order to achieve a total control of the mass media. She used at least three methods in
manipulating the newspapers:

1) Allocation of government advertising:

The Indian newspapers depend a great deal on governmental advertising; without such revenues,
it would be difficult for many Indian newspapers to stay in business. Unfortunately, this has kept
many of them vulnerable to government manipulation. The large-scale possibility of such
manipulation, however, was not fully demonstrated until Indira Gandhi's government decided to
take advantage of this unique circumstance. In the beginning of censorship, when a few leading
newspapers such as The Indian Express and The Statesman refused to abide governmental
censorship, the government withdrew its advertising support from these newspapers. Later on,
this type of financial castigation was used on several other rebellious newspapers.

2) Shotgun merger of the news agencies:

The second and perhaps more profound way of manipulating the news flow resulted from the
governmental decision to bring about a shot-gun merger of the four privately-owned Indian news
agencies; the main purpose behind this merger was to alter the management and control of the
Indian news agencies and thus to control much of the content of the leading newspapers. Since
these agencies had been acting as the gatekeepers of information, it was essential for Indira
Gandhi and her Information and Broadcasting Minister, Mr. V.C. Shukla, to control the
gatekeepers. To effect such a merger, the government carried through various successful tactics.
First of all, pressure was put on the members of boards of these agencies. Then the financial
squeeze was applied to the agencies themselves by withholding governmental subsidy. Thirdly,
the government introduced the threat of cutting-off the teleprinter services, the lifelines of a news
agency. For example, the government-owned Post and Telegraph Department ordered a
suspension of services to the United News of India if it resisted the merger. The manipulation of
these four news agencies was so effective that hardly a voice was raised to resist the
governmental perfidy.

3) Use of fear-arousal techniques on newspaper publishers, journalists and individual

shareholders:

A third and equally effective method applied by Indira Gandhi was to use fear-arousal techniques
on the newspaper publishers, editors, reporters and shareholders. Such techniques were imposed
by making false charges with regard to tax arrears, imprisonment of publishers and their
immediate press, and removal of governmental housing and other facilities for Delhi-based
journalists.

Post-Emergency era

Between 1977 and 1999, Indian daily circulations increased some 500%. According to the
Newspaper Association of India (NAI), India’s combined circulation of mostly small and medium
regional language newspapers is 11 times greater than all Indian similarly sized English-language
newspapers. After 1992, India’s television landscape, dominated by state-controlled TV stations,
was “invaded” by numerous indigenous and transnational television channels (ZEE TV, in October
1992, kicked off the era of private television broadcast- ing in India).

In 1995, television news channels were launched. In 2004, TRAI (Telecom Regulatory Authority of
India) started expressing concerns about cross-media ownership and a lack of diversity. Media
houses had entered into content-sharing arrangements and content management across media
platforms. Journalists increasingly became managers and corporate executives at media outlets,
and media owners’ control over editorial content increased further than during post-emergency
times.

Until the 1980s, Indian newspapers were treated as modest, small-profit businesses. But
everything changed in the late 1990s, when public relations departments were established in
newspaper offices. Newsrooms were now concerned with making significant profits, and “paid
news” and “private treaties,” bribes for positive coverage, flourished. The Indian government,
which sees paid news coverage as a serious threat to democracy, continues to fight this practice.
For example, in 2009, India’s Election Commission charged electoral candidates for purchasing
paid news during general elections. Although many such candidates were found guilty and
punished, this unauthorised activity continues. In 2010, the Election Commission distributed
guidelines and mechanisms to curb paid news. And in May 2013, the Ministry of Information and
Broadcasting issued its 47th report investigating paid news.

Scholars have severely criticised India’s television news channels for inadequately covering
disasters and tragedies, creating news rather than covering it, and generating media-initiated
investigations. For example, TV news coverage of the November 2008 Mumbai terrorist attacks
was condemned for inadvertently providing security information to terrorists. And in the December
2012 New Delhi gang-rape case, after a young woman died of her injuries, media coverage took
on an activist role by creating awareness about violence against women. Finally, during the 2014
general elections, TV channels began overtly endorsing candidates and taking sides on issues.

The Indian press continues to produce multiple editions and local supplements, to survive
circulation wars, and to participate in electronic news media ownership. The government has also
made it easier for newspapers to access foreign investments. Most newspapers, including
Indian-language newspapers, have started online editions easily accessible through mobile phone
apps. And such innovations continue. For example, in 2011, the South Indian multimedia Eenadu
Group launched a mobile newspaper. And in 2015, the Rajsthan Patrika Group started Catch
News, a multimedia digital platform news outlet.

A 2015 Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industries (FICCI) and international
consulting corporation KPMG report stated that rising literacy, growing disposable income, brand
consciousness, and strong commercial development in larger cities have contributed to increased
regional print media circulation. It also stated that online reading behaviour studies have found
only 35.4% of the total In- dian population use the Internet and visit newspaper websites, and
only about 10% of daily Web users turn to newspaper sites every day. It added that regional
newspapers are conversing with readers in their local languages, leading to a much higher growth
rate in revenues compared to India’s English-language dailies.

Since 2015, newspapers, news magazines, TV news, and social media have been flourishing in
India. The Indian television news market is crowded with diverse languages, coverage, and
presentation styles. Online newspapers are a reality, and the mainstream media is actively using
social media. Alternative media exist, but their scope and scale remain largely unknown due to a
lack of research. Mainstream news media tend to focus far more on speed than on accuracy and
social responsibility. And news sites provide information and perspectives on Indian current affairs
JOURNALISM: TRADE OR PROFESSION

The key question in journalism education to this day is whether journalism should be regarded
as a trade or a profession. The main distinction between the two is the implicit standing
afforded to journalists and the educational background expected from them. A trade is defined
as the habitual practice of an occupation. Regarding journalism as a trade would require only
vocational teaching needed “to perpetuate practice”, and on-the-job training without prior
study would suffice.

Few, if any, public activities attract as much definition and redefinition as journalism and news.
Notions of journalism’s roles – its purposes, standing, impact and future(s) – remain contested
among its practitioners, its scholars and, increasingly, its public. To understand the impact of
platform service providers on the level of choice and quality of 'news and journalistic content' –
the focus of the current inquiry – for consumers, we must agree on what constitutes news and
journalism.

Tellingly, the law struggles to define news and journalism. This is evident in the many ways various
legal protections and privileges afforded to journalists are enacted. They reveal considerable
uncertainty over what should be protected and how to define terms, including what is news. It
may be the act of news-gathering that is protected or the act of publication; protected content
may be limited to news or it may extend to comment and opinion; the protection may be limited to
professional journalists and news organisations, or it may extend to bloggers; in some cases,
commitment to media standards is required, in others it is not.

If journalism demands to be a profession, then it would need at least a defined educational

pathway to underpin this claim. However, as indicated above, journalists come to their jobs
from a great variety of educational backgrounds, and most of them receive in-house training by
the media organisation they join. This has led to the debate about journalism education having
been “framed as scholars versus practitioners”, and has caused a mistrust between academia
and industry.

According to Deuze, “journalism education […] must negotiate rather essentialist

self-perceptions of both industry and academia.” Deuze correctly points out that this dichotomy
between theory and practice “adds a level of complexity to our understanding of journalism
(and its education).”

This dichotomy is also perceived as one of the key questions in journalism education in tertiary
institutions, with discussion centring on the weighting of subjects either towards the scholarly
or the practical. Yet this debate masks another, wider issue. When looking at the theoretical
subjects that are part of journalism studies, the entrenched ideological positions of journalism
education become apparent. To most in the Western world, journalism—and hence journalism
education—is inextricably linked to the political form of democracy. The importance of this link
is one of the as yet rarely debated key questions of journalism education. So far journalism
education has been seen as the exclusive domain of democracies, but geopolitical changes
and transitions in media systems will force journalism scholars and educators alike to address
this hallowed view.

Also, the Internet has challenged conventional notions of professionalism. On one hand, an
increased “communication autonomy” of citizens has cast journalistic work as an “intervention”
rather than a helpful conduit to information. On the other, the professional ideals of objectivity and
disinterestedness have been seen as a barrier to contentious journalism. This has led to the
concern that professionalisation can make journalism elitist and exclusive rather than inclusive.
JOURNALISM AND DEMOCRACY

Journalists are generally on the side of progress and reform; yet they are deeply sceptical about
all the major institutions of society except their own. The very notion of self-criticism has become
taboo to journalists, and the word itself has become a semantic flame, which attracts outraged moths, both
legitimate and illegitimate. For every hundred exemplary works of literary criticism, there is probably
just one on journalism. There is, quite simply, little important critical literature concerning
journalism, especially within the Indian sub-continent. The newspaper or broadcast channel may
foster such literature in every other field; it does not foster it in its own domain.

- Ideally, a media system suitable for a democracy ought to provide its readers with some
coherent sense of the broader social forces that affect the conditions of their everyday
lives.
- Dramatic changes in the technology of reproduction within the media have led to the
implosion of representation and reality. This is true not only of journalism, but also of the
other media.
- For instance, an advertisement, for example, may be intended merely to sell a car to
women, but it may incidentally encode a message about gender relations and what it
means to be a ‘woman’.

In a democracy, journalism has a fundamental role: give people information that would help them
exercise their citizenship and participate in government decisions. Journalism watches closely the
actions of the government to make sure they do their jobs accurately and with honesty. The news
presented in mass media will have a direct or indirect influence in democratic processes of
society. This can be seen from a community to an international level.

To fulfil this essential role, journalism cannot be controlled by the government or manipulated to
serve the interests of those in power. Only free and independent journalism is the one truly useful
for a democracy. Unfortunately, in many countries free journalism only exists in theories or is only
an illusion. Even in democratic countries, on many occasions, news media have worked only to
benefit the interests of elites.

Because of its emerging function as a watchdog that monitors the running of the nation by
exposing excesses and corruption, and holding those in power accountable, the media was
regarded as the fourth estate, supplementing the three branches of government by providing
checks and balances. The media also plays a more basic role as a provider of information
necessary for rational debate. A healthy functioning democracy is predicated on the electorate
making informed choices and this in turn rests on the quality of information that they receive. The
media, as an institution, has for a long time enjoyed the position as a trusted primary source of
news and information. Due to the enlarging population, it has become no longer possible for every
citizen to participate directly in the democratic process. This led to the representational form of
democracy where representatives speak and act on behalf of individuals. The media, in this
environment, took on the role of being a voice of the people to those in government.

Reading media imagery is an active process in which context, social location and prior experience
can lead to quite different interpretations. Much of media discourse does involve struggles over
meaning. Furthermore, it is frequently interactive, taking place in conversation with other readers
who may see different meanings, as the chapters in the last section in this volume inform us. On
the one hand, events and experiences are framed by external circumstances; on the other,
journalists themselves frame events and experiences. But journalists are supposed to be active
processors and, however encoded their received reality, they may decode it in different ways. The
very vulnerability of the framing process makes it a locus of potential struggle, not a leaden reality
to which scribes must inevitably yield.

Further complicating the relationship between democracy and journalism has been the emergence
of computer-based interactive media, including the Internet. New media forms provide ordinary
people with unparalleled opportunities to distribute information quickly and inexpensively to large
numbers of their fellow citizens.

The democratic potential of such new media is sometimes described as being a way to
compensate for the ownership of traditional media forms (e.g., newspapers) by fewer and fewer
large corporations, given the concern that this trend to "media monopolies" has or will reduce the
diversity of opinions that are expressed in established media.

However, the proliferation of Internet sources has meant that the information provided on the
Internet often is not accurate or, at the very least, Internet information has not been properly
checked for accuracy. Additionally, while some political observers have discussed the potential of
Internet voting and campaign material distribution to rejuvenate interest in voting and in political
activism, others have argued that the tendency of Internet websites to engage in shallow political
humour and parody is more likely to foster cynicism than to combat it.

Of course, given the rapid development of the Internet and its steady increase in availability and
ease of use, the political implications of emerging electronic media are far from certain, whether in
historically democratic societies or in authoritarian nations where governments are struggling,
usually with uneven success, to restrain the free flow of information.

End of Unit I
 UNIT II

Journalists and the organisations for which they work produce news. In other words, news is both
an individual product and an organisational product. Even freelance journalists—journalists not
employed by a media organisation—were dependent until recently on media organisations for the
distribution of their messages. The complex technologies that have been used to distribute media
messages have required resources that few individuals controlled.

The Internet has changed much about the way news is produced and distributed. Journalists now
can do their work on their own and distribute their messages on their own.

The news organisations and news construction, for the most part, is grounded in the past, when
the journalist was weak and the news organisation was powerful. That is changing, however,
reflecting the shifts in the relationship of the news worker to news organisations.

ROLE AND FUNCTIONS OF JOURNALISM

News is that part of communication that keeps us informed of the changing events, issues, and
characters in the world outside. Though it may be interesting or even entertaining, the foremost
value of news is as a utility to empower the informed. The purpose of journalism is thus to provide
citizens with the information they need to make the best possible decisions about their lives, their
communities, their societies, and their governments.

The press performs a very important role as a means of mass communication in the modern
world. The press tries to inform its reader objectively about what is happening in their community,
country and the world at large. To bring certain developments into focus, editorial comments on
the news are also given. Newspapers also play a very important role in eliminating undesirable
conditions prevailing in society. Sometimes, newspapers carry on campaigns for some highly
desirable civic projects and serve society in this way.

Information

Informing the audience about news helps in informing people of what is going around them in the
world. It covers the entire serious topic that every individual has the right to know for the better
living. This function includes all reports, news and happenings concerning daily life. It does not
include any information involving or concerning the pursuit of leisure. But it does cover all news
regarding government politics, foreign affairs, weather, accident, business, labour, education. This
function consists mostly of matter, which is given in news broadcast on the radio and T.V. as well
as in the news columns of the newspapers and magazines

Interpretation of News

The need for interpreting and explaining the news in our day and age is readily manifold because
their own fields of knowledge baffle even the specialists at times. The ordinary mortal caught in a
maze of economics, science or invention needs to be led by the hand through its intricacies.
Accordingly, present day journalism sees to it that along with its announcement of a fact, event or
theory, the reader or listener also gets explanation, background material interpretation and
diagrams. These are all aimed at helping an individual to achieve a better understanding of the
significance of what he reads or hears:

Entertainment

Side by side with its more serious roles as a purveyor of information, interpreter and moulder of
opinion, journalism lays increasing emphasis on its function as an entertainer. Under this Function
can be included all types of fiction like comic strips stories amusing aspects of everyday life etc. It
also includes factual material, sports news, theatre reviews and hobby columns, which deal with
leisure. The entertainment function of the press is very important. This function not only competes
for space and time with either function but it can also exert indirect influence and impart
information incidentally.

It plays a vital role in selling newspapers and magazines by the millions. The sports pages, comic
strips, astrology columns, advice to the lovelorn and crosswords are essential to the average
newspaper's survival as a mass media.

Advertising

This function of the press can very easily be recognised because it is commercially oriented.
Sometimes, the advertisements also have some public service message under the prestige
advertisements regarding family planning, driving safely, childcare, health care etc. The
commercially oriented advertising seeks to promote the sale of their goods.

Generally, people have to depend upon the press for the major share of their total news
information because even television newscasts cannot carry that much bulk, nor could the
television viewers assimilate it, if they did. Of course, information can be written and edited in
such a slanted fashion that it exerts more influence than the printed editorial.

The entertainment function's greatest threat to good journalism is its competition against
information and influence for media space and time and consumer attention. Addition of an extra
page of comic strips may add to circulation and accompanying advertising revenues, thus
enabling the newspaper to add editorial material, or it may simply oust a few columns of news
and commentary. Similarly, a second lovelorn column not only steals space from significant
offerings, but also tempts more readers away from the remaining substance.

There is no doubt that information and influence play an inevitable role in the success of the
largest general interest. For example, much space of Reader's Digest is devoted to articles and
opinion pieces, about government foreign affairs, current morality issues, and education.
Advertising also plays a very important role in the success of running a mass media. Advertising
provides the largest part of the revenue to finance the most elaborate technically sophisticated
press system. In fact all sorts of daily newspapers, magazines; publications depend on advertising
revenue. Advertisement also supplies essential marketing information to the public and helps
inform businessmen of changes within their fields.

Education Function

The journalism / newspapers not only provide the information to the people but they also educate
people by providing guidance on various .issues through the editorials and column. The need for
interpreting and explaining the news in our day and age is readily manifold because their own field
of knowledge baffled even the specialists at time. Accordingly, the present day journalism sees to
it that, along with its announcement of a fact, event or theory, the reader or listener also gets
explanation, background material, interpretation and diagrams. These are all aimed at helping an
individual to achieve a better understanding of the significance of what they read or hear.

News Function (extension of information)

The most important and exacting function of journalism / newspaper is the provision of a daily or
periodical supply of news and all the news. The provision of news to the readers is a basic
concept and Ale newspaper journalism.
The function includes all reports, news and happenings concerning daily life, it does include any
information involving or regarding Govt. politics, foreign affairs, weather, accidents, business,
education etc.

Opinion for Motives

It means to influence the opinion of the readers through editorials, articles or certain special
features. In journalism people are not only informed, guided and entertained but they are all
influenced to have their opinion on certain issues. In certain cases, the opinion of people is
diverted to another direction, sometimes to negative and sometimes to positive direction.

Guidance

From the earliest days journalism has sought to influence mankind. Journalism endeavours to
sway the minds of men through the printed words, cartoons and pictures as they appear in the
newspapers, magazines, pamphlets and books and through the spoken words over the air.

Avowedly the newspaper strives to influence its readers through its articles of opinion, its editorial,
its cartoons, and its signed column etc. By Journalism we mean collection and editing of material
of current interests for presentation through print media.

Now-a-days Journalism developed into a full-fledged social discipline and News is the essence of
Journalism. Journalism is actually the information, education and guidance as such information is
one of the constituent parts of Journalism. It stands for writing for newspapers or magazines. It is
the communication of information through writing in periodicals and newspapers.

ORGANISATION AND STRUCTURE OF THE NEWSPAPER

Who does what in the newsroom?

General reporter: Most reporters start their careers as general reporters. This may change
once their editor has evaluated their work. The general reporter normally starts the day without
knowing where he/she will be or what they will be reporting about. The news editor will assign
a story to the general reporter who will usually cover local news. Often a general reporter gets
assigned a story simply because there is nobody else to do it.

Beat reporter: The beat reporter works in a particular area or on a particular subject. A good
example of a beat reporter is the court or crime reporter. A beat reporter has to know what is
going on in their special beat. Mostly their stories will be about routine [everyday] events on
their beat, but they must constantly search for unusual stories. A beat reporter has to try to
scoop stories. Scoop means to get a major story ahead of your competitors. As a beat reporter
you will be held responsible if, on the other hand, your competitors scoop you. (More under
‘the concept of Beat’ below)

News editor: The news editor controls the news desk which is the heart of the newsroom. All
news is gathered there. Editors of other sections like sports, business and entertainment all
liaise [link up] with the news editor. The news editor supervises the general reporters.

Chief sub-editor: The chief sub-editor (usually just called chief sub) is in charge of the copy
desk. The copy desk is where the pages of the newspaper are designed and the different
stories are edited and arranged on the pages. Under the chief sub are the sub-editors (subs),
who improve and polish stories. They must verify facts [that is, check whether facts mentioned
are correct or not] and check the spelling of names and addresses. They also have to write
headlines for all the stories. The chief sub enforces deadlines to ensure that the newspaper is
produced on time.

How does a story get from the reporter to the page?

A story starts with the reporter collecting all the facts, writing the story and then checking the
story for accuracy. The reporter then passes the story to the news editor, who edits it and may
suggest changes if necessary. The news editor then either returns the story to the reporter or
sends it to the chief sub-editor.

The chief sub looks at the page layout plan and decides where the story will be placed in the
newspaper. The chief sub then calculates how long the story must be and how big the headline
must be. After this, the chief sub passes it on to the sub-editor.

The sub-editor checks the story to ensure it is accurate and clear and is the correct size. If
necessary, the sub-editor will also polish the writing to ensure that the story reads better. The
sub-editor writes a suitable headline as well as a caption for any pictures or illustrations
accompanying the story. The story then goes back to the chief sub for final checking.

Once the chief sub is satisfied that the whole page is complete and correct, the page is sent to
production. The following diagram shows the way copy [the written stories] moves through the
newsroom:

The role of a Night Editor

Responsibilities of a Night Editor include taking over stories handed off by dayside beat
editors; assigning coverage of late-breaking stories; scheduling the home page during the
evening hours and for the following morning; and coordinating with other editors on coverage
planning. The night editor will work closely with a reporter, a copy editor, a photo editor and an
audience editor who work the same hours.

The night editor is expected to coordinate with the dayside news team to ensure that stories
get published promptly. Apart from that, s/he is expected to the do as follows:
- To complete editing on stories handed over from dayside editors Monitor late
afternoon/evening news developments.
- To assign coverage, in coordination with other editors
- To write and edit accurate, compelling display copy
- To monitor other nonprofit news sites for articles that we can co-publish
- To keep the website updated Occasional travel and work on nights, weekends and
holidays.

Other departments

A newspaper is a business and like other businesses has to make a profit for its shareholders.
Several other departments carry out the business functions of the newspaper.

Administration: The administration department is responsible for important business functions

of the newspaper. For example, it deals with salaries and wages, debtors and creditors,
purchasing and also human resources.

Advertising: Most successful newspapers get most of their income from advertising sales and
most newspapers actually consist of up to 60 per cent advertising. Without advertising, very
few newspapers could survive. Newspapers usually have two types of advertising: display and
classified. Display advertisements are various sizes and are distributed throughout the
newspaper, whereas the classified advertisements are small advertisements arranged in
columns under different subjects in a special classified section of the newspaper.

Circulation: The circulation department has the job of distributing the newspaper i.e. getting
into the hands of the readers. Copy sales come second to advertising sales in earning income
for the newspaper.

Production: Production is the department where the newspaper is finally put together and
printed.

EDITORIAL DEPARTMENT AND CONTENT

An editorial is an article that presents the newspaper's opinion on an issue. It is written by or

under the direction of the editor of a newspaper or magazine, or a statement broadcast on radio
or television. Editorials give opinions on important social, political, economic, or legal issues of the
day and intend to persuade readers to agree to a particular point of view. An editorial, printed on
the editorial page of newspapers, is an example of persuasive writing and many of the
suggestions.

Editorials reflect the views of the owners, managers or board of directors of media companies.
Furthermore, editorials usually do not shy from controversy, in the hope of not only presenting the
issues to the reading public, but also of drawing response from the public and attracting new
readership in the competitive marketplace.

Editorial Structure

An editorial is similar to an essay in that it focuses on a specific issue or topic, offers a thesis, and
provides evidence and supporting arguments to convince its readers. The title clearly identifies
the topic; the introductory statement includes the writer’s view on the issue; the body provides
supporting evidence and examples; and the conclusion restates the writer’s view and provides a
final appeal for the reader to agree to that view.

It reflects the majority vote of the editorial board, the governing body of the newspaper made up
of editors and business managers. It is usually unsigned. Much in the same manner of a lawyer,
editorial writers build on an argument and try to persuade readers to think the same way they do.
Editorials are meant to influence public opinion, promote critical thinking, and sometimes cause
people to take action on an issue. In essence, an editorial is an opinionated news story.

1. Explain or interpret: Editors often use these editorials to explain the way the newspaper
covered a sensitive or controversial subject. School newspapers may explain new school rules or
a particular student-body effort like a food drive.
2. Criticise: These editorials constructively criticise actions, decisions or situations while
providing solutions to the problem identified. Immediate purpose is to get readers to see the
problem, not the solution.
3. Persuade: Editorials of persuasion aim to immediately see the solution, not the problem. From
the first paragraph, readers will be encouraged to take a specific, positive action. Political
endorsements are good examples of editorials of persuasion.
4. Praise: These editorials commend people and organisations for something done well. They are
not as common as the other three.
How should an editorial be written?

Avoid moralising editorials. They tend to preach and turn the reader off. Whatever type of editorial
you write, it must be built around a logical framework. It must have a/an:

• Introduction: To get the reader’s attention.

• Body: To persuade the reader.

• Conclusion: To prompt the reader into action—vote, attend a rally, support the
troops, write letters, etc.

The editorial should be written in third person and should be forceful, never condescending or
preachy. Because the editorial is the official stance (position) of the newspaper, any reference to
the person writing the editorial would be inappropriate. Avoid phrases such as in my opinion or I
think. Some publications allow the use of we, as in “We believe the time for a change is here.”
However, the statement might be stronger to say “The Courier staff believes it is time for a
change.”

Quotes do not play a large role in editorials. Although a quote or two may be used for effect.

Editorials of Persuasion:

It is crucial that the editorial show evidence that the writer understands the issue, that he or she is
aware of all sides of the question and understands why the different sides feel the way they do. In
the body of the editorial, the writer should make a strong case for the position the staff is taking,
then bring in some points from the opposition’s viewpoint, and shoot them down with powerful
arguments. If the opposing side is not mentioned, it will appear that the staff might not have been
aware of opposing viewpoints, and the message of the editorial would not be as strong.

An effective formula for editorial writing is SPECS.

State the problem;

Position on the problem;

Evidence to support the position;

Conclusions: Who’s affected and how;

Solutions to the problem: At least two.

QUALITIES OF A GOOD EDITORIAL:

1. Clarity: Precise conveyance of ideas

2. Colour: Using words that evoke images

3. Concreteness: Being specific

4. Economy: Making every word count

5. Tone: The general impression of the writing

6. Tempo: The pace (how the writing moves- fluency)

7. Variety: Vary word choice, sentences, length, and sentence structure

THE CONCEPT OF BEAT

Integrated into the discussion of news routines is the concept of news beats. News organisations
generally organise themselves so as to be able to observe events and gather the raw materials
that are used to produce news.

The origins of the term “beat” as used to describe the organisational structure of news gathering
are not known. One possibility is that the term is borrowed from police work, where police officers
are assigned geographical areas or beats that they cover in a routine way. In fact, one dictionary
definition of the word “beat” is “a habitual path or round of duty: as a policeman’s beat”.

The literature examining the construction of news and news routines has given extensive attention
to beats. For Tuchman (1978), news organisations use a “news net” as a means of acquiring the
raw materials that become news. The net, she argues, was originally designed for “catching
appropriate stories available at centralised locations”. It assumes that the audiences of news are
interested in occurrences at these locations, that they are concerned with the activities of specific
organisations, and that they are interested in specific topics.

For these reasons, Tuchman argues, the news net is “flung through space, focuses upon specific
organisations, and highlights topics”. Of these three methods of dispersing reporters, geographic
territoriality is most important. A beat, for Tuchman, is a method of dispersing reporters to
organisations associated with the generation of news and holding centralised information.

Fishman (1980), in his now-classic observational study of news gathering, noted that the beat
system of news coverage was so widespread when he did his study in the late 1970s that not
using beats was a distinctive feature of being an experimental, alternative, or underground
newspaper. In Fishman’s view, the beat is a journalist’s concept, grounded in the actual working
world of reporters. Beats have a history in the news organisation that outlives the histories of the
individuals who work the beats. Superiors assign reporters to their beats, and, while the reporter
is responsible for, and has jurisdiction over, covering the beat, the reporter does not own that
beat. The beat is a domain of activities occurring outside the newsroom consisting of something
more than random assortments of activities. The beat is a social setting to which the reporter
belongs. The reporter becomes part of the network of social relations which is the beat. In
Fishman’s view, beats have both a topical and territorial character. Journalists talk about their
beats as places to go and people to see and as a series of topics one is responsible for covering.

The key process in news creation is story suggestion. Reporters have the responsibility for
thinking up story ideas. To this end, they are required to “keep up with what is going on in the
beats they patrol or in the areas of the country assigned to their bureaus, and they are evaluated
in part by their ability to suggest suitable stories”. Other staff members, including top editors and
producers, are also expected to come up with story ideas, and non-journalists are encouraged to
do so as well.

EDITORIAL CARTOONS: Writing or drawing critically?

The editorial cartoons work as a kind of news, and, in the news agenda it holds an exclusive
discourse function. Editorial cartoons are described as a single panel of illustrations in the form
of a satire on recent events. Functioning as a type of visual news-talk, editorial cartoons hold
an interesting critique position within the news agenda. Utilising artistic and rhetorical devices,
cartoon illustrators provide supplementary (and sometimes alternate) viewpoints on current
news events; their visuals becoming frames for organising social knowledge in addition to
capturing the essence of issues or events and by doing so, audiences are presented with
several different condensing symbols that suggest the core frame of any issue portrayed.

In the print media, newspaper cartoons, as they are fondly called, have continuously displayed
sequences of drawings arranged in interrelated panels to display brief humour or form a
narration. These are often serialised with text in balloons and captions. This unique literature of
change has brought about names such as political cartoons, newspaper strips, editorial
cartoons or comics when it is being described. Editorial cartoons trigger responses from
outrage to delight. They are clipped, shared, discussed, and argued about, and they are the
most read item on the editorial page. Opinion, point of view, perspective—whatever it is
called—sells.

In an era when media are increasingly fast-paced and visual, the cartoon seems to capture the
best and perhaps the worst of modern communication. Be that as it may, today, a developing
assortment of examinations portrays the animation, its authentic roots and its stylish profile.
The examination picture is as yet crude. Whatever researchers are simply starting to value the
graphic shows mental effect and its social outcomes. Now, the cartoon comes obviously into
the centre confined in a communication context.

● First, the cartoon today is a form of mass communication. It certainly is mass, each day
millions of people around the world look at cartoons. And it certainly is communication.
There may be other things in addition-for example, art-but it often earns its way by
transmitting the information.

● Second, under scrutiny, the cartoon is surprisingly complex. Any given cartoon can vary
in its complexity, code, content and the context in which it is used.

● Third, the cartoon presents in sharp outline, many problems which critics have long
studied in the mass media generally. For example, the effects of violence, instruction
and inherent political comment.

Cartoons have long been popular forms of pictorial Journalism, designed to simplify or to
crystallise ideas regarding current affairs, so that the reader can catch the meaning of the
drawing at a glance. It is a vehicle for humour and ridicule and they aim to entertain and to
exert an influence on the public. For generations, the cartoons have had a significant place in
newspapers and magazines particularly as an effective means of influencing public opinion.
The typical cartoon deals with idioms and problems which have political and social
significance. Cartoons can be extremely differing, however there is a sure settled style among
the vast majority of them.

Most utilise visual representations and personifications to address convoluted political

circumstances and hence summarise a recent development with a silly or passionate picture.
Regularly, their substance incorporates cliché, one sided and additionally disparaging
depictions of individuals and events. The word ‘caricature’ often confuses the students of
journalism. Many people identify with cartoons on the editorial page. The difference between
the two is that in caricatures the figures of persons are shown prominently. Cartoons and
Caricatures have come to stay in Journalism, while the caricaturist manages primarily with
individual and political satire; the cartoonist treats types and gatherings in comedies of habits.
Political cartoons can be very funny, especially if you understand the issue that they’re
commenting on. Their main purpose, though, is not to amuse you but to persuade you. A good
political cartoon makes you think about current events, but it also tries to sway your opinion
toward the cartoonist’s point of view. A more successful political cartoonist can change your
mind on an issue without you even realising how he or she did it. Cartoons also make the
complex or abstract phenomenon more clear, explanatory and easy to understand.

Although many of the engravings are neutral or objective reproductions of scenes, some
cartoonists used their drawings to hammer home their own political points of view. In fact,
cartoonists often did their best work when they were attacking an individual, a group or an
idea. They were especially attuned to corruption, scandal and political mischief. In seeking to
capture the nub of a complex issue, cartoonists sought readily understandable visual images.
With both gentle and ferocious humour, they dressed political figures incongruously and
highlighted the peculiarities of their physiognomy. Over time, the people and situations that
readers a century ago might have recognised have grown obscure. In some cases, the
cartoonists created their own symbols, which remain vivid a century later.

While the quality of the illustrations varies widely depending on the artist and the medium, may
have retained their power and visual appeal. The cartoons were initially printed in black and
white, but later several tints were added, and soon the magazine burst into full, eye-catching
colour.

The editorial cartoonist has both opinion-moulding and opinion-reflecting roles within the
community served by his or her publication. Although the job of the editorial cartoonist is to
express personal perspectives about current events using visual metaphors in order to
persuade readers, the cartoonist must not alienate either newspaper management or readers.
This is possible only because the cartoonist understands his or her community and respects its
values. Good (or should I say ethical) cartoonists are driven by a sense of moral duty, a desire
to oppose what they believe to be wrong, and the need to work for the greater good.

A newspaper’s editorial cartoonist ultimately interprets current events through the filter of his or
her individual world experience and conscience to create cartoons that are synchronistic (to a
greater or lesser degree) with the perspective of management and readers. Editorial cartoons
are rhetorical devices, persuasive communication analogous to print editorials and op-ed
columns that are intended to influence readers, part of the democratic tradition that requires an
informed electorate knowledgeable about issues and candidates.

Editorial cartoons “are primarily visual means of communicating opinions and attitudes or of
‘summing up’ situations…” It is noted that such cartoons can provide insight into “the depth of
emotion surrounding attitudes”. Because political cartoons generally comment on or embellish
news reports, they are documents rather than historiography, historical in nature rather than in
mode. They are reliable indicators of the response to new information that is still being
digested (a process they stimulate), but their full operational effectiveness relies upon a context
of cultural and historical assumptions embedded but not necessarily inscribed in their images.
The editorial cartoonist’s work is successful only if readers understand the framework within
which the point is made, which means that he or she must gauge the community’s familiarity
with the topic of the day and choose images to express her or his opinion succinctly and
appropriately. As Desousa and Martin Medhurst note, “cartooning is a culture creating,
culture-maintaining, culture-identifying artefact.”

A “really good cartoon” is witty, truthful (or it depicts “one side” of the truth) and serves a moral
purpose. That only one side of an issue may be covered and that a cartoon serves a moral
purpose are particularly relevant observations to the study of wartime cartoons. Cartoonists
must know where they stand on an issue and be able to compress their opinion into a suitable
visual metaphor. Their moral purpose is to further the cause they passionately support or to
thwart a perceived wrong. Cartoons lacking this motivation, passion, and concern are weak
and pointless. One must, however, always acknowledge that editorial cartoons are printed in
newspapers that are businesses controlled by editors and publishers who have the ultimate
authority over their content. The tension between the editorial cartoonist and management is
usually resolved by hiring a cartoonist whose politics are compatible.

Analysing a Cartoon

If a politician in your country does something controversial, such as voting for a law or bill that
would seem contrary to their normal behaviour, or having a sexual intercourse with a sheep,
there are several courses of action available to the critic who wishes to express themselves in
print. Two of these, however, involve a rudimentary grasp of the written word.

1. Using expertise or applied knowledge, examine the issue and then deconstruct it in a
dispassionate way, making cogent observations, arguments and conclusions based upon
research and turning them into an informed editorial.
2. Use your minimal writing ability and inherent bias to trivialise details of the issue and shit
out an uneven, illogical criticism more fitted for a tabloid than a respected journalistic
publication, thereby creating an op-ed piece.
3. Draw a funny picture and have it have something vaguely to do with the issue: questionably
pithy statement optional. Voila! The political cartoon is at hand.

Political cartoons typically feature one or more grossly deformed caricatures of well-known
politicians or public figures engaged in a static, easy-to-draw situation that distracts the reader
very little from the insightful political commentary. These situations include politicians giving
speeches, politicians talking with one another, and politicians talking to someone else.

Political cartoons thrive on hyperbole and exaggeration, and, to a lesser degree, humour.
Symbolism is also heavily used. Symbolism also allows political cartoons to reach a broader
audience: while people with college educations might nearly giggle when a cartoon gives a sack
of money to an elephant, illiterate high-school dropouts might nearly chuckle at the thought of
giving an elephant a sack of money.

Lastly, editorial cartoons are not intended to tell why an event happened. As historical
evidence, the editorial cartoons produced depict what the individual cartoonist and the
community in which he or she worked were thinking, what they cared about.

REVIEW WRITING

A review is not a report. Its primary function is to be critical. Although it does contain factual
information on which the writer’s opinion is based, the focus should be on the elements the
reporter found to be worthy of mentioning.

What should a review do?

• Make sense to the reader, whether or not he/she saw the movie, attended the play, or
listened to the music.

• Extend one’s appreciation of the performance.

• Convey honest and fair criticism, pro or con. (Usually a good review includes both
elements, although not necessarily in balance.)

• Offer a unique perspective, one reflecting the production as a whole, and one stressing a
significant, fresh angle.

• Cite tangible, observable evidence for all conclusions.

• Build on accurate observation and appropriate reporting (listening, watching, reading--

often more than once--as well as interviewing background sources).

• Make the reader feel, “That’s right! That’s what I thought or felt even though I couldn’t
express my reactions in those words.”

How should a review be written?

• Combine elements of feature writing and of opinion writing. Use colorful, sight-sound
details. Express a meaningful, clear viewpoint.

• Begin with a novelty (feature) lead.

• Give the writer’s overall impression of the art form being reviewed early.
 • Organise the experience in a meaningful way, often by artistic concerns (effect, style, tone,
acting, staging, sound quality), rather than in a chronological order.

• Include details to support the criticisms, both good and bad.

• Reflect artistic sensitivity and avoid condescending manners and simplistic statements (It
was fantastic...beautiful...brilliant...etc). Show your reader how it was fantastic, beautiful or
brilliant.

• Use transitions to lead the reader from one part of the story to the next.

• Conclude with a paragraph that ties the review together which repeats a key element from
the lead.

What kinds of art forms can be reviewed?

• Drama

• Music (concerts, albums)

• Art (painting, sculpture, architecture, photography) Film, Media (TV , radio)

• Publications (books, periodicals)

• Restaurants

• Travel

• Software (games, new programs)

IMPORTANCE OF GRAMMAR IN JOURNALISM (AND EVERYTHING)

• The quickest way to lose credibility with your reader is to have a story full of grammatical
errors.

• Journalists often rely on sub-editors to ‘clean up’ their mistakes, but this should not be the
case. Sub-editors have a heavy workload and should not be expected to fix basic
mistakes. They also might not spot a mistake before it goes to print.

• Always run a spell-check before you submit your work, but do not automatically accept
every correction offered by your computer.

• When in doubt, read it aloud. You might ‘hear’ a mistake that you could not see.

• Avoid long, complicated sentences. They often introduce unnecessary errors, and also put
the reader off

The main culprits

1. Incorrect: The couple were waiting for the ordeal to end.

2. Correct: The couple was waiting for the ordeal to end.

3. Incorrect: Either of the two players are on the final list.

4. Correct: Either of the two players is on the final list.

5. Incorrect: The organisation is reconsidering it’s position.

6. Correct: The organisation is reconsidering its position.

7. Incorrect: Its now up to the weather to play along.

8. Correct: It’s now up to the weather to play along.

9. Incorrect: There were less people at the match.

10. Correct: There were fewer people at the match.

11. Incorrect: I had plans for lunch, however, they were cancelled.

12. Correct: I had plans for lunch. However, they were cancelled.

13. Incorrect: There house is over their, and they happy with it.

14. Correct: Their house is over there, and they’re happy with it.
FACT VS OPINION

The average person is bombarded with thousands of messages every day—from the television,
the radio, billboards, the Internet, telephone calls, the intercom, mail—we often feel we are in an
information overload. However, many of the messages do not pertain to us, so we do not pay
attention to them. It deals with factual messages that are important to readers because they are
newsworthy—they contain information which will enable them to make better decisions in their
lives or they contain information which is interesting to them. These are the messages that make
up what we call “news.”

Journalists are constantly faced with problems of reporting facts and opinions. They must be able
to distinguish between them. This is important in both gathering and writing news. It affects how
you deal with anything you are told and also how you pass the information on to your readers or
listeners.

A fact can be defined as something said to have happened or supposed to be true. However as a
journalist, you need to know how reliable statements are before you can report them as facts. This
determines how you present them to your readers or listeners.

There are three kinds of facts which you have to deal with as a journalist. There are facts which
have been proved to be true; facts which are probably true though they have not been proved;
and facts which could be true, although they appear to be lies.

Proven facts

These are facts which are proved and accepted as true by everyone. They include such
statements as "The world is round" or “Ramnath Kovind is President of India”. You could check
these facts yourself, but they are so universally accepted as true that you do not need to. Of
course, facts can change. It is a proven fact that Kovind is President at the time this paragraph is
being written, but he will one day be succeeded by somebody else. When he is, the fact will
become untrue, but for the moment it is a proven, accepted fact.

You can rely on proven facts and report them to your readers or listeners with confidence. They do
not depend for their truth on who said them, so you do not need to attribute them.

Probable facts

These are statements which it seems reasonable to believe are true, but you are not able to prove
yourself, either because you do not have access to the information or because you do not have
time to dig for proof (but not because you are too lazy to check). Probable facts include
statements by people who are in a position to know the truth and who have no obvious reason to
tell a lie. If the Finance Minister tells Parliament that ₹10 million was raised from taxes last year,
you can treat this as a probable fact.

These are not, however, the same as proven facts. Although they are probably true, there is a
chance that they might be wrong, either because a mistake has been made or because someone
lied. Because this doubt exists, we must attribute probable facts to the people who provide them.

Probable lies

People occasionally make statements which seem on the surface to be untrue, but which might
just be true. A claim that "The Prime Minister has secretly married a sixteen-year-old fashion
model" may seem highly unlikely, but it just might be true.
You must always check such statements before using them, and never use them without
confirming them first. Once you have checked that they are true, you do not need to attribute
them. They have become proven facts. Of course, if you find they are untrue, you must not use
them.

If you have to report a known lie – for example, when reporting evidence presented in a court case
– you must attribute the statements and you should also present the alternative counter view
where and when it is given.

Opinions

Opinions are different from facts. An opinion is a conclusion reached by someone after looking at
the facts. Opinions are based on what people believe to be facts. This can include probable facts
and even probable lies, although few people will knowingly give an opinion based on a proven lie.

One person's probable fact can be seen by another person as a probable lie. This is one reason
why people have differences of opinion.

Although an opinion can be any statement of what a person believes to be true (as distinct from a
proven fact), for journalists there are two main categories of opinions.

Verifiable opinion

These are conclusions which can be verified (shown to be true) or shown to be false. People who
predict the results of horse races draw conclusions from what they know about horses and racing.
For instance some may say that Shillong Lajong FC will win the coming I-league. It is their opinion.
Once the game is over, that opinion is proved to be either correct or incorrect, depending on
whether Shillong wins or loses.

Although people usually base their opinions on facts, there is always a danger that they can reach
the wrong conclusion. They might have based their opinion on facts which are themselves untrue
(such as Shillong Lajong's fitness); they might have failed to consider a relevant fact (the ground
was muddy and Shillong Lajong players runs best on firm ground) or they might have reached the
wrong conclusion because of a gap in the logic they used to think it through (Mumbai FC had a
strong name, so was bound to win).

You must always treat verifiable opinions as if they could be wrong. You must always attribute
them to the person who gave them.

Expert opinion

It is worth mentioning here a special category of opinion we call expert opinion. Experts can give
their opinion on an issue, based on their special knowledge of the facts.

A pathologist gives an expert opinion when she tells an inquest that she believes a person was
killed before being thrown in a river. She has examined the body and found very little water in the
lungs.

Unless there is proof of what happened, this must remain an opinion and be attributed to the
pathologist. The opinion may later be verified when the killer confesses and describes what
happened.

The best kind of expert opinion is one in which the expert keeps their own personal feelings out of
their conclusions. They look at the facts as they see them, and draw a conclusion based only on
those facts.
However, even opinions from an impartial expert must be attributed, so that your readers or
listeners can judge the likely truth or otherwise of what they say.

Personal opinion

Personal opinions are the conclusions someone reaches based partly on facts and partly on what
they already believe.

Personal opinions can be given by people just because they are asked. If you conduct a vox
pop with people on the street, asking what they think about capital punishment, they will give you
their personal opinion.

Personal opinions which are based on beliefs or values which a person already has are
called value judgments.

These are opinions of what is good or bad and advice on what other people should do about
something.

For example, a socialist might give the opinion that a new tax on the rich is a good thing; a rich
person might give the opinion that it is a bad thing. To understand value judgments, your readers
or listeners need to know who is making them and why. Such opinions must be attributed.

As a journalist, you are likely to encounter a lot of people who want to express their personal
opinion in order to impress people and to affect other people's attitudes. They will see your
newspaper, radio or television station as a useful way of getting their personal opinions across to
people. The most obvious examples of this are people such as politicians, who believe they know
what is right or wrong for others. They need to get their opinions to the people, to gain their
support. The prime minister who says that his government is good for the people is expressing a
value judgement. If he says it often enough, people will believe that it is true, whether or not it is
based on fact.

Even experts can make value judgments, although this is quite distinct from an impartial opinion
based only on known facts. An expert who gives a personal opinion may be better informed than
many other people on that topic, but their opinion is still just a value judgement, based on their
own beliefs.

Why distinguish facts from opinions?

People use information in all sorts of ways. The most important way is to learn about the world
around them and their place in it. They can then decide on what to do. They can use information
on a tin of fish to choose whether to buy that brand or another.

In order to do something with information, people need to know whether or not it is true. They use
facts to reach conclusions about things, to make their own opinions.

Reporting people's opinions is useful to your readers or listeners. Hearing an opinion on an issue
might stimulate them to think about the issue themselves. If they hear a variety of different
opinions, they can use this information to build up their own ideas.

They can also use other people's opinions as models for their own. If they read about someone
expressing an opinion they agree with, they might adopt that opinion for themselves.

People use both facts and opinions when they are making decisions. Whereas we generally
accept facts whoever states them (assuming, of course, that they trust the person to speak
honestly), we judge an opinion by the person who expresses it.
________________________________________________________________________

Exercise: RTLM and the Rwandan Genocide

The Rwandan genocide has become a textbook case of the ways in which hate speech, especially
the use of the spoken word on radio, can spark genocidal violence. A focus on radio is a
consistent theme in most popular representations and in many academic analyses of the
genocide. Moreover, the United Nations International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) found
two radio journalists and a print journalist guilty of inciting genocide, the first international court to
do so since the Nuremberg conviction of Julius Streicher. The received wisdom about media
effects in Rwanda has had far- reaching implications, in particular about the potential dangers of
private media during democratic transitions and about how media can foment extreme violence.

RTLM, which was a semi-private station launched in 1993 (about a year before the genocide
began) was founded and owned by political actors associated with hardliners within the then
ruling regime and who are largely seen as responsible for organizing and implementing the
genocide. RTLM stands for Radio Télévision Libre des Mille Collines, which translates to
"Thousand Hills Free Radio and Television" in English. It was a Rwandan radio station that played
a significant role in the Rwandan genocide of 1994. RTLM has received the lion’s share of
commentary on radio media effects in Rwanda, and indeed RTLM was the focus of the ICTR
investigation into hateful radio media.

Very soon after its establishment, RTLM became popular due to its entertainment programming.
However, it also became notorious for its broadcasts that spread hate speech and incited violence
against the Tutsi ethnic group, referring to them as "cockroaches" and encouraging their
extermination.

During the genocide, RTLM played a crucial role in spreading propaganda and coordinating
attacks against the Tutsi population. Its broadcasts contributed to the dehumanisation of Tutsis
and helped to fuel the violence that resulted in the deaths of an estimated 800,000 people, mostly
Tutsis.

After the genocide, RTLM was shut down, and its founders and key figures were prosecuted by
the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) for their role in inciting genocide and crimes
against humanity.

Read more^

End of Unit II
 UNIT III

JOURNALISTIC WRITING FORMAT

How to report a News story :

1. The Five ‘W’s (and the ‘H’)

This is the crux of all news. You need to know these things:

Who? What? Where? When? Why?

(How?)

A good news story provides answers to each of these questions. For example, if you’re writing
a story about a new database you’ll need to answer questions like:

• What is it? Is it the first of its kind?

• Who created it? Who else is involved? Who will maintain it? Who will use it?

• Where is it based? Are there any partners based anywhere else? Where will the users come
from?

• When is it released? How long have they been preparing?

• Why has it been created? What is the need for it?

• How does it fit into the bigger picture of other resources? How can people start to make use
of it? How does it fill a gap in the market? How will it affect the science people are doing?

2. The Inverted Pyramid

A good journalist puts the most important facts

at the beginning and works ‘down’ from there.
Ideally, the first paragraph should contain
enough information to give the reader a good
overview of the entire story. The rest of the
article explains and expands on the beginning.

In the story about the baby, most of the

answers to the five ‘W’s appear in the first
sentence, known as the lead.

Who: a baby. What: born. Where: on a London

bus. When: in rush hour.

A good approach is to assume that the story

might be cut off at any point due to space
limitations. Does the story work if the editor
only decides to include the first two
paragraphs? If not, re-arrange it so that it does.
The actual news is buried, if
you can be bothered to read
that far.

3. People and what they say

News stories are really all

about how people are
affected. A dry story can
become much more
interesting and relevant when
it is targeted towards the
audience and how they could
benefit.

Try to quote people. It adds a

personal touch to the story,
and you know the journalist
has actually spoken to the
people involved, and – most
importantly – it makes the
story more interesting and
readable.

4. Angle

Most stories can be presented using a particular angle or ‘slant’. It can help make the purpose
of the story clear and give it focus.

To find an angle, try to pinpoint the most unusual or interesting aspect of the story.

5. Keep it simple – keep it tight

Don’t make the mistake of thinking that by using jargon, formal language, complicated
sentences and going into great detail, you’re making your story sound important! It just makes
it boring. Report the pertinent facts in a language that can be understood by everybody. Use
an analogy if it helps to explain a concept better.

COMPONENTS OF A NEWS STORY

1. The Headline: The headline is a one or two line summary of the contents of the news story, in
larger type, that tells readers what the story is about . Headlines act as an index of the
contents of the newspaper, and a summary of the information in its stories.

2. The Lead: The lead is usually defined as the first sentence of a news story, sometimes as the
first few sentences. The lead is the beginning of a story. The lead on a hard news story is
often called a summary lead. Lead should contain the most important facts of the story - at
least some of the Five Ws. The ideal lead is short - no more than 25 or 30 words. Leads
should be "tight" - that is, written with economy. A news story with a strong lead is more likely
to be read. (Read further the header ‘Lead’ below)
3. The Backup Quote: Most news stories, except the briefest of briefs, should have a backup
quote placed soon after the lead. Ideally, the backup quote - attributed to comprehensible
and entertaining way.

4. Attribution: All news stories require attribution . Attribution is the explanation of the source of
the information in the news story. Attribution allows the reader to judge for herself whether
the facts set out in the story have merit. The best stories contain lots of quotes - and all
quotes have attribution. A news story without attribution is worthless.

5. Reaction. All news stories that contain controversial statements, should have reaction - the
comments of someone who is familiar with the situation, or of someone with an alternative
view of the main thesis of the story. A representative of the government should have the
opportunity to respond. Fairness requires reaction.

6. The Nut Graph. A nut graph informs readers of the focus of the story. The lead will serve the
same purpose as the nut graph. A nut graph is essential to set out for the reader what is
going on.

7. Background. Most stories need some background for the reader to understand what's going
on.. The more complicated the story, the more pressing the need for background. Background
helps explain the action.

8. The Ending. Sometimes writers end a story with a reference to future action that is expected.

LEAD

Summary lead/lede

The first paragraph of a news story, or the lead (sometimes spelled lede), is a concise summary
statement of the most important or most interesting of the 5 Ws and H, usually giving the
information about what happened or will happen. Other information may include who is
involved and why or how it happened.

The lead is the most important part of the story. The first three or four words of the lead should
capture the reader’s attention. They should be concrete informational words. Readers are busy
people, and if a lead does not grab their attention with the first few words, the story does not
get a second chance in most cases. Openers such as “There was”, “There will be” or “There is”
will not grab readers’ attention. Likewise, empty words such as “a,” “an,” and “the” do nothing
to grab the readers’ attention.

Poor Lead: There will be a meeting of the Student Council homecoming committee next
Tuesday after school.

Better: Student Council’s homecoming committee will meet Tuesday after school.

The second lead lets the reader know right away what the story is about.

The lead should give the readers the most important answers to the questions posed by the 5
Ws and H, but should not overwhelm them with information. Not all facts should be placed in
the lead; less important information should go into the body of the story.
The summary lead usually features one of the Ws or H and focuses in on that fact. Modern
reporters try to focus on the “How” or the “Why” if they are relevant to the story. Some leads
focus on the “What,” and in cases where the “Who” overshadows the “What,” that information
will be used. Unless the “When” or the “Where” are extremely important or extremely unusual,
they are usually not featured in the lead.

Here are some examples of leads featuring the various Ws and H:

• What lead: Finding a solution to the nation’s economic woes will be a top priority
for the nation’s governors at their national conference this week in Boca Raton, Fla.

• Who lead: Senior class president Susan Jones will be featured speaker at
Tuesday’s weekly Teens Who Care meeting in the Central High School auditorium.

• Where lead: Under the same shady branches of the huge live oak where he had
his first picnic with Gladys more than 60 years ago and where he married her three years
later, the family of John Bloom will lay his body to rest on Wednesday morning.

• When lead: Following a decade of struggling to pay the electric bill, provide braces
for the teeth of his six children, and keep enough food in the house for his growing family
while his inventions, one after the other, flopped, Sam Matthews has finally hit on the
invention that may set him up for a lifetime.

• Why lead: Because recent flooding destroyed much of the underground tunnel
system downtown, all major entrances to the tunnel have been sealed off while repairs are
made.

• How lead: By exercising for 30 minutes three times a week and limiting her caloric
intake to 1000 calories a day, science teacher Beth Phillips went from a size 32 to a size 6
in less than a year.

Lead writing checklist:

• The summary lead is short, usually no more than 25 words. If it is longer, it is broken into two or
more sentences.

• The lead begins with the most important or most interesting information, featuring the most
relevant of the Ws and H.

• The lead should be able to stand alone and make the reader understand the most important
information about a news situation. It should be written in standard grammatical form.

• The lead should not overwhelm the reader with information. Save some facts for the body of the
story.

• The lead should avoid beginning with a question.

• The lead should avoid beginning with a direct quotation.

• The lead keeps the subject and verb close together.

• The lead is written in an active voice.

• The lead uses specific, interest-arousing words rather than generic terms (oak rather than tree,
stumbled rather than walked clumsily).
OTHER TYPES

Descriptive Lead: As the name suggests, this type of lead goes into great detail to describe the
scene or person that makes up the subject of the story. The idea is to create a visual impact. It
describes how an event happened rather than simply telling what the event is about.

Punch Lead: It uses strong verbs and short sentences that are meant to create an impact. The
purpose of this type of lead is to give a jolt so that the reader take note.

Contrast Lead: This lead uses two different thoughts or two sentences that are exactly opposite
to each other in the opening paragraph to make a strong statement. The contrast in the lead is
employed to drive home the point about a particular event, person or happening. For eg pitting joy
against sorrow, new against old, tragedy against happiness are some of the ways to do it.

Anecdotal Lead: An interesting anecdote can pull the reader’s attention which statistics or
straight narration of fact necessarily wont. This kid is rarely used for breaking news but works well
for both soft stores and news-based features.

Quotation lead: Quotes frequently are the essential documentation for a lead and should be used
immediately after a paraphrase that summarises them. Here paraphrasing the verbatim quotation
permits the removal of unnecessary words. But if a verbatim quotation itself is very important or
interesting, it can be the lead itself. This lead would add an element of interest such as drama,
pathos, humour, astonishment, or some other factor that will reach out to the reader.

Question lead: Many editors dislike question lead on the basis that people read newspapers to
get answers, and not to be asked questions. But if the question is provocative, it may be used as
a lead.

'You' lead (or Direct Address lead): The `You' lead is intended to make a personal appeal to the
reader involved in a complicated situation. The second-person approach reaches out to involve
the reader and capture his/her attention. Here is an example, fairly typical of a trend toward
consumerism in the news:

WASHINGTON (UPI) -- If you are one of 30 million Americans working for a company with a private
pension plan, Congress has given you a new bill of rights. It is the Employment Retirement Income
Security Act and it promises that if you have worked long enough to earn a pension, you will
receive one at retirement age. Nothing -- including bankruptcy, plant closings, dismissal or
resignation -- can stand in the way.

Blind identification lead: If the person concerned is not well known in the community, his/her
name is less important than other salient facts that identify the person. eg. "an 80-year-old
woman" instead of her name.

A police inspector's son was attacked with a knife by some miscreants on Mount Road this
evening.

Many leads do not really fall into particular categories but use the features of different types of
leads to create a unique beginning.
FEATURE STORIES

A feature story is a creative, sometimes subjective article designed primarily to entertain and to
inform readers of an event, a situation or an aspect of life.

Feature stories are usually longer than news reports and columns and are written about a range of
topics including society, health, food, politics, entertainment, individuals, the environment, sport,
economics and current issues, etc.

Following are some of the most important characteristics of feature stories:

1. They may inform, instruct and advise, but their primary purpose is to entertain the readers.
They are usually read after the news and in leisure moments.
2. They are factual, and require reporting.
3. They may or may not be timely. If they are timely and related to a current news event, they
are likely to appeal more to readers.
4. They may be written in any form and style. The only criterion is that the form and style be
appropriate to the contents and purpose of the story.
5. They permit the reporter to use his/her knowledge and ingenuity to write a story original in
ideas and treatment.
6. They rarely have news leads. Instead, they more often have novelty leads.
7. They usually strike the keynote in the opening sentences, which permit the readers to
come into quick contact with the story and become interested.
8. They usually are not cut in make-up. Thus, the reporter may use any devices of the fiction
writer: suspense, dialogue, description, narration, climax, and the like. The inverted
pyramid does fit the purpose of a feature story.
9. They require the writer to apply his/her imaginations to the facts, yet they are not fiction.
10. They usually can be improved by rewriting to eliminate all writing faults. For example,
stodginess, verbosity-, abstractness, monotony and absence of rhythm, etc.
11. They bring readers as close as possible to the experience or idea of the story. The reader
feels himself as a part of the story.

TYPES OF FEATURES

News Feature story has its basis upon timely news happening with a human-interest angle is
called a news feature Often a news happening can be made much more interesting or
newsworthy by writing it in a semi-feature sort of thing. A news feature is generally timelier than a
straight human interest or a long feature story.

Historical Feature. though It is deal with events or personalities of the past, have interest for
present day readers because the facts these features give:

• are timely.
• are unique.
• throw new light on an old story.
• debunk wrong popular beliefs.
• promote speculation and imagery among the readers.

Informative Feature. This type does not use many of the fiction writer's devices, since its
purpose is to inform more than to entertain. It may be very closely related to the so called "New
Journalism". Facts for this type are usually obtained from interviews, library research and personal
observation. To create interest, feature writer includes human-interest elements in his feature. Its
success depends upon the accuracy of facts and the style and form with which it is presented.

Biographical/ Personality Sketches. It is very popular among the readers as everybody wants to
know about other people. These features are written about those men and women whose stories
are worth telling because they are historical characters in whom interest survives long after they
are dead.

This type is not easy to write as it is an uphill task to portray a personality with artistic
preciseness. Facts about the person are obtained from his friends, teachers, relatives and
associates. While writing a personality sketch a feature writer must avoid, stereotyped pattern that
finds its way into these features very often.

Human Interest Feature Story. Human-interest sketches are written under the influence of
humorous and pathetic incidents that are reported in the daily routine. It usually develops from an
ordinary incident or situation but due to fantastic style of composition appeals to the emotions.
But it must be kept in mind that it is based upon facts of a timely nature. Its news value is almost
nil and it would not have been published if it were not presented in an interesting and entertaining
style. Therefore it entertains more than it informs. It may be written about almost anything i.e.
person's places, animals etc.

Interpretative Feature. Interpretative features inform, instruct and throw light on the background
of certain problems. The following topics are usually discussed under the heading or interpretative
feature.

• Social problems
• Economic problems
• Political problems
• Problems of everyday life

Scientific Feature. Popularised scientific articles, bridging the gap, which separated the scientist
and journalist for a long-time present scientifically accurate facts in a non-technical easily
understood language.

COLUMNS

A column is written weekly, monthly or bimonthly, and must be focused on one particular topic.
You have to be consistent in what you write, maintain the same tone of voice, and stay focused on
the issue at hand. A column can last from three to four months, to ten or maybe even twenty.
What differentiates a column from other forms of journalism is that it meets each of the following
criteria:

• It is a regular feature in a publication

• It is personality-driven by the author

• It explicitly contains an opinion or point of view

There are two main types of analytical writing in newspapers: editorials and opinion columns.
Opinion columns are often found on the page opposite the editorial page. The page is usually
labelled "Opinions" or “Comment." Opinion columns may be found elsewhere in the newspaper
as well, especially on the page preceding the editorial page. Opinion columns are usually labelled
as such, to separate them from news reports.

Column and a news report:

The main difference between a column and news reports is that opinion columns are subjective
rather than objective. This means that they express an opinion or make an argument. A news
report, for example, might list various mistakes that a politician has committed. It would not
however, go on to state that because of these mistakes the politician should resign. An opinion
column, however, may do exactly this.

When reading an opinion column, it is helpful to imagine that the writer is engaged in a debate
with his or her readers. The writer is trying to persuade you or convince you that a certain point of
view is the correct one. There are, however, important differences between editorials and opinion
columns.

Column and an editorial:

Personal columns differ from editorials in that editorial is a voice, policy and ideology of the
newspaper whereas a column is a viewpoint of the columnist himself. This viewpoint of the
columnist may come in conflict with the newspaper or the editorial's stance at times. Only
columnist is responsible for his words whereas the whole newspaper is responsible is for the
words which appear in editorials

QUALITY WRITING

1. Conscious writing: Even on deadline, a story needs to be carefully crafted. With

experience, you learn how to do it under pressure.

2. Simple is stylish: Stories should appear simple but be packed with meaning, and that
comes from careful crafting. Excessive wording drags a story down, so make sure every
word has been hand-picked for your story.

3. Human interest: Good stories, even shorter ‘hard news’ pieces, are improved if an
element of human interest is included.

4. News angle: The converse is that softer, longer features are improved if a news angle is
included.

5. Show, do not tell: Use physical descriptions rather than abstract concepts to convey your
information. Use all your senses when gathering news and writing stories so that the
reader can do likewise.

6. Avoid clichés: News editors and readers are looking for something unique. Using clichés
in your attempts to include description and meaning can bog your story down.

7. Pace and rhythm: These are very important in writing – through the story as a whole, and
within each sentence. If your writing is jarring, it will immediately put the reader off.

8. Variety: Facts and figures, descriptions, direct quotes and personalities are blended
together for a compelling story.
 9. Transitions: Your story must flow easily from one theme or element to the next. This
means your linking sentences are a very important part of the crafting process.

10. Story-telling: Remember that every story has to appeal to

the age-old human love of ‘a good yarn’. A carefully planned beginning, middle and
ending, and the journey they will take the reader on, must constantly be on your mind as
you craft your story.

NEWS SOURCES

The study of reporters and their news sources draws its roots from questions about bias, power,
and influence. Couched in an atmosphere of adversarial conditions, a key question in the early
literature concerned whether reporters or sources exert greater influence in shaping the news.
One extension of this question asks how journalists’ use of news sources leads toward a
particular news agenda that either favours or excludes some issues over others. A second
extension asks if source power provides the ability to subsidise the time and effort required for
reporting.

In essence, the relationship between reporters and their sources has long been depicted as a
battle for power over public opinion and public consent. Journalists end up in a role of protecting
society from corruption, while officials in government and business take on the task of protecting
their own interests at all costs. But these kinds of power only represent something ephemeral, that
is, the ability to shape the outcome of specific issues and policies. Once the outcome is resolved,
the power battle begins anew.

The basic relationship between reporters and their sources can thus be seen as “portable,” that is,
the relationship exists in all press systems, from the most authoritarian to the most libertarian, if in
different forms. Even when examining the same situation, what might be seen as an element of
freedom through one lens of journalistic professionalism might be viewed as rather constrained
through another. In every case, a fundamental belief of journalists is that they cannot simply make
up news but instead must rely on what they have been told by somebody holding a perceived
level of authority.

Build up a list of sources with whom you stay in regular contact. As you develop a relationship
with them, they will call you with story ideas. When you call them, they will give you up-to-date
information which you can then analyse as possible story ideas.

Police and emergency services: They are the front line of all crime and accidents in your city.
Stay in touch with them, or speak to your news editor to see if anything interesting has come up.

Press conferences: These can be a mine of information, and a good opportunity to get
comments and pose questions to various parties. Do research on background information, and
craft some questions, beforehand. Caution against simply regurgitating what you hear there. Find
a unique angle, and hang around afterwards to ask more questions and build your contact list.

Press releases and invites: The story may seem like it has been dished up on a platter, but your
job is to explore the topic thoroughly, from various points of view. Never simply paraphrase what
you find there. Keep an eye out for ‘hidden agendas’ and ‘spin doctoring’.

Witnessing an unplanned event: Being in the right place at the right time is a stroke of luck. The
trick, then, is to think on the spot about your angle and any questions you could ask others who
are also on the scene.
Brainstorming: The news of the day always has spin-off story ideas. It is useful to brainstorm with
a group of reporters across beats to generate many story ideas.

Follow-ups: Readers love to find out what happened next. Do not leave them dangling. Keep
following a story you have already written to see if a newsworthy event follows in its footsteps.

Morning shows and radio: Breaking stories delivered by more immediate channels, like television
and radio, are limited by their timeframes. Good newspaper story ideas can develop from these
initial short reports.

Internet and other technology: There is no limit to what you can find on the internet. Websites,
social networking tools like Twitter and Facebook, chat rooms, blogs ... the list goes on.
Remember to keep an eye out for any new technological tools as they are a mine of story ideas.

Conversations: Casual conversations with family members or friends – or eavesdropping in

public places – can trigger a thought for a story.

Community leaders: They are often the window onto a range of stories or issues affecting a
specific community. It could be, amongst others, a geographical community, religious community,
or people united by their language, work, or culture.

Community workers: People who work out in the field have excellent knowledge of what is
happening ‘on the ground’ in various communities. Building a relationship with them is important.
The more they trust you to handle stories sensitively, the more they will give you information.

Local newsletters and community papers: Local news stories sometimes shed light on a story
that has broader significance or is interesting to a readership beyond its location.

Non-government Organisations: Often engaged in both research and fieldwork,

non-government organisations often have knowledge of ‘hidden corners’ of society and can
introduce you to some useful contacts.

Lobby groups: People involved in a cause love being heard. This makes them excellent sources,
though one should never become their mouthpiece without finding balanced information.

Official reports and research papers: Academic research, reports and statistics often contain
information that is of interest to a mainstream readership. Your job is to make it more user-friendly
for the public, and to place it in context.

Foreign publications: Stories from overseas can ignite an idea for a local exploration of the same
or a similar topic.

Mailing lists: They might annoy you by clogging your inbox, but mailing lists often provide small
nuggets for much greater stories.
Impact of different information intermediaries on diversity of supply and exposure

Exercise: Read about News-Sourcing agencies (also known as Wire agencies): Say PTI, UNI,
ANI, IANS
INTERVIEWING SKILLS: HOW TO INTERVIEW

Interviews are the main sources of information for journalists, for many reasons.

• Direct quotes in an article, or real voices and faces on air, give the story credibility. They are
evidence of attribution: the in- formation is not just coming from you, the journalist.

• Interviews are more lively, interesting and up-to-date than documents, and potentially more
honest than press releases and other public relations material.

• Journalists work under pressure. You may get a long report about an important issue from the
government or a research institute, but you are not likely to have the time to read every word
and understand it thoroughly. So it is easier and quicker to call someone who has deeper
knowledge.

• As a journalist, you are not an expert, so you must rely on others who are experts.

• The way you conduct an interview will depend on your aims and what you want to find out. You
may have one or more aims, and your approach will vary according to your aims:

If you want information —

You are most likely to ask straightforward, ‘who’, ‘what’, ‘when’, ‘where’, ‘why’ questions, for
example, “Who was involved?”; “How did it happen?”; “How many people were present?”; “What
time did it start?” and so on.

If you are investigating, probing or challenging —

The information you want is much deeper, and interviews of this kind can become quite hostile.

For example, if you are calling government to account, you might interview an official and follow
up information with more probing questions:

“Why was this allowed to happen?”

“Who was responsible for the safety regulations?”

“Is it police policy to extract information through beating suspects?” You might ask for a
comment: “In your opinion, should prisoners be kept 15 to a cell?”

If you want background and contextual information

You are likely to ask questions like, “Would this normally hap- pen?”; “Has this happened in the
past?”; “What policies are there on this?”

You might want analysis or interpretation — Your questions will be more about meaning:

“What does this tax increase mean for the rights of older people to security of income?”

“How will the new law change girls’ rights to go to school?”

“How will the new border policy affect migrants coming to work in our country?”

Or a personal interview —
You will include questions about the person’s history, character, opinions and experience. You
could also include emotional questions, like, “How did you feel when it happened?”
With emotional interviews, avoid obvious questions like, “How did you feel about the death of
your daughter?” And avoid being patronising — don’t say things like, “I know just how you feel....”
— because you almost certainly don’t!

Before, during and after

There are different types of interviews, and each has its advantages and disadvantages. In your
work as a journalist, you will conduct face-to-face interviews, telephonic interviews, and
interviews over email. The interviews you conduct – whether for five minutes on the phone or an
hour in person – can make or break a story. There are certain skills you need to master for the
‘before’, ‘during’, and ‘after’ phases of an interview. Please note: some of these points are only
applicable to the face-to- face interview.

Before

Know what you want: Different interviews have different purposes. You might be seeking
information, or exploring someone’s personality, or hearing the ‘other’ side of a contentious issue.
Whatever the purpose of an interview is, you must be clear about it before you begin planning.

Proper briefing: Make sure you know what your news editor has in mind for the story, and
express your ideas too. This will play a role in how you plan and conduct the interview.

Background research: Displaying ignorance or wasting time asking basic questions can put the
interviewee off.

Preparing questions: Write up a list of questions before conducting the interview. As you do this,
keep checking them against your ultimate ‘purpose’ for the interview.

Dress: You need to strike a balance between looking professional and placing the subject of the
interview at ease.

Punctuality: Being late is unprofessional, and can get your interviewee’s back up.

Time allocation: Estimate how much time you need for the interview, and let the subject know
how long you are hoping to meet with him/ her. Allow for flexibility, however.

Put yourself in the readers’ shoes: Your questions should be designed to elicit information that
the readers would want to know. Try to imagine what the readers themselves would ask the
subject if they were given the chance, but avoid clichés and ‘the obvious’.

Look beyond: Also think up some off-beat or quirky questions which will provide greater insight
into the topic you are writing on or personality you are profiling.

Choose equipment: Dictaphone, notepad or laptop? All these have their advantages and
disadvantages. Make sure you choose the right one for each specific interview.

Check equipment: Malfunctioning equipment can spell disaster

in an interview situation, so you should always check that it works before you go. If you are opting
to use a Dictaphone or laptop, have a notepad and pen with you just in case.

During

Prepare but be flexible: Research and pre-written questions are useful, but you should also allow
the interview to take its own natural course.
Your own bias: Go to an interview with an open mind. Let the interviewee really ‘speak’, even if
you do not believe or agree with what he or she is saying. Leave your own assumptions out of it.

Body language: Remain professional at all times, but place the interviewee at ease.

In context: In some instances, a source will be more relaxed in their own environment which will
also help you to rely on visual clues to add some colour to the story. In other cases, the work or
home environment might prevent them from telling you the ‘full’ story.

Spelling: Make sure you have the correct spelling of every name that comes up in the interview,
particularly if it is something you cannot check on the internet later. It is embarrassing to have to
call an interviewee again to get the correct spelling.

Steering the interview: With your purpose in mind, guide the process so that it feels like a natural
conversation but still draws out the information you are seeking. Within that, do not be too rigid.

Asking uncomfortable questions: You need to strike a balance. Being pushy or abrasive does
not encourage interviewees to open up, but asking uncomfortable questions is part of the job.

Awkward silences: Avoid the temptation to jump in during awkward silences. This is often when
you will get the best information out of an interviewee.

After

Take a breather: If you have time, let the interview settle down in your mind before you tackle it.
What is important and what is not will become clearer.

Start looking at your notes or listening to your recording: The first time you go through them,
just read them or listen to them as if it is your first encounter with them.

Start putting notes into some kind of order: Group all the information under different themes.

Brainstorm angles: Make a list of all the possible angles for your story as informed by the
interview. Decide which will be most unique or interesting and which will easily engage the
readers.

Go back to the question of ‘what will readers want to know?’: One can lose perspective on
the overall topic after an interview, so go back to thinking about the readers as the target of your
story.

INTERVIEWING OFFICIAL SOURCES

• Disinformation — inaccurate or false information that is deliberately spread.

• Public relations — information put out by an institution to improve its reputation and win
public goodwill.

• Spin — interpretation of issues or events to persuade the public to view a certain public figure,
organisation, law, action or set of actions favourably. Spin usually involves deliberate
manipulation of the facts. People who develop spin are referred to as “spin doctors.”
• The official line — a position taken up by an institution which the public is intended to believe;
the institution’s spokespeople (official sources) and messages will consistently reinforce the
official line.

The voice of authority

Official sources represent social institutions and

associations. They usually hold positions in these
organisations and speak on behalf of institutions. For
example, a member of the board of directors, a chief
executive officer, a public relations officer or a senior
man- ager may be a company’s official source on
matters relating to that company; a government
minister, civil servant or departmental spokesperson
is an official source for a government department; a trade unionist is an official source on a matter
involving workers’ rights; a police spokesperson is an official source for the police.

Information from official sources carries a lot of weight, because official sources have — or are
believed by the public to have — both power and knowledge. An official source is generally a
senior person in an institution and therefore someone who should know about the topic being
reported, as well as about the positions, agendas and views of the institutions they represent.

Official sources are the voices of authority and legitimacy. The more senior an official source, the
more likely they are to be believed. This presents both opportunities and challenges for journalists.

Interviewing official sources

Because official sources have power, they inspire awe and deference. Journalists are sometimes
fearful of challenging them. In some cases, it is right to be afraid: when challenged, powerful
people may take revenge. Many journalists who have challenged official sources have suffered
intimidation — arrest, assault and threats; some have been murdered. Where journalists challenge
powerful institutions on their human rights records, they are raising the threat of investigation and
people in the institution may face arrest and prosecution. So there is a lot at stake for powerful
institutions when confronted about human rights.

However, an important role of journalism is to hold the powerful to account, so it is important to

challenge official sources when there is justification for doing so.

Three broad groups of official sources

Official sources who want to be interviewed.

These official sources will be quite easy to interview; they want to share information and the
interview will be relaxed and friendly. However, it is important to remember that they represent the
official line: be careful to verify the information and challenge their statements by asking
well-researched follow-up questions.

Official sources who do not want to be interviewed.

These are official sources who have something to hide. They are much more difficult to interview,
and you must be well-prepared and confident.

Official sources who want to remain anonymous

This is a complex and difficult group, and you will have to be very careful. Ask yourself — why do
they want to remain anonymous? What are their agendas? Anonymous sources have different
reasons for wanting to remain
anonymous. The most likely reason is
self- protection, but there may be
other interests and agendas at play.
Assess official sources who want to
remain anonymous as carefully as you
would any other source; especially
consider their reasons for wanting to
remain anonymous. Treat them as you
would any other anonymous source.
Ask them: “Is there anyone who
would be prepared to go on the
record with this information?” If there
is, be sure to interview that person.

READY RECKONER: Tips for interviewing official sources

Be prepared

Good preparation is the golden rule for all interviews. It is absolutely essential when you are
interviewing official sources. It is best to cultivate relationships with official sources before an
issue comes up. Of course, this is not always possible.

Before the interview, conduct as much background research as possible, about both the source
as a person and the issue being addressed. What kind of a person is the source? What is
his/her position in the organisation? What has s/he said before about the issue? What is the
official line? What facts do you know about the story? Which can you be sure of? What are you
less clear about? You can only challenge an official source if you know your facts; if you make a
mistake, you will look like a novice and the official source may dismiss further questions. If you are
not prepared, you may be misled by your source and risk reporting half-truths and carefully
“sanitised” information as facts.

Sometimes you may only have a few minutes to prepare. If this is the case, ask yourself: What do
I know about the situation? Jot down notes and plan a line of questions based on what you know.

Decide your news line or angle in advance

Decide what you want the outcome of the interview to be — your news line — and pursue it. But
be open to the unexpected. If some- thing emerges during the interview, be prepared to change
course.

Prepare your strategy; draft an interview guide

What kind of interviewee is the official source? Friendly? Hostile? What interests are at play? The
answers to these questions will help you decide your approach and the order of your questions.

Draft a list of questions in the order you want to ask them — but remember, listen to the answers.
Do not stick rigidly to your guide; think on your feet and ask follow-up questions or follow new
lines of questioning as they emerge.
Your interview guide should have a logical structure that is partly determined by the topic; partly
by the nature of the interviewee.

If the source is willing to be interviewed and you feel confident that you will get the information
that you want easily, your plan and question guide can be relaxed.

But if you believe the official source does not want to speak to you, or will try to confuse you with
spin or just toe the official line, the order of questions is very important. A good way of putting a
difficult or reluctant interviewee off their guard is to start by asking for information that you know
they feel comfortable with, then switch to more difficult and probing questions.

If you have time, discuss and test your interview strategy and guide with your news editor or
colleagues.

Take your notes to the interview

You will have done some background research and made notes. Bring them with you and make
sure they are organised so that you can quickly refer to them if you need to challenge something
your source says. Make sure your question guide and your notes work well together. For example:

Be sceptical, challenging and probing, but always be polite

Journalists hold the powerful to account and serve the public’s right to information, and therefore
have a responsibility to challenge powerful institutions and people. But this does not mean being
rude. Always respect your sources; be direct, but not argumentative or aggressive.

Be provocative if necessary. Do not be afraid of confronting the interviewee with other points of
view. This is also a way of ensuring the other side of the story is reflected in the interview. For
example: “You say that the police attacks on the demonstrators were justified. But the opposition
National Party says they were completely unprovoked. What is your response to the National
Party’s point of view?”

Stay in control of the interview

You are the interviewer, therefore you are in control. Official sources may try to use their power
and knowledge to take control of the interview. Guard against this. If you lose control, the
interviewee has won, and you will not be able to fulfil your role as a journalist. The public will hear
only public relations, spin and the official line.

Do not let the interviewee ask the questions. If this happens, politely assert your position: “Thank
you, but I am conducting the interview here.” And then immediately ask another question.

Remind yourself to be strong

As you go into the interview, remind yourself to be brave and strong. You are going to have to ask
difficult questions. Be pre- pared to do this.

Look — and be — confident

Good preparation will give you confidence. As with any interview, you must also look confident
and professional. Dress properly and be sure you have the right equipment (tape recorders;
cameras) and be sure the equipment works. If you have a camera crew or any other team
members, be sure that they are also professionally dressed, and well-briefed about the
interviewee and the interview.
Be human

If the official source says something that shocks or surprises you, do not be afraid of showing
your feelings. This will add to the interaction between you and the source, and it will help inform
your audience. This is especially important for TV and radio journalists: your reactions will help
shed light on the issue.

Keep your emotions in check

Official sources may tell outright lies. Challenge and probe; try to expose the lie, but do not show
anger. Do not be aggressive, argumentative or rude.

Challenge the official line

Watch out for public relations, spin and disinformation, and challenge these when you recognise
them. The best way to challenge these is to assert what you know. For example: “But according
to the government’s own White Paper on Access for the Disabled, only 23% of hospitals have
wheelchair access.” Or, you could quote other sources. For example: “But Sir, only two weeks ago
the Minister of Defence said that the army was involved in the northern part of the country....” The
more you know about the issue, the more likely you will be able to ask challenging questions and
get official sources to move away from the official line.

Concentrate and be quick on your feet

While you listen to answers, think about your next question or which direction you want to go
next.

Rely on your instincts

If you believe what you are hearing is not true, trust your instincts. Challenge and probe.

Ask for opinions as well as information

Official sources are likely to be more comfortable with informa- tion and facts. One way of
challenging them is to ask for their personal opinions. They will resist, but they may also be
discomforted and give information they did not intend to.

Know where you are going

Avoid asking questions when you are absolutely uncertain what the answer might be. You do not
want to be caught by surprise, or put on the back foot. Official sources sometimes introduce new
information into interviews in order to change difficult lines of questioning. Watch out for this.
USING ANONYMOUS SOURCES

Anonymous sources may give you the core of a story; sometimes background or insider
information; sometimes just a tip-off. What- ever the value or amount of information, you must
handle requests for anonymity with great care.

Should you use anonymous sources?

This is a difficult decision that raises serious ethical issues. Some media forbid the use of
anonymous sources. Others allow it, but with strict guidelines.

In general, sources who speak on the record are always the best option in any story. But
sometimes, you do not have a choice. Some
stories would never be published if journalists
did not have the option of allowing sources to
be anonymous.

Why use anonymous sources?

• To get the story out if there is no other way.

• To protect your source. Sources may risk

their reputations, jobs or even their lives by
speaking to journalists.

• To protect your relationship with your

source. If you fail to protect a source who
has asked to remain anonymous, you will
lose that source.

• If you use them carefully, anonymous

sources can be very useful.

Why is it better to use named sources?

• Named sources give the story credibility: they are like witnesses.

• They are more likely to tell the truth.

• They are less likely to change their story.

• The journalist is seen to be acting professionally; that is, reporting what is happening; what
others see and say.

• Readers can make up their own minds about whether to believe what the source says, based
on the person’s reputation or position.

What are the arguments against using anonymous sources?

• Anonymous sources create an atmosphere of gossip, rumour and speculation.

• The public might think the journalist is making the story up.

• Anonymous sources may be promoting certain agendas or interests and using the journalists
for their own ends, leading to bias.
• It is harder for the public to decide whether to believe what the source says, because they don’t
know the person’s reputation, position, or connections.

NEWSWORTHINESS

News values

When making decisions, journalists also consider “news values.” News values are qualities that
make information newsworthy. News values have been developed over many years, through
practice and experience, and are not rigidly defined. They are what the media have come to
believe will attract interest and audiences. Like the values of good journalism, they vary in
different media, but there is a generally agreed list:

To be newsworthy, the story must have some or all of the following values:

Impact — the story must be relevant to people’s lives. For example, stories about price rises,
political developments and climate change all have a direct impact on people’s lives.

Public interest — do people have a right to know the information? Do people need to know?
Will telling the story prevent harm or save lives? Will it inform the decisions they make?

Timeliness — the story includes information that people need to know in order to organise
their lives in the present.

Proximity — close to home. A crime in your own city is more important to your community
than a crime that is far away.

Currency — what’s in the public focus at the time, e.g. controversial issues, cultural trends,
topics of debate set in motion by recent events.

Development Goals — is approaching. Race and racism were “hot” topics when Barack
Obama, America’s first black president, was elected in 2008.

Novelty — events that are unexpected or surprising. The “man bites dog” story.

How do you recognise a good story?

To recognise a good story, you need a good “news sense.”

“News sense is recognising the potential news value in facts that might by themselves seem
unimportant, and selecting the parts that will interest people. It is finding ways to bring the
audience into the story. It is making connections between facts and events and predicting the
ways an audience will react.”

—“Understanding Journalism,” Lynette Sheridan Burns

We are bombarded by events and information all the time, but we are limited by deadlines and
space. Having news sense means you can make quick decisions about what stories to follow
and what facts to include.

Most journalists develop news sense over time. Here is a set of questions to help you develop
good news sense and to choose your stories:
 • Would people be interested to know about this?

• Who are the stakeholders — that is, who are the people who would be most affected
by the story? Who else would be affected?

• What is the news value — is it unexpected, timely, current, “close to home” ...?

• Is it in the public interest?

• How will it affect people’s lives?

• What is my own relationship to the issue? To what extent am I driven by my own

interests? What values / beliefs / connections do I have that may be influencing me?

Is news found or made?

What exactly qualifies as news? And is news made, or found? How do events become news?

The analysis provided a list of news characteristics:

• frequency (daily events fared well, while long term social trends did not);
• threshold (high impact events were favoured);
• unambiguity (ability to clearly interpret events);
• meaningfulness (content needs to be contextualised within the familiar frames for local
audiences);
• consonance (refers to the possibility of an impending event);
• unexpectedness (refers to the element of surprise or level of novelty);
• continuity (continuing coverage of an event or issue);
• composition (has a strong resonance with the newspaper’s ideological agenda and target
audience);
• reference to elite nations (whose actions are considered relatively consequential);
• reference to elite people (whose actions are considered relatively consequential);
• reference to persons (presenting events as the actions of named people rather than a
result of social forces); and
• reference to something negative (element of conflict or drama, even surprise or shock).

Drawing on this work, these news values are put to the test empirically in two influential studies of
the. Taking into account the role of search engines and social media, a revised and updated list of
factors that determine ‘newsworthiness’ was drafted to include:

• Exclusivity: Stories generated by, or available first to, the news organisation as a result of
interviews, letters, investigations, surveys, polls and so on;

• Bad news: Stories with particularly negative overtones such as death, injury, defeat and loss (of
a job, for example);

• Conflict: Stories concerning conflict such as controversies, arguments, splits, strikes, fights,
insurrections and warfare;

• Surprise: Stories that have an element of surprise, contrast and/or the unusual about them;

• Audio-visuals: Stories that have arresting photographs, video, audio and/or which can be
illustrated with infographics;
• Share-ability: Stories that are thought likely to generate sharing and comments via Facebook,
Twitter and other forms of social media;

• Entertainment: Soft stories concerning sex, show business, sport, lighter human interest,
animals, or offering opportunities for humorous treatment, witty headlines or lists;

• Drama: Stories concerning an unfolding drama such as escapes, accidents, searches, sieges,
rescues, battles or court cases;

• Follow-up: Stories about subjects already in the news;

• The power elite: Stories concerning powerful individuals, organisations, institutions or

corporations;

• Relevance: Stories about groups or nations perceived to be influential with, or culturally or

historically familiar to, the audience;

• Magnitude: Stories perceived as sufficiently significant in the large numbers of people involved
or in potential impact, or involving a degree of extreme behaviour or extreme occurrence;

• Celebrity: Stories concerning people who are already famous;

• Good news: Stories with particularly positive overtones such as recoveries, breakthroughs,
cures, wins and celebrations; and

• News organisation’s agenda: Stories that set or fit the news organisation’s own agenda,
whether ideological commercial or as part of a specific campaign.

In this list, we can begin to see the contours of some of the impacts of digital platforms on news.
Most obviously, as editors become concerned with shareability, their definition of what constitutes
news may shift. Indeed, in various factors (surprise, entertainment, celebrity) we can see potential
pressures on what qualifies as news. In the digital platform landscape, definitions of news are
becoming extremely broad, it seems, with extensive scope for the ‘softest’ of content.

In this observation lies an acknowledgement that the selection of news is not a purely routine or
neutral process. News coverage is strongly influenced by logistics such as resource availability
and time constraints as well as subjective factors such as: the combination of social, educational,
ideological and cultural values of journalists; the organisational cultures of the news organisations
for which they work and their position in the organisational hierarchy; and the target audience for
whom the content is being produced.

All of these objective and subjective factors influence the selection of information that is
considered newsworthy, as well as the manner in which these events and issues are
reconstructed – or imagined – for consumption by news audiences.

FINDING STORIES

• The world is full of stories waiting to be written. A journalist has the power to ‘conduct’
those stories into the written word. That’s why news editors lose patience with reporters
who say they have nothing to write about.
 • On some days, the news editor will approach fellow journalists with a story idea. On many
other days, you will have to generate your own. This can seem daunting at first, but there
are countless avenues to explore.

• However you come by a story idea, make sure you apply some critical thinking. Your job is
to research the idea properly, not simply relay your first encounter with the story’s
tentacles.

Points to ponder:

• Think about whether your story is really newsworthy. To be so, it should contain at least one
of the following characteristics: proximity, prominence, timeliness, human interest, oddity or
consequence.

• Not everyone who’s reading will know something about the subject. Assume that the reader
has never read your publication before. You may need to add some background, but brief
explanations of projects or concepts can always go towards the end. They’re not part of the
news.

• Be active in your writing. The more action sentences that are included in the news story, the
more a reader will feel that it really happened. Try to avoid passive sentences – not easy
when you’re used to scientific writing.

• Try to think of a catchy headline if possible.

• When you’re writing for the web, most of the same principles outlined here apply; but do
assume that your reader will devote even less time and attention to the story that a print
reader would. Reading from computer screens is tiring for the eyes and about 25% slower
than reading from printed matter. Make sure you answer the Five Ws as early as possible.
Keep your paragraphs short.

• When you think you've finished, edit the story...and edit again. Remove words which aren't
completely necessary and avoid repetition. As a rule, journalists will not use a long word
when a short one will do. Use ‘begin’ rather than ‘commence’, ‘used to’ rather than
‘accustomed to’, etc.; this makes your writing precise and succinct, and intelligible to the
vast majority of readers.

GATHERING NEWS

Time is a scarce commodity for journalists. Before you begin any story, take five minutes to come
up with a game plan: define exactly what you need to do to write the story properly. But, however
scarce time may be, adequate news gathering is fundamental, whether your story is a short news
piece or a longer feature.

A quick reference in your mind for news-gathering is the 3-P and T method: People, places, paper
trail and technology.

3-P and T

“People, places, paper, and technology”

People
Without people, there is no story.

Once you have got your story idea, you need to speak to a wide range of people (even for a short
article) to develop it further. These include, amongst others:

Sources: While you develop your story, stay in touch with the person/ people who gave you the
initial information that ignited the idea. Things can change from minute to minute.

Contacts: They can provide you with expert or insider information, and as you build a relationship
with them, they will contact you with information on a regular basis.

Witnesses: They are your eyes and ears for an incident they experienced first hand and which
you are now reporting on.

Ordinary people: They have no hidden agendas, and the readers can relate to them. They’ll tell
you about their own experience as it relates to the story.

Main players: Spokespersons, politicians, leaders and other ‘top dogs’ provide important
information and comment but these must be balanced against other views and well-researched
facts.

Places

Get out of the office and into the world

Hard evidence: A story is more credible when you have witnessed it – or its immediate aftermath
– first hand. The public is relying on you to give an account of events.

Many people in one place: Being out in the ‘field’, whether it is a conference, the scene of an
accident, or the courtroom, will give you access to many sources at once for face-to-face
questions.

Colour and atmosphere: There is nothing like ‘being there’ to give yourself, and therefore your
reader, a real sense of a story. Use all your senses.

Observation: Look, listen and keep quiet for a while. Your powers of observation will reward you
with crucial information which is more subtle than ‘hard evidence’.

Interviews: Sources will often refuse to meet up for an interview because they are too busy, but if
you catch them ‘on the scene’, they’re more likely to give you a slice of their time.

Time and convenience: With today’s technology, you can be on the scene of the story, write it
while you are there, and email it your news editor before you get back to the office. That way, you
are not just relying on notes after the fact.

On their own turf: Many interview subjects are more relaxed in their own environment and will
therefore be more candid if interviewed elsewhere.

Time constraints: There is not always time to be on the scene for a story, but you always have to
measure this against what you will gain from it. If you are on deadline and you cannot be there,
contact a reliable source who is there and who can feed you some colourful details.

Paper

There it is, in black and white

A paper trail provides clues, information and confirmation, and it might come in the form of a long
academic report from a university, or a person’s death certificate, to mention but two. It gives your
story credibility as the reader is given the hard facts thanks to your efforts. Paper-based research
is without limit, but here are some examples:

Public records: Birth, death and marriage records are very useful. Birth certificates verify
someone’s real name, the place and date of their birth, and their parents’ names. Death
certificates indicate time, place and cause of death. Marriage records include the names of both
parties, and the date and place of marriage.

Police and court records: These shed light on someone’s criminal record and what their
convictions, if any, were for.

Telephone directory: This may sound ancient but you can find your way to sources and confirm
physical addresses with this age-old treasure. This stands redundant in the ever-changing digital
world though. It would apply especially while unearthing a legacy matter in hand.

Old newspapers: Articles that never found their way into new forms of computer-based
technology can be very useful when researching the history or background of a story.

Other: You can find information in the property register, traffic department records, judgments
from legal cases, and many other such documents.

Technology

The IT (information technology) revolution has changed the nature of research

Internet: One wonders how reporters managed to conduct research on deadline before the
internet came along. Online dictionaries, digital news sites, data bases, blogs, information
websites and many other useful tools are available at the click of a button, but make sure you
assess them critically.

Email: This has exponentially sped up the process of asking people for information. It also means
you have their answers ‘in writing’ should a legal problem arise at a later stage.

Cell phones: As you write stories, keep a list of all the cell phone numbers you acquire. It is then
easier to conduct research on deadline if you can get hold of the right people immediately. Text
messages have also come to play an important role in the process of gathering news.

Social networking: Twitter, Facebook, and other social networking tools are increasingly playing
a role in helping journalists mine the information they need.

The sky’s the limit: Technology is changing and developing at a rate faster than ever before. As a
journalist, you need to be aware of any developments that might aid you in collecting information
for your stories.

STORY STRUCTURE

The way you structure your story will determine its impact on the readers. If it is well structured, it
will be compelling to read. Whether it is a short news piece written on deadline, or a longer feature
that has taken a while to research, the way you structure your story is of utmost importance.
Stories need to be ‘crafted’ just like any work of art.
Angle: You cannot decide on the structure of your story until you have decided what your angle is
going to be.

How you would tell a friend: It is useful to imagine how you would tell your friend the story in a
conversation. A sense of structure will begin to emerge.

Active structuring: Typing up your written notes does not mean you have structured your story.
You need to select and reorder the information to give you your first draft.

Themes: You should group all your information into different themes or ideas. You can then see
what type of order they should follow.

Theme sentences: These alert the reader what you are about to tell them next. What follows is
the information and who or where you got it from.

Chronology: Some stories work best as a description of what happened from one moment to the
next. This is a chronological structure, but the story should still be placed in context with some
guidance for the reader as to why it is newsworthy or significant.

Logical flow: A story needs to move from one theme or sub-topic to the next in a logical manner.
It should never read like a ‘list’. Think of obvious questions that would arise next in readers’ minds.

Linking sentences: The reader should be able to ‘glide’ from one theme to the next if intelligent
linking sentences are used. The connection between one theme and the next should be clear.

Headlines, blurbs, captions and pictures: Your story will not exist in isolation. It will be on a
page with a headline, and very often, a blurb, picture and caption too. Bear this in mind when
deciding on structure, and feel free to make suggestions to the layout and copy editors.

Genres: Your structure should be appropriate for the genre of story you are writing. For example,
a hard news piece would not begin with a lengthy description, while a feature allows more space
for each theme.

Beyond the inverted pyramid: Before, journalists were always told to cover the ‘who, what,
where, when, how and why’ in the beginning of the story. Today, this structure is only suitable for
some stories, so you must think about it critically before you begin.

Introductions: The way you begin your story is closely related to how you structure it. The first
paragraph gives the reader a sense of what the story is about, so make sure your structure
echoes that.

Substantiation: All information in a story has to be substantiated. For example, throughout your
story you might be attributing quotes to your sources, describing what you saw with your own
eyes, or explaining where you got your statistics from. This all has to be woven into the structure
of your story.

End of Unit III

 UNIT IV

JOURNALISM ETHICS

Driven by a shared professional identity and journalistic values, the news industry has maintained
a range of accountability instruments including industry codes of ethics and journalistic norms
and practices. The contemporary media environment has introduced new challenges to
journalistic quality: the 24/7 news cycle; algorithms; the blogosphere. For consumers, this
represents a new information asymmetry. In response to escalating quality challenges, a number
of online communities have assumed the roles of news media ‘watchdog’, ‘fact-checker’ and
‘critic’. Indicators of journalistic quality can be grouped under three sets of criteria: content
indicators; organisational indicators; and audience engagement indicators. The current regulatory
framework for the news media is fragmented. There are ways in which digital platforms, as
participants within the broader social framework for news media, could help maintain journalism’s
accountability schemes.

Ethics is the analysis, evaluation and promotion of what constitutes correct conduct and virtuous
character in light of the best available principles. Ethical reasoning is about how people interpret,
balance and modify their principles in light of new facts, new technology, and new social
conditions. The boundaries of ethics change. In our time, ethics has come to include such issues
as animal cruelty, violence against women, the environment and the rights of homosexuals. Ethics
is the never-completed project of inventing, applying and critiquing the principles that guide
human interaction, define social roles and justify institutional structures. Therefore, ethics,
especially journalism ethics, is essentially a practical activity that seeks reasons to questions of
how to act.

Is it ethical for journalists to reveal their confidential sources to police?

Is it ethical to invade the privacy of a much-admired politician to investigate alleged misconduct?

Ethics includes the theoretical study of the concepts and modes of justification that provide
ethical reasons for acting. But the purpose here is also practical: to clarify principles and improve
deliberation so as to lead to well-considered ethical judgments. A stress on the practical in ethics
assures us that “the problems we have followed into the clouds are, even intellectually, genuine
not spurious”

Journalism ethics is a species of applied media ethics that investigates the “micro” problems of
what individual journalists should do in particular situations, and the “macro” problems of what
news media should do, given their role in society. Journalists as members of news organisations
have rights, duties and norms because as human beings, they fall under general ethical principles
such as to tell the truth and minimise harm, and because as professionals they have social power
to frame the political agenda and influence public opinion.

Therefore, a question about journalism is an ethical question, as opposed to a question of

prudence, custom or law, if it evaluates conduct in light of the fundamental public purposes and
social responsibilities of journalism. A story that sensationalises the personal life of a public figure
may be legal—it may be legally “safe” to publish—but it may be unethical in being inaccurate and
unfair. However, there is no necessary incompatibility between ethical values and other types of
value. A story may be well-written, legal and career-enhancing, yet also ethical. What one regards
as a question of journalism ethics depends, ultimately, on one’s conception of the primary
functions of journalism and the principles that promote those aims. Consequently, there is room
for disagreement on the level of practice, in applying norms, and on the level of theory and
principle.

PROBLEM AREAS

A major task of journalism ethics is to determine how existing norms apply to the main ethical
issues of the day. Some current problem areas are:

• Accuracy and verification: How much verification and context is required to publish a
story? How much editing and “gate-keeping” is necessary?

• Independence and allegiances: How can journalists be independent but maintain ethical
relations with their employers, editors, advertisers, sources, police and the public. When is
a journalist too close to a source, or in a conflict of interest?

• Deception and fabrication: Should journalists misrepresent themselves or use recording

technology, such as hidden cameras, to get a story? Should literary journalists invent
dialogue or create composite “characters”?

• Graphic images and image manipulation: When should journalists publish graphic or
gruesome images? When do published images constitute sensationalism or exploitation?
When and how should images be altered?

• Sources and confidentiality: Should journalists promise confidentiality to sources? How

far does that protection extend? Should journalists go “off the record”?

• Special situations: How should journalists report hostage-takings, major breaking news,
suicide attempts and other events where coverage could exacerbate the problem? When
should journalists violate privacy?

• Ethics across media types: Do the norms of mainstream print and broadcast journalism
apply to journalism on the Internet? To citizen journalists?

The history of journalism ethics can be divided into five stages. The first stage is the invention
of an ethical discourse for journalism as it emerged in Western Europe during the sixteenth and
seventeenth centuries. Gutenberg’s press in the mid-fifteenth century gave birth to
printer-editors who created a periodic news press of “news-sheets” and “news-books” under
state control. Despite the primitive nature of their news-gathering, and the partisan nature of
their times, editors assured readers that they printed the impartial truth based on “matters of
fact.”

The second stage was the creation of a “public ethic” as the creed for the growing newspaper
press of the Enlightenment public sphere. Journalists claimed to be tribunes of the public,
protecting their liberty against government. They advocated reform and eventually revolution.
By the end of the eighteenth century, the press was a socially recognised institution, a power
to be praised or feared, with guarantees of freedom in the post-revolution constitutions of
America and France. This public ethic was the basis for the idea of a Fourth Estate—the press
as one of the governing institutions of society.

The third stage was the evolution of the idea of a Fourth Estate into the liberal theory of the
press, during the nineteenth century. Liberal theory began with the premise that a free and
independent press was necessary for the protection of the liberties of the public and the
promotion of liberal reform.

The fourth stage was the simultaneous development and criticism of this liberal doctrine across
the twentieth century. Both the development and the criticism were responses to deficiencies
in the liberal model. The “developers” were journalists and ethicists who constructed a
professional ethic of objective journalism, bolstered by social responsibility theory. Objectivism
sought to use adherence to fact and impartiality towards political parties to restrain a free press
that was increasingly sensational (or “yellow”) and dominated by business interests. The
“critics” were journalists who rejected the restraints of objective professional reporting and
practised more interpretive, partial forms of journalism such as investigative reporting and
activist (or advocacy) journalism.

VALUES OF GOOD JOURNALISM

The values of journalism guide journalists in exercising their power, and protect the public.
They are intended to guarantee good journalism.

According to the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ), there are about 400 written codes
for journalists, which vary in quality and comprehensiveness. Some news organisations have
their own lists of values and codes of practice. In other newsrooms, they are not written down,
but learned in practice through working with more experienced colleagues.

They vary from country to country to accommodate different situations and sensitivities. But
there are certain elements that are universal and recognised by all journalists. These are
journalism’s Big Five: truth, accuracy, independence, fairness and a commitment to minimise
harm.

Other important values say that good journalism should:

● Expose crime and corruption

● Make governments work better

● Promote open debate

● Explain the impact of events

● Be inclusive

● Respect privacy

● Promote the values of freedom of expression and information

> BEING FAIR AND ETHICAL

Above all else, a journalist must serve the public good and write responsibly. With many stories
you work on, sticking to that definition will be clear. Other stories will pose an ethical dilemma.

Basic fact-checking and accuracy: This is a non-negotiable rule in the newsroom. Make sure
that your sources are reliable, and that you have counter-checked every fact in your story.
Watchdog: The public relies on you to play the role of the ‘watchdog’. This means reporting
without bias on anything in the public interest.

Law versus ethics: You, as a journalist, are bound by the law just like anybody else. Make sure
you are up to date with legislation pertaining to the media, particularly the concept of ‘libel’.
Ethics, on the other hand, refers to principles that ensure moral behaviour. They are usually
contained in a Code of Conduct (see below).

Consult a lawyer: When in doubt, speak to your news editor about consulting a lawyer.

The whole process: You need to be fair and ethical from the moment you conceptualise a story
to the moment you send it through to your news editor. When you think of your topic, gather your
information, conduct interviews, and write up your stories, you need to think of all sides of the
story and how you are representing them.

Code of Conduct: Your newspaper will have a written Code of Conduct. This is your moral guide
as a journalist. Make sure you read it and refer to it as often as necessary.

Conflict of interest: Anything which threatens your impartiality as a journalist results in a conflict
of interest. This includes, amongst others, receiving payments or gifts from sources.

Deception: You might sometimes ‘embed’ yourself as a journalist. This means ‘blending into the
crowd’ to gather information through observation. You may not, however, conduct an interview
under the guise of being something other than a journalist.

Prejudice: All your writing should be free of discrimination and prejudice, whether it is obvious or
subtle. It should also not incite discrimination or prejudice in others. If you are not sure, discuss
this with your news editor.

Sensitivity to grief: While you should always do your best to ‘get the story’, this should not be at
the expense of a grieving family or friends.

Diversity: Sources should be as varied as possible, therefore representing a wide cross-section of

society.

Quoting out of context:If the meaning of a direct quote changes if you only use part of it or do
not provide enough background information, this is referred to as ‘quoting out of context’ and is
an unethical practice.

Comment clearly identified: Never take an allegation or comment from a source and present it
as ‘fact’. All comments and opinions should be clearly attributed to their origin.

Yourself: Be aware of, and think critically about, any prejudices that you may bring to your story
because of your own background, gender, upbringing, religion, sexual orientation and other
factors or experiences which have shaped you.

Getting too close to sources: While it is good to build trust between yourself and your sources,
developing too close a bond will bring about a conflict of interest.

Spin doctoring: If a source puts a certain spin on their information (for example, if they are
covering something up, or justifying bad behaviour, for example), it is your fundamental duty as a
journalist to explore the other sides of the story. If you fail to do so, you are involved in ‘spin
doctoring’ which is the opposite of unbiased, fair and impartial journalism.
Plagiarism: Never present someone else’s work as your own. Reading previous articles on the
same topic by other journalists during your research is one thing but you may not copy their work
at all.

Press releases: While they provide useful starting points for stories, they should never be
regurgitated or even paraphrased. They should set you off on a path of investigation so that you
get both sides of the story.

Photographs: Photojournalists are also bound by law and guided by a Code of Conduct. When
you are out on a story together, it is important to discuss any sensitive issues.

Multi-sourcing: This is a key element in being fair and ethical.

> GENDER-SENSITIVE REPORTING

Male bias

Most stories in the media are about men and quote men. There are thousands of untold stories
about women everywhere. The best way of finding these stories is to talk to women and to
ensure that women’s voices are also heard in the news. Media that carry women’s voices and
perspectives are more balanced and richer.

Another way of countering male bias is to look for the women’s perspective in stories, i.e. to
mainstream gender perspective.

Lack of knowledge of issues

Journalists, both men and women, often lack knowledge of the issues affecting women, or of
how issues affect women in different ways. This can be remedied by education on gender
issues and mainstreaming the gender perspective.

The invisible woman

The media ignore certain categories of women, creating the impression that they are
unimportant or worthless. Examples include elderly women, working-class women, women
from certain minority ethnic groups and poor women.

Gender stereotypes

One of the most frequent criticisms of media coverage is that it portrays women in terms of
gender stereotypes.

Stereotypes are simplistic generalisations attributed to groups of people without regard for
accuracy or truth. For example

● Men are logical, women are emotional

● White people are arrogant

● Working class people are stupid

 ● People living with HIV/AIDS are promiscuous

When the media reproduce these stereotypes they are shaping public opinion in ways that
reinforce them and deepen inequality, stigma and prejudice.

Stereotypes prevent us from seeing people as they really are. Gender stereotypes prevent us
from seeing women as they really are.

By challenging gender stereotypes, the media are fulfilling their obligations under international
human rights law. Media that challenge gender stereotypes are also in a stronger position to
challenge governments to fulfil their obligations with respect to gender.

Sex objects

Many studies have shown that the media most frequently represent women as sex objects for
men to look at and fantasise about. In news, features, entertainment and advertising, images
focus on women’s bodies, their clothing and their looks. The impression is that women have
nothing else to offer society and that women must live up to unrealistic and undesirable
standards.

Gender stereotypes

Common stereotypes of women are that they are mothers, home-makers, weak, subservient,
victims and intellectually inferior to men. The stereotype of a young girl is that she is pure and a
virgin.

If a woman behaves in a way that does not fit the stereotype, she is represented as extreme. For
example, a woman doctor, or a woman who leads an organisation that looks after street children
is likely to be portrayed as an “angel” or a “saint” rather than as a professional person. A woman
who challenges a man is represented as unnatural. An unmarried woman who is sexually active is
portrayed as a sinner.

Double standards

In the media, a teenage boy who has sexual relations is represented as a man. A teenage girl who
has sexual relations is represented as promiscuous. A man who abandons his children is simply
bad or irresponsible; a woman who abandons her children is portrayed as unnatural.

Covering sensitive issues

As mentioned, women suffer grave human rights violations that sometimes include sensitive
topics such as domestic violence, rape and other sexual abuse. Media coverage is often not
sensitive to these experiences or may portray women as being responsible for the crimes.

> WATCHDOG ROLE

The watchdog role, variously described, appears in most contemporary definitions of what
constitutes journalism. Typically, however, the watchdog role is included as merely one form of
good journalism. The below are the key features of good journalistic practice :

• to keep the public up to date with what is going on in the world;

• to provide the public with reliable information on which they may base choices as
participants in political, economic and social life;
• to provide a forum for the exchange of ideas and opinions;

• to be a watchdog on those in power;

• to help societies understand themselves;

• to provide the material upon which members of a society can base a common
conversation.

Quality Indicators of Journalism - Content Attributes

 Quality Indicators of Journalism - Audience Engagement

Quality Indicators of Journalism - Organisational Factors

The news industry is subject to a wide range of accountability instruments, including codes of
ethics and journalistic norms and practices, all of which promote quality in news and journalistic
content. As we have seen, indicators of journalistic quality can be grouped under three sets of
criteria: content indicators; organisational indicators; and audience engagement indicators. Yet
aspects of digitisation such as the 24/7 news cycle, algorithms and the blogosphere have
introduced new challenges to the pursuit of quality and to the effectiveness of these
accountability schemes. In some cases, this enables online actors and communities to assume
roles that traditionally belonged to news media, including those of ‘watchdog’, ‘fact-checker’ and
‘critic’. This in turn raises concerns about how such online actors and communities are
accountable. They may fulfil roles traditionally played by journalists, while not subject to the
industry's accountability instruments.

> QUESTIONING TRUTH AND OBJECTIVITY

The pillars of truth and objectivity show serious wear and tear due to a postmodern scepticism
about objective truth and a cynicism about the claims of profit-seeking news organisations to be
impartial informers. Therefore, any discussion of journalism ethics must include the problem of
truth and objectivity in journalism, and the decline of the traditional doctrine of news objectivity to
the point where it is, today, a spent ethical force. There have been three types of complaint
against news objectivity: First, objectivity is too demanding an ideal for journalism and hence
objectivity is a “myth.” Second, objectivity, even if possible, is undesirable because it forces
writers to use restricted formats. It encourages a superficial reporting of official facts. It fails to
provide readers with analysis and interpretation. Objectivity ignores other functions of the press
such as commenting, campaigning and acting as public watchdog. Finally, objectivity restricts a
free press. A democracy is better served by a non-objective press where views compete in a
marketplace of ideas.
Yet scepticism about journalistic objectivity has not solved any serious ethical problems. It only
leaves a vacuum at the basis of journalism ethics. If objectivity is abandoned, what shall replace
it? Three options loom:

- Abandon objectivity and replace it with other principles; “return” to traditional objectivity in
newsrooms;

- Redefine objectivity.

Returning to traditional objectivity is unrealistic. Abandoning objectivity, without a replacement, is

not an option. The central question is: If a news report involves (at least some) interpretation, how
can it be objective? One option is to re-conceive objectivity as the testing of interpretations. On
this view, objectivity is neither the reduction of reports to bare facts nor the elimination of all
interpretation. Rather, objectivity is the testing of journalistic articles, regarded as interpretations,
by a set of agreed-upon criteria appropriate to a given domain.

Ethics and New Mediums

Given this debate, whither journalism ethics? Positively, it is possible to regard the current media
revolution as prompting a much-needed re-thinking of journalism ethics. The clash of ideas may
lead to the invention of a richer journalism ethics.

The future of journalism ethics appears to depend on the successful completion of two large
projects:

(1) development of a richer theoretical basis for journalism ethics;

(2) development of a “mixed media ethics”—a more adequate set of principles and norms for a
multi-platform journalism with global reach.

As we have seen, the first project requires a more adequate epistemology of journalism, with a
“believable concept of truth” and objectivity. It also requires the enrichment of liberal theory with
other approaches to media theory. Ethicists need to reflect upon how new theoretical approaches
might change newsroom practice and journalism education.

The second project is a more practical task. It is the construction of rules, norms and procedures
for newsrooms that tell stories in print, broadcast and online.

What do the principles of truth-seeking and impartiality mean for mixed media?

By the late 1900s, the liberal and objective professional model was under attack from many
sources as journalism entered its fifth stage, a stage of “mixed media.” Not only were increasing
numbers of non-professional citizen journalists and bloggers engaging in journalism, but these
communicators used interactive multi-media that challenged the ideas of cautious verification and
gate-keeping. As a result, journalism ethics was (and continues to be) fraught with disagreement
on the most basic notions of what journalism is and what journalists are “for”.

Do the norms and public aims of journalism change when embedded in “social media,” that is, on
websites where citizens share experiences, information and images?

Is journalism ethics moving away from a professional emphasis on verification and gate-keeping
to a non-professional emphasis on transparency, networking and unfiltered information?

Also, there is the practical question of how these ethical discussions are connected with the
public monitoring of news organisations, and the reform of regulatory structures for media
systems. What new public mechanisms can be put in place to improve news media
accountability, to make sure that journalism’s age-old desire to “self-regulate” comes to include
“public-regulation”?

Finally, journalism ethics should become more cosmopolitan in theory and practice. Historically,
journalism and journalism ethics have been parochial. Journalism ethics was developed for a
journalism of limited reach, whose public duties were assumed to stop at the border. The
sufficiency of this parochial ethics has been undermined by the globalisation of news media. With
global impact comes global responsibilities. The violence that rippled around the world after the
publication of the cartoons of Mohammed in a Danish newspaper is one example of global
impact. Our world is not a cosy McLuhan village. News media link different religions, traditions
and groups. Tensions propagate. Globally responsible journalism is needed to help citizens
understand the daunting global problems of poverty and environmental degradation.

Determining the content of a global journalism ethics is a work-in-progress: In recent years,

ethicists have begun a “search” for the fundamental principles of a global media ethics. This
“search” faces the problem of how to do justice to both the particular and the universal. But there
are other questions, and other quandaries. How would a cosmopolitan ethics redefine the ideas of
social responsibility or serving the public? Would a cosmopolitan ethics reject patriotism as a
legitimate influence on journalists?

Despite these difficult questions and daunting problems, the future of journalism ethics re- quires
nothing less than the construction of a new, bolder and more inclusive ethical framework for a
multi-media, global journalism amid a pluralistic world.

______________________________________________________________________________________

Sting operation in journalism

A sting operation is an investigative exercise undertaken by the media to uncover the malpractices
prevalent in the society. In an era of sensational reporting, news channels have a field day
covering the expose in the name of working in the interest of the public. The public too, deprived
of transparency about the working of public servants in office, save the lone RTI act, are ever
willing to absorb the news they are fed.

Sting operations are full of inquiries of legitimacy, and objectivity that are hard to manage in light
of the fact that the journalist is a common person loaded with his predispositions for or against
somebody or something. Therefore, the rightfulness of a sting operation cannot be determined
objectively as the journalist may have a bias towards or against a certain person that he might
target. In addition, in the present world where video doctoring tools are easily accessible and
widely used, the question of legitimacy of the sting operation audio/video is yet another issue for
thought.

The expression 'Sting' is also illustrative of media's power in a democratic set-up and how it can
be both potent and venomous for the public at large; potent by exposing the evils, and venomous
by infringing the fundamental right to privacy of an individual or potentially entrapping someone
into accepting a bribe and thereby, causing corruption.

A few nations like the US, UK and Canada have perceived sting operations completed by legal
enforcement agencies as lawful techniques for gathering evidence. However, there are no
directions regarding the test for legality of sting operations in India and there is no nexus in
decisions given by various courts, which requires an earnest need to address the issue.
The ethical question of sting operations

Despite the fact that the freedom of press is not ensured in our constitution unequivocally, a few
interpretations by the apex court have held it as a basic part of our constitution. However, this
freedom is not absolute and there are some sensible limitations. In the technological age, the
electronic media has assumed control over the print media, and a huge number of individuals
have access to and can be strongly influenced by the information published by the media.

Media has an incredible role to play as the fourth pillar of democracy. This is based on a simple
equivalence relationship i.e. corruption cannot breed within the sight of transparency. The role of
media involves uncovering callous and degenerate public servants to the eye of the omnipotent
public in a democratic set-up and hence, undoubtedly, media is in its legitimate space while
utilising apparatuses of investigative journalism to make people familiar with the hideous
underbelly of the society. However, occasionally, the media, in its endeavours to secure efficient
administration, over-reaches its assigned obligation of disseminating information and clashes with
the judicial functions of law enforcement.

On the premise of purpose, there can be a delegation of string operations as positive or negative.
The positives are the ones in light of a legitimate concern for the overall population and planned to
penetrate the cover of the government’s working procedure. The negative ones don't profit the
general public, but are a sensationalised endeavour to build the viewership in the era of 'breaking
news' by encroaching the privacy or sanctity of an individual or a body.

The question that looms in the background however is whether such methods amount to
deliberate entrapment and are an invasion of privacy; or are they justified? Most sting operations
are carried out against public servants in the system. Media Houses claim that they are in such
cases, acting out of interest for Truth and Justice. They argue that in cases where the whole
society is at stake, like corruption, cash for votes, et cetera, they are justified in carrying out
deliberate operations, as this is probably the only way the defaulters can be caught red handed.
That too in a situation where there is conscious concealment of information, there seems to be no
better way than this. In fact, in the police department this is a time tested method to nab
criminals.

Privacy concern: However in the hands of the media, this power raises serious questions of
privacy. Assuming it is alright to cover the actions of a public servant, one wonders to what extent
such coverage is warranted. Does it stop in the course of his office hours; is it justified to venture
into his private sphere as well to ‘nail the evidence’? Just because he is a public servant, does
that grant access to his private life too, of course in the name of ‘public interest’? Questions
remain. This apart, even the fundamental logic behind such media trials seems debatable and
several pertinent questions have come up.

Entrapment: The method used in any entrapment is to undertake decoy tactics and try to induce
the person to commit the offence; thereby trapping him ‘red handed’. Doesn’t this amount to
deliberately inducing the person concerned to commit a crime? If this is indeed a case of
encouraging wrong doing, is it not unethical, ask many critics. One probable answer to them
might be that most cases of media sting operations are undertaken only when there have already
been reported instances of deliberate concealment of information.

Lacking courage: Journalists in India have covered the Punjab insurgency under Bhindranwale,
reported on the Assam violence, written and interviewed insurgents in Kashmir Valley, spoken to
Naxalites without using concealed cameras and tape recorders. This is done at risk to the
journalist, but then that is the risk that is associated with and interwoven into the profession, a
factor very visibly missing in sting operations.
Sensational: One can list any number of sting operations run by television news channels here
that might be covered through screaming headlines, but say little beyond what is already known.
A very recent one---probably being aired as one writes---is a case in point where nothing has
been said that is not already in the public domain. And yet it is being showcased as the channel's
big sting.

The question of admissibility of evidence obtained: It is regularly contended that the evidence
procured by a sting has been gotten by actuation and consequently, inadmissible. Nonetheless,
others trust that when evidence is convincing, it ought to be permissible; and little heed should be
paid on the methods through which it was secured. Some argue that sting operations should only
be allowed and be admissible in a proceeding if the media has received prior approval for
conducting the same. However, such a setup will render the media as some kind of vigilance
agency for the courts. This would not only be equivalent to pre-censorship of broadcasting of
court procedures but also curtail the media's right to freedom of speech and expression
warranted under Article 19(1) of our Constitution.

Sting Operations have been an incredible instrument in uncovering wrongdoing and defilement in
the public arena. We have seen various situations where sting operations have assumed a
noteworthy part in securing justice for all. Be that as it may, a line is required to be drawn between
sting operations that assault privacy and those which reveal debasement and like others with a
particular objective to secure the very core of our Constitution. In any case, in the present
circumstances where political corruption is at its apex, it is difficult to essentially discover which
sting operations are politically invigorated, which are truly proposed to filter the social order, or
which are truly the results of fabricated broadcast bolstered by different political gatherings, their
corporate benefactors.
______________________________________________________________________________________

Impact of Digital Journalism

Digital platforms have changed the news. The consumption, distribution and production of news
have altered fundamentally. The platforms provide a point of access to news – a function formerly
performed by media companies.

Journalism doesn’t stand still. It has been changing since before the advent of digital platforms.
However, digital platforms have had significant impacts on the production of news, and journalism
has had no choice but to adapt. Perhaps above all, journalists are embracing engagement as a
core value, with both positive and negative effects. One effect is that content that is shorter and
more emotive is proliferating.

Digital platforms have also had significant impacts on the consumption of news. Consumers
increasingly access their news via social media. Faced with unprecedented choice and
convenience, today’s consumers have become accustomed to receiving news for ‘free’. And in
many cases, consumers can become part of the distribution and production process. They can
share, react and comment. They can create content. Consumers are no longer just consumers.

The distribution of news has been disrupted too. Before the advent of digital platforms, news
producers tended also to be the dominant news distributors. Now producers share their
distribution role with consumers, and also with the digital platforms. The result is an atomised
news landscape, a multi-sided market where advertising revenue commonly goes to the digital
platforms that distribute news, as well as to the news media that produce content. Digital
platforms extend the reach of news media, even as they capture much of the revenue news media
needs to do its multiple jobs.
Certainty vs. Uncertainty

For today’s producers, distributors and consumers of news, uncertainty is a given, disruption is
the norm and change is a constant. The result is a confusion of effects: on the one hand, benefits
and opportunities; on the other, harms and challenges.

Benefits (+)

The benefits of recent changes are many. Digital platforms give news producers access to
substantial audiences, while search engines and social media engage global audiences at
unprecedented speed. This explains the success of internet news outlets such as Scroll, The
Print, Swarajya, The News Minute, Buzzfeed and Vox, which mastered the art of creating viral
content.

As a result, news consumers have access to an unprecedented array of content. Indeed,

consumers can now become producers, as seen by the emergence of terms such as ‘prosumer’
and ‘produser’. On digital platforms, the voiceless can express themselves and audiences can
become empowered as citizens and creators.

The impact of technology (i.e. algorithms, AI etc)

Algorithms are a set of specified rules and protocols enabling a system to act autonomously.
Digital platforms employ various algorithmic methods to produce and curate news to optimise
engagement. Indeed, digital platforms’ innovation includes periodical and often significant
changes to algorithms. Such changes most obviously affect the distribution of news, but they also
have significant effects on production and consumption.

For news consumers, algorithmic systems can provide significant benefits. In 2016 it was said that
approximately 90 percent of data on the internet has been created in the past two years. The
increase in the quantity of information available online has been unprecedented and dramatic.
Methods to search, sort and filter information are becoming increasingly essential, and the
capacities of algorithmic systems to filter the abundance of news content are immense.

Without algorithmic systems, access to recent, relevant and important news content would be
considerably more cumbersome (see ‘Personalisation’, below). Algorithmic systems also provide
benefits for news producers. They can help news producers to identify important stories on social
media platforms and they can help news producers use data sets to generate stories. Meanwhile,
digital first and public broadcasters are particularly reliant on social media algorithms. Digital first
publishers, whose business model is built on atomisation, rely heavily on social media distribution
for their audiences. And for public broadcasters, social media can help them fulfil their mandate
by granting access to traditionally ‘hard-to-reach’ news audiences.

Personalisation and customisation

The capacities to personalise and customise news consumption have been made possible by the
growth of online news access. Personalisation, in this context, is a digital process that involves
searching, sorting and recommending news content based on the explicit and/or implicit
preferences of individual users. Customisation refers to the modification of sources, delivery and
frequency of digital news content for individual consumption. Both personalisation and
customisation help to filter the abundance of digital news and to present information tailored to
the interests of the individual.
The purpose of algorithmic news personalisation is to optimise user engagement by increasing
the consumption of news items per user. This aligns with the nature of internet advertising, where
granular details on user preferences are gathered to create comprehensive user profiles. These
profiles allow digital platforms to sell targeted advertisements and to personalise news content
that engages the user.

Digital platforms and digital news producers rely on ‘recommender systems’ to filter news
content. Such systems prioritise and personalise news content based on recorded or inferred user
preferences. The ensuing recommendations are designed to assist the user’s decision-making
process in the consumption of news. Generally, recommender systems operate in a cyclical
process, which involves:
• Collecting information on the user: a system receives explicit and/or implicit feedback on
user preferences to build a profile (or model) that is used for prediction;
• Processing and learning: a system applies an algorithm to ‘learn’ from the feedback data
gathered about the user and adapts the profile (or model) of the user; and
• Prediction or recommendation: a system then predicts or recommends news content that
the user may prefer. This can either be predicted based on the user’s behaviour on the
platform (through probabilistic inference, for instance) or recommended based directly on
a dataset of explicit feedback provided by the user.

Three major types of recommender systems are used for news content online.

Content-based filtering: Systems that learn to recommend content similar to items that the user
has explicitly liked or engaged with in the past. Similarity is calculated based on comparing
features of content. For example, if a user positively rates a news story that belongs to a particular
topic, then the system learns to recommend other stories that are also associated with that topic
area. As news content can be associated with an array of features (including author, medium and
political orientation), recommendations can become extremely precise. A significant problem with
content-based filtering, however, is its dependence on metadata; that is, rich descriptions of
contents’ features and well-organised user profiles are required before useful recommendations
can be made.

Collaborative filtering: Systems that learn to recommend content that other users with similar
preferences have liked or engaged with in the past. Recommendations are calculated based on
the similarities between user profiles, such as user or behaviour ratings history . For example, a
single woman aged 23 from Dimapur and interested in Bangladesh politics might engage with a
news story that received high engagement from similar profiles.

A significant advantage of collaborative filtering is that it can perform well in domains where it is
difficult to accurately label content (such as opinions). Collaborative filtering systems can also
generate useful recommendations even when content is not explicitly listed in a user’s profile.
Challenges can emerge, however, when inadequate information is known about the user or the
content, which results in irrelevant predictions and can make collaborative systems difficult to
scale.

Hybrid filtering: Systems that combine different recommendation techniques to utilise the
advantages of one method and compensate for the weaknesses of another. This allows hybrid
systems to base their recommendations on both content and similar profiles that have engaged
with the item. There are many variations of hybrid systems, including the sophisticated system
built by The New York Times.

Related to the personalisation practised by digital platforms and news media is the capacity for
consumers to customise their news feeds. Customisation, as previously noted, refers to the
modification of sources, delivery and frequency of digital news content for individual
consumption.

Customisation, like personalisation, is in part a response to the way in which digital media has
expanded the possible channels by which users can consume news content. That is, the
proliferation of digital devices, in concert with the accelerated news cycle, has created an
increasing range of options for news consumption. This had led some to argue that an abundance
has been superseded by an overabundance of news options.

Against this backdrop, greater capacities have been developed enabling the customisation of
how, when and where news is consumed. In particular, social media is founded on a principle of
customisation. For instance, users choose their friends on Facebook and who they follow on
Twitter. The news encountered on Facebook and Twitter is thus largely determined by whatever is
shared by those who have been befriended and followed. Among many other capacities,
consumers can also: customise their settings on Google News; customise their settings on
various news aggregators; and customise the news they consume on YouTube by subscribing to
specific channels that stream news coverage.

News organisations also enable users to receive email newsletters customised by topic. With the
rise of social media, email newsletters were for a time regarded as ‘old technology’, but they have
recently experienced a surge in popularity. For many news producers and some consumers, one
advantage is that newsletters are not subject to the algorithms of search engines and social
media.

Thanks to these and other expanding customisation capacities, individual consumers are now
able to make the sorts of curatorial decisions formerly reserved for editors of traditional news
outlets. One potential caveat is that this shift to customise news consumption presumes certain
levels of news literacy. That is, individuals are presumed to have the knowledge and abilities to
make responsible news consumption decisions that are in their best interests. Given the lowered
barriers of access to content for consumers, it is argued, news literacy becomes more important
as users are increasingly required to check facts, monitor the reliability of sources and consume a
diversity of sources.

Echo-chamber

There are two primary purposes for deploying algorithmic techniques for news consumers:
(1) to sort through the abundance of news content; and
(2) to recommend news content that users will consume to keep them engaged with the platform

As noted above, this is done by gathering information on users, selling that information to
advertisers to generate revenue, and then providing personalised news content via algorithmic
methods to engage individual users. Greater user engagement logically leads to greater
opportunities for advertising revenue for digital platforms.

The concern, however, is that the relentless pursuit of engagement does not always align with the
fundamental ideals of news as the fourth estate and the public interest. Scholars have argued, for
instance, that it is in the interest of digital platforms to host news that attracts attention. The
public interest is irrelevant. As legal scholar Alice Marwick writes: ‘YouTube and Facebook take no
interest in what the content is about, whether it’s holocaust denial videos or makeup tutorials; they
are simply interested in keeping their viewers on the platform’.

To maximise engagement, it is argued, consumers are increasingly having their news content
filtered to reflect narrow, personalised interests. Inadvertently, as we have seen, consumers
increasingly rely on algorithmic systems to provide them with news content that aligns with their
preferences. And when digital platforms are incentivised to show content that optimises
engagement, consumers can find themselves in algorithmically constructed ‘filter bubbles’. These
filter bubbles are personalised according to user preferences, and then further reinforced by
customisation. These cycles of personalisation and customisation, it is argued, exacerbate the
tendency of people to consume news that conforms to their existing worldviews, which thus
creates ‘echo chambers’. The potential implications include a constrained public discourse, a less
informed citizenry and sharpened political polarisation.

In this section, we address three specific issues attending claims of ‘filter bubbles’ and ‘echo
chambers’. First, we consider the argument that the diversity of news content being consumed is
being reduced by personalisation and customisation. Second, we ask whether the autonomy of
news consumers is being inhibited by algorithms. And third, we consider whether there is a
problematic lack of transparency and accountability attending the use of algorithms.

Diversity of digital content or reduced diversity?

Diversity is often regarded as a fundamental principle of news quality, which helps to ensure a
well-informed citizenry. A balance of news can include a diversity of sources, content, and
perspectives Algorithmic filtering methods, however, run the risk of constraining diversity, which
may cause information blindness for consumers. This has led scholars to question whether
algorithmic methods on digital platforms value and foster diversity as a key feature of news
quality. Further implications of these filtering effects are that consumers could have their
preferences and perspectives artificially reinforced. These ‘echo chambers’ can lead people to
avoid important public issues altogether or can polarise public discussion and thereby inhibit
constructive debate.

A point to note here is that algorithms do not necessarily limit diversity. In fact, the reverse can
also be true: content diversity can be programmed into platforms’ algorithms. The effect of an
algorithm on diversity depends on the specifics of that algorithm. In addition, studies on filter
bubbles and echo chambers which consider diversity do not establish conclusive evidence that
algorithmic techniques inhibit content diversity.

However, one study that is directly on point examined whether news recommendation
engines contribute to filter bubbles by asking 168 participants to search Google News for
news about Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton during the 2016 election and report the first
five recommended stories. The study found that users with different political leanings from
different states were recommended very similar news: the top recommendations were
consistently identical for conservatives and liberals. This challenged the notion that
algorithms are encouraging echo chambers. However, the researchers also found a high
degree of homogeneity: on average, 69 per cent of all recommendations were to five news
organisations; and the most-recommended five publishers accounted for 49 per cent of
links collected. It would be difficult to attempt an analogous study for a social media
platform such as Facebook, where news items mingle with non-news items, and where
user experiences are necessarily more individualised.

Meanwhile, studies have certainly observed a dramatic increase in the quantity of news content.
In part, this is driven by the rise of both social media and search platforms, which require that
websites have a steady stream of new content to remain competitive. There is also a growing
amount of ‘robot’-produced journalism content. However, many hard news stories are now written
quickly, with little, if any, original reporting. Even before the rise of digital platforms, online news
had moved towards becoming a ‘generic’ commodity, with news outlets differentiating their
stories only by cosmetic differences in headlines and lead paragraphs. Further, some researchers
are finding an increased quantity of news stories does not equate to increased content diversity.

Algorithms can filter and prioritise news in much the same way as human editors. Rather than
replacing humans in news production, algorithms can thus be regarded as helping journalists to
curate and communicate the news. This can work both ways: to promote diversity, or to limit it. In
their study of 59 open source mobile news apps, Weber and Kosterich found that the coding for
news flows is often closely linked to the content flows on social media. For 43 per cent of the
news apps studied, a first step is to search the social media habits of the user. This common
starting point suggests a limit on, rather than an expansion of, diversity in these apps. However,
such limits can be designed out. Certainly, news recommender systems can be designed to have
diversity effects similar to human editors. In other words: code and algorithms can be just as
excellent as human editors, and just as lamentable. Recently, digital platforms have changed their
algorithms in the wake of the outcry over fake news.

Choice and diversity

A further point here concerns a potential excess of choice. On the internet, news consumers have
access to an abundance of information and sources. So much so, that many users describe being
overwhelmed by an overabundance of news content (see 'Customisation', above). This is
potentially problematic, given that research has shown that when people are confronted with too
many choices, they regularly make bad choices, or are paralysed into making no choice at all.
What's more, they are often left feeling dissatisfied with those choices. This has been described
as the 'paradox of choice': presenting more options can lead to worse choices and lower
satisfaction. This paradox has been confirmed for search engine results: participants whose
searches returned six results made better choices and were more satisfied than participants
whose searches returned 24 results.

It is unclear whether this paradox prevails for news consumers. It is argued that in the field of
culture, the paradox of choice does not prevail. An enormous choice of novels, say, may not be
overwhelming. We have noted above that news users take unpredictable and idiosyncratic paths
to get their news. Certainly, they are not always satisfied with the news they consume. As Joelle
Swart writes: news 'users do not always use what they prefer, nor do they prefer what they use'. A
detailed account of this issue is beyond the scope of this report; however, given the vast range of
news content available to consumers, the role played by customisation and personalisation is
hard to overstate. Given this abundance, algorithms can determine whether consumers make
good or bad choices, including by means of the number of options presented to users.

Hence recommender systems, for instance, become vital. As Ricci, Rokach and Shapira write: ‘In
recent years, RSS [Recommender Systems] have proven to be a valuable means of coping with
the information overload problem.’ Just as the effects of algorithms on content diversity remain
unclear, so too it is unclear whether algorithmic techniques are fostering a constrained public
discourse, a less informed citizenry and exacerbated political polarisation. This lack of clarity may
be due to the relatively recent rise of algorithmic systems, the difficulties and methodological
shortcomings of measuring their effects, or simply, that theories of filter bubbles and echo
chambers are exaggerated. Further, these negative effects must be weighed against the benefits
that algorithmic systems provide to news consumers, including the ability to search, sort and filter
masses of online news content. What is clear is that the prevalence of algorithmic systems in
digital news media is wide and growing, and that their effects on content diversity and public
discourse warrant ongoing scrutiny.
Autonomy and Constrained choice

Ostensibly, digital platforms promote autonomy when it comes to news consumption. The
cross-platform availability of content seemingly affords users greater freedom to consume news
media in ways that they choose. However, as more consumers access news via digital platforms,
and more digital platforms use algorithmic methods to personalise news consumption, it has been
argued that user autonomy is being compromised, and that user choice is considerably more
limited than it first appears. This argument holds that algorithms, not autonomy, are guiding our
actions and thoughts. As Eli Pariser writes, ‘The algorithms that orchestrate our ads are starting to
orchestrate our lives’.

The value of individual autonomy is rarely questioned in applied ethics and legal philosophy. The
concept is difficult to define, but is tied up in notions of self-determination, self-governance and
self-authorisation. In simple terms, it is the ability to determine one’s own life and chart one’s own
course. This is precisely what the algorithms of search engines and social media arguably
compromise: that is, they compromise autonomy by limiting and channelling choice. For instance,
as legal scholar James Grimmelman writes, ‘Whoever controls search engines has enormous
influence on us all. They can shape what we read, who we listen to, and who gets heard’.

As discussed in the previous section, algorithmic methods infer the implicit preferences of
consumers. This means that news content can be personalised based on consumers’ historical
behaviours on the platform, similarities between consumer profiles and the profiles of others like
them, and other inferred attributes. However, consumers might change their preferences over
time, or they may in fact prefer content that diverges from the content received by people with
similar profiles. A related issue concerns transparency: if users do not know how those algorithms
affect them, including their consumption of news, then their autonomy would seem to be
compromised. The degree to which Facebook and Google dominate the social media and internet
search markets – two increasingly significant news consumption channels – could also mean that
this process of algorithmic personalisation falls disproportionately into the hands of two
companies. The more consumers use these platforms, the greater incentives for news content to
be published on these platforms. There is potential for these ‘network effects’ to constrain
consumer choice and inhibit autonomy

The question of transparency

Consumers are largely unaware of how and whether digital news platforms track user preferences
to make editorial decisions in the delivery of personalised news content. This is due, in part, to the
non-transparent nature of how algorithmic systems are developed and deployed. Transparency of
the way algorithmic systems produce, curate and disseminate news content is limited. The
tension between preserving trade secrets and disclosing algorithmic methods is an emerging
issue. This is potentially problematic for companies that don’t identify themselves as ‘news
organisations’, yet increasingly host the publication of news content. In the transition to digital
personalisation, accountability to dispense accurate, balanced and timely news is arguably
compromised.

Reduced transparency from the algorithmic delivery of news content has a number of
implications. First, as discussed earlier, the autonomy of consumers can be constrained by the
inability to fully evaluate consumption decisions. ‘If readers don’t know they are influencing
content, they cannot make critical decisions about what they choose to [consume]’ . Research has
shown that people are unaware or uncertain of how digital news content is being algorithmically
personalised, particularly via social media channels. Algorithmic methods that are reasonably
transparent and intelligible (through understandable explanation) could equip consumers to make
appropriate news consumption decisions.
Second, transparency is considered a route to accountability. It provides an avenue for public
scrutiny and a means to build legitimacy with consumers. The current lack of transparency
contributes to a dynamic of self-regulation in accountability. It has been argued that this process
of self-regulation of accountability raises contradictory incentives: relentlessly pursuing
engagement on the one hand; and upholding the values of the fourth estate and the public
interest on the other. Greater transparency and explanation offers one approach towards more
accountability of algorithmic systems on digital news platforms.

Third, inhibited transparency can contribute to reduced trust in news media. In theory, greater
access to information reduces uncertainty in social relations, which increases trust. Conversely,
however, methods for improving transparency have had negative effects on the user experience.
This acts as a potential disincentive for digital platforms, including digital news platforms, to
become more transparent.

Choice and regulation

‘Choice’ in competition law has a close parallel in media regulation where ‘availability’ is a
measure of media diversity; as a framework for assessing the digital media environment, media
diversity can account for the public functions of journalism. Media regulation takes a narrow
approach to diversity, based on availability of traditional media, while omitting all online news, pay
TV and public media. Even these recent attempts at measuring plurality or pluralism have only
limited success in accounting for the impact of algorithmic delivery of news and the use of
recommenders; this is now the focus of international research on diversity and pluralism.

Challenges (-) and the way forward

One of the biggest and most complex changes involves the ways in which the relationship
between journalists and audience is shifting reflecting the hybrid role of platforms.

The impact of technologies is complex. Indeed, with radical, ongoing changes to the media
landscape, various distinctions are becoming blurred. These include the distinction between
digital platforms and news media companies, the distinction between digital platforms and the
internet generally, and also the distinction between news consumers, distributors and producers.
Nonetheless, specific impacts on news consumers, distributors and producers can be identified,
and can sometimes be clearly attributed to digital platforms.

There is conflicting evidence on the overall impact of digital platforms on news and journalistic
content.

Some negative effects – such as shorter, more emotive content – can be attributed to platforms;
others – like pressures of the 24/7 news cycle – are largely an aspect of digitisation.

Two aspects present specific future risks:

> sudden algorithmic changes which can severely disrupt conditions under which news is
produced;

> the potential devaluation of journalism through extractive summaries (reference: News
Aggregator applications).

Digital platforms can now be regarded as key participants within the broader framework for news
media; they may not be publishers, but their role as distributors is increasingly hybrid in nature.
As participants within this news media framework, digital platforms have a responsibility not to
harm the public benefit provided by news and journalistic content; there may also be ways to
promote it.

Digital platforms are renowned for innovation. They are nimble and fleet, adjusting quickly to new
challenges and opportunities. Yet these technologies warrant detailed, dispassionate scrutiny, as
their impacts on news consumption, distribution and production are often significant and hard to
discern.
________________________________________________________________________________

POINTS TO PONDER Ask

• Why is this story going to be in the newspaper?

• Why will it be significant to the reader?

• What will ‘pull’ them into the story so that they carry on reading?

• Of the where, what, who, how, why and when, which is the most important for this
particular story?

• What is my angle on the story?

• How can I add an element of human interest?

• In conversation, how would I start this story if telling it to a friend?

Other handy tips:

• Your intro must match the genre of your story. Hard news should start with a hard
newsworthy lead, whereas a feature might start with a description or a quote, for example.

• Keep it simple and punchy.

• It should not be more than 30 words.

• Some journalists find it easier to write a ‘dummy’ intro just to get them started, and then
return to it once they have crafted the rest of the story.

• Others spend a long time crafting the introduction and then find that the rest of story flows
easily.

• Endings are also very important and again, they should match the genre of the story. They
should be punchy, give an indication of the next event related to the story, and tie up any
loose ends.

> अंत <