Chapter 5: Newspapers

History

• 1st American newspaper, “Publick Occurrences both Foreign and Domestick” 1690, by Benjamin Harris

• critical of the king of France

• shut down after one issue

• no free press....just yet

•Benjamin Franklin becomes the publisher of The Pennsylvania Gazette in 1729 -- the most successful colonial newspaper

•The political press: openly supported a political party or view

•First Amendment: introduces the idea of a free press, ratified in 1791

The mass newspaper

•1830: R. Hoe & Co’s steam printing press allows for mass production

•newspapers were still expensive: around 6 cents an issue (about the same as a pint of whiskey at the time)

• Increased literacy (the first public school systems were being established in 1830)

Penny press

•1835: The New York Herald

•the idea was to produce papers for a penny, so more people could afford them and would read them

• literacy was up, the penny press papers were successful

•The New York Times (1851) still in production today

Newspapers as big business

•A new reporting technique emerged during the Civil War as the telegraph was being used for reporting

•Only the most important facts were reported first, in case of telegraph failure, at least the important info would go through first

•The Inverted Pyramid

Journalistic writing

•the inverted pyramid

Major influences on American journalism•Joseph Pulitzer:

immigrant who turned newspapers into successful publications by stressing accuracy, developing practices for advertisers (price based on circulation), and writing in a simple style with lots of illustrations to appeal to a mass audience

Major influences on American journalism• E.W. Scripps: started

papers in industrial cities, featured concisely edited news, human interest stories, editorial independence, and frequent crusades for the working class

• Pioneered the idea of a newspaper chain

Major influences on American journalism•William Randolph

Hearst: went after readers by appealing to their emotions; banked heavily on sensationalism

Tabloid journalism

•usually “sensational” in nature, tabloids often focus on crime, entertainment & gossip

•its beginnings stem from Yellow Journalism: sensationalized reporting about sex, murder, self-promotion and human-interest stories

•Jazz Journalism: short trend in tabloids after WW1, focused on entertainment & lifestyle issues, tabloid format

•tabloids were printed on paper about half the size of regular newspapers, making them easy to scan & carry around. They were filled with many pictures and illustrations, with a simple and short writing style

Newspapers today:

•splashy graphics and color

•short, easy to read stories

•many graphics & charts

•“factoids” graphical lists or bullets

In the digital age..

•Print newspapers are struggling to compete with online news

•Online news is always up to date

•Online news is FREE (for the most part)

•Online news offers an unlimited newshole, no edition deadlines (updated throughout the day), interactive

•Print newspapers with their own online presence: offering additional images & video content

Defining features of newspapers

•Made of of diverse content

•Conveniently packaged

•Local

•Serve as an historical record

•Perform a watchdog function in society

•Timely

The Newspaper Industry

•Print Dailies: a new edition at least 5 days a week, usually 7

•Circulation: the number of copies distributed to newsstands, vending machines and subscribers

•National Newspapers: no specialized local content. Examples: USA Today, The Wall Street Journal & The New York Times. (NYT has a local version just for the NY area called the Metro edition)

•Large Metropolitan Dailies: daily paper for a specific metropolitan area

•Suburban Dailies: a publication put out by, and for, a smaller area outside of a greater metropolitan area. Example: Batavia’s The Daily News, Regional versions of The Buffalo News, The Niagara Gazette

The Newspaper Industry

•Print Weeklies: publications with a new weekly edition. Examples: Cheektowaga Times, Amherst Bee, Buffalo Rocket

•Special-service & Minority newspapers: aimed at well-defined audiences, with content specific to each group. Example: Am-Pol Eagle targeted to the Polish population, Artvoice targeted toward the younger, hip, liberal population.

•Maintaining old and attracting new readers: layouts resemble webpages, adding more 'soft news;' readership is still on the decline

Organization of online newspapers

Three main types of online news:

1.News aggregators: sites that take info from many sources, and compile it into a new presentation

2.Affiliates of traditional print outlets: the online companion sites to print newspapers

3.Online only: no print counterpart (the Batavian)

Producing the print and online newspaper•All papers are divided into three

departments:

•Business: selling advertising space, building the paper's circulation and web site traffic

•Production: handles the physical and electronic production of the paper

•News-editorial: news pages contain objective reporting, editorial contains opinion

Prepublication routine

•The modern converged newsroom is a 24/7 operation

•The converged reporter: one who writes for both print and online, shoots and edits video to accompany stories on the web, write a blog, etc.

•Editors arrange stories and graphics for both print and online

The economics of newspaper publishing•Revenue: selling ad space and

circulation income (subscription and newsstand)

•Four main types of advertising revenue: local retail, classified, national, prepaid inserts

•Expenses: news and editorial costs, printing costs, mechanical costs, circulation and distribution costs, general administration costs

Will newspapers survive?

•The landscape for newspapers is likely to change, with surviving papers adopting a print/online hybrid: featuring continually updated online content, and specialized content in fewer print editions

•Online delivery to new platforms: kindle, iPad, iPhone, Droid devices

•Future employees need to not only be journalists, but also audio and video reporters with strong digital production skills

Feedback for newspapers

•The Audit Bureau of Circulations: organization which established ground rules for counting circulation, provides verified circulation reports

•Online: Neilsen/NetRatings

Journalism

•there are many types of styles in journalism

•news, features, reviews/opinion

News writing

•balanced; offers information about both (or all) sides of the story

• impartial; no “voice” of the writer in news articles

• factual

Feature writing

•more “casual” than a news story

•offers an in-depth look at a person or story

•attempts to add more life-context to the facts

Reviews/Opinion

•based on fact, the writer’s opinion is injected

•Takes a side

•written by reporters, editors, readers

Newspaper writing terms:

•lede/lead: the first sentence of a news story. Should include the most important facts, and be written in a way to grab the reader’s interest

•graph(s): short term for “paragraph” in news writing. Each graph should be short, usually 1-3 sentences, between 30-50 words

•inverted pyramid: writing style that puts the most important information first, then tells the rest of the story in order of importance/interest

•column length: the length (in inches) a story appears in print

•white space: the literal “white space,” or areas of the page where there is no text. White Space is desirable because it makes the article easier to read