Page updated:
Wednesday, 12 September 2007

SPECIAL REPORT...

Getting your message across

PRESENT adequate information clearly

Whether the news is global or local, choices have to be made about what to publish and what to leave out.

A selective process

It is important to recall that news production is a selective process. This is so whether it is for a major metropolitan daily or the newsletter of a community association.

News production involves decisions about:

• what to publish - material that is compatible with the themes reported by the publication and its target readership (professional groups, association members, special interest groups, segments of the general public)
• what to leave out -
  • material unrelated to theme or audience or for which there is no space even though it is relevant
  • relevant material in unsuitable form - feature articles, for instance, in a journal reporting only short news pieces.

BBC journalist, John Simpson, summed it up in his book News From No Mans Land - Reporting the World (2002; Pan Books, UK; ISBN 0 330 48735 3)...

"The real problem with journalism of every kind, and television more than any other, is its selectivity. We separate out the interesting from the dull, and the most interesting from the merely averagely interesting, until every item on every news bulletin, every column inch of every newspaper, is filled with exceptional cases.

"This is inevitable if you are telling people news - that is, new things. Yet this selectivity can be a serious distortion... the best policy, it seems to me, is to inform people better, more often and at greater length about the world they live in".

Simpson's words are reiterated by another BBC television journalist, Kate Adie: "Reporting is a distillation and a selection. The camera and the reporter choose, select and edit continuously.

"The whole process is one of choice and decision-making... the camera looks in one direction at any one moment and it's far less observant than the human eye... vital images... have a knack of happening while you're concentrating on a tricky shot in the opposite direction... you try to sort out the significant from the merely interesting or odd... it's often tempting to go for the peculiar or the sensational, but if you've got only a couple of minutes in which to tell your story, fairness has to rule.

"The reporter acts as an extra pair of ears and eyes, watches out for the cameraman's back in dangerous circumstances and keeps scanning the scene while the camera looks steadily and carefully at individual images" (The Kindness of Strangers; Adie K, 2002; Headline Book Publishing, London - ISBN 0 7553 1073 X).

Adie's comment " ...to sort out the significant from the merely interesting or odd" sums up the particularity of video and photojournalism practice. You can only make an image of one scene or thing at a time and, although tens of images might be made, it is the photo editor that selects the most appropriate. The selection of "the significant " from the "merely interesting or odd" is primarily determined by the experience and values of the photographer.

Limiting factors on publication

Editors consider a number of points in coming to a decision on whether to publish an article:

• suitability - is the material suitable to the publication's themes and target readership?
• length - is the material too long to fit the space available? can it be edited to fit? can it be serialised over more than one edition?
• legal - is the piece defamatory, does it vilify a particular ethnic group or race or does it contravene other laws? if so, and if the editor can otherwise make use of it, will the author edit or approve the editing out of the offending segments?
• timliness - is the information timely as well as interesting? if it is related to topical issues or other news themes currently running it may have a greater chance of publication
• significance - is the information significant in some way? does it represent or presage a wider trend? does it personalise or demonstrate the impact of an issue?
• new slant on an existing theme - if the subject is not new, does the writer introduce a new slant on existing news? do they introduce new information? publishers will reject reporting on previously-reported subjects that does not introduce new angles or material.

Getting a businesses or organisation's item into a major newspaper or television bulletin is a competitive process that makes the writing of press releases an important skill. A press release can stimulate a journalist's interest. This is important because there is only so much space in a newspaper or time on a radio or television news bulletin - far too little to report everything of potential interest to readers, listeners or viewers.

Types of newspaper writing

An understanding of the different types of writing found in publications will provide clues about how we present our information.

Flick through a newspaper and you will find four main styles of journalistic writing:

• news writing - this is the crisp, fact-laden, quick-to-read style in which most stories are presented; it is known as the 'inverted pyramid' or newswriting style
• features - these are found more commonly in the weekend editions of major metropolitan dailies; they are longer stories carrying more detail and background and may be written in a 'literary' rather than inverted pyramid style
• columns - these are opinion pieces in which the columnist presents information to support a line of argument; columnists may be regular contributors to newspapers or they may be guest columnists invited to contribute on some current controversy or theme
• editorial - this is an opinion piece produced by staff of the paper; sometimes, guest editorials are commissioned from someone not associated with the newspaper.

There are other forms of writing found in newspapers, such as reader's letters, obituaries, food and book reviews, schedules such as television and radio programmes and short reports on what other newspapers are writing about (press reviews).

Of all these styles, it is the inverted pyramid news writing form that is most useful to writers of community publications or to occasional contributors of articles. It is also a style suited to online content.