Press values

The Press industry can be said to be like a gate-keeper, as it decides what makes the news and what does not. The concept of Ideology would suggest that as a result of this gate-keeping, we are susceptible to the dominate ideas of the people behind the Press, which could include political and religious stances. Below are other factors which may affect what makes it into our papers and what does not:

• Frequency: Events which occur suddenly and fit well with the news organization's schedule are more likely to be reported than those which occur gradually or at inconvenient times of day or night. Long-term trends are not likely to receive much coverage. 
• Negativity: Bad news is more newsworthy than good news. 
• Unexpectedness: If an event is out of the ordinary it will have a greater effect than something which is an everyday occurrence. 
• Unambiguity: Events whose implications are clear make for better copy than those which are open to more than one interpretation, or where any understanding of the implications depends on first understanding the complex background in which the events take place. 
• Personalization: Events which can be portrayed as the actions of individuals will be more attractive than one in which there is no such "human interest." 
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• Meaningfulness: This relates to the sense of identification the audience has with the topic. "Cultural proximity" is a factor here -- stories concerned with people who speak the same language, look the same, and share the preoccupations as the audience receive more coverage than those concerned with people who speak different languages, look different and have different preoccupations. 
• Reference to elite nations: Stories concerned with global powers receive more attention than those concerned with less influential nations. 
• Reference to elite persons: Stories concerned with the rich, powerful, famous and infamous get more coverage. 
• Conflict: Opposition of people or forces resulting in a dramatic effect. Stories with conflict are often quite newsworthy. (CONFRONTATION)
• Consonance: Stories which fit with the media's expectations receive more coverage than those which defy them (and for which they are thus unprepared). Note this appears to conflict with unexpectedness above. However, consonance really refers to the media's readiness to report an item. 
• Continuity: A story which is already in the news gathers a kind of inertia. This is partly because the media organizations are already in place to report the story, and partly because previous reportage may have made the story more accessible to the public (making it less ambiguous). 
• Composition: Stories must compete with one another for space in the media. For instance, editors may seek to provide a balance of different types of coverage, so that if there is an excess of foreign news for instance, the least important foreign story may have to make way for an item concerned with the domestic news. In this way the prominence given to a story depends not only on its own news values but also on those of competing stories. (Galtung and Ruge, 1965) 
• Competition: Commercial or professional competition between media may lead journalists to endorse the news value given to a story by a rival. 
• Predictability: An event is more likely to be covered if it has been pre-scheduled. (Bell, 1991) 
• Time constraints: Traditional news media such as radio, television and daily newspapers have strict deadlines and a short production cycle which select for items that can be researched and covered quickly. 
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• Which values do you think have played a part in the construction of your favourite reads?
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