News Values

News Values are used by journalists and news editors to help determine which news stories and images are accepted as newsworthy, and also to help them decide the running order of news stories that may appear on a television or radio news bulletin. Obviously there are a far greater number of potential news stories that could appear on a radio news bulletin than the number listeners actually hear. News values therefore become essential when deciding which news stories to broadcast.

The following list of news values has been adapted from Galtung and Ruge's study of news criteria;

• Immediacy - this refers to recent stories, stories that can be classed as "breaking". This news value is likely to push the story up the news agenda - often the first story in a bulletin will be breaking news.

• Familiarity - this refers to whether the news story is culturally or geographically close to the audience - so for listeners in the UK, this refers to stories that have taken place in this country (or affect citizens of this country) or possibly within Europe and the USA (are close cultural/political allies). Familiarity can be applied to national news and local news - a national radio station may include stories from across the country whilst a local radio news bulletin would include stories from that regional area.

• Amplitude - this is refers to the size of the event covered in the story and whether or not it involves large numbers of people. Often stories towards the beginning of a news bulletin will contain this news value as lots of people may be affected by the story. 

 

• Frequency - this refers to how often the event covered in the story happened. As a news value frequency sometimes pushes a story up the news agenda (if it is a story whose frequency is likely to provoke outrage) whilst sometimes frequency will push the story down the news agenda (as people become used to the event happening so often).

• Impact - this refers to whether or not the story has a profound effect on the public's lives  and whether the story contains elements that would make the public feel threatened. Again, a story that contains this news value is likely to appear near the top of a news bulletin because of its potential to affect large numbers of people. 

• Predictability - this news value is found in stories that the public expect to happen. Because events are expected this may push such a story down the news agenda.

• Surprise - This news value is the opposite of predictability and refers to stories that contain unusual or unexpected events. Because these stories are unusual and surprising they often find themselves higher up the news agenda. 

• Continuity - This news value is almost the opposite of immediacy- here the story has already been defined as news. If the article is part of an ongoing or long-running story. It may appear further down the news agenda than it did when it was 'breaking'.

• Conflict - This is probably the most dominant of all news values. Conflict can take a wide range forms. Many news stories report disagreements, arguments or fights between two or more people/organisation. Stories involving conflict are popular with the public as conflict is often the driving force in most narrative forms that the public will be familiar with.

•  Elite people - within certain publications and on certain radio stations, stories involving elite people such as celebrities are often found towards the top of the news agenda- this reflects our country's obsession with celebrity. Many news stories, which we wouldn't normally consider to be newsworthy, appear to make the news purely because they involve a celebrity. 

• Personalisation - stories that provoke an emotional response from the public. These are known as 'Human Interest Stories' and present real people and their problems, concerns or achievements. This news value often dominates news stories as the public are asked to sympathise with or relate to the subjects within the stories.

• Negativity - often news stories can be classified as 'bad news', containing elements that make people feel threatened or that will affect people in a negative way. These stories are usually found towards the beginning of news bulletins (almost completely dominate the whole news bulletin)

• Scandal - stories involving scandal often centre on celebrities or people in prominent positions within society, and are likely to provoke outrage within sections of the audience. 

• Balance -  Often stories are chosen largely to balance the other news stories- For example a positive heart warming story to counteract the bad news stories that may have dominated the rest of the news.

When I am analysing news stories in more detail I am going to make a note of the news values these stories contain. This is to try and determine what effect the news values have on a stories inclusion and also its position within a bulletin's running order. I will think carefully in future about the importance of news values when writing my own news stories.

The Five Ws

The Five Ws are the key elements of a news story that a viewer, listener or reader of news would expect to find within that story- therefore journalists tend to include all of the Five Ws in any story that they write. Often the five Ws appear towards the beginning of the news story which helps the reader determine whether they would be interested in the story to read on. Another reason for the inclusion of the 5 Ws towards the beginning of the story is that if the story needs to be cut for any reason editors can cut from the bottom up without fundamentally altering the meaning of the story. The Five Ws are;


Who is it about? 

What happened? 

When did it take place?

Where did it take place? 

Why did it happen? 

How did it happen? 

I have picked a news story at random (click on the link below to see the full story) to see if it includes the Five Ws. As you can see the story about Paul McCartney performing a gig in Covent Garden includes all five:

Who - Ex-Beatle Paul McCartney
What - Played an impromptu gig
When - At lunch time on Saturday
Where - In Covent Garden
Why - To help promote his new album

Who, what, when, where, why and how.

Throughout the rest of my research into news stories I will try to identify the Five Ws in each story and think about where they appear within the story. This will help me include these vital elements when I come to write the stories for my radio news bulletin.

Preliminary Task; Sound FX and Music

Below are the sound effects and the music that I have used in my jingle and in the archive clip on my preliminary task.

For my jingle I used a track called 'Chemical Abuse' from the extreme music indie rock CD and a selection of crowd noise sound effects taken from the BBC Sound Effects Library.

My archive clip consists of commentary from a number of football matches and I have again used football crowd sound effects taken from the BBC sound effects library.

Below, you can listen to the sound effects and music before I had edited and mixed them.

Preliminary task- Script

Here is the script I have written for my Preliminary Task. As you can see, it is for a sports radio station and includes clips featuring my guest. I hope to record this later in the week and I have already started choosing appropriate sound effects and music. 


Jingle: Kick FM 107.4. The UK’s No 1 Sport’s Radio Station.

Presenter: Good morning and welcome to kick FM 107.4. I’m Ian Moore. Coming up on this morning’s show we'll have the fallout from last night’s Capital Cup games and the latest news on Xavier Puerto’s move to Chelsea...but first we have today’s special guest star, former-championship striker, Mark Frost who has just signed for Premiership giants, Manchester United. How are you Mark?

Mark: I’m good thanks.

Presenter: The move to the current champions is a big step up for you, but the transfer has made the headlines because of the unusual move by your agent to put together a highlights package of your greatest moments in a bid to encourage prospective clubs to buy you. Let’s listen to a clip of your best goals.

ARCHIVE CLIP:

Commentator 1: Quick ball to Frost. Brilliant skill and good dribbling as two defenders fail to tackle him. Frost strikes it from well over forty yards. The keeper had no chance!!!! What a world class goal. You don’t see that every day in championship football.

Commentator 2: It’s a foul just outside the penalty area, we’re into injury time. Ipswich have a real chance now to secure all three points and put them top of the table on goal difference. Frost places the ball, takes two steps to his left and hits it. Oh my word! Frost has curled it straight into the top corner. Frost once again saves his team in the nick of time. Is there nothing this man can’t do?

Commentator 3: Frost tackles Leeds midfielder Smith. And he makes a sprint for it. He jinks past four defenders. He carries on sprinting, he shoots, and it’s in! Bad mistake from the midfielder but outstanding skill from Mark Frost. That goal will secure promotion for the tractor boys.



The list of sound effects needed:

• Rock indie Jingle (it is used often for sport radios)- final twenty seconds of Chemical Abuse + football crowd cheering for a goal. 
• Commentators' voices 
• Crowd cheering 

Introduction

For my AS coursework, I am going to be creating scripting, recording and editing a five minute extract from an imaginary local radio show, which will include a news bulletin. Alongside this I have to create a preliminary task which will include a jingle, a presenter introducing a guest, the guest responding and an archive clip featuring the guest.

My preliminary task will be a short extract from a sports radio station where my guest will be a fictional footballer and the archive clips will feature commentary from some of his most famous goals.