News Values

News Values are factors that help to explain how journalists and editors decided that certain news stories were accepted as newsworthy, while others were not. These values were defined by Galtung and Ruge, and also define where, and when a news story appears in a news bulletin.

The following news values, along with examples, will help determine whether a news story will be included in a bulletin, and where it will appear in a bulletin:

Immediacy - Whether the story has happened recently, and if the story is 'breaking'.

Familiarity - If the story is culturally or geographically close to us (London, Britain, Europe, Asia etc).

Amplitude - If the story is a big event or if it involves a lot of people.

Frequency - Whether the story happens often.

Impact - Whether or not we can identify the story as having a profound effect on our own lives, and whether the story contains elements that would make us feel threatened.

Predictability - Whether we expected it to happen or not.

Surprise - If it was an unusual or unexpected event.

Continuity - Whether or not the story has already been defined as news, and whether or not it is part of an ongoing or long-running story.

Conflict - If the story contains drama in describing disagreements, arguments, fights, or battles between two or more people/organisations.

Elite People - Whether the story concerns well-known people, such as celebrities.

Personalisation - If it is a human interest story.

Negativity - If the story contains bad news.

Scandal - Whether the story is likely to provoke moral outrage from parts of the audience.

Balance - Whether or not the story is selected in order to balance other news, such as human survival story to balance a number of stories concerning death.

The 5 W's

The 5 W's are the best way to define news stories. These are used by journalists as a formula for getting the 'full story'. The 5 W's include Who, What, Where, When and Why. This also includes 'How'. The 5 W's are likely to be used in the opening paragraph of a news story, as a way to simplify the information in the story, for example, Who the story is about, What happened in this story, Where did it take place, When did it take place, Why did it happen, and How did it happen!

When using this information, and the information I obtain from researching the 5 W's in various news stories, I will make sure that I include the 5 W's in all of my news stories, and that they will appear at the beginning of the news story.

I have looked at a news story on the BBC News website which I picked at random to see if it contained the 5 Ws. If you click on the link below, you can read the story in full.

London Duck Tours suspends River Thames trips after fire

Who - An amphibious tourist boat company
What - One of the companies vessels caught fire
Where - On the River Thames
When - Sunday afternoon (yesterday)
Why - The cause is yet to be established

Preliminary Task - The Script

The first thing I will do is write the script for my Preliminary Task. It includes the Radio Station, Goal FM 91.5. My Radio Station is a Football based station that will include a presenter, Darren Hall, and a guest, former French Footballer and Match of the Day pundit, Allan Robert.

Script:

"Goal FM 91.5 (They think it's all over... it is now) ... Bringing Football to the Nation (Sound of ball being kicked? Vuvuzela sound?) ... with Darren Hall.

Darren: Good morning and welcome to Goal FM. This morning I have Match of the Day pundit Allan Robert on the show. Bonjour Allan.

Allan: Bonjour Darren

Darren: What a finale to the Premier League season yesterday.

Allan: It was a fantastic day of football.

Darren: Indeed. And to recap for anyone who missed yesterdays action, Manchester City, who were a point behind Chelsea before the weekends game, won their second league title courtesy of a Sergio Aguero brace at Stoke, and a Chelsea defeat at Fulham. Now Allan, sorry to bring this up but you made a certain prediction at the beginning of the season (Allan laughs). You remember it, so here is a clip just to embarrass you even more...

Allan (on the phone): I think Man City will struggle this season. They are weak defensively and err, as everyone knows, they have signed two new strikers, but that is not enough. They will take time to settle into the league. And the err, Brazilian, Fernandinho, he will not live up to his price tag. He is not good enough for this team, as is Demichelis, who is very slow, and is probably better suited to the Spanish game, than the English. I think he will be a useless signing, and I think City will struggle to make top four this season, let alone challenge for the title. It is dark days for the blue side of Manchester...

Radio Task - Brief

In my coursework I am creating a 5 minute long Radio bulletin, that will include a news bulletin, jingles, adverts, a presenter, and various other components that will help make my Radio show sound realistic. 

In this coursework, I have to make a preliminary task, a main task, and evaluation, as well as recording all my research and planning on this blog.

My preliminary task will be a 1 minute long clip which will include a jingle, a presenter introducing a guest, guest responding, and an archive clip featuring the guest.