Introduction to the News

Part 1 (News Broadcast)

The broadcast I have chosen to look at is Look East from 8th March 6pm 2015. There is an opening titles with music and images from around the East of the country, with intent to connect with the more niche, personal audience. The reason they are there is so that the viewers get used to them and relate the opening sounds to the news, which will grab their attention ready for the programme. The visuals of local areas allow the audience to feel involved and able to relate to what is on the screen. The titles end with the title 'Look East' with other routes to reach them listed below, like Facebook and Twitter for example. In this broadcast the first story is about 240 jobs across the east on the verge of being lost as councils cut costs by 313 million. 181 of them are in the regions unitary authorities as they try to freeze council tax this year. Next was a story about Northampton shire County Hall redeploying 4000 staff leaving them with just 150 employees. The third story was about a teenage girl who had been sexually assaulted near Suffolk Police Headquarters. The final main story is on Michael Foale, the former NASA astronaut who has been at Cranfield University for school holding an event called Mission Discovery. Drawing the show to a close comes the sports news, where Norwich's hope for automatic promotion takes a boost, whilst Ipswich lay a place off of the play-offs. The show then ends with the weather. 

Part 2 - Role of Presenters

In the broadcast I watched yesterday, the presenter was Jenny Kirk. She is a middle-aged female around the age of 40-45 who presents the Look East 30 minute broadcast from 6 O'clock. In the news, the role of presenters is one of great importance. The presenter is the one in the news team who has the job of delivering the news to the viewers at home by directly speaking to them. The difficulty of the job varies depending on the show they are presenting, and it's of course different everyday. Appearance wise presents tend to be middle aged and a little older, and are required to dress to a formal, professional standard. This is so those at home watching see the appeal of the presenters and like them, as a lack of interest in the presenter could potentially effect viewing numbers, since the presenter has a lot of screen-time and interaction with the consumer. There is only one presenter in this news broadcast as it's a fairly short show, but usually there will be two, both a male and female, so viewers of both genders are happy and have a presenter to relate to if needed. Also, when there is a lot of news, whilst one presenter is speaking, the other will be listening to their ear piece ready for the next story that they will be covering. How they tell the story is with an earpiece, where they are spoken to throughout the broadcast by the director, producers and others all at the same time. A key skill of presenters is to not show any stress they may be feeling as it will have a negative impact on the audience. They have to appear like they are in complete command throughout, even when in their earpiece things aren't playing out quite as intended.

Part 3 - Huw Edwards

The term ordering news is to assemble a series of text based reports together in a priority first to last process, ready to broadcast to an audience. This is to keep the audience interested, watching and listening until the end. The story that is shown first is called the leading story. This is shown first because it's the most current, big story, sometimes breaking news, and will affect/involve a large percentage of the audience. After this the remaining stories are ranked in terms of interest for the audience. The ability to think and act quickly is important as in the news things can change any second, so you have to flexible and be able to alter the running order at any moment. The term ;slow news day' means that there is no breaking news, or any big, important leading stories to broadcast, so not a lot happening, meaning the broadcast is filled up with minor, low priority stories. An example of this is when you get stories about local shops or farms, showing you what they do and run their business, which you wouldn't see if there had been big events such as deaths that day. The final story is often called the 'round-up' and this is so you can group multiple stories that have similar topics together so you are delivering more to the audience but in the same time frame. An example of a 'round-up' is sports, specifically football, going through multiple leagues and multiple results in a small amount of time. 'News Values' are general guidelines/criteria that are used by media outlets. It's a set of factors that different media texts have in common. In 1965, Galtung and Ruge analysed international news stories and came up with a set of news values. These values include negativity, recency, continuity, personality and size.

The Chowles

This story was a bout a family of 3 (soon to be four) known as The Chowles. They have been struggling to pay of the mortgage on their house due to Mrs Chowles being a stay at home mum, and Mr Chowles has been too ill to work. The family now face being kicked out of their home and bailiffs coming to take their possessions as payment. Involved in the story is Pierre, the husband and father, Christina, his wife and their baby. Also the dog makes an appearance.  In the broadcast, the family are represented in a vulnerable light and are victimized. This causes the average viewer to have pity on them and their situation. Personally I pity the Chowles family to an extent. They have had a hard time and looking after a kid in such poor financial circumstances cannot be easy. I also know it's tough paying for bills and a house in today's economy for the majority of the population so it is relatable. On the other hand, I don't think they should be having a second child when they know they cannot afford it. The news story does have a narrative to it. It was based on a happy family, shown by the children playing with their toys in the opening shot, which has been met with destruction due to financial issues. The narrator is also an important part of the story. Without the voice over, the viewer doesn't know what is going on, as the family don't explain the whole situation themselves, and instead just give their opinion and answer questions from the interviewer.

Part 5

I have chosen to analyse and talk about a BBC News broadcast called 'Power chairs'. This story is about a man who's daughter was diagnosed with a spinal disability meaning she would need an electric wheelchair from 18 months old and for the rest of her life. He took this on board and made her one himself, and now 30 years later children are still benefiting from his inventions. People present in this story are Ruth Everard, the daughter of the inventor and now director at their business 'DragonMobility'. Also included are David a child suffering the same illness and his dad Jonathan, and Charlie a further young boy suffering the same illness and his mother Aimee. Ruth is seen as a victim that has become an inspiration for everyone suffering from the spinal disability that she does. The two young boys are represented as victims which they are, but they are making the most out of their lives being very positive, and their parents are not wallowing in pity and crying for help. I feel like everyone in the story is brilliant and people to admire. They have all had to deal with the disability in some way, whether it be personally or being the parent of a sufferer, and they haven't thrown in the towel at all. They are surrounded with positive vibes making the most of what they have. The story had a narrative as it begun with Ruth's story as a child and the discovery of her illness and invention of her electric wheelchair. After this the audience is taken back to the present where other sufferers are gaining the same benefits that Ruth has, showing that the invention was helpful for a lot of people.

Part 6

1) Selection and Omission - Editors can express bias by choosing whether or not they want to include a specific news story or leave it out. Also, specific elements of the story can be ignored and left out, causing the audience to have a different opinion on the story. This type of bias can only be noticed by the comparison of multiple sources. An example of this is a news story about the Queen receiving gifts in Berlin. The Mirror have only included questionable and negative comments by the Queen on them, making her appear ungrateful. Link to story - http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/is-supposed-father-queen-disses-5940414

2) Placement - Depending on where a story is placed people will have a different view on it's importance. Stories on a front cover or at the start of a radio show are thought to have greater value than ones towards the end of the magazine/show. Here is an example of placement Bias. A story about an individual doing drugs is at the top of the news page and has a larger image and text than stories below, making it out to be more important than them, which it isn't as there are deaths and stabbings below.

3) Headline - headlines are what stand out, with a big, bright and bold font. They can be misleading expressing excitement for a mundane story, or put forward opinions of the minority. Here is an example of a misleading headline, as it's branded 'worst divorce ever' when really it's just a man cutting objects in half. It could have been far, far more extreme and certainly isn't the worst ever. Link to story - http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/weird-news/jilted-lovers-worst-divorce-ever-5937987?ICID=FB_mirror_main

4) Captions, Photos and Camera Angles - Pictures can easily effect someones appearance, making them look more attractive, evil, older etc. than they really are. This can easily alter someones perception of a person or event. Here is an example of a photo and caption being misleading, as the cat is branded brave as it approaches a lion, but the photo is cropped to hide the fact that it's through a thick glass window of a door.

5) Names and Titles - News Media constantly label people and places where interviews are taking place on the news. These can be biased and reflect the view of just the editor, or a minority and not that of the general population. Here is an example of a title that may be just the view of the editor, or a minority. Here the footballer Steven Gerrard is branded an 'Anfield Legend' but this isn't necessarily the view of everyone reading. The editor could be a Liverpool fan himself. Link to story - http://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/football/news/steven-gerrard-admits-liverpool-title-5936674?ICID=FB_mirror_main

6) Choice of Words - The use of positive and negative words can influence someones view, and also the tone of voice a newscaster uses will effect the way people see the subject topic. An example of this is a news story about drug problems in Britain. The use of the negative word 'tragic' is used which would immediately push readers to have a feeling of sympathy towards sufferers, when in reality they may have no compassion towards drug addicts at all. Here is a link to the story to see for yourself - http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/tragic-images-drugs-den-reveal-5942937?ICID=FB_mirror_main