News Values

The lecture in week 9 focused on news values and newsworthiness, essentially outlining what news values are and how the different news institutions or services come to decide on what they believe to be the most newsworthy to the least newsworthy. Many quotes were shown throughout the lecture, tho one which particularly interested me was the quote reading “if it bleeds it leads.” When hearing this quote I immediately reflected upon my own experiences when watching the news and this quote while quite horrifying is certainly true. Especially on ABC or Sky News stations, where nearly every lead story is on the topic of war, murder, car accidents, deaths etc. However on channel 7, channel 9 and channel 10 the phrase “if its local it leads” is a more accurate insight into what they believe to be most newsworthy. This is evident in their in depth coverage of local issues such as the Queensland floods, local politics, currently the lady missing in Brookfield etc. Numerous different lists were shown in the lecture outlining the factors which make news valuable. Something which particularly caught my interest is the idea that the news value of a story can be determined by the class of people involved and how elite the country they live in. Bruce brought up the example of how thousands of people may have died from starvation in Africa however these tragic deaths will receive no coverage while the case of the woman missing in Brookfield will receive weeks of coverage. Prior to this lecture this hadn’t crossed my mind and it was a point made that certainly gave my mind something to feed on subsequent to the lecture.