This is why I hated School-quick version

Disclaimer:
This is an invention, and any resemblance to individuals or places is unintentional, and/or does not reflect the opinions of the author.
Bonnie Scott

5/11/12

This is why I hated School

Get up, stand up: stand up for your rights!
Get up, stand up: don't give up the fight!

(“Get Up, Stand Up” —Bob Marley)

It began with that Charon’s craft, the overcrowded, decrepit bus conveying us to our prison. As prisoners of the bus, sweltering in the sticky seats, we observed in silent horror as we approached the School gates, young hands and noses pressed to the windows forming clouds of moisture on the grimy surface. A winding snake of downtrodden seniors stretched before our dismayed eyes. The welcoming committee were garbed in blindingly white long sleaved button-up shirts and long trousers—the same for males and females. Charon squeezed his passengers out into the strange welcome. The kids were in a state of resigned panic and dull confusion, until they looked into the seniors’ eyes and saw the inevitable conclusion: the ridiculous get-up was the new uniform they had been demanding. It was plain to see—especially from the pained faces of the seniors—that everyone now longed for the return of the ugly, but permissible green and brown uniform. I however, was still caught in a state of acute horror: I was all alone among my peers, being the only senior to catch the bus with the juniors. I searched the sea of horror-drawn masks for my best friend, and found only the anonymous crush of young captives. The flow of passengers was ebbing, and I could delay no longer. In a way, it was a relief to step out of the stifling air of the bus that cooked us from the inside with every inhalation. I exited the bus, at the end, and its jaws almost caught me as they closed in a skeletal grin.

On the footpath, the embarrassed seniors’ eyes were dull with dismay and some wept quietly. They stood in a faux-welcome, someone’s sick performance of “School pride”, and I knew just whose it was: the Doc’s. That’s what we called her: the head teacher. She surveyed the albino student snake with a disciplinarian’s enjoyment, hair in a severe black crop and penetrating eyes taking in her handiwork. The Doc stood there for a moment more, savouring the horrified expressions then started spouting some rubbish about how we will be so pleased to see our request for a new, more professional uniform has been obliged, and that we should start wearing it immediately. She then stalked away through the tall gates, no doubt to return to haunting the senior’s designated district, formally known as “I Block”. At the exit of Her Ominence (yes, I did just make up that word), some of the more tear-stained seniors tugged at their uniforms, muttering about how all they needed to do now was dye them orange, and the effect would be complete. The two groups of students began to meld and commiserate about their shared fate. My peers seemed to be recovering from their initial horror, donning an additional layer of resignation. This new defeat was an iron ball and chain that made them drag their feet as they filed into the School grounds as the warning bell rang. “Bring out your dead,” it said to me.

I could not follow the group this time, aware of the wrath I would incur as punishment for tardiness. Panic had again risen in my chest at the thought of facing this new situation without my ally. A moment later, mingling with the echo of the bell was the distinct sound of her van’s motor pulling into the car park. She bounded up to me in a flurry of nervous energy, and a sliver of fear slid away at the sight of her. Breathy greetings were chased hurriedly aside as I relayed to her the ghastly new situation. She gave me a curt, grim nod of solidarity and we sped into the grounds. I was exulting that the new uniforms were “horrible, just horrible. Worse than the last-“ when sirens went off, too loud and too close. Appearing among the flashes of red and blue lights was a girl from our year. She was a stocky girl, with a serious face and humourless grey eyes. She had always been a kind girl, until Doc had caught her for some minor offence, taking her under her wing and had returned one of them. She read mechanically from the printed sheet of paper in her hands.

“Classmate 44218, you are charged with crimes against the institution for your debasement of the new uniform. You, and classmate 44351 here are also in violation of the Uniform proclamation as of four minutes, thirty-two seconds ago that states all students must wear Uniform 3.0, the white upgrade,” (upon which, she handed us a set of the white atrocities each and ensured we donned them on the spot) “furthermore, you are now…two hundred and thirty-…eight seconds late for class. You will await your punishment at the final School bell.”

She turned on her heel and marched toward our classroom with the knowledge that the both of us would surely follow. My ally exchanged a fearful glance with me, wondering what cruel and bizarre punishment awaited us once all the other students had escaped for home.

“Keep up!” our authoritative classmate barked, without turning to look at us at her heels.

Along our hurried march to the classroom, some of my fear turned to anger: anger at this place that was supposed to be a place of learning, where young minds collaborated to seek and education about all possibilities of things imaginable. Where has the dream gone to die? The only things we saw here were fear, obedience, punishment, and the unquestionable power of authority. This totalitarian prison took the world’s most promising hopes for the future, young minds, and turned them into cowardly, detestable vermin, which resorted to scrapping and bullying amongst themselves to vent their frustration with the dominance of an authority they could not rebel against. That was how the authorities did it, the teaching and administration staff; they kept the cohorts separated so the student body could not unite and rise against them, in a unified whole. It made me want to shout “Look what you’ve done!” at the top of my voice. It was a miracle when anything positive like friendship formed out of this, like it had with me. If only we could unite! Maybe then our goals might be achieved.

From somewhere far off, I knew that with a little time, age would give us the power to break the curse of suppression and enable us to forge our own identities. We would become responsible for our own actions, when we left the totalitarian School-state in our memories and our nightmares. No matter how much we think we could do things better, if we could do it over again, we can be eternally grateful that we don’t have to return because it’s over now.

Catch-up television on the web

"Be gentle, it's my first time,"

Being the age I am without ever having watched missed TV show episodes on the web previously, may seem a little strange. But truly, up until last night, whenever I missed crucial episodes I would think to myself: That's it, I'll just have to fill-in the blanks or go buy the series. It is a sign that I am a full convert that I now cringe at that primitive seeming mentality. So yes, those websites that offer reruns of the latest episodes do seem to serve their purpose for catch-ups, but I am still an old-fashioned TV girl at heart. The crappy quality of my computer screen, a couple of mishaps with the progress-bar-thingy (you can tell I've definitely not done this before), and the loading times, make me only willing to resort to telly on the computer as the back-up for missing the shows. There is no way in hell I could watch whole series on the computer. I don't know how people can! Not unless their computer equipment actually bests their entertainment systems (though, I suppose there are people who don't have a TV at all, so the computer is their only option).

So am I a convert? Not really...

Don't get me wrong: improvements in technology and our greater reliance on it, which in turn, fuels society to be more web-based, has made many activities simpler, faster, and sometimes cheaper. But I don't believe that technology in society is at the stage yet, were television has become redundant. I, personally, would still much prefer to watch every piece of audio-visual media on the TV, because the quality is a lot higher for a lot less money. Our tiny little family flat screen was one of the smallest digital enabled TVs that you could  buy at the time, and when compared to the (similar quality bracket) laptop, the TV wins hands down for comfort of experience. I think relying on our computers for almost everything is going a bit overboard. Sure, I  always wanted a device that could do everything, (think of all the pocket space I'll save!!!), but I've realised through this experience, that when you intend to use something for a good experience, it's better to go with the experts. And this relates back to many devices: sure you can go on the internet on your phone, but you would prefer to do  it on your computer because the tiny phone is not designed for hardcore browsing. Sure you could listen to music on your computer, with it's teeny-tiny built in speakers-but who would dance to the tinny racket if they could be pumping their fists to the ground shaking bass of a legitimate sound system?

A further reason why I will be trying to catch my shows on the TV rather than the internet at my leisure: I missed crucial elements of plot because I could not read the pixelated computer and phone screens from my grainy internet video. Not cool. Not cool at all. For anyone who has watched the Benedict Cumberbach Sherlock on a tiny, blurry screen, you will share my frustration and confusion. It's not worth it.

I hope you've enjoyed my rant, and please feel free to leave me your comments,

-Bon

Twitter talks on TV

I saw a share worthy episode of the ABC's Big Ideas program on Twitter. Below is a link to the iview video, but it is going to expire on that site in a few days, so for reference, it was series five, episode thirty-eight aired on the twentieth of June, 2012.

http://www.abc.net.au/iview/#/view/23200

One of the speakers, Catherine Deveny (a comedian and columnist for the Age for nine years, among other things) said something to the effect of that she uses Twitter because there are too many wankers on Facebook. I quite like that, as I prefer Facebook to Twitter, and I agree that, yes, it is mostly fluff and there are a few wankers. : P

And on another note, I have to congratulate myself, and a lot of others out there, that they have finished the first semester of Uni. Hurray! Bring on the holidays! I plan to keep writing my creative piece and NOT do any Uni. I do so love the artist of the photo below-please find him in my earlier post: you will recognise his distinctive work, I am sure.

Take care all,

-Bon

Evaluation of JOUR1111: Goodbye Journalism, hello Writing

So JOUR1111 is almost over: there are no more lectures or tutes, just some little pieces of assessment to do here and there. It was with an air of finality that I left the final tute, as it will not only be the last of the course I will attend, but likely the last of any journalism subject. After having said that I'm not continuing with the journalism major, it may seem strange when I say that I thoroughly enjoyed this subject. The lectures were informative and engaging-the lecturers both knowledgeable and helpful. It all sounds very cliche as I write this, but it has honestly been a really enjoyable subject.

Since I've cleared that up, you will probably be wondering why, exactly, I'm not continuing journalism study when I like it so much. Here's the rub: in the attempt to become a journalist, I realised why I will not do well as one. I lack passion for this pursuit. We were always taught, in this course to take an interest in what is happening around us, seek the stories, and make the effort to create quality journalism. When I tried to do all these things, I felt very false, because the interest I did take had to be forced out of me, and I could not shake my lazy attitude.

Though I was initially disappointed that my first choice of study hasn't worked out, it has made me decide to follow my passions instead of engaging in wishful thinking. I will be changing my major to writing (ironically, since this blog has been riddled with errors and for the draft stage, ineffectively written).I thought The Beatles would cheer up the tone of this post.

The tutes were amazing, probably the most enjoyable I've had so far with my uni study. They inspired all to learn and appreciate the merits of journalism, its function in our society, and its relevance to many aspects of daily life. So I would like to say a huge thank you to all those involved in the course: especially Bruce and Ali Rae. I hope that none of the staff involved in the course take my lack of success as a journalist as a failure on their part. 

My last message on this blog as part of this course is to say that I plan to continue adding content, but there will be a greater focus on English-hopefully with more effective writing... ;) And who knows? Maybe there will be a little more journalism too.

It has been an absolute pleasure,

-Bon.

Attempts to brain-wash homosexual teens: I despair for society

I was shocked and disgusted by the article, its headline: "Praying away the gay" on the first and fifth pages of the June 10th Sunday Mail. Certain American and Australian Christian groups employed brain-washing techniques with the purpose of 'straightening out' homosexual teenagers and children. Such events seemed at odds with the apparent rise of social equality and anti prejudice movements in our societies, particularly after governmental actions against racism. Was I wrong? The perpetrators make me wonder if ignorant and hateful people will ever leave the rest of the world alone.

"Homosexuality is treated in the therapies as a disorder that can be brought on through abuse as a child or lack of a strong father figure" -McKenna and Murray for the Sunday Mail.

My summary of the article:
This brain-washing practice is being enacted on homosexual Queenslanders by certain Christian groups. The American state of California has already taken actions to ban this brainwashing on minors, and yet, nothing has been done yet in Australia, it seems. One alliance of Christian ministries claims that their 'ex-gay therapies' have a 65% rate of success with changing the child's sexuality--never mind the 100% rate of 'reformees' being subject to prejudice disguised as care. Queensland children as young as fourteen have sought help after being subject to the the therapies, making former advocates of the program speak out against it. One of whom, psychologist Paul Martin, stressed that the children are likely suffer long-term harm from the therapy. Mr Martin was once at the receiving, and then the giving end of this treatment, but he now supports the children who seek psychological help after the treatment. Mr Martin suggested that exposure to this kind of treatment during puberty is likely to increase the number and severity of cases of depression and mental illness. *It is a very logical conclusion to reach: when young, impressionable minds are lead to believe they will go to hell for a part of themselves they can't control, they won't feel great about themselves, will they? The ministries association, Exodus Asia pacific listed one ministry in Victoria, two in New South Wales, and five in Queensland that advertised themselves as being able to cure homosexuality. The article mentions Brisbane filmmaker Heather Corkhill's documentary "The Cure". Corkhill's documentary investigated the so-called 'ex-gay' therapy, revealing that children under twelve were believed to have undergone the process.

Here is a link to an on line version of the article I read: http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/gods-shock-tactics/story-e6freoof-1226390040324

 *The above image aligns with my reaction to the Sunday Mail article; despite some improvements in society's prejudiced treatments of outgroups, it is still prevalent. Prejudice has had so many facelifts that it's persisted in the hearts, minds and actions of too large a portion of society. If the cartoon men were replaced by priests or something similar, it would back up my point even further.


I apologise: these topics should be approached with a cool head and intelligent analysis rather than impassioned rambling. But it can be difficult to control your anger at these misdeeds if you have a heart. What kind of a person do you have to be to tell a child or teen that their unconscious cognitive, emotional, and perhaps even physical actions are wrong? I would be interested to see how these people would react to someone telling them that they should stop breathing. Could their self-righteous attitudes ever be brain-washed out of them so they felt that being born requiring air is unnatural and wrong, and that they are evil for doing it. It seems unlikely, I'm sorry to say.


If  reading about the stupidity prejudices of some of humanity does this to you:

may I recommend a refreshing detour to a few reasonable arguments in adorable design form? Find them here: http://www.slapupsidethehead.com/tag/unjust-laws/
* And a note from me that this story was sensationalised, but I think it's more important that what it contained needed to be said: programs and mentalities like those of Exodus must not be tolerated in our society.

-Bon

W13 (final) Lecture: Steve Molkington

Steve Molkington is a media commentator/TV fantatic, a blogger and has a regular radio segment... who gave us the story of his journalism career and some helpful advice to boot. Here is the URL for his site about,--you guessed it--TV:
 http://molkstvtalk.com/
*But it is much more fun than I've made it out to be. What I particularly like about it is that it isn't some trashy celebrity gossip-hyped 'entertainment' style blog. The reader can tell that the author is intelligent, and more importantly, has intelligent comments to make about the genre, about which, he is well informed.


Employers are looking for employees who have the capability to present stories etc. across different media platforms-especially new media such as Twitter. The traditional concept of journalism as 'broadcasting' is old school, and there is a great surge towards interactivity in current journalism. Latika Burke is a political reporter employed to give the news online via Twitter etc. This is a promising message for new media journalists who could now be employed (and payed) for the work they are already doing.


*Interesting fact: The Gruen Transfer (an absolutely brilliant program) is currently the largest money-maker for the ABC.

Now for some advice on how to being a great journalist...
-Form opinions
-Have an ego now as it will help you later (be confident-something I personally need to work on)

A final message from Steve Molks:

"When your opinions are starting to be considered valuable, you are succeeding"

Thanks Steve,
-Bon.

W12 Lecture: Investigative Journalism

Most good journalism is investigative, or Shoe Leather Journalism. Investigation in journalism is about discovering truths and deviations from the truth. It should be intelligent (know your purpose and be prepare yourself to encounter troubles), informed (if you are not informed about the basic aspects and facts, you can miss the true story), intuitive (explore your hunches), inside (try to get exclusive information-to do this, the interviewee must be able to trust you), involved (invest your time and effort to be thorough) and interactive (interview, observe, research, watch for leaks, briefings and documents).

Good investigative journalism should be the critical and thorough. Wherever possible, it should provide civic voice to the voiceless, therein becoming the "custodians of conscience" and enablers of social justice-exposing society to itself . By doing this, investigative journalism may hold those with power to account as "the Fourth Estate". This Fourth Estate allows freedom of information so that democracy functions properly. It keeps 'the man'-the government, legislation, the judges/ judiciary and the police etc. on their toes, so they don't get away with injustices against the people by abusing their power.

Bruce gave some famous examples of when investigative journalism and the media have exposed the powerful to bring about justice, including "the Moonlight State", Wikileaks, the Watergate Scandal (the investigations prior to the Frost and Nixon interviews) and the Fitzgerald Enquiry. *There have really been many more instances of this, I think. I mean, any time there is ever a scandal in Parliament, it is always the media who have uncovered it, or at least helped in making it known the the public. As you could expect, the powers being exposed for wrong doing generally try to weasel their way out of the blame *cough cough* Craig Thomson acting as if his Union credit card paid for those prostitutes itself: yeah right! Because of the nature of Australia's governmental and judicial systems, thankfully Thomson is probably not going to get away with his offences. This is not the case in other countries though, where the level of corruption is so high and freedom of speech and press is so severely suppressed that the powerful offenders do get away with their crimes. Not only that, but if the journalists actually manage to expose the things the powerful don't want in the public sphere, the 'messengers' may be literally shot, or worse. It all depends on how corrupt the government and the military etc. are, and how much control they have.

Triangulation of whether what you have been told, what you have seen and what was recorded match up can be a rule for checking the validity of your story. Investigative journalists should take a sceptical-not cynical-approach to the information they discover. A current goal for them should be to improve the quality of their stories, and not follow the trend of churnalism, by being thorough and reliable, checking their sources and doing vast amounts of research. Some advice to keep in mind when compiling an investigative story: check your facts, assume nothing, expect whistle blowers to go and BE crazy. *Investigative journalism can change society and the world...Or maybe that's just because a couple of superheros work for the media?

Some good investigative journalism programs are Australian Story, the 7:30 Report, Four Corners and Hungry Beast. *Hungry Beast was a really accessible, intelligent, interesting and entertaining program, advertised as "Youth Orientated Investigative Journalism", but it's a bit unconventional and offensive at times. Here's a link to a review on it and my encourage it to watch it, it's a great show.
http://www.bhatt.id.au/blog/hungry-beast-youth-oriented-investigative-journalism-abc-tv-review/

 -Bon

Annotated Bibliography

Maier, S. (2010). All the News fit to post? Comparing News content on the Web to Newspapers, Television, and Radio. Journalism and Mass Communication Quarterly, 87(3/4), 548-562.

Online news content differs to that of legacy media in the way content differs between any media platforms. This online and traditional media content overlap supports journalism’s agenda setting role, as the more a topic is covered, the more import it is given by the audience. In addition, many blogs and other Internet news sources refer back to content of traditional media through links. Study findings supported the article’s stance that online news had only slightly less depth than its heritage media counterparts. Media fragmentation is more disruptive to journalism as the audience is given too much choice, so they only consume news that aligns with their existing views. Due to this, the media have more difficulty setting a common agenda for the fragmented audience. All of the claims in the article are supported by studies, which are explained in depth. However, the studies are based on American media in 2008 and 2009, meaning the findings are less relevant to the current Australian media-scape. The author is a fairly reliable information source on this topic as he is an associate professor in the school of Journalism and Communication at the University of Oregon. The author outlines the limits of the study and suggests that further studies be conducted on this same topic, dispelling the bias it may have had.

Atkinson, C. (2012, April 16). Atheists meet to discuss faith-or lack of it. Retrieved from http://www.atheistconvention.org.au/2012/04/16/atheists-meet-to-discuss-faith-or-lack-of-it-sbs-radio/

The Atheist Foundation of Australia organised the Global Atheist Convention: A Celebration of Reason in Melbourne, held in April this year and which sold almost four thousand tickets. Speakers included prominent atheist authors, scientists, philosophers, comedians and more. They argued that religion has a negative impact on society, using the issues of homosexual rights, abortion and euthanasia as examples. Christianity, in particular, was argued against, though Islam was also criticised. Muslim and Christian groups protested against the convention, which did not affect the large audience numbers. This source was accessed from the website for the Global Atheists Convention, though it was originally aired on SBS Radio. Clare Atkinson’s reporting is unbiased as her story was intended for the public media outlet SBS. This is supported by the neutral tone that Atkinson employs in her objective communication of all the featured protesters’ and speakers’ opinions. In this way, neither the SBS’s or Atkinson’s personal opinions influenced the story. Thus, no ideological or political agenda was forced on the listeners. Agenda setting was employed by the Website managers in including the traditional media story on their page, as, according to Maier, repetition increases an issue’s news value.

Stevenson, C. (2012, April 27). Global Atheist Convention-Sunday, 15 April (Part Seven). Retrieved from thatsmyphilosophy.wordpress.com: http://thatsmyphilosophy.wordpress.com/2012/04/27/global-atheist-convention-sunday-15-april-part-seven/

Chrys Stevenson’s blog piece offers her experiences at, and reactions to the 2012 Global Atheist Convention. Stevenson discusses the fundamentalist Islamic protesters who were mentioned in the SBS Radio piece. She negatively described the actions of the group as an embarrassment to the rest of their community and praised the Atheist convention attendees who argued against the protests. She described the protesters as embodying hate, while the atheists embodied peace in order to highlight the hypocrisy of the protesters. Stevenson employs agenda setting techniques by reiterating the already publicised kiss between a homosexual couple in front of the protesters. She attracts further attention to the story by covering it on her blog with links to other journalism on it, therein making the event more newsworthy. The author of this piece is an Atheist blogger; sceptical and secular activist, historian and freelance writer-with some of her recent articles appearing on The Drum, ABC’s Religion and Ethics and Online Opinion. Stevenson’s professional background is in marketing and public relations; she also wrote most of the media pieces for the 2010 Global Atheist Convention. Stevenson’s style is personal and subjective- she is the sole author, sympathetic to the Atheist point of view because she shares it, meaning that her writing is biased, as is to be expected in the journalism blog format.

Walker, T. (2012, January 17). Global Atheist Convention stimulates Christian evangelism. Retrieved from creation.com: http://creation.com/global-atheist-convention

This online article was written by creationist Tas Walker, an employee of religious organisation Creation Ministries International, who own the website it was accessed from. The writing is biased because of Walker’s affiliation with the company who commissioned the piece, as they both have vested interests in conveying a negative image of the Global Atheist Convention. Walker gave his opinion as though it was fact, stating that media coverage of the Convention would ignore the theist viewpoint by sympathising with the Atheists. The source of this information is the author’s own subjective opinion, making the piece unreliable. The level of bias breaches the amount appropriate for the online article format, where objectivity is required. The SBS Radio coverage of the convention was exemplary of media objectivity, contradicting Walker’s accusation of sympathetic alignment with the Atheist viewpoint, thus supporting that the article is unreliable and bias. A religious agenda is set due to the article’s bias against the convention and that it encouraged readers to buy copies of a newspaper with similar views as the author. This is the agenda setting technique by which gaining more publicity for an issue makes it seem more important discussed in Maier's piece.

W11 Lecture: Agenda Setting

"How the Media 'constructs reality'."

The way individuals perceive reality may be affected by communication through shared language, society and the media.  Journalism has a large role in constructing the public's opinion of the world and issues around them. The four interrelated agendas in the media are what's important to the public, what the decision makers think is significant (policy), what's important to large companies (corporate) and of course, the media agenda.

The agenda is set by the privileging of certain news items (so, Agenda setting is closely related to news values*see W9 Lecture). When mass media presents certain issues frequently and prominently, the audience perceives it as important. More coverage=issue perceived as more important. The media report, reflect, filter and shape the consumers' concepts of reality. The mass media influence the images events make in the audience's minds. Here are some models that explain it better:

Agenda setting as propaganda: in a way it is, as it may have a big influence on what people think is news and even their cognitive and emotional responses to events. These are the two levels of agenda setting: what is salient in the news and how the issues are portrayed (how the viewers feel). *The negative aspects of this are that the reality of events may be warped into untruths and that the audience stops thinking critically about issues-instead relying on what the media tells them. To critically assess propaganda/agendas, Lippmann suggests the viewer should "liquidate judgements, regain an innocent eye, disentangle feelings, be curious and open-hearted.

The example in the lecture of the same stories being portrayed differently, thus setting a different agenda, was rather striking in this photo: 

 Facets of agenda setting:

Media Gate keeping: what the media exposes (or doesn't expose) to the public.

Media Advocacy: promoting a particular message.

Agenda Cutting: the majority of what's happening in the world isn't making the news because of news value, i.e, One Direction concerts are dwelt on, but not AIDS, and so people care less about it.

Agenda Surfing: The media jumps on the bandwagon of topics receiving a lot of coverage, and tends to mirror existing portrayals of the issue.

Diffusion of News: decisions when, how and where to release news.

Media Dependence: the more dependent a person is on media, the more likely they are to be affected by its agenda.

All of this theory relies on the public paying close attention to the information they are consuming, whereas, with intermittent attention or interest in public affairs, the public is less likely to be subject to the influence of the media's agenda. Not to mentions all the people who have already formed their opinions independent of the news, who are disinclined to be swayed by the agenda.

*If you pay attention, you can see the way the media agenda sets the political reality. For example, the 'controversies' revealed about politicians in the media, and even to a less extreme degree, the spin the media puts on policies etc., influences what the politicians talk about.

-Bon

W9 Lecture: News Values

Salutations all. I ought to explain here, that I won't be writing my posts in point form anymore. It was time for me to face the facts: it looks terrible, especially because the 'points' are just sentences with a hyphen at the start. I will eventually rid my earlier posts of this troublesome nuisance, but for now, this post will be a teaser of what is to come.. Enjoy. :)

The degree of prominence media outlets give to stories, and the attention payed to them by the audience constitutes news values. In other words, the measure of how 'newsworthy' a story is, is based on how much interest people take in it--if no one cares about a particular event, it won't appear. It's because of news values that only a small amount of stories that are happening, are published.

Current determiners of news values are a story's impact, audience and the pragmatics of it. To have news value, stories must be hard-hitting, interesting and relevant to the audience (so they will buy into it). In addition, the source of the news i.e. press releases and ethics, influence an item's news value.

The inverted pyramid reappears: the more newsworthy a story is, the earlier it appears. "If it bleeds, it leads"- gore, violence and tragedies tend to lead. (This is a common complaint of my parents- "There's too much violence in the media. We don't want to see that.") So I guess an argument can be made that this also puts people off, therein decreasing the item's news value.

News values differ across countries and cultures. We can also see a difference in news values between commercial and public media outlets, i.e channel nine's focus on local areas in Brisbane etc. versus SBS's coverage of international stories over insignificant local ones. With local media outlets, generally, "If it's local, it leads"...which doesn't have quite the same ring to it.

Harold Evans, the editor of The Sunday Times calls editors the human sieves of the torrent of news, saying that for them, a sense of news values is more important than their command of language. But knowing what is newsworthy is dependent on practise and instinct, rather than logic and there is no formal code, as it is transient, and news-service specific.

International news values: negativity (blood), proximity, recency, currency (ongoing investigations etc.), uniqueness ('dog bites man' is old hat: 'man bites dog' has news value), simplicity (faster to absorb in our fast-paced modern era), predictability, presence of elite nations or people (if the Pope wears a sombrero, it will be more newsworthy than me wearing one) and where it is an exclusive.  Some others: drama, visual attractiveness, entertainment value, importance (I can't believe this is just an 'other', what is the world coming to?), brevity, educational value, timeliness*, emotional value, controversy, surprise, positive news, agenda of news service, celebrification of the journalist (how high-profile the reporter is), surprise, follow-up.

*I thought I ought to throw in a reference to Mothers Day somewhere in here, as it would be a very timely inclusion, and that is a news value. Happy Mothers Day!

In theory, the more news values one story has, the higher the newsworthiness (additivity hypothesis). Maybe it's like having all the different colours and flavours of skittles or Jelly beans (throw-back to the week two lecture!!). But complemenarity hypothesis states that these factors tend to exclude each other.

If you thought that was the end of it...another model of news values for good measure:

In descending order of news value-significance, proximity (incl. historical and cultural background), conflict, human interest, novelty and fame/prominence (celebrities doing stuff, pretty much).

To the nitty-gritty now, what are the threats to news values? With the current rapid production of the news because of fast technology, there is less research being done, leading to erroneous news. This can be called 'churnalism'- the news cartel is hyper-commercialised and mass-produced, causing one stagnant viewpoint to predominate and bad quality of the end-product. PR battles with journalism to make their client appear in a better light, distorting the truth. Additional to all these:  ethics, geographic impossibility of reporting and censure may effect news values.

Not to mention the massive power-shift between the audience and the media. With all the ways that the former "audience" can broadcast themselves and create their own content, the public are now deciding their own news values. Power to the people, I say!

-Bon

Factual Storytelling Assignment

Experimentation

You should get Facebook, it's really good.

Early Addiction-trying it once is never enough

I need a nice profile picture.

Abuse Phase: Denial

But I only just logged in, and I have plenty of time to do homework.

Abuse Phase: Secrecy

Seriously, I am going to go to bed soon.

Abuse Phase: Apathy

 Can you wait? I'm talking to someone on Facebook.

Heavy Dependency

I know I shouldn't be doing this, but I can't help myself.

The Struggle-incompatible needs collide

 There isn't enough time, it's all too hard.

Rehabilitation

 I'm sorry for being such an idiot.

Recovery

Now that I've seen how addictive it can be, I won't fall into the trap again.