This book focuses on journalistic news values from an audience perspective. The audience influences what is deemed newsworthy by journalists, not only because journalists tell their stories with a specific audience in mind, but increasingly because the interaction of the audience with the news can be measured extensively in digital journalism and because members of the audience have a say in which stories will be told. The first section considers how thinking about news values has evolved over the last fifty years and puts news values in a broader perspective by looking at news consumers’ preferences in different countries worldwide. The second section analyses audience response, explaining how audience appreciation and ‘clicking’ behaviour informs headline choices and is measured by algorithms. Section three explores how audiences contribute to the creation of news content and discusses mainstream media’s practice of recycling audience contributions on their own social media channels.
Author(s): Martina Temmerman, Jelle Mast
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
Year: 2020
Language: English
Pages: 189
City: Cham
Contents
Notes on Contributors
List of Figures
List of Tables
Chapter 1: Introduction: News Values from an Audience Perspective
References
Part I: The Different Connections Between News Values and the Audience
Chapter 2: The Bad News and the Good News About News
News as a Lived Experience
‘Imaginative Empathy’ and the News
News and ‘the Landscape of Overwhelming Normality’
‘What’s the Point of This Story?’
The Bad News
The Good News
An Ethical Approach to Listening
Reporting News from the Bottom Up
News Stories Can Resonate and Inspire
Conclusion: We Can Do Better
References
Chapter 3: News Values in Audience-Oriented Journalism: Criteria, Angles, and Cues of Newsworthiness in the (Digital) Media Context
Introduction
Different Perspectives in News Value Research
Predicting News Decisions (or Not)
Distinguishing Between News Criteria, Angles, and Cues
Bringing in the Audience (Again)
Conclusion
References
Chapter 4: News Values and Topics: A 15-Nation News Consumer Perspective
Media Use
News Values
News and Topic Areas
Methodology
Subjects
Measures
Data Collection and Analysis
Data Analysis
Results
Discussion
Limitations
Conclusion
References
Part II: News Values, Audience Metrics and Shareability
Chapter 5: Analysing News Values in the Age of Analytics
News Values and Audiences
Audiences and Web Analytics
Web Analytics and News Values
Moving Forward
References
Chapter 6: Raising Clickworthiness: Effects of Foregrounding News Values in Online Newspaper Headlines
Introduction
Literature Review
Researching News Values
Headlines and Clickbait
News Values in Headlines
Effects of Foregrounding News Values in Headlines
Hypotheses
Method
Data Analysis
Results
Discussion and Conclusion
Limitations
References
Chapter 7: Facebook Status Messages as Seductive and Engaging Headlines: Interviews with Social Media News Editors
Introduction
News Headlines
Online News Headlines
Social Media News Headlines
Method
Results
Use of Facebook Status Message
Use of Emoji in Status Messages
Conclusion
References
Part III: News Values for Audiences on Local and Social Media
Chapter 8: “We Would Never Have Made That Story”: How Public-Powered Stories Challenge Local Journalists’ Ideas of Newsworthiness
Literature Review
News Values: From Journalistic Values to Audience Values
Participatory Journalism
News Values of Local Journalism
News Values from a Participatory Audience Perspective
Method
Data Gathering
Data Analysis
Findings
How Does It Work?
News Values Challenged
Enduring Values
Discussion
References
Chapter 9: From Newsworthiness to Shareworthiness: Understanding Local News Value Judgements Through an Ethnographic Study of Hyperlocal Media Facebook Page Audiences
Newsworthiness and Shareworthiness
Hyperlocal Media
Ethnographic Research Methods for Studying Hyperlocal Media Audiences
Everyday Media and Keeping on Top of Local Information
How Does Hyperlocal Media Work as a Participatory Format?
Sharing Is Caring
What Gets Shared?
Why Do People Share?
Closing Discussion
References
Index
