Assessment Four - Annotated Bibliography

Introduction to Journalism and Communication – Annotated Bibliography

Journalism can be described and defined in handfuls of ways however it is most simply known to be the process of “gathering, analysing, and disseminating socially relevant information in a consistent, transparent, and honest way.” (Chen, G.M, 2009). Without journalism and communication the world would have no way of to be informed of current happenings. This annotated bibliography surrounds the current issues relating to the chaos of Federal MP Craig Thompson. This is conveyed through an article from the Sydney Morning Herald, Television Segment from Today Tonight and a radio podcast from ABC Radio. These three media types present similar yet different opinions on the matter.

Brake, D.R (2012). Who Do They Think They’re Talking To? Framings of the Audience by Social Media Users. International Journal of Communication 6, (pp. 1056–1076)

Currently an academic at the University of Bedfordshire, Dave Russell Brake uses his knowledge, experience and understanding of communication to analyse the topic of social media blogging throughout this article. From the beginning of the article brake describes how the process of modern media, such as blogging, resembles past forms of mass media communication. The article then moves to focus upon the authors’ relationship with their audience which is an element of journalism that is crucial for success. Brake critically analyses a study of the conception of this relationship with twenty three bloggers for which is shown that these authors’ are not entirely concerned with gathering information of their viewers and what they seek however the audience plays a marginal role. Brake uses numerous citations and referenced sources to his advantage in order to support the article and draw to conclusions on the topic. The article then concludes with Brake illustrating the diversity that blogging practices are framed and understood by the author maintaining them showing that blogs are more aimed at writing and its’ process and through the audience there is both personal and professional risk in journalist blogging.

Ireland, J. Jacobsen, G. (2012, May 21). Opposition, media unleashed a lynch mob – Thomson. Sydney Morning Herald. Retrieved from: http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/political-news/opposition-media-unleashed-a-lynch-mob--thomson-20120521-1z025.html

With both authors to this body of work being well known and credited for their work in a handful of the best national newspapers and particularly Ireland to whom works as a researcher in the Journalism and Media Research Centre at UNSW and has previously worked as a policy adviser in Canberra, an educated and reliable perspective of the unfolding of the parliamentary address by Federal MP Craig Thompson. Ireland and Jacobson begin by presenting the statements and defences presented by Mr Thompson during his address. Throughout the article various quotes from other politicians in the media eye are presented by both Ireland and Jacobson to enhance the article in various means. The authors throughout the body of work present the given parliamentary address accurately and tactically when beginning to conclude the article they draw upon comments made after the speech was concluded to sway the audience to their opinion of Mr Thompson. Unlike the television segment presented by Today Tonight, this particular article states more facts then opinion of the author which allows the audience to develop their own opinion on the matter.

Choueifate, J (Executive Producer), (2012, May 21). Today Tonight, Channel 7.

The author of this particular television segment allows for an experienced perspective through his career as former Sydney Director of News for the Nine Network, Network TEN Chief-of-Staff and Daily Mirror News Editor allowing for a credible analysis of the topic surrounding Federal MP Craig Thompson and the controversy over his parliamentary address. The piece is focused on unveiling the truth behind what Mr Thompson claimed during this address through the means of involving professionals in both the reading and interpreting of body language and detective processes. Choueifate uses this to his advantage throughout the segment to sway the audience to believe that what Mr Thompson is saying is deceitful through the use of the professionals saying so. The visual techniques used throughout the visual media reinforce the message of the segment and assist with the execution of the story which in turn generates the all-important interest of the public audience. The use of case facts and contradictions to what Mr Thompson claims to be the truth assists in supporting the argument being made to the guilt of the Federal MP of laundering government funds. In comparison to the radio segment presented by Alan Jones, this particular story is very bias and really forces its' audience to go by their opinion upon the controversy surrounding Craig Thompson.

Jones, A. (2012, May 22). Alan Jones says Craig Thomson has Tried Every Last Trick in the Book. Retrieved from: http://www.2gb.com/index2.php?option=com_newsmanager&task=view&id=12859

Jones is an exceptionally creditable figure though out his career within the media. From graduating from both Queensland and Oxford Universities Jones has since then moving on to win numerous awards through his lifetime. The audio piece analyses the lead up to the Federal MP Craig Thompson's parliamentary address in which Jones makes professional opinions upon the accusations and claims made upon the MP. Jones uses quotes by those related politicians and those who are claimed to be Thompson's witnesses to sway the audience to see the flaws in Craig Thompsons defences to the claims of laundering money while in government. Jones raises a question in closure of his segment as to why none of this was reported by Thompson to the police when it happened. This is a tactical move made by Jones that enhances his argument and pushes the audiences to agree with what he has said. Similar to the article presented in Sydney Morning Herald, Jones relies on facts and all though he provides the audience with his own personal opinion he too allows us to develop our own thoughts. 

It is inevitable that through the development of technology the range of journalist and communication mediums is bound to expand (much like blogging discussed within the article by Brake). It can be seen that through the attention to audience that these mediums can be utilized to the authors advantage in order to engage and get breaking news across through the greater accessibility while still remaining credible.


Reference List

Chen, G.M. (2009) What is Journalism? Retrieved May 20 2012 from: http://savethemedia.com/2009/04/06/so-what-is-journalism/

Lecture Nine - News Values

"If it BLEEDS, it Leads"

The one phrase that seems to keep appearing each time I sit in Forgan Smith E109 at 2pm on Monday. And this week was no different. Today's lecture was based on 'News Values' which was simply defined as "the degree of promise a media outlet gives to a story, and the attention that is paid by an audience." News stories are selected on the basis of four main values:

Impact - what intrigues the audience 

Audience Identification -what is of interest to the audience 

Pragmatics - ethics and current affairs 

Source Influence - public relations 

These four categories are what separates the handful of news stories from the rest of the happenings of the world. The inverted pyramid best explains the broadly agreed upon set of values of news journalism known as Newsworthiness. As mentioned before in Lecture Three, the inverted pyramid has the most important facts at the top and bleeds down to the least important facts.

This then leads back to the beginning of this post. It is said that media outlets go by the theory of "If it BLEEDS, it Leads," (basically anything damaging or disastrous) where as other go by "If it's LOCAL it Leads." But there has to be factors that determine this, right? Particular institutions shape their own news values on and around the twelve factors of Newsworthiness. Those being:

- Negativity

- Proximity

- Recency

- Currency 

- Continuity 

- Uniqueness

- Simplicity

- Personality 

- Predictably

- Elite Nations or People

- Exclusivity

- Size

There are also three hypothesis of Newsworthiness:

- The additivity hypothesis that the more factors an event satisfies, the higher the probability that it becomes news.

- The complementarity hypothesis that the factors will tend to exclude each other. 

- The exclusion hypothesis that events that satisfy none or very few factors will usually not become news.

We then went through other journalists opinions on the values of Newsworthiness which were interesting however most were very similar to the original twelve presented. We were the shown the threats to Newsworthiness which were put simply as:

- Journalism / Commercialisation of media and social life.

- Journalism / Public Relations. 

- Journalism’s ideals / Journalism’s reality

The sad truth is the journalism is becoming lazy, incompetent and in my opinion potentially unreliable due to these three threats. We were given a quote by McKinnon (which I found really stood out) in which he stated  "All of which leads to an unfortunate trend … in which pressures of the newsroom(or according to some, laziness or inadequately trained journalists) result in everyday reuse of press releases without re-writing, checking or analysis." Which basically sums it up.

We then concluded with media outlets providing the audience with what the audience need and desire because after all the media depends on its' viewers.

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