Lecture 3 and a little extra ;)

I was expecting quite a full on theory lecture today after doing the set reading which focused so heavily on the inverted pyramid. I was impressed by the level of experience of the guest lecturer, Skye Doherty. She has worked at the paper in my small town before – woo Gladstone!


What Skye told us about telling factual stories using text was as follows...
It's a great medium because it is fast and flexible. News can be put out to the public so very quickly!  The journalist has complete control over what they write, it's portable and searchable. I think out of all the different mediums of journalism this would be the one I'd focus on. 

I’d like to have learnt a bit more about news values though, because I’m completely new to journalism and am not sure what constitutes a ‘news value’, if that’s even the right context to use it in. I think I can grasp the main gist of it though (death, scandal, etc.).

I didn’t realise the level of difference that goes into making text suitable for online use or print use! I guess I should have realised that being easily accessible by google search is important because online success is all measured by traffic. Adjustments and additional information must be included to make it have the biggest readership possible. This was actually a major factor of Skye's talk, all about hypertext and how people jump from one story to another using links. 


I can definitely say I do it. Take for example when I have a browse on News.com.au, I'm forever reading the little side notes and clicking on the links embedded throughout the text. This opens up the journalist to have more exposure to a wider audience or at least get more of their (or colleague's) work read. 

I still haven’t had a tutorial yet! I don’t know if I’m even on the right track with all my blogging yet. But I start tomorrow so I might leave it til then. BYEEEE J

PS. I went to an intro to photography session and was shown this picture:

I just thought it was one of the best examples of photojournalism I've ever seen. It's so powerful not only from the brilliance of the photographer in framing the shot but also reminds you that a photojournalist HAS to be on the scene. They can't gather information from a range of sources, they actually have to be there amongst conflicts, dramas and danger. This photo really hammers that message home. Completely unrelated to text journalism I know, but how could I not include it!