Journalism. Do you know what it really means?

What is journalism? According to Wilkinson, Grant & Fisher, 2009, “Journalism is the business of telling true stories about things that are news.” What is news? Stated by the same authors Wilkinson et al., 2009, “News, generally speaking, is something you hear, see, or read about that is important to you. News is not experience (we call that “life”).”I could not have come up with better definitions for these terms.

While thinking about what to write for this blog, I really got stumped. I did not want to write something that was based on experience, but something that was truly news that people would want to read. I am still not sure if people will want to read this, but at least I am writing the truth. I really loved what the authors discussed in chapter two about their definitions of journalism and news, along with the examples on how to determine if something is newsworthy. Of course, there was more to this chapter, but this is what really grabbed my attention.

One of the concepts that I found interesting is need vs. want. Actually I like all the terms, but I am going to give my example in regards to this one. As journalist, we cannot just surf the web for the latest trending topic to write about. We need to understand what our viewers and readers want to see and hear. I know that is not always the case. The authors mention there will be times when viewers will not realize what they need to hear. So that is why we must make them aware of government activity that they might not know, like how Governor John Doe voted 20 times to cut down the Everglades. I know this is an extreme example, but you get the point.

Wilkinson, J., Grant, A., & Fisher, D. (2009). Principles of convergent journalism . (9th ed., p. 15). Oxford, New York: Oxford University Press, Inc.

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