The Sorry State of U.S. News Media

Submitted by Diane Farsetta on

The Project for Excellence in Journalism's "State of the News Media 2006" study claims, "The troubles of 2005, especially in print, dealt a further blow to ... journalism in the public interest." While newspaper circulation, ad income and staff levels decreased, "the industry will still post profit margins of 20%." The study also examined news coverage across numerous print, broadcast and online outlets on one randomly-chosen day, and found "enormous repetition and amplification of just two dozen stories." This means that "while there were more media outlets ... they were covering less news," reported the New York Times. Noting that national broadcast reports repeatedly quoted the same few people, the study cautions that "more coverage ... does not always mean greater diversity of voices." The "shallowest" news media was cable news, according to the study. Bloggers "raised new issues," but "did almost no original reporting."

Main Source: 
Editor & Publisher, March 12, 2006
Topics: 
Journalism
Democracy

Comments

Diane Farsetta replied on

[http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/CA6315346.html?display=Breaking+News&referral=SUPP Broadcasting & Cable reports] that the Project for Excellence in Journalism study called local TV news "the most thinly sourced and shallowly reported of any medium studied other than local radio":

The study found that "roughly half of all the news hole on local TV news that was not given over to weather, traffic and sports was devoted to crime and accidents. Stories about local institutions, government, infrastructure, education and more were generally relegated to brief anchor reads in the middle of the newscast," and war news got less time than lifestyle stories.

squinn999 replied on

This reminds me of all those entertainment news shows like Extra, Access Hollywoow, ET, ect and no matter what day you watch them they all have the same story on the same day, regardless if it's a big news story or little story. You would think they would at least shuffle it up a bit.