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News
is any new information on current events which is relayed
by print, broadcast, Internet or word of mouth to a third
party or mass audience. The reporting and investigation of
news falls within the profession of journalism.
News is often reported by a variety of sources, such as newspapers,
television and radio programs, wire services, and web sites.
News reporting is a type of journalism, typically written
or broadcast in news style. Most news is investigated and
presented by journalists and can be distributed to various
outlets via news agencies.
There are many categories
of news. The weather is typically presented by a certified
meteorologist or, on smaller stations, a less-trained "weatherman"
and is considered news. Other news categories are: sports,
fashion, society, entertainment, business, cartoon strips,
features, lottery numbers, lives of celebrities, advertising
and more. Until the 70's, when women's lib issues came to
the forefront, most newspapers had a "Women's" section
devoted entirely to fashion and society news.
Papers even printed "cheesecake" feature photos
of attractive young women in bikinis, often transmitted by
the AP or UPI wire services, illustrating various news events
or feature ideas.
News values determine how much prominence a news story is
given by a media outlet. In practice such decisions are made
informally by editors on the basis of their experience and
intuition, and analysis shows that several factors are consistently
applied across a range of news organizations.
In 1965, Galtung and Ruge enumerated these factors. The following
list is based on their analysis, which remains influential
today. Boyd 1994 states that: "News journalism has a
broadly agreed set of values, often referred to as ‘newsworthiness’
events suitable for news which tend to be proximity, relevance,
immediacy, and drama."
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