Annotated Bibliography

Altmeppen, K.D, Arnold, K & Kössler, T. (2012). Are the media capable of fair reporting? Remarks on the principle of fairness in professional journalism. Justice and Conflicts, 6(1), 329-343.

     The authors of this book are currently all professors at German universities working in the departments of journalism or communication. Together they make a knowledgeable and experienced team as they discuss the concept of fairness in journalism. They analyse the role that fairness plays in media ethics and journalistic professionalism because without fairness, an unbiased account of a story is not guaranteed and this may also lead to other negative impacts. They particularly address the notion that news reporting should always be about fact not fiction – something that every reporter should keep in mind. Altmeppen, Arnold and Kössler also argue that journalism cannot always be fair to both the audience and the sources at the same time because it is unable to cope with all the varying perspectives of a society so, ironically, in various circumstances “journalism can only be fair when it is unfair” (Altmeppen, Arnold & Kössler, 2012). They reflect on how independent journalism should be able to reflect the diverseness of the media whilst significantly using many citations throughout the chapter which adds much credibility to the writing of the authors. The ideologies that the authors bring to mind widely acknowledge and affectively address the values and ethics a journalist has or should have.

King, M. (2012, May 5). Questions add to pain for Gerard Baden-Clay over tragic and unsolved murder of wife Allison. The Courier Mail, p.9. Retrieved from: http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/opinion/questions-add-to-pain-for-gerard-baden-clay-over-tragic-and-unsolved-murder-of-wife-allison/story-e6frerdf-1226347438707

     Madonna King, the author of this piece, brings a great deal of experience and expertise to this story, being an award-winning journalist, commentator and author. Having a career in newspapers spanning more than 20 years with a focus on crime and politics, she gives this story an edge, painting the victim’s husband, Gerard Baden-Clay, in a guilty light. She opens with two questions that any person would immediately think of when questioning the actions of Gerard. These questions are crucial in developing King’s opinion as they encourage the reader to think the way she has when writing the story. She then goes on to describe what the victim’s family and friends have done and effectively relates this back to the lack of action and emotion of the husband. King clearly acknowledges that he does not have to answer to her, making her appear fairer and not as judgemental to the reader. But she strongly concludes that these questions must be answered when asked by his children in the future. The way she concludes the story makes the reader feel empathy for the children and, perhaps, dislike for the husband – successfully reinforcing her view on the topic.

Police seize evidence in search for missing woman. (2012, April 26). Channel 9 News. Retrieved from: http://au.video.search.yahoo.com/video/play;_ylt=A8tUwXBELrtPZGIAZXw25gt.;_ylu=X3oDMTBsZG9sa2NlBHBvcwMxMwRzbGsDcmVzBHNlYwNzcg--?n=35&ei=utf-8&fr=news_sb_hd&fr2=piv-news&tnr=35&c=12&p=allison+baden-clay&vid=da500d4d4cdd6d69c2562ad0528a5365&dt=1335429000&l=93&turl=http%3A%2F%2Fts3.mm.bing.net%2Fvideos%2Fthumbnail.aspx%3Fq%3D5000862912544950%26id%3D005ebcec60c8f2e168e228934d88e8f3%26bid%3D72LGcI%252ftoWDpiw%26bn%3DThumb%26url%3Dhttp%253a%252f%252fvideo.au.msn.com%252fwatch%252fvideo%252fpolice-seize-evidence-in-search-for-missing-woman%252fxoix7a1&rurl=http%3A%2F%2Fvideo.au.msn.com%2Fwatch%2Fvideo%2Fpolice-seize-evidence-in-search-for-missing-woman%2Fxoix7a1&tit=Police+seize+evidence+in+search+for+missing+woman&sigr=12tjjam2a&newfp=1

     Channel 9 reporters present a detailed story about the murder and investigation of Allison Baden-Clay. It begins with reporter, Amelia Adams, who introduces the story and then passes onto crime reporter, Alyshia Gates. Gates, a journalist for 12 years, has spent most of her career working with police and as a court reporter with a continued focus on crime. She has covered several high profile stories, including the brutal triple murder in Toowoomba in 2005 and it appears that she uses her knowledge and experience in this area in covering this story. Gates begins the story by stating that evidence has been seized for the investigation. She then brings to attention the fact that a close female friend of the victim’s husband was questioned. Although she puts an emphasis on the friend being female, she does not linger on it therefore not fully insinuating that she was perhaps, a past lover and/or a current suspect. Gates keeps the audience well informed on what detectives and police have been doing while Adams asks relevant questions. Gates’ extensive experience in crime reporting ensured that she gave a solid update on the investigation while giving the audience the most current and relevant details without making obvious negative assumptions about the victim’s husband’s female friend.

Davies, L. (2012, May 5). Friend of murdered woman laments: “She told me things, I should have done more”. The Age. Retrieved from: http://www.theage.com.au/national/friend-of-murdered-woman-laments-she-told-me-things-i-should-have-done-more-20120504-1y489.html

     The author, Lisa Davies, brings a fair sided approach to this story. Rather than painting the husband in a guilty light as many other writers and television networks have done, she instead discusses this murder of Allison Baden-Clay in an informing, non-judgemental manner. Currently the crime editor for various newspapers at Fairfax Media, and previously being the Chief Court Reporter at The Daily Telegraph, it would be fair to say that she brings a significant amount of experience to her job and to her writing. Davies uses her crime writing and court reporting experience to write a fair, unbiased account of the murder and the events that ensued. Beginning by setting the scene and describing the victim, her family and lifestyle, Davies then integrates a quote from the victim’s husband that describes his current situation. She then accurately summarises the night of the murder and how and when the victim’s body was discovered and what detectives have been doing and stating to the public. Although Davies writes that the victim’s husband may be a suspect, she does so in a way that does not paint him guilty. Davies concludes the story with quotes from the victim’s parents and best friend and ends on an optimistic note, writing about the detectives’ efforts and their progress in the case and leaves the reader with a fair and informative perspective on the murder case. 

That wench!

   It has to be said. Deb from Masterchef is a complete and utter wench. And I don't mean it in a Game of Thrones type manner meaning a prostitute, I just like the word and in my opinion it encapsulates someone who is a shit of a person and sucks.

I cannot believe she just threw Mindy under the bus like that! In tonight's episode of Masterchef the contestants were faced with a yum-cha challenge in Sydney's Chinese Garden of Friendship. It was a team challenge and each team had to come up with and serve five different types of yum-cha.

Deb was the leader of the red team and since she lacked any skill necessary for this challenge she pretty much handed it all over to Mindy to choose the dishes and keep everything under control. Okay no, she didn't "pretty much" hand it over, she did. Like she actually said something along the lines of, "Mindy, you do what you need to do because I don't know anything because I suck." That end bit isn't entirely factual but whatever. I hate her guts.

Ultimately the red team lost and at the end when the judges were questioning the contestants on the challenge, Deb acknowledged that she was unfamiliar with the cuisine which is fair enough but then she goes on to completely stab poor Mindy in the back! So much for being a team. Deb stated, "It was quite challenging working with Mindy. To be honest I didn't feel supported." This is suuuucccchhhh a load of crap. Mindy, as always, was fair, exerted the right amount of control, was encouraging and guiding. If Mindy hadn't been on her team she would have been insanely screwed. While Deb was saying that, the camera cuts to Mindy and a few other team members and you can see the shock and surprise on their faces. They kept it in pretty well unlike me who was yelling abuse at the tv! But I thought that Mindy handled Deb's harsh words quite well. She went on to say that she did the best she could - I mean, what else are you meant to say when someone totally cuts you?

In my opinion I think that Mindy is going to go very far in this competition. She's a calm, cool and collected cook and she's a much better person than that wretched Deb!

To watch Deb screw over Mindy, click here and select Full Episodes, Week 3, Episode 16, Part 9/9.

Look at that evil face.

Investigative Journalism

    Investigative journalism. Apart from thinking about The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, I've always thought that most types of journalism are investigative because  don't most types of journalism require questioning facts and opinions, researching and finding out more to the story? My suspicions were proved correct by the quote from investigative journalist, Ross Coulthart - what a genius, I must say.

And Bruce, I freaking love acrostics! God this made the lecture so much better. So the "in's" of investigative journalism are:
Intelligent: you must have a plan and know what you're looking for and it has to be well thought out.
Informed: we've got to know the facts!
Intuitive: that gut feeling. Go with your instinct!
Inside: you need to get on the inside the story - you need to gain the person's trust.
Invest: invest your time, money, health, YOUR LIFE! Okay not so full on, but you get the idea. You've got to invest yourself. Going off track a little, whenever I hear the word invest, I immediately think of this scene from Moulin Rouge. One of the best movies ever! Oh my God it cracks me up.

But why do we need to be and know all these things?

Critical and thorough journalism: we ain't just messin' 'round 'ere. 'Tis serious stuff. Active intervention!

Custodians of conscience: testing people's ethics, morals and seeing what they think. Exposure!

Providing a voice to the voiceless: social justice - power to the people! Public interest, people. 

Fourth estate/branch of government/watchdog: ensuring the free flow of information necessary for the functioning of a democracy and being able to hold public personalities and institutions accountable.

So what are types of investigative interaction?

Interviews, observations, documents, briefings, leaks, trespass and theft - but thank God for technology. Instead of stealing things now we can just take pictures of them instead. Don't want to be going to hell now do we! And methods of investigation (quite obvious) are interviewing, observing and analysing documents. And believe it or not, there are other places to research other than Google (though I am yet to figure that out properly myself).

So I have, in fact, learnt a lot from this lecture. I quite liked it. My view on investigative journalism has changed quite a bit. It's not all sneaking around in dangerous places around dangerous people trying to solve a murder, there's a bit more to it than that. But one thing is for sure: always check your facts and assume nothing!

Here's the trailer to The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo if you haven't, for some insane reason, read it or seen it.

Oh Baz.

    The Great Gatsby! Holy mother of God I cannot wait for this to come out. Baz Luhrmann is a fricken genius. And I'm not just saying this because he directed Moulin Rouge, one of my all-time favourite movies and Romeo + Juliet. Well kind of. But not really. It's just that he always puts a spin on things. His cinematography is just insane in the membrane. It's awesome. He always films and directs things with a little twist. His way of doing things is not the norm.

For instance, take Michael Bay. I've always seen him as just doing everything in a very "Hollywood" style. But not good ol' Baz. I feel as though he shows old things in a modern and exciting way. He makes things interesting. He just makes his films so... cool. And this is the reason I am so darn excited about seeing The Great Gatsby.

Of course it helps that Leonardo DiCaprio and Tobey Maguire are in it. DiCaprio plays the wealthy Jay Gatsby while Maguire, aka Spiderman, plays Nick Carraway, Jay Gatsby's neighbour. Playing Tom Buchanan is Joel Edgerton (his name sounds familiar but when I stalked him on IMDB I couldn't place him) and playing Daisy Buchanan, his lovely wife and Gatsby's former lover, is Carey Mulligan. Also playing Myrtle Wilson is the hilarious and also Australian, Isla Fisher.

Carey Mulligan is quite the rising star I must say. I first saw her in Pride and Prejudice, another favourite movie of mine. And since then I've seen her popping up in all sorts of blockbusters such as An Education, Public Enemies, Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps and Drive with the oh so good looking Ryan Gosling.

But yeah. SO pumped for this. It comes out in Australia on 10 January 2013. AAAAHHHH. So far away. But since my birthday is on January 23... early birthday present perhaps?

Agenda Setting

   I don't really know what I think of when I hear the words "agenda setting". Honestly, I get flashbacks to grade four when my teacher would always say, "so what's on the agenda today?" But that's what week 11's lecture was on. And on a side note, I must say I absolutely loved this clip that Bruce showed at the start of the lecture. It's so true!

But back to agenda setting. What is it? Agenda setting is a theory, but like all good, solid theories, it's all a bit obvious really! As quoted by the highly influencial and well known Sir Bruce Redman. Nothing like a good sucking up to lecturers ;) And if you're in need of a more academic definition, here's one by Coleman, McCombs, Shaw and Weaver: "Agenda setting is the process of the mass media presenting certain issues frequently and prominently with the result that large segments of the public come to perceive those issues as more important than others. Simply put, the more coverage an issue receives, the more important it is to people." But anyway, so within agenda setting, there are four interrelated agendas: 

Public Agenda: what the public perceive as important.

Policy Agenda: issues that decision makers deem as salient.

Corporate Agenda: issues that big businesses/corporations think are important.

Media Agenda: issues that are discussed in the media.

There are also two basic assumptions of media agenda setting. The first of which is that the mass media does not merely reflect and report reality, they filter and shape it. And let's be honest, this is  true. There is a lot of news out there. So many events happen everyday throughout the world and the media filters through heaps and heaps of stories and events in order to narrow it down to the most important and interesting  ones. The mass media also shapes the way we see news. Different media outlets will always have different perspectives on different events. The second assumption is that media concentration on a few issues and subjects leads the public to perceive those issues as more important that other issues. 

So where did agenda setting come from, I hear you ask? Well for now I'm going to focus on Walter Lippman. Good old Walter. So in the early 20's Lippman was a newspaper columnist and in his book "Public Opinion" he stated that "the mass media creates images of events in our minds." And I find this to be pretty accurate. For example, the 9/11 attacks. When we think of this story, pretty much all of us will associate it with a photograph similar to this: 

Even as I googled "September 11 attacks", almost all the pictures I saw were like that. And I know you're all thinking, "Well obviously. There couldn't be any other photos we associate with 9/11 because that picture is of what happened." But you sir, are wrong! These images were provided to us by the media. We could have associated the attacks with a photo of terrified people running down the street. Or of firefighters rushing to the scene. But we don't. We immediately think of the two buildings alight with fire. We rely on these images in order to formulate judgments instead of thinking critically about the matter.

Old Walter boy also brings to attention the use of propaganda. And I can't help but have another flashback to year nine humanities and learning about how Hitler used propaganda. But let's not get into that. As Lippman stated, "Propaganda is used as a tool to help shape images in the minds of human beings in support of an enterprise, idea or group."

So basically, agenda setting is not necessarily about telling readers what to think but rather, telling readers what to think about. And like many of us, agenda setting also has a cute little family:

Media Gatekeeping: how individuals control the flow of messages through a communication channel. Basically how much exposure an issue gets and what the media chooses to reveal to the public.

Media Advocacy: the purposeful promotion of a message through the media - all the good messages like anti-smoking. Don't want our toes falling off now do we? DON'T SMOKE!

Agenda Cutting: stories that are reported over others. But seriously gaiz, who wouldn't want 2 no about da Beebz' nu haircut?! Belieber 4 lyf. But really, the stories that are covered less are basically cared about less.

Agenda Surfing: the 'bandwagon' effect. How the media follows trends. For example KONY. See my first post. I was successfully sucked in.

The diffusion of news: the process of how an important event is communicated to the public. (ie. how, where and when will it be released?)

Portrayal of an issue: the way an issue is portrayed by the media influences how the public perceives it.

Media Dependence: the more dependent you are on the media for information, the more susceptible you are to agenda setting. Suckers!

Media dependence is kind of worrying though. With information being so accessible these days that we can get what we want with the touch of a button, (or an iPhone screen), will we all just fall victims to the mighty and ever-powerful media? Let's hope not. I do like everything being accessible though ;)

News Values

So what are news values? According to this week's lecture they are "the degree of prominence a media outlet gives to a story, and the attention that is paid by an audience". The quote by Stuart Hall that Bruce brings to mind gets me thinking. We don't often think carefully about who picks the stories because we assume that the most important stories will "select themselves" - they are the ones that will make headlines. But only a fraction of stories are seen as potential news stories and of this fraction, only a tiny portion are produced as daily news. And we choose these stories by the amount of news value they have.

What are the news values, I hear you say? Well my pretties, here they are:
Impact: news that contains the x-factor babeh.
Audience Identification: news that interests and connects with the audience.
Pragmatics: ethics, practicality and facticity.
Source Influence: public relations ;) Let's face it. We need them and they do a good job.

As one would suspect, news values differ across different countries, cultures, news services and the list goes on. Everyone will always have different news values. It may be subjective, depending on the topic, but essentially we all have our own values. And this is where the inverted pyramid comes into play again. The most important and sought after details go at the beginning of the story, then come the more important details and then background and general information finish the story off. The information at the top is considered the most newsworthy and the information at the end is the least newsworthy so if we're over our word count we can just chop that end bit off! We can see this coming into social media as well. As Bruce so rightly mentioned, with Twitter, you are only allowed 140 characters so you've got to make sure that what you tweet counts!

"If it bleeds, it leads". Crude, but true. This is the way many television news programs value stories. No wonder we see so many stories about murder, violence and war.
"If it's local, it leads". This statement is also true. There is something about the proximity of a story happening that draws an audience in. Obviously if something is happening locally people want to be aware of it. Perhaps this is why the Allison Baden-Clay case has gotten so much publicity - because it combines both of these values.

And what of newsworthiness? Certain factors define how newsworthy something is:
Negativity: I think you can figure this one out for yourself - bad news.
Proximity: this is going back to the whole "if it's local it leads" notion. People relate to things that are physically close to them.
Recency: The whole concept of breaking news! Media outlets are very competitive with being able to produce stories as they happen but sometimes stories take a while to gather all the facts so be aware because the first story hot off the press may not be the most accurate.
Currency: Sort of the opposite to recency. These stories are more about ongoing cases. People love follow up stories and want to be kept up to date with what is happening with the story and want to know the eventual outcome.
Continuity: These are the stories that have a continuing impact on society
Uniqueness: Who hasn't seen the video of the bear falling out of the tree?

And if you hadn't seen it before, well now you have and now you can see that it is, indeed, unique.
Simplicity: I, for one, am so in with this factor. There is no way in hell that I would read something about some complicated conflict that requires me to put to use more than ten brain cells over a nice, simple story. And apparently, the majority of society agrees with me. And if you don't? Haters gon' hate.
Personality: People also love stories about... well, people. Particularly if that person is well-known.Celebrity gossip anyone?
Predictability: Will what we think will happen, happen? DUN DUN DUNNNNN. Pretty straightforward.
Elite nations/people: We also like stories about powerful people and powerful nations. All hail Obama! And all definitely do not hail Julia Gillard... the wench.
Exclusivity: We always see or hear the phrase "a ___ news exclusive!" And why? Because if that media outlet has an exclusive then it means higher ratings and more moneyyyyy! Plus, as a viewer or reader, we feel exclusive after reading something exclusive. Am I right or am I right?
Size: And lastly size. Apparently it does matter ;) hehehe. But seriously, the bigger impact a story has, the bigger an audience it generates, the more money it involves and the higher value it then has. AKA, threshold.


There are also three hypotheses on newsworthiness:
The additivity hypothesis: the more factors an event includes, the higher chance it has of becoming news.
The complementarity hypothesis: factors tend to exclude each other.
The exclusion hypothesis: events that satisfy none or few factors will most likely not become news.


Now these factors and hypotheses were created in 1965 by Galtung and Ruge, but in 1979 Golding and Elliott came along and created another set of factors that depicted newsworthiness. And as the times changed, so did the factors of what was newsworthy: drama, visual attractiveness, entertainment, importance, size, proximity, negativity, brevity, recency, elites, personalities.

I'm sure another set of factors that define newsworthiness will crop up sooner or later. And I'm pretty sure social media will be in there somewhere. Perhaps. I mean, it is everywhere now so I wouldn't be surprised.

But anyway, it's bedtime for me now.
Ciao ciao.