What is Newsworthy?

Jeanne Cantwell
jc446712@ohio.edu

What you consider newsworthy could be just gossip to someone else. We live in a world with a variety of news outlets, that makes anyone with their own blog a journalist. I find myself constantly wondering if the articles that litter my Facebook feed are newsworthy. Last week my feed was filled with articles regarding the WDBJ reporter and cameraman who were shot and killed during a live-shot. A story like this makes headlines on all media platforms. Turning on any nightly newscast you were almost guaranteed to hear about the horrific incident. Scrolling through social media platforms you could see everyone's reaction to the tragedy.

Photo via Cartoon Stock 

Not even a week later I open my Twitter account to see everyone reacting to Nicki Minaj throwing shade at Miley Cyrus during the MTV Video Music Awards. It’s incredible to me how quickly news changes. One week a nation is shaken by a shooting that has people reconsidering gun laws. By the next week they are taking sides in a heated celebrity feud. Is one story more newsworthy than the other? Asking your parents they would most likely say that the WDBJ story is more important to cover. Although asking a thirteen-year-old Miley Cyrus super-fan I’m sure they’d say the VMA drama. This begs the question of is it a generational gap? In our reading The Elements of Journalism by Bill Kovach it says, “Every generation creates its own form of Journalism”, a statement that I believe to be true.

I feel stuck between a generation that gets news from CNN after dinner and another that uses Buzzfeed as their main news source. I find myself being drawn to both if I’m honest. I think the world needs a healthy balance of both. If we only focused on the tragedies that occur every day in our world what shape would we be in? We need to sprinkle in some of the entertainment news and viral videos of cute puppies to keep our sanity and faith in humanity. My opinion might not be the popular one, but that’s the thing, it’s my opinion. So who can decide what is newsworthy; it’s all personal opinion.

Last semester I took a course where we produced a newscast at the end of each day. Gathering stories each day was a harder job than you’d think. Making sure you constantly checked the wire to see if any news was breaking was a very important job. Even during the live show, if a story broke the producer could cut a story that wasn’t as important in order to run the breaking news. A blog post shares the eleven things that journalists consider newsworthy. Everyone can find an item on this list that they agree with, and some that they don’t. If I were able to come to any sort of conclusion on this topic then that would be it. What is newsworthy to one is irrelevant to another. I think that many factors like age, gender, social class, etc. factor in to this. So will we ever have an answer for what is newsworthy? The best thing that a journalist can do in my opinion is delivering the most relevant news to an audience, but what is relevant can change within minutes.