Yesterday in class, we talked about what stories we would put on our A1. We had to weigh what the most important stories were for our readers. But when looking at news Web sites this afternoon, it got me to thinking: How do editors choose what should be at the top of their Web sites?
News judgment for online has many of the same aspects of newspaper judgment. One must consider what the reader must know. But since the Internet is so much more fluid, editors can choose to put lighter stories up for just a little while, and take them down if something more important breaks. Newspaper editors must consider what the most important news will be when the paper is printed, but online editors get to tell readers what the most important news is at that exact moment. And that is a large benefit to be able to tell readers what they need to know when they need to know it.
But do editors put certain items higher on their sites because they know they are going to get a lot of clicks? CNN.com ranks their stories in one section of their site by the 10 most popular. At the time I am writing this, the top story is about Obama reversing Bush's policies, Gun sales spiking after the election gets second place, and the 10 healthiest grocery stores gets first. It's interesting that the top two deal with politics and the third is a lighter story. So how do we learn proper news judgment for online journalism?
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2 comments:
I can tell you from experience, not only to online editors consider what will get hits when they arrange their sites, but they may change the content in an attempt to drive Web traffic.
For instance, when I met with Charlie Meyerson from ChicagoTribune.com, he introduced me to the idea of a "teaser" headline for Web sites. An example is a headline that says "Famous actor dies at young age." If the story doesn't have a photo with it, chance are you'd click on the article to find out who died.
Shallow? Not so much. The more hits, the better a Web site can do when it comes to advertising. Without this advertising the part of journalism that is supposed to keep the craft going would die out.
It's like writing a features headline, just for a different medium.
That's interesting. I would probably put the name of the famous actor to draw people to the story. But if the actor is only famous to an older crowd, for example, you would only get the hits from that crowd. I've never thought of it that way.
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