News, there are all types of news these days.
There is good news where news casters talk about serious no nonsense stuff that concerns the economy, government, peoples safety, and just the significance of the story provided by a news broadcasting station. On the other hand there can be news that have no kind of purpose except for entertainment purposes. On my paper I will discuss and compare and contrast on 4 different stations in the San Francisco Bay Area. The stations that I choose to do my research on are CBS channel 5 news, FOX channel 2 news, NBC channel 4 news and ABC channel 7 news.
I will rate each of the stations in my own personal rating system that I have constructed. The system of rating is:1: The station talks about events that can affect the government, economy, safety of people and politics. 2: The station should have national, local and international stories3: Talks about up to date events that can either have positive or negative affects on people. CBS Channel 5 newsThe CBS news at 10 is a not very well rounded news organisation.
When I tuned in to watch this station, I was surprised to see that the new casters very little significant news to discuss . They had nothing important to say about the anything that was considered significance to the Bay Area. CBS talked spent a lot of time on sports and weather. It had little time on news that would affect anything. The only significant thing I saw in that whole hour was about a small fire by Marin County. The rest of the news cast was about small little things in selected areas of the Bay Area.
For example they did surveys on what people think of President Clinton and the new casters kept on talking to each other about how their days was and all the rest of the nonsense news. They had very little to none about the economy and government. The whole news cast was a shocking 30% commercial, 10% sports related stories, 5% weather, 5% of informal exchanges and a very low 50% of news that was not significant according to my rating system. This whole news cast lasted for an approximation of 23 minutes. The average number of stories per show was 4, average length of stories was an approximation of 40 seconds. The percentage of stories was based on 10% stories of crime, fire etc.
, 10% of national news coverage, 20% of state news and a 60% of local news. FOX Channel 2 News. The channel 2 news at 10 is a very interesting and informative news organisation. When I tune in to watch this news cast I found a very well and organised news cast.
This news cast had plenty to say about the things happening around the Bay Area and some national and international news. For the Bay Area it talked about things happening in San Francisco, Sonoma, Caltrans, and the last Critical Mass San Francisco had. In national and international news coverage channel 2 talk about the recent Mexican drug bust at the border of the United States and Mexico. It talked about things that happened in Britain, Kentucky, and things concerning the NAZI party. This news cast is just a great mix of local, national and international news coverage.
Channel 2 news also had a great mixture of government and economical news stories. The channel 2 news cast was 15% of commercials, 10% things relating to sports, 4% weather coverage, 1% of informal exchanges and a 70% of news content. The number of stories per show was around 4. The average amount of time on a story was an approx.
1 minute and 10 seconds. The percentage of stories was based on 35% sex, fire and crime, 15% national news, 25% of State news and a 25% of local news. The total amount of minutes for this news cast is an approx. 26 minutes.
NBC Channel 4 NewsNBC news at 10:30pm is an very serious and fun newscast to watch. In the news cast I saw a lot of news based on the Bay Area. NBC had many stories that concerned fire, sex and crime stories that happened in the Bay Area. NBC had few stories on national and international new though. NBC also had junk news that had nothing to do with anything too. They had a 1 minute story about a dog show, a 30 second thing on the movie G.
I Jane and a story about some baby. NBC had a short time for sports and weather. The NBC also had a lot of informal exchanges towards one another during the news cast. NBC had little stories that had to do with economy and government. NBC news cast consist of 15% of commercials, 10% of sports coverage, 5% of weather reports, 5% of informal exchanges and a 65% of news coverage in total.
The number of stories in percentages were 15% sex, fire and crime, 25% of national news, 10% state news and a 50% of local news coverage. The amount of seconds spent on a story was an approx. of 50 seconds. The average number of shows per story was an approx.
of 5 shows. This whole news cast lasted for a approx. of 25 minutes. ABC Channel 7 NewsABC news at 11 was is a very informative news cast. It almost of have an even margin of state, national and local news coverage.
At ABC news they talk about events like the serial rapist in the Bay Area, the beef recall in the United States, the old UPS strike, the MIR space station, the death of Princess Diana and Mother Teresa and much more. So ABC do cover a lot of local, national and international stories. At ABC they are basically there for hit news stories because their weather and sports percentages are very low. They did stories that did effect economy, government, and personal safety. At ABC the percentage of commercials is 19%, sports percentage is 3%, weather percentage is also 3%, informal exchanges is a low 1% and the news content is 70%.
The number of stories per show is 3, average length of a story is 45 seconds. The amount of sex and crime stories are 24%, national news is 28%, state news is 24% and local news coverage is another 24%. The total number of minutes for this new cast was approx. 24 minutes.
ComparisonAs I compare these stations I found that ABC news was the only stations that covered the things I considered to being a good station. ABC was the station that covered all the subjects of local, regional, national and international news almost evenly. CBS on the other hand did not. There station did not cover many of the things in my rating system. FOX is a good station too. Compared to CBS, FOX is way better because of the quality of news they covered.
If I compared FOX and ABC they would probably ending up almost evenly. NBC was completely different form all the other stations (ABC, FOX, and CBS) they covered mostly local stories in the Bay Area. They covered stories that was only significant in the Bay Area. (All ideas are my own personal opinions)RATINGThrough the facts and data I have researched I will now rate the stations according to my system of rating. I would rate ABC the number 1 news station because of the spread of their news cast.
They did not just focus on one thing, they focus on things that dealt with issues that would affect government, economy , and the personal safety of people. They also went in depth of the stories they had to offer. So though my system of rating I rate this station #1I would rate the FOX network number 2. I rate this station number two because it too did have stories that affect government, economy and the safety of others. I just rated this lower than ABC news because it did go in depth with the news cast as ABC did.
If ABC news cast was not in this report I would have rated FOX news #1, but since ABC is in this report I will rate FOX news #2. NBC news is a great source of news if you want to look for local news. I rate this news cast number 3 because NBC just dealt with mostly local news. Sure the news did affect people, government and economy but it was only the population and government in the Bay Area. It did have a little of national and international news, but unfortunately it was not enough.
. So though those facts I would have to rate this station a number 3. CBS news, I do believe by seeing this news cast that it was the weakest news cast of the 4 other stations. It contained barely any good news of local and national news. The stories they had was of no quality.
So through those opinions, facts and my rating system I rate this the lowest of the 4 stations, a number 4. ConclusionIn this project I have learn a lot from the TV news and the quality of news they provide. Some news they provide is good and other news are very bad. (Bad news is news that is based on human interest) I have found that local news stations base most of their stories on local stories.
They spend a lot of time on local stories and little time in national and international stories. So in my conclusion I say local news is a very good place you can obtain local news for whatever purpose you need it for, but if you need stories on world news, look somewhere else. I also conclude that channel 7 ABC is the best local news station in the Bay Area.
