Scanning the News; It’s How We "Read"
Will Shuck says he’s sick of the anecdotal lead on news articles, and I have to agree with him. Can we please just get to the news?
I think the proper evolution of the newspaper will be toward a smaller (tabloid size), more local, second-day medium (i.e. doesn’t try to be first with the news; covers news events over time with lots of depth and context). But even that kind of newspaper should not use anecdotal leads on news stories (features are an entirely different matter).
There are as many ways to read a newspaper as there are people who read them. The so-called general audience for journalism is nothing more than a useful (?) fiction. But here’s something I believe could be true about most readers: They have a limited amount of time to read the paper.
Michael Schudson, in The Good Citizen, argues that citizens today are “monitorial,” i.e. those who pay attention to the news do so selectively; they scan for information of immediate interest or concern. If they find it, then they are likely to read further (and want depth and context).
A “general” reader, then, ought to be able to get the good (scan –> dismiss or read) out of the news from a headline (and sub-hed) and the lead.
Somewhat related is my pet peeve about the death of “page 1″ on newspaper websites. I’m greeted with an mishmash of the salient with the mundane and profane, with no readily comprehensible prioritization or organization. The WaPo is the absolute worst.
Sven… That’s a good observation. News design on the net has not, in many cases, moved beyond print. Some are even worse than the paper edition. Gotta wonder about that