Sep
15
News Critique #3
September 15, 2011 | | 1 Comment
Spongebob Squarepants!
I recently looked at the Star Tribune’s home page and decided to take a peak at the local section since that is where I am from. The top headline was as follows- “Who Lives in a Pineapple Under the Sea? (and rots your kids’ brains?)” I thought that this was definitely a catchy headline. It made me want to read it. After talking about the journalism upside down pyramid, I started noticing how stories are written. I had never really paid attention to what goes first, second, third, and so on. This story followed it and it followed the question of ‘when’ and ‘what’ right from the beginning of the lead. I did find it a little odd that the first sentence was simply “Spongebob Squarepants!” and that it was followed by “Monday’s study showing that…” I think the first quote was a little unnecessary. Most of the important statistics were in the beginning, along with the five W’s. Following that were a few quotes that were from first hand sources. The rest of the article was more of fluff and extra details not necessary to getting the main point of the article across to the readers.
Comments
1 Comment so far
Yes! Begin looking at stories for their leads and organization. An excellent way to learn. I didn’t see the story you’re referencing, but sometimes writers will use a short — or incomplete — sentence just to get attention. It is way too easy to overuse.