http://www.weblog.ro/soj#41600There are nearly an infinite number of reportable stories out there. In fact, there are thousands of news stories that are reported via the wire services every day (you can see them in real-time here). But not all stories are treated equally. Not all stories receive the same amount of attention.
So what are the factors that promote a story (s) to become a national headline (nh) and even international (ih)?
Guessing what these factors are seems almost self-evident yet I'm not aware that it's been done in a systematic manner. So let's see what we come up with:
* Celebrity - What exactly is and is not celebrity deserves its own study, but any (s) involving a celebrity automatically has a factor to boost it to (nh). Celebrity can refer to both entertainers as well as politicians or anyone who is well-known for other reasons (Cindy Sheehan at the moment)
* Gore/carnage/blood - Death and/or injury alone is not a factor in promoting (s) to (nh) unless it involves gore, carnage and blood. Consider it the "rubbernecker" or "gladiator" phenomenon, where people enjoy being spectators at death and destruction of other human beings. That is, someone else's death (or violent injury) must have an entertainment value
* Mass death - If enough people die, even in a non-entertaining manner, this promotes (s) to (nh) and (ih) but is an extremely weak factor. If we're going to weigh these factors from 1-10, then "mass death" would only rate a 5
* Scandal - The word "scandal" is rather ambiguous but what I'm referring to here is "violation of the cultural norms". A perfect example of this is a female school teacher who has sex with an underage student. This violates the cultural norms and promotes the (s) much more than a male teacher having sex with an underage female student because that is a lesser violation of the cultural norms. "Scandal" of course also involves violation of cultural norms such as a politician taking a bribe.
* Government - Any decision and utterance of the government makes an (s) but is an extremely weak factor in promoting a story to (nh), probably a raw score of 2 on our scale
* Beauty - Stories involving people who are not necessarily in the above categories but who are physically attractive are a strong factor in promoting (s) to (nh). Also included in this factor is "sex", meaning anything referring to sexuality, sexual intercourse or nudity. I should mention here that "beauty" not only refers to the physical attractiveness of human beings but also things which resonate harmoniously with a cultural ideal. For example a Boy Scout saving the life of an elderly neighbor would fall in this category, although this type of "beauty" is lesser weighted than physical beauty.
* Children in danger - Because there is a strong cultural attachment to the preservation and protection of the very young, this is a very powerful factor
* Tribe - By this term, I am referring to the fact that people assemble themselves into subgroups within the larger culture. This could be something like "race" or "business people" or "environmentalism" or even "sports fans". Anything which affects the local sub-group (tribe) is of news to the sub-group
* Footage - Pictures and/or video from a (s) are a strong factor in the promotion to (nh) in a codependent relationship with the above factors. This is especially true in television but is nearly equally true in print media
The above list is a summarization of the major factors involving the promotion of (s) to (nh) and (ih). And it should be understood that they work in combination with each other.
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