What’s the News?
These are the three primary criteria used to evaluate news: R_______, Usefulness, and Interest.
What are Relevance, Usefulness, and Interest?
To maintain objectivity, writers should use these types of verbs instead of biased ones like "attacked" or "admitted".
What are neutral verbs?
Media writers should avoid these "intensifiers" that add no real meaning, such as "very" or "really".
What are intensifiers?
A "Hard News" lead should summarize the key facts and answer these four "W" questions immediately.
What are Who, What, When, and Where?
This style guide must be followed consistently to ensure professional "correctness" in journalism.
What is AP Style?
This news value refers to how close a story is to the audience geographically.
What is Proximity?
Instead of saying a plan is "outrageous," an objective reporter would describe it using this neutral term.
What is a "proposed" plan?
Instead of using the vague modifier "many," a sharp journalist provides these to strengthen accuracy.
What are specific details or concrete facts?
This is the name of the traditional story formula used for breaking news where the most important info is at the top.
What is the Inverted Pyramid?
According to the "Fake News" checklist, you should always check this to ensure a story isn't several years old.
What is the date?
According to the Principles of Journalism, a journalist's first obligation is to this.
What is the truth?
This "Rule of Objective Writing" requires that writers avoid personal opinions and instead do this for any claims made in a story.
What is attribute claims to sources?
This is the "Clarity Checklist" rule that suggests using this voice whenever possible to keep sentences direct.
What is active voice?
Unlike hard leads, "Soft News" leads focus on these two elements to engage the reader.
What are people or emotion?
To protect your credibility, you must verify these four specific items before publishing.
What are names, titles, dates, and places?
This specific discipline is what distinguishes journalism from other forms of communication like propaganda or fiction.
What is the discipline of verification?
This is the practice of presenting all sides of a story fairly without following personal bias.
What is maintaining neutrality/balance?
To help readers understand instantly, journalists should avoid this type of "academic" or technical phrasing.
What is jargon?
Journalists use these to simplify long, complex quotes while maintaining their own "writer's voice".
What are paraphrases?
This is the term for a "view, appraisal, or judgment" that must be clearly labeled and segregated from news.
What is an Opinion?
While "Hard News" focuses on breaking events, this type of news focuses on features and human-interest stories.
What is Soft News?
Objective writing avoids "nominalization," which is the process of turning a strong verb (like decide) into this weaker part of speech (like make a decision).
What is a noun?
This is the maximum number of ideas that should be contained in a single professional sentence.
What is one?
These are used to connect ideas smoothly and prevent "choppy" writing.
What are transitions?
When a student editor finds two independent clauses joined by nothing at all, they have found this specific error.
What is a fused sentence or run-on?