Throughout the course of this week, the incident that prompted the emergency landing of a JetBlue flight has taken on many names. Since the event on Tuesday, there have been countless stories about the crazed pilot from many different media outlets. As I continue to follow this story, I am beginning to ask the question: How long is a story relevant?
Some of the earlier stories on Tuesday and Wednesday answer very important questions and provide necessary information. Some example of these are from Fox News and CNN.
These stories were both published on Wednesday, the day after the event occurred. In my opinion, these stories are very newsworthy. They are informing readers and viewers about the pilot being charged with interfering with the crew. This is a necessary follow-up to the story. In fact, without this follow-up these news outlets would be lacking in their coverage.
It is a story like this one from CNN, which came out today (Friday), that makes me wonder if the story is still newsworthy.
The story is basically "re-hyping up" the story by asking readers the question: How would you have reacted?
Is it the media's job to inform or to keep a story going as long as possible in order to keep readers coming back for more?
As I assess this coverage, it seems as if some news outlets are simply dragging readers along with an old story. If something new is discovered, by all means, cover it. If not, don't continue to dig at the same story. It's our job to produce news, not hype.
Unless you write celebrity news....
ReplyDelete