Media Skills 2014: Week 3

1. Media Skills 2014!
Week 3: Understanding the Media
Environment
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Dr Kane Hopkins

2. The Hannah & Elizabeth Show
Peer Mentor
Hannah Merritt
Tuesday 11am–12pm and Thursday 12–1pm
AKO2, which is upstairs in the library next to the
computers.
!
Class Representative
Elizabeth Ellis: elizabethellis40@gmail.com
!
!

3. New Zealand National Party

5. What is News?
• To get coverage for your client/organisation, you need to
understand how news happens; can be routine, staged and/or
spontaneous — and media relations staff facilitate in all these
• Routine news is day-to-day; often covered in journalists’
“rounds” (e.g. court, local government, sports)
• Staged news is “managed” by PR practitioners (or a more informal
equivalent) (e.g. politicians’ news conference, protest marches)
• Spontaneous news is unpredicted events such as Christchurch
earthquake — but there will usually be a managed aspect that
kicks in at some point.

6. What is News?
• Information about recent events or happenings
• Information about previously unknown events and
happenings
• Fresh information of any kind
• Newsworthy material: “a public figure on a scale
unimaginable in America; whatever he did was news”
• Middle English news, new things, tidings

7. Newsworthiness
• Sufficiently interesting to be reported in news bulletins; "the
judge conceded the newsworthiness of the trial"; "he is no
longer news in the fashion world"
• Something strange or just happened
• New information about specific and timely events; "they
awaited news of the outcome”
• New information of any kind; even about past events, if
previously unknown

10. The media relations context…
• It’s well established overseas that journalists exhibit a
‘neurotic double bind’ (Haller, 2007) or ‘love-hate’ attitude
towards public relations
• Does it happen here?
• How widespread in NZ is the journalistic view that public
relations is a “tragic distortion of the once proud profession
of journalism” and “the Devil's business” (Trotter, 2007,
paras. 1 & 7)

11. NZ Research: Top 10 response themes
1. Can be useful or helpful
2. Live and let live, has a place
3. Invective (wholly, unequivocally wrong / evil / dark side /
manipulative / sneaky / liars)
4. More money and or better conditions
5. Of concern because blocks access to truth or corrupts flow of
communication with undue influence
6. PRs lack media understanding or skill
7. There are two types of PR – good and bad
8. Journalists are responsible for what happens with PR
9. A necessary evil, tolerated but not liked
10. Advertising, puffery, spin, not to be taken seriously

12. Roles of Media Workers
• The news media are considered (by those seeking coverage)
to be an “uncontrolled” media
• News workers select, filter, control and modify what flows
through media channels, where and when
• Owners, journalists and editors are therefore “gatekeepers”
• To successfully practise “media skills”, you need to
understand what pressures and influences impact on the
gatekeepers, and the nature of the media relations-
journalism relationship

13. Journalists
• Described as “professional busybodies, driven by curiosity”
• Their working environment is categorised by deadline pressures,
increased competition and tight budgets, leading to increased
reliance on unsolicited material from business/community
• Media structures and operating methods offer both
opportunities and limitations for those trying to get a message
into the news
• Critical theory suggests this privileges the wealthy/powerful and
squeezes out alternative voices (journalists also tend to be part
of a privileged social group)

14. The Newsroom
• As a communication person, you need to be familiar with the
main players at your local/key media outlets
• Editor/News Director – the most senior people; don’t
approach directly
• Chief of staff/Chief Reporter/News editor/Producer – more
contactable, depends on medium and size
• Reporter/Journalist – those doing the actual writing; can be
contacted directly especially if you have a relationship
• Build up your list of contacts with correct, up-to-date details
• Be familiar with deadlines

15. Media Ethics
• Ethics is about right and wrong; and duty (to whom?)
• When employing your media skills, you need to understand
journalists’ ethical codes
• These codes commit news workers to principles such as
truth, freedom of information, attribution, objectivity,
accuracy, fairness and balance, protection of sources, etc.
• In practical terms, decisions about the provision of
“freebies” will be common

16. PR Ethics
• Both PR and journalism are governed by ethical codes
• A media relations /PR practitioner has five ethical duties, to:
self, client, employer, profession, society
• Core values of journalists and PR overlap considerably, and
comprise: accountability, responsibility, serving the public,
fairness, honesty, and confidentiality
• “Never lie to media” is good rule of thumb for PR
practitioners and news sources

17. Two Ethical Camps
The relationship between media skills practitioners and
journalists can be:
• Closed – media seen as an annoyance or “the enemy”;
strongest ethical duty to client, tension with journalists
• Open – media regarded as “partners”, media access is
facilitated, ethical commitment to “boundary spanning”,
helping democracy
• (Or more often, it is a sliding scale)
• Both parties need to consider the ethical implications of their
interactions