A topic that has recently had decent media coverage is the fatal hit and run on South Park avenue where a 19-year-old was killed. The print source of this article was called “Lawyer Pleads Guilty to fatal hit-and-run” from the Buffalo News (Gryta, Buffalo News). The article concentrated on the lawyer mainly, John P. Duffy, having no quotes from the victim’s friends or family. It showed as unbiased as possible what Duffy’s experience had been and what he had to say about the incident. The article was presented professionally and very factual with appropriate quotes from Duffy and his lawyer as well as the judge who has Duffy’s case. In the online news article that I found on the same incident; both were written on the same day as well, October 30, 2008, on msnbc.msn.com and the article was titled: “Fatal Hit and Run Victim Remembered”(2008, Borsa). This article took a depressing but fairly professional outlook on the incident. It focused more on the victim with a few facts about Duffy and a quote from his lawyer. As I read the article I felt so bad about what happened to this girl as it described how the incident took place and the article from the Buffalo News did not, it just claimed what Duffy thought he had hit. Both of these articles I noticed contained some bias but it was just enough to influence the reader to give them Duffy’s perspective vs. the victim’s perspective.
I found that reading both of these sources I was amazed on how bias things can be written now. I took a Journalism course and they kept pushing that everything you write has to be objective and not biased because you can get into serious trouble. Now everything you read seems to be biased in a way whether it is low key bias or not. I think it also depends on what source you receive information from. Its amazing that looking at how far we have gone with the internet and a lot of people have changed from print to online articles. In an article online titled “Web vs. Print: Online success at one Newspaper Raise More Questions Than They Answer” stated that from the Washington Post print source, they lost 3% of their prescribers, 4% of their ad revenue, and 14% of their recruitment revenue . Also the Washington Posts online subsidiary gained revenue of 28% and online visitors went up 11% (2007, http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article.cfm?articleid=1699). I think that even now online sources have become much more prominent and according to the article “Online vs. Print Media” being online allows for more promotions and more options for people(2008, Pandy). What I took this to mean is that if a person wants to get a different perspective on the same news article it is much easier to do it online instead of with print. With print you have to go and buy another newspaper and they may not have the one you want. It may be quite difficult to find a Washington Post newspaper here in Buffalo.
Both print and online sources are very different and can offer the same things but structurally I don’t find them that different. I find that how much information that you want to know is the difference between them.
References:
Web vs. Print: Online success at one Newspaper Raise More Questions Than They Answer. 2007. 4 Apr. Received from: http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article.cfm?articleid=1699.
Pandey, Sandeev. 2008. 29 Aug. Online vs. Print Media. Received from: http://www.articlesbase.com/online-business-articles/online-vs-print-media-540885.html.
Borsa, John. 2008. 30 Oct. Received from: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/27415446/.
Gryta, Matt. Lawyer pleads guilty in fatal hit-and-run. 2008. 30 Oct. The Buffalo News.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
2 comments:
I actually live off of South Park, right around where this happened. It saddens me that anyone could hit an individual and drive away like nothing.
As the uppity lawyer sat at home with his wife did it not eat away at him? It makes me happy to see and hear that he was tracked down.
Hopefully justice will be served. Whatever it may be.
Writers should have an unbiased opinion, I feel like something like that isn't fair to the reader to make an appropriate judgment on the story. Who knows the lawyer probably knew some people and tried to make it seem like it wasn't his fault.
Post a Comment