A factory closes. The story about it is 600 words long. The company gets 220 of them. A minister gets 180. The workers' union, the group that speaks for the workers, gets 90. One worker who lost the job gets 40, at the end. The numbers are made up. The shape is not.
Company press office10 min
Minister's office30 min
A worker on shift240 min
Minutes to get a usable quote. Illustrative.
The reason is a phone. The company has a press office. A press office is a team paid to answer reporters, fast, with a sentence that fits. It picks up in ten minutes. The worker is on a shift, has no number on any reporter's list, and takes four hours to find.
Company press office10 min
Minister's office30 min
A worker on shift240 min
Minutes to get a usable quote. Illustrative.
Why does the company get the first quote?
It has a press office that answers in ten minutes with a sentence that fits.
Right. Speed and shape. The press office exists to hand a reporter a usable line before the story is due, and it does. Nobody is paid to do that for the worker.
The reporter is on the company's side.
Not yet. The reporter has four hours and a phone. The side that picks up in ten minutes wins without anyone taking a side.
It is the most important voice.
Not yet. It is the most available voice. Which voice looks important is decided afterwards, by who got quoted. This is how that gets decided.
The company220 words
The minister180 words
The workers' union90 words
A worker who lost the job40 words
Illustrative.
The person with the most at stake, the most to lose, is usually the hardest to reach. The company will still be trading next year. The worker's life just changed. So the company gets the most words and loses the least. The worker gets the fewest words and loses the most.
How the 600-word story divides its words. Tap the voice with the MOST at stake.
Tap the part of the picture that answers it.
The company220 words
The minister180 words
The workers' union90 words
A worker who lost the job40 words
Illustrative.
A worker who lost the job
Right. Forty words, at the end, for the person whose life just changed. This worker lost the most and got the fewest words. The reason is the phone: nobody could reach them in time.
The company
Not yet. Most of the words, and it will be trading next year. It is the easiest to reach, not the most exposed.
The minister
Not yet. A hundred and eighty words from an office two hundred miles away, with a spokesperson whose job is this sentence.
The workers' union
Not yet. Ninety words. Closer to the workers than the company is, and still an office with a line ready rather than a person.
For every one reporter in the United States, how many people are paid to speak to reporters on behalf of a company or a government?
Pick one. Nothing is scored.
Press officers for every reporter, 19801
Press officers for every reporter, 20206
About 6.About six, and rising. In 1980 it was close to one for one. The people whose job is to answer reporters now outnumber the reporters, and every one of them has a sentence ready before the phone rings.
The story is due at six
↓→
Press offices: top of the list, always pick up
↓→
The people it happened to: bottom of the list
Now add a clock. The story is due at six. Every hour the reporter rings the next number on the list. Press offices are at the top of the list and always pick up. The people it happened to are at the bottom, and the clock runs out before the reporter gets to them.
The same story, written as the time runs out. Change the hours left.
Official voices in the story2 voices
People it happened to3 voices
Hours until the story is due: 8 hours
Eight hours: two officials and three people it happened to. Somebody drove to the factory gate.
Official voices in the story2 voices
People it happened to2 voices
Hours until the story is due: 4 hours
Four hours: the officials are still there. One of the people it happened to has gone.
Official voices in the story2 voices
People it happened to1 voice
Hours until the story is due: 2 hours
Two hours: one worker, reached by luck. The press lines are all still in.
Official voices in the story2 voices
People it happened to0 voices
Hours until the story is due: 1 hour
One hour: two press offices and nobody it happened to. The story has every official quote it needs. Nobody who lost a job is in it.
As the time runs out, who disappears from the story?
Nobody. The story just gets shorter.
Not yet. It gets shorter from one end only. The end it loses is the people it happened to.
The officials.
Not yet. They are the last to go, because they were the first to answer. Watch the first bar: it never changes.
The people it happened to, because they take longest to reach.
Right. The officials never move: two at eight hours, two at one. The people it happened to drop off one by one. The last hour is a story with nobody in it who lost anything.
Move the control.
The numbers are made up. Set how organised a voice is and how much it has at stake. Here a press office earns up to fifty per cent of the words, and stake earns up to ten.
This voice's share of the words5%
What its stake alone would earn10%
Illustrative.
How organised the voice is: No press office · How much it has at stake: Little
No press office, little at stake: about 5% of the story's words, where stake alone would give 10%.
This voice's share of the words10%
What its stake alone would earn35%
Illustrative.
How organised the voice is: No press office · How much it has at stake: Some
No press office, some at stake: about 10% of the story's words, where stake alone would give 35%.
This voice's share of the words15%
What its stake alone would earn60%
Illustrative.
How organised the voice is: No press office · How much it has at stake: Everything
No press office, everything at stake: about 15% of the story's words, where stake alone would give 60%.
This voice's share of the words25%
What its stake alone would earn10%
Illustrative.
How organised the voice is: A part-time press officer · How much it has at stake: Little
A part-time press officer, little at stake: about 25% of the story's words, where stake alone would give 10%.
This voice's share of the words30%
What its stake alone would earn35%
Illustrative.
How organised the voice is: A part-time press officer · How much it has at stake: Some
A part-time press officer, some at stake: about 30% of the story's words, where stake alone would give 35%.
This voice's share of the words35%
What its stake alone would earn60%
Illustrative.
How organised the voice is: A part-time press officer · How much it has at stake: Everything
A part-time press officer, everything at stake: about 35% of the story's words, where stake alone would give 60%.
This voice's share of the words50%
What its stake alone would earn10%
Illustrative.
How organised the voice is: A full press office · How much it has at stake: Little
A full press office, little at stake: about 50% of the story's words, where stake alone would give 10%.
This voice's share of the words55%
What its stake alone would earn35%
Illustrative.
How organised the voice is: A full press office · How much it has at stake: Some
A full press office, some at stake: about 55% of the story's words, where stake alone would give 35%.
This voice's share of the words60%
What its stake alone would earn60%
Illustrative.
How organised the voice is: A full press office · How much it has at stake: Everything
A full press office, everything at stake: about 60% of the story's words, where stake alone would give 60%.
Who gets the most words: the organised voice with little at stake, or the unorganised voice with everything at stake?
They get the same. Stories are balanced.
Not yet. Balanced between the voices that arrived. The one that could not be reached is not balanced against anything. It is absent.
The organised one.
Right. Fifty per cent of the words against fifteen. Moving the press-office control changes the bar by tens. Moving the stake control changes it by fives. Being easy to reach earns more words than being affected.
The one with everything at stake.
Not yet. Slide it to everything at stake with no press office: fifteen per cent. Stake earns words slowly. A press office earns them fast.
Move both controls.
Reached in minutes, or in hours if at all?
One card at a time. Tap the pile it belongs to.
Card 1 of 6
A company press officer
A shift worker who just lost their job
A minister's spokesperson
A patient on the waiting list
A research group with a press officer
The tenant of the flooded flat
A company press officer → Reached in minutes
Not yet. A press officer is reached in minutes. Answering reporters is the whole of the job, and the number is on the website.
A shift worker who just lost their job → Hours, if at all
Not yet. A shift worker takes hours, if they are found at all. Nobody has their number, and they did not plan to be in the news.
A minister's spokesperson → Reached in minutes
Not yet. A spokesperson is reached in minutes. They sit by the phone for exactly this call, with a line ready.
A patient on the waiting list → Hours, if at all
Not yet. A patient takes hours, if at all. The hospital will not hand out names, and the patient may not want to talk.
A research group with a press officer → Reached in minutes
Not yet. A group with a press officer is reached in minutes. The press officer's job is to make that call easy.
The tenant of the flooded flat → Hours, if at all
Not yet. The tenant takes hours, if at all. Their phone is wet, their flat is wrecked, and nobody in the newsroom knows them.
People paid to answerminutes
vsvs
People the story is abouthours, if at all
Right. The first column is people paid to answer. The second is people the story is about. When time is short, the story is built from the first column, without anyone meaning it.
The hospital's managers1 quote
The health ministry1 quote
The doctors' union1 quote
Patients0 quotes
A story about a hospital ward quotes the hospital's managers, the health ministry and a doctors' union. What is missing, and why?
Nothing. Three sides is balanced.
Not yet. Three offices is not three sides. The people the ward exists for are not in the story at all.
The government. It should be there.
Not yet. The health ministry is the government, and it is in the story. What is missing is the one voice without an office.
Patients: no press office, no phone number on file, and permission to be named takes days.
Right. Three organisations answered by lunch. The people in the beds have to be found, asked, and given time to say yes. The story was due before any of that could happen.
Lesson complete
The voice with a press office gets quoted most, whatever it has at stake.