Earthquake B: distance from the newsroom6,000 miles
Two earthquakes happen on the same day. Each one kills fifty people. One is 200 miles from a big newsroom. The other is 6,000 miles from the same newsroom. The near one leads that evening's news. The far one gets a line near the end, or nothing.
Reporters
++
Pictures
++
Readers who can picture the place
All three get scarce with distance.
Three things get scarce with distance. The first is reporters. A crew can drive to the near earthquake, and nobody is at the far one. The second is pictures. From far away they arrive late or never. The third is the reader. They can picture the near town and not the far one.
Earthquake A: distance from the newsroom200 miles
Earthquake B: distance from the newsroom6,000 miles
Both earthquakes killed fifty people. Which one leads the evening news?
Both the same. A death is a death.
Not yet. To a reader, yes. To a newsroom, a death with pictures and a name people can say is a different thing from a death with neither.
The near one. A crew can drive there, pictures arrive by evening, and readers know the place.
Right. The fifty deaths are the same in both. The reporters, the pictures and the readers who know the place are all on the near one's side.
The far one. It is more exotic, so it is more interesting.
Not yet. Exotic just means the audience cannot picture the place. A story about a place readers cannot picture gets scrolled past.
Twenty events of the same size happen at different distances from a newsroom. Move the control to change the distance.
18 of 20
of twenty equal events that get reported
Distance from the newsroom: Same city
18 of the twenty are reported. Almost all of them. A crew is there before lunch.
9 of 20
of twenty equal events that get reported
Distance from the newsroom: Same country
9 of the twenty are reported. About half. The bigger ones reach the national news. The rest stay in the local paper.
4 of 20
of twenty equal events that get reported
Distance from the newsroom: Neighbouring country
4 of the twenty are reported. Four. One reporter in the region catches the largest.
1 of 20
of twenty equal events that get reported
Distance from the newsroom: Other side of the world
1 of the twenty are reported. One, and only because it was enormous or someone from home was there.
What is falling as the distance grows?
The importance of the events.
Not yet. They were the same size in every frame. Importance did not move. The number of reporters did.
The chance a reporter is already there, not the size of what happened.
Right. Twenty identical events in every frame. The only thing that changed is how many of them had a witness whose job it was to be there.
The number of events.
Not yet. Twenty in every frame. The world does not have fewer earthquakes far away. It has fewer cameras there.
Move the control.
An event at home100
The same event next door, nothing shared10
Illustrative units of coverage.
Distance is not only miles. A far country can feel near. The audience speaks its language, goes there on holiday, has family there, or buys its goods. Then the pictures make sense and the names are easy to say. A country next door that shares none of that feels far.
The numbers are made up. Set how far away a place is, and how similar it is to the audience: language, holidays, trade, family.
Coverage of this event100
Coverage of the same event at home100
Illustrative.
How far away: Next door · How similar to the audience: Very
Next door, very similar: about 100 units of coverage, where the same event at home gets 100.
Coverage of this event40
Coverage of the same event at home100
Illustrative.
How far away: Next door · How similar to the audience: Somewhat
Next door, somewhat similar: about 40 units of coverage, where the same event at home gets 100.
Coverage of this event10
Coverage of the same event at home100
Illustrative.
How far away: Next door · How similar to the audience: Not at all
Next door, not at all similar: about 10 units of coverage, where the same event at home gets 100.
Coverage of this event50
Coverage of the same event at home100
Illustrative.
How far away: Same continent · How similar to the audience: Very
Same continent, very similar: about 50 units of coverage, where the same event at home gets 100.
Coverage of this event20
Coverage of the same event at home100
Illustrative.
How far away: Same continent · How similar to the audience: Somewhat
Same continent, somewhat similar: about 20 units of coverage, where the same event at home gets 100.
Coverage of this event5
Coverage of the same event at home100
Illustrative.
How far away: Same continent · How similar to the audience: Not at all
Same continent, not at all similar: about 5 units of coverage, where the same event at home gets 100.
Coverage of this event30
Coverage of the same event at home100
Illustrative.
How far away: Far away · How similar to the audience: Very
Far away, very similar: about 30 units of coverage, where the same event at home gets 100.
Coverage of this event12
Coverage of the same event at home100
Illustrative.
How far away: Far away · How similar to the audience: Somewhat
Far away, somewhat similar: about 12 units of coverage, where the same event at home gets 100.
Coverage of this event3
Coverage of the same event at home100
Illustrative.
How far away: Far away · How similar to the audience: Not at all
Far away, not at all similar: about 3 units of coverage, where the same event at home gets 100.
Which counts for more here: distance, or similarity?
Similarity. A far country that shares the audience's language beats a near one that shares nothing.
Right. Far and very similar scores 30. Next door and not at all similar scores 10. Real coverage looks like this: British papers report Australia more than Belgium.
They are the same thing.
Not yet. They pull in different directions here. A place can be near and foreign, or far and familiar.
Distance. Near always beats far.
Not yet. Slide to next door with nothing shared and you get 10, against 30 for far and very similar. Miles matter less than whether the audience can picture the place.
Move both controls.
A 1980s study of US television counted how many deaths a disaster needed in each region to get the coverage of ONE death in Western Europe. For Asia, about how many?
Pick one. Nothing is scored.
Western Europe1 death
Eastern Europe3 deaths
Latin America9 deaths
The Middle East11 deaths
Asia12 deaths
Deaths needed for the coverage of one Western European death.
About 12.Nobody at those networks wrote that rule down. It came out of where the reporters were based, which places the audience had visited, and whose pictures arrived by evening.
Other side of the world, with all threenear
vsvs
Next door, with none of the threefar
So for the news, a place is far when it has none of the three. No reporter is based there. No pictures reach the newsroom by evening. Nobody in the audience can picture it. Miles do not decide this. A place with all three is near, even on the other side of the world.
Which of these pull a distant event nearer, and which push it away?
One card at a time. Tap the pile it belongs to.
Card 1 of 6
Tourists from the audience's country were there
The story needs a translator
It is a holiday destination the audience knows
No film of it, only a written statement
A large community from that country lives among the audience
The names are hard to pronounce on air
Tourists from the audience's country were there → Pulls it nearer
Not yet. This pulls it nearer. The audience can picture the place, because people like them were standing in it.
The story needs a translator → Pushes it away
Not yet. This pushes it away. A translator is time and money for the newsroom, and time is what a newsroom has least of.
It is a holiday destination the audience knows → Pulls it nearer
Not yet. This pulls it nearer. The audience has been there, or seen the photos, so the place is already in their heads.
No film of it, only a written statement → Pushes it away
Not yet. This pushes it away. Television needs pictures, and a written statement gives the newsroom nothing to show.
A large community from that country lives among the audience → Pulls it nearer
Not yet. This pulls it nearer. Many viewers have a cousin or a neighbour from there, so the place is close to home.
The names are hard to pronounce on air → Pushes it away
Not yet. This pushes it away. A presenter who cannot say the names will pick a story where they can, without meaning to.
Ways the audience can picture the placepull it nearer
vsvs
Costs to the newsroompush it away
Right. Every puller is a way the audience can picture the place. Every pusher is a cost to the newsroom. Neither has anything to do with how many people were hurt.
Deaths in the famine40,000 deaths
Deaths in the shooting5 deaths
Illustrative sizes; the coverage runs the other way.
A famine in one country gets a fraction of the coverage of a shooting with five deaths in another. What is the most likely reason?
No reporter is there, it has no single day, and the audience cannot picture the place. All three at once.
Right. Lessons one, two and three are each one reason, and the famine fails all three at once. The shooting passes all three. No newsroom decided which mattered more.
The famine is exaggerated.
Not yet. The groups that bring food aid counted those deaths. Nobody filmed them. Only filming gets a story onto the evening news.
Editors think the five matter more.
Not yet. Nobody thought that. The shooting had a day, a place and a crew. The famine had only a number.
Lesson complete
For the news, distance is counted in reporters, pictures and people who know the place, not in miles.