Every morning a desk has about two hundred possible stories and room for twelve. This lesson is about the other hundred and eighty-eight.
Reported12 stories · 6%
Not reported188 stories · 94%
Two hundred stories, twelve slots. Which twelve fill them?
Not quite.An editor chooses, and chooses from what survived the gates before the choice. Most of the two hundred were gone before anyone cared either way.
Not quite.The heating story from lesson two affected half a million and lost to a footbridge. Affecting people is not the test.
Yes.Not a ranking of importance: a ranking of what the bulletin can do by six. Importance is one ingredient, and the weakest.
Illustrative: how many of a day's stories survive each gate. Tap the gate that removes the MOST.
Tap the part of the figure that answers it.
Look at the drop between one bar and the next, not the bar itself.
Things that happened10,000 stories
Someone was there900 stories
It changed today300 stories
Near or familiar enough80 stories
There are pictures30 stories
It fits a slot12 stories
Someone was there
Yes.Ten thousand to nine hundred: more than nine in ten things that happened, gone before anyone judged them. The first gate is the biggest, and the quietest.
Things that happened
Not quite.This is the start, not a gate. Everything is still here.
It changed today
Not quite.Nine hundred to three hundred: a big cut, and the one people notice. It is a third the size of the first.
Near or familiar enough
Not quite.Three hundred to eighty. Steep, but it started from few.
There are pictures
Not quite.Eighty to thirty. Fifty stories, mostly the ones with no footage.
It fits a slot
Not quite.Thirty to twelve: the choice everyone imagines is the whole process, and it removes eighteen stories out of ten thousand.
Forty-eight stories worth telling. Change how many slots the bulletin has.
6 of 48 · of forty-eight stories that get a slot
6Six slots: the capital, the crash, the summit, the match. Nothing slow, nothing far.
12 of 48 · of forty-eight stories that get a slot
12Twelve: the same six, plus the court case, the strike and a story with good pictures.
24 of 48 · of forty-eight stories that get a slot
24Twenty-four: now a report on rents, a far-off election, a hospital wait.
48 of 48 · of forty-eight stories that get a slot
48Forty-eight: the slow and the distant finally appear, near the end, briefly.
What appears as the space grows?
Not quite.The first six are already the crash and the capital. Extra slots reach past them into what was cut.
Not quite.Look where the rents story landed: the twenty-fourth slot. Importance got it in last, not first.
Yes.More space is not more of the same. The extra slots go to the stories that failed the softer gates, and they are the ones a reader most needed.
Move the control to see what changes.
Put a story's morning in order, from happening to being seen.
Tap them in order — first to last.
Happens→Noticed→Weighed against the day→Wins a slot, or not→Seen, or never known
Yes.The weighing is against the DAY, not against a standard. The same story wins on a quiet Sunday and loses on election night.
Illustrative. Set how many stories the day has, and how many slots the bulletin has.
Stories that make it6 stories
Stories that vanish54 stories
Illustrative.
A quiet day · 6A quiet day, 6 slots: 6 stories make it and 54 vanish. A factory closing gets in easily.
Stories that make it12 stories
Stories that vanish48 stories
Illustrative.
A quiet day · 12A quiet day, 12 slots: 12 stories make it and 48 vanish. A factory closing gets in easily.
Stories that make it24 stories
Stories that vanish36 stories
Illustrative.
A quiet day · 24A quiet day, 24 slots: 24 stories make it and 36 vanish. A factory closing gets in easily.
Stories that make it6 stories
Stories that vanish194 stories
Illustrative.
A normal day · 6A normal day, 6 slots: 6 stories make it and 194 vanish. A factory closing is fighting for the last slot.
Stories that make it12 stories
Stories that vanish188 stories
Illustrative.
A normal day · 12A normal day, 12 slots: 12 stories make it and 188 vanish. A factory closing is fighting for the last slot.
Stories that make it24 stories
Stories that vanish176 stories
Illustrative.
A normal day · 24A normal day, 24 slots: 24 stories make it and 176 vanish. A factory closing is fighting for the last slot.
Stories that make it6 stories
Stories that vanish794 stories
Illustrative.
A huge day · 6A huge day, 6 slots: 6 stories make it and 794 vanish. A factory closing does not exist.
Stories that make it12 stories
Stories that vanish788 stories
Illustrative.
A huge day · 12A huge day, 12 slots: 12 stories make it and 788 vanish. A factory closing does not exist.
Stories that make it24 stories
Stories that vanish776 stories
Illustrative.
A huge day · 24A huge day, 24 slots: 24 stories make it and 776 vanish. A factory closing does not exist.
The same story, a factory closing with 300 jobs. When is it most likely reported?
Yes.The story did not change. The competition did. On a quiet day it is the third item; on a huge day with six slots it never happened.
Not quite.A huge day is eight hundred stories fighting for six slots, and a factory closing loses to all of them.
Not quite.It matters exactly as much on both days, and it is reported on one of them. What it is measured against is the day.
Move both controls to see how they work against each other.
What you saw today was chosen against what else happened today. The same story is news on a Sunday and nothing on the day of an election.
Bulletin minutes on the attacks that week95%
Bulletin minutes on everything else5%
Illustrative.
September 2001. A report on a famine was scheduled for that week. What most likely happened to it?
Not quite.Made and ready is not the same as aired. A finished report needs a slot, and that week there were none.
Not quite.The audience was watching one thing. Attention was not spare; it was spoken for.
Yes.Every slot that week went to one story. The famine was as real on the Friday as on the Monday; the day it was measured against had changed.
Lesson complete
Every story you saw was chosen against what else happened that day.