Compare two front page newspaper reports based on the same story. Which in your opinion is the most reliable report?

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Media Coursework Essay 2007/2008: Compare two front page newspaper reports based on the same story. Which in your opinion is the most reliable report?

To find out the reliability of the newspaper articles I must first find out a bit about the sources of the articles. Newspapers are primarily money making business, this means, like any other type of business, profit is the main issue. In order to make this profit the newspaper companies will not mind altering and changing the truth slightly. A newspaper would not be able to keep going without revenue as they are in a competitive market. Newspapers need to attract as many people as possible to increase maximum turnover this could mean writing what the people want to hear as opposed to the truth which people may not like. Newspapers are part of the mass media which means they will have to try and appeal to the largest group of people as possible, this will mean using a lot of different writing techniques and putting in more than just raw facts.

The newspaper story I will be focusing on is that of Blair’s cabinet reshuffle as well as John Prescott’s affair with his secretary.  After the shocking local election results, Tony Blair decided to hastily reshuffle his cabinet. The front page of The Sun is dominated by the very large and very bold title that fills almost the whole page. The front page of The Sun focuses on the affair that Prescott was having with his secretary as opposed to the Telegraph which focuses on the cabinet reshuffle. The Telegraphs front page only has a small title but you are drawn to the three pictures in the near the middle of the page of Charles Clarke, Margaret Beckett and John Reid. There is an unusual amount of body shown in the pictures, the picture of Charles Clarke looks particularly glum as he has been sacked but the other two look happy or proud. The Telegraphs title, “Nightmare on Downing Street” is a pun on the popular and well known horror film “Nightmare on Elm Street”, these strong words tell us of the seemingly complete mess of a cabinet shuffle that Blair had made. The Sun however has gone for the less subtle approach with the title “Now Were All Being Screwed By Prescott”, although this title does have some background to it the writer does explain himself in the text, the title refers to the 119 Norman Lamont quote “Now were all being screwed by Cabinet” . From this we can learn that the Sun is trying to appeal more towards the working class and maybe the lesser educated audience. The telegraph seems to use a more relaxed and well recognised title, from this we can tell that he is trying to appeal to the more educated higher class people that may be put off from buying the Sun because of its title. The picture of Prescott in the Sun is hardly flattering, it makes him look fat and old and also it shows him grinning, this implies to the reader that he is happy about the headline and he is endorsing the fact. From the presentational devices we can tell that the Sun is really out to ridicule Prescott and has used aggressive language. The Telegraph has kept to a more refined and polite title.

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        Another important area to look at when covering a newspaper story is to look at the use of facts and opinion. The opening paragraph of the Sun’s story is very much the papers opinion, using strong words that add emphasis to the papers opinion, for example the paper opens with the word “SHAMED” in capitols, this really puts out a bold impression from the start of the papers view on this matter. The title uses the phrase “600k A YEAR PAY AND PERKS”, this implies that he is earning more than he is, although there is some element of truth ...

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