Revision: profit, power and ownership of the newspaper industry

Sample question

In Question 3(d), you will be rewarded for drawing together knowledge and understanding from across your full course of study, including different areas of the theoretical framework and media contexts.

(d) Explain how ownership shapes media products. Refer to The Daily Mirror to support your points. [12]

News values - the values or ideology that are demonstrated in news media. The news is constructed through a process of selection and omission

Newsworthiness - refers to how 'worthy' something is of being in the news

'If it bleeds, it leads'

Nazanin Zaghari Ratcliffe 'vs' Anousheh Assoori - why did the UK media favour the coverage of one of these people over the other?

• Women are hegemonically and ideologically represented as the primary caregivers to children. Thus Nazanin's story is seen as being more tragic and relatable. This is more easily narrativized 
• Anousheh's story is more complicated. He tried to kill himself through starvation in prison, and his family apparently supported this. Perhaps this 'story' is too controversial? Additionally, he was a protestor, which may make things more ideologically complicated
• She is more apparently middle class than him, which may make her more relatable to middle class audiences
• She is significantly more light skinned. Historically, white lives, especially white British lives hold more value in the UK news. This is a clear indication of Gilroy's theory of racial hierarchies
• Nazanin is a woman, and a mother of a young girl. This is a compelling and exciting narrative
• Her child is significantly younger, which again presents a more compelling and relatable narrative to the target audience
• Her family is white. She is a British national with a double barrelled surname, which could lead to her being more relatable to the target audience
• His name is potentially more 'foreign' to certain British audiences, representing him more as an 'other'
• Nazanin is significantly more hegemonically attractive than Anousheh, and may in particular appeal to middle age men
• All of these decisions have been made for the reasons of securing profit

Comparing the news values of the front pages of the editions of The Daily Mirror and The Times from Tuesday 22nd March 2022

Curran & Seaton - all media products and their owners are motivated by power and profit. 'Power without responsibility". The UK media is constructed in such a way that it wields considerable ideological power, and is in the business of deliberately manipulating audiences. It is advantageous for newspapers to support popular political parties because it gives them financial security

David Hesmondhalgh - Industries minimise risk and maximise profit. the structure of the media industries/the cultural industries. Processes include conglomeration, where a company buys out another company, and vertical/horizontal/multimedia integration

• The Daily Mirror is a tabloid with broadly left leaning ideology. Tabloid newspapers typically utilise an informal mode of address and use an informal lexis to appeal to a working class target audience. The Mirror 95p
• The Times however is a broadsheet. Ideologically it is right leaning, but far less right wing than newspapers like The Sun, The Daily Mail and The Sunday sport. It would argue it is more of a centrist paper. Broadsheets typically target middle class audiences using sophisticated mode of address and language. The Times is £2:20

The Mirror

• The mirror demonstrates a far more colourful and lively mode of address. It features significantly more pictures, and significantly less words
• There is a large splash story featuring Kate Middleton. She is referred to as 'Kate' which is highly informal, and constructs an informal mode of address. This splash features little information, yet does feature two large, very similar images of the royals walking around. This is a classic example of soft news.
• Bias by selection - where something is included in a newspaper, which demonstrates the ideology
• By including a story on 'Kate', the newspaper is demonstrating it has a pro royal bias. The Mirror is a left leaning newspaper, which means arguably it may be 'against' the royal family. It includes stories and information about the royals, because the royals are popular with its readership
• Another splash story featuring 'Nazanin' (again, familiar, informal address) chooses a mid shot of a smiling image of the woman, which promotes a positive, straightforward narrative. Yet the pull quote criticises the UK government. Controversy is often popular as a subject choice, and it is standard for a left leaning newspaper to criticise the conservative party. The blue background and the font is in conservative blue which might emphasise the responsibility of the conservative government
• However, broadly, this edition of The Mirror has chosen to avoid significant reference to political issues  
• Headline story: features Michael Gove in an apparently life and death situation . The headline features quote marks so the newspaper can avoid accusations of libel
• This story lacks many concrete facts, yet is violent and lurid and exciting, and is typical of the front page of a tabloid
• All in all, the front page of the mirror is typical of a tabloid newspaper, and definitely reflects how ideology has been shaped by the ownership of this newspaper

The Times

• Significantly smaller font than tabloid newspapers, with significantly more information, clearly targeting a middle class, educated audience
• Uses far fewer colours
• Masthead uses a serif font type. Serif font has connotations of classiness and formality
• Refers to Nazanin by her full name, which reveals it s more formal mode of address. The caption features the same information as The Mirror, but substantially smaller. The Times have selected an image of Nazanin with her white husband, which reinforces her status as a stereotypical British national ,and may make her more relatable to the conservative target audience
• The headline story features the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The headline features formal language, which suggests it is targeting a middle class, sophisticated audience. This story is international, which may explain why it was bumped from the front page of the Mirror that day. By focussing on an international story, the editors are assuming the target audience audience of The Times have more of an interest in international events Additionally, the story in the Times lacks an image, which again speaks to the sophistication of the readers. It uses some technical language and makes many references to people's names, which assumes some level of knowledge on behalf of the readership. Story is complicated, but ends with a lead in to considerable more information
• The assumes much knowledge of its readers, including the term 'No 10', an abbreviation of 'number ten downing street' , which in turn is an example of metonymy, where one word stand in for the whole thing. In this case, 'no 10' represents the UK government, which is a sophisticated abbreviation.
• Being a right of centre newspaper, The Times may be ideologically opposed to taxes. Being higher earners, the readership would be likely to pay more tax already, and right wing ideologies tend to focus on the individual rather than the collective
• The story on road tax and toll roads would appeal more to middle class, middle aged audiences. It uses a range of technical language to present an issue that arguably only affects more well-off people