Dramatising the news
“news values in the press photograph include the unexpected, dramatic, recent event concerning a person of high status” (Bednarken and Caple, 2012, p57)
To put in perspective how the tabloidization of news looks and compares to a quality newspapers here is a great example.
‘The Sun’ and ‘The Daily Telegraph’ are publications that both share the same political orientation - centre-right wing and both in support of the conservative party. Yet when looked at closely they are a million miles apart. We know that tabloid newspapers are there to sell and gather revenue and in order to do that, they sometimes exaggerate the stories to attract more attention. Where as quality newspapers already have a set audience, which they have an obligation to provide quality news to.
Clearly ‘The Sun’ has gone for the classic look with a picture and bold letters that almost reads like a shouting statement creating a scandalous look to the story, which is on a serious matter. The picture of The Queen speaks to the audience and their sense of patriotism to buy and read what she had to say on the matter.
On the other hand we have ‘The Daily Telegraph’ which did allocate the main attention to the same story about The Queen and her views on the matter of the exit from the EU which was allocated the main headline, however there is no picture, just the headline with a few columns that can be continued on page eleven. The reason for this is that the consumers of a broadsheet are those who are looking for quality news and not news that have them dramatised or exaggerated . Broadsheets rather put out more quality news on the front page to inform about all the main news that have been reported rather than one.
Because broadsheets have audience that will continue to purchase the publication they don’t have to be so competitive with other publications allowing them more freedom into what stories make it to the front page. The tabloids such as ‘The Sun’ have to sell in order to survive the competition and adding a huge picture of the queen with text of her views dramatizes the news making them more appealing to consumers.