BAD NEWS! Will Things Like this ever stop?

[kyuusai]

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naa man sad good news but people prefer to have the bad news because they want to be informed and be aware of the bad things happening around them.

[duke pikaso]

kay mas daghan man mga bagag leps kuntra sa maau sa kalibutan! pareho nko! :mrgreen:

[beowulf]

ang good news kay ang BIBLE na lang.

[samsungster]

mas daghan man gud ang bad news kay sa good news....

[alter_ego]

Are you serious about this thread? Sensational news sells. The only good news that make it to the front page are exceptionally good news. Bad news sells because it is often, if not always, sensational!

But who says news is always bad news What about the news about Manny's political knock-out against Custodio?? I thought that news was hilarious!

Is the glass half full or half empty??

[lucius]

Good news = Bad news for the News paper industry,

Bad news = money for them

[duke pikaso]

lingaw man ang bad,

ang good, walay au

[gareb]

technically speaking, there is no such thing as "good news" or "bad news". we describe news as either 'good' or 'bad' depending on how it affects us. these are impressions on the events reported in news, and are not inherent characteristics of the event themselves.

consider news reports on the strengthening of the peso. most would see this as 'good news' but others won't. exporters would suffer because of the lesser returns they would have for their goods. and if you have a relative living in outside the country that periodically sends you money, you know for a fact that a strong peso means lesser amount of money exchanged for their foreign currency.

News is information about an recent event concerning people, places or things. we can create 'news' about everything that is happening around us, but the question is, "would it be worth telling?" this alone drastically reduces the amount of news stories that can be published. a report on how nice your seatmate's shoes are is not as important as, say, the strengthening of the agricultural sector. the more people are affected by the events described in your news story, the more value it has.

another aspect that must also be considered is best expressed in the question, "would the people listen?" we can create tons of great news but what catches their attention are the only things that they can retain. it might sound silly, but more people would actually listen about the latest happenings on kris aquino's life than the moribund state of the economy.

so, does 'bad news' sell? not necessarily. it is not 'bad news' itself that sells, but the sensationalism and scandal that is caused by the 'bad news' that draws people to it. curiously enough, 'good news' too has its own brand of sensationalism, but it generally lasts shorter that its counterpart.

again, you might ask, 'why does scandal and sensationalism sell?'

it is simple really. we have social norms that dictate how we must behave and the reasons for behaving as such. since everyone is expected to follow those norms, when one does, it does not strike anybody as particularly remarkable. granted that some even excel in "following norms" it does not evoke the same kind of attention as when someone breaks rules and disobeys them.

[bongjo]

because our homeland security is not secure, we are eventually vulnerable to bad consequencies in our day to day struggle, it made us so defensive the reason why we must have to listen to stations/ read newspapers broadcasting crime related reports for us to be pre warned on whether to go or no go,

[baron]

Sometimes the media people are practicing paranoia instead of responsible journalism. It's okay to give precaution to the people but they are exaggerating the issues they present. Sometimes, this leads to wrong perception of the real situation. Take the case of Mindanao. Mindanao has always been reported as a place where terrorists hide; as such we should be very careful if we want to go there.

But residents there are living the casually. Of course, there are parts in Mindanao which is really inhabited with terrorists but not the whole of Mindanao. Sometimes, it's plain hasty generalization.