Newspapers vs. News Blogs

The two websites I chose to compare and contrast are http://www.goodnewsblog.com/ and http://www.latimes.com/. First impressions are key to catching the viewers attention and keeping it. When I first viewed The Good News Blog, I wondered if it really was a news blog. The way the page is laid out isn’t like a regular news site usually is. Their website also looks like they are on a smaller budget than other news websites. You don’t have to a have a lot of money to deliver news to your readers, but it helps with first impressions. When I first viewed The LA Times, I had no doubt that this was a credible source. The website is laid clearly and is very organized. The top stories are at the top of the page, the different sections of the newspaper are to the left of the page, entertainment, quick links, most e-mailed stories, weather and traffic are all located on the right side of the page. There is a ton of information on the home page alone, but it’s not overwhelming to the viewer.

Comparing this clear, organized, reputable news website to The Good News blog is like comparing night and day. The Good News Blog is really only one page that has different links to articles. The Good News Blog only provides information that is “good” because newspapers these days only focus on the “bad” news. Whether the news is “good” or “bad”, it’s still news, and the people still need to hear it. I do give credit to The Good News Blog for having a massive amount of “heartwarming” news stories. Although I would choose The LA Times over The Good News Blog any day, it would be nice to have a couple of these “good” stories make the front of the LA Times instead of all the stories being scandals, murder, etc.

After reading various articles on both of these websites, my hunch of The LA Times being a more credible news source was correct. The Good News Blog is family owned and is relatively small as compared to The LA Times that is a huge newspaper and has tons of writers working for them. Major newspapers have standards and requirements all of their articles have to meet which guarantees quality news whereas blogs don’t have to meet any requirements. Who knows if the stories they are writing are accurate. With that being said, I don’t feel that blogging particularly supports the type of journalism that digital print media produces. Some blogs may reputable, but most aren’t.

To convince me that a news blog is credible, I would have to see sources of where they got their information. I would also look up the information being given on the news blog on a reputable newspaper site to see if the information is the same. If it’s exactly the same, with the same questions answered, etc. then the blog is just copying other news sources and putting their own spin on it. However, if I see that the news blog and the newspaper have different interviews with different people or went to different locations to find out information, I would believe that the news blog was a credible source, and I would read it.

I feel that any big, well known newspaper is credible whether it’s online or in print. Like I said above, newspapers have to meet requirements and have restrictions on what they write in their articles. They have credible sources and have a “clean” record of having credible sources since they began the newspaper. I feel the newspapers are more credible than news blogs.

The research that I did for this module did not change my original thesis. I would rate this research a 5, strongly supports my thesis.