<

Newspaper Editors Criticize TV Sniper Coverage
Wednesday, October 23, 2002
By Joe Strupp
Associate Editor for Editor & Publisher Magazine

Although the editors admit they are keeping in closer contact with their newsrooms because of the story, few say it is distracting them from the convention. "I think it ads an element to the conference. We are having a meeting of 300 editors not far from the biggest story in the nation. It helps remind us what we're about; it adds to the conversation."

BALTIMORE -- E&P
Editors gathered here this week for the annual Associated Press Managing Editors conference criticized the non-stop, wall-to-wall news coverage of the Washington-area sniper by broadcast and cable outlets, claiming newspapers are taking a more responsible approach to the story.

"It tends to come across as sensationalistic," said Ed Jones, incoming APME president and editor of The Free Lance-Star in Fredericksburg, Va., referring to broadcast and cable reporting. "The volume of it becomes overwhelming. It's almost like turning over all of your A section to nothing but the sniper."

Other attendees said newspapers can take a more measured approach because they have the luxury of a daily deadline and, in most cases, larger reporting staffs than their broadcast counterparts.

"I get a sense as a news consumer that the paper is more credible," said Tom Callinan, editor of The Arizona Republic in Phoenix. "I think TV could wait more for news to happen. It is being overdone."

Carl Hunnell, editor of the News Journal in Mansfield, Ohio, agreed. "TV is trying to take 15 minutes of news and stretch it into a three-hour window," he said. "That is not necessarily good journalism."
(More: MediaInfo.com News Source)
2002 © Editor & Publisher.

Dan