I was chided this week by several people over negativity. And also chided over why the paper runs so much bubble and chintz.
Those reacting to negativity said, “”You lot only run stories when things go wrong.”
Well, there’s a deal of truth in that, but it is not the driving force of what gets selected to run in the paper.
I have been chided over coverage of the Bruce Stadium grass, the Mitchell incinerator, the Carillon, the Canberra Hospital and the V8 car race.
Organisations say they do wonderful things every day. They run a city state, they clean national facilities, they treat grateful patients, they build skating parks etc etc etc. And The Canberra Times runs not a word. But as soon as there is strife the reporters are photographers are stiffing around. It is not fair, they plead. Why don’t you run the good news stories? Why don’t you run stories about when things go right?
It is a common complaint. Not by readers, however. Mostly by people running organisations. Those people have, quite legitimately, an interest in their organisation being seen in a good light. They want it, and their position in it, to continue.
Readers have a different interest. Sure, many do not endless negativity. But they do not see it in terms of negativity or positivity. They see it in terms of what interests them. And we try to meet that desire. We do that because it is our business. If we want to stay in business we have to meet those desires. (Indeed our concerns on this score are very similar to those organisations who complain to us.)
The critical question for us is not “”Is this a positive or negative story?” Rather, the question is, “”Will this interest our readers?”
The fact is there has been trouble over the grass at Bruce Stadium. They had to replace it. The Carillon has been silent for some time. Waiting lists have blown out. Environment ACT has had to set new standards for the incinerator. The V8 race cause traffic disruption and noise and doubts remain about the costs. People are interested in these things.
And they are not especially interested when things do not go wrong. They expect that. When events plough along normally, nobody is especially interested, no matter how diligent and competent the providers have been.
But they are not only interested in things that go wrong.
Things going wrong are just a sub-set of a more important communication with readers. People are interested in things that affect them. The effect might be direct and immediate or indirect. It might be financial or emotional. It might be when things go wrong or it might be when unusual events occur.
Radio stations never report that The Canberra Times came out on time. Their listeners are only interested on those (very rare) occasions it is late or does not appear at all. Then they are affected.
If something goes wrong at a hospital, people say, “”That could be me or a member or my family.” The closer the hospital the more the concern.
The grass a Bruce Stadium and ticket and transport stuff-ups at the Olympics affect people. Will my planned Olympic attendance be wrecked, they ask. Will our rates go up to pay for the grass. They have an interest in these stories.
They also have an interest (perhaps a greater interest) in the “”positive” stories, which also got a good run. The Olympic flame’s run through Canberra is a case in point. The pictures of every torch bearer and hundreds of spectators obviously interested many readers, include a lot of non-regulars who bought the paper and many regulars who bought multiple copies.
The Olympics in general are getting such wide coverage because they affect people – in this instance, emotionally. The emotional appeal is on several levels.
First, is the appeal to nationalism. Gold, gold, gold for Australia. Crass to some; glory to others. Then there are the heroic athletic struggles and achievements and the appeal to athletic beauty. Thirdly, for some, there is identification with the athletes — childhood dreams of being a star, identity with the hard slog of training, the joy of winning and the bitterness or losing, or the joy of having played the game. These things interest us because we have been there, even if on a very much smaller scale. Nearly all of us have played competitive sport, even if only at school.
Similarly, other sport is run because it interests people. Racing interests people financially, as do the stock-market tables. And the endless reporting about the form of companies and the form of horses interest people, so they get a run.
So things do not get a run just because they negative or just because they are unusual. They get a run because they interest people. The Olympics are positive and run to a predictable four-yearly schedule. Take away the money element and nothing could be more predictable or boring than a horse race. Twenty horses all looking roughly the same run around a track one comes first, another comes second and another comes third.
People running organisations and events often ask, why doesn’t The Canberra Times get behind X, Y, or Z and be positive about it? They say The Canberra Times is a business in the town. It takes advertising. It benefits from economic activity. Maybe so. But it is also in the business of serving its readers with what interests them. Very often that coincides with the public interest in the broader altruistic sense more often than being positive.
So, dear reader, expect a celebration of the Games. Expect coverage of Canberrans enjoying the Games. Balloons and bubbly. But do expect a blind eye to be turned if transport goes wrong, crowd control fails, costs blow out or grass does not grow – after all, I suspect you are interested in it, in more ways than one.