Three Ways to Screw Up Web News

[David]

I don't know what it is, but the helicopters were back in 'hood this morning (for those new to the forums, I wrote up another post a while back about news chopper covering a murder near my house).

Today, I got up, looked online and nothing. Walked to work and came across a big ass crime scene--someone found a body in the river.

OK, that's the context. But check out the story on the three TV news affiliates and see which one you like the best. I'll point one thing out, at least one of the outlets got the story wrong.

So, to keep up with BK, let's make this a game. Please vote for your favorite version of covering a local crime scene:

http://www.thedenverchannel.com/news/16705503/detail.html

http://cbs4denver.com/local/denver.body.platte.2.756591.html

http://www.9news.com/news/article.aspx?storyid=94479&catid=188

And just to point out how bad their reporting is, I'll add Fox News:

http://www.myfoxcolorado.com/myfox/pages/Home/Detail?contentId=6845...

Oh hell, just for fun, here's how the dailies covered it:

http://www.denverpost.com/breakingnews/ci_9689850 (very odd comments in this one)

http://www.rockymountainnews.com/news/2008/jun/25/body-pulled-platte/

Here's my point (the buried lede)--if you put all these approaches together, you might actually have one decent news story produced correctly for the Web. Instead, this took at least 2 news choppers, three news trucks and who knows how many reporters to cobble togethe a mess that I have to Google to tie it all together.

[Brad King]

My thoughts:

The Denver Channel video - completely useless (we don't know what's happening, we have nothing, we're just talking to people). Thanks for wasting my life for 1:12 to tell me they don't know anything yet.

CBS4 and 9News each had 4 sentences on their site. A body was pulled at this time; it's lifeless; more coming. WOOHOO.

Fox has a great picture of police tape. Wow. I feel smarter for having seen that. Their copy at least reads like someone human wrote it.

Denver Post - what is it with police tape photos

Rocky Mountain News is the only one that had anything of substance. This looks and reads like news.

My continuing bitch is that news organizations are not equipped to do the very basic job: informing the public. This story should have database information about the local area (crime, education, ect) already available to give me context.

Is this the tenth death this year or the 100th or the first? What types are they? The very first component of a modern news story needs to happen before something breaks.

Mostly, though, David is old and needs sleep. We don't need helicopters -- we need better modern storytelling.

[David]

OK, so maybe I am old. But a few points:

* The map was cool. And seems sort of obvious to add.
* A couple of the sites didn't allow comments. Weird.
* I don't mind the video, and some of the images were OK.
* The "Stories" were crap. Errors (notice that they all claimed different addresses? No one had any idea where they were).
* The reporters didn't respond to comments. This was weird, especially when the comments are directed at the reporter.
* There was no way to subscribe to updates on the story.


Even without cool databases and such, this kind of story could be fixed.

-- David

[Andrew]

Rocky Mountain News? C'mon Brad. This quote says it all: "Oh, my gosh," said Kareen Erbe when she and a group of eight teens heard that a body had been found.

[Brad King]

The picture is good - I disagree with your description of the quotes. It's called color - and it goes in storytelling. The other pieces are just a body was found. Yeah? So what. What does it mean? Where's the important context that I hear so much about.

At least this is a story with some interesting visuals.

But I don't think any these stories is particularly rich.

[Andrew]

David, perhaps you should consider moving.

My vote would be the denverchannel.com. Just the facts from the experts, no lame speculation and stupid quotes from bystanders (who don't know shit anyway). I don't think if you grouped these stories together you'd end up with a better story.

[David]

Move? Nah, the weather's too good.

Anyway, I just get my news the old fashioned way. I asked some old guy standing there and he told me everything relevant in about 30 seconds.

Although, come to think of it, he did leave out the "Oh my gosh" part.

David