Audience-Based Indicators for News Media Performance: A Conceptual Framework and Findings from Germany

Many attempts to conceptualize and to assess the performance of media systems or single news media outlets focus on the “supply side” of public communication, operationalized as characteristics of the news content and the form of presentation. These characteristics indicate the potential performance of news media; they are a necessary but not a sufficient condition for media performance. In order to assess the actual performance of news media we need to know what kind of audiences they reach, how they fulfil their users’ news-related interests and needs, and how they contribute to their users’ perceptions of the news environment. In this article, we propose a conceptual framework for the definition of audience-based indicators for news media performance. We apply this framework to data gathered as part of the 2019 Reuters Institute Digital News Survey for Germany. We compare 42 news media, both online and offline, in regard to their reach in different parts of the population, and to their audiences’ interest in news and politics, their trust in media, and their perceptions of the overall performance of German news media. The findings underline that news media performance is a multidimensional concept and that there are different ways in which news media can perform. Furthermore, the particular type of media, technically or organizationally, still matters when it comes to audiences’ expectations and perceived functions

The Relationship Between Community Violence and Trauma: How Violence Affects Learning, Health, and Behavior

Research on trauma is frequently featured in mainstream news outlets, pointing to its connection to a range of behavioral and health outcomes. While trauma can have multiple interpretations, for the purposes of this report, it is the result of experiencing or witnessing chronic and sustained violence, or specific events that can have lasting effects on individuals. Researchers have identified 13 distinct types of trauma, including community violence. Community violence is an umbrella term that encompasses experiencing or witnessing firearms violence as well as exposure to drug markets. In addition to the commonly understood, more immediate impacts of gun violence on the victims and their friends and family, this report will provide an overview of the consequences of community violence on health and well-being, specifically illuminating the impact of trauma caused by the longer-term, frequently cumulative effects of living with the fear of violence. This report is intended for members of the gun violence prevention community and policymakers and is designed to provide a foundation of key concepts and research on trauma in the context of gun violence in an easily accessible format

Linking Audiences to News: A Network Analysis of Chicago Websites

The mass media model, which sustained news and information in communities like Chicago for decades, is being replaced by a "new news ecosystem" consisting of hundreds of websites, podcasts, video streams and mobile applications. In 2009, The Chicago Community Trust set out to understand this ecosystem, assess its health and make investments in improving the flow of news and information in Chicagoland. The report you are reading is one of the products of the Trust's local information initiative, Community News Matters. "Linking Audiences to News: A Network Analysis of Chicago Websites" is one of the first -- perhaps the first -- research projects seeking to understand a local

Opportunities for Foundation Leadership: Meeting Community Information Needs

Profiles three community foundations developing new insights into program areas, new partnerships with community organizations and institutions, enhanced roles in community dialogue, new collaborations and programs, and greater visibility and prominence

Doing the Business? Newspaper reporting of the business of football

This research draws upon a growing interest within media sociology in the ways in which news is shaped by information flows between sources; it focuses on how the media, and newspapers in particular, report on the business aspects of the UK football industry. Media interest in the workings of the City and issues of corporate governance extend beyond the conventional business pages to encompass the sports pages, commentary and even editorializing. The case study in this article centres on the Scottish club, Celtic, and serves to illustrate how public interest in sport can help illuminate aspects of how financial news is produced and reported in the print media. The article argues that much of the growing and complex business side of the game goes largely unreported and that there is evidence of an over-reliance on celebrity sources by journalists and a lack of knowledge or experience among sports reporters in reporting business stories

The Epistemology and Ethics of Media Markets in the Age of Information

The paper will seek to demonstrate that information as communication has a dual inherent normative structure that commits its disseminators, especially the media, offline and online, to epistemological and ethical principles that are universally mandatory. With regard to the dissemination of information by the media, its business intelligence constituted by its commercial interests as a media market must always be congruent with moral intelligence on the basis of the epistemological and ethical universal principles that the dual normative structure of information gives rise and to which the media itself is committed. When the media?s business intelligence comes into conflict with moral intelligence, the latter must always take precedent over the former. Moreover, the communication of information to the public by the media, offline and online, even if conceived merely as another market commodity, commits the media to ethical conduct regardless of any other commercial interests that may come into conflict with the media?s ethical commitments to the public

Beyond the Boom: Ensuring Adequate Payment for Mineral Wealth Extraction

Examines Ohio's severance tax rate and receipts on gas and oil extraction compared with other states, oil and gas production's costs to the state, and potential impact of a higher tax. Recommends raising the tax and creating a severance tax trust fund