Professor Bill Grigsby

Sociology 205

January 31, 2017

Media Assignment Draft

Station/ Date/Time No.Stories/Average Story Subjects Ads, length, % of Main Length page advertisers network

USA 1/31/2017 13 headlines Bannon on security issues, Christian refugees 4 on homepage, 8 Les Schwab, Today 2-3 scrolling pages unfairly kept out of USA, Dems should allow on articles. 35% H&R Block, vote of Supreme court nominee, Betsy of page is ads. Golfweek. DeVos clears sen. Committee, Trumps refugee ban. Fox News 1/31/2017 13 headlines Trump bureaucracy battle in implementing 7 on homepage, Truthfinder, 3-4 scrolling pages agenda, Dems gamble with American lives, 10 on articles. The Liberty Trump pledges more cybersecurity, Sept. 11th 30% of page is Project, Wells families speak out against travel ban. ads Fargo, H&R Block, Forbes. Huffington 1/31/2017 20+ headlines, Trumps immigration ban, Trump’s SCOTUS 3 on homepage, 5 Walgreens, Post 3-4 scrolling pages pick, Trump may deport legal immigrants on on article. Chevy, KY, welfare, Betsy Devos clears Sen. Committee, 20% of page is Airborne. Dems boycott Trump’s picks. ads.

The homepage of USA Today is very busy with a lot of articles and ads mixed together. Formatted: Font color: Dark Red

If someone weren’t paying close attention, they might click on an ad thinking it was just another Formatted: Font color: Dark Red

article on the site. This was probably done consciously by the website to get more people to click Formatted: Font color: Dark Red

on ads without realizing it. Also surprising was the pop-up video ads on some of the articles. Formatted: Font color: Dark Red

These video ads immediately begin playing (with sound) when you click on an article, forcing

you to watch at least some of the ad before exiting it. A good portion of the ads were for USA

Network or their mobile app. Ads on the site for H&R Block and Les Schwab were obviously

targeting middle-class Americans. Although, a huge ad for Golfweek Magazine could be seen on Formatted: Font color: Dark Red Formatted: Font color: Dark Red the very top of their homepage, which didn’t fit in with the rest of the ads targeted demographic. A quick google search confirms that both USA Today and Golfweek are owned by the same company; Company, Inc. good catch. The article on the homepage were a mix of politics, celebrities, football, and finance. The focus on football and finance reinforces the idea that USA today’s demographic is the moderate middle-class. The USA today’s website was highly commercialized with the more ads per page than the Huffington Post. Formatted: Font color: Dark Red

The Huffington post was a stark contrast to USA today for a few reasons. One being the placement of ads and the number of ads on each page. The Huffington Post’s homepage was Formatted: Font color: Dark Red sleek and easy to navigate. With less articles on the homepage compared with USA Today or

Fox News. It also had the least number of ads of the three sites. The ads it did have on the homepage were not hidden; most of them had a label at the top that said “sponsored” or “ads.”

Unlike USA Today who hid their ads between row after row of their own articles. Ads for KY lubricating jelly were obviously targeting a young adult demographic. The ads for Chevy and Formatted: Font color: Dark Red

Airborne also targeted a demographic of working young people. The ads were consistent with Formatted: Font color: Dark Red the articles on the homepage, which were all about United States politics; except for all the Formatted: Font color: Dark Red tabloid stuff to the right … with the majority being about President Trump’s immigration rule and his SCOTUS pick. Obvious liberal bias was present in most articles which makes sense Formatted: Font color: Dark Red when you consider that the ads target young people, who tend to be more left leaning than other demographics. Only one ad on the homepage and one on each article were advertising

Huffington Post’s own site, which was an ad to sign up for a newsletter (delivered to your email) for the Huffington Post. The Huffington Post was the least commercialized of the three News Formatted: Font color: Dark Red sites, which may be because most of their sponsors were huge companies (Walgreens, Chevy), and because they know that out of all demographics, young people are the least likely to put up with a lot of ads. Fox News had the most ads on each article, but they were less “in your face” than USA Formatted: Font color: Dark Red Formatted: Font color: Dark Red Today. A majority of the ads on the articles were located at the very bottom of the page, way past were people would normally read. A lot of the ads on the homepage were to outside

‘junk’ news sites, such as Liberty News, which is a far-right news website that features articles like NSFW: BlackLivesMatter Activist Demands Reparations, States ‘We Need to Start Killing

People’. Oh yeah, that’s right there on their home page! Some of Fox’s ads are plugs for the network, trying to direct traffic there. These ads are targeting far-right wing conservatives, as Formatted: Font color: Dark Red were several the headlines from the homepage of Fox News. Most of the articles had an obvious conservative bias that could be ascertained by simply reading the title (for example); with a heavy amount of internal advertising of other articles from Fox News on the bottom of every article. The content of the articles, along with the ads, is strong evidence the Fox News’s demographic is far-right conservatives. The top of the homepage was dedicated to Trump and the Formatted: Font color: Dark Red liberal’s liberals blocking his agenda. There was also an article about a homeowner charged with Formatted: Font color: Dark Red murder after ‘protecting’ himself from a burglar. Gun rights being infringed upon is a major issue with conservatives, you can see how this article was placed on the homepage with a conservative audience in mind. The main article on the homepage was titled Trump faces bureaucratic battle in implementing agenda, which was bashing democrats for going against

President Trump’s recent Executive Orders and cabinet picks. The article was clearly biased against democrats, and written for a conservative audience. There were hardly any ads for Fox

News on the site, except a link in the top right corner of the homepage for Fox News’s Facebook,

Twitter, and Google Plus pages. Sponsored stories, outbrain …The number of ads may have been a bit high, but Fox News was still less commercialized than USA Today. Comparing these sites on coverage, the Huffington Post focused almost solely on Formatted: Font color: Dark Red

American politics. It had a very clear liberal bias in the way the articles were titled and the Formatted: Font color: Dark Red language used within the articles (for example). On the opposite side of the political spectrum was Fox News, which also focused on politics but also had news articles on the army and gun Formatted: Font color: Dark Red rights, all which were written for a conservative audience. USA Today, which was the most commercialized, was also the least biased. USA Today had a good portion of political coverage, Formatted: Font color: Dark Red but was also littered with articles about celebrities and other ‘junk’ news articles, such as an Formatted: Font color: Dark Red article on an ATM that dispenses Big Mac’s instead of cash. Seriously?? Seems like a product placement, too. The political stories they did cover did not have any discernable biases, USA

Today seems to take a moderate approach to news reporting; which cannot be said for the

Huffington Post and Fox News. For example, if you take three headline articles from each site, and simply evaluate the title and content, you can clearly see the different biases each site has, and see the demographic the site and it’s advertisers are targeting. Let’s look at how each site handled President Trump’s Supreme Court nominee, Judge Neil Gorsuch. Huffington Post’s article on the subject was titled Donald Trump’s SCOTUS Pick Has A History Of Favoring

Police. Which talked about Gorsuch’s history of siding with the police in cases considering officer’s powers, and when he granted officers more power to conduct searches. With the Black

Lives Matter movement and police abuse of power a popular topic with liberal democrats, this Formatted: Font color: Dark Red piece was obviously written for liberals to reinforce ideas about police brutality and corruption.

Or reinforce opposition to Gorsuch’s nomination. Fox News, unsurprisingly, went the opposite direction in their article. Titled 'A MOST SOLEMN ASSIGNMENT' Trump nominates Judge Neil

Gorsuch as his choice for the Supreme Court, it focused on Gorsuch’s record and his ‘credentials and legal mind.’ It also pointed out the similarities between Gorsuch and Antonin Scalia, the late Supreme Court Justice who’s position Gorsuch will fill. The article was a complete praise of the Formatted: Font color: Dark Red pick and offered no criticism. Gorsuch is a republican, appointed by a republic republican president, so it is safe to say that the high amount of praise shows a conservative bias and that the article was written with a conservative audience in mind. USA Today covered the stories with Formatted: Font color: Dark Red the least amount of bias and was the most informative. You can tell by the title Neil Gorsuch:

The case for and against Trump's Supreme Court nominee that the article contains an argument for and against Trump’s pick. By not taking a side, democrat or republican, they stay moderate and unbiased. The article weighed the ‘pros’ and ‘cons’ of Gorsuch as a Supreme Court Justice and gave the reader information so they could make an informed decision in the matter, without trying to sway them one way or the other (for example). This is the definition of unbiased news and shows that USA Today does not write their articles for conservatives or liberals. traveling businessmen? As was mentioned previously, the ads that each of these sites had were in the same demographic of the way the articles were written. You would be hard pressed to find a Planned

Parenthood ad on Fox News’ website. That wouldn’t be money well-spent for them …

The Huffington post while having the least ads, had the best production quality of all the sites that have been compared. It was had a simple and easy to navigate, without any distracting graphics or ads. The feel of the website was classy/chic, which probably resonates with its targeted demographic; young liberals. Fox News had a busier feel, more ads, and muted colors.

The overall tone of the website was more serious, with a bigger emphasis on ads. The more serious tone could be pandering to an older audience. It also had more video articles, which would grab your attention by auto playing (with sound). The final site, USA Today, was more colorful than the others. It had a busy feel and the ads were mixed in with a plethora of articles on the homepage. It had a more “paper newspaper” and personal tone than the other sites. Which could be popular with older moderates.

In conclusion, there is a direct correlation between the demographic targeted by the ads Formatted: Font color: Dark Red on news sites, and the demographic targeted by the news sites themselves. Even unbiased site like USA Today have a demographic in mind; moderates (or people less concerned about politics, looking for business, sports news and some headlines …). Although the stronger the bias in the articles of a site, like Fox News, the easier it was to see the demographic the ads were targeting. Such as Fox News having ads for a far-right wing news site. There is a healthy dose of bias in every single news site one visits, but the more knowledge you have on identifying this bias makes it easier to ignore, and makes you less likely to be fooled when reading the news. It also helps to glean information from multiple sites before forming your own opinion on a subject, instead of believing whatever bias that is in the article you read. Nice job of providing descriptions and some analyses—a few spots where (for the next paper) you’d be wise to support your points with evidence, an example. On coverage, there is a lot more on those home pages— much of it junk, or reader ‘bait,’ that suggests some things about the target readers, too.

Section Description (see above for more detail) pts Document Chose one site from each group; describe what you 10 10 did, when, etc. Advertising How much advertising versus actual news? Target audience for each source; relationship between ads 20 17 and stories? How to explain differences between the sites? Coverage Coverage/stories; headlines; ‘hooks’ (to draw in 25 21 reader)? Use of sources; video content? Production Graphics; the ‘look’; colors; audio (music, sounds); 10 9 ‘bells,’ ‘whistles,’ ‘eye candy’ Conclusions What did your comparison yield (what did you learn)? Are all news sites basically the same? How does 15 14 money figure into this? Base your conclusions on your observations. Writing Use your observations to write the paper, support any conclusions with evidence; Mainly, proofread your 10 9 paper (go beyond spell checker …) Total 90 80