Story Review

Would you say looking at pictures of criminals is good fun? A lot of people would, according to traffic figures for the News & Star’s website.

A gallery, dubbed Banged Up, including pictures of some of Cumbria’s worst offenders, has made its way into the top-five most viewed pages of the News & Star’s digital publication. And it looks like it’s there to stay.

“[It’s] a ‘constant’ and sits permanently at the foot of the home page,” says Ian Brogden, the online editor of the Cumbrian Newspapers Group, who hatched the idea. “It grew out of a spread in the News & Star paper. The spread included some pictures of criminals and was welcomed by the police who were keen to highlight recent successes.”

The gallery is updated constantly and at the time we reviewed it it featured more than 30 pictures of murderers, thieves, hooligans, drug dealers and pedophiles.

According to Journalism.co.uk, which has also written about Banged Up, the photos include some of the News & Star’s own pictures and pictures supplied by the police. As well as sitting in the gallery, they can also be used elsewhere on the website or in the hard copy of the paper.

Brogden says that as far as he is aware no-one has done a similar piece before. The News & Star has used photo galleries but not in quite the same manner. In September it used a collection of its own photos and video, and images submitted by readers to cover a fire at a tyre depot, one of the biggest blazes in the county for many years.

The quality of the pictures in Banged Up ranges from good to total crap. While this reviewer is convinced that good enough is better than perfect, some of the photos are just not good enough. This takes away a bit of the gallery’s production value but does not spoil the overall experience. Neither does the fact that the gallery ends quite abruptly: with an advertisement and nothing to indicate the end.

Updates to the gallery are announced via a “flash” on the home page teaser. At the time we contacted Brogden about it, there was no option to subscribe to an RSS feed for the gallery.

At the Digital Editors’ Forum in October, where we first learned about Banged Up, the question was raised: “Is that really journalism?” While Brogden has admitted to Journalism.co.uk that the gallery requires minimal editorial input, we feel that is no reason to write it off as a journalistic effort. Banged Up tells the story of who lives in Cumbria’s prisons in far greater detail than a feature story would have. Although not always of decent quality, the photos paint a multi-facetted portrait of the average Cumbrian villain: he (it is mostly a “he”) can look threatening or funny, or just like your neighbour. He may move you to pity him. He may make you worry about your child.

The only grumble we have with Banged Up as a piece of journalism is that it is not open to input from the audience: there is no option for readers to comment on the pictures. While it is pretty easy to imagine why this should be so, it nonetheless goes against our understanding that the best stories are born by the collaboration of media and public.

VERDICT

Originality: 4 (out of 5)

While it is hard to be certain if that storytelling technique has not been used in news before, the fact remains that three dozens of media people at the Digital Editors’ Forum were taken by surprise by the Banged Up gallery.

Presentation: 3 (out of 5)

Quality of pictures is uneven. End is abrupt. No RSS option.

Journalistic value: 4 (out of 5)

It is “serious court news at-a-glance”, as Brogden puts it. No option for readers to get involved though.

Overall: 3.8 (out of 5)

Impressive.

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See here how ranking works.

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We could use your help. Contact us if you’d like to suggest a story worth reviewing, become a reviewer or get involved in any other way.

Each story reviewed is rated on a scale of one to five for each of the three criteria: originality, presentation and journalistic value. Here is what the ratings mean:

1 Poor

2 Meh

3 Passable

4 Impressive

5 Outstanding

There is also a final rating, which is calculated as a weighted average of the three sub-grades. Weightings are assigned by the reviewer and vary for different stories.

Since this blog has set out to collect examples of fine storytelling, poor reviews are likely to be a rarity. There is no real competition. The ratings serve as a means to quantify the reviewer’s assessment of a particular story and possibly showcase areas for improvement. For example, an otherwise great effort could be rated lower for presentation, meaning the reviewer feels there is room for improvement there. This will not necessarily affect the overall rating, though, as presentation can be given less of a weight in calculating the average.

One of the great things about new media and web 2.0 is that improvements can be made immediately. The ratings thus only reflect what the story looked like when we reviewed it.

Well, let’s get this started. We are not yet entirely clear about the design but we will just tweak the site on the go and hope you will not mind.

This blog will feature reviews of journalistic stories. No, it will not be like book reviews of extremely short books. We will try to explain.

People have told stories for as long as they have had language. Over the millennia, technology has changed and the ways to tell stories have multiplied. Storytelling started off as an oral tradition; it then expanded to paper, picture and video, and is nowadays going online. But, as well as changing the means to tell a story, each new medium has meant a shift in people’s perceptions of what a story is, how it is structured and how it works. Some writers of fiction, like Kurt Vonnegut in Breakfast of Champions, have experimented with doing away with storytelling.

Journalism has long been obsessed with telling stories. It still is. Many journalists are under the impression that they are in the business of producing and distributing news. And when they say news, they usually mean stories. Pictures, although an established part of the journalistic product, are largely seen as an aide to telling a story. Text is king.

But why should it be that way? Stories told in print, sound and video are ubiquitous. But can a Google map tell a story? Can a Java game tell a story? Can a discussion on a Facebook group’s wall tell a story? What will it mean for a story if a video shows one thing and the sound tells another?

An industry on the verge of a radical shift, as journalism is, needs bold and creative minds that are eager to explore and find the answers to such questions. This blog we will try to present some of the best efforts in the field in the hope to inspire creativity.

We will try to give an objective rating of each story reviewed, focusing on three main criteria: originality, presentation and journalistic value. The last one might need some explanation. Many journalists will probably think it means newsworthiness. But we are rather of the view that journalism is not about news: it is about content. Journalism is not about telling people something: it is about talking to them and listening to them, and letting their views become part of the story. Journalism is not about democracy: it is about community.

We are starting with just one reviewer – me – but hope people interested in the project will want to join. Also, we will be extremely grateful to anyone who suggests a story that we should review: the web is now too big to scale it alone. Do not be shy to promote your own stuff. If you have done a good job, there is no reason not to brag.

Image|quintessence by Demion

Expect launch soon.