MailOnline Case Study: Blog Task

1) What are the top five stories? Are they examples of soft news or hard news?

-Megan and Harry on holiday on Sydney beach- Soft news
- Britain's most dangerous hate preacher is released from prison under cover of darkness -  two years after he was jailed for supporting ISIS- soft AND hard news
-Theresa May having a hard time negotiating Brexit deals- Hard news
-Strictly dancer Dianne Buswell SPLITS with her boyfriend amid claims she was 'getting too close to dance partner Joe Sugg'- Soft news
-Ant McPartlin 'purchases £5 million house to renovate'... as his divorce from Lisa Armstrong is finalised- Soft news
2) What celebrity content is featured?

-Megan and Harry
-ITV presenters eg Ant and Dec, Holly Willborough 
-Strictly contestants
-Chris evans

3) What examples of ‘clickbait’ can you find?

-Meghan cradles her baby bump on Sydney beach and wears £880 maxi dress before she and Harry kick off their shoes to join an 'anti-bad vibes circle' with surfing mental health group

4) To what extent do the stories you have found on MailOnline reflect the values and ideologies of the Daily Mail newspaper?

I found that MailOnline does not reflect Daily Mail 's values and ideologies since they both share quite different stories. MailOnline uses a lot of click bait and has many celebrity stories and tricks to help the audience. While the Daily Mail would cover a Brexit story, you'd fight in the MailOnline  you would struggle to find a political story.

5) Think about audience appeal and gratifications: why is MailOnline the most-read English language newspaper website in the world? How does it keep you on the site?

MailOnline is one of the most visited journal websites with a lot of clickbait content. The fact that it has endless scrolling with countless stories and pictures that easily capture and force the audience to click on it. All these factors contribute to how MailOnline generates clicks and how it became the most visited UK newspaper website. 

Guardian column: So Daily Mail and Mail Online are ‘totally separate’? It depends how you look at it by Peter Preston

Read this Guardian column by Media veteran Peter Preston on a row between the Guardian and the Mail over the controversial MailOnline (ex-) columnist Katie Hopkins. Answer the following questions:

1) Why does Preston suggest that the Daily Mail and MailOnline should be considered to be basically the same publication?

He exclaims that "If one day the earth closes over the print version, there will be no Daily Mail as we know it left. Success today – and disappearance tomorrow? Transition factor: zero." What Preston is suggesting is that when the decline of print media eventually leads to no more newspapers, the Daily Mail will simply transfer to Mail Online. 

2) How does Preston summarise other newspaper websites?

"The Sun’s website is pure Bun. The Mirror’s is a sprightly extrapolation of the print version.

3) How many readers does the online-only Independent now boast?
31.1 million UK readers a month: 
9.1 million print, 
7.7 million on PC 
22.7 million via mobile

4) Do you feel the Daily Mail and MailOnline have a different ‘world view’?

I believe that both these sources provide audiences with generally the same worldview but the mail online potentially talks about soft news more and stories to do with celebrities

5) Do you see a future for the paper version of the Daily Mail or will it eventually close like the Independent?

I believe that daily mail has a future that is better than the independent as it is the second highest newspaper read in the UK and many people do follow it. This means that it will not close as it allows audiences to comment as it uses controversial headlines and opinion columns on the website Even though it has a falling circulation, which is a serious concern. 

Media Magazine MM55: Media, Publics, Protest and Power

Media Magazine 55 has an excellent feature on power and the media. Go to our Media Magazine archive, click on MM55 and scroll to page 38 to read the article Media, Publics, Protest and Power', a summary of Media academic Natalie Fenton’s talk to the Media Magazine conference in 2015. Answer the following questions:

1) What are the three overlapping fields that have an influence on the relationship between media and democracy?

The political field 
The economic field
The journalistic field

2) What is ‘churnalism’ and does MailOnline provide examples of this kind of news gathering?

Churnalism is a pejorative term for a form of journalism in which press releases, stories provided by news agencies, and other forms of pre-packaged material, instead of reported news, are used to create articles in newspapers and other news media.

3) Fenton argues that news should serve the public and help democracy. Does MailOnline do this?

The daily mail does do this to a large extent as it publishes stories that are accessible and what audiences would actually like

4) What is infotainment? Is MailOnline guilty of relying on this kind of content?

This is the type of content which has the element of surveillance to provide audiences but is also for entertainment purposes so that consumers interests can be maintained.

5) Has the internet empowered audiences or is it still dominated by the major media conglomerates? How does MailOnline fit into this?#

It is still dominated by the major media conglomerates as there is pressure on news organisations to produce even more profit than before. The corporate media are profit led and not obliged to fund unprofitable news. This has overtaken journalism and local news.

Factsheet 182 - Case Study: The Daily Mail (Part 3) Industrial Context

Finally, read Media Factsheet 182: Case Study: The Daily Mail (Part 3) Industrial Context and complete the following questions/tasks. Our Media Factsheet archive is on the Media Shared drive: M:\Resources\A Level\Media Factsheets

1) What do Curran and Seaton suggest regarding the newspaper industry and society?

The newspaper industry is believed to say to reflect desires and interests of readers to maintain its readership and they suggest that the mass media and newspaper industry should have a liberal ideology because newspapers are wielded as propaganda tools to have an influence on individuals.

2) Curran and Seaton acknowledge that media ownership in the UK is dominated by what kind of company?

Dominated by powerful individuals who own nearly 51% of the market in newspapers. An example of this is Rupert Murdoch.

3) What does the factsheet suggest regarding newspaper ownership and influence over society?

Owners of newspapers can influence their newspapers with their ideologies and beliefs. An example given is Rupert Murdoch who wanted a war with Iran, his 175 newspapers supported his belief in their articles.

4) Why did the Daily Mail invest heavily in developing MailOnline in the 2000s?

The Daily Mail invested heavily into the MailOnline as they were aware of the growing interest in digital content. Newspapers were seen to have less readership over time and revenues were decreasing, because of this they invested into the MailOnline where they believe the future of the company is.

5) How does MailOnline reflect the idea of newspapers ‘as conversation’?

The reflection of conversation in a newspaper is believed to be direct and immediate making it seem like a conversation building a relationship with the editor and reader.

6) How many stories and pictures are published on MailOnline?

1000 stories and 10000 pictures.
7) How does original MailOnline editor Martin Clarke explain the success of the website?

“The reason MailOnline has become a success is because we cover the waterfront. It’s all the news you need to know, all the news you wanna know. The big stories. The lighter stories. The completely amazing stories"

8) What does it mean when it says readers are in control of digital content?

This means that the audience are in control of what media they choose to consume and what articles appeal to them. This is why clickbait has a massive influence on people as people are more likely to read a news story which has little relevance then to an important topic such as Brexit.

9) How is the priority for stories on the homepage established on MailOnline?

The audience control what is on the homepage of the MailOnline. Which ever story has the most amount of clicks is put onto the front page of the MailOnline.

10) What is your view of ‘clicks’ driving the news agenda? Should we be worried that readers are now ‘in control of digital content’?

I think clicks is a bad way of deciding which news stories should go on the homepage. This can lead to the homepage being covered with useless articles about celebrities rather then covering important topics which may actually effect the audience directly.