Grade the News

Evaluating print and broadcast news in the San Francisco Bay Area from A to F.

What was the most important story to Bay Area, state editors?

The San Mercury News made the clearest choice, devoting 67% of front-page news space to the trial of Scott Peterson, the fertilizer salesman from Modesto accused of murder. The San Francisco Chronicle gave 42% to the same story. Some California papers found other events and issues more worthy of dominant play on the front page. The opening day of the Peterson trial failed to make the front page of the Los Angeles Times.

What do you think? Discuss it in The Coffeehouse.

A project of the School of Journalism and Mass Communications at San Jose State University, Grade the News is affiliated with the Graduate Program in Journalism at Stanford University and KTEH, public television in Silicon Valley.

Monitoring the Bay Area's most popular news media:

Knight Ridder

Hearst

Knight Ridder

KTVU, Oakland (FOX)

KRON, San Francisco

KPIX, San Francisco (CBS)

KGO, San Francisco (ABC)

KNTV, San Jose (NBC)

Bay Area media advocates:

Media Alliance

Center for the Integration and Improvement of Journalism at SFSU

Maynard Institute

Youth Media Council

Project Censored

New California Media

Society of Professional Journalists, Northern California chapter

National Writers Union Bay Area chapter

Site highlights

THE GROWTH OF FREE NEWSPAPERS

The three-part series follows the rise of three Bay Area handouts:
• Part 1: At free dailies, advertisers sometimes call the shots
• Part 2: Free daily papers: more local but often superficial
• Part 3: Free papers' growth threatens traditional news
• See also: SF Examiner and Independent agree to end payola restaurant reviews
• And: The free tabloid that wasn't: East Bay's aborted Daily Flash

FATE OF KNIGHT RIDDER NEWSPAPERS

Lou Alexander started a firestorm with his original guest commentary predicting the company would be sold. Several other experts on newspapers have weighed in:
• Newspapers can't cut their way back into Wall Street investors' hearts, by Stephen R. Lacy; Alexander responds
• Humbler profits won't encourage buyouts, by John Morton; Alexander responds
• Newspapers can't maintain monopoly profits because they've lost their monopolies, by Philip Meyer
• Knight Ridder in grave jeopardy, by Lou Alexander...

KQED-FM AUDIO PERSPECTIVES BY JOHN MCMANUS

• Leakers and plumbers: There's no difference between a good leak and a bad leak? Journalists need a shield law. 11/22/05
• Unintended consequences: How Craigslist and similar services are sucking revenue from faltering newspapers. 9/13/05
• Is CPB irrelevant? As Congress moves to cut public broadcasting funds, has CPB become obsolete in the modern marketplace. 6/26/05
• The paradox of news: There's more news available and its cheaper than ever before, but fewer young people are interested. 5/12/05

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