I’ve written a news release only once so far in school… but I practically use them everyday- and I’ve never realized the importance of them until I read the news release chapter.
Working on a news station-- we don’t have to search too hard and deep to find stories, we get them sent to us -- so receiving press releases helps tremendously with assigning stories to reporters. News stations would waste so much time if there were no press releases, and in the newsroom, time is precious.
So I think this chapter on writing news releases is a huge help, because they are different than writing an actual news story, and I look forward to practicing writing them in class.
*Writing about speeches, news conferences, and meetings is a very difficult thing to do as well. The book tells you to prepare in advance as much as possible, and that is truly crucial to the writing process. On a personal note, when I went to a community meeting for my town once, I didn’t know what the meeting was about… so I got there, began taking notes, and realized that I had no idea what they were talking about! Instead of listening to what was going on, I had to keep asking others around me to fill me in on the subjects, I feel by doing this I missed tons of important information and good quotes from speakers. If only I had our news reporting book at the time to use as a reference on how to cover that meeting!
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haha, yes, we do use news releases a lot of the time. However, not all of the time.
Sometimes news releases are pointless and worthless. And sometimes it's easy to tell that. sometimes not.
That's why reporters are given stories with news releases, and can't find a story anywhere. It happens.
I would like to really learn how to write them though. Maybe if we did learn, I'd be able to tell which releases we get were duds--before having to waste a reporter's (or many reporters) time(s).
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