Assignment Directions:
Step 1: Choose Sites
First, you need to choose two sites to focus this analysis on. These should be two media outlets that you are interested in possibly writing your feature article for.
Step 2: Read Articles
Next, find and quickly read 2-5 articles on each site that you've chosen. The articles you read don't necessarily have to be labelled as "features" (they rarely if ever are), but doyour best to find the meatiest articles you can, the ones most like what you will be writing for your feature.
As you read, take note of the following:
1. How long is the average article at each site? You may have to copy and paste the text into Microsoft Word or Google Docs to get a rough word count.
2. What methods are used in the articles' production? Methods might include the following:
- Reporting (visiting the scene of the action, talking to eyewitnesses, etc.)
- Research (finding and reading scholarly or other textual sources)
- Experience or experimentation (eating at a restaurant, testing a product, etc.)
- Other methods
3. What tone do writers tend to adopt? Tone can be described as personal, familiar, formal, humorous, conversational, etc.
4. What angles are employed in the articles? An "angle" is a term used in journalism to describe the specific way a writer approaches a story. For example, when a new iPhone is released, one angle would be to focus on how the new version is different from the previous one. Another angle might emphasize the price, and another the supply chain that produced the phone. Still other angles could focus on how the phone relates to different demographics or audiences-urban or rural, young or old, male or female. The angle helps a writer take a general story ("something happened") and make it interesting and relevant as well as different from other stories on the same topic ("something happened, and here's what it means in terms of x").
Step 3: Analyze Formatting
Next, go back through those articles and consider how they use the formatting elements we read about for class this week.
Paragraphing: How long is the average paragraph in the articles you read? Think in terms of both number of sentences and number of words.
Headings: What levels of headings do the articles tend to use? How often do they use headings? What do the headings tend to include (single words, short phrases, entire sentences, questions, etc.)?
Text: Do the articles use bold, italics, underlining, colors or other formatting within the main text? What are these embellishments used for? Is there a consistent style to how they are used?
Hyperlinks: How are links styled within the main text? How do they behave when they are hovered over with the mouse pointer?
Lists: Do the articles use unordered (bulleted) or ordered (numbered) lists in a consistent way to improve readability?
Step 4: Report
Lastly, write an informal report that includes the following:
What sites you chose to analyze
What articles you read on the sites
Your findings from Step 2
Your findings from Step 3
Answers to the following questions:
- What kind of reading pattern do you think readers typically adopt when reading features on these sites?
- How have your ideas for a feature article topic changed as you've dug deeper into these sites?
- How could you tailor your feature article ideas to best fit at each of these sites?
- What questions do you still have after completing this assignment?