News Sites Not Reflective of Newspapers

We all know that more and more people are beginning to get their news from online sources, and slowly but surely, actual printed newspapers are becoming extinct. However, something that has really caught my eye lately is the manner in which the different organizations present their news.

I was always under the impression that the home page for any news organization was supposed to be similar to the front page of a printed newspaper. The stories with the most prominence are the first things you see, and then smaller, local stories ensue after, with numerous advertisements arranged in columns on the left and right sides of the page. However, with comparing the Atlanta-Journal Constitution to the Chicago Sun-Times, I noticed subtle but large differences between the two.

For example, there was a recent plane crash in northern N.Y. that claimed the lives of 50 people. To me, personally, I feel this to be quite a newsworthy event. Apparently, the AJC agrees with me, as they make it the central story on their home page, complete with blurb and a link to the main story. However, on the Sun-Times’ home page, the story is available via a small link, under Chicago car show ads and stories, as well as stories about the 2016 Olympics. I find this to be moderately strange considering that the plane crash is a quite significant event in lieu of the Hudson crash. It also is strange to me that Atlanta puts more emphasis on the story than Chicago, which is closer and a larger city. The mere fact that the auto show takes more prominence than a more newsworthy event just reflects people’s lack of judgment when putting together news websites.

I feel that news web sites should organize their stories and other material as though it was the front page of a printed newspaper. These sites should be just as professional as any paper, regardless of what they can catch readers’ attention with.