News organizations show varying emphasis with a fairly tight playlist

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There weren’t that many different news stories on the radar screens of the five media monitored by the Project for Excellence in Journalism during the week of 8/23-29/10. The 2010 elections prevailed as the #1 story out of a mixed bag of competition.


Cable and radio outlets propelled the elections to the top spot. Newspaper picked the economy, while online and network TV outlets focused on the five-year anniversary of Hurricane Katrina.

There were not that many stories under the radar, showing up on just one or two media top ten lists. A very unusual inclusion there, however, was coverage of the Glenn Beck rally, which got 2% of one medium newshole and 3% of three others, yet still failed to find a slot on the overall top ten list.

Network television had a pair of odd items on its list – it’s not that they alone covered the stories, but that they alone gave double-digit coverage to the egg recall and the tale of trapped Chilean miners.

Story Overall Newspaper Online NetTV CATV Radio
2010 elections 14% 9% 13% 8% 24% 16%
Katrina anniversary 11% 5% 15% 13% 12% 8%
Economy 9% 14% 6% 9% 7% 6%
NY mosque controversy 6% x 2% 4% 14% 9%
Egg recall 4% 3% x 10% 4% 4%
Trapped Chilean miners 4% x 5% 11% 2% x
Obama administration 3% 2% x x 3% x
Events in Iraq 3% 6% x 4% x x
Afghanistan 3% 6% 3% x 2% x
Tea Party movement 3% x 7% x 2% x
Education system x 5% x 4% x x
Stem cells x 3% 3% x x 3%
Pakistan x 2% x 6% x x
Oil spill x x 7% x x x
Glenn Beck rally x x 3% 2% 3% 3%
Talk show host wars x x x x x 3%
Same-sex marriage x x x x x 2%
Source: Project for Excellence in Journalism