Wikinews:News concepts

Concepts in news reporting deal with the interface between the news media and the outside world. Within the news organization there is structure, hierarchy and editorial process, based on some criteria. That criteria in commercial media is widely understood to be business interests; those with more money can claim more influence in the direction that their reportage may take.

The idea of open independent media presents the duality of inclusion of material and reports; since the pay is low, the medium is without hierarchy, and the organization itself is under no commercial obligations; the only obligations left are egalitarian: Honest, complete reportage, free from the constrains of commercial or yellow journalism. An open news project needs to remain free from imposed rules, it still requires structure to emphasise and direct the focus of its contributors.

Independent news presents the paradox of having multilingual reportage with an English-only format, which can be at odds with "good writing" in English. Good news writing is a concept that transcends origin language, and should be consistent across languages. Get to the facts: Who, What, When, Where, Why? Etc. (See Style)

Basics