A Comparison between Fox, ABC and Google News in Reporting Current Events

It has been quite a while since I have gone online through various news websites for information and by going through Fox, ABC, and Google News, I was reminded why. The news, mostly, seemed to focus on negative situations, disasters, disease, and murder. All these news outlets seem to think Ebola is the most dangerous disease since the Black Death and there is no guarantee we can be safe. ABC News seems to have a more lighthearted approach to news, versus the other two, focusing on softer stories.

For example, the top story on ABC News is that of a South Korean fan coming to the United States to root for the Kansas City Royals in the World Series. What I can take away from these three news outlets is two primary results. Firstly, news gets out insanely fast and is potentially rushed, and secondly, the news focuses on negative aspects far more than positive ones.

As for the news getting out quickly, I visited ABC News at 5:10 PM, the stories were listed with timestamps, the first one, was from 5:08 PM: “Man in Shooting Spree Says Officers Are Bad Shots”.

That story was published two minutes before I got to the website, and the one before that was published ten minutes before I visited it.

It is important to get the news out as soon as possible because if Fox beats ABC to the story, consumers will turn to Fox first. The need to always be first is apparent with how extremely time-relevant the stories on the websites are.

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There is no doubt in my mind not a single story on the front page was published before today. This can lead one to also believe the news is rushed, because of the constant strain of the deadline people are under they may report facts that are not so accurate, or make faulty conclusions due to not having enough evidence.

The set up of Fox News is very flashy, more so than the other websites. There seems to be four main stories, and small links to the other, less meaningful stories, this layout is definitely making the top story feel like it is infinitely more important than the other stories. This website seems to target more middle-aged folk and has people worrying with murder, ISIS and Ebola.

Google News set up is much different that Fox News. Google has all the stories weighted equally, as far as size is concerned. The website is more bland, as there is a lot of black and white, maybe gearing it toward an older audience. The first story is large, but can be made smaller if you click on another story. Whatever the consumer values enough to select becomes the biggest story, and you can read more on it and visit external links. Google has the mass murder of seven women atop their website and again seems to focus on more of a dark side of news. The top three stories had to do with murder, rape and Apple sales increasing.

ABC News is different from the others in that it seems to offer more. It has a sideline based just around Ebola stories, and the wrest of the stories cycle through the center and can be found underneath. This website’s design is a bit more extravagant than the rest and is probably more geared toward younger adults. Certainly with all the colors and the large pictures it is more appealing to the eye than Google, and with its moving projection of pictures has kind of a television feel, putting it ahead of Fox News as well. This site’s top stories include Ebola, Obama and the upcoming election, and the scary ways online dating can go wrong.

Another point I took away today is the news corporations seem to aim more toward the negative. In the cases of Fox and Google the front two main points on both pages were that of “Indiana Police ID Sex Offender in Killing of 7 Women” and multiple stories about Ebola. ABC also had a section about Ebola, and the murder that murdered 7 that was atop the other two news pages was missing altogether. Most of the stories are geared toward nasty events and I struggle to find any about encouraging stories.

A consumer of these news stations I would see Ebola as the most important idea, everything else seems less significant due to the way Ebola is portrayed, with the big headline and much larger size compared to all the other news stories. As far as agenda setting is concerned: my agenda has been set to care about Ebola the most, a murder caught who is suspected of at least 7 murders second most. I can tell the news is extremely current, and extremely negative.