Read or Listen? Print vs. Radio News

By BRANDON RYAN 

Picture this; you get in your car on a cold morning, start it up, and you hear an NPR host talking about the melting of the Alaskan ice sheet. You marvel over how effortless it is and feel a little better knowing you learned something,  but as soon as you get to work and join your coworkers who are huddled over a newspaper, you realize you have nothing to add to the conversation. You had forgotten most of what you had heard while you were aggressively honking at slow drivers in the fast lane. 

While radio interviews and podcasts are a great way to get information in a way that doesn’t require sitting down with a newspaper or squinting at a screen, they allow for lapses in attention. So while you’re folding that basket of laundry or driving to work, you miss things. In a newspaper, you reread a line or a section, but what about when you miss what someone said?

Radio presents a unique problem for hosts; how do I keep my audience interested without overwhelming them? Print news allows for more complex issues to be covered effectively without losing the reader. It also allows for a greater opportunity to expand on context and background information while having greater length to discuss news versus a limited period for radio news.

When a radio host discusses a topic, they are giving the most concise version of events, often leaving context out of the equation. Writing allows for the luxury of time, both on the part of the editor and the reader.

While print might offer the reader an opportunity to revisit, radio offers a more hands on experience. Hearing a radio interview allows for emotion, and it allows the listener to hear exactly what someone said. This can be especially useful in politics to hear a speaker’s tone, or in the case of NPR’s coverage of the Amazon fires, hear first hand accounts of an event from someone witnessing the devastation firsthand. 

In an NPR interview hosted by David Greene, listeners are given a firsthand account of the Amazon fires from the perspective of a reporter on the scene, Jake Spring. His experience in the field allows him to describe in his own words what he has been experiencing, in his own voice as well, perhaps more compelling than the alternative block quotes of a written news piece. Personability goes a long way in news, an area much easier to touch on in radio. 

An area in which a print news organization such as the New York Times shines is in the breadth of their coverage. In an article discussing the backlash Brazil is facing for its environmental policy, the New York Times provides more information in addition to supplementing with visual aids. The use of images in addition to text helps readers more fully understand a topic and creates a more comprehensive coverage strategy.

The benefits of print and radio coverage expand reporters ability to make it through to their audience. While one medium might not cater to your audience completely, the strategic use of both radio and print news creates an effective strategy to push information out to consumers, with each bringing their own unique advantages to the table. 

Sources:

Andreoni, M., L. Casado, E. Londoño. 2019 August 22. With Amazon Rainforest ablaze, brazil faces local backlash. The New York Times; Americas. 

David, G. 2019. In Brazil, tens of thousands of fires ravage Amazon Rainforest. <https://www.npr.org/2019/08/23/753642821/in-brazil-tens-of-thousands-of-fires-ravage-amazon-rainforest> Accessed August 23, 2019.

Dear, J., F. Scott. 2015. The responsible journalist: An introduction to news reporting and writing. Oxford University Press, New York, New York, U.S.