Module 6: Other Types of Media Writing
The style of reporting you use for TV and radio broadcasting and for the Internet are slightly different than the style used for newspapers and magazines.

1. Writing for radio and television
The news as spoken on television and radio faces a restriction the print reporter does not: the speaker has to breathe while telling the story. In general, then, the sentence in a radio or TV news report should be short enough to be read in one breath. Therefore, where a printed sentence might be 25-30 words, the TV/radio sentence is more like 15-20 words. Otherwise, the news speaker risks either breaking the story to breathe at an inconvenient point or gasping for breath.

Also, the listener to a news broadcast is in a different mind-set from the reader of the news. Listening is a more passive activity than reading, so the listener is less impatient to get on to the details – he/she is willing to listen to a few sentences before getting the Five W’s + H. The print reader may not be so patient and might want the important details first before he or she decides to continue with the “work” of reading.

The first sentence of a radio or TV news story is a headline, with the details coming later. Putting it another way: the lead sentence of a TV or radio story is general rather than specific – the opposite of what you would aim for in a print news story using the inverted-pyramid style.

Overall, as the CP Stylebook tells us, writing for radio and television news emphasizes “short, punchy words and simple sentence structure.”

Also, a radio and television news story is usually short — often less than a minute. That means that, for TV and radio, even a complex news story may have to be highly condensed into, say, three paragraphs.

The writing style for TV and radio is less formal than the print media. The spoken news reader is, in effect, having a one-sided conversation with the listener, and the style is, therefore, conversational.

Here are more of Canadian Press’s suggestions for writing for broadcast:

· Use the active voice whenever possible. People don’t usually speak in the passive voice in conversation. So, note in the example above that the print version of the car accident begins “Eunice McIntosh, 80, was struck …. etc.” which is in the passive voice, while the radio story uses active voice: “A car struck ….”

· Use the present tense whenever possible. The print version of the car accident story might say, “A police spokesman said the woman was crossing …. etc.” The broadcast version would likely say, “Police say the woman was crossing ….”

· Keep sentences to a single idea.

· Keep syntax simple; untangle complicated sentences and ideas. Print readers can always go back and puzzle out what is meant (although, if you have written the story well, they won’t have to). In broadcasting, they don’t have that luxury; once the words are spoken, they can’t be recovered (unless the broadcast is being taped, of course).

· Avoid jargon and unfamiliar words. The reading comprehension level for print journalism is Grade Seven; the comprehension level for broadcasting is Grade Three.

· Avoid unnecessary adjectives and adjectives; aim for an uncluttered, direct writing style.

Writing for the Media: Module 6