1: Introduction

CCBY

This is an open educational resource (OER) digital textbook published under a CCBY license, which means it is free for anyone with access to use in whole or in part, with minor exceptions. Some portions of this text, though, are remixed from an OER with a stricter use license. Those specific sections are indicated in the text. Please honor the original author's wishes and do not repurpose those sections for commercial use.

In basic terms, what the CCBY license indicates is that educators, students, and other interested parties may download, deconstruct, rebuild, amend, and/or remediate this text to their heart’s content. The only stipulation is that attribution must always be provided when this text is shared in whole or in part. You can follow the link to find out more about the CC BY 4.0 DEED.

This text is itself a media product and only exists because of the work of professional instructors, professors, librarians, instructional designers, editors, and more at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville.

The previously published OER text that some sections of this book are based on is called Writing for Strategic Communication Industries by Jasmine Roberts. Any content in this text based on sections from Ms. Roberts' book is clearly labeled.

To reiterate: If any author builds on The OER Guide to Media Writing, they must provide attribution for Ms. Roberts, M.A., Mark Poepsel, Ph.D., and Mitchell Haas, MSLIS.

Images

Images used in this text either come from image sharing platforms with expressly written open copyright policies, such as Unsplash, or they have been published with their own CCBY licenses, or they were developed for this text and are included under its CCBY license.

Thus, this text includes remixed OER content that has been edited and updated as well as original work made possible through the generosity of the State of Illinois. The OER movement has as its goal to make education as free as possible for anyone. This text is published in that spirit. Whether you are reading this textbook online, downloading it to read on a device, printing it to read on paper, or uploading it to your brain Matrix-style, it is hoped that this text is of use to you.

Suggestions for improving The OER Guide to Media Writing should be sent to the corresponding author, Mark Poepsel at mpoepse@siue.edu.

Content

This text consists of thirteen chapters: 

1. Introduction, which includes the section you are reading and the first "Art of Clarity" writing exercise;

2. Accuracy in Media, which defines misinformation and disinformation and discusses how and why to avoid them;

3. Information Gathering and Interviewing, which covers researching and reporting techniques including searching for web resources, gathering useful data, and interviewing;

4. Writing Straight News for Digital and Print Media, which defines the news industry and news values in contemporary terms and covers how to apply classic story structures in ways that are relevant to today's media;

5. AP Style Essentials, which is a brief chapter focusing on key AP style elements that arise most often in newswriting and in writing news releases and other content for news audiences;

6. Writing Feature News, which covers researching and writing soft news stories with a focus on some of the most common story structures;

7. Writing for Audiovisual Media, which covers understanding the unique role of the "medium formerly known as broadcast," learning how to write for the ear, formatting basic audio and video scripts, and recognizing the power of podcasting;

8. Writing for the Public Relations Industry, which covers essential context about the history and role of public relations in societies, a brief discussion about key writing tasks in PR, and examples and exercises covering basic PR writing techniques;

9. Writing for the Advertising Industry, which briefly covers the history of advertising as a field, a section clarifying the difference between advertising and marketing, a brief discussion of key copywriting tasks as well as examples and exercises;

10. Writing for Social Media, which covers how professional media organizations might wish to approach publishing content on social networking platforms, a section on best practices writing for social media, and social media examples and exercises;

11. Building Audiences through Engagement, which covers what audience building is, how it differs from media gatekeeping, how digital media producers build networks, and strategies for audience building, including using demographics, psychographics, and basic audience analytics to develop content strategies;

12. Creating a Media Portfolio, which is a brief how-to guiding students in setting up a portfolio website to showcase their best work and to represent their personal brand to the media world; and,

13. Basic Law & Ethics of Media Writing, which includes an introductory-level discussion of key legal and ethical terms from the media industry as well as a few media ethics case studies taken from the Society of Professional Journalists Ethics Case Studies website.

Those of us who have worked to write, remix, lay out, copy edit and check this text for copyright and accessibility standards hope it serves you well, be you professor, instructor, or student.