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Diversity of Journalisms. Proceedings of ECREA/CICOM Conference, Pamplona, 4-5 July 2011
Informative Genres
In this first group, attention is brought to the connections of video with news stories and
interactive graphics.
News story. Video was first attached to online text stories by juxtaposition, achieving
multimediality by publishing independent parts next to each other. Such modularity is
ideal for breaking news, as updates can be made easily; the downsides can be
redundance or incoherences between the text and the video. Video in online news may
be used to tell the whole story, or just to show the angle that is best suited to the video
form. For example, through raw footage or a soundbite. Short-lived, freshly gathered
video about national or world news is usually sourced from broadcast channels or
audiovisual news agencies. Breaking news became an early priority for online media in
order to differenciate websites from their print counterparts, and to increase pageviews
and the frequency of visits (Salaverría & Cores, 2005: 151). Short news stories are the
dominant genre in television news broadcasts and the services of audiovisual
agencies.
Interactive graphic. This media form excels in textual, iconic and sound integration
(Salaverría, 2004). The last word must be stressed, as it has proved to be an ongoing
challenge for online journalism to go further from putting media forms side by side.
What makes interactive graphics different from their print counterparts are interactivity -
in the form of buttons or other elements-, movement -emulating those that take place in
nature- and hypertext -understood as the addition of external links- (Valero, 2003: 563-
565). Flash containers, which will be discussed later on, enable journalists to integrate
the codes of video and infographics seemlessly for the user. Professionals have
highlighted for years the likelihood of video taking over some of the functions covered
by interactive infographics in the early 2000s, such as to explain or to show in detail
(Esteban, 2007).
Interpretative Genres
As opposed to breaking news, features allow for more production time, which makes a
difference in how video can be integrated in feature stories, reports, and profiles.
Feature story. The “hypermedia feature” or “special” (Larrondo, 2009) is the form in
which the context and detail of feature journalism can be conveyed online. Multimedia
containers, developed in Flash or solely in HTML, are a common way to confer sense
and unity to multi-part features in video. These programmes are sometimes published
periodically as a branded series with a leitmotif or purpose that will let users know what
to expect, and can be loosely or closely based on successful television reportage
formats.
Report. The journalist tells the story as witness, on site, from the place where the
action takes place. Mobile technology makes it possible to record and even edit video
clips on the go. Otherwise, audio reports can be recorded on the phone and later
moving images can be added to produce a package. When defining their style for
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