Perspective from the 19^th Hole is the title I chose for my personal blog, which is meant to give me an outlet for one of my favorite crafts – writing – plus to use an image from my favorite sport, golf.  Out of college, my first job was as a reporter for the Daily Astorian in Astoria, Oregon, and I went on from there to practice writing in all my professional positions, including as press secretary in Washington, D.C. for a Democrat Congressman from Oregon (Les AuCoin), as an Oregon state government manager in Salem and Portland, as press secretary for Oregon’s last Republican governor (Vic Atiyeh), and as a private sector lobbyist.  This blog also allows me to link another favorite pastime – politics and the art of developing public policy – to what I write.  I could have called this blog “Middle Ground,” for that is what I long for in both politics and golf.  The middle ground is often where the best public policy decisions lie.  And it is where you want to be on a golf course.

PEW Research asked the question that I used for this blog headline.  And it raised a long-ago memory for me.

What is news?

There is no pat or magic answer.

When I lived in Washington, D.C. to work for an Oregon congressman, I returned home on a weekend for a job interview at the Oregon Department of Human Resources in Salem, Oregon, which, at that time, included the Division of Corrections.  That title meant the state’s prison and parole system.

The director of that Division, Bob Watson, was part of the interview process and asked me a good question – “what is news.”

For me, it was a reminder back even farther when I worked as a reporter for the Daily Astorian newspaper in Astoria, Oregon.  There, I covered “news.”

When Bob asked me the question, I cannot remember how I answered.

But, today, what I would say is this:  News is what reporters and editors think it is.  Nothing more.

If a news editor for a newspaper or television station thinks something is news, they’ll cover it.  If they don’t, they won’t.

In the New York Times, several reporters told the PEW Research story, which started this way:

“Measuring people’s news habits and attitudes has long been a key part of Pew Research Center’s efforts to understand American society.  Surveys regularly ask Americans how closely they are following the news, where they get their news, and how much they trust the news they see.

“But as people are exposed to more information from more sources than ever before and lines blur between entertainment, commentary, and other types of content, these questions are not as straightforward as they once were.”

The Times story continues:

“Before the rise of digital and social media, researchers had long approached the question of what news is from the journalist perspective.  Ideas of news were often tied to the institution of journalism, and journalists defined news and determined what was newsworthy.

“News considered information produced and packaged within news organizations for a passive audience, with emphasis (particularly in the United States) placed on a particular tone, a set of values, and the idea of journalism playing a civic role in promoting an informed public.”

Now, according to the Times, the PEW analysis focuses on the basis of what an audience sees. Thus, the concept of news is not necessarily tied to professional journalism.  Audiences, rather than journalists, determine what is news.

PEW puts it this way:

“…the power to define news has largely shifted from media gatekeepers to the general public.  And discussions with everyday Americans confirm the idea that its definition varies greatly from person to person, with each bringing their own mindset and approach to navigating a dizzying information environment.

“These perceptions are consequential because news – regardless of what people consider it to be – remains a consistent part of most Americans’ lives today.  About three-quarters of U.S. adults say they follow the news at least some of the time, and 44 per cent say they intentionally seek out news extremely often or often.”

Here is a summary of key findings from PEW

• Defining news has become a personal, and personalized, experience.
• Most people agree that information must be factual, up to date and important to society to be considered news.
• “Hard news” stories about politics and war continue to be what people most clearly think of as news.
• There are also consistent views on what news is not.  (People make clear distinctions between news versus entertainment and news versus opinion.)
• At the same time, views of news as not being “biased” or “opinionated” can conflict with people’s actual behaviors and preferences.
• People don’t always like news, but they say they need it. 
• People’s emotions about news are at times tied to broader feelings of media distrust, or specific events going on at that time – perhaps in combination with individuals’ political identities.

So, for me, the definition of “news” remains a simple one.  It is what reporters and editors – as well as those who write for social media outlets, even ones they create — believe it is. 

And the result is that, unless we happen to have the skill or time to research issues ourselves, the news – call it information – we consume, affects how we look at society, including government.