Morning News Meeting Coverage Mind Numbing (Media Review)

by Talk Business & Politics ([email protected]) 98 views 

We opened the May 12 issue of Fayetteville edition of The Morning News and saw that half of the front page was eaten up by meeting-advance stories.

We know this is a tradition with The Morning News on Mondays (the slowest of slow-news days), but we think it’s time the Springdale-based newspaper gave its readers a break. Put the meeting coverage inside, ESPECIALLY if it’s an article about what will be considered at a meeting that hasn’t even taken place yet. Yes, there are readers who want to know about upcoming meetings, but we don’t believe the advance stories justify a marquee spot on Page 1.

By contrast, on the same day, the front of the Northwest Arkansas section in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette (that newspaper’s equivalent of the front local page) consisted of five very newsy stories, including an interview with trucking mogul J.B. Hunt. None of the D-G stories on that page was about a meeting, and we managed to stay awake through the whole thing.