The Paradise Papers story coverage

                                       

• Write up a description of the main differences between the two front pages from The Guardian and The Daily Mail, looking at both conventions and how the stories have been presented to the reader.

The Daily Mail used the past tense verb 'Dragged', suggesting that the Queen was involuntarily brought into the tax row, and is therefore a victim.This reflects their capitalists views and right wing ideology, so are therefore biased.

The Guardian however, uses the verb 'exploiting', which is negative language, making the Queen look like a perpetrator, as they are suggesting that her money is being invested so it is therefore her fault. This reflects their left wing ideology, incorporating some of their socialist ideas into he capitalist government that we have today.

The Daily Mail's audience are interested in soft news so take interest in lives of celebrities so will therefore be interested in the celebrity school girl Billie and her lifestyle. This is also linked with the ' party dress diet.' The plugs help their readers to find an interest in a story if they aren't interested in the Queens scandal, this is because their audience are interested in more softer news and social issues.

In contrast to this, The Guardian put the story on their whole front cover. This is because The Guardian's readers prefer softer news and are interested in economics, therefore they don't need plugs to gain interest of other areas of their audience as they will mostly be interested in the scandal.

• Write a paragraph outlining why you think the Guardian created a series of news articles looking at the same issue and how that may reflect the newspapers political ideology and news values.

The Guardian spent a number of days publishing a series of articles focusing on the 'Paradise papers' story. This is because the Guardians readership would be interested in the story and therefore by publishing the story several time as allows the audience to have a depth understanding of the story. They are providing interesting articles for their  educated  audience, therefore money and investments would be more relatable to them than the people who read the Daily Mail.  The yellow colour linked all of the covers together and highlighted and emphasize the story.

• Look at the Mirror. The Daily Telegraph, Daily Express and the Independent online newspaper and consider what you learn about these two publications from their versions of the story and the front page conventions.

The Daily Express and The Daily Mirror have also included plugs on their front cover, similar to the Daily Mail. This is because their audience aren't as interested in news headlines focusing on the economic scandal,so therefore use plugs which focus on other areas of news to entertain their audience that do not engage with the story. Contrasting this, the Daily Telegraph and The Guardian have focused their front covers only on the Paradise papers story. This is because their readers prefer harder news and will be interested in the story so therefore don't need to attract their `audience by introducing plugs on their front cover.

Most of the other newspapers don't really show any bias towards the story through the headline, whilst The Guardian and The Daily Mail show their strong right and left wing ideologies through the headline that they gave the stories due to the verbs used to describe the scenario. The other newspapers tend to be less influenced by their political stance, by using non-bias headlines not favoring a side, therefore people may be more likely to read the articles from these non biased newspaper headlines, as they will not be subject to having their opinions changed through the cultivation theory.

• Look at the online versions of these stories via Mail Online and The Guardian website. Compare and contrast their coverage. Use the sites to find out as much as you can about the story, so you fully understand it. What other media elements do the two websites provide readers (e.g.: audio or video clips, hyperlinks to other sites or connected stories).

The Guardian have a page on their website dedicated to all the paradise papers stories. whereas, the Mail Online, the paradise papers stories were located in different areas on their website. On an online article of the Daily Mail, a video telling the story appears. this is so that the story can be told through other way than text, and is sometimes easier to gather the story via watch a video. There are also images to make the story seem more interesting to the readers. On the Guardians articles, there were lots more text than the Daily Mail. This is because the story is told in more depth as the readers are interested in it so want to find out all about the scandal.

The Guardian continues using the colour yellow theme running through the articles about the Paradise papers, which makes them easy to recognize.

• Look at social media sites and explain how you think they encourage readers to interact with the story.