project 3 summer 2008

8/14/2019 Project 3 Summer 2008

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Evaluation f the Exponent

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news. Onlya few articles re devoted o local, tate or global ews espectively. n addition {,-

there are wo editorial rticles nd a student urvey. one of the articles s about a celebritif-and')..11'

\ r-- ' ' - , -4leight are about sports . There are small areas devoted o 5 differentpuzzles, oroscopes,

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"f ,, .*frdatherorecast, nda comic trip.The lassified ection overs ousingo ob opportunities). iJ .

. , , ' , '" to personal ds. The volume s ndexed, abeled nd dated suIicj"g-n-tJy..andeadings re arge,

bold and clear. The appearance nd presentation f the paper s professional nd on par with

larger,more enown newsPaPers.t

The most ntuitiveway o evaluate he Exponent s o compare t to another imilar

newspaper. he Journal {l!_egqlel s Lafayette's ain ocal aper, ndso t should over

some imilar ews.Though t is arger han he EIggEqt n erms f unding,t ismuch maller

than major ewspapersike he \gylgjllites, so t willsufficen our comparison. isually,

the Journal ndCourier, r JQC, s morepleasinghan he Exponent. hedesign s more

detailed nd he pictures re more colorful nd clear. Whereas he Exponent eatqre{color

onlyon the front page, he J.,Q-c-ncludes olor mages hroughou:,:T:jo"t. The J&C s 24 t)

pages ong; wice he size of the ExgoleJt. These/discr*,"rJ;';fi;expected because f the

budget difference he two papers hare. The JSC-s broken up nto sections or national nd

world news, ocalnews, ports, nd classifieds, ith about he same number of pages evoted

to each. While he Exponent ad disBroportionately ore arti!*es ocusing n Purdue ews as

well as national ews, he J&Cwas significantly etterproportioned.

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articles n the Exponent ere about Purdue, nlyone article n the J&C oncerned he

university. he J&Carticlewas about Purdue's udget nd spending. Most of the Exponent

articles oncerning urduewere about ndividual tudents nd heir stories n school r in he

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realworld. Thisexposes discretion ri he perspectives f the two newspapers. While he J&C

is concerned bout Purdue s a member of the economic ommunity, he Exponent s more

concerned ith the ives nd he image f the students. The most pressing ssue o the

majority f the country urrently s he war on terror. In a time when war reports re outine,

the Exponent ails o deliver n the ssue. The J&C eports hat over he weekend ine soldiers

died n Afghanistan swell as 24 civilians, f which he Exponentmakes o mention. This

discrepancy eflects a d!_fferg_n9en the inte_q9_9tf,_s!_u{gl!t19J|'-"-se[9t9!p_9PUp_tiqn

regarding urrent events._.nterestinglyhe one article he two papers haredwas an obscure

story about an sraeli ifeguard iscovering n ancient alisman. Finally ne major difference

betweenthetwopapersis theamountof pacedevotedtoadvert isements . quarterofthe

J&C's ages ere covered n advertisements hilea half of the Exponent 's ages ere ads. '- , ' i- ' f t\ .J*,1Though he Exponent as much more ad space, t charges ess or the ad space nd so t has o '")",: .e'

// ,'se l lmorespacetomakeenoughtorunthepaper. heExponentcharges400dollarsforaful l :

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page n ullcolor, hile he J&C harges 000 ollarsor he same. &C anafford o charge o r. .

muchfor i tsspacebecausethepaper isseenbymanymorepeople ,andsothespaceismuch, , ; , t r i ,; ,f l

more valuable. On he other hand, he J&Chas many more articles bout echnology, sually n

the form of information bout personal adgets. One can't help but suspect hat hese articles

1r '1,*rtir^ ' \are nfluenced y he funds of vendors. n his respect would say he Exponent s reer rom

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,' ,' "ldvertisers nfluence. Most of the advertisements n he Exponentre or apartments r other

items of interest o students. These re useful orms of notification or students nd heir

functionality utweighs heir nconvenience. he advertisements n the J&C are more andomly

themed and n general ess seful.


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Accordingo Rachel avis Mersey, n mportant method or evaluating newspaper s

"to understand eader erception f credibili tyn he [newspaper]. . .3The newspaper's

success n he eyes of Purdue tudents s evident n the statistics rovided y Newton

Marketing & Research. hey state hat 90 % of Purdue tudents ead he !ry9rl.gll-and17,500

papers re ead dailyby 46,000 tudents, aculty nd staff.a he numbers uggest he Exponent

is well received y he populace. n nterviewing student found a different pinion. Sam

Fowler s a unior at Purdue; e went o CarmelHighSchool nd was a photographer or the

school ewspaper alled The Hilite." hisnewspaper as been anked ationally, nd Fowler

considers imself n expert. When asked bout he Exponent e said he Exponent as good

for Purdue ews,"but crit icized he writing or being poor and he photographs or being

poorly aken and out of focus. On one occasion amhad been nterviewed y he Exponent

and misquoted n an article. Accordingo him he reporter nterviewed imover he phone

and asked im a series f questions. hen n the article ome of his ater esponses re aken

out of context o make he article low. This s a content misinterpretation rror,as opposed o

a typographical rror,or worse a misinformation. he Exponent as printed ypographical jI

errors but hese are orgivable. Misquoting owlerwas an error n nterpreting he meaning f

Ithe speaker 's ords, which s more serious. uteven more serious re errors n which

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newspaper rints ncorrect nformation. he Exponent as printed ncorrect nformation few

times every ear, and has had o correct nd apologize n subsequent ssues. Correction otices

were printed n the April5thand November th ssues f 2007. One of the most amous

misprints n the Exponents ccurred n June L4,2006 nd eads s ollows, Alito.. .His otive

for shooting ohn Paul n the abdomen n May L3,1981, emains nclear."S he words were

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writ tenabout Supreme ourtnominee amuel l i to ,and one can onlyassume ope ohnPaul

ll , and are completely bsurd. The April5th rrorwas a mistaken ast name, and he November

7therror was ncorrect nformation bout a footballplayer 's ollege eam. All hese errors

tdiminishhe credibilityf he Exponent.

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project 3 summer 2008

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