OK, so why is weather news?

[ColbertNation]

I thought of jacking Inky's thread, but decided against it.

At least once a week, our paper will run a weather story as a 1A centerpiece (that's an average -- some weeks, we might not have any; some weeks we'll run 2 or 3). Why? Is it because it makes for good art? I hesitate to bring this to the bosses' attention, but there's weather every day. And folks are more likely to see the weather when they pick up their paper before they read about it on the front page.
We had a story that was about 2 months in the making get bumped to Page 10 last week because there were thunderstorms that night (no power outages or major accidents; just lots of thunder, lightning and downpours).
Shouldn't a weather story, especially a prominent one, be reserved for a major event (i.e. blizzard, flooding, heatwave, ice storm)? As with everything, if you play up all of them, none of them seems very important.

 

[OTD]

Weather stories were very popular with the bosses of one of my first stops. The reason was that they don't offend anyone. No one cancels their paper because you put a thunderstorm on the cover.

 

[RickStain]

People like it, and it's one of the few truly common experiences a community has left.

 

[WriteThinking]

Don't know that a significant story months in the works should have been bumped in favor of a weather story that didn't sound that momentous.

That said, weather is a huge, if sometimes taken-for-granted, part of life.

The everyday-ness, and yet, the pervasiveness of it, as well as the range and breadth of its effects on the day-to-day life of everyone, makes the weather not only a legitimate chit-chat subject, topic of conversation, and news topic. Even on routine days.

It's a significant part of why people often make major moves from one area of the country to another, for example.

And, it's why newspapers always hear about it from readers if/when the weather map or page is ever omitted or significantly altered.

The weather page might seem to be the most disposable, least-read thing in the paper. But readers always miss it and complain if it's not there.

 

[YGBFKM]

In certain areas (Florida), weather is life and death. Can't ignore that.

 

[Football_Bat]

Weather is an easy local story. Has been for the last 150 years.

 

[DanOregon]

"How about yesterday's weather reports? For the people that were too drunk and slept all day?
"Why don't you try taking that to the San Francisco Chronicle. They could use it."

 

[sportsguydave]

There are times when the weather is the news.. (a blizzard that shuts down the city, for example, or a tornado or damaging T-storm).

A garden-variety storm with no damage should never be a story though.

 

[sportsguydave]

"How about yesterday's weather reports? For the people that were too drunk and slept all day?
"Why don't you try taking that to the San Francisco Chronicle. They could use it."

Have to love an "All The President's Men" reference.

Solid.

 

[gutenberg]

People like it, and it's one of the few truly common experiences a community has left.

RickStain knows what he is talking about.

Haven't any of you scored a women's phone number with a conversation that started with 'Damn, it's hot' or 'Brrrrr, it's cold outside' or 'can't believe another hurricane is headed our way' or 'Mt. Helens is about to erupt! What do we do?'

If not, you homebodies need to try those lines. They work every time on the average to chubby girls.

 

[Hank_Scorpio]

There are times when the weather is the news.. (a blizzard that shuts down the city, for example, or a tornado or damaging T-storm).

A garden-variety storm with no damage should never be a story though.

If you have a cool place to take a lightning photo from, with a nice background/foreground, it can be an ok standalone.

But yea, a weather story with no damage is horrible, especially if it knocks an in-depth story to page 10.


Colbert, why didn't they just hold the two-month, in-depth story til the next day?

 

[kingcreole]

One of the first things my reporting prof taught us was this: When writing a story, you need to ask yourself: Who cares?

I think almost everyone cares about the weather.

 

[2underpar]

we have weekly weather stories also.
usually, our weather guy talks to farmers, who say "we've had too much rain" followed next week, by " we need more rain."
occasionally, someone will say, "it's too hot," followed next by "Man, it's cold."
scintillating stuff, and readers love it.

 

[Den1983]

Weather is an easy local story. Has been for the last 150 years.

Yup. Readers generally like to know trends or other stuff regarding weather, especially if they're in the midst of so many consecutive days at 100+ degrees.

 

[TheMethod]

Watching my local TV stations, I sometimes wonder why they don't just devote the entire broadcast to the weather. Seems like they're dying to do that, anyway. And heaven knows it's the only reporting of any depth and nuance they do.

 

[RickStain]

Watching my local TV stations, I sometimes wonder why they don't just devote the entire broadcast to the weather. Seems like they're dying to do that, anyway. And heaven knows it's the only reporting of any depth and nuance they do.

They do it with good reason: people eat it up

 

[ColbertNation]

There are times when the weather is the news.. (a blizzard that shuts down the city, for example, or a tornado or damaging T-storm).

A garden-variety storm with no damage should never be a story though.

If you have a cool place to take a lightning photo from, with a nice background/foreground, it can be an ok standalone.

But yea, a weather story with no damage is horrible, especially if it knocks an in-depth story to page 10.


Colbert, why didn't they just hold the two-month, in-depth story til the next day?

One more day would've made it old news, actually. It was leading up to an event that happened that day, and basically, the gist of the weather story was, "It rained last night, but it won't affect any of today's festivities." I raised two points with this: 1. One look out the window that morning would've told you weather wasn't going to be a factor, and 2. OK, do the story, but make it a sidebar, not the centerpiece. What they essentially did was turn this two-month researched piece into the sidebar because weather happened. I'm not against all weather stories, but you can't (edit: shouldn't) re-budget the whole paper just because of a thunder storm.

 

[MileHigh]

We ran weather on our front page seemingly a lot.

And I always said -- it became a running joke, and everyone knew to bring it to my attention when it was out there -- that when we did put the weather out there, my saying was that it was basically the paper saying, throwing up its hands, "Really, we've got nothing else, so here's the weather." Same with sports (save championship game stuff).

Of course, that paper is now 6 feet under ...

 

[Second Thoughts]

My hometown paper still does the "It's hot" articles when it's July or August when it's supposed to be hot. Weather seems to get them jacked up.

 

[Mark2010]

yeah, weather effects everyone. If another Katrina is headed my way, I'd like to know soon enough to get out. Even a thunderstorm or heat wave can affect one's outdoor plans.

Think about it: turn on a sporting event that is played outdoors and within the first five minutes the commentators are talking about the weather, whether it's wind, rain, snow, whatever.

That said, yeah, if it's hum-drum story, not sure it has to be on the front. Guess it depends what else you got that day.