TRUST INDICATIORS
The news articles published by the news outlet azfreenews cover a range of political, educational, and communal news topics with perspectives from both parties, but lacks a culturally diverse representation. Articles written by Terry Jo Neff and Corinne Murdock, equally represent perspectives of both political parties without a biased tone. Murdock demonstrates her neutral perspectives by sharing articles discussing the factual information in politics whether it is in favor of the president or not. I read on the website that investigative work by Corinne Murdock had been featured on The Rush Limbaugh Show, which happens to be a conservative talk show radio, which gives her credibility in speaking on politics. Lastly, Eric Porteous contributes to the audience of sports and finance according to his , portfolio. With the combination of these three individuals, there are still many audiences not being attended to. By diversifying the team and adding more individuals that can provide insight on topics that could develop stories that would inform left-out groups such as minorities and people living in lower income areas.
AZFREENEWS.COM:
6/8 Trust indicators:
Diverse Voices
Journalist info
References
Local
Actionable Feedback
Best Practices
The team in charge consists of 3 individuals who all have all lived in Arizona for most of their lives, so this can give them some credibility due to their years of experience living in the state they are reporting on. In contrary, when reading about the team on AZfreenews I noticed a lack of credibility and relevant expertise among the staff collectively. For example, the description provided for the managing editor, Eric Porteous, informs us of his experience with leading mission trips, running a marathon, and mentoring young kids. This information may imply that he is a good Samaritan, but there is lack of relevancy to how this contributes to his credibility in professional journalism. In fact, his website is strictly about financial coaching and fails to include any information relative to experience in journalism or communication.
There is open communication and feedback available for the audience due to the social sharing of the stories on platforms such as the AZFreeNews Twitter and Facebook. This helps create an outlet for feedback and insight from the audience, allowing them to communicate and assess questions and concerns to the news outlet.
Values of authenticity and transparency are expressed in the mission statement by providing their company’s foundation being to combat misinformation and provide quality news. This landing page helps reassure the audience by ensuring they are doing this voluntarily for the community, and not for profit.
There is a section on the website that displays the opinions of the Scottsdale audience in the newspaper called the valley voices. There is also a section available on the website for the viewers to share their feedback by submitting a letter. This allows a forum for open communication and feedback from the audience.
There is a lot of contribution from the people of Scottsdale directly, allowing the audience to hear feedback and research done within the community. This ensures the information is relevant to the people of Scottsdale.
The newspaper lacks diversity. If you look who the articles are about, it is primarily about individuals that are white. There should be more inclusion in terms of including information relative to people of color in Arizona.
The best practices concept is unclear on this news outlet. This website is a branch off of the daily independent, splitting up into extensions of the primary news outlet by different cities. There are also advertisements include all throughout this outlet, leaving room for misinformation for profitable purposes.
The articles are labeled with clear headings and subheadings, allowing the purpose of each article to be direct and informational. Many of the articles are relative to the city of Scottsdale because this is the specific news outlet for the city of Scottsdale, branching off from the state news from the daily independent.
Lastly, the journalist info is not included on the site which creates a lack of credibility or trust. When going through the articles, there is no reference to who is behind the development of the article. With the lack of knowing who is writing the article, the credibility, intention, reliability, and trust is all unsure and unidentifiable.