Essay on Newspaper for Students, Importance of Newspaper Essay

Essay on Newspaper for Students, Importance of Newspaper: Newspaper is a printed publication about current events, advertisement, articles of opinion, weather forecast and entertainment segment, which is distributed periodically. Newspaper covers different field including movies, business, politics, art, sports, local services review, Crosswords, puzzles, weather report, cartoon, astrology, interviews and advice column.

Newspapers are traditionally in printed form, but with advanced world and digitalization, digital newspaper is not a new thing now and is published and popular in general.

History of Newspaper (Newspaper Essay)

The use of bulletins carved in metal or stone, somewhat familiar to newspaper, was popular in Ancient Rome for government announcement. In China, government used News-shots. Printing press got its popularization in 17^th century. The first newspaper was published in 1929 in English in Amsterdam.

However, under the British Raj, on 29^th January, 1780, the first newspaper of India, “The Bengal Gazette” was published by James Augustus Hickey. Moreover, because of government control, unbiased and true journalism through newspaper can be started only in 1811 with the publication of Calcutta Chronical. Thereafter, the press gained it’s momentum and newspaper like The Hindu were initiated, which is in huge demand even nowadays.

Categories of Newspaper

Newspaper can be categorized under several specifications. The specifications are frequency, geographical scope and area of interest.

1. Frequency. The frequency of distribution of newspaper may be
   • Daily. Newspapers that are printed daily except national holidays. E.g. The Times of India.
   • Weekly. The print media which is published on a week only and are relatively smaller than daily newspaper.
   • Interim weekly. It includes semi-weekly, bi-weekly and tri-weekly newspaper.
2. Geographical scope. The newspaper which deals with the news and articles of a certain region and is distributed within the limit of geography specified.
   1. Regional. Regional or local newspaper of a city or town provides information and news of specified geography only.
   1. National. The national newspaper are those which are published and circulated throughout the nation.
   1. International. There is very small list of newspaper that can be named as international newspaper, however, they do exist and are circulated throughout the world with certain limitations.
3. Area of interest or subject matter. These are special type of newspaper and are different from general newspaper. As general newspaper covers all topics, these newspaper covers the topic of a single subject matter and laid emphasis on that only. E.g. sports newspaper, Business newspaper etc.

Criteria of a good newspaper

A newspaper needs to possess some features and the criteria may be summed up as below:

• Usefulness and Impact. The news, articles or the advertisement published in the newspaper should be useful to the readers and it’s impact must be positive and reasonable.

• Accuracy. The news published must not be vague, but accurate backed up with evidence.

• Timeliness. The old information is like information without value. So, the published article must be of recent activity and updated.

• Freedom of speech and way of expression. The print media has freedom of speech and can deliver news with independent opinions and ideas. However, the way of expression must be professional and opinions should not harm the interest of innocent.

• Proximity. Everyone is interested about national and international news, bit people are even interested and keen to know the news of surrounding atmosphere. Thus, a newspaper must contain regional news too.

• Circulation and advertisement. The printed newspaper with handful of important news in the press is of no use unless it is circulated among the masses. So, circulation and advertisement is a must criteria of a good newspaper.

Importance of Newspaper

Newspaper is an important link between a common man and events going on in his surroundings. It is a routine of many people to flip through the pages of newspaper early in the morning and go through the events happening in the world. It is absolutely a bridge between government and citizens too. Being readily available at affordable prices, the most traditional and popular media helps every section of society well informed.

Some of the significance however, can be summed up as under:

• Newspaper beings knowledge about day to day events and situation in the country.

• As news which are published are investigated beforehand, the citizens can rely on the authenticity of the news.

• Newspapers are available in regional language and it is distributed at economical rate, hence making it easier for every section of society to have access to knowledge and information irrespective of their financial status.

• Newspaper contains information on almost all topics and recent activities, this making the readers better at current affairs.

• Country’s economical condition can be accessed with the news contained in newspaper, which will help readers to plan their financial issues.

• The habit of reading only enhances the knowledge and vocabulary of readers, affecting their personality positively.

• Newspaper contains space for public opinions and editorial section, which helps in brain racking and enabling reader to judge the situation as per pros and cons.

• Newspaper includes Crossword, puzzles, cartoons and other entertainment cum knowledgeable sections, which helps in enhancement of mental abilities.

• Newspaper industry involves various manpower starting from collection of news to distribution of published newspaper, raising employment opportunities and contributing in the economy of the country.

Development of Online media and Impact

The development of 24-hours news channel and online availability of news cause a threat to the press industry. Since 1990, news channel were developing day by day, shifting the profit from print media to social media.

As online news are freely available, but newspaper involves finance contribution, many readers are aligning towards social media. The development and spread of internet minimises the habit of newspaper reading and thus passing a threat over newspaper business.

The news published in newspaper are a day old, and online news can be published on same day. This is also one of the drawbacks of the print media. In 2008-09 recession, profits of newspaper industry falls off and it become debatable topic whether online media will make print media obsolete or not. Since 2010, many newspaper started their online versions of newspaper too. In 2017, the percentage of people using social media get tremendously increased.

Even if newspaper has certain advantages, social media is making its place deliberately and conveniently in the market and the advantages of social media is truly surpassing the benefits of newspaper and print media because of it being convenientand free to access.

However, newspaper is obsolete in front of social media or not is still debatable topic to be endured.

Essay on Newspaper for Students, Importance of Newspaper

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