Speed v. Depth. The great debate.

I was watching BBC News 24 on Saturday when the news broke that a US Congresswoman had been shot in the head at point blank range. Initial reports were coming in that she had been killed along with several others. Then in came the rumours that she was perhaps in surgery. And then it was confirmed that she had in fact survived the horrific ordeal.

Speed v. Depth: the highs and lows of a 24 hour news channel. The above example isn’t uncommon – for a news agency to break a story first, facts can’t be taken as gospel in the opening moments of such an event as the actualities slowly unravel and reveal themselves. And I’m definitely not saying that this is a bad thing; we’re now in a culture where news is absolutely everywhere at every time of day. I can wake up in the middle of the night, switch on my BlackBerry and bam! there’s my news. People inhale it, headlines are skimmed, banners at the bottom of the screen tell you all you need to know and the ingestion of the news I’m sure can lead more to indigestion than anything else – information overload. Or underload. They might even amount to the same thing.  Because ‘news’ is all around us all the time in a plethora of different media. It is in bitesize form and has a turnover rate that’ll make your head spin.

Queue audio slideshows.

And this is where depth comes in. Because once you’ve heard the headlines and seen the banner you can stop. And sit. And watch. And enjoy.

Slideshows allow you the depth that 24 hour news does not. They afford stories of particularly emotive significance the time to develop organically. The subject is portrayed in a different light entirely to the blaring neon haze attached to BREAKING NEWS. The words are said with conviction, and the pictures are chosen with time and consideration. They are not library pictures, and they are not words barked down an earpiece from the gallery.

Take this example by the Guardian on former child soldiers in Southern Sudan. While your radio or your television or your newspaper will be telling you details relating to the current referendum on independence, online you can learn a more intimate account of what it is like to live in the region.  Humanity is attached to news; news is not detached from humanity.

There is of course a time and a place for 24 hour news and a time and a place for audio slideshows. If an event of national importance broke I would want it there and then, regardless of whether the facts were 100 per cent accurate. But likewise, a story can be conveyed really quite beautifully with the slight retrospect afforded by slideshows. You might just have to wait a day or two for it.