Chapter 17 & 18

    There are specific guidelines and organization techniques a writer should follow when writing a profile or an obituary. Profiles should not be in chronological order and should contain elements, such as the main focus, a theme, background, age and physical description when relevant, and visuals. Obituaries are profiles of people who passed away and focus on the importance of facts. While covering stories on speeches, meetings, and news conferences, your observations and scripted comments from the speaker are important parts of the story. Reporters should act as watchdogs for the public because meetings and conferences are where officials make decisions that affect the public.

    Writing for a profile, obituary, speech, meeting, or news conference requires a lot of the same writing techniques. It is important to research your topic for all of these styles of writing. Ask people that they often come in contact with the subject or find news clips or videos about the subject. This will prepare you to write a more accurate story and receive more information from the direct source if you already have some background knowledge. It is also important to do research after the speech, meeting, conference and relay the messages to your audience and state how they are impacted by it. These styles of writing are important because people do not want to sit through and listen to a whole speech or conference, and they might not have access to it. The summary of the main points that the writer comes up with may be all the majority of the public actually views. 

How does writing for a speech, news conference, and meeting differ? Is it the same style of writing for all three or are there specific techniques we should use when writing about one of them?

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