Four years after being jailed in Italy for the murder of her roommate, Amanda Knox is now free. While the verdict may have been a surprise, the timing was not. The appeals ruling was announced around 3:50 p.m. ET, and journalists had known it was coming since at least 2:30 ET. So, how prepared were they for it? Broadcasters were standing by, reported TVNewser.
Online, broadcast news websites used tickers to announce the verdict, and were likely to highlight streaming video of their coverage. Photo choice and headline size varied, conveying the story’s emotional impact differently. (The images below were captured between 4 p.m. and 4:20 p.m. ET Monday.)
- Knox was born in Seattle and was a student at the University of Washington at the time of Meredith Kercher’s murder. The Seattle Times used a photo of Knox from AFP/Getty that made it appear as if she was behind bars.
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- The Huffington Post featured an older photo of Knox and a large — but short — headline to announce the verdict.
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- AOL, which owns The Huffington Post, used a standard-size headline with the same photo that was featured on several sites.
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- It was hard to find the Knox story on the Yahoo home page (It’s in a breaking news section about halfway down the image).
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- On the Yahoo News home page, the Knox verdict was the top story, and the ticker at the top also announced the ruling.
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- Several of the broadcast websites — including msnbc.com — used tickers across the top to announce the news.
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- CBS also had a ticker, along with an emotional photo of Knox.
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- CNN, too, had a ticker, and in a second top story featured its live coverage of the ruling.
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- Fox News used a ticker to promote its live video coverage of the verdict, and its bold headline and photo told the story.
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- Photo choices distinguished one home page from another; ABC used an image of Knox crying.
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- Initially, The New York Times had the Knox news only in a ticker above the top story.
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- Within a few minutes, the Times had an image of Knox and a headline topping the home page.
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