Housing prices are plunging, but we really should have seen it coming

Tuan's short analysis for Assignment 1

I have chosen an article from the ABC News Online website entitled: “Housing prices are plunging, but we really should have seen it coming”. It can be seen here: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-12-10/how-low-can-stocks-and-property-go/10598708.

The article aims to analyse the current Australian housing market by comparing it to other regional and global markets. The author primarily uses plain text to express their analysis, whilst supporting their points using a series of infographics and supplementary links to relevant ABC News articles. The author’s points are easy to read because he uses a combination of short paragraphs and subheadings to break up the text.

The article isn’t very short, so the author has placed a two-minute video at the top of the article as an intended summary of the article’s content. Auto-play is disabled and the video size isn’t too large, so the reader isn’t entirely discouraged from reading the main content in the article.

The article also links to another feature piece entitled “House of Cards”, where the reader can access an article that is more interactive. However, to open that article, the reader must click a link that is presented as a graphic that combines text, image, and a search box, all of which is organised by two horizontal ruling lines. This is confusing because the user can’t immediately identify if the graphic is a link, picture, or interactive component of the article.

About Tuan Vo 5 Articles
Aspiring journalist. Some experience in the tech industry. Planning to use those skills to present better journalism for the new digital age. Follow me on twitter @iamtuanvo

1 Comment

  1. This is actually a news feature, not a news story Tuan, because it’s well over 500 words, is not talking about a timely, new thing (house prices have been falling for months) and because it’s full of analysis and casually toned comment. I agree that the House of cards hypertext is a little confusing at there’s three links in that field – the headline, image and the caption.

    On your web writing: You need to set a feature image and give it a caption, copyright details and alt text. You also needed keyword tags for external search discovery. For this next assignment post don’t forget to:
    – Embed URLs, and keep link phrases to 2-3 keywords
    – Make links open in new tabs
    – Use your precede (subheading field below post) to promote your post, rather than saying what is already in the category tag.
    Be careful to check your spelling, grammar and punctuation before you upload your next assignment. Also please upload an image of yourself to your blog bio to elicit trust from your readers.

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