Professionalization of journalism and editorial independence influenced the rise of newsworthiness and news selection in the late 19th century.
Newsworthiness is one of the principles for evaluating events by those inside the newsroom, depending on which journalists decide what is important, interesting, or attractive enough to be presented to the public as news. The evolution of the concept of newsworthiness has shown that it is determined by a set of criteria known as news factors and news values.
News factors represent the characteristics of an event depending on which journalists evaluate and select the news. But news factors alone do not determine the newsworthiness of a story if a news worker does not allocate a value to it.
News values represent the estimation of the relevance of a news factor, which is determined by values such as timeliness, proximity, prominence, consequence, conflict, oddity, human interest, impact, or scandal.
Both practitioners and theoreticians agree that the news selection process implies judgements made according to, among other criteria, the professional standards of news workers, the organizational structure, the economic conditions, the events, the news actors, the clarity of a story, or access to the events. Furthermore, other considerations can be taken into account to describe newsworthiness, such as political importance, economic or social effects, or the interest of the audience.
