Nibs and Shorts

As a local reporter there is a constant demand for news in brief stories, which are called nibs. Mostly, these are not needed for their news value but they increase the paper's story count and a "string" of nibs down the side of a page can improve its visual look. 

There will not be enough interesting things that happen for you to make all your nibs and short stories (between 100 and 200 words) interesting. Because of this, you need to make sure you spend as little time as possible writing nibs so that you can concentrate on writing proper stories.

How To Write a Nib

Usually, when the newsdesk asks you for nibs, you will be expected to produce a number of them in the same document and they are the one type of story where you are expected to come up with the headline. The headlines are only a couple of words in length, so just sum up what the story is about rather than trying to think of a clever headline.

Nibs should be between 30 and 60 words in length and never more than 80 words or so. If you are unable to tell the story in this amount of words, then either do not write it at all or write it as a short article.

In terms of structure, a nib should be one or two paragraphs long and contain as many of the "who", "when", "what", "where", and "why" as possible in as few words as possible.

Your aim in writing a nib should be to get across all the key facts as quickly as you can. For example, if you are publicising an upcoming meeting it should read something like:

"A meeting of Lambeth Council's licensing committee will be held at the Town Hall in Acre Lane on August 5. It starts at 7pm and the items on the agenda include an application by the Good Times night-club to extend its opening hours."

This gets the story across without using up much space. It might also be worth adding a contact number for people to call if they want more information about the meeting.

Finding Nibs

The key to finding nibs is to put in place a proper system. It is worth spending some time at the beginning as this will save you time in the long run.

As a reporter at the Watford Observer, I used to drive around my patch once  a week to read notice boards for nibs. Looking back, it was a terrible waste of time and could have been averted with some proper planning. 

Put some time in doing research on the internet to find when community groups are meeting. Many council websites have “what’s on” sections that are a rich source of nibs as they list all sorts of community events. Almost any upcoming public meeting in your area will make a nib, whether it is a meeting of a council or health authority committee, a charity event or a school event.

You should also phone any local groups you can think of, such as amateur dramatics societies and music clubs. Make it clear to them that you can offer them what is essentially free advertising by publishing an article to promote any upcoming events.

Also, make it clear to them exactly what information you need (such as date, time and venue of the meeting and what the subject matter is) and when you need it by. And tell them that you are also happy to put something in afterwards to say how it went.

Planning lists from councils can also be rich pickings. If there is a slightly unusual planning application, why not make a nib it? Then when the decision is made, nib it again. This also works for agendas and minutes of meetings of public sector bodies. If there is something on the agenda that is even vaguely interesting, then make a nib out of it.

Keep all your nib material in a separate folder and make sure it is in date order and that you get rid of material once it’s out of date. This way, you can plan ahead and be systematic about making sure you can milk as many stories as possible out of the same material.

And it’s important that you quickly find out whether it’s acceptable to put the same nib in the paper again and again. Most editors will not mind it, though it’s best not to advertise it and if you do this it is worth changing the wording of it slightly. 

Doing Your Share of Nibs

In many newsrooms, there are reporters who are adept at getting out of writing nibs, but you should always try to do your fair share. If you write fewer nibs than the other reporters then your colleagues will quickly realise this and you will be identified as someone who does not pull their weight and are likely to resent you for it.

But equally, do not be too quick in sending your nibs over. The last thing you want is to give the impression that you always have some nibs that are ready to write, even if you do. If you give this impression then you could get a reputation that can lead to you being asked for nibs more than other reporters. After all, fairness can be forgotten when the newsdesk is under pressure from a sub-editor.