Service journalism

Not to be confused with Public service journalism.

While public service journalism is about reporting issues that concern citizens and equipping them to form reasoned opinions on matters of shared interest, service journalism is a term for generally consumer-oriented features and advice, ranging from the serious to the frivolous.

History

Magazines have always striven to inform and entertain. Modern service journalism was pioneered in part by Clay Felker, who launched New York in 1968. Published among lengthy investigative and literary pieces were tips and features on fashion, food, and travel. Service journalism appears in magazines as varied as Maxim and U.S. News & World Report, whose slogan "News You Can Use" aptly defines the term.

Selected Magazines

• Budget Travel
• Better Homes and Gardens
• Best Products
• Cosmopolitan
• Family Circle
• FHM
• Fill
• Gear Patrol
• Glamour
• Good Housekeeping
• Health
• Marie Claire
• Men's Fitness
• Maxim
• Ladies' Home Journal
• Men's Health
• More
• Redbook
• Seventeen
• Self
• Shape
• VIVmag
• Women's Health

Further reading

• Jessica Lockhart (March 1, 2008) "5 Reasons to Love Service Journalism" Review of Journalism