Journalists aren’t like other writers. While they care about conflict, they don’t build and foreshadow like the narrative writer.  While they care about facts and exact quotations, they don't create a thesis and structure evidence like the essay writer.  In order to do their jobs, journalists follow their own set of ethical rules and stylistic rules. These style guidelines have four goals: consistency, clarity accuracy, and brevity. Here are the major guidelines of this style (commonly known as AP style).

Rule One: Put all the important info up front

News stories are meant to be consumed quickly by readers. Thus, all the important information is upfront in the article. This starts at the top of the article, with the headline, strapline, byline, and dateline, all of which provide the reader with vital information about the article.
 

• HEADLINES: All stories start with a headline. Headlines act as the title of the story and consist of 4-8 words in a larger print to grab the reader’s attention. The key to a good headline is to write the headline after the story. Start by listing 10-15 interesting words that relate to story, then pick the best word and create an interesting phrase using rhyme, alliteration, assonance, cliché, pun, or a snowclone. Don’t worry about including specifics—that’s the job of…
• STRAPLINES: Straplines appear immediately below the header and summarize the whole story in a sentence. This should answer the who and what of the story—if the headline excites the reader, the strapline clarifies. Straplines should be larger than the text but under half the size of the headline, and straplines should be no longer than fifteen words at most.
• ​BYLINES: The byline comes immediately under the strapline and attributes the author of the story as well as photographers in some cases. If the story is not by a staff reporter, the byline lists the original publication as well.
• DATELINES: If the byline answers where a story originated, a dateline shows when it originated, both date and time. Note that datelines are only used for digital newspapers, not for print publications.

Playing the Long Game (headline)
Frederick welcomes a record number of students committing to college athletics (strapline)
Jordan Anders, Frederick Scout (byline)
February 28, 2020 (dateline)

Under this header the article starts, which is referred to as copy. All copy starts with a lede paragraph is meant to set the tone of the feature, introduce the feature topic, and catch the reader’s attention. Since journalism is all about giving information quickly, the who, what, when, and where of the story is all present in the lede. Some ledes are even followed by a hook line, a single line of copy that intrigues the reader to go forward. The mark of a good lede is that a person can read only the lede and get all the important information they need.
 

Rule Two: Stay objective

News stories are supposed to relate just the facts about an event or topic, so to stay factual, journalistic writing should be written in third person to stay objective. News articles should also be written in past tense, as the events have already happened. Avoid all uses of I, me, my we, us, you, and your in a news article. Writers typically do not comment on their own opinions about a story or topic in order to stay neutral. However, this does not mean articles must pick a neutral position: a piece on, say, a wildfire burning down a national park doesn't need balanced commentary from the pro-wildfire community. Objectivity should never compromise ethics.

That being said, some journalism is more personal. Extended journalistic pieces discussing the reporter's journey for a story can be written in first person. Reviews also commonly have limited use of first person, as the review is an opinion and is personalized (however, this use is limited, as the reviewer wants their opinion to seem as objective as possible). Editorials and opinion pieces are also written in first person, as these are meant to be subjective arguments toward readers to do something or believe something. 

Rule Three: Short is sweet

The key to journalistic style is brevity. To do this,

• avoid passive verbs (am, are, is, was, were, to be)
• use specific nouns to cut down on adjectives (musicians instead of students in the band)
• use specific verbs to cut down on adverbs (rushed instead of quickly ran)
• keep sentences and paragraphs in the body copy as short as you can
• ​Use abbreviations and acronyms whenever possible, including for title, countries, states, and street names ​

Numbers are another way to create brevity. The general rule in journalistic style is to always use digits instead of spelling out numbers, including using digits for ages, measurements, addresses, figures, dates, and times. However, numbers that start a sentence or are under ten are almost always spelled out.

Rule Four: Stick the Landing

Different types of articles end in different ways. News stories often end with the repercussions of an event. Advances end with information on how to attend an event. Reviews conclude with an opinion about the text. Editorials end with a final warning or appeal. But no matter what type of story is written, they all end with a button.

A button is a final quote or witty line that connects back to the lede and makes the reader feel like they have come full circle. It's a reward for the reader because they did not stop at the lede and read all the way through. A button can be offset like a hook line or part of the final paragraph. Say that an article is about a teacher who is going to retire to be a dog trainer: the button could be, "This old dog is finally learning a new trick." Or for an article about a protest against discrimination in the community, a nice button could be "Ultimately, concerns about the movement going too far are dwarfed by a more worrisome thought: that it won't go far enough."

Rule Five: Quirks of AP Style

What I've outlined so far is mostly structural and does not conflict with the typical style of academics (MLA and APA). However, there are three specific features of AP Style that directly contradict academic grammar:

• AP Style does not use the Oxford comma ("Her favorite colors are red, green and yellow")
• AP Style does not italicize titles but instead quotes the titles of films, books, TV series, and albums (but not newspapers)
• AP Style requires commas around all appositives ("The neighbor, Martin Williams, saved the boy, age 8, from the truck.")

While these rules are used by journalists throughout the world, they are frequently criticized by the general public, as they lead to a lack of clarity, and are often entirely ignored by academic journalists, such as those producing school newspapers or scholarly journals published by universities.