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Journalism & Media vocabulary · Media Ethics and Law

Public interest

Meaning in journalism & media, with examples

nounCommon term

In journalism & media, public interest means: The benefit of society as a whole, used to judge whether publishing information, especially private or secret information, is justified.

In Turkish: kamu yararı, toplum yararı

How it is used

A key test in ethics codes and media law: a story is in the public interest if it exposes crime, protects health or safety, or stops the public being misled. Editors often must show a public interest defence for intrusion.

Example sentences

  1. We decided the hospital's safety failures were clearly in the public interest.

  2. A celebrity's holiday photos are interesting to the public, but publishing them is not in the public interest.

Common collocations

  • in the public interest
  • public interest defence
  • public interest journalism
  • serve the public interest
  • press freedomThe right of journalists and media to collect and publish information and opinions without censorship, threats or control by the state or other powerful groups.
  • source protectionThe principle, recognised in many ethics codes and laws, that journalists should not reveal the identity of confidential sources.
  • investigative journalismJournalism that spends weeks or months uncovering hidden information, often about wrongdoing, corruption or abuse of power, using documents, data and confidential sources.
  • defamationThe legal wrong of publishing or saying false statements about someone that damage their reputation.

This word in other fields

The same English word can have a different meaning in another field:

More terms: Media Ethics and Law

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