The attack has dominated world media coverage

From the dramatic pictures of the attack on the World Trade Center which dominated newspaper and television coverage for the first two or three days, through the heart-rending human interest stories, the political analysis and the coverage of America's preparations for war, editors and reporters have explored events from every conceivable angle.

And in the US one thing in particular seems to have struck observers: in the search for an explanation for the events of 11 September, for the first time in a long time the mainstream American news media are devoting time, space and resources to coverage of the world outside the States.

"To the extent that anything good can come out of this, it's a greater focus on international affairs," says John Schidlovsky, director of the Pew International Journalism Program at Johns Hopkins University in Washington DC.

'Genuinely dismayed'

"There has been a crying need for the media to pay more attention to international coverage. It is critical for our own security as Americans that we pay attention to what goes on in the rest of the world."

And Chris Cramer, a former BBC journalist who is now president of CNN International Networks, agrees. "The public have been genuinely dismayed to find they know so little about the outside world. 'We did not know that,' is the prevailing cry."

It is clear the coverage failed to prepare many Americans for the shock of discovering quite how much they are hated in some quarters of the Muslim world.

The thirst for understanding was dramatically demonstrated in CNN's home base of Atlanta.

On the day after the attacks the morning Atlanta Constitution and afternoon Atlanta Journal (complementary, not competing papers: they are published by the same company and based in the same newsroom) between them added an extra 225,000 copies to their combined daily sale of about 500,000.

Some 79.5 million people watched television coverage of the attacks on the first night. CNN's audience in the first week averaged almost three million - approaching 10 times its daily average of 323,000 viewers.

Honourable exceptions

Yet travellers from Europe have long remarked on how few foreign stories the US media carry.

With the honourable exceptions of a handful of major metropolitan newspapers (New York Times and Washington Post, Wall Street Journal and Los Angeles Times among them) and of National Public Radio, world news is hard to come by.

Even when a story is reported - usually because US interests are affected in some way - American journalists' admirable commitment to separating fact from opinion, straight reporting from comment, means events are not often explained or contextualised.

Although domestic US media devoted much time and space to Israel, it is clear the coverage failed to prepare many Americans for the shock of discovering quite how much they are hated in some quarters of the Muslim world.

But in the past fortnight that has changed.

The question now, according to Schidlovsky, is how permanent the change will be. In particular, he asks, will the networks, newspapers and news agencies commit more resources to overseas coverage?

Hard news

In recent years competitive pressures have forced US news media to cut back their presence overseas. ABC News once had 17 foreign bureaux. It now has seven. Coverage has fallen too.

The Tyndall Report, which monitors US television news content, has recorded a fall from 4,000 minutes of foreign news coverage on the three main network news programmes in 1989 to just over 1,300 in 2000.

Rescue crews searched for survivors

The trend has gone hand in hand with a softening of the news agenda. CNN's chairman Walter Isaacson, now says his network "lost his way" in the pursuit of health, entertainment and technology stories and the big-name star presenters which market research said the audience wanted, rather than hard news.

Now, after the most devastating attack on the US since Pearl Harbor, the news media are recovering a sense of purpose, and a belief in international news, as their audience and readers rediscover a thirst for understanding the world.

Aftermath

But paying for more foreign news in the long term is a different matter. America was headed for recession - and a slump in advertising - even before the attacks. An economic downturn now looks even more likely, and it will hit especially hard sectors like the airline industry and insurance companies which have traditionally been heavy advertisers.

For several days in the aftermath of the attacks television networks carried few if any commercials, and in newspapers too many advertisements were scrapped or cancelled.

"It's made a dreadful financial year more dreadful. But who cares?" the chairman of the New York Times Co told the trade magazine Editor & Publisher.

Consumed with enthusiasm as they rediscover their core business, editors and executives are pouring resources into coverage, including foreign news. But for how long can they afford it?

Nick Higham will be hosting a live forum on this subject. Click here to send your questions to a panel of experts including Eastern Eye editor Abul Tahir, the Media Guardian correspondent, Lisa O'Carroll and American network, ABC's Nathan Thomas.