The term soft news was originally synonymous with feature stories placed in newspapers or television newscasts for human interest. Such stories were often placed much lower in priority than more urgent items. However, more recently soft news evolved into a concept associated with a style of journalism that blurs the line between information and entertainment. In addition to soft news stories, there are now entire soft news programs and reporters who present with a soft news style. Professional journalists often make a distinction between hard news and soft news this way: Hard news stories require immediate attention to an event or incident, soft news stories usually center on the lives of people. In 1973 Gaye Tuchman noted that the publication of hard news of the ...