What do you think are some of the main differences in the way Japanese and U.S. media report the news?

First of all I believe Japanese media (not yellow ones) are at least trying to remain neutral and true to facts, while being polite and thorough with the content that is being published,

And then there is USA...

America sensationalizes everything, where the Japanese is straight and bland...at least on 6 in the evening kinds of news programs.

Curious. Why the America-centric slant on this question? Why not "What do you think are some of the main differences in the way Japanese and WESTERN media report the news?" Are you looking for specific, US related answers here, I wonder...?

In answer to this question, though, being British and having experience of having spent time in both countries, I would say that there are fewer differences than there are similarities. Both sets of news media focus heavily on domestic issues rather than international ones. It can be a very long wait sometimes in the States waiting for the first non-American news story on the evening news...

Politics in the way that I understand it, does not seem to exist in Japan. The way it is reported seems to remove any attempt to analyse the issues.

Do not know enough about American news to comment.

I would have liked to see other gold medal games but the media assumes we are only interested in ones where Japanese appear.

@ quercetum

I would have liked to see other gold medal games but the media assumes we are only interested in ones where Japanese appear.

Ain't that the truth...

quercetum

I would have liked to see other gold medal games but the media assumes we are only interested in ones where Japanese appear.

Australian coverage of the games is the same, only showing events where Australia is playing. Think all countries do the same.

Japan doesn't have a conservative news organization that amplifies Russian propaganda meant to divide the country.

Australian coverage of the games is the same, only showing events where Australia is playing. Think all countries do the same.

Incorrect. While Channel 7's coverage was more nationalistic than previous Olympics, there was plenty of coverage of events such as cross country skiing, bobsleigh, luge, hockey, and other sports where Aussies or Kiwis weren't involved. In fact, I saw more coverage of them than of Kailani Craine's figure skating. While 7 did do interviews with her and replayed her short program, it was nowhere near the level of NHK's coverage of Sochi, where I saw Hirano's qualifying run for the snowboard halfpipe over a dozen times, and none of the other competitors'.

The media is the media. Doesn't matter which country they are from. They either follow a particular parties agenda...which is easy to spot. Or they have their own agenda. Which is usually the owners political or world view.

Either way its very difficult to get an unbiased opinion.

In the US, politicians get asked hard questions by journalists. In Japan, this never happens.

Don't know about the states, but here in Japan, outside the Shukan (weekly) tabloids, no one has the guts to ask any hard questions.

Why? Because individual reporters / journalists would be putting their careers on the line, and their employers would be scared of being shunned / black-balled by the Advertising Mafia, thereby strangling their source of revenue. The power of business giants like Dentsu can even determine aspects of govt planning & policy. Witness the olympics. So nothing out-of-line ever happens.

The only real consistent investigative reporting is on a handful of programs like Asahi's news at ten or as I said in the better tabloids.

I forgot who said the "famous" comment - "In the West the Media and the People work together, keeping the Govt and Police (authorities) in check. In Japan the Govt., the Police and the Media work together to keep the People in check."