In the fourth of five extracts from her new book The Content Makers, Crikey media commentator Margaret Simons looks behind the scenes in the preparation of network news.

Five-thirty, and the Channel Ten news goes to air. “The Cross City Tunnel saga has claimed its first scalp…” the newsreader begins. The chief executive of the Roads and Traffic Authority has been forced to resign.

At Channel Seven a quarter of an hour later, the game show that leads into the news, Deal or No Deal, is in its final quarter of an hour, the tension at breaking point due to the fact that the suitcase with the largest amount of money – $200,000 – has yet to be found.

In the studio, newsreader Ian Ross – “a transparent and decent face on a transparent and decent man,” the head of news and current events, Peter Meakin, tells me – is practising the first few items, editing his script with underlining and capital letters and making sure he can pronounce all the names. Then the money is won, the briefcase opened, and it is six o’clock. Ross is on. “Good evening. The Cross City Tunnel has claimed its first scalp…”

Simultaneously, the Channel Nine newsreader is starting with the Cross City Tunnel story. He too uses the word “scalp” in the first sentence. Bob Carr, until recently the New South Wales premier, has been interviewed by all stations. He made himself available to the media in a “doorstop” interview – meaning one conducted by appointment but on a street corner or a doorstep rather than at a press conference. Carr was available because of a conference about the Kyoto climate change treaty, and this is what he wanted to talk about, but this is not the lead item. What is going to air are his comments on the Cross City Tunnel.

The next story at Channel Seven is about the drug ice, or crystal meth. The newsroom is proud of this one. The “hook’”for the story is a new specialised ward being opened to treat the addicts, but Channel Seven has been preparing a story on ice for weeks and has astonishing visual images of the deterioration in addicts.

Channel Nine and Channel Ten will have the story about the ward too, but only Channel Seven has the images, taken from a United States law-enforcement website. This is value-adding, being proactive, says Willis. It is the kind of thing that makes a difference.

The third item is about the death penalty being imposed on the Australian drug trafficker Nguyen Tuong Van. “Melbourne man Nguyen Tuong Van now seems certain to hang after the Singapore Government appeared yesterday to end any lingering hope he would escape the gallows…”

Then there is a story about a Sydney cult leader who has been arrested, a follow-up about the s-x shop near the school, a story about bird flu and then a story about the Kyoto conference. This too includes words from Bob Carr, but that is not the lead-in. Instead there are pictures of Mount Kilimanjaro, on which the snows are melting, with Africans singing and clapping in front of it. A reference to Ernest Hemingway, then a sound bite from Bob Carr. He is, after all, still regarded as a politician. The pill must be sweetened.

Then the ad break. This is high-risk time. If people are going to switch channels, they will do so now. Ian Ross does a bit more practice. A little more make-up is applied to his decent, transparent face.

Straight after the break there is a story about police being caught speeding, and then two stories in one about industrial relations, although it would never be promoted that way. Former prime minister Bob Hawke has condemned the Howard Government’s industrial relations reforms as “despicable”, but (quick segue) current Labor leaders have been dining at a $5,000-a-head business forum. There are pictures of them going in for their food.

Straight to a story about a Palestinian suicide bomber. In the editing suite earlier, the direction had been given: “No uncovered bodies, please.” People turn off if they see blood. Then a story on breast cancer and how early detection leads to better outcomes. Then an ad break and shortly afterwards – and promoted beforehand in the hope it will make viewers “stick” – some feel-good vision of beach fashions, which means bikinis and curvaceous models.

Then sport, then finance, then weather, which is the part of the bulletin either rushed through or taken at a leisurely pace depending on whether the show as a whole is running to time or over time. In the weather, you can make up or lose the necessary seconds.

There hasn’t been a single item on the Channel Seven news that Channel Nine hasn’t covered as well, and the reverse is also true.

This is an extract from The Content Makers, by Margaret Simons, (Penguin, rrp $35.00), available in bookstores from 3 September 2007.

Tomorrow: Straight to cable – Inside the Sky newsroom