Headlines as a crime-mill in the “Belle Époque”, a serial principle

In the Third Republic, newspaper articles became part of and grew to resemble a market economy. The regular trading of news stories between reporters involved on-the-spot writing or even rewriting of events once the paper reached the hands of the news editor. At that point, the story alone was either handed over or traded. Before publication, the article had to be reworked by its writers, a process that often resembled dramatization.