Agenda-setting refers to the "ability to influence the importance placed on public agenda topics." The study of agenda-setting describes how the media attempts to influence viewers and create a hierarchy of news prominence.

Gatekeeping takes place at all levels of the media structure, from a reporter deciding which sources to include in a headline story to editors deciding which stories to print or cover. This includes, but is not limited to, media owners and advertisers.That is what we refer to as media gatekeepers.

News stories are selected based on;

1. Negativity	‘Hard’ News - bad news will almost always be prioritised.
2. Proximity	Things that happen close to home (domestic news) or that involve people from a local area.
3. Recency	“Breaking News’
4. Currency	The ‘value’ of a story. If it is useful for people.
5. Continuity	Stories that are likely to continue for a long time.
6. Simplicity	The easier the story is to understand, the better.
7. Personality	Often ‘soft’ news surrounds personalities in whom the public has an interest eg. Royal family, celebrities, athletes
8. Uniqueness	If a story is unusual or surprising
9. Expectedness	Includes diary events - things that happen at a particular time of the year.
10. Elite nations/people	Western societies such as European countries and the USA will tend to dominate the news.
11. Exclusivity	When a news channel has footage or information that is not yet in possession of others.
12. Threshold	How many people are impacted on by an event.

National news sites: Indonesia in specific

The Jakarta Post

The news stories selected here are based on:

Proximity (centers around Indonesia and Jakarta in particular)
Recency (based on current news and are are posted within the day/week you view the news)
Currency (most of the stories here are related to politics and Indonesia's achievements which can be useful to the Indonesian people)
Expectedness (the stories mentioned are of politics and the system which is expected and people can come back in to check on updates)
Continuity