Q1: I'm not a journalist, but its my understanding the news is anything that happens and/or comes to light that is of interest to the public.
Q2: These are rules that if followed will tell the reader all the essential facts surrounding the news article, whatever else is communicated..
Q3: Not sure what the difference is between hard and soft news.
News sources are where the reporter got his information.
Press Conference happens whenever a person invites the press to hear any kind of public declaration, and is often followed by questions/answers
News Story Structure is the format required in putting a news story together-writing it all down for print-usually dictatated by the publisher/News Paper
Q4: If there are any "principles of news writing" I would assume that among the top should be the ability to logically dissect statements made by public figures, and to point out any falacies, and/or discrepancies. This is almost never done. Usually, the Press simply misses the point, and thereby misses the real story. A case in point is the time Secretary of State, Condoleza Rice, used as a rationale for invading Iraq, the statement, "We don't want the first evidence of a smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud." What she was saying, and what the Press absolutely missed, was (1) there was no real evidence of WMD; (2) the Whitehouse was so paranoid that it was willing to sacrifice thousands of lives, both our own military, and even more so, the lives of Iraqi civilians, men, women and children, over an absurd notion that Iraq posed an imminent threat to the U.S.,which of course, was completely without any foundation, except of course, the question raised by the accountants who compared the numbers of Chemical, Biological and Nuclear items that it claimed it possessed just prior to Desert Storm, and which the Nuclear Reg. Committee required that Iraq destroy, compared to what was found by the weapons inspectors. Of course the two numbers failed to compare-Sadam was bluffing, as he was known to do.
Q-5: I would guess that there are as many categories of reporting as there are subjects to report, but obviously, there are human interest stories, criminal stories, financial stories, sports stories, family stories, and many of these cross over so that you might find a story about a sports figure who is getting divorced, or has gone bankrupt, or arrested.
Anyway, I wanted to highlight the fact that overall reporters fail miserably to understand what they are being told, failing to analyze is logically, which should be the most basis task even before checking out the veracity.