News Reporting and Writing Ch. 10

obituaries. one big reason my parents read the newspaper. a reason i feel many people read their local papers. that and the police beat.
i don't think that i am yet at that age where i wonder if any of my childhood friends or neighbors are passing away, so it's something i normally skip when reading the paper. so i never really realized how much goes into writing an obituary. and how particularly written it has to be.
because most of the people who read a certain obit had known the person who passed, they read with a very critical eye, and will catch the slightest misprint. therefore, the writer has to be extra careful to double check facts, dates, and times. other rules that i've never thought about is the language of the obit. how a person dies "unexpectedly" not "suddenly" because all deaths are sudden. or a that a person dies of injuries "suffered" not "received."
i feel that everyone deserves a good obit. whether written by a professional or a family member that submitted it to the local paper. i just hope that when it's time for mine to be printed its big enough to be put in the NYtimes or USAtoday, not that i wouldn't be happy with the good ol' Daily Messenger. hah.

Giuliani and his cell phone

Rudy Giuliani answered a cell phone call from his wife in the middle of a speech he was giving to the NRA. He said before he even looked at the phone "it's probbaly my wife calling" and then quickly told her what he was doing, he would call her when he was done, and that he loved her. all very endearing. the crowd awwwwed after when he hung up, and the speech went on. but it makes me wonder if it was a sort of set-up? it definitely put Giuliani in a good light as sensitive, a family man, a good husband, etc. which im sure he is, but was it really necessary to display that so publicly? obviously answering your cell phone during a speech would get you press. so why did he really do it?

candidates face bloggers

democratic candidates attend a blogging convention shows a cnn.com video. in efforts to gain more support from the blogger community, as a lot of the democractic energy for the election is happening online, on blogs.
turning the election into an online race is smart, as information gets out quickly and spreads like wildfire to every inch of the web. the candidates seem to be taking it as far as they can. each candidate has their own website, and Barack Obama, appealing to the younger demographic, even has a myspace.
the democratic candidates seem to be focusing much more of their attention on the online world than the republicans. is this good or harmful?
in my opinion any publicity is a good thing. put as much out there as you can, get as many people to know your name as you can. and taking a campaign online is a perfect solution to that. kudos to all the candidates who have figured that out.

Using a timeline to tell a story

Mindy McAdams, a fellow blogger on blogspot.com and also fellow journalist knows where its at. online! or as she calls it, multimedia journalism. with multimedia journalism, the oppurtunities are endless. as Mindy showed, using an interactive timeline helps the reader to better understand the story. you can't do that in a newspaper.
doors are opening everywhere in multimedia journalism, one click can take a person to many different areas on the same subject. i feel a bit redundant in my last few blogs, discussing online journalism and where its headed. but yeah, its pretty much the same idea. potential, growth...

E-Media Tidbits 8/27/07

i wasn't exactly sure which tidbit we were supposed to read, so i just read them both, they weren't long. the first one discussing how you can streamline the news from a website to put a feed onto your site in a much more specific manner. for example, if Elle magazine wanted news stories specifically just on fashion week in NYC to put a feed on their website, they could do just that. it's a great thing. (even though this particular feed just has to do with environment news, i was making an example).
it just goes to prove that news via the internet is growing faster than ever. and that we should all take note of its potential to become greater.

the second tidbit was very short, yet made its point. blogs can be powerful, well really any information on the internet can be powerful. but when you're boss is "Googling" you online, to find out about your background, well stuff could could come back to haunt you. like in this article, how a friend made fun of another friend in his blog. so everytime his name was Googled, that blog showed up.
it can happen to anyone. remember that myspace you made when you were 16? now you're 24 and looking for a job. your potential bosses can find that site you made with the pictures of you're tattoos or you funneling a beer. it could really harm the chance of you getting that job.
so it just goes to show you have to be careful what goes on the internet. because once its on there, almost anyone can look at it. lucky for me, if you google my name, thousands of other Holly Smith's preceed me in the search...good luck finding me out of over 4 million results.

AP Stylebook - Punctuation

Punctuation is one of those things that I don't really think about too much when writing. It is like second nature to know where to put a comma, how to use an apostrophe in the possesive form and when it's a contraction, that an exclamation point is used in excitement, that a question mark is, well, at the end of a question, and that a period goes at the end of a sentence. Yet punctuation is a lot more complex than what it appears to be. For example, I am always confused by the use of the semicolon. Honestly, I usually only put it in when microsoft word tells me to. And hyphens, I really don't use them.
Punctuation is very important, but like learning how to be a journalist, you can't just read it from a book. It's difficult to read all these rules and then incorporate them immediately into your work. It takes time and practice on how to properly write a sentence with proper punctuation.

News Reporting and Writing Ch. 1,2,3

after reading chapters 1, 2, and 3, i feel like i experienced deja vu. or rather, read a couple weeks worth of the class introduction to journalism. from what news consists of (impact, conflict, novelty, prominence, proximity, and timeliness) to being objective (which i think is, if not competely, but close to impossible), to multimedia journalism and its importance today to the same images of a news room organization of different types of newspapers.
also, reading about how to interview, in my opinion, is completely unhelpful. to fully understand how to conduct an interview you have to do it. it is a total real-life experience. while the basic fundamentals are useful to know, it is much better to just go through the motions.
it is good to review the important aspects of being a journalist and what skills you need, but there is such a thing as overkill. im just hoping that the next readings are more beneficial.

Oprah in....politics?

As a big fan of Oprah, and an avid watcher of her show, I realize what she is capable of. She picks up a book, it immediately makes it to the top of the best seller's list. She creates a magazine, its already on the main racks right before you walk through the line at the grocery store. Oprah has shown that her name sells. But can Oprah influence a presidential nomination? Or even an election? Barack Obama thinks so. According to an article on cnn.com "Oprah may assume a visible role in the Democrat's presidential bid." Her large fanbase, also considered her "congregation" follow Oprah in all that she does, but will they follow her to support this new presidential candidate? There are skeptics.
In my opinion, Oprah has so much influence, that she has just created a whole new demographic for Obama. He should consider himself very lucky to have her backing him this election.

A Candidate's Wife: Elizabeth Edwards

so i watched a video on cnn.com, where Elizabeth Edwards (democratic candidate John Edward's wife) was interviewed on the release of her newest edition novel, "saving graces: finding solace and strength from friends and strangers".
but of course, that was not discussed very long, as the interviewer cut right to the campaign for the white house and how elizabeth is the most outspoken one of all the candidates wives. i was surprised to hear she even disagrees with her husband on some tough issues, like gay marriage. she says "i don't know why somebody else's marriage has anything to do with me. i am completely comfortable with gay marriage."
this is very surprising for a wife to openly disagree with her husband who is running for president, as they are supposed to appear as a team, and a support system. yet, elizabeth edwards should get some respect for speaking truthfully on a subject if she is asked. as she also says, "i have no agenda" (as i think that hilary did as first lady), and is behind her husband no matter what. seems like she has good potential for a future first lady to me.

News Reporting and Writing Ch. 7,8

this book is very similar to all the other books that we have seen in our journalism courses. in chapter 7, a full 20 pages about the inverted pyramid. as a journalist student, by now, i should know what the inverted pyramid is. and i do, and after reading chapter 7, even more so. yet i still have not mastered how to write one. or at least, write a good one. there are many different forms of leads, as the chapter describes, but the main aspect in all leads is discerning the importance of each fact from a news story, and knowing what to include in the lead, and what to shove farther down in the story.
in chapter 8, it really emphasizes how reporting greatly reflects in the writing. if you don't "report with all your senses" then the story will be bland and straightforward. as a reporter is important to see, hear, touch, smell, and perhaps even taste the story that you are reporting on. details, although they may seem miniscule, can make a story. also reading in reading chapter 8, it reminds you how important wording can be. how grammar can significantly change how a sentence sounds. or how bringing in small facts can make a story that much more concrete. its amazing how many pieces go into creating a well-written news story, that will eventually be read in only a few short minutes.

The State of the News Media 2007

online news is becoming the prominent way to get informed. from videos, to articles, to being able to get what story you want, when you want it, online seems the better choice. i know that i rarely read newspapers anymore, unless its the ithacan. my homepage is CNN.com, so it's even easier to get the news with one click of the mouse, much more efficient than traveling down to mac's to pick up a newspaper.
while jobs in the newspaper industry are decreasing, online news jobs are going up. now they not only need people to write, but also to produce videos, bring in more advertising, and have graphic designers. with online news, space is unlimited. it allows the reader to go back months, even years, and find a news story.
news is elastic, it bends and shapes with the times. moving towards online news access is in correlation with how the public is moving, and the new technology lifestyle.