What a semester this has been. Coming into this class, I will admit I was pretty inimidated by the challenge of learning new technologies and how they can each be used to tell a story, either by themselves or conjointly with other medias as well. It was hard, especially when we had to learn how to use the equipment on the fly. Another big challenge was adjusting to problems that arose while “in-the-field.” Despite all of the pressure and the speed of the course, it was an extremely helpful course, especially considering where journalism is heading these days. Considering all of the limitations of time and accesibilty, I think that the class was taught effectively. So to the teacher, Mimi Perreault, thank you very much for all of the effort you put into teaching us in this course. I appreciate all of the effort you put in.
As a big sports fan and future journalist, I naturally watched the NFL draft last night. And to be honest, it was one of the most entertaining and shocking drafts of all time. There were so many trades and surprise moves that as a sports geek, I thoroughly enjoyed the whole thing. The problem i had though…the constant coverage. And this goes beyond just the draft. This goes for all of the 24-hour news networks. I understand the desire to have news as quickly and efficiently as possible. What I don’t understand though, is all of the pre-event analysis. For football it’s the weeks and weeks of pre-draft picks and mock drafts that build up the event to the point where the average fan is nonplussed and even bored at the draft because their minds have been numbed to the point of indifference. Not only that, but the draft has now been divided into three nights as opposed to just two, the analyses and all of the coverage has been drawn out to the point that it seems like the networks are trying to draw things out just so they can talk more. So with all the Twitter, blogs and pick-by-pick analysis, I wonder now if things have gotten a little too in-depth. Sometimes, I wonder if it’s all just too much.
As cliché as this will sound, one of the great joys of being a journalist is the people I get to meet and talk to and learn about when I work on stories. Most recently I have had the distinct pleasure of interviewing a man by the name of Arnie Fagan, owner of “Cool Stuff,” a niche store of sorts that resides in downtown Columbia. Fagan has a particular connection to Columbia Missouri because of his role in changing the culture of this college town. Sure, we met under the pretense of me working on a class project that he was so gracious to assist me and my group with, but the actual interview turned into more of a conversation, a passing of oral tradition as I asked a few of my slated questions but said more in a conversational role that a journalistic one. To me, Fagan’s story was so intriguing, so charmingly out of the ordinary that I was put aside my role as a journalist and donned that of a personally interested audience, engaged with what I thought was an incredible story.
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Arnie Fagan inside his shop, "Cool Stuff." Photo provided by the Columbia Business Times.
So, recently I have been using Twitter a lot more than I ever thought I would, and with good reason. It provides a useful method of receiving quick little headlines that keep people informed of what’s going on in the world, and letting you decide if you want to know more. In some ways, they’re like mini-headlines. But another, more popular way to utilize Twitter is a way of just seeing what people think and getting entertainment value out of what people post. Typically once a day I scan through my Twitter feed to see what people have put up over the course of the day. Some things make me laugh, but a few nights ago, I was actually peeved at what one person wrote. Read More »
Eliot Chang is on his annual “Comedy Central Presents” college tour, during which he spends eight months on the road visiting more than 400 college and university campuses.
Tonight, Chang stops by at the Memorial Student Union on the University of Missouri-Columbia campus.
Chang, who got his start in comedy doing standup in New York City comedy clubs, has worked his way to the top of Comedy Central’s comedians, ranked number two in Comedy Central’s Stand Up Showdown in 2011.
There is a full house on hand as the Asian American Association and the Student Unions Programming Board collaborated to bring this very funny comedian to the Mizzou campus.
The seats are filled in Stotler Lounge before the show even begins.
When booking a prime time comedian like Eliot Chang, it’s reasonable to expect to jump through hoops to book him.
However, Asian American Association member Jennifer Liu said that wasn’t the case.
“Since he does a college tour every year, he sends out promos to us,” said Liu.
“We checked him out, decided we wanted him, and then worked out the time and cost and got him,” concluded Liu.
Jennifer Liu (right) talks to a friend before the show begins.
“The Shack,” located at the University of Missouri-Columbia Student Center, knows how to host a watch party.
Free pizza and the NCAA Men’s Basketball Championship game projected onto canvas screens draws a full house of Mizzou students to watch the biggest basketball game of the season.
The game is even bigger as Kentucky faces off against rival Kansas.
“I just want to watch Kansas lose,” said freshman Kevin Bowerman.
The watch party is sponsored by the Student Union Programming Board, which provides the student body with a variety of fun events, like this one, all year long.
A full house of Mizzou Tigers watch the NCAA Men's Championship game. Taken on the University of Missouri-Columbia campus.
There is hot, free pizza at “The Shack” here at the University of Missouri-Columbia Student Center! Good crowd on hand for Kentucky-Kansas!
Freshman Kevin Bowerman at "The Shack." Taken on theUniversity of Missouri-Columbia campus.
I read about the NPR retraction of their story about Foxconn that was aired on their show “This American Life,” and was quite frankly angered at the response Mike Daisey gave in light of the retraction. But before I get to that, I must say kudos to NPR for admitting their mistake and retracting one of their most popularly downloaded and streamed stories. Doing so was probably not easy, but it was the right thing to do.
Now, back to Mr. Daisey. I do not care if the program he puts on air is one that is intended to have some fabrications, allowing NPR to use a clip of it knowing that he fictionalized some of his accounts was wrong. NPR may have had a gaffe in missing some of their fact checks, but he would have saved a lot of trouble if he had just come clean about the whole situation. Instead, he took the publicity and left NPR out to dry. To me, it is wrong to go on a news source and tell fabrications. That would be akin to me going to a friend’s house and putting my muddy shoes on their furniture. I could say, “This is what I do at my house, so you can’t get upset with me here,” but of course I cannot and should not do that. It was this following quote that piqued me the most.
“What I do is not journalism. The tools of the theater are not the same as the tools of journalism. For this reason, I regret that I allowed THIS AMERICAN LIFE to air an excerpt from my monologue. THIS AMERICAN LIFE is essentially a journalistic - not a theatrical - enterprise, and as such it operates under a different set of rules and expectations. But this is my only regret. I am proud that my work seems to have sparked a growing storm of attention and concern over the often appalling conditions under which many of the high-tech products we love so much are assembled in China.”–Mike Daisey
I have a big problem with this quote, mainly because I think it is a copout and displays a lack of class and integrity. As someone who is seriously considering going into the field of broadcast, it is extremely important to take someone at their word. However, after reading something like this, it makes it tough to believe what a source says, especially when you can’t necessarily verify it. Then you risk the possibility of getting burned by a source and looking a fool, all because they wanted some publicity and had a cheap answer to cover themselves but not the news program that put them on the map. I certainly do not think that all people/sources are like Mr. Daisey, but I, for one, would make sure never to talk to Daisey again if I were NPR or any other news organization.
Collegiate Musings... 