Archive for September, 2009

College Media Matters: My (Not Really) Goodbye Post

Posted in College Media on September 21, 2009 | Leave a Comment »

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I have been passionate about college journalism since high school.  As a junior and senior, I treasured the visits I made with my father to campuses throughout greater Philadelphia and beyond.  There is simply *something* about a lively campus that puts a smile on my face and a giddy-up in my heartbeat.  Some students on a college tour seek out the main academic buildings, the athletic facilities, the freshmen dorms. I searched for newsstands.

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Campus newspapers (and magazines and broadcast stations and online outlets and individual blogs) are the lifeblood of every good college or university.  I felt I learned more about the schools I visited through one issue of a quality student paper than in a full tour, admissions rep sit-down, and Web site visit.  When I selected a college, I immediately sent an e-mail to the student newspaper’s faculty adviser requesting to be considered for the position of editor in chief. OK, so I overshot a little.  In my sophomore year, that dream came true.  Cue the smile, and the giddy-up. Both have not let up since.

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I believe in the power of college media and the idealism and passion of student journalists.  Over the past year, I have greatly enjoyed blogging for CMM.  I truly now feel a part of a community of like-minded scholars, professionals, and students.  My immense thanks to Meredith Cochie at UF for her guidance early on (and for helping greatly with the header).  My sincere gratitude extends to many others for their interest and support, notably Bryan Murley at CICM, Daniel Bachhuber, David Wilensky, and  Steve Veres at UWIRE.

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Speaking of UWIRE, I am taking the Jay Leno approach with my blog work.  It is not goodbye, but hello, again.  I am moving into prime time- from College Media Matters to College Media Beat, a fantastic (if I do say so myself) new blog covering college journalism in-depth, in the moment, and across all media.  It will be spirited.  It will be snarky.  It will be *something.* :)

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Check it out:

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COLLEGE MEDIA BEAT

www.collegemediabeat.com

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College Media Beat

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Journalism Student Secretly Released After 2 Years in Prison

Posted in International Student Media, Journalism, Journalism Education, Journalism Ethics, tagged , , on September 16, 2009 | 1 Comment »

Warning: Do NOT study journalism in Afghanistan.  Or at least for now, if you do, keep your mouth shut.  Case in point: An Afghan journalism student was secretly freed earlier this month after spending nearly two YEARS in prison.  His crime: Speaking up in class “about women’s rights under Islam.”

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Specifically, according to an AP report, “[p]rosecutors said he showed contempt for Islam by asking questions about women’s rights and for distributing an article he had taken off the Internet that asks why Islam does not modernize to give women equal rights. He also allegedly wrote his own comments on copies of the article.”

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Officials originally sentenced the poor guy, a student at Balkh University, to death, and then settled for 20 years in prison.  Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai secretly signed a pardon a few weeks back and the student is now out of the country due to fear of reprisals for his actions.  All this because he had the gall to speak, or seek, the truth.  The pardon is a positive for our profession, but as the story shows, Afghanistan’s journalism education has a long way to go.

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Online Campus Gossip Still Strong After Juicy Ran Dry

Posted in New Media, tagged , on September 15, 2009 | Leave a Comment »

Reputations are once again no longer safe.  Facts are once again less than sacred.  Innuendo is once again in.  As The Chronicle of Higher Education recently reported, “They’re Back, and They’re Bad: Campus-Gossip Web Sites.”

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While JuicyCampus, the equally loathed-and-loved “virtual campus grapevine,” shuttered its site in February, a few other entrants are happily enabling students to continue spreading the word about anyone and anything, truth be damned.  CollegeACB (Anonymous Confessions Board) is one.  A higher-profile new player is the not-so-subtly-named Campus Gossip, which implores its potential participants “Go ahead, tell it like it is…always 100% anonymous….”

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Here are a few posts from the site in the past few days (with names changed): ”So i met jane smith (sophmore?) a few days ago and i think she is f*cking hot/really chill…butttt i have heard some things. anyone have any info?”; “Porn ‘star’ goes to seton hill: Jane Smith spent her summer modeling. At least that’s what she told everyone. Google “Janey Smith” to find out what she was really up to. I’m sure her parents are very proud. But lets be honest. She was a whore before, so at least now she’s getting paid for it.”; and “I got VD from the Dean of Students. Pass it on.”

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Others are interested in the legality angles, the possible sexual harassment issues or the woe-is-our-society critiques.  I find the sites intriguing as cultural arbiters of our repressed need to scream and shout and besmirch and smear under the cover of anonymity but before a potentially international audience.  Sure, it could be argued that these sites are simply new platforms for one of the oldest human trades, but they are different in that what they feature can stay etched into our reptuation (i.e. our Google prints i.e. the very core of our identities) far longer and far stronger than any spoken or even printed gossip of the past.

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Are we becoming more cowardly (the phrase “say it to my face” almost sounds quaint nowadays)?  Are we simply more venomous or vindictive?  Are we more casual with the truth?  Are we more inclined to sensationalize?  Are we more cut-off and in turn more unfeeling to our fellow man?  Do we simply want to be heard (and do these anonymous posters even care if anyone is reading/listening)?

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College Media Critiques: Meaningful or Just Mean-Spirited?

Posted in College Media, Journalism, Journalism Ethics, New Media, tagged , , on September 14, 2009 | 1 Comment »

There are not many of us who blog regularly about college media en masse.  Yet, according to an intriguing recent Poynter piece, commentaries, critiques, and behind-the-scenes news of specific SMOs (student media outlets) are growing in blog-land (at least in the state in which the writer spent part of his higher ed. career).  The blogs’ existence and the bloggers’ motivations behind them raise an interesting question, one that interested observers occassionally ask me as well: Is it right to critique student media?

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Those in the lay-off-’em camp cite j-students’ still-in-training status.  Many students of course work for SMOs without pay, course credit or sleep, lending a helping hand out of idealism and for the experience and a résumé boost.  So, the argument goes, an outside blog-watch of all major and minor moves and miscues comes across as just mean-spirited and demoralizing to those who deserve our appreciation and need a pick-me-up (and a paycheck).

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It’s an argument I have never been able to buy.  I critique because I care.  I critique because to me being a student does not somehow make you a second-class journalist. Students are at the heart and on the leading edge of journalism’s 21st-century reinvention. They do not simply need (professional, courteous) critiques, they deserve them. College media matter and if a blogtastic or more expansive treatise on their work offers them even one nugget of truth or one glimmer of new perspective to chew on, the journalism field as a whole will be the better for it.

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Quality critiques also provide j-students with thicker skin.  The Poynter piece offers my favorite related quote, from a Marquette University political science professor who apparently frequently criticizes the school’s student newspaper: “Taking some flak is something that journalists don’t like, but it is part of the job. So when they go out and get jobs with real newspapers they are going to run into some flak. The whole project is to socialize them into being journalists.”

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Internship to Feature ‘American Idol’ Application Style

Posted in College Media, Journalism, New Media, tagged , , on September 13, 2009 | 1 Comment »

Bryan Murley, director of the Center for Innovation in College Media, recently announced a second internship opportunity with CICM.  The application deadline is October 1st.  The potential responsibilities, in Murley’s words:

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  • Podcast interviews with media movers and shakers.
  • Reviews of college media online initiatives.
  • Maps and databases of college media online sites.
  • Live video streams of conferences and/or interviews.
  • Round-ups of relevant new media writing.
  • And more.

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The shake-up from last spring’s application process: All finalists will be featured on the CICM site and voted upon by the general j-populace.  It’s the we-think-wiki-wisdom-of-crowds approach!  Best of luck. :-)

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Eco-Friendly Resolution May Force Student Newspaper to Drop Print Edition

Posted in Uncategorized on September 11, 2009 | 2 Comments »

The Shorthorn, the award-winning 90-year-old student newspaper at the University of Texas at Arlington, may cease to exist in print due to economic environmental concerns (?!).  It is true.  As the newspaper itself is reporting, the school’s student government “is researching a resolution recommending the university’s daily newspaper go online-only as a way to join ongoing university green initiatives.”

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One of the student sponsors of the resolution: “I think it’ll pay off since we’re going to a more technological society.”

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Pay off for who?  The newspaper’s leadership confirms more than 17,000 readers for its four-times-weekly print edition, compared to less than a thousand daily for its online version (comprised mostly of non-students). Current comparative ad sales per year:

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$11,000 online

$438,000 in print

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It is a loss of ad revenue, a loss of a shared en masse experience and conversation starter for students on campus, and a loss of sanity about how to best balance the environment and information.

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Advertisement

An announcement atop The Shorthorn Web site.

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My favorite quote comes from a UT Arlington student who admitted she was not even aware the newspaper had a Web site: “If it did go only online, I probably wouldn’t read it because there’s so many other things to do online such as Facebook or Twitter.  I think going green is good, but I think less people would read the newspaper online.”

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Where’s the payoff in that?

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To the UT Arlington Student Congress: The Shorthorn must stay in print!   Issues are still being consumed daily.  If you want to go green, force profs. to stop assigning print textbooks.  I promise you, those are not as well read.

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Update: SPLC story

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Holocaust Denial Ad in Harvard Crimson Causes Criticism

Posted in College Media, Journalism, Journalism Ethics, Student Newspaper, Uncategorized, tagged , , , , on September 10, 2009 | 3 Comments »

When I went to bed, it seemed like a highly regrettable minor production snafu. When I awoke, it had apparently become an international incident.  In case you’ve been stuck on no-journalism-allowed island in the last 48 hours: In what its editors are calling a mistake, The Harvard Crimson ran a Holocaust denial ad on page seven of its Tuesday issue.  (Hat tip to the wonderful Adam Hemphill.)

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Do I believe it was an honest mistake?  Yes. I also accept the editor’s apology and explanation that running the ad “was a logistical failure and not a philosophical one.”  And I applaud the good faith and highbrow response of groups such as Harvard Hillel, whose president and director declared the Crimson response “extraordinary mature student leadership in response to an unfortunate situation.”

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These things happen.  The Crimson mea culpa- a public apology, a basic accounting of what went wrong, and promises to stop running the ad, return the money accepted for the ad and to work harder to ensure it is a one-time mistake- has been pitch-perfect.  What has become the main deplorable aspect of this “unfortunate situation”: the over-hyped press coverage.

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I respect that anything occurring at this school among schools will resonate more widely than incidents elsewhere, especially on campuses without Ivy or those enrolling mere mortals.  But the news reports I have seen so far, embodied by an overblown CNN piece, are a step too far.  Take the start of CNN’s story (with my critiques in parentheses):

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“Harvard University, one of America’s premiere academic institutions, is coming under fire for running an advertisement in its campus newspaper questioning the reality of the Holocaust.”  (Show me one person who is actually blaming the *university* for its *independent* student newspaper’s snafu and I’ll show you someone with half a brain and absolutely no understanding how journalism at the college level works.)

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“Recently named for the second straight year as the No. 1 school in U.S. News & World Report rankings of American colleges, Harvard is known for its rigorous scholarly standards and prestigious reputation.  On Tuesday, however, The Harvard Crimson, in what it said was an error, ran the Holocaust-questioning advertisement . . .”  (Meaning what, exactly?  That the newspaper betrayed the school’s high-ranking or that these things should not happen at such “rigorous” or “prestigious” places or at the very least could be more understandable at schools not ranked No. 1???)

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The photo accompanying the CNN story also literally includes smokestacks from what is left of the former Birkenau concentration camp, a horrifically off-kilter visual that again appears to place the newspaper (and according to the lede sentence, the entire university) in opposition to the atrocities that occurred there and elsewhere during World War II.

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A note to CNN and others: This is NOT World War III.  It was an honest logistical mix-up by one of the world’s finest student newspapers, without any hint of a hidden ideological agenda.  Take a step back.  Take a deep breath.  Accept the apology.  And realize, these things happen.  (One example.  One more.)

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Campus Newspaper Blog Shares Student’s Swine Flu Battle

Posted in College Media, Journalism, New Media, Student Newspaper, tagged , on September 9, 2009 | Leave a Comment »

I’ve seen blogs in my life- great blogs; middling blogs; blogs of towering mass appeal; blogs that make the phrase inconsequential irrelevance not sound redundant; blogs about exotic food, a person’s mood, a church bingo group, President Obama, Hello Kitty, and being a working mother. I have never come across a blog like this.

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It is built atop a disease sporting two letters interspersed with a repeating number: H1N1. “The Swine Flu Diaries” is a “slightly morbid, but still funny” blow-by-blow account of one student’s fight with swine flu. SFD is an official blog of The Seahawk, the campus newspaper at UNC-Wilmington, arriving at a time of heightened sensitivities toward H1N1 at the school, after “an outbreak of flu-like illness” affected hundreds of students.  It also comes amid a semester’s start in which Center for Innovation in College Media director Bryan Murley says there is not enough student press coverage of the disease.

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It is posted atop a very basic WordPress template, penned by student Lisa Hyunh. In three lengthy entries so far, Hyunh has reflected in memoir form upon her H1NI symptoms, initial diagnosis, treatment-in-progress, and attempts at avoiding exposing others.  As her “Day 2″ entry began:

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2:00 AM: Woke up finding myself covered in a thick layer of sweat. Had brief, OMG, panic attack. Drank a bottle of water in one gulp, wiped off my forehead, then rolled over and decided to worry about it later.

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10:00 AM: Realized that freak sweating incident was probably body’s way of fighting off the fever, because unlike yesterday, I don’t have weirdo chills anymore. Hooray!!! Progress is being made!

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In her latest entry, Huynh even posted a mock obituary, prefaced by the simple lively statement “NOTICE: Did not die.” It was heartening to read- for her sake certainly, but also for the paper. Why? Because the paper has a terrific new blog going. Now the only worry is what to do with the blog once she’s back to feeling fine. :-)

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“Encyclopedia of Journalism” Set to Debut at Month’s End

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , on September 8, 2009 | Leave a Comment »

Six volumes.  Three thousand pages.  Roughly 350 signed entries.  Contributing scholars galore.  Launch date: late September 2009.  It is the Encyclopedia of Journalism, an everything-and-more look at news media then and now overseen by The George Washington University professor extraordinaire Christopher Sterling.

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Sterling has been shepherding the project to fruition for more than four years, helping put together a compendium of knowledge on the technologies, individuals, issues, events, trends, and honors related to the creation, dissemination, intake, and impact of all-things-journalism.  He was gracious enough to recently grant CMM a brief e-interview about the project’s significance and scope.

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Encyclopedia of Journalism

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In the age of Wikipedia and other online knowledge sources, why should a print encyclopedia be of interest to j-students or educators?

Excellent question and one we’ve heard before as you might guess. Indeed many reference book publishers are pulling back as they feel the market has shrunk. But Sage (the publisher) and a number of other firms continue to develop these multi-volume, multi-author works, arguing that a carefully designed and edited work remains of value even in an electronic age (and…no small point, the new Encyclopedia is also available electronically).

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Another point is that such a project does a huge amount of organizing of information- arranging the field, if you will- and that kind of “teaching” is valuable when people first approach a new topic. Wikipedia, for example, is often a great place to start looking up a new subject, but it’s a bad place to stop looking (as so many do).

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Finally, all our authors are identified (obviously not the case on Wikipedia), as is the whole editorial team, which provides some sense of the quality behind the bindings.

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What would you consider the strangest or funniest entries in the encyclopedia?

That’s nearly impossible to say after all these years. Having read and edited virtually every word in the whole thing now about three times, I am way too close to be a fair judge on either question. There is probably not much that’s actually funny, save for some of the journalistic hoaxes, especially in the 19th century. I can say that I learned one heck of a lot (this is a huge field) doing it- and I hope others do as well.

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Bulletin Bounced Due to California State Budget Cuts

Posted in College Media, Journalism, Student Newspaper, tagged , , , , , on September 6, 2009 | Leave a Comment »

The California budget mess has now sadly claimed a college media victim: The Bulletin, the student newspaper at California State University, Dominguez Hills. It has been axed, a victim not for its journalistic value but its costs.

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Specifically, budget cuts throughout the CSU system have precipitated the Bulletin‘s disappearing act, leaving CSU Dominguez Hills as the only school within the system without a campus paper. According to one report: “University officials last spring had sought to cut $16.1 million from the school’s budget, much of which was made up through a 30 percent tuition hike and imposing unpaid staff furloughs on some Fridays and Mondays. Slashing the Bulletin saved the university $76,000 annually, which included printing costs, along with a part-time newspaper adviser, a layout artist and a journalist-in-residence who acted as a writing coach for the student staff.”

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The Bulletin–

Save the Bulletin options being bandied about include going online-only (right now, the Web site is just an online repository for the print edition), upping the advertising revenue, and switching from a paid outside layout staffer to a student team who will do it for free.

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For now though, the campus newsstands stand empty, and talk about the newspaper is a mix of reflection and anticipation. The Bulletin adviser: “I can’t tell you how many success stories we’ve had with this paper.  Hopefully it’ll be back.”

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“Global Student Journalists”: Facebook for the College Press

Posted in College Media, International Student Media, Journalism, New Media, tagged , , , on September 5, 2009 | 1 Comment »

The latest addition to the college media social networking scene: Global Student Journalists.  Billed as “an online meeting place for student journalists from around the world,” the site is aiming to be a universal Facebook for j-students.  Creator Anna Rodrigues is a former television news reporter and producer who now teaches journalism at Durham College in Canada.
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The goal is to allow students to interact, network, share their journalism efforts, and receive feedback from peers.  Rodrigues also plans to provide links to interviews, training tips, and story ideas on a separate Resources page.  In addition, the venture is meant to be a learning experience for Durham journalism students.  They will act as moderators for all content, which will need approval before posting.
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Global Student Journalists

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Rodrigues granted me special access (since I’m a non-student) to explore the current set-up.  At this very early stage, the site is barebones.  Only three student journalists have uploaded anything- two from Egypt and one from Brazil- all providing basic photos of themselves.   The site’s desired scope will provide an interesting case study for a bunch of questions including: Are student journalists clamoring for a virtual point of contact with their peers?  Is there room in the ‘here am I world!’ logjam for another social networking site, especially one tailored to a niche, ever-changing group?  And will students really bother creating and maintaining a professional-type profile and uploading samples of their work if no potential employers have access to see them?
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I really appreciate the idea and admire the site’s ambition.  Idealistically, it should flourish.  Realistically, I think it needs the backing of a major outside organization to reach a tipping point and survive.
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Check out this commercial for the site on YouTube that defines handmade, in the best sense.  Here also is Bryan Murley’s e-interview with Rodrigues recently run on Innovation in College Media.

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26-Year-Old Harvard Alum Named New Yorker Managing Editor

Posted in Journalism, Magazine Journalism, tagged , , , , on September 4, 2009 | Leave a Comment »

Journalism neophytes and dedicated students take heart, all hope is not lost. Yes, jobs may be shedding.  Predictions of demise may be looming.  As you talk about your journalism passions, your parents’ eyes may be rolling.  But with the right training, and a stint in Paris (OK, and a Harvard degree), you too might be able to make the leap to managing editor of a major magazine in the media capital of the world only four years out of school.

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Amelia Lester has spun her journalism experience and “tremendous literary knowledge” into a dream job come true at an age most of us are still flummoxed about how to make our monthly loan payments.  She is a former exective editor of The Harvard Crimson magazine Fifteen Minutes and a past features editor for the lit mag The Harvard Advocate.

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Lester’s leap up the j-career ladder is astonishing for its speed, I imagine even by Harvard standards.  Does it portend positive job news for other young journalists?  Is it a sign of the new media economy (or new media mindset) invading old media?  Or does it prove more simply (but still positively, in my opinion) that connections and an Ivy degree still count for something in this crazy mixed-up media sphere?

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In May 2005, Lester wrote in Fifteen Minutes: “Amelia E. Lester ’05, an English and American literature and language concentrator in Adams House, hopes a publishing job in New York City is forthcoming.”

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Well, it’s here. Some journalism dreams, it seems, are still coming true.

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New Journalism Class: From Breaking News to . . . Tweets?!

Posted in College Media, Future of Journalism, Journalism, Journalism Education, New Media, tagged , , , on September 2, 2009 | 1 Comment »

“The way you make yourself valuable on the Web is: you edit the [expletive] Web.” – Jay Rosen

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So begins the syllabus for a new tweetastic, microblogerrific DePaul University journalism class that is all atwitter over Twitter, employing the site’s 140-character-at-a-time grab-bag of information as the centerpiece of a semester-long practicum on journalism investigations of the new media variety. The course title… “Digital Editing: From Breaking News to Tweets.”

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Page 1 of "Breaking News to Tweets" syllabus

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It is being taught by a digital intern at the Chicago Tribune who also operates Breaking Tweets, a “hyperlocal gone global” collator of citizens’ reactions to specific news events happening in specific places at specific points in time.

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DePaul is citing the course as “cutting-edge” practice in the art of Web and citizen journalist news discovery and evaluation.  A separate report says “this one actually might eventually provide students some return on their precious tuition dollars.”  Others are less convinced about its value.  According to one commenter on Gawker: “The difference between a Twitter Professor/SEO ‘Expert’ and a Sandwich Maker is that sandwiches taste good, while being a professional instructing people on how to use self-evident technology tastes like bullsh*t. And costs more.”

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Twitter.com

+ Breaking Tweets

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DePaul University Logo

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Journalism 2.0 Education!

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Student Newspaper Drops Rising Death Toll from Front Page

Posted in College Media, Journalism, Journalism Ethics, Student Newspaper, tagged , , , , , , on September 1, 2009 | 2 Comments »

The new blog is happening- aiming for a post-Labor-Day debut.  In the meantime, a death toll is missing.  In a recent staff editorial, eds. at The Daily Toreador, the student newspaper at Texas Tech, announced that the paper will no longer publish a tally of soldiers killed in fighting in Iraq on its front page. The feature has run on page one amid controversy in all Toreador issues since fall 2005.

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In a comment to the editorial online, a former Toreador managing editor explained: “When we first created it, we thought it would be a constant presence to remind students of the toll of war. The beauty of the toll was that its number never lied. There was no spin or bias behind those four digits. The numbers told the story, and readers were left to interpret their meaning.”

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At the time, depending on the reader, the tally’s prominent placement in the paper was interpreted, ironically, as either pro-military spin or anti-Bush bias. Presently, with editors attributing its removal to President Obama’s Iraqi withdrawal pledge, the latter criticism is cropping up as most common in online comments.

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According to the editorial: “The decision to remove it came after President Barack Obama pledged to withdraw troops from Iraq by 2011 and focus attention to Afghanistan. . . . At a time when the United States is engaged in multiple foreign conflicts, the editorial board feels it [the death toll] no longer serves readers as it once did.”

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One commenter’s comeback: “You mean to say the United States is engaged in so much war and loss that it serves no purpose to track war and loss? . . . You’re taking down the death toll at a time when you should be expanding it to include such an important escalating theater where Obama is sending more troops: Afghanistan.  Or include contractor deaths (which everyone forgets).  Or coalition troops.  Most [of] the deaths occurring in Afghanistan are college-aged men and women, yet you guys feel it’s not topical or relevant or serves any purpose to college-aged readers?”

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My take: The Toreador team is truly in a tough spot, one they must expect, respect, and build upon journalistically.  If running the death toll in the first place four years ago caused such a brouhaha (even a Student Government resolution attempting to remove it!), current staff must have realized that dropping it was also not going to slip past the dogs of war.  So embrace the controversy!  Run competing editorials.  Publish a story about eds. at professional papers who have run or still run similar features.  Spotlight a Q&A with military experts about the difficulty of keeping a concrete death count in an era of modern warfare in which the fighting locations and starting and end dates are constantly subject to change (“Mission Accomplished” banners aside). The tally may now be gone, but the conversation about its meaning does not have to end.

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