The Quality-Control Quandry

The article "The Quality-Control Quandry" by Carl Sessions Stepp made me think more about the future of journalism. It is interesting to know all the goes into putting out a newspaper. In times like these where the economy keeps worsening, we need our news to keep us in the know. But with a limited number of editors, are we getting all the of the news?

With the number of editors decreasing, there are less people to check the work of journalists before it goes to print. This means less source checking and fact checking also. This could lead to fabricated stories by lazy journalists who think that they won't get caught, because after all like the article writes, essentially all editors have time for is to check spelling and write headlines.

Are these budget cuts in the journalism world going to lead to more concise journalism? Well as the article said the future of journalism may be that journalists will be better trained to edit their own stories. But with less time going into what goes into print, major mistakes can be made.

The thinning of newspapers (literally) means that stories need to be as newsworthy and concise as possible in order to fit as many news stories as the newspaper can hold. But with less people working in departments to improve stories, does this make the production quality less or greater?

Is Cosmopolitan in trouble?

I will admit that I enjoy reading Cosmopolitan magazine. I recently have been reading it more often because my aunt got me a subscription for Christmas. In the latest May issue, there was a reader's survey in the back about the online website. It asked things like "How often do you check the website?", "Do you check the website more than buying the magazine in the store?" and so on...

I have been noticing lately that the magazines I enjoy reading are getting thinner. I have noticed this especially in my favorite magazine I read cover to cover: Entertainment Weekley. I feel like there is less advertisements and articles and reviews are more condensed than they used to be. To me, the slimming of magazines and newspapers is a real problem. Of course it is nice to have instantaneous updates online, but there is just something about holding a magazine or newspaper in one's hands. It is real, I can flip through it, and I can tear out articles I enjoy. I can give it to someone else to read and enjoy. It is more difficult to read things online. It hurts my eyes to stare at a screen for hours at a time.

So I'm hoping my favorite magazines don't fail like many newspapers. But in today's world maybe this is going to start happening soon. I think Gutenburg is going to roll over in his grave.

Is Cosmopolitan in trouble

Fake Palindromes

I came across an interesting column in my hometown newspaper called "Wood on Words" in the Rockford Register Star. Barry Wood is the columnist and in his March 29th column he takes about palindromes. Palindromes are very interesting because they say the same thing if you read them backwards. I had no idea there were so many. There are also words like "level" and "noon" that are spelled the same way backwards and forwards.

Other palindromes listed in the article are:

"Mr. Owl ate my metal worm."
"Evil olive"
"Was it a car or a cat I saw?"
"Rise to vote, sir."
"I prefer pi."
"Ma is as selfless as I am."

And there are many more. I just find it interesting that this exists in the English language. This is a very strange language indeed.

Technology and Journalism

I have been thinking about the generation that I have grown up in and how technology has always been a part of my life. Because of this I can adapt to new technology but my dad and mom struggle with it because they did not grow up with computers, cell phones etc. (my dad doesn't even know how to turn on a computer).

So with the internet age soon all generations will have grown up with computers. However, many people still cannot afford them. If newspapers go completely online and are never printed anymore, will everyone get the information? Will people care as much?

What is the future of journalism if technology keeps advancing? I keep thinking about how my grandparents acted and I can't believe that I will be 95 and still text messaging my friends. Or will I still have a Facebook? Because if I do, my profile picture will be from when I was 20 not when I am 80.

This is a strange world we live in. The world is constantly changing and advancing. I can't help but giggle thinking that I will be elderly and jamming to music on my Iphone. But by then Iphones will probably be considered passe.

Bad Grammar

I was on youtube the other day and came across this video about bad grammar. The lyrics really ring true. The song is to the melody of Timberland's "The Way I Are" which is actually fairly ironic because it should be "the way I am" if it was in proper grammar. The lyrics of the parody are:

I ain' got no reason
I ain' got no motive to articulate
My consonants and vowels
I see no good reason to enunciate

Baby it's alright you got no eloquence
As long as it rhymes
It don't have to make sense
Jus' throw out all those grammatical elements
There ain' no need to say it right.

(Chorus:)
It's the latest trend
Go an tell your friends
We can all begin
To use some bad grammar.

All the latest songs
Like to say it wrong
We be singing with some bad grammar

Take the last letter
Off the ends of words
Now you talkin' wit' some bad grammar

I ain' pullin' tricks
With my linguistics
I'm jus' talkin'
I don't use no syntax

I ain' got no idea
What a singular verb is
I'm worser at superlatives
And I don't ever use no double negatives.

Baby it's alright
C'mon now don't be skurred
It's all the latest craze
To mispronounce some words

Like instead of saying "that right there"
We would say "that right thurr"
And we won't even spell it right

(Chorus)

Baby girl
When I took my English class
You know I barely passed

Listen baby girl
Got no proper verb skills
But I be wearin' grillz

I ain' gonna talk da talk
To make my record pop
So that's why baby girl
When I'm talkin' it seems impaired
Seems impaired, yeah

Yo ma grammar ain' no prodigy
Ma strongest suit isn't morphology
It's hard for people to be understanding me
Never changed my verbal habits since I was three

So listen baby girl
Before you make another sound
Make sure that you're on par

Cuz listen baby girl
We be talkin' wit' some bad grammar
Bad grammar yeah...

(Chorus)

Timberland is not the only artists who makes money off of grammatical errors. Somehow in our culture it has become the norm to talk this way. The simplest songs become big hits. Other songs that are more thought provoking with complicated lyrics do not become hits because music for our generation has become dumbed down.

Bad grammar usage in songs is a problem because the common teenager will think that if Timberland speaks this way, then he or she should also speak in the same manner. It makes a person sound uneducated when they take off the ending of words, speak in double negatives and swear a lot.

This parody is funny but also rings true in a lot of ways. You can view it by going to http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mj6QqCH7g0Q

Class Photos

I would only publish the first of the first of the Budd Dwyer photos. At first glance these photos look like a joke. Upon seeing that these photos are real and the last photo is after he has shot himself, a reader would be very disturbed. I would possibly publish the second photo, but definitely not the one of him with the gun in his mouth or after he has shot himself. Dwyer obviously called the press conference for attention and does not deserve the respect of not printing the photos. However, this is more out of respect for the reader.

Of the five other photos, I would probably only print the first one of the boy with the dog. This photo makes a statement and is very emotional. The newspaper editor did the right thing in asking the family if they could use the photo. Most editors would not check when printing a photo like this. The other photos are too sensitive to be printed, especially the photo of the boy in the body bag. The boy on the spike fence did not die, but this is too grosteque of a photo to be printed. The last photo of the woman's clothes being ripped off is too sexual in nature to be printed. However, I could see it being printed in order to show that Mardi Gras can get too out of hand and women are still mistreated during these events.

Shows are an inverted pyramid

I'm not sure if this really has anything to do with editing, but I realized the other day that it seems like television shows follow an inverted pyramid style, especially reality shows with more than one segment. Broadcast news is definitely like this with the "top story" first, something that most viewers will watch first and then the less important news will come after and viewers begin to dwindle.

The same goes for television shows. For example, if you have ever seem the show "Ghost Hunters", the most interesting segment is first. The investigators usually find more evidence during this segment and it is more interesting. Some viewers might stick around for the second segment to see if what they pick up is more interesting, however, most of the time they do not find anything.

You can explore most reality shows and even some scripted shows and find this phenomena.

Poor Caesar

I have gleamed over the blog I was assigned. http://commonsensej.blogspot.com/ I have found that most of the posts are not things that I am really that interested in, however this post from Tuesday, January 27th caught my eye.

By Doug Fisher:

"AP stood its ground for years on the traditional spelling of Caesarean section, going back to the roots of the word (though as you can see from Wikipedia and alt-usage-english, those roots are mighty cloudy). No more.The wire service as of today has converted to the now more widely used cesarean section.Also note the new one is lowercase."

I wonder often how certain words get their meaning. Who decided that a c-section during a birth should be called a Caesarean? What in the world does it have to do with leaders of Rome, Augustus or Julius Caesar?

There is also Caesar dressing and Caesar salad which make a little more sense because maybe Caesar liked salad? Or was the name given to this salad because it is somewhat regal in appearance with its ingredients of croutons, shredded cheese, lettuce and a creamy dressing?

I really do not have an explanation for the salad but in the case of the C-section (for those of you that do not know what this entails, it is when an infant is cut out of the womb because of complications of the pregnancy will not allow the woman to birth the child naturally) I do have an idea. Julius Caesar was stabbed to death and I am sure that having a C-section is like being stabbed to death because a scapel cuts into the woman while she is still awake. This sounds so pleasant, doesn't it?

I wikipediaed (is that a verb) this and I know that I should not use the wiki as a reputable source, but it says that the origins of the name comes from the Latin verb caedere which means to cut a baby out of a woman before she died. Some say that Julius Caesar got his name this way because his ancestor was born by C-section.

Also with some research, I have learned that the Caesar salad was invented by a different Caesar, Caesar Cardini, in Italy in 1924. The story goes that on this day at Caesar's family restaurant, the place was packed and the cooks were running out of supplies. Caesar threw whatever he had together and supposedly gave it to the customers.

Sources:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caesarean_section
http://www.kitchenproject.com/history/CaesarSalad/index.htm

Hope you all enjoyed this blog and I gave you something to mull over...until next time!

3-D commercials?

I have two topics to write about today. First, I was thinking about the News Editing lecture today and how journalists make mistakes and I can think of many instances in the newspaper that a copy editor has made a mistake when putting in a photo caption, however, it was probably mostly the fault of the reporter.

When I do Civil War Reenacting with my family, I end up having a photo in the newspaper at least some of the time. One instance I can recall is when I was with my friend Lanah and my sister walking around the battlefield in our dresses when a man asked to take our photo. He asked for our names and assumed that Lanah was our sister and did not ask for her last name. When we opened the newspaper the next day, we saw that not only was her name spelled "Lona" but it also said, From left to right Lona, Elizabeth, and Carrie Allen at the Civil War Reenactment in Waconda, Ill. What was also strange was that I was on the far left so if anyone looked at the photo they would think that I was Lanah.

On a different topic I was wondering what everyone thought about some of the commercials during the Super-Bowl being in 3-D. While it is an interesting marketing ploy, it the viewer did not have 3-D glasses, which I doubt many people had, the commercial looked tacky and the video looked animated. It was almost difficult to watch.

I have really never bought into the 3-D thing because I find it difficult to watch anything in 3-D for more than 15 minutes. This is because the viewer has to keep their head straight the entire time or they will lose the effect. This is hard on the eyes. I am sure many of you agree.

In case you missed it, check out the Sobe commercial on Youtube. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=slbzIP-WYhk

Cranes, trains and automobiles

In my first post, I will introduce myself and some interesting things about me. My name is Liz Allen and I am 22. I go to the University of Illinois Champaign-Urbana and am majoring in Journalism. Some random facts about me and things that I enjoy:

1. I enjoy making paper cranes. I hang them all around my apartment. I can do some other simple orgami but cranes are the only things I can do from memory.

2. I love crocheting. It is different from knitting for those of you that don't know. It is done using only one needle instead of two and the needle is more like a hook. While knitting is done vertically, crocheting is done horizontally.

3. I really like any books, television shows (Paranormal State, Ghost Hunters) and films about the paranormal.

4. One of my dreams is to write a novel that would really affect people. Maybe it would be made into a movie starring Rob Pattinson <3>

5. One goal I have is to move to Chicago and write for a magazine. I would love to eventually move to New York and work for Entertainment Weekly. I read EW cover to cover.

6. When I was younger I wanted to be an archaeologist. In fact, I would dream of living in Egypt and going on digs for artifacts. But then I realized that going on digs meant days of digging in the dusty earth and finding almost nothing.

7. I am ridiculously obsessed with Twilight and Harry Potter, but honestly who isn't? However, I liked Twilight before it was mass hysteria and even got Eclipse signed by Stephenie Meyer.

8. I really like Hanson. I know you can't get past their MMMbop days but if you give them a listen now that they are 23, 25, and 27 you may actually like them: Download-Great Divide.

9. Halloween is my favorite holiday. I love carving pumpkins, going to haunted houses, watching scary movies and dressing in costumes.

10. I have been a Civil War Re-enactor for 22 years now. My sister and I were basically forced into it because it is my parents job but I actually have enjoyed dressing like a soldier or a woman in the 1860s. It has even inspired the novel I am working on now.

11. I love old movies. I think that they are much better quality than movies that are slapped together today. Some of my favorite actors and Jimmy Stewart, Carey Grant, Gregory Peck, Grace Kelly, Audrey Hepburn, and Marilyn Monroe.

12. I love having jam sessions. I can play piano somewhat well and so does my sister along with other instruments. During the Christmas season we probably play and sing Christmas songs a few hours a day

13. I love riding the train more than any other means of travel. I get my best thinking done while on the train and I have met some "interesting" people.

14. If I could be anyone (which I don't recommend because you should always be yourself) I would be Tina Fey because I think that she is absolutely the funniest woman alive and she is nerd chic which is what I can be at times. However if I could be someone that has passed I would be Audrey Hepburn because she is my favorite actress and completely fabulous.

15. I'm obsessed with television shows that have mythologies for example: Lost, The X-files, Fringe, and more. They challenge my mind and make me think about possible theories.

I realize that this isn't really the assignment blog for this week but I thought that I would just write something for fun and then write a blog more with a news editing scope for next time. But for those of you reading this, I thought you may enjoy a few fun facts.