September 2008 Archives

"Aero was helpful when he came down to the office once to help sort through his photos to put on the sports page."

- Chelsea Oliver

"Aero is enthusiastic and friendly, which is an important factor in making the Setonian an enjoyable experience for the many students who volunteer their time. He also has a great eye for visual detail, and he's not at all shy about moving around the room or getting up close when he's taking photos of an event. We can always use sports photographers, since it's always a challenge to get good, close-up, clear photos of sports events. Since SHU is expanding its study abroad programs into China, Aero's connections might be very useful for writing an in-depth story on SHU's study abroad in China efforts.  I'd also like to see a better process for getting color pictures on the Setonian Online. (Right now, if any pictures do get online, they are black and white, and I find it frustrating that we're not putting our best stuff into our online archive.)  We can always use help with layout, online publication, and preparing the photos for publication, so there are plenty of technical areas where Aero's skills would be a good fit.   As he continues to work on his English skills, I'd like to see Aero taking photo assignments that include submitting long captions, so that he can practice his news-gathering skills in English."

- Dr. Jerz

Aero is a very photographer who full of passion - maybe only passion that he has. Of course, whatever picture that he took, shows that passion inside his soul. However, rather than a talented young photographer, he might just an expensive young camera guy with shameless heart eager the closer photos of the things happened in his life time. Not like most young ambitious photographer, he does not own any studio or work for some famous photo magazine but came to a small campus laid on a small hill in the other side of earth from his hometown to pursue his dream of freedom speech in America. But he himself here does not speak freely - not even close, because his English is way much worse than he thought he can learn.

       However, with his friends' generous help, he is getting better slowly. Deep into his heart, he knows without his friends, he will become nothing but a big loser. Can his friends help him to inquire his knowledge? Maybe yes. But can his friend dig out his desire for him; say what he wants to shout out loud for him; or find his way into future for him? Definitely, he has to count on himself, learn his lesson by his own.

"I think that you have a lot of potential entering the vast field of journalism. You show eagerness and the ability to perform under pressure. Entering this field from a different culture brings in new perspectives to traditional ideas."

- Jeremy Barrick

       The worse explanation of "potential" is "someone has not had this ability". It is an exact understanding of Aero's situation right now. And the eagerness just another describe of his shameless action - this time is not for photos, but the language. Fortunately, the word "potential" can too be interpreted as "one ability that someone will gain sooner or later". Aero is more happy with this ability, because he can at least hopefully gain some ability to write a piece for entertaining someone but himself eventually. Once he realizes he could be a useful man for the Setonian, he therefore laughed and said:

"Oh, I might not be just 'potential'."

"Aero's photography skills are excellent. He attended the first meeting, helped us get our Mac back online before production started, and submitted all the photos Chris asked him to. Aero can contribute by continuing to take photos, and if he has any interest in editing them I am sure Chris Bruce would be more than happy to train him."

-         Stormy Knight

Aero is a young journalist who pursues his dream, which is using his own word to tell the truth happened in the world to his reader, cross country to a new land in the other side of earth from his hometown. His understanding of "new media journalism" is the journalism that base on a new format of medium - internet. This medium not only provides an easier way for people to gain information, but also let the reader have a chance to comment the news itself. So internet does not like the traditional format of mediums, have a different perspective of responding. Besides, it also is a hyper of video, music, and text. Thereby, we cannot treat it just like it is only a text.

By more ten years internet writing and photographing experience, and one year working experience at TV channel, he has fully capability at designing webpage, using diversified media, and suggesting interesting idea to grabbing readers' attention.

As he is not an English native speaker, he need more practice to improve his English. In this course, he would fine more chances to improve it.

As Aero's best interest in photograph, he will spent most of his spare time sticking in improving his photographing skill in order to better serve his future readers. Just like Ms. Knight's word, he is now a hard-working photographer busy about taking photos around the campus. But he also knows, a good journalist cannot only good at taking pictures.

So, his personal goal is also to develop his English writing skill - writing the article with clarity information, few grammar mistakes, and common sense of English.

The way that he is going to improve it will be reduced to three methods.

1.      Read his classmates' blog entries. By reading his classmates' blog entries, he can easily stimulate the writing. So he can improve the writing skill faster.

2.      Write extra composition by using spare time. The more he write, the better he can write.

3.      Try new way of writing. he can try new way of writing in order to explorer the potential of his writing skill.

Overall, as long as the ambition of writing stays in his heart, he will be able to write a better simple.

Well, I hate reading! LOL. Yes, I just spent 2 hours to finish the required reading on my textbook! What I read from the Kilian basically are:

1.      Make your article more readable on Internet.

2.      The internet writing is different, you should follow a routine. Of course, if you feel like this routine that I gave you is not so suitable for you, OK, than do not follow it! (Do not blame me if you fall to interest people by following my routine.)

3.      What is my routine, I am going to tell you by following couple of chapters!

4.      Oh, yes, you can also call my chapter as hyper-text, it is so cool!

OK, I maybe just too tired, I will modify it when I feel like this book!

Before network exists, I do not think there is any large scale of opening writing discussion in the whole world. But I believe there are something functioning just like the smiley in writing before the smiley was invented.

Believe or not, most students in China love to write a paper content nonsense discussion during the class time. They transmit the paper underground, avoid the noticing of teacher, and enjoy the discussion such as the color of the teacher's underwear or the activity after school. On the paper, beyond pure writing, there are also a lot of drawings, and most of the drawings are indicate the emotion of the sentences. Hence to use emotional image to express one's opinion is not a huge invention but only human's nature capability. However, to dig out the relationship and express it so well, the smiley is truly a great invention of this era of Internet.

Speak to smiley; we have to mention the inventor Scott Fahlman. He mentioned some idea that I interest about on his article about the history of smiley. "I believe that I invented this particular glyph and the 'turn your head to one side' principle independently", "Leonard Hamey's post suggesting (#) for humor might be taken as an example of 'turn your head to one side'," he typed in this article. It is very interesting that it explain the humor might be taken as 'turn your head to one side' here, because it is very visual - while we make joke, we usually turn our head to one side or shrug one side of our shoulders (that also looks like turn our head to one side).

About the discussion of whether the smiley has a bad influence of literary, I have to say this influence is bad. However, it is a good influence to the model society. Only because the writing discussion became possible for the public, the smiley was invented. And to express our emotion efficiently, easily, and heartily, the smiley is definitely a necessary tool for most of us.

"Translate jargon. Interpret bureaucratic, legal, scientific or technical language for readers." - Ch. 5. The Student Newspaper Survival Guide by Rachele Kanigel, p. 42

Can technical language be used in general newspapers? I think it can be. There is my point of view: because the audience is not necessary to understand all of the vocabulary in order to understand the whole article. If we used some professional terms in our article, it would only show that we are highly specialized. Moreover, to use some "easy language" to express some big word may cause the results turns too redundant. 

Newbie is something I am very familiar. It came from UUCP (I think it short for Unix to Unix Copy Protocol), and was invented by Tom Truscott and Jim Ellis. The biggest difference between the Internet today and usenet is usenet run by the NNTP agreement.

In China, we have tw.* and hk.* (I notice that cn.* is also established, but I never used that). Actually, as usenet has its unique advantage (you can never hack the host), it is widely used in our government (based on a closed network).

If there is a relationship between newbie and internet, I think that would only be hair like. But we would definitely gain some similar experience from them. I read a lot of my classmates' comment about this article, and they show some confusion about the work model of usenet. I realize that it because most of them did not use DOS system before.

There is one thing this article did not make very clear - "usenet messages look very much like e-mail" - actually, it is not like e-mail at all. I figure it just wanted to express the message is tasked like the push message. But it is wrong just like say the RSS just looks like e-mail. And in fact, we should say the message looks like RSS (will be more exact).

Anyway, I think this article still is a great story about how people will react when they bring into contact with a totally new information system. It also gives me a new idea that is:

If the new work system is not as open as it is nowadays, would it be so popular?

"In a tragedy, never ask a victim's family, "How do you feel?" Learn something positive about the victim before you approach family and friends. The family will respect you more if you are able to say up front that you knew the victim was "a history major and a real leader for the field hockey team."  The Student Newspaper Survival Guide, p. 34

I picked this one because I have a profundity impression while the victims of the earthquake in Sichuan, China were rescued, almost all my colleagues asked the same insignificant question - how do you feel?

We all know the answer is "I feel like I just been through hell." But why would so many professional reporters still ask such a bitter question? To make the casualty feel worse in order to enhance the tragedy atmosphere? In some case, I have to yes. We did have learned some course that teach us torture the cover object and make them feel more depress to build stronger atmosphere. But in such a case, I do not think that is necessary at all. In fact, I think most of our journalists do so are just because they lost the basic professional spirit under such an ultimate case. They wanted to ask something, but they forgot how to. The awful question just daps from their unprepared mouth. Therefore we should not just barely remember how to do, but also should prepare as our subconscious action. That is very hard, I know, but we should do so.

"The most efficient way to cover a campus is to develop a coordinated beat system." - Ch. 3, The Student Newspaper Survival Guide by Rachele Kanigel, p. 20

I have read the comments, and I believe the beat system is not only suitable for some big campus like University of Florida, but also could be a systematically co-responding source system for any small campus. To demonstrate different sort of visual would be very necessary. It can help the newspaper itself contain colligated information, which may interest distinct people. So my understanding for this sentence is it is also a pivotal way for our Setonion to fetch more attention from campus or even locals. 

"Some student newspapers have a buddy system that links incoming reporters to more experienced staffers; others assign a senior staffer to act as a writing coach." - Ch. 2, The Student Newspaper Survival Guide by Rachele Kanigel, p. 13

All right, I have seen everybody's comment already. My opinion is the "buddy system" is not very realistic, but it could be done on some points. What I am trying to say is if we just make the connection, which is not so frequent, maybe we could gain some advantage from this system. Half a loaf is better than no bread.

"Many believe student newspapers, more than journalism degree programs, are the best way to launch a career in the field. The clips and experience you get at your college paper can pave the way to internships and jobs." - Ch. 1, The Student Newspaper Survival Guide by Rachele Kanigel, p. 8

I saw Kayla's comment as

I agree with this quote. The Setonian is really the only way to get practical writing experience at Seton Hill University. Internships are another way, but those can be difficult to find depending on where you live. The University only offers one course of Newswriting. Writing for the campus newspaper is the only other way to discover a little bit about what it is like to be a journalist.

And in my opinion, I must argue that I do not agree with that. Any practical work should be built on some "basement". And a journalism degree is the "basement" that we need to improve ourselves to achieve any practical job. For example, I doubt my ability of doing any practical job that related to journalism if I will not finish the degree in a university in US, even though I have been a Chinese journalist already in China.

Writing to me, is like a huge staircase. I must continue to study and practice in order to step to a new floor. I am now feeling the more I write the more lack of experience I have. Some people say that to continue writing is very tough. I would argue writing is like digging the treasures - gold will be dug out every day - will you stop digging because it is tough? I see how difficult the writing is, but I also saw how rewarding it is. Every day, I feel I gain something truly meaningful to myself in writing. That is why I am so happy. I paid attention on everything around me, and then I write it down in my notebook. There is a phase in Chinese that can be translated as "The one who know people, is the one who is smart; the one who know oneself, is the one who is wise." Clearly understand ones' position, clearly understand what one should write, and clearly understand ones' reader. These are the stair I choose to climb. I think that the success of a writer is that he or she is good at thinking. That is to say, they have a method of thinking, which a writer can follow the perspective of readers to think about the issue, to write. And that would also be my goal of writing.

Loyal stared at the trees far away from his house through the window. "There is another dimension to this war which I haven't considered," he murmured. Yes, but how could he know if he had any other option? The environment of this area is wonderful, so is his lover. But nobody can guarantee these would last forever. Without anticipating any compensation from his country, he made his mind obvious and steped out of the house to his lover. Snowflakes fluttered in the sky and freezzed the mother earth. He put his hands on either side of her face and said: "I will come back by the approach of summer." Then he soon disappeared in the frozen air.

(The underlined words are those required to use.)

Many young teachers today have their own network publication. As they are also young adult while they have been the part of education system, to own a blog or simply some web pages is not a big deal, but some of them post different kind of inappropriate information on it, which would be consider as a challenge to the education system itself - can the educator himself or herself do something inappropriate in public?

In China, there is an old phase, which can be translated as "What we learn from the other people, is what call teaching not what call teacher." That means, when we learn other people we suppose to choose the good characters from them, and not just imitate everything.

It seems that it is internet brought this 'wild' problem, but in fact it is a problem has been existed long before internet rushed into everybody's house.  Before the internet has been widely used, they might just hide these awful idea under their mind. No doubly, internet is making the social connection much easier. Therefore, students can easier visit their teachers' web pages. But it cannot explain as internet caused this mess. In the opposite, internet is solving it! Internet just like a digging machine discovered the educators' deepest heart. If they are not probity as they trying to pretend, they might exposure their evil mind to the public on internet.

Consequently, the internet brings us a thunder of Zeus towards every unethical teacher around us.

A lot of people do not know how to think like a writer. This does not mean they cannot write, but instead indicates that they cannot create something to charm their readers. We generally do the "unconscious writing" but once we realize that writing should serve people who read and appreciate our experience on the paper, we will get to the entrance of higher writing skill. Before reading this chapter, I thought I already knew how important it is to think as a writer. However, this chapter gave me a totally new point of view and indicated a clearer way for achieving this goal. Human's brain does not reflect an organized pattern naturally. Just like the water reflection, our cerebra only reflects some tiny specify things and randomly holds them together. Therefore, if we need to write with clarity and in an organized manner, we need to master the ability to think systematically. We have to consider our opinion meticulously and rewrite our whole article constantly. As the outcome of our writing ultimately should be for pleasing our readers, we have to anticipate and appreciate the response from them. This means writing is not a one way job. It requires frequent reviews and constant changes in our drafts. We have to understand reader's expectation and should be writing to meet it. And it also means we have to aim at the potential readers of our article. For instance, if we write a medical report for the regular demos, we are not supposed to use too many medical terms. In a word, although achieving the higher writing skill is fairly complicated, as long as we have the heart to serve our readers, we will definitely create a good writing sample.

1.      Write a meaningful subject line.

As E-mail system is so convenience, we usually forget to write a decent letter for our receiver. Inappropriate subject line, frequently, is the first and biggest mistake that we make.

During this article, I noticed that if we want the receiver read our mail priority, we should make a clearly definition in our subject line. It suppose to be short, straightforward, and if we can, interesting.

But what is more important? -Do not forget to write it!

2.      Keep the message focused and readable. 

I have to say, mostly, I forget to keep my article focusing on my topic. And specially, if I trying to write some multiple messages to my receiver, I would just follow the older of my consideration and overlook the receiver's feeling.

This article gives me a great idea to catch the reader's attention - write an instruction. That would make my ideas be clear in the first paragraph. I also believe this shortcut can be use in our essay.

3.      Avoid attachments.

Well, I have to say I already achieve this point completely. When I first use E-mail, it did not even have the 'attachments' function. Therefore, attachment for me like a grenade - only use it when I have to.

4.      Identify yourself clearly. 

Basically, if I write an E-mail to someone who did not know me before or someone who might forget me after a period, I will write down some tips one my subtitle like 'met on plane from Beijing to New York 5/8/2008, the pictures I took for you'. I believe it will be more clear to show who you are and avoid the received just delete my mail because he or she cannot figure out who I am with my subtitle.

5.      Be kind. Don't flame.

I have a very good custom that is I will write my E-mail on word or notepad and copy it to the mailbox, then send it. This would help me make a mistake when I just write on the mailbox and 'incautious' hit the send.

6.      Proofread.

It is a very good tip, but mostly we do not have enough patience to do it just because we (at least me) are too lazy!

7.      Don't assume privacy.

Very good point! That is why I use the attachment as the 'grenade' for.

8.      Distinguish between formal and informal situations.

Sometimes, we just cannot distinguish the relationship with our professor, for example, Dr. Jerz - should we write formally or not? I assume that depends. What do you say?

9.      Respond Promptly.

As I never received more than ten mails per day, it is very easy for me to achieve.

10.  Show Respect and Restraint

I think sometimes E-mails are too fast. In this new way of writing (not so new, though), we can easily forget to think twice. This is not just a tip for improving our E-mail writing skill. It is also a tip for our own life.

Base on the model writing format, internet as the cutting edge outcome has a herculean influence on the new generation of teenagers. They forgot punctuations or capitalization. Somehow they even invented some new word. Moreover, most people tend to write articles which only mention few tiny things around themselves. But can we just say this is bad?

Hundreds years ago, a new writing format became popular in America - the New Humanism. The representative, Irving Babitt, had changed the view of the writing. That is because people like to enjoy writing, specially the writing focus on their own life.

Internet writing evolution is a stretch of the New Humanism. Additionally, we can say, internet gave us a Newer Humanism. Because the electronic products has been widely use in everywhere in this country, publication is getting cheaper than ever before. Almost everyone can write about their life story and easily getting the chance to publish in the internet. And while people write more about their own life, they will definitely find a way to help others and themselves to appreciate the lives.

With the love and appreciation of one's life, let's just simply say, maybe the internet is changing the world and making it a better one.

Basically, the internet today is becoming the strongest tools for writers. Increasing numbers of writers use internet to compose their stories. In the meantime, there is also a great amount of people who do not have any writing experience becoming network composers. That is because internet gives us, at least most of us, the way to express our idea liberally.

Most people would find that they can say anything that they do not dare to say in the real world. They can simply use a new pseudonym to compose articles in their blog or, if they want more people to read their work, some famous forum. In this way, the composer will believe they can say anything they want, but nobody will know. But, will they?

Like using a pseudonym in newspaper or the other traditional news media, Internet at least kept some information of the writer. For instant, IP address. Even if the writer tried to use proxy or multi-proxy to avoid the tracking, it turns out that they cannot remove all the information they left. That is to say, although internet compared to the other format of media is more protectable, someone still can figure out the writer's identity.

On the other hand, the internet allows people to post a variety of articles. The article itself can be offensive, dirty, or even worse. It does not matter. The writer can still post them as much as he or she wants. In this case, internet becomes a very "wonderful" place of the punks. Fortunately, like facing the traditional media, people can choose the materials they love to read. If we do not like someone's composing, just do not visit his or her website. Only somehow, the internet wastes more time than other traditional media, even though we can select the healthy source.

In a word, Internet is a cheaper and easier way for both writer and reader to share their ideas. And just because of this, it also is a harder and dearer way to choose what we should read and write.

(Edited by Christina Celona)