February 2009 Archives

Speak up to Journalism, many people may ask, "How does journalism influence the world?" Yes, reporting is not a power of economic. It does not create material values. Gary Kamiya, writer of Salon.com, answered, "If reporting vanishes, the world will get darker and uglier. Subsidizing newspapers may be the only answer."

If journalism is the saver of our society, how come is it facing a dramatic challenge - that all news media has a big sliding during last few years? "No print publication is immune, including the mighty New York Times," Kamiya said, "All traditional media is in trouble, from magazines to network TV. But newspapers are the most threatened." The existence of internet and the increasing blog entries did influence traditional news media powerfully over years. This phenomenon had been last since a while ago. A lot of people also indicated the internet news media would eventually replace the traditional one. Unlike those optimistic view, Kamiya argued, "As Nation columnist Eric Alterman recently argued, the real problem isn't the impending death of newspapers, but the impending death of news -- at least news as we know it."

Statement of the death of traditional news media is the death of reporting sounds bluffing, but Kamiya explained, "Online journalism is essentially parasitic. Like most TV news, it derives or follows up on stories that first appeared in print. Former Los Angeles Times editor John Carroll has estimated that 80 percent of all online news originates in print." Then she pointed out another problem, "Currently there is no business model that makes online reporting financially viable." In this case, Kamiya assumed, if the internet media replace the traditional media, "It will be feast and famine: There will be far less primary reporting done by professionals and far more information available to ordinary citizens."

The functions of internet news are also problematic. Kamiya indicated, "Academic Middle East analysts, most of whom probably never picked up the phone in their life, but know the region's language and its history, were resoundingly right about the Iraq war. The professional journalism brigade, with its access to high-level sources and people on the ground, was disgracefully wrong. And the Internet has greatly empowered such academics." On the other hand, the news online did accomplish a lot of great reports, "But those who are calling for the demise of traditional media are throwing the baby out with the bath water -- and the baby is reporting...and that faint gleam of empirical evidence will be lost amid the infinite amount of commentary that will instantly dominate the Internet," Kamiya later pointed out.

Beside all those facts, the format of internet news restricts its coverage. Kamiya remained, "It's much easier to consume unfamiliar information in a newspaper than on the Internet. Because of the physical layout of a newspaper, you're much more likely to read a story you aren't interested in than you would if you were online. Even if the same reported stories were available online, they would not be as widely read. Online media is tailored to respond to the individual's conscious desires; it is less capable of stimulating latent ones."

The internet became the killer of traditional media, the consequence might be terrible. Kamiya predicted, "The civic consequences would be just as calamitous. With little empirical evidence about the world, the country would divide further into solipsistic, isolated communities."

Setonian Online is a great student body publish website. However, the design, format, and the layout are confronting a challenge today.

The home page of Setonian Online will lose people's interest at a very short time. Grey background and plain text make it look like a scholastic research program. I almost directly click the X after skimming the homepage. In the age of "picture reading", a non-photo news website is not going to survive. Compare to the journalism program in other university, those mostly have video or at least sideshow with the article, out news look poor and dull.

The other serious issue would be the website itself does not content any newsworthy information. All the news is updating on the website had already become the yesterdays. People don't want to read a article about how the rose show from New York City is going to open tomorrow while those roses had fade. The homepage, in this case, self-knowledgably disappear the today's new or top news section, which usually should be there in any news website.

The problem is quite obvious; the way we are running this website is incorrect. Only one editor who does not have the duty to keep his eyes on the website can no longer make the express sound. More than one person should have the access of the website. We also need to reduce the quality of article in order to make it produce on time. The news like the shoot case in Greensburg, our writer is supposed to report in front of the Greensburg newspaper - even my blog entry is faster than the Setonian report.

The mainly reason is that most people are lack of enthusiasm and passion to write story without payment. The work study job only provide to copy editing and website updating, which do not confront the biggest issue for the Setonian Online now. The system has serious problem, the rule of game is incorrect. The result will only be pathetic.

Being an international student, Aero Windwalker, a freshman year student in Seton Hill University majoring Journalism and Graphic Design, is confronting his second semester's service in the Setonian publication office. Due to the experience of English, Windwalker had not dedicated himself into the copy editing. The many times of rejection of his writing submits also terminated his ability of a copy is deficient. Yet Windwalker had participated the upcoming issue's writing assignment of the shooting case in Greensburg. The efforts and dedications are doubtless.

The photography skill of Windwalker is significant. Tiffany Gilbert, the executive editor of Setonian, stated, "Aero is an extremely important member of our newspaper staff. He has exceptional photography skills and is very reliable when it comes to accepting any photo opportunity." Windwalker had helped four issues of Setonian produce their photos. His capture can always describe the exact moments and conditions in the happened events.

In the end of last semester, Windwalker had trained by Chris Bruce, the former photo editor of Setonian. Now, he is prepared for the photo editing for the next coming issue. Shirley Pol, a sophomore Journalism major student in Seton Hill University, and Windwalker are the potential photo editor for the future Setonian.

Sunday, February 15, 2009, Joseph Briggsm, a Seton Hill University senior, was shot and killed by police. According to police, Joseph Briggsm, 22, had fired at least 30 shots randomly into the street, hitting parking cars and residences with a rifle. The police came to Joseph Briggsm's house at about 4 a.m. and shot at him after he injured one of the policemen.

A mass was held in the St. Joseph Chapel at 4:30 p.m. Monday afternoon. Campus staffs and student representatives mourned the death of Joseph Briggsm. Josh _, student representative, announced the tribute from Janet Bender Jacoby, 1974, Stevens Point, Wisconsin, "My prayers are with all of you. I work as a chaplain and our hospital is right next to the university here in town and I have dealt with some serious situations and it breaks everyone's hearts and the students, faculty, even our hospital staff from crash or too much alcohol, it pierces one's heart. I hold the SHU communities in special prayers these days as you grieve. Thank you for the message so we can pray for all of you. Blessings."

After the mass, the friends and family members of Joseph Briggsm could not accumulate their sadness any more. Many of them cried out loud and had a serious emotion crash down. The family members chose to remain silence and could not reach the common. Robin E. Anke, Associate Dean of Student Serivices Director of Residence Life in Seton Hill University, said, "It is just sad. He is only a kid. I am so sorry for him."

Adam Kezmarsky, a junior student in Seton Hill University, said, "He is really a nice guy. I know him for years. He used to play football, and he helped out the team so much. I had a lot of classes with him, mainly criminal justice. He is so knowledgeable and quiet. It is a shock that this happened to him."

Joseph Briggsm was a criminal justice major at the university and was supposed to graduate this summer. He had a plan on becoming a state trooper. Now his body is waiting for legal medical expert to do the autopsy on Tuesday.

Why do I think that I had heard this podcast last week? Anyway, it is interesting that Dr. Jerz tried so hard to help the audience to remember what is Newsworthiness.

About Newsworthiness, I want to say that we only need to remember two things:

1. Odd
2. New

It is not such a hard thing. Of course, some journalism student may dedicate to magazine writing or journal writing. In this case, the news from 300 hundreds years ago is still breaking news (for those people are digging out dinosaur). In fact, when we can forget what newsworthiness is, but to serve readers as assuming we are they; we start doing newsworthy pieces invisibly.

Even though it seems that internet is innocent for the quality loss of media today, it does lower the total quality of media by changing to habit of reading from readers.

New way of reading in internet content numberless pictures, video, and other interest may disturb the concentration of text. A reader may only review the photos and their footnotes. Some people, on the other hand, directly jump to the comments of the piece of news. It is easy to just read the reactions from other readers, like "Oh that sucks" or "Cool". Readers tend to think less than ever before.

No doubt, it is becoming an age that people is losing their attention on text. But why is Internet the top collaborator? I think it is because of two main reasons.

1. It is cheap.
2. It is fast.

No matter what kind of produce, while it became cheap and fast, the benefit for individual producer becomes little. Apparently, while it comes with money, it is no longer only involve with a person's moral duty and journalism desire. On one hand, more people can easily participate to this area. On the other hand, the quality and motivation from material stimulation are going down.

How many people read digg.com everyday? Does it really have any useful information?
This is the awkward of internet media facing today. We can change it; we can make it better; but overall the quality can only be strengthened by well training writers; who are less popular in this image era.

Go back to the EL200 entry.

December 19, 2005, the staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor, Gregory M. Lamb, post a news journal called Is 'Googlezon' in our future? on the csmonitor.com. In this article, Lamb explains the idea of Googlezon and boldly predicts in 2014 the journalism will entirely transfer from traditional mode to the internet. On robinsloan.com, the blogger title, "In the year 2014, The New York Times has gone offline." Fortunately, The New York Times still runs in a very good condition today in 2009, but according to Dennis Jerz, another famous traditional print out news media, The Times, "is destined for significant and traumatic change".

 

Is it the time for us to leave The Times? Or is it the time for us to put more our attention on the Internet?

 

In VG Cerf's How the Internet is Changing the Concept of Journalism, he states, "Technology is changing the economics of journalism." Like Dennis Jerz has claimed, all the new technologies had more or less changed the way of journalism. Capitalism, as the symbol of western society, makes the economic played an essential role in any circumstances. Even though journalism was not found a discipline to serve economic purpose, but today, obviously, it has become a tool for business class to spare their commercial output.

 

The death of traditional journalism is unavoidable. The higher cost and less convenience of print out news determine the destiny of main stream news media from last century. Many people might still want to open a piece of paper carries the scent of ink, but more and more youth people would accept the new way of reading. Journalism is a subject to deliver information. No matter what the fate of The Times will be, we will not leave it. The way we read it or the shape of the container may be new, but the spirit will be remained.