Bmolinarfall09's Blog

neighbors go

bmolinarfall09 — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 17:57:25 +0000

I absolutely loved neighborsgo.com. I think its a great idea to have a small local newspaper. It keeps the residents involved and informed. Also I would like to point out is this the fact that the readers are able to specify things that are important to them and make people aware of them, not just have the journalist make all the decisions about whats being discussed. With the DFW being such a large area its easy for some of the smaller suburbs to get lost in such the fast pace big city stories. Having Neighborsgo makes it easier for smaller communities to address their issues. Newspapers such as the Dallas Morning News is filled with horrible facts about how crappy our world is becoming. Having a “Community Newspaper” like this just gives you a lighter side of things thats going on because honestly people get tired of reading about all the horrible things that are going on in the world. Yes its important yes people need to know about it, but we also need something that we can look at that doesn’t make us want to live in a metal room with a shotgun just so we feel protected. Everyone has their own opinion and having different types of options is good so that people can read and choose what they want.

USA Today

bmolinarfall09 — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 04:59:15 +0000

The newspaper that I decided to look up about political content was USA Today, merely because I was going to go with the number one newspaper but I thought a lot of people would choose that plus I dont really like odd numbers. Anyways what I found, after I got past the pop up advertisements, was that the USA Today has a tab for 2008 archives. Which was kind of perfect because thats exactly what I was looking for. In connection to the PEW Internet was that graph/map/chart was really good and clear. Everything was labeled and color coated and very easy to read and understand. On the top of the page is also has little tabs for different things like if you wanted to see pictures or video all you have to do is click on it and it would take you to whatever you wanted to see it also includes different branches of the government like Senate, House, Governors. And they are on multiple social networking sites like MySpace, Facebook, twitter, and yahoo buzz. I think all in all if I had to say whether or not this newspaper took the advice of PEW, I would say yes. Everything thing that the newspaper has, the website either said the ratings were up on this particular section or that it was used by a high percentage.

maps

bmolinarfall09 — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 17:20:22 +0000

1639 N. West County Road, Near Lewisville.

video

bmolinarfall09 — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 05:01:44 +0000

So the web video I watched was on myfoxdfw.com it was about this cop in Maryland who went to this haunted house apparently got scared and pulled his gun out on this guy! I think this story was pretty funny thats why I chose it. I mean no one was hurt and its a lil weird. Like, this guy willingly went to this haunted house you would think he might be aware that some guy would chase him with a chain saw and that it probably a joke. But nope not this cop, he thought it was real and pointed a gun at the chest of this man. Can you say crazy? Well to start off the main thing about this video is the sound. It doesnt have a reporter on it. It has the interviews which you can hear then it goes to b=roll but absolutely no audio. So if I hadnt read the story I wouldnt really know what the story was about. I would say this is a horrible video for FOX 4 to put on their site. The quality really just sucks. They should have just told it in print style. The key element is basically telling the story about a cop pulling a gun on a guy at a haunted house. One thing that the guy mentioned was the fact that in Maryland officers just recently became available to carry their weapons. So this guy was saying of things like this are going to happen maybe they shouldnt be able to carry weapons at all times. All in all the story was compelling the interviews were compelling but the video as a whole was not.

Convergence

bmolinarfall09 — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 05:45:24 +0000

convergence is a brilliant idea. It’s a time saver, it’s an engaging way to keep people informed and entertained at times. With technology growing it all about competition and the more you have to offer the better off you are. And although I think its great for different news organizations to incorporate this, It’s not always the route that everyone wants to take. So with that I dont think that this should be the only way to go.

In the article multimedia storytelling she says When you report a story for print — using a reporter’s notebook to write down information from interviews or what you see or hear — what you gather is useful only for print. Well I dont agree with that at all really. I mean maybe Im reading it wrong but Im pretty sure that Iv done a story (For TV) and used a reporters notebook to write down information of what I saw and heard and what I gathered was not used for print it was gathered for tv and it was useful. So, I think Jane should probably reword that. Other than that Both articles were good. They did a good job defining and describing the different parts of a story and telling why they were important. When you say multimedia most people say phone, internet, tv, ect. But when you bring them all together thats real multimedia. No matter where you are or what you’re doing convergence gives us the opportunity for find what we are looking for.

Chicago Beating

bmolinarfall09 — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 17:21:06 +0000

Just six-weeks into the school year there has already been five student deaths. Sixteen-year-old Derrion Alber was one of them. He was beaten to death last month in Chicago. People seem to be pointing the finger and nobody taking the blame. Parents are blaming the school system, the school system is blaming the government. Who is taking responsibility. In the last three years there has been over 40 children killed violently. 254190414711_derrionalbert.jpg

Officials pledge Campaign against youth violence, but its going to take a lot more help from everyone in the community. The problem extends beyond Chicago and everyone needs to take responsibility.

Nieman Foundation

bmolinarfall09 — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 05:15:30 +0000

Ok well I do have to admit I not quite sure where to start on this one. Im assuming that Im just suppose to write about this guy Jeff Howe, who is now going to attend Harvard University and participate in the Nieman Foundation program. Howe is a journalist and author who is basically going to be attending Harvard for a year doing a bunch of research on media journalism. Which its pretty cool, I mean he doesnt get paid, but he doesnt have to pay either so, guess it works out.

He was taking some time off from his blog but now is starting back up on it. Howe wrote a book called crowdsourcing, wikipedia with everything, is basically what it boils down to. It’s a pretty intense hypothesis that you really have to pay attention to understand. It’s like everyone coming together but though the internet and coming together through shared interest and helps companies come together. In stead of having the one perfect person from the job, you have an entire network of people coming together making the job even better than anyone may have expected.

Our World

bmolinarfall09 — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 06:28:51 +0000

The Our World website is a very interesting website to say the least. It’s great that the website is directed to the younger audience. It’s difficult for some young people to be interested and want to learn about our world if its being broadcast in a boring difficult to understand sort of way. With this website it makes it fun and entertaining for young americans to ingest what is going on in their world. It intertwines things that they would be interesting in like networking websites and music along with educational information which is a brilliant idea. It’s also great that the website shows our leaders of tomorrow how they can help now. Even the little commercials on the website were awesome.

When viewing this website I tried really hard to try and find something that I would change or critique. The website would be a little better if it placed more informative news as far as what’s going on in the world in a more point blank non bias sort of way. I wish more people old and young were aware of the website.The adults of today are concerned about the future as well because the future is what their children will be living through and I think they are aware of what needs to be known and how much effort it will take.

in class 9/17

bmolinarfall09 — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 17:20:19 +0000

Ideas are being brought to government’s attention on bringing dollars to the states. A group of specialist and doctors have come up with the idea of taxing sugar-sweetened beverages. A nation tax of 1 cent per ounce of sugar-sweetened beverage would bring about $14.9 billion in the first year.

With the numbers of obese Americans raising this problem is not only affecting the people themselves but also has an effect of financial health programs.

Being aware that taxing the drinks will not solve Americas obesity problem it will certainly help provide the funds for hospitals and programs that are needed for all the side affects that come along with being obese, like diabetes and cardiovascular disease.

Connection

bmolinarfall09 — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 05:00:18 +0000

Defining the role of a blog on a news website I think can be sort of complicated, because I think it can be defined as more than one thing. I think there are different reasons why networks have blogs and for each reason that could be considered a definition.

For example one station may have a blog because they feel that its important for their employees (reporters, anchors, ect.) to be able to discuss things they feel are newsworthy and important and give their own angle to that might not have been covered on air. Also I think that we the viewers are able to see this it and it actually makes us feel a little more connected to the people that we turn to for news on a daily basis because we get to see a more of a personal side of them and that just makes them a little more human.

Another reason the role of a blog in a newsroom is so important is the interaction that it brings between the viewer and the news station. This can also include outside bloggers. Which is basically other people that read the blogs might have blogs themselves. I would say though is that yes people trust news blogs because there legit, but there are also so many phony bloggesr out there who claim to be ethical truth telling people are actually just full of it. But because they’re seen leaving comments on news website blogs people who are unaware chose to click and look them up, just to have their head filled with a load of bs.

Blogging more and more overtime is becoming a very large part of a news website. I think the more people are becoming aware and are able to tweak the better they are getting because its getting more and more people involved. I think if I had to narrow it down to one definition that the role of blogging plays in a news website I think the one word I would use would be connection. Connection to the news, to people, to new generations, to new aspects of everyday life.