Sunday, November 29, 2009

‘Bowling for Breaks’ raises money for EMU alternative breakers

EMU students and their families banded together to raise money for VISION’s annual Alternative Breaks on Wednesday, Nov 18 at the Ypsi Arbor Bowling Alley.

Alternative Breaks, sponsored by VISION, is an annual event that sends EMU students on spring break trips to various locations and gives them the opportunity to do charity and volunteer work in areas such as urban youth education, disaster relief and animal rights.

“We are trying to raise money to keep our trips on the cheaper side and help pay for our food while we’re on our trip,” said alternative breaker Chelsea Riley, an EMU sophomore.

For 10 dollars at the door, you could rent shoes and enjoy three games of bowling and also be entered to win door prizes and participate in various raffles. All the proceeds from the fundraiser, which was put on by the Alternative Break coordinators, and the raffles went towards Alternative Breaks.

Other than raising money for the event, Riley said that it was a great way to meet fellow breakers and get comfortable with one another. “It was great being able to talk to other alternative breakers because I got to see where they were going on their trip, and I got to meet people who would be going on the same trip that I would be going.”

“I was surprised to see how many people came out for the fundraiser,” said EMU sophomore and alternative breaker Holly Knick. “They place was packed and it was really cool to see that many people who wanted to go on these trips to help people and make a difference.”

VISION will be holding another fundraiser (time is still undecided) to try and raise more money before students jet off on their various trips.



This is a video to show the mission of Alternative Breaks and why it is an important cause.

Students think green with alternative Thanksgiving

Residents of Downing Hall at Eastern Michigan University had a not-so-traditional Thanksgiving dinner Wednesday, Nov 18. Jennie Rokakis, a freshman at EMU, put together an event to give students the chance to explore vegetarian- and vegan-friendly options before going home to a traditional turkey and stuffing dinner.

“I got the idea for an alternative Thanksgiving because last year at my high school, our animal rights club held a similar event that I attended,” said Rokakis. “I thought it would be interesting for people to come and check out other seasonal foods that aren't your traditional turkey and stuffing, but that still taste great and are vegetarian friendly.”

Along with EMU sophomore Rebecca Barton, Rokakis prepared such foods as “Tofurky” sandwiches, vegan squash risotto, vegan banana nut bread, whole berry cranberry sauce, soy milk and ice cream and sweet potato pie. All of the food had to be prepared in the lone oven and small kitchen space of Downing Hall, so Rokakis and Barton had their work cut out for them.

“It took about a month to organize,” said Rokakis. “We had to call EMU Dining Services and make sure we were allowed to have this event in our residence hall and then we had to allocate money at the Leadership Advisory Board meeting. The preparing of the food is what took the longest amount of time, though.”

With all the work that was put into planning and organizing this event, Rokakis said she would consider the alternative Thanksgiving dinner a success. “We had about 15 to 20 people show up, which I felt was a great number. Being a freshman, this was my first event that I had ever organized and I was hoping that the turnout would be good, so I was very pleased with the amount of people that showed up,” Rokakis said.

“Everyone tried the food, and many people were actually surprised by how much they liked some of the vegan and vegetarian foods. We all laughed, had a good time and enjoyed each other's company, and everyone said one thing that they were thankful, which I thought was a really nice idea. I would definitely do this event again.”


Alternative Thanksgiving host Jennie Rokakis





Residents of Downing Hall enjoying their Thanksgiving feast



Sunday, November 22, 2009

Expanding

The future of the Web is very bright with endless possibilities for improvement. Sir Timothy Berners-Lee gives three ways the Web will become increasingly relevant in every day life.

First, it will become easier to manage and analyze data. Currently, it takes a lot of work to work with and analyze just one set of data. As opposed to many links that connect one central theme, the Web will become "more like a large database or spreadsheet," making it easier and less time-consuming when doing research or, as previously mentioned, analyzing data.

Second, the Web will become more accessible from different types of networks and different types of devices. Before, the Web was merely accessible on a computer through a dial-up connection. Now, we have WiFi and satellites accessed on a variety of devices such as computers, cell phones, game consoles (PS3, XBox) and iPods and MP3 players. This accessibility will only continue to grow.

Finally, Web applications will become more and more prevalent in every day life. Things such as refrigerators, car stereo systems and telephone docks all with display screens and Internet access. While these things are not so apparent right now, pretty soon they will become the norm in a typical household with WiFi.

Relating this to digital journalism, such availability and vastness will make it easier yet again for journalists to quickly and effectively publish news articles.

Looking toward the future

According to Sir Timothy Berners-Lee, the future of the World Wide Web depends primarily on two things: technological protocols and social conventions. The main difference between these two aspects of the web are that one is the interactions between the actual machines and the other is the interactions between the people using these machines and all of their capabilities (i.e. the Internet). Together, though, they make up what is called Web Science.

Web Science, as stated by Berners-Lee, is "the science and engineering of this massive system for the common good."

So how do these two factors create a technology that can be used for the common good?

From the technological aspect, the need for a protocol is imperative for obvious reasons. Of course, it is important to have computers that are functioning properly with systems such as the web and the Internet that function properly in order for them to be most effective. There is always room for improvement, so it is exciting to think about how far we've come in just a decade, and how far we can go in the coming decades with our ever-growing technological capabilities. In respect to digital journalism, technological protocol is important for providing readers with accurate and well put-together stories. There are always going to be publishing issues, especially when publishing to a virtually brand new medium such as the web -- things like broken links, coding errors or formatting errors. With the refinement of these technological protocols, the digital news environment can thrive and continue to explore new possibilities.

From the social aspect, it's pretty simple. With an every expanding realm of technology, the ability of people to communicate over the web is becoming easier and more efficient. We went from email to instant messaging to picture messaging to iChat and video messaging. However, not only does this idea encompasses the way we communicate through technology, but how we conduct ourselves when doing so. Again, this affects the digital news environment by opening up the possibilities of what is covered in digital news and how the information is presented to readers.

Overall, Web Science is a science worth studying, not only for digital journalists, but for anyone who owns and operates some type of computer on a consistent basis.

Sunday, November 15, 2009

Video Editing Assignment- "One Step at a Time"

Check out my video editing assignment!

Pay up


It doesn't take much to see that newspapers are struggling to stay afloat, as are many institutions, in this downturning economy. In their article, The Reconstruction of American Journalism, Leonard Downie Jr. and Michael Shudson discuss just how problematic this is for newspaper circulation and what publishers are trying to do to stay competitive.

One thing that stands out to me about Downie Jr. and Shudson's article is their mentioning of newspapers seeking payment for some of the news they put online. Because of the digital news movement, many newspapers have had to start putting out an online version, and because they are losing readership for their print versions, they need new ways to make money, hence, subscriptions to their online versions. I have already started to see this take effect. Many online versions of newspapers that I have seen, while not outright forcing readers to subscribe for their news, have started charging readers to view their archives. If print news becomes obsolete, I see a few pros and cons with this. While, people do need their news, what's to stop them from simply watching their 5 o'clock local news or news channels like CNN and MSNBC?

Although, Downie Jr. and Shudson do mention that not all newspapers are at risk. Local newspapers are still maintaining some sort of readership because of the stories they cover. It's easy to get global news because everyone is reporting on it. However, with local news, if there is no source of it such as a local newspaper or website, than it is extremely difficult to obtain. For example, my local newspaper, The News Herald, is doing quite well. There is virtually no competition and without it, community members would not be able to get a lot of local information.

Saturday, November 14, 2009

The Three Muskateers of digital journalism


Pierre Levy discusses three main components in his view of the changing world of journalism and its transition to the realm of cyberspace: listening, real-time democracy and community.

I don't think I can pick out just one of these aspects as the most important, rather, they all coincide with one another and allow each other to exist. Take for example "listening." According to Levy, listening "expresses problems, assumes a position and formulates arguments based on opinions." A journalist will LISTEN to the problems of the COMMUNITY and, within his or her article, will insight REAL-TIME DEMOCRACY in order to address said problem.

While the listening and community components can exist without the help of cyberspace, real-time democracy is difficult to garner without the use of something as high-speed as the Internet. This is what makes digital journalism unique. With the Internet and such things as BlackBerry's and other phones with WiFi capabilities, the concept of real-time democracy has never been so accurate. A journalist can have an article published, than, if they need to make any updates or changes, they can instantly do that from their phone or computer, keeping up-to-date with the latest happenings regarding that issue.

All in all, while these three components are found somewhat throughout the legacy system, it took a movement like that of digital journalism to really make these things stand out among other aspects of journalism.

Sunday, November 8, 2009

Ecology

The ecological model of news goes hand-in-hand with the citizen journalism movement. This model encompasses many of the aspects of digital journalism, such as the Internet, blogging and video, and requires outside participation. The reason this model is so cost-effective is because of the new technologies available. A newspaper can run a story on their online version, and as opposed to running another follow-up story the next day or week, the reporter can just go online and update their previous story. This saves publishing companies big dollars because they do not have to keep posting follow-up stories, rather, they can use that space for other stories, ads and so on.

This model require much participation from readers and outside sources. Blogs are the number one way to do this. A story can link to a blog that goes along with that topic and allow readers to get many sides to an issue.

The ecological model is a product of the digital news environment and is very cost-effective in a time where saving money is everything.

Check this out!

Check out my article in this month's emYOU! The Magazine.

Sunday, November 1, 2009

This I Believe About EMU

Listen to my "This I Believe About EMU" essay:

Where do we draw the line?

One of the main concepts emerging from the transition to a digital news environment is the idea of citizen journalism. Citizen journalism, of course, being the members of a community playing a role in the process of, ultimately, spreading news. In his article, The 11 layers of Citizen Journalism, Steve Outing says that "citizen journalism isn't one simple concept that can be applied universally by all news organizations," rather, it is more complex and has many potential variations.

On the whole, citizen journalism is a great concept. Who knows the community better than the residents themselves? Although, there is a responsibility that comes with being a "citizen journalist" and therefore, important to have boundaries for those who decide to contribute to the news. If news organizations that were accepting contributions from citizen contributers simply let those contributions go unedited, there would more than likely be inappropriate or unnecessary content getting published.

Outing's sixth "layer" would be a great way to allow citizens to contribute to the news while still maintaining the journalistic aspect. He suggests creating a news-oriented website where citizens can submit pretty much whatever they want and the site's editor performs modest editing in order to maintain some sort of integrity. It would then be the job of those editors to guide citizen contributers into making submissions worth publishing and educating them about what's useful to the community, eliminating all of the unnecessary "fluff."

With many of these sites aimed at providing news from actual residents of that particular community rather than professional journalists, there are going to be obstacles. This is why it is important for there to be some kind of editor who monitors submissions allowing only for quality contributions.