One of the major reasons I decided to go to grad school was for the new media classes. I have yet to catch the Twitterbug and blogging is worse then a trip to the dentist. I am hoping, during the course of this class, that I will develop a better understanding of sites like Twitter and will grow to like blogging......or at least not despise it. I did have an interesting experience with blogging when one of my friends came over to my house on the Monday that Gustav made landfall on the Louisiana coast. A lot of her family members rode out the storm and were located sixty miles south of Houma. She logged onto her family's blog and could read about what they were experiencing as it happened. I thought that was pretty cool.
I thought Alana Taylor came off as a sometimes tackless, wide-eyed junior, but she did have a good point. Why pay tons of money to be taught by a middle-aged professor who has no grasp about social media and still thinks the NY Times paper copy is still the best thing since sliced bread? Newspapers will be looking for web-savvy individuals who are capable of writing online articles and blogging. Although Professor Quigley is trying, she doesn't appear to "get it" as our own professor does. Hopefully these universities will see the impending need to update their curriculum in order to accommodate the changing industry. Until then, it's just another reason why I am proud to be at Texas State, since they seem to be moving in the right direction faster than some of these more prestigious universities.
The Mind the Gap article presented a harsh reality of the gap between old school journalism and new media. Since the newspaper industry as a whole is in such a state of flux, it's no wonder that teaching about it would present a challenge. There is a valid need to teach basic writing, ethics and legal skills but also address where the industry is headed. It will be interesting to see if the universities can update the current curriculum in order to make graduating students more apt to land a job or if the industry changes so rapidly that j-schools become obsolete. The smart newspapers are ahead of the curve and have learned to adapt to the changing industry. I was excited to learn the @statesman twitter was listed as one of the top ten followed in the county since I used to work there in the Retail Advertising department.
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I love to write and blogging helps me relieve stress and frustration. But, when I blog, it's normally to share traumatic experiences in a way that turns them into something that more closely resembles sitcom humor. Makes me feel better about being me, you know? In fact, my next blog will be about how my day started yesterday. I fainted (shouldn't have been sitting on the floor like a two-year-old for more than half an hour and then rushed to get up), cracked my head against the window in my bedroom, and woke up staring at the ceiling with my glasses all askew, my arms and legs all akimbo, and my blinds a bit worse for wear. I'm sure my cats got a hoot out of it because it must have looked funny as all get out! And the rushing sounds and screaming images in my head just before I saw stars . . . holy buckets!
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