Video Journalist to Bloggers

It is amazing how small urban city newspapers have quickly gained an online presence fashioned after sites such abcnews.com. We quickly learned what a video journalist is and how they use the internet to upload stories edited minutes before on their laptops. Now things have sped up again and we do not have to wait for a story to be edited we can read their twitter while they are working on the real story.

I will have to say that I had never heard of twitter until Cindy encouraged a group teachers during a lucheon to try it. None of us knew what it meant and many were probably trying to figure out the rootword to define it. Which I have learned in this class is to tweet which technically still does not define it. Twitter which rhymes with glitter sounds like a gaudy accessory for a myspace page. In reality I've learned that is not what it is at all.

It is interesting seeing newspapers twitter. I was amazed to see how many major newspapers are using it. I don't know if it is suppose to be a way of leaking news while packaging it or if its their way of updating the news station or paper of what they are doing and they are just allowing us to watch it as it goes on. One things is for sure, if we are not familiarizing ourself with the latest uses of technology how can we expect our students to succeed no matter what their level? It's real simple, tech skills pay the bills. Thier tech skills or lack of will determine thier earnings. Something as simple as twitter evidently is beneficial to these newspapers.

Why not have graduate level classes that introduce the latest in tech trends and require students to create projects to master them instead of solely relying on lectures and comprehensive exams? I agree this would be an excellent time for more universities to update their graduate programs and it would be an awesome idea to have more adjunct professors who are currently working in the New Media to be part of the faculty.

The other article, Cover: Mind the Gap, hit it on the nail when it stated that newsrooms and classrooms are not in sync. Uh, no.... really? I thought Bill Gates was the only genius that had come to the conclusion that technology needs to be incorporated into the classroom more. But on a more serious note it was good article many people believe this is the case they just do not articulate it. However, when new teachers with innovative ideas come in it does intimidate older more traditional administrators as I can attest to this. It is almost better not to inspire and keep your job then to update the curriculum. Why must everything have a catch?

I will have to say not all avenues of communication on the internet have benefited journalism. This is apparent when I have students turn in papers with acronyms instead of spelling out words as they should. Or writing in lowercase when they shouldn't or misspelling "i" and "u" which maybe is acceptable when instant messaging but not in a formal typed speech.

The article on the young lady at NYU getting paid to blog was interesting. I didn't know that you could get paid to do this. Now blogging is more interesting especially since teachers are often told at technology conferences that it is a great way to have students do online journals. I thought that was the only definition to blogging however getting paid brings a whole new definition it. Judging by readers responses not everyone agrees that this is common or should be endorsed. Bottom line is this is a multimedia world undergoing globalization. Multi-media multi-skills!