So long and thanks for all the Journalism! (lecture 12)

So the final lecture, the coup de grace as some might call it. Honestly I have to admit that I am a little sad to see it go. I’ve enjoyed Jour1111 a lot and it has taught me quite a bit over the last couple of months. Dr. Bruce has been a fantastic lecturer and all the tutors, especially Marie, have been very engaging and have provided some fantastic bits of learning. I will actually miss this course, but the star that shines the brightest does so with brevity and it is best that this course ends now, rather than when I’m bored and angry.

The final lecture mainly involved us sitting and listening while Steve Molk, an extremely prominent blogger spoke to us about the world of blogging and journalism and what we, as students can expect to find in this new world of ours. In my opinion, this lecture really touch based mainly with the new media lecture that we already attended, so there wasn’t really that much new information provided, rather various topics that were previously left in the blue were elaborated on further by Mr. Molk and some interesting information was provided on the world of professional blogging.

The part that most interested me, was seeing just how far blogging has come. Going back just ten years, I doubt there is a man among us who would legitimately think that a profession, a decent paying one at that, could be fashioned from such a personal thing. It truly is a testament to just how important the internet is, and will become, that such a thing as blogging has turned into a viable financial path.

Now I’m going to leave this one short, not because I didn’t enjoy the lecture, it’s just that much of what was said has been covered in my previous blogs and I feel as if I would be offending you and myself by retreading old ground. To finish off though, I would just like to put out a big thank you, to not only Dr. Bruce, Marie and the other tutors I had the pleasure of meeting, but to my fellow students. I’ve gone through many blogs and read some truly great stuff (mine included, hyuck hyuck). This fills me not only with confidence that I’m with a truly inspiring cohort, but reinforces my opinion that we have a truly great set of staff at this university. I have learnt so much with my time here with you and these teachers and it saddens me that this course is coming to an end. I know this will sound incredibly cheesy, but I really have taken a lot away from this course and I won’t forget any of it. Thank you for reading and please stay around, because this will not be the last you hear of Caden Reid.

Intermission, Part 3 le Finale

So here is my final intermission post and I'm a little sad. While I'm not going to stop actually blogging, considering how useful it is, I'm a little sad that I won't have the influence of Jour1111 anymore. Therefore, I thought it would be appropriate to write about what I enjoyed about this course. To be honest, I think the most enjoyable part was that the encouraged us to be the journalist. While I know we didn't do too much journo stuff in the course, what it has taught me is to always question and always be on the ball. This has been one of the most enjoyable courses I have ever done and I'm sad to see it go. I hope you enjoy my final blog coming up and you have been a fabulous audience.

My spidey sense is tingling (Lecture 11)

So the second last lecture and we get the topic of Investigative Journalism. Now after reading some of my fellow students blogs, I’ve come to the conclusion that I’m not the only one who is seriously interested in IJ (Investigative Journalism). I love the idea of being an Investigative Journalist, even more so than most other things (LOTR included). It has honestly been one of those things that have kept me awake at night, with questions like would I be willing to reveal certain information, even if it might result in death giving me pause for thought? All these factors combined kept me interested in the lecture and have given me a new perspective and respect for IJ.

According to Dr. Bruce, there are 5 In’s involved in IJ. Those are INtelligent, INformal, INtuitive, INside and INvest. Each of these provides the budding young Investigative Journalist with a set of various goals to aspire to, yet these are only what Dr. Bruce had to say on the topic. When we went deeper into the definition and purpose, we found out 4 very important factors. These four factors are:

1. Critical and Thorough Journalism
2. Custodians of Conscience
3. To provide a voice for those without one and to hold the powerful to account
4. Watch Dog/Fourth Estate/Fourth Branch of Government

Critical and Thorough Journalism, entails that the journalist is not only an active participant, but that they are enthusiastic about the topic and willing to invest a significant amount of effort. Custodians of Conscience is all about exposure, how will we do it and whether it will be in good taste or not (good old ethics). No. 3 (Because I am not writing that out again), revolves around social justice, the idea that we as the journalists (first lecture coming back) have the power to provide a voice for the downtrodden, allowing them to have some say in what goes on. Finally, we have Watch Dog and fourth Estate. This is similar to No. 3, but is there more to hold the government accountable (take that opposition), providing the general public with the opportunity to critic and question the government.

The bulk of the lecture that followed the first section, was looking to the past (distant and close) and assessing previous trailblazers, those who set the standard for future Investigative journalistic practices. This section was interesting to see not only what these people did, but what risks they faced. The most interesting was the case of W.T.Stead, who was responsible for bringing down a large human trafficking ring in the UK. While he was responsible for its downfall, because of his presence to the actual trade, he was thrown into jail. This really spoke to me, because it shows that there have always been risks when it comes to investigation and to be a good investigative journalist, I’ll just have to accept these aspects as part of the trade.

To close off the lecture and this blog post, Dr. Bruce discussed the types of interactions one can expect to have as an investigative journalist. This part was particularly interesting, because while playing on some standard assumptions, it was good to know that leg work and leaks are still considered high priority. 

Lecture 11, which I might add was the second last, was probably one of the best lectures of the semester, helped in no small part by the very interesting topic of discussion. While I have to admit I have fears about certain aspects, I’d say the lecture has done more to harden my resolve than dissuade me from this career and I can honestly see myself becoming an investigative journalist in the future.

Intermission, Part 2

Here we are again my wonderful audience, back to another intermission bridging the gap between lecture 10 and lecture 11. It is here that I thought I would tell you why I actually want to be a journalist. I've always been fairly adept at word play, oft receiving many a compliment from peer to superior with regards to my intricate use of the english language. Now it may surprise you then, that I was considering psychology at one point. Yes for my first year of uni, I tried my hand at psychology. After going through the first semester, I realised that this restrictive dribble (not saying I disrespect psychs, just that it is very, very boring) was not what I wanted to do and that I had to find something that let my creative inner self shine through. It was then a God send, that I ran into a friend from school who had recently made the switch to Journalism. After having a good long chat, I realised that this was the right field for me, that it allowed creativity, but also provided restrictions. Let me say this here, the best kind of creativity is that which comes from restriction, the more you have, the more creative you have to be to actually be CREATIVE (that sounds confusing, but it follows a nice line of thought if you look closely enough). It was then with great joy that I made the switch and here I am, standing before you a happy happy man, doing what he loves.

O behagenda! (I suck at puns)

Ah agenda setting, this is one of those interesting topics, because in some worlds in may come across as contentious. Are we really that heavily influenced by the news, are they secretly shaping the world around us, is there any hope for poor jimmy? The answer is yes we do heavily influence the news, because having a career based around news, you would hope to. No, they’re not secretly shaping the world, we can see it happening it’s just easier to let them do it. Yes, there is always hope, because it is not this day, THIS DAY WE FIGHT, especially Jimmy even with his bum leg, Back on topic.

Agenda setting in a nutshell, is the way in which Journalists, News Papers, Television and the Internet influence what we conceive as important. That may sound a bit dystopian at first glance, but it’s negative appearance is really more like beauty and the beast, though I’d never say what’s underneath is a caring, loving man, more like a slightly less evil version (I really should stop being so pessimistic). 

In reality and more importantly back to the topic, agenda setting appears as a necessary part of the news world, that just so happens to sound incredibly evil. In our everyday lives, we are pummeled with news from every angle, some important, while others not so much. Agenda setting, is simply going through all that news and taking out what aspects are the most important of the day and running them on the News or on the internet. A quote from the lecture was, “The mass media do not merely reflect and report reality, they filter and shape it.” This is a good description in my mind, because it provides what I think is a good description of the job of a Journo and why agenda setting is a necessary occurrence (I won’t say evil because that sounds silly).

Before I sign off again, I would just like to address the issue of news programs such as Fox news, Nine news and, ugh, ET (Entertainment Tonight). While I personally do not find any enjoyment or actual news from any of those “news channels,” I will say that they provide a necessary service concerning agenda setting. While other sources of news might focus on things such as world calamities, politics, recent scientific discovery and other less wasteful human interest stories, they provide an outlet for this type of news. This provides the general public with the opportunity to absorb all different kinds of news and is necessary in a world such as ours.

Intermission, Part 1

Considering I already admitted to my faults in my previous post, today for a special time only I would like to post a number of intermission posts, designed to serve as a little window into the complex (pfft) enigma that is my troubled noggin. The first is that I have an unhealthy obsession with all things fantasy, with the big three being Lord of the Rings, The Elder Scrolls and the a Song of Fire and Ice (Game of Thrones) worlds. I can't say what caused me to become so thoroughly obsessed with these various worlds, be it the wide country sides of bountiful explorable land (Elder Scrolls), the wonderful look into the political machine of the Game of Thrones world, or the sheer unbridled awesomeness of the Lord of the Rings movies and world. To be honest, I think it is simply the deep rich worlds that each one inhabits that has pulled me so thoroughly into there worlds, but speaking only for myself it is just pure awesome. Now I would like to leave this intermission with two of my favourite scenes from Lord of the Rings and Game of Thrones. I would like to mention that those of you with weak stomachs may want to avoid the Game of Thrones video. Game of Thrones and Lord of the Rings

Lecture 9: News Values

Week 9, saw us tackling the issue of News values. While I initially thought that News values concerned the issue of journalist values, similar to journalist ethics, I was pleasantly surprised to uncover that the actual topic of discussion involved what makes a good news story and what we as Journalists should be following, within certain parameters of course. While I can’t say that I laughed the whole way, I’ll admit that it was a fairly interesting lecture and has provided some useful future information.

The lecture dealt mainly with the four major aspects of News Values, along with Newsworthiness. The four major aspects of News Values are as follows: 

1. Impact
2. Audience Identification 
3. Pragmatics 
4. Source Influence

Newsworthiness is the confluence of all 4 of the major aspects, which is then split into multiple little fields within it. Now that may sound confusing, but in reality, it is simply just what happens as there is not one single given set of values for newsworthiness, rather each country, station or newspaper have there own set which they stick to like the 10 commandments. Below, is a list of multiple news values pertaining to newsworthiness, culminated in one big list (Note that this is only some of the news values around the world, there are many, many more out there, some longer than my combined list):

• Negativity
• Closeness to Home
• Recency
• Currency
• Continuity
• Uniqueness
• Simplicity
• Personality
• Expectedness
• Elite Nations or People
• Exclusivity
• Size
• Drama
• Visual Attractiveness
• Entertainment
• Brevity
• Personalities

And the Big 6:

1. Significance: Impact on the public
2. Proximity: Location, emotional, historical etc
3. Conflict: War, govt, celebrities and sport
4. Human Interest: Peoples lives and struggles
5. Novelty: Uniqueness of the story, That doesn’t happen very often
6. Prominence: Place in the public mind

This was the bulk of the lecture, as in my opinion is was really a light on content, high on knowledge kind of lecture. Don’t mistake this for apathy, I genuinely enjoyed the lecture for the wealth of new information I was provided and I consider it a valued piece for my future study.

The Good, the Bad and the Tacky (Lecture 8 Ethics)

Ethics in Journalism is a tricky sort of business to say the least. Not only are there specific types within the field of Journalism that we have to follow, depending on your choices of course, but there are also the influences that society places on us. Combine all of these factors and you end up with a very muddled system and a very confused Caden. However thanks to a fairly enjoyable lecture hosted by the amiable Dr. Harrison, I have come to both better understand and appreciate Ethics in Journalism.

The main aspect that could be ascertained from the first half of the lecture, was that there are four ways that things can be reported and presented in Journalism, Ethically, Unethically, in Bad taster or Good. Each one of these aspects plays a significant part in how the news is viewed and how much influence it can be expected to provide. For example, Dr. Harrison provided the cohort with 10 examples of Good, Bad and Ugly advertising. Let me first point out, that the ethics in Advertising and Journalism are very similar, so the two can be used interchangeably. 

One of TV commercials, was a smoking advert. While reported as being highly graphic and possibly disturbing, it was considered neither in bad taste or unethical. This ad went on to see large publicity and has shaped how various peoples view smoking. Another add that was shown, was a now infamous Australian tourism ad, featuring a bikini clad Lara Bingle, before all the “scandal.” This ad was considered controversial because of a phrase “Where the Bloody Hell are You?” resulting in it being pulled for television in the UK. It wasn’t helped by the fact that they used objectification of women as a selling point to come to Australia either. This resulted in the ad being in both bad taste and arguably unethical and was a significant loss for the Australian tourism industry, showing just how far a bad ad or bit of journalism can have on someone, or in this case a country.

The second half of the lecture, dealt with the three main types of ethics, Deontology, Consequentialism and Virtue Ethics. Deontology put simply, is following the external rule, the established rules of society set by others. This mainly results in Journo’s who follow everything by the books and who would probably be considered uppity by the Queen’s royal dress maker. Consequentialism would be considered the opposite of this, the rogue cop in the precinct who plays by his own rules, focusing on the end and disregarding the middle as a necessary occurrence. While not mentioned in the lecture, I imagine this is how some of the people involved in The News of the World Scandal felt, which shows just how badly this code of ethics can be. Finally we have virtue ethics, basically a toned down version of consequentialism. What sets this apart, is that it is based on the ethics and personal values of the journalist in question, deciding whether he/she is doing what is right and going only as far as they see fit. While I personally like this type of Journalism, I can’t help but see issues arising from it, depending on how far the journo is willing to go and the consequence that could potentially arise from this.

Lecture 8, while not being necessarily the most entertaining, was a very helpful lecture and really shines a light on just how black and white the whole situation is.

Apologies for late posts and all that

Hi all, once again I'm here to post about my laziness and beg for a little forgiveness from the general public. Now I know today is the day that the final blog is due and I haven't really done much of anything for a while and I'd like to apologise. Yes there have been some issues over the last couple of weeks that have played a part, but in all fairness I had control over everything and could have made some time for it. I'm not asking anyone to take pity on me, just that I hope aren't too critical. I still love you and this has been a very good course, with some useful skills be ascertained. Thankyou for being a great cohort and excellent batch of Lecturers and Teachers and I hope to see all of you throughout my studies.