The Importance of the Serial Comma
February 9th, 2012Mitt Romney: Serial Killer
February 2nd, 2012Briggs Chapters 1-3
February 1st, 2012Let me start out by saying that I never thought I would have to use XHTML code after ITE 103 again in my life. That being said, chapter 1 was boring. Chapter 1 also made me glad that I was too lazy to sell back my ITE 103 textbook. It will come undoubtedly come in handy in my future.
Chapter 2 started with a great quote from USA TODAY travel blogger, Ben Mutzabaugh.
“Readers are our friends. In print it is easy to feel like you are at odds with readers because people will find one little thing wrong. So, as a journalist you get defensive. The readers of a blog chime in and help you to get the story right. Readers help make the blog stronger than any single author could make it alone.”
I don’t think of myself as a perfectionist by any means, but don’t we all prefer constructive criticism over being told how wrong we are? The blogosphere seems friendly!
I’m new to WordPress, so I plan on taking advantage of the part in chapter 2 explaining how to customize your blog and add widgets and whatnot. I hadn’t really tried to figure it out further than the tutorial done in class, but I’m sure this’ll help.
It’s not like I was anti-link or anything before reading chapter 3, but I guess I just never fully understood the full value of inserting links into stories or posts. Briggs talks about people being skeptical to direct readers elsewhere thinking that they won’t come back again. I understand this. Then I read this Google quote on page 82: “All Google does is send people away from itself and all people do is come back.” Brilliant.
My Media Pyramid
January 31st, 2012In reflecting for this assignment, I’ve come to realize that my media pyramid is not as healthy and balanced as I would like it to be. The bottom of my pyramid, I would call social media. I am constantly connected to Facebook and Twitter through my laptop and my iphone. When I think back to “how did I first hear about this event?” the answer is usually through a Facebook status that got to me before my news RSS feeds. The beauty (and horror) of social media is that you don’t the approval of the Associated Press to publish anything. It’s all about who knows what first. Twitter was abuzz with the death of Joe Paterno 16 hours before it actually happened.
This leads me to to my next level of my media pyramid which is news. Broad, I know. Let me be more specific. I subscribe to USA TODAY and CNN’s RSS feeds, so I like to think of myself as informed as 140 characters will let me be until I research the whole story. My browser homepage is USATODAY.com, so I skim the front page headlines when I wake up before switching to my social sites. I don’t spend too much time reading articles in the morning–I fill the gaps in my day with news. I’ll check my news apps when I have downtime in between classes or at night before I go to sleep. I read newspapers at night. Usually the Washington Post. It may make me a day behind on the days events, but I think it’s a nice way to unwind.
The third level of my media pyramid I would call entertainment. Youtube videos, a little netflix and the occasional Jeopardy! episode takes up a decent amount of my time. I don’t watch too much TV, my DVR has pretty much gone to waste. I only keep it to around to record Top Chef once a week.
