Broadcast guest lecture

On Monday, Tony Consigliore and Cindy Michaels from Channel 7 news came to speak to our class about broadcast journalism. Their purpose in class was to give us a look into the career of a news anchor and/or reporter.

Consiglio started working for Ch. 7 as a sports reporter a couple years back and when an anchor position became available he jumped on it.

Michaels started working as an anchor for Ch. 5 around 1997. She had just moved to the area and was looking for a job. She saw an ad for a job at Ch. 5 and she went for the interview with no prior experience in the field or college education.

She proceeded to offer her services for free in the beginning much like an internship and soon she learned a lot and eventually moved onto radio for a bit. She received her own radio show on 97.1 and ran with that for a while, until she got the job at Ch. 7.

Consiglio and Michaels gave us a little insight on the career. They agreed that they both work anywhere from 50-60 hours a week and the hours change daily and weekly. Usually a good days work is around 12 hours.

Both also agreed that the starting pay isn’t great in the beginning as you start your career, but as you gain experience in the field pay can increase quite rapidly.

They also discussed the differences between working in a big market like Boston and working in a small market like Bangor. In a big market you have a specific job title like anchor. An anchor is an anchor in Boston or other big cities. In smaller markets like Bangor the anchors like Consiglio and Michaels have much more responsibilities.

For example not only is Consiglio an anchor but he is also a producer and a reporter. The budget is smaller therefore everyone must take part in more than one task. Staff size and budgets are the biggest differences between big and small markets.

As class drew to a close Michaels and Consiglio started to wrap up the discussion. They told us that a broadcast career could be both exciting and difficult at the same time.  They reiterated that there is a lot of competition in the field and you have to be aggressive in your pursuit of a career.

Tips for writing Print

On Monday we had a guest speaker in class. His name was Nathan Stormer, he’s a professor of journalism at the University of Maine and the reason he came to class that day was to talk to us about print journalism.

Professor Stormer is a very smart man when it comes to writing as was evident in the first couple of minutes of his lecture. He gave us some valuable tips from correct word choice to the correct use of objectivity.

He emphasized good writing techniques and the importance of who, what, where, when, and why.

Journalism is a competitive field and you need to know how to write correctly to keep your readers attention. People will always scan the news but it’s about getting them to read your story and making a lasting impression on them.

Professor Stormer left us with a quote that I’ll remember for a while he said, “Theres a basic desire to know and a basic desire to tell.” That right there sums up the meaning of journalism to me.

People need to know important information and our job as journalists is to inform them.

Stormer also emphasized keeping your stories and articles simple. You must try to stay away from using jargon-based language, because not everyone understands certain technical terms involved in the story topic.

Instead you must use accessible and common language that everyone can understand, but while also making sure that you have a good variety of words. It’s important not to become repetitive.

It’s also useful to use the five senses in your writing metaphorically speaking. Explain touch, sound, smell, taste, and sight. It helps to put a visual in the reader’s head and therefore might get them to read your article for a bit more.

So all in all we learned a few valuable tips from Nathan and because of it we’re all better writers.

this weeks beat…

For this weeks 30 second broadcast piece I plan on doing either…

1. A piece talking about this weeks upcoming hockey game against the defending national champions Boston College.

2. A piece doing a brief bio on some of our hockey freshman.

3. A piece talking about our coach Tim Whitehead.

Maine Drops Two at Home to the Huskies

This weekends games at the Alfond left a sour taste in the mouth of many Umaine hockey fans. Friday night our boys lost in convincing fashion 5-0 to the currently undefeated Northeastern Huskies.

With little to talk about in regards to that game I decided to move onto Saturday nights game, which also happened to be a loss. Yes we did get swept in our first weekend at home!

There are however a few positives to get out of Saturdays 2-1 loss. First of all we managed to score a goal and keep the score close thanks to a young goalie Scott Darling.

Darling looked great in goal in his second career start for the black bears. Darling has started the season splitting time with junior goalkeeper David Wilson. But due to Wilson’s early struggles it looks like its about to be Darling’s job.

Spencer Abbott who also is a freshman scored the black bears only goal late in the first period to put the black bears in the lead. It was a power play goal that was assisted by Van Dyk and Danis-Pepin. Both of whom are solid defensemen for the black bears.

It looked good from there. Darling was playing an excellent game up until the third period.

We entered the third stanza with a 1-0 and nothing had even come close to scoring on Darling so everyone was feeling great about the possible outcome.

And then our hopes were shattered a couple minutes into the third period when Huskies player Rob Rassey put home his second goal of the season to tie up the game.

This goal seemed to knock the wind out of the Alfond crowd, we all remember last season and how tough it was to score goals in games. Let alone score another goal with minutes left.

When I asked our young goalie Darling about the lack of scoring he replied, “I think the goals are going to come. The freshman just have to learn the right way to approach goal scoring in college because it’s a lot different than juniors. I’m not worried about it.”

Now hopefully we won’t have much to worry about, but the outcome looked grim from here. Now we were pretty much playing for the tie. Most hope was lost a couple of minutes later when the Huskies scored again on a goal by senior forward Ryan Ginand.

With minutes left in the game fans pretty much conceded the loss and started filing out of the Alfond to go find something else to do on a cold chilly Saturday night.

After the game I asked Darling what the team had to improve on for next weekends games against Niagara and he replied, “We will just work on fine tuning all the things that we did this weekend. The guys played amazing on Saturday, we just have to build off of that.”

Well all of us fans hope that that’s the case. I guess we’ll just have to wait and see what happens next weekend at the Alfond against the Niagara Purple Eagles.

my beat

I’m going to do my beat on the Maine Men’s Hockey Team. The reason I choose this topic is because i’ve been an avid sports fan for as long as I can remember and also the hockey team is followed by just about everyone in the regional area.

Quick Tips about Print Journalism

To be a good journalist you need to have an active voice and lots of perseverance. The man who told this to me is a professor at the University of Maine and his name is Paul Grosswiler.

Grosswiler began his career in print journalism as a graduate student in Missouri. His first job was writing a police beat for a newspaper there. He later moved to Maine and got a job at the Bangor Daily. He was an assistant features writer for the paper.

He then was asked to teach a class at the university. It was a news writing class and later a permanent position opened up and Grosswiler decided to take it. He’s been here ever since.

When I asked Grosswiler where he saw the future of print journalism going he responded with “The death of print journalism has been forecasted for a long time.” This of course becoming evident with the newspaper cut backs and layoffs across the country.

Grosswiler told us that he has a secret passion for muckraking. Muckraking is a term used for investigative journalism. A famous muckraker was Ida Tarbell; she most commonly known for a piece she wrote called The History of the Standard Oil Company. The point of the story was to bring down John D. Rockefeller and his oil monopoly.

Another tip of advice that we received was to keep a scrapbook of our writings. When you are looking to find a job as a journalist its important to be able to present some of your work.

Also it’s important to take good notes while conducting an interview. Grosswiler told us “Your story is only as good as your notes are.” It’s also important to be able to process information in your head.

Some more advice that we received from Grosswiler’s interview was that while writing a story its important to keep your paragraphs short and remain in an active voice. Also you should write your story using the inverted pyramid putting your important information first.

You must use good direct quotations. It all starts with the interview it’s the most important step in the process. You must take good notes and ask good meaningful questions.

At the end of the interview Grosswiler left me with some words of wisdom. He told me “Perseverance is the key. If you want to be a journalist you can be.”

Lawsuits filed over DVD coping software

Last Tuesday the movie industry filed a lawsuit against the company RealNetworks.  RealNetworks is a software maker who has also filed a lawsuit back against the movie industry. The controversy steams over RealNetworks’ new product, it’s called RealDVD story and it allows costumers to rip or copy DVD’s onto their computer.

The Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) isn’t ok with this new software being released. The movie industry will lose a lot of money if this software ever hits the market, essentially it allows anyone to rent a movie and copy it into their movie library on their own personal computers.

The MPAA claims that the program breaches copyright laws and encourages piracy. The lawsuits are still in its preliminary stages and all that’s been done so far is that MPAA asked the court to issue a temporary restraining order against RealNetworks and their new software.

The Man Behind the Scene at MPBN

As Director of Operations for Maine Public Broadcasting Network (MPBN) and Chair of the Committee for the Emergency Alert System (EAS), Tristan Richards is a busy man. Not to mention the fact that he’s also earning his doctorate in the process at the University of Maine. Richards received his Bachelor’s degree at the University of Wisconsin of Milwaukee in 1989 and his Masters at Husson College in 2004. He received two degrees at the University of Wisconsin of Milwaukee one was in Journalism and the other in History. The reason Richards became interested in journalism was through radio. He traveled quite a bit while he was younger and eventually became a radio DJ. Richards had a passion for the radio and eventually it led him to the east coast where he accepted a job as the General Manager of WABI-AM 910 and WWBX 97.1. When Richards arrived at 97.1 the station was rated last in the market. Richards decided to change the format and within a year the station went from last in the market to second.

After working with WABI-AM 910 for two years, Richards was attending a meeting in Washington, DC when Gil Maxwell approached him. Maxwell is the Chief Operating Officer and Senior Vice President of MPBN. Maxwell and Richards became friends after meeting in DC and when the position of Director of Operations became available at MPBN it was offered to Richards, a position in which he had no prior experience. Within a few weeks of getting the job Richards was also appointed Chair of the Committee for EAS. It’s since been eight years since Richards accepted the job.

One of the biggest problems that Richards’ is facing with MPBN is the switch from analog cable to digital. The switch takes place on February 17th 2009. Richards has a lot of work ahead of him, not to mention he is also in charge of updating the master control area of the network, which alone is a daunting task. Richards is also in charge of making sure that everything is put on air at the right time and overall is in charge of approximately 95% of the programming for MPBN. When asked about any personal goals he had for MPBN, all Richards said was that he wanted to see more involvement within the community.

I also asked Richards where he saw the future of Mass Communications heading. He told me that there were problems in TV, radio, and newspapers. Richards believes all the problems involving TV and radio can be resolved rather easily. Yet the primary problem lies in the heavy amount of competition involving TV and radio. TV has also become more localized than it has in the past. While newspapers are now considered to be a dying breed the Internet has taken over as one of the biggest media outlets.

As if running MPBN wasn’t enough, Richards is also responsible for overseeing the Emergency Alert System for the entire state of Maine. When asked about some obstacles that he faced with EAS, Richards pointed out that the system is obsolete and that one of the biggest problems is ignorance. Many people don’t understand the system, how it works, or even what it’s used for. The largest problem for EAS is related directly to changes in technology. As Richards put it, “It doesn’t [change] and that’s the problem!” He also added, “People are afraid of making decisions or pulling the trigger, they don’t want the responsibility.” Richards isn’t satisfied with the Emergency Alert System. He wants the system to be totally revamped with a new delivery system. Some of his ideas include the use of Internet technology and satellites to help EAS become more effective. When asked to give a couple of examples of when EAS would be used in the state of Maine, Richards gave two examples. He said, “The two most common situations in which the system would be used in Maine are for severe weather alerts and amber alerts.” Although Richards is quite thankful that the amber alert hasn’t had to have been used yet. The Amber alert is a voluntary partnership between law-enforcement agencies, broadcasters, transportation agencies and the wireless industry, to activate an urgent bulletin in the most serious child-abduction cases. The state of Maine has been very fortunate in the fact that they haven’t had to use the system in the 5 years in which its been operating.

All in all Tristan Richards has made great strides in furthering the progress of both the Maine Public Broadcasting Network and the Emergency Alert System. Hopefully we can look forward to a revamped and effective form of the EAS all thanks to the man behind the scene at MPBN. I would like to end things by thanking Tristan Richards for his corporation and for allowing me to take up some of his time outside of work.

this weeks news

The most important news story of the week would have to be the $700  billion government bailout plan. The plan is supposed to be passed either later today or early tomorrow. Due to the possible bailout the stock market dropped again significantly today just like it has a various points throughout the last week. The money is supposedly going to be used to buy up companies that are struggling and the government thinks that they can turn them around and then re-sell them for a profit. As of now this bailout isn’t expect to hurt taxpayers to much. The only downfall is if the plan doesn’t work out and the government ends up losing money than so will the taxpayers. We are putting a lot of trust into our government and we are possibly on the verge of the next great depression is everything doesn’t work out as planned. The plan proposes that the money will be spent in increments over the next couple of years starting with $250 billion that will be able to be spent once the bill is passed. That money will be free to be spent until 2009 when the next increment becomes available to government spenders.

Song to Story

Wagon Wheel by Old Crowe Medicine Show (also written by Bob Dylan)

Headed down south to the land of the pines
And I’m thumbin’ my way into North Caroline
Starin’ up the road
And pray to God I see headlights

I made it down the coast in seventeen hours
Pickin’ me a bouquet of dogwood flowers
And I’m a hopin’ for Raleigh
I can see my baby tonight

So rock me mama like a wagon wheel
Rock me mama anyway you feel
Hey mama rock me
Rock me mama like the wind and the rain
Rock me mama like a south-bound train
Hey mama rock me

Runnin’ from the cold up in New England
I was born to be a fiddler in an old-time stringband
My baby plays the guitar
I pick a banjo now

Oh, the North country winters keep a gettin’ me now
Lost my money playin’ poker so I had to up and leave
But I ain’t a turnin’ back
To livin’ that old life no more

So rock me mama like a wagon wheel
Rock me mama anyway you feel
Hey mama rock me
Rock me mama like the wind and the rain
Rock me mama like a south-bound train
Hey mama rock me

Walkin’ to the south out of Roanoke
I caught a trucker out of Philly
Had a nice long toke
But he’s a headed west from the Cumberland Gap
To Johnson City, Tennessee

And I gotta get a move on fit for the sun
I hear my baby callin’ my name
And I know that she’s the only one
And if I die in Raleigh
At least I will die free

So rock me mama like a wagon wheel
Rock me mama anyway you feel
Hey mama rock me
Rock me mama like the wind and the rain
Rock me mama like a south-bound train
Hey mama rock me

Converted Lyrics to News Article

I’m heading down south to North Carolina, the land of the pine. The ride was a long one and all I could do was stare down the road looking for headlights. I made it down the coast in 17 hours and I picked up a bouquet of dogwood flowers for my girlfriend. I can’t wait to see my girl it’s been a long time since I’ve seen her.  I can’t wait to dance with her all night and let her do whatever she pleases with me.  I left from cold New England and I’m driving south to see her. 

I’m a musician who has a knack for the fiddle and my girlfriend plays the guitar. Now I’ve learned to play the banjo as well.  Up north in New England the winters started to get to me and I lost a lot of my money gambling on poker. So I left New England and I’m not turning back, I’m heading to North Carolina to see my girl. On my journey south in Roanoke, I met a trucker who was from Philadelphia and we passed the time with a smoke break.  The trucker himself was heading to Johnson City, Tennessee from Cumberland’s Gap.  After a short while I said my goodbyes because I had to get a move on, if I wanted to make it to my destination on time to see my girl.  I can’t wait to see my girlfriend because she the only one for me. She waiting in Raleigh and if I died there with her, I would die a free spirit. I finally got there and she was waiting for me, and that’s how the story ends.