Citizen journalism: What is that anyway?
July 1st, 2009
Why didn’t we think of this before? All this time we could have fired those trained, experienced reporters who expect salaries and benefits, and then turned the news gathering over to these citizen journalists. We could have closed – indeed, never opened – 300-plus journalism schools. Let the students learn gender-based world politics critiques instead. You know, something more universally useless. Simply put, every week we could have saved millions of dollars of precious advertiser money, and we know how critical that money is.
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Stand behind your comments: Use name
April 28th, 2009
You can chalk this up to the grumblings of an old fart who refuses to see bliss and wisdom in progress, but I grew up believing that standing behind what you say, write, and even murmur was the better choice. If you write something, you should put your name at the top and be ready to defend it. That’s integrity. It shows you have fiber and strength. To refuse to stand behind your own words reveals you as dishonest and gutless. It shows you are at least a weenie.
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Wanted: Something to believe in
April 2nd, 2009
It is going to be tough for this new generation to carry the torch. Perfectly good kids say they have very little to believe in, that they were taught this truth by not being taught something else, and that they learned it well. As our education system bolstered the curricula with meaningless glop, the same system also retreated from giving students the tools and ideas for them to find something to believe in. So students now go to college and consider journalism and advertising and public relations as pretty much equal. They are not equal. How can you “believe in” anything to do with, for example, public relations?
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Cover religion in depth - begin now
March 5th, 2009
For decades journalism has been tip-toeing around any topic smelling like spiritual or religious matters. It has been an attempt on the part of media not to offend anyone, so it limited stories to bare facts — announcements of change of leadership, times of services, names of churches, priests and ministers under arrest, and occasional explanations, right out of the encyclopedia, of a few crucial beliefs. That must change, and it is changing.
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English majors, professors are OK
October 28th, 2008
Good writers teach you how to shape stories. They select verbs with precision. They splash scenes together and make it look easy. I told them to read every Pulitzer Prize-winning novel. Read well-written books on history, economics, physics, politics. Read, read, read. Albert Einstein and John Kenneth Galbraith are among the clearest writers I’ve encountered, and if you don’t know who they are, please find out.
Read like an English major.
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Government 101: A few tips to understand it
October 2nd, 2008
Government is a mess today.
That’s not a political comment. That’s the view of reporters who suddenly must understand government based on the pathetic education provided them in high school and college. A high school senior today can believe states have presidents, not governors, and still graduate at the top of the class. Why would anyone want to learn all that government crap, anyway? Let’s assume you might want to know, and I’ll give you some basic things about the nature of government to help you out.
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Open marketplace of ideas is our fundamental right as writers
September 16th, 2008
It began with the idea – originally an English philosophical idea – that no one should fear bringing up unpopular ideas because truth will continually defeat falsehood. As naïve and hopeful as this idea seems, if you push the notion one more step, you create the right to place any idea into the marketplace. So what began with John Milton and John Stuart Mill evolved into the “open marketplace of ideas” when Thomas Jefferson got a grip on it.
What are we talking about here? We’re talking about what has become known as the “open marketplace of ideas,” and how that notion — fundamentally necessary in this culture — worked its way into the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution and what that means. Sure, most studies of these topics might require a book shelf, so we’re doing our best to highlight it here in five minutes.
Every writer should know at least this much.
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Gushing, and saccharine emotional overloading
July 7th, 2008
In journalism, people die. They do not pass away or pass on or just pass. The dead do not ascend to somewhere above. More likely, dead people are toes up on the coroner’s table getting the final physical exam, and reporters are nice enough not to mention that. What I’m talking about is gush, or prattling over whatever subject lies before us. Gush is syrupy, usually unjustified positive overstatement, and the statements often go on and on, the facts lost in a thick, sugary soup of words.
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Why you should learn to write well
May 14th, 2008
Many of you are now in college, and like your high school teachers, professors still settle for papers exploring your reactions and your feelings. How do you FEEL about politics…. After all, most professors can’t write, either. Meanwhile, you’ve discovered that the professional world demands you write well, clearly, and concisely. Who in the hell is going to teach you to write? I can’t teach you everything, but I promise that you will learn much from me about being a good writer who also thinks clearly, explores complex concepts, and struggles to find words and phrases to capture those concepts in words. A good writer works intensely at this craft.
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Welcome to Remedial Academy
April 26th, 2008
Most college students cannot write, and it is not their fault. No one bothered to teach them how to write. But, alas, they find themselves in situations and seeking professions where writing is not only important but absolutely required.
In this series of PodCasts, beginning with this introduction, we’ll provide a series of writing tips so that you, too, can write with clarity and intelligence.
We begin with journalistic writing, but we’ll soon move to all kinds of writing. Begin with us now to make up for those dolt teachers you’ve suffered who never thought you were worth all the trouble.
