Diving into the books

Check out my second news video about the benefits of being a student athlete at BYU!! I love what I do :)

Stay fit stay warm

I am starting up my blog once again. My older posts were for a communications class at BYU, but now I am going to post for my own enjoyment. 

I am on Channel Eleven News every Friday at 12:00pm. Fridays are fun because its all about sports, so it's actually called Coog Tube. I like to focus on people when I do news. I have done two news packages so far. I really love doing it. This is my first one!!

ENJOY!! :)

 

Citizen Responsibility

Back when the printing press was first invented, only a handful of people had access to journalism. Nowadays, with our ever growing technology, anyone and everyone has the capability to be citizen journalists.

I have a blog right here. I also have a Twitter and Facebook account. All of these social media uses contribute to the information people read about the world. Newspapers have grown with technology by putting their articles online as well.  http://www.nytimes.com/

Citizen journalists should not take the online world lightly. It is important to understand that what you post online is stuck there forever! It doesn’t matter how many times you try to take it off, it will always be somewhere online.  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LlqslTxKkmo

Since we all have the means to be citizen journalists, we also have the responsibility to write the truth. As Confucius said, "The object of the superior man is truth." He also said, "It is man that makes truth great, not truth that makes man great." http://tinyurl.com/7km4mhk. It is our responsibility to take the truth we have and make it interesting and relevant to online viewer.

Let us all be responsible citizens and only present the truth!

Journalists as Celebrities

How do we as a public determine who is a celebrity? Are journalists celebrities? Here are three reasons why broadcast journalists are celebrities.

1. Broadcast journalists are consistently seen on T.V.

When a face appears over and over again on television, they can’t help but become well known to the public. Here in Utah, Carole Mikita is a celebrity because of her work with Latter-day Saint leaders and members around the world. Her name and face appear consistently on T.V. http://www.ksl.com/?nid=166&sid=101151

2. Broadcast journalists set agendas.

As the seventh element of journalism discussed in my Comms 239 class, journalists must make the “significant interesting and relevant.” When journalists do this, they set the agenda for discussion and concern. Barbara Walters makes news interesting through her personality and interviewing techniques. http://www.biography.com/people/barbara-walters-9523127

3. Broadcast journalists cannot hide.

It doesn’t matter how badly broadcast journalist want to hide from the public, they can’t. People know exactly where and when they will be on air. Reporters are seen with big cameras and important microphones; naturally, people will gravitate toward them. Here is an example of a crowd drowning out a reporter on live T.V. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VD6QbrCsuw8

Broadcast journalists can’t help it, but they are celebrities. 

Journalism and Faith

This was my favorite Comms 239 class thus far! I love combining anything with my faith and beliefs.

Religion and faith are completely tangled in everyday living. People do what they do because of what they believe. I do what I do because of what I believe. I am a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and I will never shy away from that. www.lds.org

I liked how the group presenters in class discussed the “ghosts” in news today. These “ghosts” are the reason why events happened, the lack of context in the story, yet they were not directly addressed. Religion and faith are these “ghosts.” A journalist can present a story in such a way as to hide the true reason and motivation behind it, but the public knows something is missing. It is better when the news outlets are as transparent as possible, even with the touchy religious issues.  

Amazing faith is shown when the Amish people in 2006 forgave and even attended the funeral of Charles Carl Roberts, the man who killed five of their young Amish girls.    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qXAUQWqUAXY . There is no way to distance this story from religion. The Amish people forgave the murderer because they were taught to forgive in their religion, and they strongly believed in it.  http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/10/04/national/main2059816.shtml

Ethics in Journalism

In my Comms 239 class, we discussed the importance of ethics in journalism. The group focused mainly on the Society of Professional Journalists’ four pillars of ethics.

1.       Seek the truth and report it

“If you are out to describe the truth, leave elegance to the tailor.” –Albert Einstein http://tinyurl.com/ly9l8z

Truth should be simple, direct, and to the point. Truth does not have to be dressed up elaborately, it is just there.

2.       Minimize harm

We specifically talked about the Golden Rule. This is a simple and universal code that applies to all people and not just journalists. http://tinyurl.com/cur5xt

If you were on the other side of the microphone how would you want to be treated?

3.       Act Independently

If journalists don’t remain objective, readers will not trust the newspaper. If I wrote for the New York Times, and I attended a republican rally, readers will assume that I have a republican bias, even if I try to remain objective in my column.

4.       Journalists are accountable to their readers, viewers, listeners, and each other

The underlying principle here is to be transparent. Let the public know what you do and how you do it. Give follow-up websites and give people a chance to get involved.

People trust journalists and politicians that come across transparent. Obama knows this, and so gave this address. http://tinyurl.com/as2mrv

In class, we also discussed a few case studies in which ethics comes into play. We discussed each issue, and decided what would be the “ethical” thing to do. We got into heated debates, and not everyone agreed on every issue. This is when our personal morals come to play. We must look deep within ourselves and decide what is right and wrong. 

Watchdog Journalistsm

In Comms 239 we talked about watchdog journalism.

All of us can become watchdog journalists thanks to the internet. We all have the ability to keep tabs on anything and everything.

The government is always a good place to start. But can we weaken the government by what we post? WikiLeaks, http://wikileaks.org/ a professed watchdog, have been accused of making the U.S. military more vulnerable. When we view videos on the internet, we must make sure that we search both sides of the story before we jump to any rash conclusions.  

Watch this WikiLeaks clip posted in April 2010. U.S. soldiers were accused of killing innocent Iraqi citizens. You be the judge. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5rXPrfnU3G0

How does the United States government react to WikiLeaks? Well, according to Julian Assange, the WikiLeaks founder, the U.S. is trying to indict him on criminal charges. Here is an interview with Assange on CNN’s 60 Minutes. http://tinyurl.com/3mcxn3w

I think WikiLeaks and other social media watchdogs can be very useful in exposing truths about the government and other big wigs. But we cannot take everything we read and/or see by face value. A little research never hurt anybody.