Headline Writing

This week in our editing class, we're talking about headline writing. The few times I've tried to write a good one. I've failed miserably and I've concluded that it takes a lot of talent to write a headline that both encompasses the entire article and is catchy.

I started thinking about misleading headlines when I came across this one from the Globe and Mail this morning.

"Girl who had hiccups for five weeks charged with murder"

My initial thought, before reading the article, was what I hoped to believe. Having the hiccups for five weeks drove her to murder?

But when I read the article, I found out that a woman who was famous in 2007 for having the hiccups for five weeks when she was 15 years old (she appeared on The Today Show and got a hug from Keith Urban).

Now 19, she has been charged with first-degree murder, the climax of a downhill slide which her mother claims started with the "curse of the hiccups". The girl ran away from home twice and the family sued a hiccup-curing company for using the girl's image without permission.

But really, I got to thinking, without the mother's somewhat ridiculous claim, what is the link between the hiccups and the murder? Without her hiccup fame, we likely wouldn't be hearing about a Florida murder in a Canadian paper.

But I know for sure, without that headline, I likely wouldn't have read the article. So despite the confusion, maybe the headline writer did his/her job?



(Images from blogcrack.com)

A week in the life of a J major.

Today kicked off a big week for us journalism majors at Red River.

We started with a visit to the Winnipeg Law Courts this morning. It was a really interesting experience.

I was a little bit nervous going in, as I wasn't sure if I would be able to find a good story, and even if I did, write about it without breaking one of the many rules about writing about court cases.

But, with the help of Mike McIntyre, lawyer Kevin Sneesby and the CP stylebook, I got a story (a bail hearing turned sentencing) and wrote it in less time than I expected. Most importantly, I was happy with it.

But the best part of the day was wandering in-and-out of courtrooms and taking in how the justice system works on a daily basis. With so many cases to process and lawyers and judges hurrying from courtroom to courtroom, I can't believe they keep it all straight.

I was surprised at how informal some of the proceedings were. The public can come and go from courtrooms as they please, as can lawyers, many lining up their documents in front of the judge before the last hearing is over.

But the best experience of the day was in a more formal courtroom where a preliminary murder trial was taking place.

It was more like the trials you see on TV — a judge, lawyers, the accused, witnesses. I wish I could have stayed longer.

I hope I get to do some crime reporting sometime in my career.



Tomorrow, Dawna Friesen will be in Winnipeg filming Global National at the Forks, and since she is a former CreComm J major, she's coming by the college to talk to the J students and first years about social media.

Dawna is really an inspiration for all of us because she started from the same, humble roots as many of us and got her education where we're studying. I can only hope to one day be as successful as Dawna Friesen and I'm looking forward to hearing her speak tomorrow.



Then Wednesday, of course, is civic election day! I'm looking forward to doing a few live hits from Judy Wasylycia-Leis's election night headquarters for KICK-FM, the college radio station.

But I also think we're all excited for the election to be over. It's been on our minds — and workloads — since the beginning of September, so to finally see the results and end our coverage will be gratifying and a relief.

And of course, Thursday, is broadcast journalism today. This week, we're learning how to put together full broadcast stories with interviews. Lots to learn!

And Friday, our day of rest? Many of us have few to no classes on Fridays, but there is really no rest for the J majors. Homework calls.

My greatest nemesis... math.

In our editing print and online media class the past few weeks, we've been talking about numbers... code for math.

Many journalism articles contain numbers and often, a new set of numbers acquired by a journalist need to be compared to a previous set of numbers to track changes and trends in patterns (particularly in business). Therefore, some math is required by the journalist to make these numbers relevant in a story and useful to the reader.

But math is my biggest crutch. It was my worst subject in grade 12, so I avoided it all through university. At Red River, we've barely had to deal with them. My brain just doesn't work that way.

So I am nervous to run into them in a work place scenario. There are a lot of people who can do math better than I can, so if I make a mistake, which is very possible, either my editor (hopefully) or my readers (even worse) would notice.

Furthermore, if I ever became an editor and have to be checking someone else's work, I could very well miss errors in numbers and math.

We've been discussing percent versus percentage point in class lately, and while I understand the difference between the two and why both are useful in a story, I have trouble actually doing the math to figure them out or check whether they are right.

So my goal for the next few years is to get better at math. In particular, the math that I will need to use most often in my stories. Starting with percentage points.

Tweeting Live from the Courtroom

Warning: slightly disturbing content.

The Globe and Mail had reporters live-tweeting from the trial of Colonel Russell Williams on Monday.

We followed it for a while in our journalism class this morning, and I've been hooked on it since, which has kind of surprised me.

I'm not usually a fan of live-tweeting, or tweeting at all. But when it comes to something as interesting of such magnitude as this case, I want to know everything.

And live-tweeting is the best way to do it (as the events cannot be broadcast on TV).

I'm also interested in the kinds of tweets that are being published. Some are purely facts about the case.

12:47 - Greg McArthur: The Crown shows a photo of Col. Williams wearing pink underwear, and asks the judge to take note of the time and the colour of Col. Williams pants and shirt: It's 5 pm, and the colour is blue. The Crown says, it's impossible to say with certainty, but it looks like he's wearing the girl's panties underneath his military uniform while at work.

Others set the scene.

2:48 - TimothyAppleby: The mood in here this afternoon could hardly be more grim. Hardened police officers and crime reporters stare blankly as the horrifying photos are shown on the video screen. It is all reminiscent of the 1995 Paul Bernardo murder trial.

Others are more editorial.

12:57 Greg McArthur: A thought: when did this man ever sleep? Between the plotting of the break-ins, and the actual break-ins themselves, and running Canada's largest air force base, there certainly couldn't have been much time.

Others are even broader, surrounding the case.

2:33 TimothyAppleby: During the lunch hour, a television station reported that Col. Williams's wife, Mary-Elizabeth Harriman, was in the courthouse listening to her husband's horrifying life of crime. Not so says the Belleville police officer in charge of security.

With all of these details provided every 3-5 minutes throughout the whole day, will I need to read the story that actually gets published on the Globe website at the end of the day's proceedings? No. I've heard everything. But will I read it? Yes. I'm interested to see how the reporter takes the days events (and tweets) and condenses all the information into a so-many-word story. A good journalist can maximize the important details that readers want to know from a full day of information overload.

I think studying how the good ones carefully select their content and present it in an informative, interesting and encompassing manner, along with practicing it myself, is the best way to learn.

Attending the event a reporter is covering and reading the story later is the best way to do it.

But if you can't be there? Well, I guess live-tweeeting isn't so bad.




(Images: top: the Blackberry Globe and Mail application, from theglobeandmail.com; bottom: Colonel Russell Williams, from pysih.com)

Mom is always right.

My mom is going to be thrilled when she reads this.

I'm admitting that she's right.

I have a bad grammar habit that she points out every time I go home.

It happened again over the Thanksgiving weekend.

Flashback to Sunday.

Me: "I saw that Facebook movie. The Social Network. It was really good."

Mom: "Oh. Who all went?"

Me: "Just me and Chris."

Mom: "Who?"

Me: "Me and Chris."

Mom: "Chris and I! Weren't you an English major? And aren't you a journalist now?"

Me: (Grumble, grumble.)

But it's true. I say "so-and-so and me" all the time. It's a hard habit to break. And I never even think about it until my mom brings it up in our conversations.

But it's a habit I need to break because I'm sure there are industry professionals out there who are like my mom who would notice every time I said "so-and-so and me".

So I'll try my best, mom. But for my sanity and my pride, just let one or two of those slide once in a while.
(Image from sodahead.com)

8 Things I Learned at 2 Mayoral Debates

Today I attended two mayoral debates — one at the Red River College Princess Street campus this morning and one at the Franco-Manitoba Cultural Centre this evening. I learned 8 things. (Well, likely more than 8, but it's my favourite number!)



1. A debate featuring mayoral candidates doesn't always mean every mayoral candidate will be invited.

Rav Gill and Brad Gross were not invited to the CJOB RRC debate. But they were almost completely ignored at the debate they were invited to. I'm not sure which was more awkward for them. Though I do think they should always be invited.

2. Who hosts the debate makes a big difference.

The tone of the debate hosted by CJOB's Richard Cloutier was much different the tone of the debate hosted by Kim Babij of Shaw. While I think part of that was due to the audience and the medium, both tried to keep the debate moving along and make it happen on time and I think Babij did a more effective and professional job of it. She let them speak, but firmly cut them off at time, while Cloutier rushed the candidates through their answers with overbearing hand signals.



3. You can tell a long-time politician from a real estate agent.

Sorry Brad and Rav, but you just don't have the political rhetoric of Sam and Judy.

4. Cheap jabs get cheap laughs.

Sam to Judy:

"When someone calls me "my dear Sam Katz" it's like being scolded by my grandmother!"

“Thanks, Mom.”




5. Broad questions get rehearsed answers.

ie: What are you going to do about crime?

Candidate's eyes light up. Well... (insert heavily rehearsed platform here.)

6. Having a panel of well-informed, city hall beat journalists keeps the candidates on their toes.

The evening debate featured harder-hitting questions that required candidates to speak off the cuff and often left them unable to dodge questions (though they always managed to dance around some!) Less platform = less repetitive and more interesting!



7. Debates = Press Conferences

They get a bunch of media in a room to get out the politicians' key messages.

8. While I like politics and have an interest in political journalism, I think it would make me cynical.

Politicians rehearse their answers and stick to them. They are tight-lipped about speaking off the cuff, even though their electorate would appreciate an honest answer. The PR of politics sickens me and I don't know how long I could put up with it.

But at the same time, I think the monotony of debates like the two I attended today would encourage me to work harder to find interesting way to cover elections and get voters important information in perhaps a more audience-friendly format.

Photos (in order of appearance): Sam Katz (from winnipeg.ca), Judy Wasylycia-Leis (from action.org), Rav Gill (from winnipeg.ctv.ca) and Brad Gross (from winnipeg.ctv.ca).

Huh... it is a word!

One of my pet peeves has always been the use of the word "disorientated". Every time I hear someone say, "I was so disorientated!", I cringe.

I got to thinking about it again the other day when I heard someone using it to describe the after-affects of cold medicine and decided I would blog, begging people to never use that word again! It's disoriented, not disorientated!

But then I decided to look it up.

And according to dictionary.com, disorientated is a word.

Whoops. I was wrong.

dis·o·ri·en·tate

–verb (used with object), -tat·ed, -tat·ing.
"to disorient"


But dictionary.com also makes the distinction between "disoriented" (which it says can be an adjective) and "disorientated" (which it says is a verb). So are the words really interchangeable? I can't find a good explanation online.

Help!

Student Journalist: Help or Hinder?

(Image from collegemedimatters.com)




On Friday, my work for the CBC website was posted on cbc.ca.

I was proud to see my work online, but when I read my byline (Ward and candidate profiles by Kim Lawson, a journalism major in the Creative Communications program at Red River College), I started thinking about the pros and cons of being a student journalist and how they helped and hindered me over the course of finishing the assignment.

The Benefits of Identifying Oneself as a Student Journalist

1. You become more approachable. Some people find you less threatening if you're a student. Perhaps they feel they are less likely to judge their answers, because after all, students are still learning. They don't know everything.

2. Some people feel like they're doing a good deed by doing you a favour. They know you aren't getting paid. You're completing an assignment to try and do well in class (and isn't that what every parent wants their child to do?). They feel a sense of responsibility to help the students of the world. By talking to you, they do their good deed of the day.

3. If you screw up, it's a great card to have in your back pocket! "I'm sorry, I'm new at this. I'm just a student." Then look at the pity that crosses those faces!

The Pitfalls of Identifying Oneself as a Student Journalist

1. Your credibility goes out the window.

2. High profile figures (like politicians) automatically put you last on their priority list. They often want to talk to you, but not if someone more important comes along. Be prepared to be rescheduled on... multiple times. Or just flat-out not answered.



So in summary, being a student worked well for me when I approached the regular citizens of Winnipeg. Most of them were friendly and patient with me and tried their best to answer my questions. But when it came to the politicians, I definitely wasn't a priority and I could tell. It took weeks to get replies, if I got them at all. I felt like a pest for the number of times I had to call and email some people to get a response. I don't like feeling that way.

But student or not, you have to get the job done. That's the life of a reporter, and I'm looking forward to being a journalist, sans the student.