Dancespeak
October 31, 2006 at 8:59 pm | Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a commentI apologize for neglecting Navigating the Storm over the past few weeks. I have been working on a new blog, dancespeak.wordpress.com on dance in New York City, so please check it out!
Newassignment.net, new opportunities in journalism?
October 31, 2006 at 8:57 pm | Posted in new media | Leave a commentThroughout the semester, our interactive class has been a place for discussion about how this is the time for burgeoning opportunities in journalism, especially good for those with an entrepreneurial mind. On Thursday, we got to discuss one new idea about to launch.
Jay Rosen, faculty member at the NYU Journalism school and journalism entrepreneur, came to speak to the CUNY Graduate School of Journalism about his new project, newassignment.net. With the goal of sparking innovation in online journalism, Rosen aims to harness the power and knowledge of people on the internet. The result is a brand new form of social networked and citizen reporting.
What is interesting about newassignment.net is that it combines the access and experience of professional reporters and editors with the passion and knowledge of an interested and engaged public. The professionals will work with “posses” of individuals in communities who will both suggest and report stories. Rosen said that newassignment.net will attempt to organize its interested public through a Director of Participation. Whoever takes on that position will have the heady task of ensuring that participants work in a useful and productive way, sorting out all of the crazies and the like.
I believe that newassignment.net appears to be an honorable endeavor. It attempts to bring professional journalism back into the community, tapping into the technology that is changing the industry. It also strives to bring the community in. But I really feel like I need to hold off judgement until I see this in action. After working in fundraising over the past few years, I have seen donors turn into volunteers, do I do believe that there are certain folk truly passionate about journalism and the media who will take that extra step to become participants in the process. If journalism is supposed to be independent, how will newassignment.net prevent certain biased or interested parties in skewing coverage or encouraging mob rule? And what kind of stories will it report on? Rosen kind of danced around that issue, so I’ll be interested to see if this is community-based, like our neighborhood beats or if this form could ever have a national stage.
In response to the suggestion of a second blog…
October 9, 2006 at 8:03 pm | Posted in journalism, new media | Leave a commentWhen I began here at CUNY, I was more than a bit hestitant about maintaining my own blog. Insecurities ran rampant. Would I be insightful enough? Would I be witty? Would I, could I, be funny? And this is to say nothing of having a permanent record of my thoughts and writings at the onset of my journalistic career. Where do I stand now? Well, I am still wrapping my head around a blog’s form, its limitations, and its benefits. I have enjoyed learning the tools–Photoshop, Dreamweaver, etc.–and believe that acquiring these additional skills will be beneficial as I try to build a career.
As for a second blog, I agree with a few of my classmates who have indicated that an additional blog shouldn’t have to be about our neighborhood beats. I understand the argument of having neighborhood blogs, including adding value to some of our Craft stories and creating a dialogue between us and the community we’re covering, but I think this is an opportunity to revel in the form’s flexibility. We are in the midst of acquiring a great number of skills–both editorial and technological–why not use them to cover and write about something that we are passionate about, an issue or topic that we don’t necessarily get to examine while bogged down in Craft and Legal and Ethical Issues assignments?
As somewhat of an entertainment junkie, I would probably like to write about television, the upcoming awards season, and expand upon my previous post on dance and dance criticism.
The Parks Beat
October 2, 2006 at 3:47 pm | Posted in parks, Uncategorized, Williamsburg | Leave a comment
A neglected McCarren Park Pool, the new track at McCarren Park with the new development that borders it, and a recently renovated Sternberg Park–over the past two weeks, my
Williamsburg beat has transformed into coverage of that neighborhood’s parks. A community in transition, the development is not just concentrated on building lavish condominiums, but also on maintaining and upgrading the neighorhood’s green spaces. In the face of continued construction creating a brand-new Williamsburg, clean places to gather and play have become even more important to residents. And city officials have been listening, so far. Last Tuesday, New York City Parks Commissioner Adrian Benape even promised the audience at the Sternberg Park opening that a renovated McCarren Park Pool was next on his list.
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