The reproduction of print onine??

Being a person who is extremely interested in online journalism, I would like to say that news sites are producing a whole new type of journalism, totally different to what we see in papers and magazines everyday. But unfortunately, I don't think they are. Not yet anyway.

After having looked at some of the feature links, I think it seems like alot of these sites are scared of moving away from the formality of a news paper feature. Surely the point of the internet is to have a little freedom and do something a bit daring?

To name a few. The Wired articles appear to be taken straight from the magazine on pasted onto a webpage. This pattern occures throughout the whole site, and if anythings seems a bit lazy.

The piece on Glen Reynalds was very dissapointing. A piece about blogging, which in its self is a great example of how the internet is being used to bring changes to journalism, is layed out just like an Q&A in a magazine, it even uses pull quotes. In a magazine this is a very attractive way to lay out a page, but on a computer screen it looks very confusing.

I think the features from the Guardian Unlimited show a little more of what the internet can do for a story. They are brief, but use links to expand on the story and give readers the choice.

Nora Paul, the limitless newshole, and online journalisms full potential.

After reading this piece I have to say I don't wholey agree with it.

For starters, when it talks about the initial expectations, it doesn't take into account that the full potential of online journalism hadn't really been realised and I don't find it surprising that the internet hasn't been used as a facility to showcase what didn't get put into the final edits of the newspapers. Generally what we read in the papers is what the journalist deemed to be the vital information, what the reader needs and wants to know. I would consider the use of linking to pages relivant to the story, which may be of interest to the reader, is how the internet has been used to give that little bit extra information.

It also doesn't talk about the freedom online journalism brings to the writing. It does briefly mention how a change of style was expected, but I think the internet has made a huge impact on journlism, because it gives it a more personal, intimate feel.

The article also gives he impression that the only way of communication between journalist and reader is email and says that initially it was thought that more communication would be established, but this hasn;t happened. What about comment boxes? And blogs? Thanks to these most news sites have build a bridge between the journalist and the reader.

Over-all I found this article interesting, but as one of the comments described rather 'blind'. I get the impression that she thinks the nation is disapointed that the internet hasn't done for journalism, what was promised. But the internet is providing more possiblities all the time, providing more possibilities for journalism. Developments like blogging, and online only publications weren't invisioned 10 years ago. Maybe online journlism should be given a little more time to develop, it's still reaching it's full potential. Maybe we don't have a limitless newshole just yet, but who knows what will happen 10 years from now?

How the bloggers brought down Dan Rather

In this lesson I had the task of finding out who Dan Rather is, and how blogs affected him.

Firstly I searched Wikipedia, to find out who Dan Rather is. I found out that he used to work for CBS news. He was an upstanding, well respected reporter who worked at CBS for 44 years.

Rather made a very controversial documentary about George W Bush's Military career. This is where the bloggers come in. Many right wing bloggers who sided with President Bush investigated the documents used in the documentary and managed to prove they were forgeries. This, consequently lowered peoples respect of Dan Rather, and shortly after he resigned from CBS.

Silver Surfers - Research

Here is a collection of sources which could be used for putting together an article about Elderly people using the internet.


The best piece I found was an article from The Telegraph which used survey results from
the Insurence company AXA. This company could be contacted for more infortmation. The results gave the percentage of elderly people who name Internet usage as their faveourite past time. It also found that the online activities enjoyed by elderly internet users include Email, talking to friends and family online, booking holidays and shopping.

I searched Myspace for any users who may be over the age of 65. I found several but most of them had not been updated for some time. The most recently updated was Old Man John, who is 79 and from Bradford. He could be someone to interview about how he uses the internet.

I also researched Online dating for older people. I wasn't really surprised to discover several dating websites specifically for people over 50. These websites could be contacted for infortmation. Also people who have successfully found a partner online could be contacted for their story.

Critical Evaluation of Review Tube

In this evaluation I am going to discuss what we did on our blog, which worked well, and also what we struggled with or could have done better.

The name we chose for the blog ‘Review Tube’ works really well. It sounds good and leaves the blog needing no description as it does exactly what it says in the name. The layout looks good. At the top Fogg made a title banner and we chose colours, which match so it all looks organized and professional. There are features down the right side of the screen, like links and categories, these look really good as they fill up where a lot of white space would be if they were not there, although we thought there were possibly two many categories and it looked a little unorganised. This is something we tidied up a bit. We initially decided to have the video at the top of each post above its review. This has worked well and everyone stuck to this plan.

The style of the writing in each post works well and compliments each writer’s posts. I think we all need to be a bit more careful with typos and grammar, it s important to read through each post several times before publishing. We all used a similar type of humour within our writing, which has worked well and reads easily.

Individually, I need to remember to link within my posts. I tended to link bands to their Myspace page, as this would be familiar for our target group of students and people our own age. I think I could have linked to more relevant videos on you Tube within my posts. I also need to be careful not to repeat myself.

One thing we all struggled with was sourcing videos. There are hundreds of thousands of videos to choose from on You Tube and it’s hard to know where to start looking. Hayley said she found it difficult finding videos she actually found funny and that she could write about. Personally I found it difficult to write about a music video I didn’t like. I did however, make sure all the videos were new, but when searching in the music categories on You Tube none of the popular videos were by artists I felt I could write about. In future I need to be a little more open-minded and not just write about all my favourite bands.

You Tube has become a stage for world to display their most creative hidden talents. BockandChewy is a You Tuber who does just that. This member has an extensive collection of homemade videos displaying the fictional antics of the Californian rock band AFI, in the forms of paper puppets.

Hunter’s Revenge on Jade, is the latest of BockandChewy’s creations. Hunter Revenge is the name of Hunter’s (AFI’s bassist) side project. This piece tells the story of Hunter discovering from two of his band mates, that Jade their guitarist is having a dinner party and he wasn’t invited. Hunter sees red and sets out to get his revenge on Jade.

This short piece, like BockandChewy’s other films, to AFI fans, is extremely funny, with the way it plays on the personalities of the band members, and makes fun out of real life events and stories. To those who haven’t heard of AFI or aren’t to familiar with their music, this piece may be mildly amusing, but it’s more than likely you just wouldn’t ‘get it’.

Brand New love boys!!

Let's all jump on the "We hate the NHS" Bandwagon!

We see it on TV, we read about it in the papers, we hear people talking about it on the bus, and we ourselves can’t deny having moaned about it at some point in our lives.

The NHS is quite possibly the nations favourite subject to moan about.

All right, so it’s fair to say there is a bed shortage in hospitals, we know this and the hospitals admit this. Although it has been suggested the NHS are using the excuse of a Flu epidemic to explain the shortage in hospital beds. It’s constantly in the news and if you haven’t been affected by it, then chances are someone you know will have been. I am pleased to say I have never had the misfortune of being admitted to hospital; therefore I have never experienced the problems with bed shortages first hand.

The second point I’d like to raise is the so-called nursing staff shortage in our hospitals. It’s being talked about constantly, and seems to be a real problem. But an article from the BBC says the NHS has employed 40,000 new nurses since 1997. So why is there still a shortage. I think it’s exactly the same reason there aren’t enough beds. There isn’t enough money to pay nurses.

I have a friend from the Cheque Republic who moved to England a fully trained nurse. But she can’t get any work over here, because there are no vacancies for nurses in Hospitals at the moment. She is now working in a restaurant and improving her English. But it seems sad that someone with the right training cannot get a job in their field, especially when it seems to be a field where there is an alarming shortage.

Hospital hygiene might be what the population complains about the most. Five years ago when my Nan went into hospital for an operation on her arm, I remember being disgusted at the state of the ward she was staying on. There was a bloodstain on the bed sheets, and everything was grubby. I have, of course visited people in hospitals since then. Most recently last October in the very same hospital, and conditions had improved dramatically. Figures released by the department of health say that 60% of hospitals had good levels of hygiene. It would be better is it was nearer to 100% it is a hospital. But it is an improvement on the 44% in 2001. So what is everyone still moaning about?

Many people complain about the level of care they receive from nursing staff during their stay. When I went to college I caught the same bus as the one that went to the hospital as it was next door to the college. I lost count of the amount of times I sat behind a couple of elderly women who were moaning about the poor care they experienced when they were last in hospital. But a recent survey by the Healthcare Commission revealed that 92% of patients were happy with the care they received. But I think more than 8% of patients are still moaning about it. Are people just jumping on the bandwagon? Have these people who moan at the bus stop even been admitted to hospital in the last year?

My sister has been in and out of hospital all her life. Along with this I have paid many hospital visits. Not once have I found anything to complain about. A lot of the time my mum has been left to do her general medication, but she does that at home anyway. Four months ago my sister was once again admitted. During this time her condition deteriorated and a few weeks before Christmas things were at an all time low. As you can imagine it was a hard time for the whole family. But the people who made it easier were the nursing staff. They took over full care and for once let my Mum be a Mother not a carer. This took so much strain off the family and it was still an upsetting time, but the support we received was well above my expectations.

As far as standards of care go in hospitals, I think our nursing staff is constantly improving and people who complain have quite obviously never been in a situation where high levels of care and support are needed. At a time when a family needed support the most, the staff at Evelina Children’s hospital at St. Thomas’s was exceptional.

The general public of Britain need to get off their high horse and start taking note of the positive things, and stop searching for the negatives. Because walking into any NHS hospital these days, you will have to look very hard to find something to complain about.

Back to Iraq - Dispatches from the Middle East

Back to Iraq is a blog created by Christopher Allbritton, a former AP and New York Daily News reporter. He created this blog to raise funds so he go to Iraq and write reports independently. He became the webs first fully reader-funded journalist blogger.

Christopher Allbritton uses the blog to post reports from Iraq, which not only account the news, but also his experience out there.

I think the posts on this blog do count as news, because they report what is happening in Iraq and are quite detailed. I also think the reader can trust these accounts more so than similar blogs like Baghdad burning, because the reports are coming from an already known/ trusted journalist.

Allbritton has since moved onto Beirut and also reports for a variety of publications, including Time Magazine.