Abstract #1
The article on story ideas seemed mundane at first, after reading the whole list I realized how important the idea was. So often as journalists, or even as members of the general public, I feel we take the news for granted. We rarely think about where good stories come from, assuming at times that they pop up in the heads of editors or reporters. What we fail to truly grasp, I believe, is that finding good story ideas takes a little more time and work than we like to admit.
I remember back in the days of my reporting class (oh, the fond memories) when my partner and I had to come up with a tip sheet for our lab. It seemed easy at first-we were on a large campus and there are 50,000+ students roaming around a small city. There had to be plenty of things going on. However, what seemed interesting to us often failed to take into account the news values on which we have been trained, such as prominence, proximity, conflict and timeliness. Much of what we had were events, poorly thought localizations on stories that weren’t very strong in the first place and similar “fluff.” Though it took some time, and some help from our lab instructor, we eventually came up with something that was passable and hopefully helpful to our fellow lab mates.
I had similar problems in my magazine and feature writing class. Here, we had much more freedom to select stories. However, I felt that this added another layer of difficulty to a process that was already foreign to me. Thankfully, most of my story ideas turned out OK in the end after much head scratching and, at times, frustration. As I mentioned, story ideas take more effort than perhaps we initially assume.
As a result of these past problems, I found the article very useful. My reporting professor had always told us to keep an eye out for stories wherever we were, yet this list brings up some interesting ideas I had not previously thought of. Some of the more interesting places to find ideas for me were: tombstones, classified ads, eavesdropping, the hairdresser and a newspaper’s ad representatives.
I also thought the article brought up an excellent point about writers being unhappy with story assignments even though they were unwilling to think of their own. It seems to make much more sense to pitch ideas that you are interested in and to work with your editor on writing a good story. It has been my personal experience that working on a story that I am interested in keeps me motivated, excited and more likely to write a better story.
The second article, dealing with the flow of news, brought up some thought-provoking ideas. It was interesting to see how a story would go from conception to reality in the past, when there was no Internet, e-mail or related conveniences of modern times. The notion of actually having to look at hard copies of old newspaper stories, watch old videos or using archival radio reports to start research on a story seems almost foreign in this age of rapid information that is available in just a few clicks online.
It was also interesting to see how the basic framework, however, hasn’t changed much in the current flow of stories. It seems the process has simply become more streamlined and, hopefully, more accurate. With the ability to send e-mail or check facts through extensive online sources, the excuse for making mistakes seems to be a thing of past (although things do inevitably slip through from time to time). The current process is also intriguing in that it brings up issues of convergence, as reporters are now being asked to capture audio or video for online components of stories-skills previously associated with broadcast media.
The process that the author thinks will be used in the future is, to me, novel and promising-yet also a little scary. I like the idea of having a forum that would help highlight stories that are of particular interest to the community, as well as serving as a melting pot for potential sources and experts on a story idea. I also like the idea of having community input to help further flesh out a chosen story. What is a little uncomfortable for me, however, is the idea of having so much user input as far as the actual story is concerned.
While I like the idea of users being able to point out corrections and make suggestions, the idea of a wiki where people would actually be able to change the story seems a little strange to me. Perhaps it’s just the way I have been trained, but it seems like it gives average people, whose intentions might be somewhat unclear, a little bit too much control. But maybe I’m just over thinking the situation. Perhaps this process would actually lead to much better stories.
I guess only time will tell if this becomes a viable option that both the media and the general public will enjoy and find useful.
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