The Last Word; Self Reflection on My Social Media Involvement

To mark the completion of my News and Journalism unit I wrote a small self reflective piece regarding the information that I have learnt from this unit and my involvement with social media.

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I found the use of social media throughout this unit to be very insightful and helpful. It proved to me how easy it is for anybody with access to social media to take part in news distribution.

As I was already an avid user of Twitter I found it very easy to start incorporating news into my tweets. I didn’t want to simply retweet every news item that appeared in my timeline as this would have become meaningless and had no relevance to me. Instead I chose to tweet the news that I found mattered to me and interested me the most, with a little line of what could be said to be my own opinion. I learnt that for me, this was the best way for me to partake in news distribution. Again, it was incredibly simple to do and meant that issues that I found interesting and important were then being passed on to my followers. I was already following certain official news sites such as the BBC’s Twitter account, along with Sky and The Guardian. I also began following local newspapers to give me a wider variety of news in my timeline.

In terms of my blog, this platform gave me the opportunity to discuss in more detail certain aspects of journalism and what I had learnt throughout the unit. It also enabled me to publish work I had created for my assignments and draw attention to certain news sites such as The Guardian which I find very valuable.

Overall, my involvement with social media has taught me a lot about how journalism is changing as a profession and the ways in which many people can become a part of citizen journalism.

Feature Articles; My Favourite Place To Find Them

When it comes to reading newspapers and magazines I find I get most of my enjoyment from the wide range of feature articles available to us. As gripping and important as breaking-news stories are, feature articles offer much more to me when I read them. They can be educational, helpful or sometimes just simply entertaining. My favourite place to find all of these types of feature articles is The Guardian’s website whose features cover numerous categories such as the environment, travel and also culture. I had a read today as I often do and found three features that I particularly liked.

The Guardian offers a wide range of feature articles with something for everyone

The first was in the Culture section and was part of an ongoing feature theme that The Guardian are running; ‘The State of British TV’. The one that caught my attention was the one that focussed on Sport. It examined whether the amount of Sport on British television today was detracting from the enjoyment of it. Being that the feature is published on the website, readers are able to upload their comments on the feature. This is possible on all Guardian features on their website, an aspect that I think adds to the feature itself.

The second feature was a heartwarming tale in the Environment section that told the story of how small birds have beaten all the odds and increased in numbers through the coldest December recorded in Britain for 100 years or more. This feature was enhanced by photos of the birds. What amazes me about reading features on the Guardian website is the amount of variety you get with one simple click.

The third feature that took my interest was a recommendation of the best places to eat in Western Spain, by chef Jose Pizarro. He listed his top six best places to eat in Extremadura including a restaurant inside a monastery, the Relais and Chatequx hotel, and his favourite restauarant which offers modern Spanish cooking. I loved this feature because of its simple style and educational, cultural tone.

Obviously there are many more feature articles out there, but for me personally I think the Guardian offers the best range of variety all in one place. I would recommend it if you have a spare half an hour every day!

My Community Story – Alcohol free nightclub could reduce excessive crime levels in Lansdowne.

The following is the story I wrote after completing some first hand reporting for my News and Journalism unit. You can read my previous blog post about it here.

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ALCOHOL FREE NIGHTCLUB COULD REDUCE EXCESSIVE CRIME LEVELS IN LANSDOWNE

The opening of an alcohol free nightclub in Old Christchurch Lane this month could reduce substance related crime in Lansdowne.

The over 18’s ‘Late Night Cafe’ in Old Christchurch Lane will be open one Saturday a month and run by Michael French; Bournemouth’s Nightclub Chaplain.

Since statistics for crime levels in Lansdowne in December 2010 were published (wwwpolice.co.uk) it is hoped that the alcohol free event will help to reduce the 471 counts of anti-social behaviour that were reported in the Lansdowne area. Alongside this were 324 counts of ‘Other’ crime including criminal damage and drug offences, and 180 reports of violent crimes in just one month.

French, who currently co-ordinates a group of volunteers that patrol the Lansdowne area at night said, “Most night time crime we encounter is people under the influence, some definitely from excess drinking.  We’ve teamed up with ‘Clean Time Sound System’, a group of recovering addicts that put on alcohol and drug free events.” French said.  The group behind the nightclub hope that by removing the alcohol element from a night out they will lower the acts of violence and crime that take place when people drink excessively.

Some locals of the Lansdowne area are backing the opening of such a night club. Cedric, an employee at the Lansdowne Subway said, “We’ve experienced a lot of anti-social behaviour here which is always related to drink. We’ve had to resort to having security in the building at night, so to take alcohol out of the equation would help make the late night environment safer.”

Others however feel that it won’t have much of an effect. Hannah, who works at Lansdowne Florists, said “I don’t mean to stereotype but there are lots of other places in the area that attract people who have caused trouble. I know people in Lansdowne that have experienced crime in this area due to excessive drinking but the club should be available to under 18’s as well. This would help get them off the street and reduce crime levels further.”

The Late Night Cafe will be open on the 26^th March.

Social Media – A Journalistic Tool – Embrace or Disgrace?

As mentioned before in my entry about the Christchurch earthquake, social media is playing a huge part in the distrubiton of news nowadays. It has become a tool that enables almost anybody to provide news to a wide range of people, and citizen journalism is on the up.

However, this of course has an impact on journalism as a profession. After conducting some research on the matter I wrote a feature article that would perhaps be suitable for a publication such as The Guardian on the effects of social media with regards to journalistic profession. This feature is uploaded below.

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On Friday 11th March 2011 I did what I always do first in the morning; I checked my Twitter feed. As I worked my way up from the point at which I had last checked the night before, through some general mundane bed-time related updates, and the odd drunken-tweet that never fails to amuse, the tone of my timeline took a sudden change. From here, somewhere around the ‘early hours’ mark, and within the space of about ten tweets, I learnt of the horrific events that had unfolded while I had been asleep.

One of the largest earthquakes ever recorded had hit Japan and caused a tsunami to engulf the country, causing, as we are all now aware, mammoth destruction and devastation. Twitter was telling me that no one in the country was safe, that the death toll was rising, and that we must pray for the poor people effected because sadly, there was not much else we could do.

The devestating effects of the earthquake which hit Japan on March 11 2011

The trending topics that blinked alternately at me from the top of my Twitter app said it all. #Prayforjapan. #Tsunami #Poorjapan and even, if somewhat insensitively – #Godzilla. I clicked on each one and scrolled through, the devastation becoming ever more apparent and frightening. There were thousands of people in danger and I was glued to my timeline for updates on the country’s safety.

It occurred to me around two hours later that despite fervently watching Twitter for updates on the events in Japan, I hadn’t once felt the need to visit a mainstream news website or even turn the television on to watch the live coverage from the BBC. Yes, I’d read tweets from @BBCBreaking and @SkyNews which provided me with facts; the ever rising death toll and the amount of people missing, for example. But, I’d found myself provided with information through friends, associates and people I didn’t know but had found through the related topics that were trending. Information such as the phone number to ring if you were worried about a loved one in Japan. The website to visit if you wished to make a donation to the rescue mission. I even found myself ‘retweeting’ this information; I was part of this massive news-sharing conversation.

When I finally turned on the television to watch the events unfold on the BBC news, it struck me that a lot of the information I had received from Twitter wasn’t available to me through the mainstream forms of journalism. The newspapers couldn’t give me the personal insights of terror that I got from reading the tweets of those who worried for loved ones in Japan; the sort of insight that gives you a fuller, deeper understanding of the extent of what has happened. The news programmes took days before they mentioned the ways in which you could donate to Japan’s rescue mission. What was happening here – had social media taken a massive leap over the mainstream news channels?

Is social media taking over from the traditional practices of journalism?

Not quite. Of course, many people still tuned into the news programmes for their information, or bought the newspapers to read up on what was happening. But this, obviously, was not the first time that social media sites had acted as news distributors.  Shayne Bowman and Chris Willis write in their paper We Media of the terrorist attacks of September 11 2001. They talk of the ways in which people turned to social media sites such as blogs, chat groups and forums for information when the major news sites crashed under the massive demand for information.  Dan Gillmor explains in his book We the Media: Grassroots Journalism by the People for the People that this turn to social media on 9/11 was profound. Because of the Internet, news was being produced by regular people who had something to say or show, and people were interested in this citizen journalism because it was news that the American media couldn’t or wouldn’t provide.

So, with people turning to social media sites such as Twitter and Facebook with every big news event, is social media reshaping journalistic practices? Richard Sambrook, the director of the BBC Global News Division was quoted in The Guardian in 2009 with the opinion that Twitter provides you with information; but information is not journalism. “Journalism needs discipline, analysis, explanation and context.” he said. “Journalism is still a profession.” Frederica Cherubini published an article on Editorsweblog.org in March this year in which her opinion echoed that of Sambrook. She explained that while a blog post, a Facebook status or a Twitter update are all forms of sharing the news, journalism is about much more than this; it is indeed a profession.

But is the profession of journalism under any threat from the rise of social media? Laura Casewell is the senior features writer for the country’s oldest press agency; Birmingham based Caters News. She has written for magazines such as Reveal and Closer alongside having articles published in The Telegraph, The Mirror and The Sun. When I posed the question to her – “Do you think social media has reshaped journalistic practices?” – her answer was an indisputable “Yes.”

“In news breaking situations, every journalist wants to be the first to get the story out there. In one sense, sites like Facebook can be extremely helpful to us. We use them to quickly source photos or family details, even in some cases phone numbers and addresses. But the problem is that a story can be broken on Twitter by someone who isn’t a professional journalist. To our audiences, this might make our profession seem a little redundant!” Despite Laura’s concerns, she went on to tell me “In terms of features, Twitter and Facebook are nothing but beneficial to me. I use them as a means of finding case studies and stories. I can reach so many people through Twitter, and Facebook is great for searching groups and talking to people online who might want to share their experience.”

Laura then, it seems, like many journalists now, is embracing social media as a tool to enhance her journalistic practices. Whether it’s a case of being almost forced to do so by the overwhelming use of such sites isn’t clear, but one thing that is becoming ever more so  is the power social media harnesses in relation to journalism. In an interview with Cindy Kim which she published to her blog in 2009, Del Jones, reporter of USA Today, stated that he joined the social media craze when he realised the rate at which Twitter was growing. When asked whether social media was helping or hindering the journalistic profession he answered, “Helping those who are good at employing it.”

Will we still tune in to watch the news, or will we simply turn to Twitter for information?

So it would seem the way forward for journalists is to embrace the effects of social media as it strengthens its connection with their profession. From a personal opinion, I am confident in saying I will look to Twitter for my news and information for the foreseeable future. It is, and will be for a while, the first place I turn when a story breaks, on the basis that I will be provided with citizen journalism alongside the mainstream, professional updates. This is an undeniable sign that social media has indeed reshaped journalistic practices. Surely then, as many more people adopt the same internet habits as me, journalists should embrace these changes and employ social media tools to the best of their ability, to make sure we as readers are receiving news and information in the best ways possible.

The Patch Report Experience

A little look into my experience of first hand reporting.

As one of our assignments for News and Journalism this term we are required to get off our backsides and do some first hand reporting. In pairs we were assigned locations, or ‘patches’. Katie and I were given Lansdowne, an area near the centre of Bournemouth that homes many student accommodation buildings, pubs and bars etc.

We decided to do a little bit of background research before we marched on in to help us acquire an angle to investigate. I came across a small article in a local free paper regarding an alcohol free nightclub that was going to be opening in Bournemouth; The Late Night Cafe. The man behind the plans was Michael French, Bournemouth’s Nightclub Chaplain. Katie got in touch with him and we found that he was also responsible for patrolling the Lansdowne area with a group of volunteers, helping people whp have been victims of late night crime etc.

The Late Night Cafe are using Facebook to publicise their events

We also found through the Police.uk website that Lansdowne was a hotspot for anti-social behaviour and other offenses involving drugs and alcohol. Everything began to slot into place and we had our angle.

Our next step was to try and get the police to talk to us regarding the levels of crime in the area. We visisted the Lansdowne police sataion to acquire the contact details of the local beat officers and were given some phone numbers. These officers, however, proved impossible to get hold of. It just goes to show how difficult it can be for reporters to gather information from reliable sources.

After having no luck with the police, we turned to the locals of the Lansdowne area. Everyone we spoke to here, students, shop workers etc, were more than willing to talk to us and very helpful. This was by far the most enjoyable aspect of first hand reporting to me; it was extremely rewarding to talk to fruendly people and get the answers that you needed.

Overall, completing our patch report was a real learning curve. Journalism isn’t just about sitting somewhere with your laptop and knocking out a quick story, you have to be dedicated and determined to get facts, opinions and information from the people that count. Which, as we found, isn’t always easy!

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(Since posting this entry I have uploaded my patch report assignment. You can read it here!)

The Christchurch Earthquake Through Social Media

Many people will have learnt of the devestating earthquake that hit Christchurch, New Zealand on the 22nd February 2011 by watching the news on the television or listening to it on the radio. Images and videos of the destruction were broadcast from all major network channels as the world watched in horror. I, however, along with millions of others, learnt of the tragedy through my Twitter account.

It occurred to me after this that I rarely watch the news on the television. I hardly seem to need to anymore; the minute something newsworthy happens my Twitter and Facebook livefeeds explode. I spent ages pouring over my Twitter account when the earthquake hit, watching live updates from the BBC Breaking News account  (@BBCBreaking) and watching as the trending topics changed – a solid indication of how fast the news had spread via social media.

A photo from bbc.co.uk of a building collapsing shortly after earthquake hits.

In the days that followed after the earthquake, Twitter still acted as my main port of call for any information on the natural disaster. Photos were posted of the destruction and you were even able to read the tweets of people who had experienced the earthquake by reading through the trending topics. It would appear that social media is becoming a more and more effective platform by which to spread news.

For more pictures of the devestating earthquake in New Zealand visit the BBC Website. (Or, like I do, simply check your Twitter account…!)