Lavish Life in Monaco

Monaco, a small city-state located on the shore of the Mediterranean near the French-Italian border, encapsulates how the top 1%  of Europe lives. Home to famous European billionaires who are not required by law to pay income tax and live their lives in lavish surrounded by expensive yachts and foreign cars. Monaco has developed a world-wide reputation of being a country of luxury through many famous Hollywood films, most notably in James Bond's iconic premiere in "Goldeneye". Monaco's has come to rely on around-year tourism to fuel their economy as wealthy gamblers rush to secure a spot to gamble in the Place du Casino located in  Monte-Carlo. Additionally, every May, Monaco has hosted the F1 Grand Prix on the inner gulf of the Mediterranean."Racing million dollar machines down the winding streets of Monaco" extravagantly displays the luxury of what the small city state of Monaco has to offer. (1 quote, 149 words, 2 images, https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-17615784)

Stella Paul

Stella Paul is a journalist who reports about a lot of topics that many reporters stay away from, including human trafficking and sexual harassment. According to the International Women's Media Foundation, "Stella Paul shares stories of those who have been silenced". She speaks out for the rights of women living in India, and for that she has endured a lot of "death threats, threats against the welfare and security of her family, [and] physical harassment". Even though,  Stella Paul has gone through many hardships, she has not backed down, and she continues to bring awareness to the things going on in India. For her hard work, she was received a Courage in Journalism award.

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False Authenticity

Fake news is everywhere, whether we like it or not. Many media platforms purposely misinform the public about what is going on to sway public opinion to their side. They use many different rhetorical strategies in order get people to think  certain way, or believe certain things. According to Library Guides, fake news sites "[use] language to persuade or manipulate" people. Simply put, media platforms use specific words that cause the reader to feel a certain emotion. Whether that emotion be anger, disgust or annoyance, they are masters in cultivating the response they want from readers. According to Library Guides, fake news tries to include "more sinister" phrases or headlines, drawing people's attention and curiosity what these articles have to say. These organizations are so good at what they do, the often, people don't even realize they are reading fake news.

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Fake news

Creators of fake news often find and use information from verified news sources, but then layer it with misinformation that can throw the reader off. Fake news creators use website names that look real enough to have more people trust them. The layout of these fake websites "purposely designed to look as much like real news sites as possible." Cookies are another strategy that is used to spread specific fake news to a specific audience. Cookies can track a user's actions that are done across the web which can give the creator an idea on what usually grabs the user's attention when surfing the internet. 

European Fake News

Emmanuel Macron is a large political figure attempting to bring an end to fake news. British parliament tried and failed to force Mark Zuckerberg to attend evidence hearings. Zuckerberg denies all ties to fake news and he wants to stay out of the sticky international dispute. It is good to know that wretched fake news is not only poisoning America, but the world. “It’s clear that all European member states, regardless of size, are potential targets” (Drew). Lithuania has even gone to the extent of hiring the militia to work aside journalists to engage fake news. Unfortunately this is what the 21st century has become but we are still constantly fighting against fake news.

https://theconversation.com/why-emmanuel-macrons-plan-for-a-european-agency-to-fend-off-fake-news-makes-sense-113217

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Anna Erelle

Anna Erelle is a journalist who went undercover to "[investigate] the secretive world of jihadi brides" and to find out more about ISIS (Day) . She Skyped an Islamic State fighter, pretending to be a young girl. She exposed a lot of what was going on in ISIS at the time, and ISIS issued a death warrant against her. She is under police protection at all times because her life is always in danger. She even writes under the pseudonym  "Anne Erelle" to stay safe by preventing her identity from getting out. Anne says that it is hard always being in danger, due to the fact that "many people left [her life] because they were worried about being seen with her]" (Day). She states that even though her life has changed drastically, she doesn't regret going undercover and exposing some of the things going on in ISIS.

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Boston Herald vs. Metro - Boston Edition

Although both of these articles have bright and colorful pages, they differ in the way that they capture the attention of their audience. Boston Herald uses headings with the words "Sorry Liz!" and "Artful Dodge" to gain people's interest. The newspaper also uses a large font for both of those headings, making the words visible from far away. Most of the front page is filled with a picture of three candidates running for the 2020 election. 

While Metro - Boston Edition  also has a colorful front page, it is a lot busier than that of Boston Herald, making it harder to focus on one certain aspect of the front page. One third of the front page is taken up by the name of the newspaper, another third is filled with the actual news, and the last third is filled with ads. With so much going on at one time, it is challenging for the reader to differentiate between ads and actual news.

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Gaining Trust Through Familiarity

    When browsing through the front pages of Californian news papers today, I noticed that The San Diego Union-Tribune and The Sun used different fonts for their front pages. The most noticeable font is that of The San Diego Union-Tribune's name, which is written in a typeface known as 'Blackletter'. According to a website focusing on web design articles called "SitePoint", Blackletter is commonly found in "newspaper nameplates where...it lends gravitas to the publication" and its contents. After seeing this font in so many reliable newspapers, such as The New York Times, people begin to hold more trust in papers with this font as they appear more authentic and genuine. For this reason, The Sun is less effective in gaining their reader's trust because they put more of their focus on large letters and overall look less trustworthy at a glance. The San Diego Union-Tribune does a more effective job at getting their audience to trust them and purchase their newspaper by sticking to conventional fonts and layouts for their front pages. [2 images, 3 links, 1 quotation, 172 words]

Fake News

Russian president Vladimir Putin has recently passed a bill “which will allow the punishment of individuals and online media” for the distribution of what russia calls fake news (Zemlianichenko). This is targeting is exhibited to those that show disrespect to the society, government, official government symbols, constitution or governmental bodies of Russia. This bill can result in one getting fined up to $23,000 and up to 15 days in jail. Many journalist oppose the bill as the feel as if they are censored. The internet is labeled as a free place of political expression  making these new russian laws politically significant.

https://www.npr.org/2019/03/18/704600310/russia-criminalizes-the-spread-of-online-news-which-disrespects-the-government

March Madness

As many sports fans know March Madness is about to start on March 21st. Every basketball fan has their eyes on Duke’s dynamic trio; Zion Williamson, RJ Barrett, and Cam Reddish. Many believe that Duke is the favorite to win it all, but the past says otherwise. Don’t get me wrong, I want to see Duke Succeed, but this tournament is called March Madness for a reason. Crazy upsets happen all the time. For example, last year first ranked Virginia lost to sixteenth ranked UNBC. The first one seed loss to a sixteen seed ever! The amount of upsets along with participating in filling out brackets to predict the winner is what makes this event so popular. This allows fans to get involved and even compete with friends. When filling out your bracket, think. There are “millions of possible ways to fill out your 2019 March Madness bracket” (CBS Sports staff). With the chances of filling out a perfect bracket so little at  1 in 9,223,372,036,854,775,808 a lot of money is at stake.

Twitter VS Snapchat

Many people get their news through social media. In my opinion, social media is not the best place but it can be reliable. Twitter can be more informative than snapchat when it comes to news. In contrast it can also be less reliable due to the amount of sources. In addition to the users adding their own opinions to the situation, twitter is a swing in the dark unless you follow the correct reliable sources. While Snapchat has stories that are credible sources. These can also be informative. With the amount of bias in today's society, news sources can be biased. Also many of the snapchat stories are limited to what they can say as these stories are set to a certain length.

Ethiopian Flight Crash

On March 10th an Ethiopian flight crashed killing all on board, while showing similarities to another Indonesian plane crash in October. On Sunday March 10th took off and was in the air for six minutes before “it crashed into a field outside the capital, Addis Ababa, killing all 157 aboard” (Schemm). The pilot, Yared Getachew, was considered to be very experienced with over 8000 hours of flying before the crash. The voice and data recorders were taken by Ethiopian investigators on Thursday to France, where they are being analyzed to determine the cause of the crash https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/ethiopian-official-black-box-data-shows-clear-similarity-between-ethiopian-airlines-lion-air-crashes/2019/03/17/92573222-48d4-11e9-8cfc-2c5d0999c21e_story.html?noredirect=on&utm_term=.5c1f7ecc1256

Journalist Skills

When you read an article what usually catches your eye and draws your attention to the article. Many people including myself, are drawn to the article by the headline of graphics. While these do play a big role in a journalist success, the timing of the article is just as important. Having the ability to be “accurate and clear in the way you express yourself, and to do that under pressure” and in a quick manner (Marshall). Being able to have your article out in a timely manner could mean the difference between your article being successful and no one seeing it.

https://www.journalism.co.uk/news/five-must-have-skills-if-you-want-to-work-for-the-bbc-news-website/s2/a551681/

The Bakersfield Californian vs. The Modesto Bee

These articles take two different approaches to presenting the public with the news. The Bakersfield Californian newspaper takes a colorful approach by making the whole front page a picture with the article name in large letters to draw attention to it. The article is able to catch the reader's eye because of its color.

On the contrary, The Modesto Bee has almost no color because text takes up most of the front page. However, it uses titles like "California's Most Threatening Volcanoes are not far from Fresco" to grab the reader's attention. Since there is almost no color on this front page, the newspaper relies on article titles to prompt the reader's interest.

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Putin's New Fake News Bill

Russian president Vladimir Putin has recently passed a bill making all kinds of fake news illegal in hopes
of punishing, “the distribution of information that “exhibits blatant disrespect for the society, government,
official government symbols, constitution or governmental bodies of Russia.” This bill will force those
who disrespect the government with fake news to pay a fine, and those who create fake news about
authoritative figures could face up to 15 days in prison. Many writers are protesting the bill out of fear that
they will lose the ability to protest the government because it seems as if it is more of a direct censorship
of news.

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Daniel Golden

Daniel Golden is an investigative reporter that works for propublica. He created a book exposing how
wealthy parents can buy their kids way into ivy league schools. Golden recently responded to this book
with an article in which he stated that he had responses from parents asking him questions about how to
buy their child's’ admission. He says, “readers embraced it as a “how to” guide,” instead of reading for its
true purpose. According to Golden he received offers for large amounts of money in exchange for being
an admissions counselor which he turned down. He delivers his story of a current harvard alumni’s
father paying over 2 million dollars for admission and claims this story may have encouraged the
responses he got.

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News Feeds

The layout of news feeds vary depending on the app you're obtaining the information from. Snapchat and Twitter are two social media sources that vary in layout, and both have very different ways of presenting news to users. Both apps will embed news articles into the app to where users will see posts from people they follow but also places to check trending news and other media. People can also follow a variety of news sources on both apps. On Snapchat an example of the headline reads, “Teen Found Dead Feet From Her Home?” while an example from Twitter reads, “Obama White House economist Alan Krueger dies aged 58.” Twitter is a much easier app to get news from in my opinion because not only can you follow different sources for news but you can also search for specific keywords.


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Front Page Articles: Quantity and its Significance

    

When viewing today's front pages of two Coloradan newspapers, I discovered that despite being relatively close to each other and being in the same state, The Gazette and The Denver Post use different strategies in presenting their uncovered news. The two newspapers seem to focus on making as many articles as possible visible from the front page to interest readers more. While both papers try to use this strategy and are able to fit about seven articles each into their front pages, The Denver Post does a better job of this because six out of eight of their articles have enough information given about them solely on the front page to draw people's interest. In comparison, The Gazette is only able to successfully present about three of their seven articles mentioned because they spend most of the space on their front page on images. Due to the lack of remaining space, three of the articles including a sports article apparently about "Colorado College [topping] their host Western Michigan" in a hockey match are crammed into a small section titled "Inside'. The minimal information given about the articles located in this section give readers less of an idea of what they are about, so people are less likely to feel the need to buy the newspaper for such articles. I would conclude that The Denver Post does a much more successful job in the presentation of their front page because a greater proportion of their articles have sufficient information given about them on the front. [2 images, 2 links, 1 quotation, 254 words]

Marie Colvin – The Truth is Priceless

     Famous for the saying, "Our mission is to report these horrors of war with accuracy and without prejudice," Marie Colvin has devoted her life to that principles. Marie Colvin's footprints were imprinted on the world's most fierce battlefields, from Chechnya to Sierra Leone, from Zimbabwe to Tunisia, Egypt and Libya.

     Although she lost an eye in an ambush in the Sri Lankan civil war, but the danger in the profession has never once become an obstacle for her. Marie Colvin had to trade with her own life to get the truth. The price to pay for the truth can be very high but for the world to understand war is a crime for war reporters that price is priceless.

https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/4fa49dc14b3dcd997cc10cf307f8797a5b3fe443/0_94_1014_608/master/1014.jpg?width=300&quality=85&auto=format&fit=max&s=a5acbe02aa01bfc29e538c5fa556952e

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Anna Politkovskaya

     Known for her series of reports condemning the Chechnya war and human rights violations in Chechnya, the journalist Anna Politkovskaya has become a symbol of courage in the hearts of the Russian people.
   
     In 2006, she was assassinated in her own home, and the case has not been clarified. Her death caused a wave of outrage not only in Russia but also throughout the world. After her death,
an organization "Reach all Women in War" - a human rights organization focused on preventing violence against women in war and conflict - created the "Anna Politkovskaya Prize", to honor the human rights activists, like Politkovskaya.
,

“People sometimes pay with their lives for saying aloud what they think. In fact, one can even get killed for giving me information. I am not the only one in danger. I have examples that prove it.”

Anna Politkovskaya

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Katherine Graham

     Have you ever heard the name “Katherine Graham”? That is the name of a female journalist who was the one brought the Washington Post Times to the top of the globe with the Watergate scandal in 1972.

     

    Despite the ban on posting Pentagon secret documents about the Vietnam War and threats from the Nixon administration, she still decided to publicly disclose this information. She steered the Washington Post to expose the worst of the US government and fought to force President Richard Nixon to resign. With her intelligence and bravery, Katharine Graham became one of the leaders who fought for freedom of press in the 20th century.

“The only way to assert the right to publish is to publish.”

Katharine Graham

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/65/Katharine_Graham_927-9432_%28cropped_retouched%29.jpg/220px-Katharine_Graham_927-9432_%28cropped_retouched%29.jpg

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State of Play

     The movie “State of Play” will illustrate you the mysterious relationship between politics and journalism. The film is about a prospective congressman Stephen Collins, who is running into the presidential seat, and his assistant/mistress is murdered, along with some unfavorable information of Stephen be revealed to the public after the murder. Cal McAffrey, Stephen's best friend and a Washington's well-known journalist, was given a mission to investigate the murder. 

     When McAffrey and his colleague Della investigate the incident, Cal realizes that he has stepped into a dangerous game - where the bets of billions of dollars dominate the people and the information. “State of Play” introduce a complex world of journalism in which reporters must fight to choose between bringing the truth to the newspaper or avoiding revealing the dark side of politics to keep themselves safe.

“You're just seeking the truth. You're a truth seeker. You can't help it, that is just who you are...”

Stephen Collins

https://i2.wp.com/www.moviesinfocus.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/state-of-play-review.jpg?w=784


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Hemingway & Gellhorn (2012)

      In previous posts, I presented you one of the greatest female war correspondents of all time, Martha Gellhorn. If you want to know what makes Martha Gellhorn so special, “Hemingway & Gellhorn” movie from HBO production will give you the answer.

      Gellhorn herself used to come and be present in many battlefields all over the world to record reports and articles that shocked the world about the severity and truth behind the war.Hemingway & Gellhorn, in addition to portraying Gellhorn's glorious life and career, it also builds the image of a brave female journalist. The film also shows viewers the hidden corners, the hardships, the difficulties in the life of Martha Gellhorn, and her unstable marriage to Hemingway.

“I do not see myself as a footnote to someone else's life.”

Martha Gellhorn

https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0799/0083/products/hemingway-gellhorn_grande.jpeg?v=1524674603


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Investigating mother nature

Anyone who lives in North Texas can relate to this post, weather is unpredictable and ever changing. This is less an ‘issue’ and more of a seasonal event to be discussed. In the summer and winter, temperatures are consistent but in the fall and spring, they are not. For this discussion I interviewed my mother to discuss mother nature. When questioned about how the weather can be sometimes, she responded “well seems like mother nature plays games with us” (Vela). In Midland, Texas the average highs and lows in March go from 74-41! Dramatic temperature changes just within 24 hours happen frequently and its astounding.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climate_of_Texas

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Journalist strategies

What usually catches my eye within articles are the headlines. Why is this the case? What makes a headline so enticing and question raising? Journalists have multiple strategies to accomplish this goal, a common rhetorical strategy is cliches. For example, “cat got your tongue”, which could be used to mimic a current event (Hayden). As you read through a newspaper it seems that most main paper headlines have a cliche or a metaphor, but after that the smaller articles tend to have more simple titles with less creativity included. Sometimes titles can actually be really funny or clever and that’s what I love.

http://suspense.net/whitefish/cliche.htm

https://agentmediafiles.wordpress.com/2011/10/25/media-language-rhetorical-devices/

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