Is anyone here a Journalist?

[Story]

I was greatly inspired by his journalism.

When I get home, you and I are going to have to cross paths. We'll rent a red Caddillac convertible, head to Vegas and find Savage Henry.

 

[Mon Amour]

Consider contacting your local newspaper for a tour; no kidding, I was able to get one. If you're in college (or high school) you'll want to start writing for the paper. The college paper will be much more fulfilling, of course. Get to know the photographers and editors; in my experience, those were the guys that could get me stories and that could guide my hand.

And although I'm sure there are some who would heatedly disagree with me, consider reading, and rereading, novels by Hunter Thompson; specifically Hell's Angels. Some folks don't appreciate his style of writing, but the man, a journalist, was able to take a largely uninteresting or vile subject and make it quite entertaining. I was greatly inspired by his journalism.

I have contacted a local newspaper but i never got a call back but i never did ask if i would be able to have a tour. Thanks a lot for the tips they are going to be very helpful.I will consider reading novels by Hunter Thompson and who knows i might agree with you in his style of writing.

 

[Cricket]

I am a reporter. In fact, we are on deadline right now, and I am busy looking at the Lounge. Go figure [huh]
I agree with contacting your local paper. I would call back and ask if you could have a tour and talk with the editor, reporters, publishers, photographers, designers, even the print crew just to get an idea of how a paper works. It really is interesting to see how the whole team comes together to get the papers on the streets.
A college paper is also a great place to start.
Many papers may not hire you as a full time reporter, but they may accept some freelance work. Try it out, and you should make connections that could pay off in the future.
I love this job because I come into work every day not knowing what I am going to do. One day I am taking a picture of a garden club meeeting and within seconds, I am on a murder scene. It really is a fun job and a great way to improve on your writing.

I admit that I also love Hunter S. Thompson. I love him so much that in college I got a Gonzo tattoo. :eusa_doh: Maybe not the best idea, but oh well.

 

[Brian Sheridan]

I am a reporter. In fact, we are on deadline right now, and I am busy looking at the Lounge. Go figure [huh]

Spoken like a true journalist! LOL! More than once I bid on a vintage piece on Ebay while I was anchoring the news! Thank God for commercial breaks and the weather segment.

 

[Cricket]

Spoken like a true journalist! LOL! More than once I bid on a vintage piece on Ebay while I was anchoring the news! Thank God for commercial breaks and the weather segment.

Amen! If people only knew what went on behind the scenes. lol

 

[Eyemo]

I used to be staff Photographer for Armchair General magazine...

 

[Undertow]

When I get home, you and I are going to have to cross paths. We'll rent a red Caddillac convertible, head to Vegas and find Savage Henry.

Haha, that doesn't sound like a bad idea!

 

[$ally]

Mon Amour: Are you more interested in writing or broadcasting? My son is on the deans list here http://cronkite.asu.edu/ and loves it. Their program is so impressive that he chose it over high-end Eastern school offers. He has been able to study abroad on scholarship, also. It's a fantastic learning experience. PM me if you'd like his contact info for pointers. He's been getting his pointers from my oldest brother and a former beaufriend of mine. It helps.
He started at his high school newspaper, then began getting articles published in teen oriented magazines locally. It's his major at university now. He is full-time staff writer at the state press, besides having other articles and fiction published elsewhere.

 

[Mon Amour]

Thanks $ally i will make sure i check out the website.

 

[Irish4]

I guess if your goal is to be unsuccessful,you would not want to emulate any individual with a media empire such as Rupert Murdoch.

 

[Visigoth]

Soft-hitting journalist here...

I write and photograph for various magazines -- mostly travel, but I've written about a lot of weird stuff over the years: vintage stereo equipment, the Pilates lawsuit, electronic art. Never fedoras, but that may soon change.

(I came close to convincing Travel + Leisure to send me to the caves in Mexico where they weave hats to match Ecuador's Panamas.)

 

[Pilgrim]

I'm a graduate of the school where Edward R. Murrow attended college - and have been a reporter for radio stations. Haven't been in that game for yeas, but doing live radio is one of the things I enjoy most.

Doing a good, thorough job and helping people understand the story as well as balancing your reporting is a real challenge - that's why it's so seldome done today. Instead, you tend to hear about spectacular stories - police stuff. Not much content or social benefit from those stories.

Also - on TV - my PET peeve - is sending a reporter out to some dark, dismal location to do a report on what happened there 12 hours earlier. It's nothing more than the news director saying "we got a live remote truck, and we gotta use it every day". Then you see a reporter freezing in the snow outside a dark courthouse or burned out building where nothing is happening.

There are plenty of reporters around - but darn few journalists.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Doing a good, thorough job and helping people understand the story as well as balancing your reporting is a real challenge - that's why it's so seldome done today. Instead, you tend to hear about spectacular stories - police stuff. Not much content or social benefit from those stories.

Exactly right. When I was a news director, I made a conscious effort to *not* emphasize the crash-and-burn stuff. I ignored most of it, and severely deemphasized the things I couldn't completely avoid. Instead, I emphasized nuts and bolts municipal stories -- city councils, boards of selectmen, planning and zoning, school boards, the stuff that actually had an impact on people's pocketbooks. Our slogan was "The News That MATTERS." We were the market leader for quite a while with that approach, too -- despite the best efforts of station management to sabotage it because it wasn't "sexy" enough.

That's the problem, really -- the marketing people need to have their side of the building, the news people need to have their side, and keep them as far apart as possible. In an ideal world, that would be the way it is. But it's a long way from being an ideal world.