In chapter 4 of “Coaching Writers,” Clark and Fry identify 15 habits of many strong writers. Strong writers:

1. see stories everywhere.
2. prefer their own ideas.
3. report voraciously
4. agonize over leads.
5. immerse themselves in their story.
6. “bleed” rather than “speed.”
7. take time to organize.
8. rewrite and rewrite and rewrite.
9. trust their ears and feelings more than their eyes.
10. love to tell stories.
11. remember the reader.
12. take chances.
13. devour books and movies.
14. write too long — and they know it.
15. guide the reader to the end.

Carefully reread Clark and Fry’s descriptions of these habits. Do you recognize yourself in any of them? Which ones? Are their traits on this list that you wish were a habit of yours? How would they make your writing life easier/better?

Post your original response by 6 p.m. Sunday. 

Then, return to this post to read/respond to your classmates’ responses before Tuesday morning. 

For me, it’s a sentencd in the “Editing Side by Side” sidebar on page 31: “Failure is normal and instructive.” That sure isn’t the way this perfectionist was raised. But I like Murray’s notion that “writing is experimental. We don’t know what works until we try it.” I need to embrace this more in my writing. And in life.

1. Thinking of editing as “coaching” is probably a new idea to many of us. We’re usually trained, through English and journalism classes, to think of editing as “fixing” and “cleaning up.” Sometimes journalists new to the idea of coaching greet it with skepticism. Is “coaching” a novel concept to you? And if so, what do you think of it? Is it realistic? Worthwhile? Could you apply it to your experiences in class, with campus media,or in an internship? What questions do you have about how coaching might work?
2. Think about your experience with editors (or with teachers who have graded your journalistic writing). Were they primarily “coaches” or “fixers”? Give examples of the kind of feedback you received from them, and what you learned from that feedback. Which kind of editor did you prefer? If you have done some editing, which kind of editor are you? Which kind do you want to be? If you share unhappy tales of an editor or teacher, please don’t include their names. Feel free, however, to name the editors you praise.

First day of J70, fall 2011. Don't they look nervous?

Welcome back to Drake! I hope you all had a relaxing break. I’m looking forward to a great semester in J70, Media Editing, one of my favorite classes to teach.

This blog will serve three purposes for us this semester:

1. a repository for information about the class (syllabus, assignments, announcements);
2. a platform to discuss assigned readings  and current industry trends
3. a playground for you to explore and experiment with writing for a blog, and to learn the technical skills of posting to a blog.

As college students, especially in the school of journalism, we know how to use social media. We know why we should be using it, how various companies and publications are using it, and how its use has grown exponentially in the past few years. We know to clean up our profiles or timelines to keep it professional, and what the consequences might be if we do not. But have you ever thought of using your Facebook account to score your dream job?

A recent Mashable article said that 18,400,000 Americans said they got their current job through Facebook. To put that in perspective, that’s more than the populations of NYC and L.A. combined.  That’s compared to 10.2 million who said they got their jobs through LinkedIn, the social networking site built specifically for business. The study, combining data from Jobsite, CNN, LinkedIn, and JobSearch, shows that the typical social media job-hunters are college graduates under 40.

Social Media isn’t the most popular way people are finding jobs…yet. Referrals, newspapers, and company career sites still top “online social network.” But it wasn’t too long ago when more people emailed or instant messaged than Facebook chatted and tweeted.

Mashable’s Job Search Series offers weekly advice on how to land jobs using social media. Do you think this is a good system? Would you apply for a job over a social media site?

Photo by Zach Klein

We’ve come a long way since the days of Xanga and MySpace: Social media networks are so much more than casual ways to connect. They’re the new tools for marketing, job hunting, socializing and even reporting.

Like others in the public eye, journalists have to be especially careful with social media. 140 characters on Twitter or an unprofessional post on Facebook can devastate the career of the unwary reporter. Journalists must also be conscious of how to effectively get their messages to a huge – and fickle – audience.

How often should reporters tweet about the latest tragic news story? Should journalists “friend” their sources on Facebook?

Is there a "right" way for journalists to use social media? Photo by 92YTribeca on Flickr via Creative Commons.

Mashable offers a few answers to these questions in a recent article, “4 Social Media Rules Journalists Should Break.“

The first rule to break is “Don’t Cross Post on Social Networks.” Some social media gurus recommend journalists avoid posting the same messages to various sites because it’s redundant,  but Mashable disagrees. By cross-posting, you’ll get the message out more effectively, especially to a user who doesn’t check all of his or her social networks on a regular basis. (Mashable also suggests using a scheduling platform like HootSuite to make life a little easier.)

The article recommends three other rules to break: “Don’t Schedule Social Media Posts,” “Follow/Friend/Subscribe to Everyone Who Follows You,” and “Don’t Repeat Yourself.” These guidelines help journalists manage their valuable time while building their online presence.

Social media isn’t brand new, but it’s new enough that we’re still figuring out what works. A not-so-informal code of ethics is developing, defined further by the AP’s decision to add a set of social media guidelines to the AP Stylebook. For me, accurate grammar is a must for plugged-in journalists. It proves journalists know what they’re doing and took the time to cut that Tweet down to 140 characters—without using outdated acronyms.

Does journalism have a place on social media sites? Are there rules for journalists using Twitter or Facebook as news outlets? If so, what are they?

Growing up, English was my first language and the second was Malay, which is my home country’s national language. I was born and raised in a Chinese family but surprisingly, I do not speak a word of the Chinese language. Strange isn’t it. It is like an American not knowing how to speak English.

Often times, some of my friends in high school would teach me a couple of words and phrases in Chinese. I’m surprised they have a high level of patience for a slow learner like me. After some awkwardness, we managed to communicate even though I preferred speaking in English. During English classes, they would even use me as a translator because most of them are Chinese-educated who grew up studying in Chinese schools.

Journalists could take some inspiration from those friends of mine who taught me Chinese. Someone once told me that everyone has a story. Immigrant communities are especially full with colorful with stories. Unfortunately, reporters often think that language is a restriction.

Photo taken from Buzzle.com

Be patient 

The longer you spend time with people, the more comfortable they’ll feel. Personal visits are better than conducting phone interviews because you can see and respond to the source’s gestures.

Spending a fair amount of time with sources is also important for the account of accuracy. You may have to continuously go over a point many times to confirm you understand it properly. WCCO-TV in Minneapolis published a story saying that a Chinese-owned market in New York City was selling dog meat from Minnesota.

The employee that was interviewed by phone likely meant “duck” not “dog.”

Use your senses

Reporting shouldn’t be limited to interviewing. Look at their walls, observe their body language and gestures. What type of written materials or old photographs can they show you? Someone’s home, office or even their room can be an icebreaker.

I have dealt with people who turn away from me after not knowing how to speak my own mother tongue; trust me, it hurts. Just curious, have you ever struggled while interviewing someone who’s first language isn’t English? And how did you go through with it?

The holidays are approaching. That means shopping, sales and the horrors of the mall parking lot. When it comes to holiday gifts, everyone wants to save a quick buck. People will go to lengths to head to the mall on the worst days to get the best sales on big ticket items (can we say black Friday?). The advertising industry profits from this. Advertising a sale has become so easy, however, that the story behind the product has gone astray.

Most companies’ advertising for the winter season simply highlights their biggest sales. There are rarely taglines, characters or entertainment of any kind. Without a story, advertising does nothing but embrace the criticism that it encourages capitalism and lowers the importance of the holidays. Creating a mini-movie within commercials or making someone smile when they see a print ad in a magazine in regards to the holidays has disappeared.

An article on Mashable highlights a particular company that decided to take their holiday ads to the next level. Ralph Lauren has created ecards that use their models to spell out holiday greetings of a user’s choice. When the person receives the card, they can click on the models to see what article of clothing the model is wearing and the price. Even though the ecards are promoting Ralph Lauren and asking people to buy their product for a holiday gift, they are still creating an interactive platform for target audience’s to become involved in.

Photo provided by ArmyPty14 via YouTube

Target is another company that has incorporated stories into their ads. Overall, Target has ads that are interesting and use good combinations of music and images to reach their target audience. Their holiday commercials, which use the crazed woman searching frantically for the best Target sale, catch people’s eyes, make them laugh and reminding them why they shop at Target. This is the kind of ad that gets people excited for the holidays but is also creative and fun.

The advertising industry has often dealt with heavy criticism. With the decrease in creativity, it is making it more difficult for journalists to support the advertising world and lowers the standard for quality ads. Storytelling is one of the most important aspects to creating a good ad and it is important to follow that through no matter what the product is that ads are trying to sell.

What companies can you think of that have been less than impressive this holiday season? Do you think by simple advertising the sale with no creativity diminishes the importance or quality of the advertising industry?

Any person can tell you about the vast number of differences between the eastern world and western world.  However, can one consider the practice and consideration of journalism to be one of those differences?

Chairman Mao is the figure head that westerners place with creating the Chinese Great Firewall.

As described by a Nieman Reports story by Glenn Mott, “what is mean by Western journalism within China is what most Chinese have casual access to: CNN, BBC or what can be culled from the firewalled Internet abroad using a Virtual Private Network to access blocked sites.”

Mott  questions what can be described as Western Journalism?  Does this involve the ethical standards that western journalists follow?  As one reads news stories about journalists in the two hemispheres it is evident that there is a distinction between each hemisphere’s practices.

One difference is the fear of violence that journalists face in the eastern hemisphere.  For example, recently, a Chinese journalist who probed the cooking oil scandal was stabbed 10 times and died due to complications from this attack.    The Committee to Protect Journalists wrote about the unfortunate story of this Chinese journalist named Li Xiang.

“Li had reported on the illegal recylcing of waste oil into cooking oil and also wrote about it on his microblog,” CPJ reports.  In the western hemisphere, this kind of reporting often receives praise in the western hemisphere.  However, in the east, according to CPJ, “Food safety scandals are common in China, and journalists reporting on them frequently encounter harassment.”

Do you think that there are other obvious differences between the ideas of western and eastern journalism?  If so, what are they?  Also, do you consider it to be more challenging for an eastern journalist to live and report in the west or for a western journalist to live and report in the east?