Wednesday « Kenny Smith | A remarkable thing happens …

Wednesday

Where I brag on CBS-42

I like to poke fun at television news, but it is all in good fun. I have a great respect for the hard work they do and the service they can provide. And I’m not just saying that because my wife is a former (Emmy-nominated) producer. Birmingham, despite its relative small size, is a great television market. This is the place for sports, the hardest weather market in the country and has as much, and more, news as the next place. (And as of this year and the county’s bankruptcy — the largest municipal bankruptcy in the history of the country — they’ll have plenty of stories for a long, long time.) Because of all of that they pull in great talent.

And that talent is very gracious, across the local industry really, but specifically I must point out the nice folks at WIAT CBS-42.

Here’s why. One of our classes takes field trips to learn about the various aspects of the media industry, and between the four (or five) sections of that class we hit all the stations in town. I visit WIAT when I teach the class and we went there today. Today also happened to be the day that the bingo trial, the biggest criminal trial of the year where defends were accused of using campaign contributions to buy and sell votes on state gambling legislation, came down with their verdicts: not guilty.

So it was a busy day in their newsroom, but we had a great tour. The students enjoyed themselves, learned about the business first hand and met some of the local experts, talking with reporters furiously working in their edit bays, meeting people like the assignment editor in the newsroom, watching the producer make his sausage in his booth and talking with nice, engaging and talented people like meteorologist Mark Prater:

It was a great tour. They all are. The local media is very kind to our program at Samford.

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29
Feb 12

A collection of things

And now, the day that leaps. I hope you enjoy at least 25 percent of this video that explains the quadrennial correction:

And now for a truly creepy video:

The first version of that story, which I saw on television and haven’t yet discovered online, had the father irate. After which he confronted his family and, writing later (to Target, I think) admitted that he had not been up-to-date on the details of his home. That wouldn’t be an awkward or uncomfortable conversation, would it?

Visited Intermark on a field trip today. This is the second year I’ve taken students there, and they do a great job. One of their account executives tells the class about the work he does. A public relations expert talks about her day. Two former internships who now have full time jobs there talk about their experience — they pitch to actual clients in their internships — and then there’s the social media talks. Media planning, the creative types and then the video production crews show off their work.

The students come away with an idea of what happens in a full service public relations and marketing shop. (It is an intro course.) Some people get a sense of what they might like to do; others may decide this isn’t for them. Someone asked about if they get discounts on car deals with the dealerships they promote.

Outside, the first dandelion of the season:

Things to read:

And now for a startling graphic

Burlington Free Press resizing

Photogs, visual artists, historians rejoice

“Owning” news

Stuff from elsewhere: AT&T Customers Petition CEO To Stop Throttling Unlimited Data Plans

Facebook cheat sheet: Sizes and dimensions

Tomorrow: Work! Meetings! A new section of the site! More!

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22
Feb 12

Don’t forget your hat

It isn’t that there’s a statue in the back of the truck — it must be contemporary, you can’t imagine any classic piece from the Vatican’s collection would be carried around in the back of a Nissan.

It can’t be that the rope is looped around the neck, though at first blush that does make you stop and wonder about the driver’s mood when they put it there.

it is the way she just stares through you.

I have a rope around my neck. I’m in a … Nissan.

Check out the latest on The Samford Crimson. It is a nicely colorful front page this week, post-Step Sing.

The copy is pretty good, except for the typos that slipped through the cracks at 2:30 this morning. The editorial staff is always chagrined when I point them out at 10 a.m.

Things to read: This is severe weather awareness week in Alabama. Were you aware the person in charge of maintaining the tornado sirens has been placed on leave? (Public service note: Do not rely on outdoor sirens. Watch the weather. Buy a weather radio or download the weather apps.)

Alabama’s exports? So glad you asked. Just happened to stumble across a story about that today, hence this entire paragraph, and the subsequent BBJ blockquote:

Alabama exports rose to a record high in 2011, according to a press release from Gov. Robert Bentley’s office.

Exports from the state increased 15.4 percent in 2011 to $17.9 billion, which was up from $15.5 billion last year.

Two prominent non-profit news outlets are shutting down. Alan Mutter has a terrific analysis:

Evidently beguiled by seeing their stories in the pages of the New York Times, two high-profile journalism start-ups failed at building sufficient audience for their own brands.

[…]

Yet, each of them seems to have stumbled in a different way.

The Chicago Cooperative concentrated all but one of its hires on journalists, including several prominent and well-compensated individuals who devoted most of their efforts to putting the best possible work into the NYT. While readers may have appreciated the articles in the newspaper, scant attention appears to have been paid to converting them into individual or corporate supporters of the venture itself.

The Bay Citizen, on the other hand, invested heavily on development …

He goes on to run through the numbers, and his commenters comment on the quality and the competition. The earlier portion of his analysis is cutting, but he has sources who suggest that both Cooperative and the Citizen were working in a bad model.

The only thing worse than a bad model is bad model security. What happens if that rope slips? Where does that garden decoration go from there? Gnomes are so much cheaper. And only slightly more creepy. The Travelocity gnome has helped a lot in that respect.

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15
Feb 12

Spamalot

A snippet of their encore number … from waaaay in the back of the hall.

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8
Feb 12

This is Wednesday

The Alabama Shakes made their television debut on Conan last night:

They liked them so much Conan invited them to play another tune for his website.

The way everyone talks you’re going to be hearing a great deal more from them in the future. Their first album is due out in April.

The last World War I servicemember has died:

Florence Green, a member of Britain’s Royal Air Force who was afraid of flying, died in England on Saturday, two weeks shy of her 111th birthday. She was believed to have been the war’s last living veteran — the last anywhere of the tens of millions who served.

Mrs. Green, who joined the R.A.F. as a teenager shortly before war’s end, worked in an officer’s mess on the home front. Her service was officially recognized only in 2010, after a researcher unearthed her records in Britain’s National Archives.

The story talks about how she’d go on dates with the pilots, who would offer to woo her in the sky. She was not interested. After the war she married a man with a sensible ground job. He was a railway porter.

Class today, where we learned a valuable lesson about the computer lab printer. It had been disconnected for a while. When it was plugged in three days of reading material was spat from its innards. It made for fascinating reading, I’m sure.

Some other things happened today, I’d bet. A meeting here, a joke there, a crisis averted in a third place. Run of the mill type things. It seemed a busy and full day. But a good day! Almost the best, even.

More tomorrow.