W5- shooting investigation.

A man was fatally shot by police in South Melbourne after he threatened them with a shotgun last night.

Five police shot the man, who was  a suspect in a gang-related murder investigation.  He died at the scene after sustaining three gunshots in his chest and one fatal shot in his head.

The man was shot by the police at 7.15 pm during a Victorian Special Operations police interception.  

There were two people in the car at the time. A man,40 , and the woman, 25, who was the man’s defacto.

They were also carrying weapons and have been arrested and taken to St Kilda Road police centre for questioning.  

Twenty special operating group police were involved in the incident. No police were hurt.

A witness, Joel Price said, “It sounded like firecrackers going off, the police were running around everywhere and there were white light going everywhere all over the street.”

Sandra Neitz confirmed the incident is still under investigation.

W4- Lead and follow through

Emergency Story

*Lead:

Two large tornadoes ripped across Townsville within an hour at 2 pm yesterday in the first tornado emergency in 30 years.

*Follow through:

Police media confirm that a busload of children is missing. One of the victims, Grace Reynolds, was waiting for her daughter at a school bus but the bus never came.

Court Story

*Lead:

A 22 years-old woman, Amenda Jane Felsbourg, was sentenced yesterday by a Supereme Court of Wayne Laffey's death for nine years in jail because of the accusation of murdering her ex partner .

*Follow through:

Felsbourg was found to commit the crime of stabbing 30 times on Wayne Laffey, the father of her child, on the front lawn of a house in Keith Avenue, Moe on October 3, 2011.

W3-The secret art of interviewing

Response to Mae West/Sex Pistols Readings
 
When I first start to read the article, the first quote on the top of it-” There’s nothing better in life than diamonds” was intrigued me a lot, led me to expect the content of it step by step, as well as Chandler’s gentle and not aggressive attitude toward Mae West who seems to be unsecured but sometimes mother like during the process of interview. It is the way that Chandler was trying to get closer to Mae is like tasting an old wine, slowly, gently but taste fresh whenever you sip it. However, although Chandler seems to be a great interviewer between these readings, the one between Capote and Marlon Beaton is my favorite as a good interview in my mind.

What I have seen here is that Capote, a writer or an interviewer in a sense, is not that easy as his titles. He knew how to catch the key moment to get the answer which people could hardly get from Beaton, he knew how to be friends with Beaton by revealing his weakness, by softening his position to make interviewee talk to him.

That is what I’ve learned from the secret art of interviewing-” is to let the other person think he’s interviewing you. You tell everything about yourself, and slowly you spin your web so that he tells you everything” said Capote. Therefore, it is very surprising that Beaton who confessed that his soul is a private place and tried to disguise his emotion with mask, was actually reflecting with his true affection when describing his childhood and his mom in the interview.     

A good interviewer should characterize themselves as intelligent, calm, responsive and thoughtful communicator. One of my favorite anchors, Larry King (Lawrence Harvey), a famous American television and radio host who is recognized in the United States as one of the premier broadcast interviewers, has made tremendous and exceptional interviews of the history. I’ve read some threads from his book saying that he always let interviewers tell him what happened instead of asking too much questions. In a word, I suggest that it doesn’t define him as an ill-prepared interviewer without making any efforts before the interviews; it’s an art of being a considerate and clever listener to your speakers.         

W2- A new social role, A new storyteller.

Reflection from“Haunted by details” by Peter Ellingsen,“Supermedia: the future as networked journalism” by Charlie Beckett and“Poverty in Atlanta” by Paige Williams

When the Facebook first emerged from Harvard University, no one would expect that this abrupt idea could totally change people’s life all over the world. And of course that is just one of the social networking sites I’ve mentioned, it is definitely sure that most of social networking site that we have involved with has invading our daily lives from schools, families, communities, enterprises of any industries, even media industry. In the reading “Social Media: the future as networked journalism,” Beckett raised the issue about how important that citizen journalism would be for the media especially when the concept of Web 2,0 is involved with, but the precondition is to keep a healthier local and global news media for international development. I mean, it seems like everyone could be a journalist if one could write the story, everyone could be the one who deliver the latest information to the public if he could post. That is, the readers nowadays are not just “a gatekeeper who delivers but a facilitator who connects“ (Beckett, 2008). Isn’t it a shame for the traditional journalist that why do people need a so called “professional” journalist to write for them? A traditional journalist might not agree with the power of “networked,” they probably take it as unreliable sources with the controlled authorities of established media. However, the truth is they refused to admit that networked journalism has become a more exceptional, technique to deliver prompt news. For example, according to the recent news in Japan, while the tsunami and earthquake happened few weeks ago, there were heaps of information from everywhere to deliver to the public, but not everyone could get it immediately, so the celebrities, famous singers and even movies stars in Japan tried to use the social networking site to update the situation to those people who check the site everyday, which is more efficient and easily to get more people were informed at the same time. The similar situation happened in Taiwan, while the Japanese were suffered from the radiation, the electronic and cables were almost disconnected, the government set up the social networking site to warn the neighbor countries such as Taiwan to be aware of the movement of radiation, and the truth is, that’s how Taiwan government get the information from, because they have no connections with Japan at the moment.

It might be awkward to say that journalist could not live without the networked journalism, but the technology has transformed it unconsciously just like a cup of coffee every morning. However, a new social role should be established with the basic moral and the paradigm of traditional journalist and should never be destroyed as an impartial platform with honor. Yet the traditional Journalist should be open minded and follow the public by using the social networking sites that is where the public go.

Back to about two decades, journalists are not as dynamic as they are today. Sometimes they just couldn’t write it down for some speechless reasons. In the reading by Ellingsen, he actually pointed out the brute history when the time that journalist had no power and no right to record it at the moment. Thus, with the pictures and videos clips at that time, to write what happen to the students in the Tianamen Square event weighs too much and massive to Ellingsen due to the political persecution. Furthermore, people in 1980’s were not allowed to publish and make speech with freedom, so most of journalists were under pressure not mentioned to write for the truth. Examining from the past, there is less burden to publish works, therefore, sometimes journalists are not looking for the truth but a newsworthy which depends on how they standardize or maybe how benefits they could get to some extend. I believe that the old saying ”seeing is believing” to claim what I describe for the situation, because that’s why more and more newspapers and magazines prefer to emphasize on the pictures, images more than written pieces. I mean, pictures could make up new stories! Just like Williams’ story, how you present to the readers is always the information that you trying to persuade them.       

W1- Journalistic Ethics.

Reflection from ‘Shattered Glass’ by Buzz Bissinger and ‘Sticky Issues in Gumshoe Journalism’ by Lawrence Zuckerman. 

The line between public interest and personal privacy is quite ambiguous and hard to be clearly defined especially when it involved with ethics. Lawrence Zuckerman (1988) described the use of hidden camera in ‘Sticky Issues in Gumshoe Journalism,’ while sometimes hidden camera could be widely used by reporters to disclose the so called “moral” issue but with such “immoral” way? That is, while the reporters try to use hidden camera which people might call it immoral way to discover the ugly truth, people could probably agree with what reporters have done as moral issue after the truth was declared. For example, the case of Boston locksmith’s store as bookie joint in the reading, it could be concealed forever if no one try to use this immoral way to figure it out. It is true that there are always judgments no matter how the reporters get the information; sometimes we, as the readers, just can’t help but need this kind of person who has ambitions and justice to discover the truth as watchdogs, or as journalists. However, I am not saying that I would totally support the usage of hidden equipments, if it is not about finding out the ethical truth, it might be illegal or unacceptable by the audience, which is why I could never give the direct answer. Getting away from the usage of Journalists, surveillance equipments could be helpful. 

Let’s think about the surveillance system around street, high way, department stores or banks…etc for instance, that really helps when the accidents happened. What I am trying to say is equipment is still an equipment, is always a cold machine, what people should realize is the necessary of using it, how much risk and responsibility does one could afford, or what if maybe it could be worthier to society and citizens than doing nothing.                       

However, how people could distinguish from the line between a respectable journalist and a betrayer of journalistic practice is still questionable. For the case of Stephen Glass, in the contemporary society with freedom of speech and publishing, the role of journalists should be expected to represent the opinions of people in writing stories which may reflect and contain almost every aspects of an issue in the most truthfully representative way. Hence, what he had done should be penalized to give back the audience proper and impartial images of professional journalist instead of a professional story maker. Therefore, I would suggest that conveying all of the most meaningful information of an affair is the most important achievement to play the role of journalists in practice properly. While journalists can never be completely objective since they are all human beings, Glass had already been way too far to tell the truth.