Can you hear me now????....Good

For my first multimedia story of the semester I plan to discuss hearing damage among ipod users specifically young adults.


My Attack
*I plan to use the Human Interest feature story approach.

*I plan to get information in the form of teen ipod users interviews(student/teen with hearing damage, students who listen ipods/mp3's frequently) as well expert interviews on the dangers and ways to avoid hearing loss and damage. (Ex. docotors, audiology professors.)

*I also plan to use statistics to help paint a better picture of the issue.


Image Possibilities
*Teen getting a hearing exam
*Teen listing to music with the volume up
*Teen listening to music with large head phones
*Teen pushing an earbud in ear further

Writing a Feature Story using the Wall Street Journal Formula

*The Wall Street Journal Formula(WSJ) is the most commonly used method of writing feature stories. This method consist of four basic sections.

1.) The story opens with an anecdotal, descriptive, or narrative lead (specific examples)
2.) The nut graf follows the lead and generally explains the lead
3.) The body of the story is supporting information (quotes, facts, developments)
4.) The ending includes another anecdotal or description of the people/person featured int the story

An example of this is in an Washington Post article titled, "6,473 Texts a Month, But at What Cost?".The story can be identifieid as the WSJ formula because of the folling sections.

1. ( LEAD) "Julie Zingeser texts at home, at school, in the car while her mother is driving. She texts during homework, after pompon practice and as she walks the family dog. She takes her cellphone with her to bed." - anecdotal lead that gave specific examples about Julie's texting

2.(NUT GRAF) Paragraphs 2-4 -explained the lead and let the story shift to the larger purpose.

3. (BODY) The Body of the story looks more in-depth at how text messaging is affecting teenager's social development. -uses many psychology statistics, quotes from doctors, psychiatrist, technology experts and other teenagers

4. (ENDING) "Still, she doubts she will change her text life anytime soon. "When I don't have my phone with me," she said, "I feel out of the loop." -ends with the person featured in the story. Julie, and gives the reader more details on the future of Julie's texting.

Tigers Accept "REJECTS"

This year's big decision for the headlining band for Towson's annual Spring music festival has every one buzzing. The campus acitivity board(CAB) recently announced that The All American Rejects, will be featured in this year's festivities. The All-American Rejects are an American rock band from Stillwater, Ok, formed in 2001. The band comprises lead vocalist and bass guitarist Tyson Ritter, guitarists and vocalists Nick Wheeler and Mike Kennerty, with drummer Chris Gaylor.The The decision was determined by the results of a school-wide survey in which students chose from award winning artist like Taylor Swift, Lil Wayne, and the list went on.

" I couldn't wait for Tigerfest last spring because The Roots were playing," said sophomore Jazmine White "I was waiting for that from the start of the semester."

From what I'm hearing around campus some student's aren't so hyped about the performance decision. "I mean I listen to rock music, but why the All American Rejects?", says freshman Lanita Roberson, "I personally won't be there because I was hoping for some better and I'm not a big rejects fan."

According to CAB, the famous rock band will bring will be bringing two of their own opening actswhich have yet to be announced. The event will go down on April 25 on Burdick Field. Stay tuned for more information and more reactions as we countdown to the big day......

Wanna hear what the All American Rejects sound like??? Check out this video of their latest single, Gives you Hell.

What is the Difference?????

In journalism, the lead is the most important aspect of the story. It can make a break a story. The lead is what gets the readers' attention to read the rest of the story. However, there is a lead for every type of story you write. Say for instance you write a hard news story, you would use a summary lead and for a feature story you would use a feature lead aka "soft/delayed lead". So what's the difference????

Feature lead
• Also called delayed leads.
• Can be several paragraphs long.
• Takes a little longer to get to the gist of the story.
• Teases the reader with a descriptive or storytelling approach.
• Requires use of a nut graph early in the story to give reader the point of the story.
• Different types: descriptive, anecdotal, narrative, mystery, teaser, question

Feature Lead tips and Example:

Bring it to life with human interest

In 1989, Elizabeth McCann of Spring, Texas, felt a knot in her left breast. Her physician told her that she needed a biopsy, but was 99 percent sure it would be benign. McCann kept putting it off — until the pain in her breast woke her up at night. …

— ContourMed backgrounder

Give startling statistics

A startling statistic can set up your story beautifully:

Every day, each of the 25,000 U.S. veterinary clinics will get, on average, a visit from two arthritic dogs. Odds are, one of those dogs will leave the clinic untreated, still suffering in silent pain.

More than 10 million dogs (that's one in five adult dogs) suffer from osteoarthritis …

— Novartis Animal Health's Deramaxx release

*Overall, feature leads are much more creative than summary leads. Summary leads stick to the facts and answer the 5w's, but feature leads give a little more detail. Feature leads give the writing more room to get the reader interested because they are typically longer than summary leads.

Ruckus Goes Down!!!!

Ruckus, the well known university music download website will no longer operate. According to Techcrunch, as of February 5, 2009, Ruckus has apparently closed it's doors. For those of you not familiar with ruckus it is an online music service geared towards universities which allowed students to stream an unlimited amount of music. Ruckus became a phenomeon because it eventually opened to all students with an accepted university email address (typically .edu). This is a major blow for college students, like me, who do not want to pay hundreds of dollars for songs, but also want to download legally.

Jason Kincaid, the author, does an Ok job at explaining what happened in the process of ruckus' website termination, however he leaves us readers wondering why???? We really don't know why the number one music download source for college students went under, we just know how. Kincaid goes into detail about how the owners of Ruckus, Total Music, attempted to get backing from social networks like facebook and Warner, but doesn't explain on what those rejections had to do with the closure, especially when the website had been successful for over 8 years. Could it have been financial issues? poor advertisement? We just don't know. All we can do is ask what's next for college music lovers.

Drop the BEAT!!! MuSiQ

CHECK ONE, CHECK TWO....My beat for my blog is of course MUSIC!!! I will be exploring many aspects of music from the latest music jamming in Towson student's mp3's to local bands visiting Towson's campus, lastest news for popular artists and popular student music websites'. Since most students can't walk from their dorm to their classroom with out pushing play on their ipod or zume I feel this blog topic is perfect for the average student to get the latest music info. and stay in the music mix. I'm ready to get started so stay tuned for the first track........