OK, so it wasn’t Alice. It was me. I’ve been sick since this weekend. I’m hoping it’s just a cold and it passes. It’s making my normally perky self well, pretty miserable. I felt bad all day and probably should have just stayed home, but I didn’t think it was fair to subject anyone else to sitting through the school board meeting tonight. So I went in anyway, worked on some enterprise and then went to my meeting. After I filed my story about tonight’s school board meeting, I decided to call it a night early.

My head had been swimming all day anyway, and just dragging myself out of bed was a bit of chore. That migght be normal at 7 a.m., but I’m talking 11 a.m. several hours after my normal wake-up time. There was even a tornado siren going off around 10:30 a.m. — which I later learned was just a test — and the only thing I could think of was, “I hope there isn’t a tornado because I’m not getting out of bed.”

It occurred to me on my drive home from work tonight that I should buy some cold medicine and cough drops because it might make me feel less miserable. When at Wal-Mart, I thought to buy some more V-8 and oranges. (Both foods I eat every day to AVOID getting sick. See where it got me?) Well, beside the oranges was the weirdest thing I may have ever seen. They’re called Grapples. They look like an apple but taste like a grape. Well, that’s what the packaging said. They certainly smelled like grape koolaid to me. But, with my cold, my smell isn’t the greatest.

So, after being slightly intrigued and highly disturbed by that weird encounter with genetically modified fruit, I pressed on toward the juice aisle where I saw another thing that made me think I was in an alternate universe: a woman (not a man) in a full-out tuxedo grocery shopping. Just meandering through the aisles with a cart full of goods. But in a black tux. At 9:30 p.m. At Wal-Mart.

Then, in the soup aisle (I was throwing in chicken noodle soup for good measure), there was this girl who was practically screaming into her phone in a foreign language. I’m guessing it was an Asian language, because the only word I could at all make out was “America!” several times while I browsed the soup selection.

That all was bothering my head, which had a pounding headache anyway. Finally, after getting my cold medicine — which btw, it seems weird to me to be able to buy cold medicine off the shelf here; maybe because meth is so huge in Northeast Ohio, but you have to go get most cold medicines from behind the counter — I got up to the register.

Now, I haven’t actually gotten around to getting a new license yet, so I still have my Ohio license. (Dorothy told me you have 60 days to get a new license after you move here. Well, that means I have about a week left to do it.) I show my ID and the woman asks me, “What’s the capital of the state that issued this.” I just look at her, mind blank, wondering a) why is she asking me this, b) is she asking Ohio or Indiana and c) what is the capital of Indiana anyway? I offered a timid “Columbus?” and she seemed to have to think about it just as hard as I did, in my foggy brained glory.

It was probably the most bizarre trip to Wal-Mart. I think perhaps I just had a heightened sense of every around me. Or maybe it was the opposite. I was too out of it to notice the things I should have and my brain was just picking up oddities.

So, it is a little soon to be ripping off the OnBeing idea from the Washington Post. But I saw the “Stater.You” link on the site and clicked.

Not as pretty as the WP or as artsy, but it is something different. And I’d be willing to bet, outside Taylor Hall the number of people who’ve heard about or seen OnBeing is a few dozen at most. So the readers won’t hold it against them.

I’m not sure I’d have chosen those subjects (for one thing Karl Hopkins-Lutz used to be a Stater columnist, though it has been a few years) or that location to jump off the project. But if the idea is to offer random snapshots of people around campus, it succeeds.

This is definitely thinking beyond the printed page. And it’s a good example of why student newspapers are great places for experimentation and trying new things. Don’t waste months, which could mean semesters, which means staff turnover in the world of college newspapers, testing and tweaking to perfection something before launch. Just go for it. If it doesn’t work, ditch it. No harm, no foul.

“If you want to achieve great things in your life, you have to take risks. The first risk is daring to feel deeply, to be passionate about what you want and care about. Enthusiasm is the key to breaking through barriers, whether your dream is to touch one person or millions.”
— Ken Kragen

Just saw this at the Stater: Interactive Renter’s Map.

It’s part of the annual renter’s guide. It’s a great example of when a map like that is actually a worthwhile addition not just an addition for the sake of having something interactive. Also, these buildings won’t be moving any time soon, so this is very much evergreen content that can and should be left up and linked all year. By plotting the local apartments, I can easily see where each is in relation to the university campus and get key information (address and phone number) for each complex. The only thing I’d do to improve this, would be to include links on this page/within each point(if possibel) to all of the stories the reporters wrote about each of the complexes, with photos of the rooms if possible and if not at least of the buildings. Those stories should also include a break out box with key information (the address, phone number, Web site and a range for the amount a student should expect to pay each month and also utilities/cable included, etc.).

With those simple changes, I’d say this would be an excellent resource. This is something every college newspaper should be doing. It’s so simple and would drive tons of traffic.

“We do not choose to be born. We do not choose our parents. We do not choose our historical epoch, the country of our birth or the immediate circumstances of our upbringing. We do not, most of us, choose to die; nor do we choose the time and conditions of our death. But within this realm of choicelessness, we do choose how we live.”
— Joseph Epstein

I have to say, I am impressed by the multimedia the photographers at the Medina Gazette are undertaking.

Medina is the county just west of Summit, which is where Akron is. It’s mostly rural. The paper is about 15,000ish circulation, if I recall correctly. I know a few people who’ve worked their part-time or as interns, but I’ve never really looked at it or its Web offerings. Today, I saw one of the projects linked at MultimediaShooter. Although I liked the presentation of that story, I was also impressed with the way they’ve collected their multimedia. It’s very streamlined and user friendly.

I just checked it out. It says Rami is their photo intern and web designer. He’s a KSU student. (Not sure if he’s graduated yet?) Seeing his name makes sense. He’s definitely talented. He was the CyBurr webmaster who preceded me my freshman year. But, as you’ll notice, he rocks (and knows Flash and has photo skills I only dream of). And I well, have a long way to go.

I just read on CNN that the AP had a week long blackout of Paris Hilton news.

I’m not sure how I feel about that.

On one hand, I can’t stand the girl. (Sorry, Kali, I know she’s your idol.) She is, as that article states, famous for being famous. It isn’t that she’s rich or spoiled. OK, well that’s part of it. What irks me most is how much press she gets for not doing anything. It’s like, here’s this stupid girl (and by all accounts I’ve seen, that adjective fits) with plenty of money to blow and nothing better to do with her life than throw it away. She has nothing else to do with her life other than party and be seen. (And it was heartening to hear that nobody was clamoring for the news.)

On the other hand, if people are stupid enough to want to read about her exploits, (Again, sorry Kali.) I don’t know if we should say we know what’s best for you. And just not cover her or anyone. Trust me, I was the kid sitting in the newsroom for the past few weeks, shaking my head “WHO CARES?!” As all the cable news covered Anna Nicole Smith’s death like she was the pope.

I know, I know. One of the most dangerous things about being a journalist is having the power to set the agenda. There’s a quote that goes something along the lines of “What we do and don’t cover matters a great deal.” Every day we have to choose what we cover and what we don’t. Which reporter covers what, how much time and resources he or she gets. How each story is played. Etc. But an all-out blanket black out on one subject or person is pretty extreme. What if it’s not Paris Hilton next time? It makes me a little queasy. That’s all.

“It is the greatest shot of adrenaline to be doing what you’ve always wanted to do so badly. You almost feel like you could fly without the plane.”
— Charles Lindbergh

One of my biggest online newspaper pet peeves is user polls.

I brought this up the other day in a meeting. I thought it might be worth pointing out here as well because it applies to probably the majority of papers with online polls (at least the ones I’ve come across).

Things that annoy me about newspaper Web polls:

• Why bury it at the bottom of the home page?
  I will never understand why the majority of these polls are tacked on to the bottom of the first page on the site. Think about it. When was the last time you scrolled to the bottom of a newspaper’s Web site, especially on the first page where the day’s top headlines, photo galleries, multimedia, special projects, forums, blogs and more entice you to click long before you ever reach that far. Chances are, it’s been a while. And chances are, if you actually did get to the bottom, you were looking for something in particular that you couldn’t easily find on the home page. I can appreciate that the home page is like the front page: valuable real estate. But, why bother if you’re just going to bury it? At least shuffle it so when it’s a particularly important topic, the poll gets higher play.

• Why is there almost no context given to the question?
  You want to ask me how I feel about the head football coach resigning, fine. But, link me to the story so I can read it and feel I’m making a semi-informed decision. Or at least so I can follow up my vote with that story as you’ve now piqued my interest. Don’t make me do the work to find that story. Don’t make me think/search/go out of my way to find the article, event or whatever that sparked this question.
• The polls don’t get included/mentioned in the stories themselves.
  Seems to me logical to include the poll with the story not just on the front page. I know this may be more technically difficult, but it would also get a lot more votes because anyone reading the story would see the poll. They’ve already expressed interest in the topic by clicking through to the story. They would probably vote just to see what their peers had to say. (Well, I would.) Even more of a pet peeve on this is when the sidebar on the story says, “Take our poll online.” And there’s no link or anything.
• Publishing the results
  I think it was because representative samples was pounded in my head by my stats teacher in college. I don’t know, but publishing the results of the polls with out a disclaimer about how unscientific and unrepresentative the results are seems misleading. I don’t see them being quoted in stories or anything, but yeah. Actually, I remember the Record-Courier quoted a Stater poll once about students preference for semesterly graduation. No joke. Not only did they quote a highly unscientific poll (If I recall correctly it had only about 200 votes on it.), but they used the poll results from a different publication. When I read that in their story (which had lazy reporting anyway), I almost choked. Don’t do that.

I’m glad to get that off my chest.