10 years of music reporting

By: Sara Crouse

Reporting today is about getting the facts fast. Its about getting the facts accurate though too. Breaking news is perhaps the hardest to get accurate, but reliable sources can be a reporter’s best option. One TV station, MTV, dedicated a show to getting the facts straight about new music.

Total Request Live, (TRL), is a commonly known MTV show that focuses on world-premier music videos and artist commentary on CD releases. How else would the public comprehend what the latest Miley Cyrus song is truly about? TRL provides fans with direct interviews to get the latest on Miley and many more A-list stars.

The show dedicates itself to not only showing the latest videos/interviews, but also the most popular ones. This concept of viewer voting was relatively ground breaking when TRL started 10 years ago. A viewer having the option to pick their Top 10 videos perhaps limits the public’s accessibility to a range of music though. What if the nightly news were done in the same format?

Instead, the American public relies on reporters to pick the Top 10 news stories of the day. Reporters are perhaps more credible than the everyday man in the street. Reporters strive to bring us ‘news’ and educate the public.

Whether TRL reporters are credible is debatable, but they have left an impression on the music world. The zany interviews with some of the past decade’s most famous celebrities are unforgettable. Such interviews have pushed viewers a step closer into the world of musicians.

With TRL’s recent cancellation, music lovers will have to decipher the best new music on their own. Reporters won’t be available to help us understand the latest love songs on the radio. We’ll have to become our own reporter.

As N’SYNC would have said 10 years ago, “Its tearin’ up my heart” that we’ll have to become conscious of our music tastes.

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Editing does make a difference

By: Shauna Agan

When visiting Lincoln High School in Des Moines, I came across a copy of The Railsplitter, a student-ran newspaper. I haven’t read this newspaper forever and wanted to see what was new at my former school, so I decided to pick up a newspaper.

From what I have been taught already, I saw a lot of things in the paper that can and should be changed in the writings, but of course these students may not have learned proper techniques to writing yet beings they are still in high school. What disturbed me, though, were the inaccuracies and contradictions in the sports section.

As a former softball player for Lincoln, I decided to look at the softball article wrapping up last season’s results. The article said, “A key highlight of the game was Junior Courtney Ghee’s three run homerun which made the final score 2-1”.

Correct me if I am wrong, but if Ghee hit a three run homer, shouldn’t the final score have been 3-1? A little bit of simple editing would have caught this mistake.

Next, I read an article about the varsity football team. The article said that the sophomore team last year had a record of 7-1. However, right after stating this, a quote from football player Devon Miller says, “Our sophomore year we went 0-8”.

Now, either the writer completely messed up the record of last year’s sophomore team, or he was referring to a different class and did not clarify the distinction to the readers.

While I understand that these students are still in high school and have a lot of room for improvement in their writing, the editor or even the teacher in charge should have caught these errors. Maybe a little extra time editing before sending the paper to print wouldn’t hurt.

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Media outlets also struggle during economy downfall

By: Taylor Browning



As the economy takes a turn for the worse, everyone relies on newspapers, the Internet, and television to get their facts. Due to this reliance it would seem newspapers would be booming with profits, but in reality they are also at a downfall.

Companies are cutting back on advertisement spending in order to save money, which is taking away from newspaper's income. Along with the accessibility of the Internet, it is difficult for these newspapers to make back the money they are losing through empty advertisement space.

Newspapers are now subject to budget cuts as well as laying off employees due to their shortfall of money. Altering newspaper layouts and cutting out 'unnecessary columns' such as fashion and opinion columns to shorten their paper is becoming an alternative to help money issues.

While insurance and banking companies are receiving billions of dollars in loans to keep afloat, many other niches of businesses are not receiving the financial help they may need. Newspapers are the ones informing us about the economic turmoil, while feeling the burn they initially report about.

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Time for change

By: Adrian Aitken

Web logging is a trend which spread through the country like wildfire. Anyone can do it from anywhere in the world and can also be viewed by anyone everywhere. Today though what is the point?

True many blogs give exclusive information about items people care about yet countless more don't. Finally the fire has reached the tops of the trees and the celebrities have joined the blogger's ranks. Paris Hilton for instance has recently posted about her latest promotional trip to Europe. This really seems unnecessary and distracting in the media world.

On the other hand not all celebrity blogs are bad. Bono for instance has recently started a new posting. It is not filled with which shirt he decided to buy today, but rather the post informs people of an international peace conference from an inside reporters view.

Blogs need to have a purpose beyond random tidbits of useless information and more regulation. Now I'm certainly not saying blocking people from blogging, but separate it into different categories. For example, a blog about sports where a guarantee of seriousness in facts is present could be called a splogg.If everyone "Blogs" it will lose its meaning much like saying a word out loud over and over.

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