Advice of the Masters

Over the course of our Media Writing class, we’ve been introduced to a lot of different opinions and ideas about the best way to improve our skills in writing for the media world. With so many different avenues in the industry that we can go down, it helps to be exposed to a little bit [...]

Religious Ritual or Child Abuse?

This video is a news story from New York about a mother who performed a Haitian voodoo ritual on her daughter and set her on fire. Yikes. The story begins with a soft lede: “What happened to a six-year-old girl inside this house, the Queens district attorney calls almost beyond belief.” A quick quip from [...]

Think Before You Speak

The Think Before You Speak campaign is an Ad Council campaign sponsored by the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network. The goal of the campaign is right there in the name: to get students to think before they say things that could be derogatory to gay, lesbian or transgendered peers, like “that’s so gay”. The [...]

GE Healthcare vs. The Wall Street Journal

Today, General Electric came out with a press release detailing a new program called Stimulus Simplicity that will offer no-interest financing on electronic medical records (EMR) machines. The Wall Street Journal covered the story in their online edition today. The biggest difference between the two stories was the length. The WSJ cut all the industry [...]

North Texans keep a level head about housing

In a time when everyone is worrying about the economy crashing and burning, Colleyville residents have managed to keep their cool regarding their houses. Interviews with four residents of the relatively affluent Dallas suburb show that, for the most part, gripes and grumblings about housing issues aren’t really a problem here. “We don’t owe, so [...]

Online News

The Onion A.V. Club Newswire I know what you’re all gonna think: “Jay, The Onion is a fake news website…have you been getting enough sleep?” To answer your question, no. But The Onion’s entertainment branch, The A.V. Club, is all truthful – just with a little snark thrown into the writing to add a little [...]

Sotomayor’s confirmation hearings to begin July 13

Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Republican leader, called the Democrats’ tactics “heavy-handed” and urged them to reconsider the schedule. “Let me be clear. … Because of what our Democratic colleagues are doing and the way they are doing it, it will now be much more difficult to achieve the kind of comity and cooperation [...]

A Great Lede from Texas

Michael Reed says he has to pack his black tuxedo and top hat. At age 16, he is going to be performing at Carnegie Hall. “I’m really excited,” he said. “I’ve never been to New York.” Reed and other members of the Texas Boys Choir will appear Sunday on one of the stages of Carnegie [...]

Southwest Airlines reports sharp drop in May revenues

Southwest Airlines Co., which last week announced steps to increase revenues, said Wednesday that its unit revenues dropped about 9 percent last month compared to May 2008. The Dallas-based carrier said its traffic dropped 3.6 percent, outpacing a 3.2 percent reduction in flying capacity. Its load factor, or percentage of seats filled, dropped 0.3 points [...]

Attitude in Reporting

“I prefer to read, watch, or listen to news that’s presented with an attitude, even if it’s opinionated, because it makes the topics more interesting.” Yeah, that sounds about right. The simple fact of the matter is, we live in a society that is stimulated from all different angles in regards to the media. Any [...]