May 27 - Rummaging for a Story

I had a few interesting story ideas, but we couldn't find a way to spin them into a story, so I began looking at something Jen suggested, which was a story on how a Boonville health clinic received an $80,000 grant from the Missouri Foundation for Health while its doctor was supposedly on probation with the State Health board (I could not confirm this - we received this in a tip from a viewer, so I had no way of verifying it in time to turn the story in a day). The doctor also received notoriety in October 2008 throughout Mid-MO for losing her license to prescribe controlled substances like Oxycodone. So naturally, it brings up questions for us to see a doctor with this kind of a record receiving grant money. A call to the Missouri Foundation for Health resulted in me leaving a long voicemail for their spokesperson, and a few hours later receiving a long voicemail explaining that the organization is "investigating" how the grant was given to the doctor's clinic (Dancing Horizons) while issuing a "no comment" on the other aspects of the story. Jen and I agreed it would be better to do this story as an HFR, since it's clearly interesting but it needs more time to seek out. There's also no true "today" angle to it since the clinic received the grant in early May. So, the best we could find was the Rummage sale coming up on Saturday.

I went out to shoot some video and interview people there. I found several people who could speak on camera and they said some good stuff - worthy of making a package out of it. Upon returning to KOMU, the producers and I discussed going live at 5 and 6 - which sounded cool to me, so I was all for it. I cut a SOT for the 5 and 6, scripted a reader, and headed up to Memorial Stadium for the live shot. Since I'd already done a live shot before (speeding ticket story), it didn't feel too wild or crazy. I think my 6 shot went better than the 5 because I had it planned out better. Instead of grabbing something next to me to show on-camera, I simply held what I considered a good pair of shoes and showed how much they were for sale when the shot came to me. I was glad that we had SOMETHING to show - so our live shot was not worthless. I'd say I learned on-the-fly that keeping it simple for a live shot, and being able to show SOMETHING, are really important to a successful shot.

Upon getting back to the station I cut a package, which was pretty easy. It was shorter than the 1:10 I was given (about :53), but I think it's always easier for the anchors and producers to finish light than finish heavy. Plus, sports or weather always want extra time, so for a pretty weak story I was happy to have squeezed this much out of it. It felt very applicable to how Jack Nicholson quotes John Lennon in The Departed, "I'm an artist [or journalist, in my case]. You give me a f!@#$%^ tuba [pronounced 'toober'], I'll getcha somethin' out of it."

The 5 and 6 versions aired in the A block, with a live headline for each at the beginning of the show. The package for the 10 was in the B block.

I really need to find some good story ideas for next week.

Reflection on 5/25 shift

What began for me as a slow news day ended as an interesting but very emotionally tough shift. In the story meeting, I wasn't sure what I could really do besides Memorial Day events, and an MU Baseball NCAA tournament selection show watch party. I went with the watch party idea, but upon arriving there, we found Chris Gervino was already there and had plans to cover it, so we had to go with something else. I ended up going to cover the arrival of the "Missing in America Project" motorcycle riders in Kingdom City. I thought it was a pretty cool event and story - a different way to pay tribute to fallen veterans on Memorial Day. Basically, the group finds deceased veterans who never received a formal military burial. They were transporting 3 cremains from California to Arlington National Cemetery in Northern Virginia, and stopped in Kingdom City to refuel and grab a bite to eat. I felt I shot some good video and interviewed some interesting people, so I was pleased with what I had going back to the station. It was very easy to write a vo/sot for the 5, a package for the 6, and another vo/sot for the 10 because I felt I had plenty of good video and enough of a story to tell with what I found. I'd say the biggest thing I learned on Monday was to ALWAYS PUT THE PROPER GRAPHIC TIMES IN iNEWS!!!! I got chewed out in the post-newscast meeting, and rightfully so because my times were about 8-9 seconds off. There's no excuse for that out of me, and I was frustrated. I had cut that amount of video out of the original sequence after I voiced it, and never went back to change the times even after printing a copy for the director. Naturally, I was pretty annoyed with myself for not properly scripting it. Also, I used "Hwy" instead of "Highway" in the 5's vo/sot locator - something I specifically checked for and confirmed as correct in the iNews script tips and during the Tiger Chair check, but apparently we got it wrong. This was also very frustrating for me, because I felt I did all the right things as a reporter to check, double-check, and check with someone else before it aired, but I (not anyone else, these mistakes are totally on me at the end of the day) still got it wrong.

As I wrote above I found it to be an emotionally trying shift. I felt fine all the way up until when I sat down and began to write my web story when I was able to reflect on the day. Since it was Memorial Day, and we aired an incredibly moving Honor Flight story, the magnitude of what I covered started to hit home. I found the notion that hundreds of motorcyclists were riding across the country in convoy to transport 3 honored, but forgotten soldiers' cremains to be really touching. Combine that with the Honor Flight story, and the faucets began running, so to speak, in my eyes. I found this link on the "Missing in America Project" blog, and I really lost it. So many people have died serving their country yet no one knows their stories, their families, their sacrifices and heroism, and it's my role as a journalist to seek out those people. That's what was tough for me - the incredible, sometimes unfulfillable burden we have to convey this realm to people. I felt my story, and the Honor Flight story, were a valiant attempt at seeking that grain of truth. It took me a few hours and a long phone conversation with my Mom to really accept and acknowledge this.

All 3 stories aired in the A blocks of the 5 (A-10), 6 (A-10), and 10 (A-18). http://www.komu.com/satellite/SatelliteRender/KOMU.com/ba8a4513-c0a8-2f11-0063-9bd94c70b769/79fcf367-80ce-0971-0125-0bcc01ff7598

confusion

OK, so I've been using Twitter a lot since Friday when I opened my account. But I don't understand what the hell any of these acronyms or special symbols do - I know what # and @ do, but what is RT?

Selling out, or staying on the curve?

I was very anti-Twitter for a long time, and to an extent I still think it's dumb. But I created an account and I've spent some time on it. It's okay, I feel I've seen bigger technological or social networking breakthroughs (Facebook, to me, is still king), but I understand the reality we're in where everyone needs to know what's going on at all times. I feel like I've sold out and lost some of my personality (i.e. being original and against the popular thing), but at the same time, it's interesting. I can't knock it anymore!

I'd say in the last 24 hours I've overhauled my internet accessibility:

I'm creating a Flickr account now - should I upgrade to the bigger account? I have a lot more pictures I'd like to put online. I like how the pictures seem to be optimized. The quality is a lot better than Facebook's picture area.

I updated my KOMU Social Networking page. I'd like to see that area grow - it'd be nice to get more viewers on there and interact with them more.

I've added a Twitter feed to this page, as well as KOMU headlines.

A week ago I acquired a Blackberry. Since then, I've added the Facebook app and synced it with my contacts, so those with Facebook have their profile pictures show up on their contact page. I've also synced the Blackberry with Blogger and Twitter, so I can update stuff from the road. Long overdue, I guess.

Headed to see Star Trek with Travis. Hope it's as good as everyone says!