The Pain Of It All…

"It's my first day..."

In-tern-ship: noun.  Webster’s defines it as “the period of service as an intern.”  Well, hard to argue that one.

The Free Online Dictionary is slightly more specific: “A student or a recent graduate undergoing supervised practical training.”

And here’s my favourite definition of internship, which I found on an anonymous PDF file: “An opportunity to integrate career related experience into an undergraduate education by participating in planned, supervised work.”

Hmm, if only it were so.

I am currently doing an internship. And when I say currently, I mean currently.  Right now.  Instead of writing something – anything – relevant to the publication, I am reduced to writing a passive aggressive online rant about the futility of finding work in the journalistic field.  My “boss” is sick today and my co-workers are nice enough but simply have no work to give me.  I feel I’ve come full circle; at the age of 15 I was doing this very job at Sydney’s North Shore Times.  Except at least I wasn’t so laced by cynicism; back then I was a wide-eyed high school student who thought journalism jobs grew on trees and the internet was used solely for online multi-player Age of Empires gaming/porn – not possibly for news.  But the print media industry was strong then – or so it seemed.  “One day, I’m going to be a real journalist, ” I said to myself, brimming with youthful exuberance.

I won’t shame the publication – although it is so damn tempting – but there is little to no respect for interns.  Yesterday I was asked to accompany a flamboyant fashion writer on a photo shoot.  I asked him of the brief: there was to be no journalism involved – my task would be to bring bottles of water and clothes to a bunch of C-list models.  Being a self-respecting 23-year-old heterosexual male – or more specifically, being not a 16-year-old teenage girl – I politely refused the offer.  The internship had begun to resemble hired help than actual industry experience.  Funny, because I’m doing this intership out of my own time – for no money at all.  I’m a university graduate – of not just an undergraduate degree but a postgraduate diploma to boot – but I feel more like a 15-year-old data entry kid.  It hurts.

How long will I have to engage in horrendous unpaid work until someone gives me a job just because they like the “cut of my jib”?

God give me the strength to survive one more day of this.

Zach Braff Dead…?

flickr: polymath blues

What kind of narcissistic, faceless, ratings-driven world do we live in?  Seriously, what possesses people to post fake deaths online?

In case you’ve been living under a rock, Scrubs star Zach Braff is the latest celebrity to fall victim to an online death hoax.  A fake CNN news template reported that Braff had committed suicide, and the story instantly spread like wildfire on Twitter.

Keeping in with the “like wildfire” cliché, am I going too far to suggest these people are the arsonists of the Internet?  Putting a lie out there and waiting for it to go viral isn’t too dissimilar to chucking a cigarette butt into a tinder-dry forest in the middle of bushfire season, is it?  In both cases the offender is playing with people’s lives.

So should these hackers be punished – or is the joke on us?

Entertainment reporter Richard Wilkins found out how stupid one can look for not fact-checking before going to air after he incorrectly reported that actor Jeff Goldblum had died.  Goldblum subsequently came out with a deliciously ironic skit about his “death”, making Wilkins look even redder in the face.

The Goldblum death hoax was good.  Damn good.  I mean, MJ and Farrah Fawcett had also just died, and I’m sure Karl Stefanovic and Richard Wilkins were just gagging to make the quip “bad things happen in threes”.  So why bother checking?  It goes right up there alongside the classic Paul “Paul is dead” McCartney rumour of the mid-60s, in which it was claimed Paul had died and been replaced with a fellow who looked and sounded exactly like him.  Personally, I believe this was entirely true.  A pre-1966 Paul McCartney would never have joined Wings.

This article – by the real CNN, I think  – touches on the very real problems we have now that the news has become decentralised.  Basically, we don’t know who to trust.  The article also mentions the site www.fakeawish.com, which provides a fake death template – all that is required is the name of your favourite/least favourite celebrity.  Punch that in and away you go.

The fake CNN report

At the moment we only have to wait five minutes after the story comes out before the celebrity in question “reassures” us they are still alive via Twitter.  Perhaps, before too long, we will be so cynical when it comes to celebrity deaths that when a real death comes along, we’ll laugh it off as “yet another hoax”?

Probably not.  We live in a celebrity obsessed world where a Miley Cyrus nose bleed equals tabloid success.  I’m sure we’ll be taken along for the ride every time.

* Editor’s note: Blogger Dave Edwards is missing and presumed dead after his luxury yacht reportedly sank off the coast of St Tropez.*

Get excited… It’s the web analytics post

eric.delcroix

It is often said that statistics don’t tell the full story.

In the case of my blog statistics, this is untrue.  They tell the complete story.

Total views: 275

Busiest day: 54 — Thursday, September 10, 2009

Views today: 8

Average per day: 10

The Watchdog blog had issues from day one.  Firstly, I was forced to change my theme several times and, for the first few weeks, my comments page was switched off.  This, I can only presume, did not help.

Then I moved from my RAWS page to the more user-friendly WordPress format.  I posted a link on Facebook notifying people of the change and voila! My highest number of visitors was clocked the day of that change (a still unimpressive 54).  Facebook, much like Kyle Sandilands, is clearly a great self-promotional tool.

Obviously, I can take a wild stab in the dark that most – if not all – of my visitors are from the graduate diploma in journalism.  Thank you, friends, for visiting the page.  I’ve also noticed the highest number of visits come on Thursdays, which, being the day before our online journalism tutorials, is most likely sparked by a curiosity to see whether I’ve penned my post for the week.  Since the new blog went up (10 Sept) I have had 275 visitors to my blog.  I guess it could be worse.

I would severely doubt I have international visitors to my blog.  My posts have so far been utterly Australia-centric and, if I was to improve on my statistics, I should perhaps do some posts on broader world issues.

I have generally tried to capitalise on the ‘burning issues’ in the media: topical “newsworthy” items such as Kyle Sandilands, Father Bob and Eddie MacGuire.  Sure, it was a shameless attempt to pick up Australian readers from Google.  It may have worked, it may not have.

I probably need to work on my headlines in order to receive better Google traffic.  Aesthetically, my posts could do with a touch up, also.  My default format appears to be photo – text – ironic Youtube clip.  I should mix things up and see what happens.

I’ll put all these ideas into play next week.

Kwoff – quaffing the news

flickr: soartsyithurts

Stop quaffing that bottle of Shiraz for a minute and take a look at Australian news aggregator site Kwoff.

You may have seen Kwoff ads at the bottom of news websites such as news.com.  Founded by Stephen Mayne (of Crikey fame) and Dan Walsh, Kwoff was launched last year amid the recent proliferation of free Australian news websites.

The content is sourced from other news sites (abc.net.au, Crikey, non-mainstream blogs and videos, etc) and goes by a voting system: if you like it, give it a vote.  Kwoff also encourages readers to submit their own content.

But, sadly, Kwoff’s website is in desperate need of an over-haul.  While Crikey and news.com.au have a clean, crisp format, Kwoff’s white background clashes with the pale blue font.  The font sizes are also a bit all over the shop, making for sore eyes.  The site lacks unity – there is no cohesion between the text, graphics and colour.

Readers can easily navigate themselves around the page thanks to the navigation bar and story listings – but it just doesn’t look pretty.  It also takes some time for me to scroll down the page to view all the ‘emerging items’.

The sheer amount of words on the home page makes Kwoff a tough read, and I found myself craving some contrast.  On the other hand, I noticed only one advertisement upon viewing the site (The Smith Family).  I guess for me, Kwoff’s lack of flashing pop-ups is a refreshing touch – intended or otherwise.

At one point I considered writing for Kwoff.  I spoke with Dan Walsh last year; he had advertised a paid writing position and I applied – he accepted.  But he was obviously a busy man; I deduced this from his failure to reply to my repeated emails and, therefore, I never ended up writing a single article for Kwoff.  I remember him saying something about the web layout and how it needed work.  To be honest, nothing seems to have changed in a year.  In fact it probably looks a little worse.  You just don’t know where to look.

Despite my aesthetic dislike of the site, Kwoff is doing quite well for itself.  It recently broke into the world’s top 30,000 sites (make of that what you will), and has more than 100,000 users a month.

Now if only it can fix up its dodgy web design…

Father Bob – is it time to hang up the collar?

It looks as if Father Bob Maguire will hang onto his job after all – with one major clause.

Fr. Maguire is supposedly in talks to hand over financial management of his South Melbourne parish.  That way he’ll keep his job as a priest well past the age of “statutory senility” (those are Father Bob’s own words, not mine).

Now, being from Sydney and formerly an avid JJJ listener, I had no idea Father Bob was such a well-loved pillar of the Melbourne community.  In fact, I had assumed that JJJ’s “Father Bob” was simply some old bloke masquerading as a Catholic Priest so as to offer fine juxtaposition to John Safran.

But it has amazed me how much media coverage Bob has wrangled over the last few weeks.  Channel Nine’s Today show has featured Bob almost every morning, giving him the chance to put his case forward time and time again.

Why should Bob retire?  In an age where The Catholic Priest is synonymous with something sordid, Bob is undeniably a shining light for the priesthood.  A regular twitterer, Fr. Bob probably knows more about technology than I do, which proves he’s quite switched on for an old bloke.

But on the other hand, if the allegations he has been mismanaging parish funds are correct, then he should accept the compromise and hand over the reigns to a more qualified person.  I mean, the guy is 75.  He shouldn’t be worrying about balance sheets and creditors.  He should be doing the things I plan to be doing at 75: basking in the Queensland sun, watching Matlock re-runs and buying All-Bran cereal in bulk.

That way everyone wins – and I don’t have to wake up to a 75-year-old man every morning…

Packed to the Rafters: is there room for one more journalist?

I’ll confess to watching Packed to the Rafters the other night.  Why? Well, I was bloated after a generous serve of spaghetti bolognaise, and couldn’t be bothered getting up to change the channel.  Why don’t you have a remote, you ask? Well I do, but it needs new batteries.  So to avoid this ever happening again I should probably get some new batteries – or at least invest in a large stick to change the channel manually.

But one of the characters, Sammy, is studying to become a journalist.  She, on Tuesday night’s episode, interviewed an ex-boyfriend for an assignment on the Global Financial Crisis.  Now as the learned students of RMIT are aware, interviewing a friend or relative is a big no-no.  As such, I leapt from my foetal position on the couch and yanked the TV cord from the power-point, disgusted by the lack of realism (and my lack of stick).

Now I would hazard a guess that “the journalist” is one of the most commonly featured professions in pop culture.  There is something idealistic about the scoop-chasing, stop-at-nothing investigative journalist that has seen the profession immortalised in movies such as State of Play and Citizen Kane. And if a comprehensive list of journalism in pop culture is just what you’ve been craving, you can check out this exhaustive page:

But is it really that glamorous a profession?  From my experiences so far as a student of journalism, I would contend it is not.  It is damn near impossible to get people to consent to interviews without being jerked around somewhat because, let’s face it, people are inherently difficult.  One of the major motivators behind me finishing this course is to get a job and be able to ring a source and introduce myself as “David Edwards from *insert reputable media group*, rather than “Hi, I’m David Edwards from RMIT University… and this is for some assignment which has no bearing upon your life but will require your time and effort.  Interested in helpin’ me out?”  Watch this YouTube video if you want to see a student journalist get shot down in public:

So far this year we have been told that “there are fewer jobs”, “things aren’t the way they used to be when I was a journalist”, “I just walked into the office and asked for a job… and they gave me one – imagine that!”, etc.  Gone are the days when a bit of news sense and an ability to write would suffice; we must now be ultra proficient across TV, radio, print and online.  I’ve even heard a rumour the Leader group is prefacing its job ads with the following: Nobel laureates and atom-splitters only need apply.

If someone wishes to hire me as a journalist, please, be my guest.  I will do a more than capable job if you’ll just give me a chance.  If not – and I’m warning you – I may have to become a TV script-writer in order to end the clichéd journalism references so prevalent in pop culture today.

More Bile for Kyle

Kyle in happier times...

Kyle Sandilands, you’ve done it again.  You really are a douchebag, my friend.

Kyle has catapulted his portly frame back into the media spotlight with another foul-tasting comment that managed to offend both overweight people and the Jewish population.  Sandilands suggested on-air, inexplicably, that Magda Szubanski would lose more weight in a concentration camp.  Given Magda is arguably Australia’s most loved media personality, Kyle might have picked a better target.

To add context to the insult, Magda’s father, a Polish man, actually escaped the Nazi concentration camps during WWII.  Bad luck for Kyle, I guess.

As of yesterday he is off the air (again), suspended (again), and Public Enemy Number One (yes, again).

Well, at least this guy still loves Kyle.  Read this if you like vomiting.  And if you haven’t thrown up enough, try this YouTube parody out for size:

2Day FM management will sit down with Kyle and re-draw the line in the sand, which has presumably been washed away by the overflowing bile he continues to choke on.

If we just stop listening to him, then maybe he will go away – like the terrorists hopefully will?

The Punch’s David Penberthy says this latest misdemeanour is “the end” for Kyle; that he will be driven out of the industry by market forces.  Do advertisers want to be associated with a mouthy shock-jock prone to the occasional Nazi one-liner?  No.  It is a fair point Penberthy makes; and  “toothless” watchdog ACMA is unlikely to step in and drag Sandilands off air – or any major personality, for that matter. ACMA’s powerlessness was exposed after it took the best part of two years to give Alan Jones a slap on the wrist after he publicly incited violence against Lebanese gangs in the wake of the Cronulla Riots.  Poor little ACMA.  Damned if it does; damned if it doesn’t.  But, generally, it doesn’t.

I’d love to know where Kyle will be in 10 years.  Will he tidy up his act to make the seamless transition from FM to AM radio, like an all-grown-up Adam Spencer?  Or will he age badly and continue the cacophony of un-PC jokes well into his 50s, alongside some ubiquitous, generic blonde?

Here’s hoping.

“Fast” Eddie McGuire makes a speedy return to radio

“Fast” Eddie McGuire, he of Collingwood fame (?) and general crimes against television-viewing humanity, is set to sign a $1 million deal with Triple M to present its early morning breakfast show.

Myf Warhurst and Peter Heliar were sacked recently, probably for good reason although that might be a bit harsh, leaving Triple M managers with a dilemma: who to choose now?

But the station has apparently decided – as seems to be the norm in Melbourne – to fall back on McGuire and an ex-footballer, in this case former Bulldog Luke Darcy, as its default option.

Why must everything in Melbourne be either presented or endorsed by some AFL stalwart?  Leigh Matthews, who I’m led to believe is a footballing deity, now promotes home and land packages for a company called Devine Homes.  Shane Crawford, another ex-AFL player, presents bad TV programs that should be subject upon nobody – no exceptions.  Dermott Brereton, whose last AFL match was well over 15 years ago, can be seen gallivanting around on the set of Getaway, bemusing Tenerife locals with his ocker accent and bizarre, peroxide-blonde hair-do.  And of course there is Sam Newman, who has been doing a bang-up job selling misogyny for the last 10 years or so.

It concerns me that celebrities – but particularly AFL identities – are considered so marketable in this city.  Are our D grade actors simply incapable of stringing together the necessary eight words needed to bleat out a bad company catch-phrase?  Or are companies and TV executives just eager to capitalise on the fact that AFL players are so well-loved – and the public so blissfully stupid – that a player’s sporting success is congruent to the credibility of the business being promoted?

Stepping back from the rant for a second, I genuinely fear for the future of sports journalism in this city.  Not that I hope to enter the field one day, but simply because I believe it has become dominated by sports-stars-turned-commentators/columnists.  Humble journalism graduates may find it hard to break in amongst the jock hierarchy, as mediocre players with a minimum quota of intellect and insight are preferred over qualified journalism graduates.

Sure, I can accept businesses and TV lifestyle programs using AFL players to promote their product.  As they say in Melbourne: AFL sells.  But I fear the day when every product at Woolies bears the smiling face of a past/present footballer.

As for Triple M and “Fast” Eddie, just ask yourself: Do I really want to tune in?  Really?

Vale: the anonymous blog rant

Americans love the fact they have free speech.  And while there is nothing more grating than the shrill voice of an American indignantly claiming their right to the much-quoted “first amendment”, I must admit a tinge of envy.

I would love to be safe in the knowledge I could write a hard-hitting investigative article using an unnamed source and still be protected, to a degree, by Constitutional Law.  Instead Australian journalists must write their copy with trepidation; fearful they may be hauled before a court and fined – or perhaps even jailed – for doing their job by not revealing sources.

But in an unprecedented defamation case, Google was ordered to reveal the name of an anonymous American blogger who described New York model Liskula Cohen as “skanky”.

Google effectively “named and “shamed” the blogger, whose scathing “Skanks in NYC” article was also peppered with factual errors.

According to the New York Daily News, Ms Cohen confronted and forgave the blogger, but refused to rule out suing for defamation.

Until now, bloggers have been able to hide behind their keyboard – anonymously, of course – and rant on about anything and anyone without real consequence.  It has been a lovely and liberating experience, but times are, apparently, a’changin.

This landmark decision could change the face of blogging forever; but it could also lead to bloggers striving even harder for anonymity.  Could bloggers – hell-bent on keeping anonymous – supply fake personal details to their blog providers? Could the days of writing posts from the safety of one’s bedroom be replaced with a new breed of fugitive blogger; one who jumps around on internet cafes to avoid leaving an electronic trail?

This case has been a long time coming.  To generalise, perhaps American bloggers believe their right to “free speech” means they can publish whatever they want online, without fear of punishment.  But the first amendment does not cover absolutely everything in print.  To make knowingly false and slanderous statements against people is to defame someone.

My only question is where to from here?  What about the millions of people who leave abusive, defamatory anonymous comments on the Herald Sun website; are they liable?  Well, no, that’s probably a little far-fetched.  But it will be interesting to see the outcome of this landmark case.

Footballers do the darndest things, allegedly.

Here’s something you do read every day: A footballer is in trouble with the law – again.

I was at the Sunshine Magistrates’ Court on Wednesday for the Greg Inglis mention hearing – partly as a voyeur, but mostly for a university assignment.  A ravenous media pack greeted the footballer on his way and out of the court, but Inglis – although visibly shaken – stayed silent.  As Inglis attempted to get into his getaway car he was encircled by a swarm of flashing cameras.  One journo, who will remain nameless, yelled out, “Greg, are you sorry for your affair?”  A poor effort by a hack who a) hasn’t done his homework (why shout out something that hasn’t even happened or been alleged?) ; b) has no respect for privacy; c) is a douche bag.

But the comment (which got a few laughs) typified the mood of all the journalists present.  It was yet another day at the courts waiting to catch a glimpse – and hopefully a comment -from another footballer in hot water.  Cynicism is rife among journalists at the best of time, but a “footballer in hot water” is as cliched as a beret-wearing Frenchman.

So how does one report this?  Well, it seems TV journalists have developed a specific formula:

1. Scour for file footage where the prominent footballer is at the top of his game – scoring tries, holding a premiership cup aloft, etc.
2. Take hand-held footage of the repentant footballer making his way in/out of court.
3. If possible, procure the most recent Facebook status update of either the footballer or the alleged victim involved.

Channel Nine did delightfully well in publishing Ms Robinson’s last status update.  But the issue of privacy has again risen up today, with the new revelation that Inglis may have actually been trying to save Ms Robinson from self-harm.  Sally Robinson’s bruising is reportedly due to recent Botox injections.

Botox or not, the story has quickly jumped from being just another “footballer in hot water” incident to being a mental health issue.  Melbourne Storm CEO Brian Waldron has been quick to protect both Inglis and Robinson from intense media harassment:

Waldron said the Storm had sought advice from Professor Ian Hickie, a national mental health expert from the University of Sydney.

Hickie was quoted as saying: “The media has an overwhelming duty to respect this request and not place undue pressure on the parties involved, especially Sally.

“Given the sensitive nature of the matter it is imperative that media outlets to demonstrate responsible journalism.

“The media must be extremely careful with this extremely sensitive issue.”

So what does the media do now?  Will they back off, as Leckie implores, now that the woman has given a fresh statement alluding to her own delicate mental health?  Or will this just make the media hungrier for the true story?  What is responsible journalism, anyway?

It has already been a forgettable year for rugby league.  Before the season kicked off, Manly player Brett Stewart was charged over the sexual assault of a 17-year-old girl.  From then things went from bad to worse: Cronulla player Greg Bird was jailed for assaulting his girlfriend with a glass; Sharks boss Tony Zappia was stood down for this unsavoury act; and, of course, Matthew Johns made national headlines when he admitted to partaking in group sex eight years ago.  The Johns scandal was highlighted by ABC’s Four Corners, but I have included some of the classic Tracy Grimshaw interview below.  (The interview polarised public opinion, but try and guess whether the guy who uploaded this clip is a Johns supporter or a Grimshaw supporter.  Clue: the clip title may give this away.)

It will be interesting to see whether the media gives the footballer and his girlfriend space in light of these new developments, or whether it spurs them on to get the “real story”, whatever that may be.  I think it’s a safe bet that this will only generate more media interest.

P.S.  I’m angry.  I had published this post earlier – much more eloquently – but it appears to not have been saved properly.  Technology hates me.