It’s alive! What NPR learned from turning its @nprnews Twitter account from a bot into a human

My student journalists tell me they learn a lot from assignments that involve livetweeting events. It’s encouraging when students ramp up the social media work on their own, outside of classroom assignments, as part of their work for The Setonian Online. This article offers a helpful reminder that even the pros have to experiment in…

Vintage TV News Coverage of Pac-Man

Vintage TV news coverage of Pac-Man. Similar:ifMUD IF discussion | Emily Short's Interactive StorytellingEmily Short on the limitations of parser…CybercultureLA Photographer Fired for Digitally Altering News Photo”On Monday, March 31, the Los Angeles Ti…EthicsRequiem for the NewsroomWhen I worked at a radio news station in…CultureCollege student makes masks for the deaf & hard of hearing…

Facebook’s Mike Hudack rants about the media: Why won’t anybody do something about these shallow viral stories?

When a Facebook executive whines about all these shallow viral links clogging our feeds, Slate’s Jordan Wiessmann clicks him a new one. If only we, the American people, could summon a champion. Someone who could, with the change of a single algorithm, turn the entire media ecosystem on its head. But who? –Jordan Weissmann, Slate.…

Times photo staffer’s invention: the streaming backpack

“From a photographer’s perspective it makes our photography process more similar to the days of film, where you went out you did your assignment, dropped off your roll of film, and went off to do another assignment. Now you download your cards, color correct and caption it. It takes away from the creative process of…

Facebook’s push of “related articles” to users without checking credibility draws fire

The links under your friend’s post got your attention. What the hyperbolic, go-for-the-gut click-baity blurb did to your lizard brain will make steaming blood gush out of your empty eye sockets. Ok, probably not, but still… [A] Facebook official made clear that the company does not apply the same fact-checking standard when offering readers related…

AP logo

Dead metaphor alert, as far as the Associated Press is concerned

Other signs of the digital age: we don’t say penned a novel or inked a book deal. #APStyleChat Twitter. Similar:An English professor tries to help ChatGPT write and revise a sonnetShortly after my online AmLit survey beg…AcademiaEmail (finding the right tone as a writer) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qXlgO…CybercultureMaking a case for a singular ‘they’  I am definitely on…

Microphowned

. Similar:Feature: History Lesson: the treasured past of LucasArts point and clicksI played more of the Sierra point-and-c…CultureTelekinetic Coffee Shop SurpriseBlogworthy promo for a movie I have no d…AmusingIn November 2000, I was blogging about the US Presidential election, mirrors, Arts & Lette…In November 2000, I was blogging about …BusinessModern Masterpieces of Comedic Genius: The…

How Americans Die

Fantastic data visualization. How Americans Die. Similar:Context for Hayles, My Mother was a Computer (Ch 3 & 4)My undergraduates are working their way …AcademiaThe Role of Higher Education in Career Development: Employer PerceptionsGPAs and majors don’t matter to employer…AcademiaWhat the police really believe: Inside the distinctive, largely unknown ideology of Americ…“That whole thing about the…

Should the AP Really Have Fired This Pulitzer-Prize War Photographer?

The original shot caught a Syrian rebel fighter moving from his position, his AK-47 in hand. It also showed something else: “a colleague’s video camera” in “the lower left corner of the frame,” according to the AP’s investigation. Before filing the image to his editors, Contreras used digital software to take the camera out of…