How not to write an article

Article link (because email blogging doesn't let me use HTML coding in posts): http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-college29-2009apr29,0,1296881.story
 
I can summerize the article in one sentence: A new report about and old topic told us everything we already know, just with slightly different numbers and statistics.
 
To get right to the point, this atricle sucks. There are two main reasons: 1) Because this is not new news, as news should be, but rather old news. People have known that colleges look through peoples social networking profiles for years. The debate on if this is moral or not did not just happen last night. Seriously, this new study doesn't deserve anything more than a mention. Which brings me to the next point... 2) The article doesn't have enough new information on this topic, which is the only thing that could have possibly saved this article from sucking so much. If I were the writer of this article, I would probably defend myself by saying there wasn't enough information to begin with. If this is the case, choose a different story to write about. This simply was a waste of my interest and time.
 
 

The brain...there is nothing like the brain...

Article link: http://www.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/04/22/twitter.locked.in/index.html
 
I have some comments (obviously, otherwise I wouldn't be posting this, whould I?) on both the article and the story to share, assuming that makes sense.
 
First about the story: THIS IS FRIGGN AWSESOME. PERIOD. Who cares if this idea is totaly ripped off from that episode of House that aired a few weeks ago? That was just Hollywood. This, on the other hand, is real life. People with the worse luck ever, who are left with as much control over their body as a rag doll, will be able to legitamitly communicate with the world around them. How cool is that?!
 
About the article: I was impressed with the way it was written. I feel like the writer (Richard Greene) managed to capture the excitement of the story while still maintaining the profesionality that's expected in a CNN article. I also like how Greene didn't focus too much on how the discovery could help people; instead, Greene doesn't get too far ahead of himself, and keeps the magnitude of the discovery in check. Many writers hyper-focus on how discoveries will be used in the future, but not this one. That aspect really made this article.
 
Also, if you understand the reference in my title, post a comment telling me what it is and I will respect you for life.

Japan and North Korea

It's kind of like a video game, except <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/asiapcf/04/02/north.korea.rocket/index.html">it's real.</a>
 
North Korea is planning on testing some kind of rocket very soon, something that Japan is clearly not happy about. In fact, Japan is planning on keeping watch on this rocket and shooting it down if it launches. Korea, after learning this and seeing Japan prepare to back up it's statements, has now threatened to attack Japan if they do in fact shoot down this rocket.
 
Overall, this is a good article. Stays with the point pretty well. The one thing I don't like is that the author is flip-flopping the terms "satellite" and "missile." I don't know about you (unles you're Justin), but when I think "missile" I think of great, massive, rather unnecessary but totaly worth it, explosions and fire. A "satillite" is just something that circles the world reciving and sending information. It's just that two different things come to mind. Other than that, this article gets my two thumbs up of approval.