I can't think of a whitty title for this one )=

http://www.cnn.com/2009/SHOWBIZ/05/11/ent.miss.california.usa/index.html
 
Long story short: Some beauty pagent contestant owned by Donald Trump could get kicked off for breaking the rules.
 
Article analysis: At first glance, it seems like a good article. Good amount of facts, some pretty solid quotes, the whole nine yards. I probably would have not even written about it if it weren't for one thing: one of the quotes at the very end, made by the contestant at question.
 

"This has given me such a bigger platform now," she told KMYI. "I actually have, you know, a purpose and a platform where I can go out and I can speak to people just about standing up for what you believe in, and not, you know, compromising your beliefs for anything."

 

So, my question is, does the writer induce bias by including "you know" in the quote? I understand and have no doubt that this is her exact words, but including the "you know"s infer that she's not entirely sure what she's talking about. It gives the reader a sense of uncirtanty. But if the writer were to exclude the "you know"s, the quote would have had a totaly different feel to it, making it stronger.

 

Is it better to infer bias unintentionaly by using direct quotes, or is it ok to water down such quotes to make articles less one sided? It's an interesting discussion that might be worth taking a look at some day.

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.

How do you say "Freedom Tower" in chinese?

http://www.cnn.com/2009/US/03/27/no.freedom.tower/index.html
 
Long story short, a Chinese company has leased a part of the building where the World Trade Center/Freedom Tower, as it's sometimes called, once was. However, the official name of the new tower, which is currently under construction, will most likely not be what it once was.
 
....that's just about all you can get out of this article. The whole thing is litteraly fact, quote, fact, quote, fact, quote for the whole article. I didn't want to read it after a while because the article format was way too repetitive. The only part of the article that changes is the end, where it's basicaly a straight list of facts.
 
Theoreticly, this is a good article, but there's no spice in it at all. There's no part in the story that really got me thinking about the topic at hand. Yes, this is a good example of a pretty straightforward article, but there has to be more to keep the reader interested.

More swimming

The review of this article is totaly not at all biaed.

This article about a recent conference championship meet was a well-written article. I liked how the writer did not focus on Pomperaug too much, not only because they are loud and obnoxious, but because if you even know nothing about SWC swimming, you know that Pomperaug was going to destroy eveyone anyways. But the writer got some quotes from other top-finishing teams too, rather than just focusing on the champion. I liked also how the writer makes an effort to mention individual performances based on their times they swam that night compared to their personal best times, as that is a HUGE aspect of swimming. Clearly this writer understands competitive swimming and as a result wrote an impressive.

And I'm not just saying this because I was mentioned. Really.

A-roid

Listening to the video, I have a few reactions:

He never says the same thing once. With every question Alex makes a lengthy speech, always answering the question with some form of 'I was stupid' or 'I'm sorry,' and only half answers the question. But that's all he ever tells us. No other details, no nothing. Just that he took the PED's and that he was sorry. How could he not know exactly what he's taking? That simply doesn't make sense to me.

I dunno what to really believe.