Trick or Treat?

I know Halloween was ages ago. But I can't help to feel absolutely horrified when watching the TV and realising that after such a long time, the twins Jedward are still in the Xfactor.. Isn't that show supposed to be all about talent? About ability to sign and perform to entertain the public. On the one hand, yes, they are still there so someone out there must find them worthy a place within the competition - but this is probably more to do with the fact that they keep embarrasing themselves week after week, make people laugh (and cry) but not from a talenty perspective. People keep them in to have something to laugh at. Just like people kept John Sergeant in Strictly Come Dancing last year, I mean, come on, he couldn't dance. Jedwards can't sing. And then Simon Coward - sorry I mean Cowell - had the final vote a week or so ago.. He was able to judge the talents facing each other in the sing off, but instead he turned to the voters, which might be considered fair - but why are there even four judges there in that case? Are they only supposed to sit there and laugh, cry and being sarcastic towards the competitors when they miss out on a note or two?

Meh, entertainment TV couldn't be worse.

And still I'm watching it every week - terrified of what will happen next.

Trick or treat?

Trick it seems..

Sunny memories..

Aaaah! Where's the summer when I need it? I need sun. I need blue skies. I need white fluffy clouds. I need all these elements to inspire me. To feel awake. To feel alive. And, it's raining outside. It's gray. Probably gonna be pitch black in an hour. Yeys. At least in Sweden there used to be snow that lit up the ground and brought something extra to the non stop darkness surrounding us.

This summer I went to Spain with my boyfriend and three of his mates. We spent a week just outside Alicante in a very nice house, had access to two swimming pools and made good use of a car that we rented for the week. We went exploring the nature, which was absolutely beautiful. Made sure we tried all food being served in the area. One night getting lots and lots of different seafood to have our own barbeque party as the sun set over Alcalali.

We also went to a theme park, which was a bit of a disappointment after visiting Disneyland in Paris a couple of years ago. But most of the time we just spent lazying around by the pool, reading books, playing games and just being randomly silly. One of the highlights of the week was us playing water cricket. I was absolutely amazing!

The last days we went to Barcelona to be able to call ourselves cultural once back in England again. Our main aim for this excursion was to visit Nou Camp, since all five of us are massively into football. Even though Spanish league football never have been that interesting for me, I had heard that this arena was supposed to be some extraordinary. And true enough, it was hugely impressive! We spent hours and hours walking around the arena, scouting the museum, turning over price tags in the shop and ending up not buying a single souvenir due to the extreme prices.

We did have a great time. And when I'm waking up on days like these, seeing that the rain is pouring down over Andover, the grey mist devouring the few yellow leaves that still swing in the gloomy emptyness - that's when I open my photo albums and think back on the brighter days when life was much more inspiring. More fun. Interesting. Perfect. Or well, as perfect as it can get :)

Shorthazzlehand

This week has been very intense and stressful, and most things I've done have been concentrated about WINOL, interviewing, reporting, camera skills etc. So when I woke up this morning I decided to have a more relaxing day, but I still wanted to do something productive. So, I took my pen, my blank note book, three million rubbers and sat down.

The adventure started when I opened my well dusty shorthand book. But unfortunately, my so far gained knowledge was not present today.

Aim: to improve my Teeline skills - which is very much needed.

Outcome: a pile of used rubber and a few swear words.

It's not that I can't discipline myself to do it. I quite enjoy it, when I understand what I'm supposed to do and how it all works. But when I can't really puzzle together and master the skills of the language built up on tiny symbols that connects to everything and nothing, I get frustrated. Guess this is the same with everything when it comes to learning. But I want to be able to use it now already. Preferably yesterday.

It always take a little while to pick up from where you ended last time you tried to get through the book. But I do think it's getting easier every time - this might be due to the fact that I've started over from the very beginning three times now.. But hey, I will get there. Sooner or later.

I am sure I will eventually master the language of busy journalists who do not have time to use the language we've once been taught - it's just a matter of time, a very long time...

WINOL - finally live!

Yesterday at 5 pm it happened. WINOL went live.

This week has been great. The more time I get to spend in the news room, the more confident I get and the more I want to do this. I still don't like the camera. I'm alright with video, can kind of manage to record things that are actually quality enough to put on air. But the audio lets me down over and over again. I just can't seem to understand how to get everything to work in harmony. Maybe one day. But that day is not here yet.

Also, this week we had a guest editor, Kay Oliver of GMTV, Sky and ITV, to help us with various issues and guiding us to improve our work to get even better.

Packages were done well in time this week. We decided to shorten the bulletin to 10 minutes though, so there would only be time for three packages in the bulletin. This week we led with Stu's story concerning the proposal on student fees being raised. In addition to this package, we had Martin Tod, lib dem MP, in for a live interview in the studio. Great to have someone else to talk in the studio, makes the entire bulletin feel more alive and buzzing. Homeless in Winchester was the second story which I managed to puzzle together after interviews with Winchester Churches Nightshelter, Emmaus Winchester and Councillor Andrew Palmer. I had a very interesting time meeting up with these people and got a few new contacts to add in my address book, which always is a really nice feeling. 

Veronicas story about parking problems around the University of Winchester went on as third story. A few NIB's (news in brief) were also included, followed by the Sports news. Catherine and Tom made a great job presenting the bulletin. I would love to give it a go at some point, but with a non-English accent I'm not sure I will be able to produce a final product as good as the ones we've produced so far. 

The production team made a good job, but as a reporter it's hard to realise what's actually going on with the other members in your big team, because you're so involved in your own work so you kind of forget what else is going on. But, since we managed to make it - even though the final live bulletin ran a bit late due to technical issues - they must have made a great job.

Overall, this week was far better than the two previous weeks, and it feels as if we're able to engage in a new, more exciting way than we actually were able to do at the start of week 1.

Bring on the weekend!

Bring on week 4!

Heroes - the new future?

Due to sickness and therefore uncountable hours in the sofa, I have managed to get addicted to Heroes - the TV series - in my opinion one of the best series in a long time. What made me want to blog about this is the fact that a couple of weeks ago we were having one of our lecturers on History and Context of Journalism with Chris, and he spoke about DNA and how our population seem to want to move towards a superhuman society were malfunctioned could be replaced to create 'perfect' human beings.

In Heroes, all main character have got their own superpowers, such as flying, healing, mind reading, telekinesis etc, which might not sound anything like today's society (except for the fact that a British guy actually took off as the wind swept him off of his feet and went flying for a split second, see the Sunday Times, 15/11/09). But if being realistic, these powers can't exist in our society, can they?

In all seriousness though, to some extent they do. Today we are able to 'heal' ourselves by replacing dead cells with alive ones, damaged organs with proper working ones, laser treatments to perfect our vision and so on. We are able to replace sperm, that cannot fertilise an egg, to reproduce, where 50 years or even less ago this wouldn't have been an option. Science moves forward, and with this it enables more and more people to tinker and build their own future. But is this really for the better?

With the revelations about UFO's made by Winchester's City Councillor, Adrian Hicks, that they live on our planet, but 'shrouded in secrecy', maybe we can learn from them and move our science knowledge to a new era. Because according to Mr. Hicks, we were able to create things such as fibre optic silicon chips, lasers and nano technology from their crashed vessels throughout the last 50 years...


Whether or not we're moving into a science fiction type of era with perfect DNA strings and powered up super humans, or staying in our present quickly evolving digital fortress era, time is changing and we along with it. I just hope it is towards the better, and not towards the end of the world...

Loving that buzzing adrenaline kick!

Another week. I have absolutely no idea where my precious time disappears to, but it just does.

Second week of WINOL running. And it was miles better than the first week. I mean yes, there are still a million and one things to improve, but at least the buzzing adrenaline team spirit was there and it felt like everyone tried to do their best, to help anyone who might need some extra help and stressing their sweaty foreheads off to get everyone done in time. And we had a complete bulletin in the end.



I managed to complete two packages, one regarding unemployment in Winchester and one about Armistice day at the University of Winchester at 11am, on 11/11. Was definitely a good thing to do the 11/11 package because that meant quite a lot of pressure since this took place on the actual day when the bulletin was to be broadcasted so I had to focus and test my so far half-existing knowledge about all the different elements that come with producing a package. I'm feeling more and more comfortable with the editing, it's not as hard as I first imagined it to be, but my camera skills (sound and light, focus and whitebalance etc etc etc) are yet to be improved by miles. But I'll get there, eventually...



It was another stressful week, but this time I loved it more than I didn't which is a step in the right direction. And, I really do enjoy working with people who are aiming towards the same main aim as you, and want things to get done, working with the same spirit as me to get there.

Tomorrow a new week awaits with new challenges. For example, I was thinking of recording one of my interviews tomorrow at Caffé Nero's in Winchester but after a phone call to confirm what their policy was, I realised that I can't afford spending £250 for an interview (never knew it could be that expensive to film in a cafe!).. Learn something new everyday!

This week I will try to get my homelessness package together, where I have got one interview sorted out already for tomorrow, and another hopefully on its way. I can see it making quite a good package. But I guess I have to wait and get it judged by my news editor before celebrating too much.

Yeah well, research for next week now, and then Sunday lunch and a walk in the weather, since I think I can go out today with the wind sweeping me away halfway around the world.

Come Monday, come new challenges!!
Maddie

Love and Hate - A thin line..

So we're off, WINOL (Winchester News Online) is up and running with our weekly 15 minute bulletin. Before success comes failure, and well... we're not quite at the successful point yet - but we will get there!!

Anyway, this is how it goes:

Monday started off by everyone (read especially me) being totally confused. Yes, I knew I was supposed to bring my three news stories to be viewed and discussed and eventually hopefully chosen to be put in action. But other than that, I didn't really have a clue what the week would offer me and everyone else. It offered a lot. And it started out with me hating it.

The first news meeting went alright. We talked for absolute ages, but we managed to get through with everyone assigned to do something. I was assigned to look into my 'closure of polling stations around the UK' story and managed to get an interview with Steve Brine (conservative) and Martin Tod (lib dem) for Tuesday.

The interviews were taking place in the morning/early afternoon and we discussed Mr. Tod's and Mr. Brine's ideas about the new proposal put forward by the Government and Mr. Straw the other week. I felt as my angle, to put the story through the view of people living and voting in the rural areas of Britain, made an interesting piece. So, I took my (veronica's) camera, and brought her and Mr. Fluffy to Chilbolton where I was able to record my GV's (general views) and also my first PTC (piece to camera). An eventful day where most things went so much better than I could ever have imagined, this because of all the technical equipment I had to fibble around with and use, and because of the dreadful weather that almost killed the equipment before black bin bags were put around the cases, preventing it from drowning.

When I came home on Tuesday night I felt pleased with what I had managed to do so far, and I was very content with myself and my 'technical skills'. But there was still the Wednesday to come, and with editing, I knew that a million and twenty things could go wrong. Been there before.

Once getting started with editing it went quite smooth. But getting started took quite a while because me and Veronika had been very smart (read not very smart) to put both our material for both our stories on the same tape which we had to capture and divide between us. It went well though, I was just about to finish off my piece before the dangerous deadline at 1pm, when my fellow students discovered my story was not contemporary news anymore. Aoch. So we had to withdraw my piece which felt like a disaster. Absolutely heart breaking. I was done. On time. I made the deadline! And yet, it could not make the bulletin. Argh!

We curiously watched and listened to our friends as the bulletin went live! We got through, went live on time. Missed to record it. Someone missed a deadline. Black spots. Wrong links. Sound everywhere. But oh so much fun. It felt as if we were all able to get there. Together. And now we definitely know what not to do in the future.

This first week of WINOL running, dummy edition week, I've learnt so incredibly much. More than throughout the entire last year! I know that I need to learn how to deal with myself when things don't work out as I've planned them to, because as a journalist that's life. I know that I need to work on me being not as nice as I am when talking to people. Need to be more hardcore. Will get there eventually. From being the girl who hates to talk to strangers I think I've come a great long way already and from here it can only get better.

I'm also very pleased that we are working with the third years, since this means we can get inspired by people who already been through what we second years are going through now and get a hand when needed, when it comes to both technical issues and linguistic problems.

I was delighted when the weekend finally arrived and I knew I had managed to get through week one, and with my new won knowledge on being a journalist I felt stronger than ever. Knowing that I can do it. I can do it. And I love it.

Maddie