Welcome to Journalism E-120W: Ethics and Journalism!
I look forward to working with all of you this semester as we examine the ethical dilemmas and pitfalls that journalists encounter on a daily basis.
One of your requirements for this course is to post weekly blog entries to our section's blog. Some of you may have never blogged before. Don't freak out. For clarification on what I expect from you, here are the rules on posting and how to blog (borrowed liberally from Elizabeth Soutter, instructor for the blogging course here at the Extension School):
I look forward to working with all of you this semester as we examine the ethical dilemmas and pitfalls that journalists encounter on a daily basis.
One of your requirements for this course is to post weekly blog entries to our section's blog. Some of you may have never blogged before. Don't freak out. For clarification on what I expect from you, here are the rules on posting and how to blog (borrowed liberally from Elizabeth Soutter, instructor for the blogging course here at the Extension School):
"Blogging typically involves an immediate response to information or an event. Please do not confuse the immediacy of blog publishing for casualness with content. There may be blogs on the Internet that host free-for-all abuse of the English language. Those are the punk blogs. We don't have punk blogs here.
Your posts for this blog – like your e-mails to me, your essays, your exams – should be clear, concise, and error-free. You are journalists: details are your life's blood. You spell things properly and you punctuate with precision so that your exact meaning is inescapable.
Some basic rules of good writing and good blogging:
1) In addition to the importance of grammar, spelling and punctuation, I also want to see concision. Every word should be the right word, weighed carefully for its place, with no excess. Short, tight articles are vastly more interesting and people are more inclined to read them. When you're all done with your post, go through and see if you can cut 25 words. Once you've done that, go back and cut another ten.
2) Use proper citation – tell me in the body of your post what sources you are using, and then put links in so we can go look for ourselves. Any time you use an idea, fact, figure, or statistic that is not your own, you must cite it. Any time you use the work of another author, you must put it in quotations. If you are unclear about this, please contact me.
3) Golden Rule of Good Opinion Writing: People care what Alan Greenspan thinks about the economy, they care what Barack Obama thinks of foreign policy, what Bill Gates thinks of technology. But when it comes to a run-of-the-mill opinion, people have their own. They don't need yours. No one cares what you think. They care whether you can make them think.
4) Have fun. It's okay to be funny, it's okay to be outrageous, just make sure your argument is clear and your facts are correct."
Welcome, and good luck!
