2 Arrested After Crashing Ship Into Australia's Great Barrier Reef

Here's an article I found interesting, not only because of the "1.9 mile long and up to 820 feet wide" gash the Chinese coal ship cut into the Great Barrier Reef, but because two Chinese operatives of the ship, the Shipmaster and the Chief Officer have been arrested and await trial on Thursday. I think this article is well written because it uses the facts of the story to display the tragedy and, while remaining objective, is able to grab hold of the attention and emotions of people from around the world that value the Great Barrier Reef as home to thousands of species of marine life. The significance of such a story is enough to appeal to most readers and people interested in the world around them.

I think it will be interesting to see what happens to the two people that have been arrested in this case. The 40th anniversary of Earth day is approaching on April 22nd, and although both suspects face fines, the ship master, responsible for the ship's movement at the time, also faces up to three years in prison..

Experts say the damage caused could take over 20 years to heal, which is optimistically speaking on the presumption that the paint that wore off of the side of the vessel, some of which is designed specifically to not allow marine life to grow, is not of the toxic variety.

Story Ideas for Story Package #2

Topic: Cyber Security and Internet Privacy

Idea #1:
To research and write the story of how employers are increasingly using social networking websites (facebook, myspace, twitter, youtube- to name a few) in order to "check out" potential employees and the attitude of graduating seniors about whether they should make their content private or take it off of the internet all together.. if that's even possible. This story is pertinent now because in little over a month many people will be graduating and looking for jobs, and right now many of those people are beginning their job search. This story is interesting because it could mean the difference between you being hired or not.. even though you may not be publicizing anything out of the ordinary for college students, the fact that it is published could be enough to jeapordize your success. On the other hand, publishing stuff that will cast you in a positive light could really help you out. Check out this article to see what I'm talking about.

Idea # 2:
Digital Privacy: how much is too much? Should people be monitoring the use of teens on the internet? Cyber-bullying is a new fad... and it's spinning out of control. On January 14th of this year, Phoebe Prince, who had recently moved from Ireland to South Hadley, committed suicide in an apparent effort to escape the bullying of her peers, much of which was centered online. This story is interesting now because 9 teens were just charged by the Massachusetts prosecutor for 'unrelenting' bullying, 2 of the 9 charged with statutory rape. This is a very serious situation. Its not the first time someone has committed suicide in the wake of online bullying. This article published today highlights the problem in South Hadley, but the problem is all over the internet, which is all over the world. What should be done to help prevent this from happening again?

The World Has Cancer (and nobodys talking about it)

According to this article posted by the Associated Press on MassLive.com, "President Barack Obama is putting forward a nearly $1 trillion, 10-year health care plan that would allow the government to deny or roll back egregious insurance premium increases that infuriated consumers."

In the Western World of medicine, everyone is required to have health insurance. Without it, when we get sick we won't be able to pay for the drugs and high technology required to make us healthy again. However, the implication here is that we will get sick. And this is true.

But what if our "health insurance" wasn't insurance for the money we will need to buy the drugs and pay the companies that run this system of "health care" but rather insurance that we will live in a healthier world and therefore are safer from becoming sick in the first place?

Will $1 trillion dollars be enough to support the populations rising concern for healthy living? Or should our health care reform consider health as much more than an individual's issue, so we can start getting better together, before its too late.

Adam and Ethan's Trip..

My 20 year old brother Adam and our friend Ethan hitched rides across the country starting in October and staying in California for a good three months before heading back with friends who came out to see them.

I had a blog going following them, so friends and family back home could watch their progress and see how they were doing.

Now they're back, and they gave me three tapes of footage from their trip.

I want to organize their footage and put some of it up on the blog, and create something with the rest of it. My audience will be anyone of the 15 followers of the blog www.adamandethantrip.blogspot.com who are clearly interested in the trip and probably would love to see some real footage to go along with the stories in the blog.

For interviews:
I've got Adam Davies, Ethan Crane, the parents of both, or people who were followers and commenters on the blog, for example Harmony Waters.

Multimedia package in the making

On February 5th, the department of Music and Dance at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst celebrated the performances of three Springfield elementary schools and the D.C. based step dancing group STEP AFRIKA!

UMass, Amherst journalism students, along with some High School of Commerce journalism students covered the event. We got video footage of the three schools that performed, as well as written notes and recorded audio interviews with some of the dancers after the show.

So.. what's the hook?

This event was at the beginning of the month, but in the next two weeks comes the deadline for submissions of videos to a contest offered by UMass, Amherst. The contest is calling for people to make a video showing why UMass, Amherst is SMART.

I'm going to produce a video that demonstrates how smart UMass Amherst really is.

Together we'll make a video that demonstrates how UMass journalism professor Nick McBride has enabled a team of journalism students to go to Springfield and volunteer their skills and knowledge (their smarts) teaching journalism and promoting higher education.

My audience is the panel of judges that will determine who the winner of the $500 first prize is. They'll find this interesting because they are looking for how we are smart and we will give them a video showing us effectively creating a vortex of education.

Three people I will likely interview are:
1. Nick McBride, the UMass journalism professor who graduated from The High School of Commerce and is now sending recruits back into the city with the mission of helping underpriveleged minority student populations attain higher education.
2. Brian Duffey, the UMass Amherst Alum and Commerce English teacher the UMass students work with.
3. Students from Commerce and students from our Community Journalism class that currently work with the students of Commerce.

Police Brutality- The Beating of Melvin Jones III

Springfield, Massachusetts Police Officer Jeffrey Asher is once again under investigation for being caught on tape using excessive force during an arrest. To see the video of Asher beating Jones repeatedly (at least 18 times) with his flashlight, click here.

The first time Asher was caught on tape was in 1997 kicking Roy Parker, a black city man in the head while the suspect was on the ground restrained. The first time Asher got in trouble was in 1994, one year after he became a cop, when the city settled with Michael Cuzzone for $75,000 after Cuzzone alleged Asher beat him unconscious.

To see an archive of Asher in the news from 1994-2005, click here.

To see before and after pictures of Jones, click here.

To see a copy of the Press Release by the Local 364 of The International Brotherhood of Police Officers, which insists this is not a racist issue, click here.

To watch and listen to the entire tape submitted to The Republican, and to hear an officer yell "Put your hands behind your back you fucking nigger!" While continuing to beat on Jones, click here.

And to see the TOP FIVE POLICE BLUNDERS OF THE WEEK, including two from MASS, click here.

Sick of the Politics

Kayla Gilmore voted for Obama. On Tuesday, January 19^th, she decided not to vote in the election to fill the Massachusetts Senate seat previously held by Ted Kennedy.

“I think it’s so ridiculous when people make commercials… back talking each other,” she explains, after describing the first commercial she heard by Martha Coakley’s campaign. It wasn’t telling her why Coakley was a good candidate, she said, but rather why Brown wasn’t a good candidate. She says she got fed up. “In my opinion,” she said, “I didn’t really like either of them.”

Although she is a registered Democrat and resides in Amherst, MA a town that voted overwhelmingly for Coakley (84%), she admits Brown seemed like he cared more about the people. I wonder out loud if this had anything to do with the infamous “truck ads" he was known for by the end of his campaign. She says she's familiar with the ad, adding “He looked like he was more caring. I think I saw him with a dog once.”

As a young 20 year old voter who’s “just not that into politics,” Gilmore had one parting request: “I just wish that people would tell the truth.”