Monday, December 1, 2008

Article 4: Second Life

The virtual 3-D world, known as Second Life™, announced its release of Showcase today, a tool that guides users to the most exciting and unique virtual hot spots.
Showcase has been in development close to a year, allowing time for revisions based on user feedback. Showcase acts as a tool for users by directing them to the best resident-created areas, for arts and culture, music, fashion and nightlife. It will also guide users to education and nonprofit institutions, display the best Second Life™ films and provide users with over 240 tutorials that can help them understand how Second Life™ works.
Second Life™ residents are the sole creators of every virtual venues and other destination. In Second Life™, new areas are created daily and there is real-time voice-chat for user interaction. Users are depicted in Second Life™ by their avatar. Second Life™ has found that users find it important to personalize their avatar, as well as their avatars home and apparel. It is the first of its kind because now residents can profit from their virtual world businesses. While some avatars design clothing, others sell real estate and their profit is real. Linden™ dollars are the currency of Second Life™, equal about $270 to every $1 in real U.S. currency.
Patia Eaton
November 20, 2008
Page 2

Second Life™ has proven to serve as more than recreation and as a tool for a supplemental income; it is also a valuable resource for corporations. Businesses with distant offices can collaborate virtually. Teachers can hold virtual class sessions for distance learning programs and networking can take place in any venue with Second Life’s™ real-time voice-chat and text-chat. Tourism bureaus are also creating Second Life™ destinations for users, hoping their virtual experience will spark interest in pursuing a real life experience.
The possibilities in Second Life™ seem virtually endless. People from all walks of life, in any place in the world, can socialize on Second Life™. Brett D. Atwood, Web Editor for Linden Lab, said Second Life™ has “an amazing artistic film-making community.”
Second Life™ is a product of Linden Lab, based in San Francisco, California. A membership to Second Life™ is free, but there are fees for upgraded accounts that allow the ownership of land and other abilities.

Wednesday, November 12, 2008

Feature Story

“Cougars Rockin’ the Vote,” a student involvement campaign put on by the Center of Civic Engagement (CCE), inspired many Washington State University (WSU) students this historical election year.
Michael J. Schwartz, a graduate student at WSU and the CCE’s statewide program coordinator, was one of four WSU graduate students who planned the new campaign and put it into action. Schwartz and his team members registered over six hundred students to vote during the “Cougars Rockin’ the Vote” campaign that ran from September 30th to November 4th. On “Election Countdown” Tuesdays information tables were set up in the Compton Union Building (CUB) informing students of how “Cougars Rockin’ the Vote” could inform them about the candidates, provide them with transportation to Pullman City Hall to vote as well as keep them updated on election results. The students were provided with food and entertainment in the CUB on election night, where they could stay updated on the election results. “It was really great to see all the students sitting in the CUB watching the election results live. I think it made them feel like the CUB is their building, as I think it should,” said Schwartz.

Patia Eaton
November 11, 2008
Page 2

WSU’s famous mascot, “Butch,” made several appearances during the campaign. “Butch” passed out voter registration forms on the Glenn Terrell Mall and helped get students engaged in the voting process and encouraged them to go to the polls. “Students were excited to vote. This election was electric,” Schwartz said. Students also had an opportunity to debate one another or watch other student debates during the “Under the Big Tent” events on October 2nd and October 30th. The debates were heated, but the passion behind the issues gave student the sense that voting is the ultimate demonstration of civic engagement, said Schwartz.
The goal of the “Cougars Rockin’ the Vote” campaign was to get students interested in the election process, registered to vote and to make sure any student who wanted to, had the opportunity to vote.
“Cougar’s Rockin’ the Vote” took approximately three months of planning and was originally the idea of Associated Students of WSU (ASWSU) Senator, Pete Semon. Schwartz estimated that $5,000 was spent on putting on the campaign. During any of the weekday events it took the CCE’s full staff, about 20 people, to help with the day’s activities.
On Election Day, as vans were pulling out of the parking lot taking students to city hall to fill out their ballots, more students would be running after the vans yelling “Stop! I need to vote!,” said Schwartz. Next year, Schwartz hopes WSU’s and ASWSU’s Presidents will attend. WSU faculty said to Schwartz, “that it was good to see a transformed sort of student activism.”
Patia Eaton
November 11, 2008
Page 3

The CCE’s mission is to “Promote civic responsibility, community knowledge, and self awareness of students through education and action,” as stated on the CCE website. The “Cougars Rockin’ the Vote” campaign made students feel passionately about their duty to vote. Schwartz said the campaign was so successful it will definitely become a tradition for CCE during upcoming election years.

Saturday, November 8, 2008

Al Jazeera

1. How effective do you think the Internet will be for Al Jazeera as it attempts to reach a U.S. audience?

I think it will have minimal effects on a U.S. audience because it is my opinion that most people, even in the professional world, watch the same news stations day-after-day. Especially if big cable networks, like Time-Warner, refuse to carry this station. The popularity of getting daily news via the internet has increased, but I think with the war on terror people will be less willing to trust a station from a place they do not feel they can trust.

2. Based on your own observations, do you think that Al Jazeera English should be allowed to broadcast in the U.S.?

In my own experience watching this network (via livestation) I noticed no bias and no radical news stories. The news stories they were covering were almost all regarding current events on a global scale, especially the recent disaster in Haiti. If this was shown on TV I would have no problem watching it. I certainly see more obvious bias on stations like Fox News that Americans watch on a daily basis.

3. What, if anything, do you notice about Al Jazeera's approach to telling the news? How is it different than the U.S.-based TV news outlets that you have experienced?

U.S.-based news covers many more stories happening in the U.S.A. and I have never seen the U.S.-based news show a story about someone like Osama Bin Laden’s son’s wife with a sympathetic theme. I would also find it difficult to believe someone like this would agree to interview with a U.S. news station for fear of how they would be portrayed or targeted.

4. While on the Al Jazeera site, be sure to check out the network's published Code of Ethics. Based on your own observations, do you think they are adhering to them?

I feel that the Al Jazeera network stuck to their code of ethics. They interviewed random citizens on the street as well as political experts, etc. They also covered stories on a global scale and seemed in go about their interviews in an unbiased fashion. I did not get the sense they were pushing for the story to go one way or the other.

Monday, November 3, 2008

In-class Research Exercise

Uniform Crime Report:

The Uniform Crime Report shows four reported hate crimes in Pullman, during 2006. All of these four hate crimes fell under the motivation bias category of Sexual Orientation.

The only city with more hate crimes in this category during 2006, is Spokane, Washington. The statistics in this specific table showed the reports of 42 cities in Washington.

The categories of motivatoin bias are race, religion, sexual orientation, ethnicity and disability. The category of race had significantly higher numbers than each of the other categories, sexual orientation is second highest.

Pullman's popuation in 2006 was 25,696. Spokane's population in 2006 was 200,200.

http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/hc2006/table13wa.html

In 2007, Pullman reported only one of 39 reported hate crimes motivated by sexual orientation bias in 42 Washington cities. The 4 other hate crimes reported in Pullman in 2007 all fell under the bias motivation category of race.

Seattle reported the most hate crimes under the category of race bias motivation at fourteen and for sexual orientation bias motivation with eleven crimes of this nature in 2007.

Seattle's population in 2007 was 585,118. Pullman's popuation in 2007 was 25,408.

http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/hc2007/table_13wa.htm

Follow the Money:

In 2008 Governor candidates Christine Gregoire and Dino Rossi each received over seven million dollars in donations. Republican candidate Dino Rossi topped the list at $7,587,579 and Democratic candidate Christine Gregoire was a close second at $7,408,120.

The largest contributing industry to Dino Rossi's campaign is healthcare professionals, which gave a total of $15,330. The largest contributing industry to Christine Gregoire's campaign is lawyers and lobbyists, who gave a total of $55,110. Gregoire also received significantly more than Rossi from healthcare professionals who donated a total of $36,055 to her campaign.

In 2008 the democratic party received $374,137 from the Forestry & Forest Products industry. The republican party received $872,236 from the Forestry & Forest Products industry in 2008.

The republican party received the most donations from the lobbyists and public relations industry in 2008 at $2,423,512.

http://www.followthemoney.org/

Google's Patent Search:

Digital Video Recorder
http://www.google.com/patents?id=N7h1AAAAEBAJ&dq=%22digital+video+recorder%22+application

Social Networking
http://www.google.com/patents?id=VXyPAAAAEBAJ&dq=%22Social+Networking%22+application

Automobile
http://www.google.com/patents?id=Kh9TAAAAEBAJ&dq=%22automobile%22+application

Monday, October 27, 2008

Article 2

Fan Parking

You resisted the urge to press the snooze-button, drove to school right on time, only to find your usual parking lot filled with Recreational Vehicles (RV).
During Cougar football season, this is an all-to-common reality for university students. Any time there is a Friday home game; parking spaces students have paid for are rented out to enthusiastic tailgaters. Washington State University’s (WSU) Parking and Transportation Services (PTS) rent the parking spaces to RV owners for $40 per weekend. The parking lot most affected by this situation, is the yellow lot on Stadium Way, east of WSU’s indoor practice facility.
Students who have purchased parking passes that allow them to park in the same lot, paid $240.97 for the 2008-2009 academic year. In some instances, the RV owners place cones in parking spaces, close to theirs, to save room for friends arriving in other RVs. This is not allowed by WSU’s PTS, but there are no security officers or PTS employees regulating this activity. On at least one occasion, this resulted in a verbal altercation between a student and an RV owner when the student removed the cones from an otherwise empty parking space.
PTS notifies students, who are yellow permit holders, of upcoming RV parking through the MyWSU portal notice system. PTS Field Operations and Transportation Manager, Bridgette Johnson, said students who complain about parking shortages are given temporary access to another parking lot, but for students like sophomore Kaitlin A. Vervoort this solution is inadequate.
Vervoort, who lives at her family’s home in Pullman, said on home game Fridays, she has to park much farther from her classes, adding “valuable time” to her daily commute. “I worry about drunken football fans damaging my car if I park in the same lot, but that parking lot is by far the closest to my classes,” Vervoort said.
Johnson recognizes issues for students like Vervoort, but said WSU has no plans to expand parking in the near future. There is currently an excess of parking, though some of the available lots are farther from campus. Johnson added that the crimson and gray lots, closest to the center of campus, are reserved for student parking-pass-holders living in the residence halls. These lots are not affected by the RV parking. So although the students affected are placed in other parking lots, they are significantly farther from campus causing timing issues for working students like Vervoort.
Vervoort says she also has difficulty parking at the Student Recreation Center (SRC) because the RVs sometimes overflow into those parking lots. “It’s unfortunate that after all of the money I had to spend on the parking pass, I am forced to park on the other side of campus,” Vervoort said. Vervoort lives too far from campus to walk and her house is not close to a bus route.
RVs are allowed to park anytime after 5:00 p.m. on the Thursday before the home game, why the PTS says this is not detrimental to students commuting to class. The RV parking passes rented out, for any yellow lot, are only available to Cougar Football season ticket holders.

Monday, October 20, 2008

Ethics Assignment

1. When referring to the allegation that Mayor Jim West was pursuing underage boysonline, why do you think editor Steven Smith differentiated between a legitimate newsstory and one that is not legitimate when he said, "If he's [Mayor Jim West] engaged in this activity … we need to know that. If he's not -- there's no story"?
Editor Steven Smith said this because while the public may not be as heavily effected by exageration of celebrity behavior, a local politician can be seen as a reflection of that community. Also, if the Spokesman Review printed a story that ruined the Mayor's reputation, then found out his actions could not be proven, it would inevitably ruin their relationship with the Mayor and likely other associated local politicians. This is why they confirmed the Mayor's online identity.
2. How did reporter Bill Morlin justify the use of a concealed identity on Gay.com as partof The Spokesman-Review's and the FBI's "sting operation"? Why didn't Morlin himselfcreate the assumed identity to engage Mayor West online?
Bill Morlin justified the use of a concealed identity on Gay.com because they it could be legally proven. The newspaper's code of ethics was also a factor preventing them from creating their own fake identity. The online identity's age was controversial because the source who originally came to the newspaper was of age.
3. Why do you think The Spokesman-Review ultimately published so many articles on Mayor West's alleged improprieties?
The editor said the story was not about the Mayor being gay, but the Mayor's abuse of his position. The beginning of the video also said that Spokane residents are not accepting of their gay community, so clearly this story would be disturbing and scandolous (and therefore heavily followed) by the Spokesman Review readers.
4. In the final analysis, who benefited from The Spokesman-Review's decision to expose Mayor West and his alleged improprieties? Who was hurt? Do you think the outcome was worth it? Explain your reasoning.
The newspaper benefited much more than the community because there were no confirmed cases of him molesting children. This may be more of an opinion, but someone living a gay lifestyle does not effect the entire community. He did, however, abuse his powers. This abuse of power by offering the young man (online) an internship should be public information because he is an elected official. The outcome was worth it because if had abused young children, the public outcry would have led to investigations confirming this behavior.
5. The Spokesman-Review has been criticized as conducting a "witch hunt" in its reporting on the private lives of some city officials. Below is a link to another recent article on Spokane Deputy Mayor Jack Lynch. Do you think that there are any ethical problems in the reporting in this story? Why or why not?
I think that reporting on the private lives of public officials is fair game. This is due to the fact that their salaries are funded by public money and that they make the decisions that effect their community. Their behavior outside of work, while seemingly not related to their duties in-office, are unfortuantely the business of the public they are representing.

Monday, October 13, 2008

In-class assignment: Identify two special leads

Narrative lead example:

Tony Miller spends his days in a towel-draped chair, heavily medicated and sweating profusely as prostate cancer spreads through his body. Over and over again, he changes out of drenched T-shirts and shorts, puts them on a hanger to dry and then goes back to his chair to sweat some more.

After a lifetime of international travel as a journalist, the 65-year-old Miller has made this one-room apartment in Portland his final home.

Miller was drawn here by an only-in-Oregon-law that enables terminally ill patients to obtain lethal prescriptions once their life expectancy falls below six months.

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2008259886_oregonlaw13m0.html

Quote lead example:

Tim Robbins is known in Hollywood as an Academy Award-winning actor, director, activist and hockey fanatic. On Friday, he added comedian to his repertoire while getting a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

"I used to take the bus from here to Burbank to go to work," he recalled. "When the bus was late, I would walk up and down and throw my cigarettes down. Now I have the honor of having this done to my star."

Guests at the ceremony included Robbins' longtime partner, Susan Sarandon, as well as relatively diminutive actor Jack Black, who said he has known the tall, lanky Robbins for 25 years.

http://www.cnn.com/2008/SHOWBIZ/10/13/tim.robbins.walk.fame.ap/index.html