And...

... Mac has died! My beloved friend of 3 years passed last week, taking all the wonderful, pointless crap on my hard-drive with it.

Not a happy bunny.

Screwed

Victoria has had her first run-in with the editor! Bloody idiot. I wrote a very nice piece for the local paper, around 300 words, telling the story of a young girl who has grown up with a rare genetic disease that has seen her spend a lot of her life in hospital. I spoke to the girl's mother a number of times on the phone and arranged to have someone go and take their photo. The editor then decided that it was far too much hassle to go and take the woman's photo cos deadline was approaching and they'd f#cked up a few things. So they cut it to 100 words, changed it arround a little and whacked it in as a short - with no photo.

Needless to say I've had an angry email from the mother demanding why she was messed around and why the story in the paper is not the same one she told me, and I have to deal with it without using the words 'editor' and 'wanker' in the same sentence.

Oh, and I wrote the article when I was at this paper on work experience, which has now finished, yet I still have to mop up somebody else's sh#t. How nice.

Not sure about the last line of this one.

This journalism game would be great if you didn't have to cut short your fun to run home and write the story! After an enjoyable but brief visit to the British Library, I stepped outside to a gloriously sunny afternoon and a Bob Marley tribute band. But alas I couldn't stay and soak up the atmosphere - I had to run to the newsroom!

Here's the result...



The British Library is currently holding a free exhibition celebrating 100 years of the British Newspaper.

‘Front Page’, created in partnership with the Newspaper Publishers Association, began on 25 May and runs until 8 October, displaying captivating headlines from 1906 to 2006.

“Friends of ours came to London two years ago and told us to come to the British Library”, said John Antonsen, on holiday with his family from Canada, “but this is totally different from what we expected. The early 20th century is fascinating”.

“I like the stuff about the Titanic, they said no one died, it makes you think about today’s headlines - are they true?”, contemplated his daughter, Britta, referring to the Daily Mirror’s: ‘Titanic wireless signal brings vessels to scene: Everyone Safe’, dated 16 April 1912.

Headlines ranged from the patriotic and formal ‘War Declared by Britain and France’ (Daily Herald, 4 September 1939), to the accusing ‘So where are they, Mr. Blair? Not one illegal warhead. Not one drum of chemicals’ (Independent on Sunday, 20 April 2003), to the fun ‘Mr and Mrs Becks’ (The Sun, 6 July 1999).

“It’s fascinating. Everything triggers a memory. I was born in 1942 and this really brings it all back”, said Suzannah Stack, a guest gazing at the headline ‘Hindenburg Blows Up: 100 Dead’, featured by the Daily Mail on May 7 1937. “This was before my time though”.

Agnes Cattoretti, an Italian journalist said, “I work in magazines, so it’s interesting to see the kind of work involved in newspapers.

“It’s fun for kids too. He really enjoyed the newsroom”, she added, showing off the page created 8 year old Marco Giacobbe, using the interactive virtual news office. Visitors can use the computer terminals to experience the fast pace of daily print journalism.

Bit of a minefield!

Ok, here's my latest news piece. I've, perhaps foolishly, broached the subject of the Middle East. Avoiding bias is bloody hard - it took a few re-drafts:


A national demonstration against the war in Iraq will take place in Manchester on September 23.

The Stop the War Coalition (StWC) has organised a protest called ‘Time to Go’ to coincide with the Labour Party Annual Conference, demanding British troops be pulled out of Iraq. The group also believe Iran should not be attacked, and the British submarine Trident should not be updated.

Lyndsey German, convener for StWC, said: “We feel the British Government and the Prime Minister have a big responsibility for the disaster unfolding in Iraq and Lebanon.

“The strength of feeling against these wars is increasing, even among the delegates. Just look at the Walter Wolfgang incident.”

Walter Wolfgang, Vice Chair for Labour Campaign for nuclear Disarmament, and a supporter of StWC, was forcibly ejected from the annual Labour Party Conference in Brighton on September 28, 2005 for speaking out against the Iraq war.

StWC have organized a number of emergency national demonstrations this summer, in response to the current conflict between Israel and Lebanon. The group is calling for an ‘unconditional ceasefire now’, a stop to ‘Israel’s attacks on Lebanon and Gaza’, and an ‘end to Blair’s support for Bush’s war’.

Israeli prime minister, Ehud Olmert, feels that international TV coverage has misrepresented his country: “The massive, brutal and murderous viciousness of Hezbollah is unfortunately not represented in its full intensity on television screens outside of Israel…the victim is presented as the aggressor.”

In a recent speech to the World Affairs Council Blair said: “We are fighting a war, not just against terrorism but about how the world should govern itself in the early 21st century."

Tony Blair, who has continued to avoid calling for an immediate ceasefire in Lebanon, has postponed his holiday plans in pursuit of a UN backed long-term peace plan.

Back to blogging!

Hey guys,

Apologies for the absence - busy, busy, busy! Having just spent the last week feeling incredibly sorry for myself because I realised I'd taken on too much at once, I've now managed to organise my time enough to go to college, work as a waitress, sleep AND eat!!

Alas I don't seem to have time to blog. Nooooooooooooooooooooooooo........

So instead I'm gonna post some of my articles that I'm writing at college. I'm pretty much living the journalism course at the moment, so anything I write about is an accurate reflection of my life anyway! So between now and October you should see a marked improvement in my writing skills!

I'll post one later today...