Final Project
Synopsis
This course covered a lot of basics that journalists entering the field need to know, but the lectures and activities built on those ideas to provide fresh insight on how to be a successful writer in the future. I learned a lot of helpful tips for interviewing, like entering the meeting with a conversational mindset as opposed to needing my set list of questions answered, or asking the important final question of ‘Is there anything else I have not asked that you feel is important?’ I also learned a lot about AI and the proper and appropriate ways to utilize this tool as a journalist. I think what stood out to me the most was brainstorming interview questions with AI. For me, that feels like an appropriate way to use AI as a tool in this field, think outside of the box, and hopefully the generated questions can lead to more colorful answers or anecdotes being shared.
Developing the Story
While I was working on my story assignment, I employed a few of the various interviewing techniques we discussed in this course. Firstly, prior to reaching out to sources for this story I thoroughly researched my topic so I was qualified to speak on it and knowledgeable enough to ask proper follow-up questions to get the anecdotal answers that I needed. I also informed my source on relevant information. This was an area I hadn’t quite heard of before when it comes to interviewing, and it includes talking with the source about who I am, how long the interview will be, what topics my story will explore and when/where it will be published etc. I found the sources to be incredibly receptive after I took the initiative to share that information.
During the actual interview process I was sure to follow ethical guidelines of obtaining informed consent and asking for the right to record, luckily my sources were comfortable speaking on the record. After the interview I was sure to fact check my information especially on topics I didn’t fully understand like ‘clip farming’ or echo chambers. Aside from the interview process I utilized journalistic guidelines of actively listening to my sources for the best story worthy information and structuring my story in a way that was clear and concise so my readers have the most essential information first.
I ran into a few problems when working on my story, from setting up the interviews and balancing time struggles, to having multiple rounds of revisions. Firstly, finding sources that were specific to my topic took a bit of work. I did have a few bands in mind that I wanted to interview, but ultimately was not able to secure a meeting with any of them. With missing that component to my story I had to pivot my idea, so my story ended up covering a broader topic than I originally planned for.
With my topic changing, I was able to quickly set up interviews with the other sources I had in mind. I conducted those interviews as quickly as I could, but one of my sources in particular, Chloe Dunham, was incredibly hard to find time with. Our schedules were incredibly conflicting, so we were never able to find time for a phone call. Luckily we were able to use voice memos for the story. After my troubles setting up source interviews and writing my first draft, I had quite a few revisions that I needed to correct, some of which required me to reach out to my sources for a follow-up interview. Although I had some difficulty during the production process of my story, after my rounds of revisions were approved my story was on its way to being done!
This story provided me with so many great opportunities to grow in my writing, my network of connections and my confidence in my journalistic capabilities. I had to reach out to a variety of figures for my interview, from teachers and musicians to bands that had a decent following, and that was a great opportunity to get my name out there as a music journalist. Because my topic ended up being more broad and in the realm of social media, I was able to research a lot of trends for the music scene here in San Diego. I also discovered a few new bands and photographers, as well as different posting analytics, for if I choose to make music-related, publicity reels in the future.
The multimedia and social components of this assignment were fun to make, but also weren’t too familiar for me. I have made social media reels in the past but it hasn’t been interview style like these, so it pushed me in that regard with editing, filming and the overall production. I ended up with a product I am not entirely displeased with but I recognize I have room for growth. I am incredibly appreciative that these were included as part of my final grade so I have some experience with the necessary technology like CapCut, YouTube Shorts and Adobe Audition.
Digital Media Experience
Creating my website and putting together my story this semester really put into perspective how important it is to understand and utilize technology for journalism in the modern day media landscape. My story, with its focus on social media, provided me with a lot of insight into how social media is the most user-friendly, convenient and inherently beneficial promotional tool in the digital age. With its cost effectiveness, multimedia components, speed, timeliness and accessibility, social media is the leading tool for brand awareness.
With that in mind, understanding how to promote myself as a journalist and recognizing the shift in readers’ attention, understanding where readers are going for their news and how they are consuming media, will benefit me now and in the future while I continue to market myself and my work. This story, in addition to teaching me more about the benefits of social media, has taught me how to tell stories through multimedia components like a social post, long-form video and audio clip. I have also learned about data-driven reporting through my completion of the infographic.
I had no experience with data in any of its stages from researching and gathering, to navigating it and then creating visualizations, until this class. I can now say I am proficient in using Google Sheets and would feel confident enough to include data points in my future journalistic reports and stories. I know a lot now about how to organize data, check for outliers and make sure there is cohesion and no errors in the data prior to making a visualization.
I feel like I understand how to interpret data and how to manipulate or organize the data to observe the results I want, like certain formulas for the sum or shortcuts and commands to list the points alphabetically. I feel like the activity assignments in this class will stick with me because they were incredibly hands-on. I retained that knowledge of how to create graphs and charts from a set of data points, and even how to create a map from a list of coordinates using Google Earth.
Some of the most enjoyable moments in creating this story were attending the live show for Thrown Away that I used as footage for my social posts and multimedia video. I also had a lot of fun researching the local music scene and the case studies of Super Sometimes and Stateside I used as data references.
In the production of my story I also really enjoyed researching music trends and learning new information on why musicians are shifting to populate social media apps for advertising, or why songs have become shorter in the last decade. I also really enjoyed revising my paper and seeing the final product and the growth in my writing from the first draft to the finished piece. Creating my website was also an enjoyable task as I was able to customize the colors, fonts and material to suit my likes and reflect my personality.