English 680V: Visual Rhetoric in a Technological Age (Purdue) - News and VizRhet

News tech: Participatory culture

Amylea — Thu, 12 Apr 2007 11:51:41 -0400

The Weekly Dig, Boston's free counter culture newspaper, reported on the emergence of ANOTHER free counter culture newspaper that appears first next week.
http://www.weeklydig.com/news_opinions/articles/opening_up_the_floodgate...
To summarize: The newspaper will be made up entirely of reader-submitted blogs. Every week, the editors select the "best" ones they receive--but in a newsworthy move, they will do so live online. Readers can respond to the editorial board as they watch the feed; of course, the editors don't have to take the viewers' advice, but this is still a bold move. Lots of interesting things get decided in editorial board meetings, and this new paper wants to expose the decision making processes that happen at all papers.

And now, to reenact tragedy

Amylea — Thu, 08 Mar 2007 11:01:27 -0500

Upon receiving a cryptic txt message, I flipped on CNN, only to see live, ongoing coverage of a "Tragic Bus Accident" in Georgia. The bus was carrying the baseball team of my college alma mater, and several were dead. Helpfully, several people emailed me the story from CNN.com.
As I watched the story "unfold" I couldn't help but note the visual constructions. First, there was the map of Ohio so that non-Blufftonians could figure out where the college is (most of them got it wrong for the first hour or so). Then, they decided to show the bus route from BU to Georgia (on I-75). Next, they cut to the outside of the hospital where the survivors were taken--all of this was given a voice over narration.