Mattox '03 blogs in her flooded hometown, Nashville

In photos and words, Denise Mattox '03 blogs today on the Nashville flood. Here's a photo; following are excerpts from her blog and more, including where to send donations.

A Joe's Crab Shack restaurant is underwater on Second Street in downtown
Nashville, two blocks up from the Cumberland River, which crested at 51.8
feet in that area, where 'flood level' is 40 feet. DENISE MATTOX photo

In case you haven’t heard, which is very possible given the lack of national news coverage, Middle Tennessee was hit hard by storms this weekend and much of the Nashville area is severely flooded.
I’ll start my account with an email I sent out to family late last night/early this morning:
...

I thought I’d take a moment to let everyone know that Craig and I are okay up here in Nashville! This has been one of the craziest weekends and experiences. Never in my life did I think I’d live through something like this flooding.

There has been storm predictions leading up to Saturday, but our biggest concern was the chance of tornadoes. In fact, Saturday, Craig and I were under a warning several times. At one point, they listed off streets in which rotation was being seen by Doppler radar… and all those streets were just blocks away. We had pillows and blankets in our guest bathroom tub, ready to take cover any second. To say I was beside myself scared would be an understatement.

As we watched on TV, the interstate that we take into town every day turned into a lake. A portable classroom literally floated down the interstate, and LaVergne (where we live) was declared a disaster area. We couldn’t have gotten out if we had to… all exits out of town were flooded. Luckily, we had food, electricity, and a sense of humor. Our foundation did get over saturated/flooded and our garage had about a quarter inch of water in it… but opening the garage door released that and we were fine.

The storms subsided, but we had more coming our way Sunday morning.

She goes on to describe the vigil that Sunday became for her and Craig, and to describe the damage and loss of lives in Nashville -- I strongly recommend going to her blog, Musician's Widow, and continuing to read.

Also, while she acknowledges that there are other important stories on the national agenda right now, she calls out the media for their lack of coverage on Nashville's crisis. A particularly painful example she cites: One newscast gave the floods the same amount of time as a lost cow in Indiana.

But there are bright points, too: Mattox told me via Twitter: "A call out to know if any Mid-TN Aggies needed help was replied with only more offers by Aggies to help other Aggies. Did my heart proud," she said.

"People can donate online by visiting www.nashvilleredcross.org or by sending a text message to 90999 to donate $10 to the American Red Cross relief for Nashville," Mattox says, and she gave me this link for people who want to help (most on this list are for locals, but a few addresses to donate are included).

Share stories, items about Dr. Starr for his retirement

Since 1986, Aggies have been learning the principles of journalism from Dr. Douglas Starr, a wonderful man who always has time for his students and former students -- and who was my first friend on Facebook and the first member of our Aggie Journalists Facebook group. So this is a sad announcement for journalism students and grads of A&M. But it's a retirement well deserved, and I hope he'll be relaxed and happy in no time! Here's the official word from Dr. Dunsford:


Doug Starr is retiring at the end of August.

We are collecting letters or other items from former students and former colleagues. If they would send their items to me at the address below, that would be great. We’re also collecting for a retirement gift. Any contributions can come to me as well, or to Debbie King, 107 Scoates Hall, MS 2116, TAMU, College Station, 77843-2116.

His official retirement party will be Friday, May 21, at the REC Center on Campus. Details will be along soon.

Thank you!

Deb Dunsford


Deborah W. Dunsford, Ph.D.
Senior Lecturer and Program Coordinator
Agricultural Communications and Journalism
Texas A&M University7
127 Scoates Hall, MS 2116
College Station, Texas 77843-2116
979-458-3389; fax 979-845-6296
dunsford (at) tamu.edu

'Aggieland' yearbook wins 3rd straight Silver Crown

Muchas gracias to Mr. Wegener for this item!

Texas A&M’s Aggieland yearbook is a Silver Crown winner for the third straight year. The Columbia Scholastic Press Association announced its top awards for collegiate publications at the 32nd annual College Media Convention on March 14. Alyssa Peña Smith, 2009 and 2010 Aggieland editor-in-chief, attended the Awards Convocation in New York City.

“We were honored to find out that the 2009 Aggieland was chosen as one of the top nine yearbooks in the country,” Smith said. “All of our hard work was recognized, and we are very proud of our publication.”

Aggieland editors and staff members also won 19 Gold Circle Awards, given by CSPA to recognize superior work by individual student journalists.

Smith, English ’10, and photo editor Doug Klembara, University Studies ’11, received first place awards for yearbook title page, division page and academic spread design.

Smith and Klembara received second place awards for organization or Greeks spread design, student life and sports multi-page presentation, opening and closing spread design, photo portfolio, sports feature photo and sports action photo.

Smith, Klembara, Jose Arredondo, Spanish ‘10, Patrick Clayton, Engineering Technology ’09, Meredith Collier, Communication ’10, and Rachel Hardman, University Studies ’10, took third place for student life spread, photo illustration, academic photo, headline writing and for organization or Greeks spread.

For Crown Awards, yearbooks are judged on writing/editing, design, content, concept, photography, art and graphics. Judging took place at Columbia University from Dec. 19-21, 2009, by the Board of Crown Judges.

“Through traditional stories and strong storytelling photography, numerous aspects of Aggie life are covered,” judges said of the 2009 Aggieland.

“Clean and simple, yet modern and bold, the typography and white space drive this book’s design. Because of its huge size (624 pages) the large body copy and simple design work to avoid overwhelming the reader.”

Davis '84: Extraco Banks executive in Waco

Congratulations! Cyndy Davis ’84 is Vice President, Human Resources Generalist for Extraco Banks, N.A. headquartered in Waco.

Job-seeking or hiring? Get in our next e-mail

I'm thinking I'll put a section in our next e-mail for Ags seeking jobs or hiring. Send me a description like this if you're interested. (Hundreds of folks on the e-mail list)

Seeking:

Name here 'xx, copy editor/reporter/web producer/whatever (can list more than 1), linktoresume or email@address

Hiring:

NewsOrg seeks Jobdescription, linktojoblisting.com or email@address

New journalism is old again; plus, what CQ means

Everybody's fed to the teeth with this discussion of "Is the Internet killing journalism (or has it been slowly dying since the '20s)?!?" and "How will social media/the iPad/global warming save journalism?!?"

So here's two different thoughts. First: The Internet is BECOMING journalism -- a thesis clearly laid out by no less an authority than Gawker, which explains that in the age of people trading links on Facebook and Twitter, your items have to have speed, brevity, clarity and accuracy, or you're going to get your pants beaten off. Oh, and good headlines, too.

This is shockingly similar to the conditions that produced Journalism 1.0. (Read here about how inverted pyramid style came about upon the death of Abraham Lincoln and avoiding bias came from the telegraph and the Civil War.)

Second: Somebody finally found out what CQ stands for. No lie. Read all about it!

Thanks to @scottmladd, whose tweet about the first item led me to the second.

Aggie senior goes from Texas Monthly to rodeo writing

I was chatting recently with Betsy Ellison '10 on Twitter (she's @betsyellison) and asked her to tell me a little more about her internship last summer at Texas Monthly. Below, you can read her description of what sounds like a great experience, and also what TM writer Pamela Colloff has to say about Ellison (hint: It's really good).

Right now, Ellison is interning at the Houston Rodeo. This week, she's the executive office intern, helping everything run smoothly, and last week, she was interviewing rodeo winners as well as stock exhibitors and buyers, plus helping put together a daily newsletter.

She blogs at Betsy's Ramblings and contributes to the Texas Country Music blog. And she'll graduate in May, so please feel free to help her out with any job connections you might know of.

Now, here's Ellison on her TM internship:

I love when people ask about my time at Texas Monthly; I could talk about it for DAYS -- 140 characters Twitter allows won't even scratch the surface.

I was thrilled to move to Austin this past summer and work next to what I personally think are some of the best writers in the state...my journalistic idols! The TM office is very laid back, professional and at times very relaxing (not typically during deadline week though). As interns we were treated just like any other staff member and my favorite part was being greeted by Evan Smith (by name) every morning he would come in! It made me feel noticed and needed when the president of this esteemed magazine knew my name and took the time to talk with me every so often--as well with the rest of the interns.

Every month the interns got to sit in on the editorial meetings and see how stories developed from ideas to the pages; we even got to submit our own ideas each month and shockingly, one of my ideas was talked about! Beyond exciting! I also had the chance to write for the Web site and have two interviews published in the print magazine as well, one of which was just came out in the March issue!

I was the only Aggie intern, and I have to say that this was quite a treat because MAJOR preparation and interviewing was going on for Pam Colloff's oral history of the Bonfire--I was like her personal intern on this story for Aggie terminology, traditions, etc. She and I became very close and still keep in contact quite often!

As you can probably tell from the length of this e-mail, my experience at Texas Monthly was more than exciting...it was a real life dream come true.

And now here's a word from Pamela Colloff, longtime Texas Monthly writer whose piece marking the 10-year anniversary of the deadly A&M Bonfire collapse appeared in November:

I’m a huge fan of Betsy’s. She is one of the most enthusiastic, hard-working people I have ever worked with. She saved my cover story on Bonfire at the very last minute, in fact.

Our fact-checker wasn’t able to confirm the very first sentence of my story, which began with a quote from an old Corps handbook. Betsy had already left the TM internship by then and was back on campus. I made a panicked call to her a few days before my story went to press and told her about the predicament we were in.

She went to the Cushing Memorial Library between classes and tracked down the old Corps handbook I had been quoting—even after the librarians there (mistakenly) insisted there was no 1947 handbook at Cushing—and read it back to our fact-checker on the phone. So she literally saved my story!

J-Studies head Dale Rice part of Southern Food Poll

He can't live without barbecue: Texas A&M's director of Journalism Studies (and the Austin American-Statesman's former dining critic) Dale Rice is part of the Southern Food Poll in Oxford American magazine. Click here to read Rice's contribution. Here's a taste:

From which Southern restaurant would you order your last meal and why?
Royers Round Top Cafe in Round Top, Texas. My last meal would have to be on a Sunday, when Royer's serves a limited amount of the best buttermilk-and-garlic coated fried chicken to be found anywhere, accompanied by home-style bowls of mashed potato casserole and creamed corn, and topped off with a piece of Bud Royer's pie.

Journalism jobs in Dallas, Austin, SA, El Paso and more

A little lunchtime break: Glancing at postings on the JournalismJobs board, I see openings for an assistant metro editor, an education reporter and a night online editor at the Dallas Morning News, a criminal justice editor at the San Antonio Express-News, reporters and a sports copy editor at the El Paso Times, photo editor at the Killeen Daily Herald, a hybrid cops/features/enterprise reporter at the Odessa American, and a copy editor at the Waco Tribune Herald (which is no longer owned by Cox). SMU is looking for a lecturer/digital newsroom manager.

Also, though it's not listed there, there is a position open for a part-time copy editor at the Austin American-Statesman, 16 hours a week, nights. Contact Sandra Kleinsasser, skleinsasser@statesman.com, with a letter of interest and a resume.

And for a peek into what it's like to work at the Statesman, check out these interviews with a copy editor, reporters and others done by the paper's Newspapers in Education program.

Ordinary people creating less Web content these days

One of my coworkers shared this interesting chart on how "social engagement is changing."

My translation: People used to blog about their cats and their belly buttons, but now they pass around links to news stories and other stuff.

Why? My theory:

Because creating good content is FREAKING HARD. Much easier to pass around the good stuff than to sit down and generate it! Social media (Facebook, Twitter) make it really easy to share links.

Said coworker (Rob Quigley, my Beatles trivia partner, Statesman social media editor and writer for Old Media New Tricks) says he believes this is good news for newspapers. I optimistically agree!

Meserole '05 shares his video knowledge with Batt

Today at the Battalion, Jordan Meserole '05 of KBTX is doing a workshop in which he'll talk about scene composition and building a story with your camera, going from raw footage to finished product.

A couple years ago, Meserole was kind enough to talk with us about his experience being embedded with a Texas search and rescue team during Hurricane Dolly. You can read about it here.

Video on Wright '92 and his Chicago marketing firm

Get a great look inside the work that A&M journalism grad Sherman Wright '92 does with his marketing company, Common Ground, in this show from ABC 7 Chicago (which Roland Martin posted awhile back on his blog). The section on Wright starts at 5:12, but the hip-hop violinist before him is pretty cool, too.

The iPad, the user and the design in between them

OK, one more post about iPads/tablets/e-readers and user interfaces, and then I will get back to actual Aggie-related journalism news, of which I have quite the backlog.

First, Adobe and Wired have rolled out a digital magazine prototype that works across multiple platforms, which is what I was hoping for in my last post. Here's a video:



And the need for an intuitive interface is underlined by a fairly unbelievable occurrence in the past few days. Friday, a blog called ReadWriteWeb posted an entry about logging into Facebook that wound up, for some period of time, being one of the top five search results if you Googled "facebook login." Literally hundreds of people went to this blog post instead of to Facebook.com, tried to log in to Facebook and then posted angry comments on the blog saying they didn't like the way Facebook had been redesigned because it was too hard to log in.

I went to that blog and read over the comments and am satisfied it's not a joke. Some several hundred people literally thought it was Facebook despite it not being called Facebook and not being at Facebook.com, and were unable to log in but perfectly able to leave angry comments saying how stupid Facebook was.

Lots of folks have had great fun mocking this, of course; others are simply worried about the future of humanity. However, a really thoughtful, elegant mea culpa comes from a designer/developer named Ed Finkler at Funkatron.com, who begins also by talking about the iPad user interface. Here's an excerpt of my favorite parts:

• How is it the fault of the users when we present them with multiple, barely-differentiated text fields within the same window. Is it really surprising that they don’t understand the differences between each? And is it surprising that they choose to use the one which works with more natural language, rather than entering syntactically-unnatural domain names?

• There is LOADS of anecdotal evidence that most users simply use search engines as a sort of natural language CLI. Shouldn’t we be designing interfaces that work in the way most natural for the majority of users?

These people have better things to do with their days than tweaking out the spacing in their browser toolbars. A computer for them is a utility. One that is increasingly complex, and one that is used because it’s the only option for accomplishing certain things – not because it’s a good option.

It’s kind of like the Photoshop Problem: when people want to crop a picture, we give them Photoshop. Photoshop is a behemoth application with nearly every image editing and touchup function imaginable, and it is terribly complex.

...

When folks need an elevator, we should give them an elevator, not an airplane. We’ve been giving them airplanes for 30 years, and then laughing at them for being too stupid to fly them right.

...

I certainly don’t think that the computer can become (anytime soon) a magic box that determines our whims, nor do I think that people shouldn’t have to learn some things.

What I do think is that the current interface modern OSes on computers provide is simply overwhelming for most users, to the point that it’s very challenging to learn how to accomplish tasks without a very significant investment of time. Driving would be a good example of a task that does require investment of time, but is not so overwhelming that the vast majority of people fundamentally get it wrong: you don’t see people steering with their feet, or accelerating and braking with the radio. I’d argue that modern computer interfaces, in a rush to offer flexibility and capability, make it possible to steer with your hands, feet, teeth, and knees — and don’t make it particularly clear which one is best.

Hearst's e-reader: the Skiff

Click here for photo and description of the e-reader designed by Hearst -- still black-and-white for now, but color is rumored, and it apparently builds in advertising features.

As a consumer, I have to say I'd buy the product that's in color and DOESN'T have advertising features... as a journalist I'd say we're better off designing our product to be viewed on many platforms. Am I wrong or is it strange for us to start making the TVs when what we're good at is making the TV shows? That said, I hate to be negative when what we need is new ideas and execution, which is clearly what Hearst is doing here.

Thank you to @givingcity for tweeting this link! Here's some of what's coming up soon on this blog: a chance to help record the history of journalism at A&M; great pics and a video from two fellow Aggie journalists; and a nice feature from the Battalion.

Happy Valentine's Day y'all!

A video from the future: News reading on a tablet

The future could be gorgeous. Until I saw this, I didn't have a clear vision of what "repackaging news for digital readers" might look like, other than, well, a Web page.

Now I do.

Mag+ from Bonnier on Vimeo.

This is just one possible concept, of course, but it's nicely thought out and beautifully presented. Many thanks to @StKonrath for tweeting this.