Change is ridiculous June 15, 2009

One day when I’m rich enough, I’ll live like this …

Why do I suddenly feel like I went to sleep at 18, and woke up seven years later an adult, my mind occupied by savings and debt and career moves and job opportunities?

Part of me longs for the days when my biggest distraction was music and a self-absorbed outlook on life!!

Wait, with those criteria, not much has changed!

So I thought I’d change the blog slightly. I find myself in an odd period of transition right now. I graduated in May – something that I didn’t have time to blog about (terrible really) and have started interning at Time Out New York and am continuing my internship at the BBC. Today marks my first real day of hunting for a post-internship job (and here I am, updating my Twitter feed and blogging, it’s going GREAT!)

Difficult times in the U.S. of A April 30, 2009

To briefly paraphrase / plagiarize / Internetize Jon Stewart of The Daily Show, last week it seemed like things were getting a bit better for New Yorkers … Over the weekend the weather was beautiful, Central Park was full, mentions of protests on Wall Street had simmered down and Obama had survived his first 100 days in office and was doing reasonably well, according to the Pew Research Center at least.

Describing an afternoon ‘disco blading’ through Central Park in his newly-cut ‘jean shorts’ Stewart says: “I gotta tell you, I really felt, you know what, we’re about to turn this thing around.”
[CUT TO THE SCARY PRESENTERS AT FOX]
Female presenter: “This is a FOX. NEWS. ALERT. The White House now declaring a public health emergency to deal with the threat of the SWINE FLU…” (You’ll understand the emphases if you listen to her talk)
[CUT TO ANDERSON COOPER AND HIS BEAUTIFUL SILVERY HAIR]
The Silver Fox: “Breaking news. A fast moving new strain of the flu, and at this hour, the death toll is rising.” Another correspondent asks, is this a pandemic?
[Cut to Jon Stewart, lip stuck out next to a picture of a pig with the banner: SNOUTBREAK '09.]
Jon Stewart: “MOTHERF—!! A pandemic. Seriously?! You’re adding a pandemic?”

April Fever: Yankees, the last weeks of school and obsessive compulsive volunteer disorder April 20, 2009

Gaia and I *SMILE* for the camera at Esme's birthday party!

Many many things are racing through my mind at the moment – this is a state of being I’m becoming quite used to, and every now and again when I manage to calm down and become “unmanic”, I get quite proud of myself.

One thing I’ve realized is that I have a major problem with volunteering for things. I just can’t help myself. I feel compelled to be present at every activity or task that someone asks for help with. It’s compulsive – especially when there’s free food, I just can’t resist!

The new beat is the same old street April 1, 2009

Riel Fisher (10), Sadira Crowder (10 and a half) and Quinshaun Williams (11) get to work reporting the event.

Meet Riel Fisher, Sadira Crowder and A.J. Morales. They’re street reporters and today, pen and notepad in hand, they’re serious about covering the Unemployment Olympics in Tompkins Square Park in the East Village.

Today, Fisher, Crowler and Morales are learning the importance of on-the-ground local reporting.
“How did you feel when you lost your job? What will you do with the money if you win a game? How are you going to find another job?” ask the fifth graders, noting down answers by hand.

Whether it appears in a blog or in the grey print of a paper, reporting skills remain the same. But are they citizen journalists or professionals in training? Well, only time will tell.

The J-school Career “Scare” March 30, 2009

Some videos documenting the Career Fair yesterday … which was somewhat odd.

I woke up on Saturday morning at 6am after a very rough week (handing in the Master’s Project, interview with the BBC) and not so many hours of sleep, and recorded me thoughts:

Gaia shares her thoughts before the start of the fair:

A five minute attempt to stream my consciousness March 26, 2009

In this post:

I continue my obsession with Edward Monkton, whose simple cartoons and captions continue to summarize my life in the most convenient way!

And for our magazine on digital trends, mag.net, a stream of consciouness that is meant to reflect the split in attention we have to grapple with these days.

The persistent ring of an incoming Skype call nags me awake from a quick nap at my desk. I’ve missed a call from my parents in South Africa who will no doubt phone my mobile in a few minutes to check I am alive (I barely feel it.) I stare blearily at my reflection in a compact mirror. The reddish imprint of my iPod shuffle distorts my cheek. What time zone am I in? Is it 3am, or 3pm? Why do I have Faithless stuck in my head – I swear I was listening to a podcast. Was the podcast about Faithless?

The new new new journalism? March 11, 2009

Apologies for the delay.

Look – I exist, and am alive and well (albeit extremely pale)!

The reason I haven’t updated in some time is that I’ve spent the last 6 weeks working on and updating other websites (yes, they exist!), and after several hours of doing that every day, the last thing you want to do is come home and spend another hour thinking of something clever enough to say about what you’ve been doing – which, at the end of the day, is not too interesting to most people anyway.

Hmm – what do I mean by that?

Jo’burg, unhinged January 27, 2009

I’m going to use this post to tout a new documentary on Johannesburg that I just learnt about today – “Unhinged: Surviving Jo’burg” (subtitle: “a black documentary”) which is coming out sometime this year. I loved the promo, which you can view here:

You can also visit their website and / or become a fan of their Facebook page.

I’d like to see two things on their site though: some background on the people producing the show (company, funding, organization etc etc) and a more concrete release date. The release date will help drum up hype in my opinion, and as a journalist I’m inclined to be curious about authorship.  The promo looks great although I think the text against the black background runs for a bit too long – second I wondered (somewhat irrationally) if the whole video was going to be text with dramatic sound effects! Love the aspect of spoken poetry in the narration (very well written.) It’s shot and cut incredibly well and has a nice tongue-in-cheek aspect. I’m a fan already and look forward to seeing the whole thing. The doc looks like it will explore both the good and the bad elements of Johanesburg which, as followers of this blog may know, I am a huge fan of doing.

Props to the makers, would love to learn more about you!

Thoughts, comments anyone?

Let the debate begin January 26, 2009

This is an all too familiar argument: will the print industry hold out in the future against the meteoric yet poorly funded rise of new media and online content? I asked this question on the password-protected blog of our Producing a Magazine class but want to throw it out there, with an added slant.

What does the death of traditional media such as print, and the rise of online media and usage, mean for developing countries and closed societies where online use is limited or restricted. Here’s what I wrote, I would love it if you guys could weigh in.

R.I.P Newsweekly?

The newsweekly is being vaunted by the new media community as the latest print category to spiral slowly towards a terrible death. (Click on the pic for the link to the NY Times story)

Is it just me, or is there a subtle sense of glee in the discussion (not necessarily the stories) on the death of the print industry? Something like, “We told you this would happen, IN 1999.” Maybe I’m being a cry baby, but being hit every single day with comments, threads, discussions and stories about how new media will take pride of place in the journalism of tomorrow constantly brings me back to two questions:

For aliens in New York January 12, 2009

The Statue of Liberty, as seen from the Staten Island Ferry (for those doing New York City on the cheap, or for those not too interested in the lady of liberty ...)

2009 got off to a pleasant start with a very nice ringing in of the New Year – dinner at our favorite restaurant, Cucina down the road from I-House, and a very happy couple of drinks at Ryan’s Daughter on the Upper East Side, which has definitely scored a couple of points with the girls (the Irish bartenders have everything nothing to do with that!) It was a wonderful New Year spent with a diverse group of people, and much fun was had by all – especially Sonja (no need to discuss that in detail in public!!)