I've learned so much every year from our yearly trip to Mass Communication Week.
On our eighth trip last week I found out about how www.501newslatino.org promotes its viewpoints to a wide audience through an online radio program, Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube. I also enjoyed the presentation on by Austin American-Statesmen staff members on how they covered their first big story, the fires in Central Texas in September.
The Hip Hop Congress (and here) is also interesting. Its members do something I could never do -- perform artistically in front of a crowd!
And I'm proud of our first effort of broadcasting live on the paper's Ustream.tv site.
While I got tired of listening the J.R. Gonzalez, the 501 news latino founder, brag about how much he makes, I thought it was interesting how he has an agenda and presents it to an ever-expanding audience through the organization's website and Internet radio program, its Facebook page, Twitter account and YouTube channel.
His stories about going to the White House were interesting, I thought.
Austin American-Statesman staff members Maira Garcia, social media editor and Tina Phan, multimedia producer, showed how much change the newspaper business has undergone in just a few years.
Garcia said during the Central Texas fires (centered around the town of Bastrop) people were looking for information on the fate of their houses and pets, and in part depended on Twitter messages ("tweets") that Garcia and I guess other staff members would send out, as they received information.
Phan's presentation of video was really interesting. The photographer got up close and had those really nice, tight shows of people she interviewed. The b-roll added so much to the story. Some good lessons for us to take our work to the next level.
Hip Hop Congress is always good. A couple of years ago after members' performances I asked one privately if he considered himself a poet or musician. We had a really good conversation!
Take a look at the recordings of the two live broadcasts (here and here) we did. Even though we had problems with the sound, I'm proud of the students that took part. Hopefully we'll have many more live broadcasts.
Throughout the day, you'll note that what we are doing in class is what these media professionals are doing. The difference? They do it all day every day, and we do it for a limited time every day.
I'm looking forward to next year's Mass Comm Week!
Original blog is here.