First Post

I am starting this blog because I want to further practice story writing and reporting skills for my journalism career.

I realize I am in a very early stage of my writing career, but I already know what I want my beat to focus and that is human rights, social equity, and diversity issues. Eventually my dream would consist of doing investigative reporting for a large media outlet where I could help liberate oppressed people by spreading awareness about their problems. But, right now I will try to uncover injustices in my community or campus.

"Many new media analysts have suggested that every reporter should have a blog," said Mark Briggs in his latest book, "Journalism 2.0: How to Survive and Thrive." Briggs is the Assistant Managing Editor for Interactive News at The News Tribune in Tacoma, Washington.

If you were unaware, journalism is changing. Newspapers are going downhill and according to the Department of Labor, media companies are looking for more tech-savvy reporters who can produce a news product with images, video, and sound.

In the journalism resource, Briggs cited a 2006 study by the Bivings Group, which found 80 of the top 100 daily newspapers in the U.S. have at least one reporter blog on their Web sites.

Moreover I know this blog will allow myself to store my ideas, views, and research about social issues today with multimedia, so I will be ready to cover news in the future.

Briggs also said that blogs help the author to "cultivate" a following of readers, so the reporter or hopeful reporter-to-be in my case, can test his or her ideas and receive feedback.

One blogger Briggs referred to was Kevin Cullen, a projects reporter for The Boston Globe, who said,"Unencumbered by the need to squeeze words into a finite space, the Internet proved better for me, as the writer, and I’d argue for readers, too, than newsprint.”

Personally I see myself as an online journalist. With the way the media world is evolving, I see more opportunities in the job market if I learn how to use digital media. Also I am more comfortable and excited about the guidelines of online writing: the immediacy of publishing, creating something visually pleasing, and best of all having unlimited space to write.

In this blog I will link stories or research I find on the web to my posts to provide evidence or reference.

For example, I just wrote an article for BU Now about newspapers' current crisis and a former BU student in her newly found media profession called, "BU Graduate Finds Niche in Uncertain Media Industry."

It is known that a good blog is one that is committed to its audience of readers. To be interactive and interesting and one that is updated constantly. All of these points will be on my list of goals to fulfill for Zealous Toward Social Harmony.

Usually my entries will be timely, but for my next post I will cover an issue I feel deeply for, Invisible Children. Then I will get to the emerging issue of La Raza.