An Eden Prairie Von Maur department store recieved a "general threat" on Saturday evening causing the store to close early. The store reopened Sunday, and police say an investigation is ongoing to investigate who made the call.

I thought that this story was interesting in the sense that both papers referenced the shooting in an Omaha mall on Wednesday. Each story was very brief, but covered the news in a very straightforward mannor.

Two seperate shootings occured aproximately 12 hours apart in the cities of Arvada and Colorado Springs, Colorado. The first shooting occured in a ministry training center in Arvada and two people (Minnesotans) were killed, as well as injuring two others. The second shooting occured 65 miles away in Colorado Springs, killing one and injuring five.

I thought there were two interesting aspects of this coverage. The fact that the StarTribune suggested the shootings were related was interesting, considering that CNN reported one of the shootings as the story, with the second as a detail in the story. I think that it is important to report them both in the same story to avoid confusion, but I feel like the StarTribune's approach was more effective.

Secondly, the StarTribune's additions to the AP story was interesting in that they included an amateur photograph of the victims from Minnesota, and changed the victim identification tags to say they were Minnesotans. I feel as though if this photo ran in the paper it would end up looking tacky.

Six American forces died Friday in an ambush by Afghani insurgents. The troops were on joint foot patrol rounds with Afghan National Army soldiers. Three Afghan National army soldiers were killed, and at least 11 were injured. One Afghan insurgent was killed in the ambush.

These articles dealed heavily with numbers, relaying information about those killed and injured. Each article mentioned the overall count of those dead in Afghanistan and Iraq. The AP article read very easily even though it was discussing trends year to year and was very number heavy. I have no complaints on the CNN article's use of numbers.

Minneapolis Park Police officer Mark Bedard died Friday after injuries suffered on Nov. 1 while chasing a suspect. Bedard was struck by a police vehicle while chasing the suspect on foot through an alley. Bedard suffered several broken bones and injuries to his internal organs, leading to his death on Friday.

These two versions of the story are interesting because they are covering different aspects of the events, but each address the initial incident in different ways. The Star Tribune article gives a lengthty account of the accident that led to Bedard's death, whereas Kare11 touched on it breifly. The Kare11 video addressed the press confrence, in which Andi Bedard spoke about her husband, heavily and used it as a centerpiece of the story, adding additional information around it. The StarTribune article aknowleged this press confrence through a detail photo.

The StarTribune article talks about the upcoming funeral service for Bedard, and therefore gives a fair amount of numbers including addresses, times, dates and ages. At first glance it appears cluttered, but everything is set up properly and reads very easily.

Pakistan's president Pervez Musharraf declared a state of emergency rule this weekend. Pakistan has been under military rule for most of its 60-year history as a nation, and protests have broken out, but are mostly limited to activists and lawyers.

The main point of interest in the coverage is that the AP version of the story mainly focuses on the protests and the stranglehold on independent media. The CNN version writes as a speech story about Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's speech, and presents it as the U.S. stand on the issue. The AP mentions this, but later in the article (in the 4th paragraph.)

KQRS morning radio host Tom Barnard and "sidekick" Terri Traen made off color comments about the Red Lake Indian Reservation in Sept.

Simple story, however I think the coverage is rather interesting. First off, because we discussed ethics this week, the Pioneer Press made an interesting (and ethically sound) judgement to include the note "(Pioneer Press sports columnist Bob Sansevere, a regular on the morning show, was in the studio at the time but wasn't part of that conversation.)" Omission of this comment would've presented the appearance of a conflict of interest potentially.

Secondly, timing of the articles is interesting. The comments made were in Sept., and the Pioneer Press article posted this story on Nov. 2. It appears as though the StarTribune followed suit on Nov.3 and re-reported the story.

Neither is strictly a straight news story, but have similar angles, speaking about FCC censorship and hypersensitivity in the media.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) held a news confrence on Tuesday, October 23 in order to address the wildfires in California. FEMA informed the media about the confrence just 15 minutes before it was scheduled to begin, and allowed them to listen in, however they could not respond with questions. Because there were no reporters present to ask questions, Vice Adm. Harvey E. Johnson, the deputy director of FEMA answered questions fielded by FEMA employees and PR representatives, which were reported as being soft and gratuitus. Homeland security chief Michael Chertoff said "I think it was one of the dumbest and most inappropriate things I've seen since I've been in government." FEMA has been under scrutiny since it's "sluggish" response to Hurricane Katrina.

I thought it was interesting how both orginizations talked about the news of the story and the comments made by Michael Chertoff in response to it, but their follow reporting differed greatly. CNN/Time focused on why specifically this might occur while MSNBC focused on the consequences of the situation. This may be due to the format differences between Time and MSNBC's websites, or the time of publication (Time's was posted one day later).

Katherine Ann Olson, 24, was found dead late Friday night in the trunk of her car in Burnsville after responding to a Craigslist.com job listing Thursday. A 19-year-old suspect was arrested at his work at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport in connection with the death. Olson's purse was found an a park in Savage, prompting a police search which found her body. Police believe the suspect posted the Craigslist ad and then killed Olson.

The coverage of this story is quite interesting for a couple of reasons. Several news outlets (Startribune.com, twincities.com, kare11.com) have at least three different versions of this story, focusing on different aspects. For all three there is a straight news story, and also piece highlighting Craigslist users' wariness or caution. Kare11 did have a phone interview with Craigslist's founder. All three organizations used quotes from Savage police Capt. David Muelkin. One of the Kare 11 stories has the full quote from what appears to be a press confrence. Both Star Tribune and the Pioneer Press used the same general quote, but it was structured differently in each story.

S.S. Bajwa, the New Dehli deputy mayor died after injuries sustained as the result of a monkey attack Monday.

I thought this story was interesting for a few reasons.
1. Because it is a breaking event from across the world, I was only able to find the AP version of the story. I figured cnn, fox, or msnbc would have a correspondant in India who might write a version of the story, however none were to be found (as of yet) and each of their websites gave the AP story.
2. The facts of the story are extremely minimal, but to flesh it out there is information about monkey attacks and the monkey population in India.
3. Although the body of each article is the same, each organization had its own headline and byline:
CNN
Deputy mayor dies in monkey attack

MSNBC
Monkey attack leads to top India official's death
New Delhi deputy mayor falls off balcony after attack by gang of macaques

FOX
Indian Official Dies in Wild Monkey Attack
Wild monkeys attacked a senior government official who then fell from a balcony at his home and died Sunday, media reported.

I just found this little tidbit interesting.

The writing in the actual AP article is brief yet effective, the "fleshing out" of the story that I mentioned is good background information...and actually enjoyable to read.

Jeremy Fuller, 18, allegedly broke into the State Bank of Cokato through the back door sometime between Friday night and Saturday morning. Fuller allegedly called 42-year-old Kelly Bell to help carry more than $15,000 back home. Fuller and Bell were arrested Tuesday after Fuller was identified from the bank's security cameras. Police siezed a portion of the stolen money along with recently purchased clothing and electronics from Bell's appartment.

Strangely, even the printed version of this story from Kare 11's website was more in-depth than the Star Tribune's version of the story. Kare 11 explained the events of the robbery and reported a comical incident involving the fact that the money was hidden under a local newspaper reporting the robery on the front page. This version of the story reported all the necicary facts and information, but was rather entertaining as well. The Star Tribune's story was brief and only reported the bare-bones facts of the story, without elaborating by any measure.

20-year-old off duty police officer and sheriff's deputy Tyler Peterson entered a duplex home in Crandon Wisconson Saturday and shot six people. Early speculations suggest jealousy was a motive as one of those killed was an ex-girlfriend. Peterson exchanged fire with police following the attack and fled eight miles north to Argonne, where he was killed by police. Crandon is a small town with less than 2,000 residents and is shaken by the attack.

The thing I found most interesting about the coverage of the shootings was the report that Peterson was killed by a sniper. The Star Tribune reported that the mayor of Crandon said Peterson was killed by a sniper, but they included the disclaimer that they could not confirm this with authorities. Kare 11 simply stated that the mayor of Crandon said Peterson was shot by a sniper. I do not think Kare 11 was irresponsible by reporting this, however I do appreciate the disclaimer provided by the Star Tribune as a deliberate effort to verify facts and claims.

At around 9:45p.m. Sunday night 21-year-old Taylor Bradford, a University of Memphis football player, was shot outside a campus residence hall. After being shot, Bradford got into a car and shortly after crashed into a tree. Bradford was taken to Regional Medical Center where he was pronounced dead. The initial police investigation says this was likely a targeted attack, but as a precaution the university is closed Monday.

The thing that stood out most to me about this was the use of headlines. How important is the fact that Taylor Bradford was a football player to the story? At this point it is hard to say. If this proves to be why he was targeted then of course it is relevent, but if this ends up not being the case, then it may be just adding hype to the story. This information is definately worthy of being in the story, but placing it within the headline as CNN has done may not be the most important information.

Also, the Star Tribune/AP article is a textbook example of the inverted pyramid structure.

Rains overnight Sunday into Monday morning measured up to three inches in places in Dodge County, causing damage to roads and homes. No injuries have been reported yet but people have been forced from their homes.

The real notable aspect of this story is within the Kare 11 online video report. I was extremely suprised that when the anchor finished talking an additional 30 seconds of b-roll footage of the rushing water was left playing. I can only immagine this is added to the online version because the video was only a short segment on the flood. This brings about the issue of online versions versus printed or broadcast versions. I think it will be interesting to see how much the Star Tribune's story of the flood will change over the course of the next several hours. The timing of this story is quite interesting simply because it broke early in the morning Monday, and will not be published in the paper until Tuesday morning. This time lapse surely will affect coverage and the nature of the writing. No longer will it be written as breaking news (as it is on the online version).

Pioneer Press: Gotta light?
Pioneer Press: Statewide smoking ban now in force

As of October 1 smoking is now banned throughout the state of Minnesota inside of resturaunts and bars. Bans had already taken effect in some cities including Minneapolis, St. Paul and Bloomington, but now the ban includes the entire state.

I thought the coverege of this news story was particuarly interesting simply because both the Pioneer Press and the Star Tribune had two articles about the story on their websites, covering different aspects of the ban. The Star Tribune's articles served different purposes. The article entitled "New smoking ban" focused on the specific legal and technical aspects of the ban, outlining exactly what it entails. "Day One: No huffs, no fumes, no butts" focuses specifically on the effects of the ban on buisness and bars. This article was written in paragraph form as a story, whereas some of the articles were almost written as straight facts.

The Pioneer Press' coverage was interesting in itself. The article "Statewide smoking ban now in force" was very similer to the Star Tribune's "New smoking ban" article in that it outlined the facts of the ban, however the Pioneer Press' version used bulletpoints answering specific questions the reader might have about the ban. The "Gotta light?" article was simply a list of bars in Minneapolis and St. Paul that have particularly good patios for smoking, and a quick evaluation of why each is notable.

It is interesting to see how these articles show neither support or dissent of the ban to avoid a biased report. Specifically "Day One: No huffs, no fumes, no butts" from the Star Tribune voiced opinions of Smokers and Nonsmokers, opponants and supporters of the ban. I found the balance of coverage in the Pioneer Press interesting simply because one was a straight news story, and the other served as reader utility piece, letting them know good locations to smoke.