I did not find an article where I could depict if the author used CAR; however, computers are changing the way reporters work. Reporters collect information in databases and analyze public records with spreadsheets.
System mappings of political and demographic changes are a part of CAR.
E-mails and research are also widely used examples of CAR.
An article from Time Magazine reports that the Journal-Bulletin used an IBM 4381 to analyze 30,000 low-interest mortgages issued in Rhode Island.
Another example of CAR: a reporter for the Milwaukee Journal was doing a story of undefended indigents being jailed for small fines they could not pay, such as jaywalking. Clerks fed records of 899 inmates through a computer. The reporter was able to bring justice to hundreds of inmates, according to Time.
The reporter has to be knowledgeable with certain computer programs, such as excel, Microsoft, spreadsheets, etc.
I would think specifically with excel because there are a lot of numbers being fed into a computer, and the computer organizes the numbers.
Also knowledge of the ins and outs of e-mail, research via the computer and basic information along those lines would be beneficial.
Recently in analysis Category
I looked at an article written about Thailand's conflict because I work with immigrants from Thailand who used to live in Taiwanese refugee camps.
Moo, a 20-year-old high school student, said the protests the red shirts are putting on are justified and news papers that report otherwise do not know the whole story. Moo lived in a refugee camp, but came to America two years ago and lives in St. Paul.
The BBC generally does a good job at avoiding stereotypes about one particular group to another.
(I read another article by the MiamiHerald, and the journalist made the red shirts out to be the bad guy, and I'm not saying who the good or bad group is, the government or red shirts, in this case, but the paper definitely generalized the cultural group.
At one point in time, the Herald said, "the so-called red shirts..." That really struck me because the red shirts are a real group with real people rallying for Democracy. There's another group called the yellow shirts; they are not 'so-called' groups.
The BBC remained neutral by reporting the whole story: the journalist did not just talk about the rebels and the protests/riots they were causing, in doing so making the red shirts the bad guy. The BBC reported on the red shirt's struggle for elections and democracy and the history with the previous prime minister (who was ousted in 2006.) That's how the BBC remained the most neutral: reporting both sides while adding the history of the struggle.
The source:
The first way the article uses numbers is to address where federal spending is headed. I'm not really sure how to read the chart, and the chart is not cluttered, but I still do not understand how to read and comprehend the data. The source is based on the Congressional Budget Office data, which has a credible reputation.
The second mention of numbers is mentioned by the author saying Medicaid and Social Security has more than doubled. This stat is easy to comprehend.
The chart is a good visual, but I/people can quickly process relational terms, half, doubled, etc.
The third use of numbers, the author said the federal government spent 3.8 percent of gross domestic product, which has risen to 8.2 percent. I don't know what 3.8 or 8.2 percent looks like. Those numbers do not help me. I see there's an increase, but I still cannot make sense of the numbers.
The numbers and stats are reliable, seeing how they came from the Congressional Budget Office, which is a partisan organization--a reader does not have to worry about the CBO being slanted toward one party or another, but still, there are a lot of numbers, figures and stats in this article, and I cannot make sense of all the numbers; however, I can comprehend relational terms.
http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/tag/us-health-care-costs/
I looked at the obituary The Associated Press wrote about my cousin, Terry Lynch, who died in Afghanistan on June 29, 2009.
AP quoted the Rev. David Reichling who was the family priest and spoke at Terry's funeral. They also quoted heavily from Mark Johnson, a neighbor and close family friend, who stood up and gave a long and heart-filled speech about the man Terry was.
The Press did not use a standard lead. The lead starts off light-hearted about friends and family who gathered at the Mass, but by the second paragraph, the standard lead is visible.
The light-hearted lead works REALLY well. As a family member, I'm really glad the journalist did not treat Terry's obituary like a blocky resume. He or she did not list a bunch of facts about Terry. He or she filled the sentence space with light-hearted quotes while telling who Terry was.
I compared the news report FOX gave about Obama's press conference on the economy's financial crisis.
Bret Beier started off by telling the major points Obama covered: unemployment, healthcare and the war.
For the most part, Beier went in chronological order with what Obama mentioned.
I would say it was comparable to a research paper.
Beier provided a thesis with three points Obama brought up, so in the report, he followed, in choronological order, the points he gave in the lead: first, unemployment, then healthcare, etc.
That is similar to what I did with the first lady speech. In my lead, I told readers what they would be reading, then I followed Obama as she mention the four pillars to successfully eliminating childhood obesity.
However, in Tim Harrowers book, he mentions that going in chronological order is not necessary, but for certain stories it may be best.
I think he called it the Martini glass style, which is best for chronology to explain how events unfolded, but for speeches, unless necessary for the story, the reporter does not have to present the speech in chronological order.
However, that is most often what I have seen.
I looked at the BBC and NY Times' websites.
Both websites have print stories and a picture that goes with the story, but they also have videos.
One thing the Times does different is their pictures change on their own, like a slideshow. The BBC has something similar, but the picture changes when the viewer's cursor moves across the different stories.
I like the BBC's method better because it is distracting to see a bunch of random pictures in a slideshow.
The multimedia, definitely complement the news stories because visual makes the story more real.
At the same time, when a picture accompanies the stories, there seems to less picture painting, probably because there's a picture, but I can see how multimedia can hurt news stories' quality.
I looked at the Madeira flood the BBC wrote about on Saturday and again on Sunday. Saturday's lead has the flood waters doing the main action, which is different from Sunday's lead when Portuguese workers came to help flood victims.
The flood is central, it's important, but Sunday's lead is more entertaining because people are intrigued (more so) by people, rescue workers, rather than water.
Also, Sunday's story is better developed. It has more quotes, more information, and obviously it is more up-to-date, but it has more questions people have answered. For example, Saturday's story did not know if tourists were involved in the casualties, but Sunday's story said no tourists had been injured by the floods.
I do not believe the Sunday's story is a 'competition' story because I have checked out the Times and CNN, but the BBC has the most thorough and well-informed stories.
However, I have seen stories that 'feed off' the competition.
I looked at the Madeira flood the BBC wrote about on Saturday and again on Sunday. Saturday's lead has the flood waters doing the main action, which is different from Sunday's lead when Portuguese workers came to help flood victims.
The flood is central, it's important, but Sunday's lead is more entertaining because people are intrigued (more so) by people, rescue workers, rather than water.
Also, Sunday's story is better developed. It has more quotes, more information, and obviously it is more up-to-date, but it has more questions people have answered. For example, Saturday's story did not know if tourists were involved in the casualties, but Sunday's story said no tourists had been injured by the floods.
I do not believe the Sunday's story is a 'competition' story because I have checked out the Times and CNN, but the BBC has the most thorough and well-informed stories.
However, I have seen stories that 'feed off' the competition.
St. Paul police and fire crews have new rescue competition in town: Mayor Chris Coleman.
The mayor was on his way to greet some convention visitors Friday evening when he came upon two young parents whose child appeared to be having a seizure. He rushed them about 2 miles to United Hospital in his official mayoral car.
"I will admit to speeding over the Wabasha Street bridge," Coleman said Saturday.
The structure of this story almost has a feature story feel to it. The St. Paul Mayor was driving down the road when a man and woman came running to his car with a baby in hand. The child was having a seizure, and the major rushed them to the hospital, but in this story, the reader would not find this out until the bottom of the story.
Generally that is not how a news story is written, and although the story has a unique approach to being written, I probably would have written it differently.
St. Paul Mayor rushes desperate parents to a hospital after their infant began having what looked like a seizure on Friday.
It's not the best lead, but it gets to the point faster. The way the story is written now is fine, but I would not say effective because the story 'lollygags.' There's no sense of urgency to the story when, it's kind of a big deal: a baby could have died, and the mayor of St. Paul was involved.
The story could've taken on a new life filled with urgency and excitement, but its set-up doesn't do that--at all.
Attribution is crucial to a story and has the potential to 'save face.'
"Make sure sources get proper credit (or blame) for what they say," said Tim Harrower.
i.e. if someone said something happened and a reporter writes that but comes to find out that the event never occured, the reporter will be fine as long as he/she has attributed the untruth to the person.
Commas come before the attribution, according to a hand-out Gayle Golden gave journalism students.
Everything in a news story must be attributed; however, accepted truths don't really need attribution. The sun will always rise in the east and set in the west.
Attribution allows facts, opinions and quotes, which can spice a story up.
It's abetter practice to put the noun before the verb.
John F. Kennedy said.
For hard news, 'said' should be used; however, 'says' can be used for reviews and feature stories and broadcast newswriting, according to Harrower.
And along those lines, 'said,' for clarity reasons should be used. One should avoid jargony words, snorted Harrower or chuckled Chuck.
