Ledes -- Do You Need A Name?

In your ledes, some of you referred to the car accident victim specifically -- Scott Forsythe -- while others referred to him in the generic -- 22-year-old local man, or something to that effect.

While neither is wrong, I'd say the latter is the best approach. You have no reason to believe Forsythe is someone that would be known by name to your readers. In such cases, the generic identifier would suffice in a first reference, and you can offer the specific name as a secondary detail later in the story.

Now, if the victim was Oprah Winfrey, the name would be a good bet for the lede, precisely because she is someone many people would instantly recognize by name.

Ledes -- Who's Getting Married?

Word order can seriously impact the meaning of what you write. Like here:

A local 22-year-old was killed when he lost control of his vehicle while trying to avoid a dog on the way to his wedding.

So, who was on his way to his wedding: the 22-year-old or the dog? Literally read what you wrote here: " ... a dog on his way to his wedding."

Yes, readers can assume you meant the person. But we're not in the assumption business; we're in the make-things-crystal-clear biz.

Now, why was this not a fatal? I can't say this was a factual error, just confusing and prone to misinterpretation.

To be more clear, I might have changed the word order to this (caps mine):

A local 22-year-old was killed ON THE WAY TO HIS WEDDING when he lost control of his vehicle while trying to avoid a dog.

See how the reordered sentence eliminates any chance for confusion?

Make sure that you aren't saying something you don't intend to say.

Ledes -- Who, what, WHEN, where, why?

What's wrong with this lede?

A man died in a car accident near the church where he was to be married.

Think about what's critical in a story -- and a lede -- via the five W's. We know who (a man), what (he died), where (near the church where he was to wed) and why (car crash).

What we're messing is WHEN -- today!

Not always will you have all five W's in a lede. Burt in this one, I'd argue as something that just happened, the "when" is central to it being news.

Don't forget your five W's, and be sure to include the ones that are central to why a particular story is news.

Out-of-Class Stories -- Sofar . . .

I'm very happy with the current round of out-of-class work. Frankly, I was surprised by how strong many of the stories were. Everyone was a 3.0 or above and we even had one 4.0!

We haven't recapped as a group the out-of-class text as much as we have the vids and blogs and such. But here's some links to some of your out-of-class work published by Spartan Edge:

Books vs. eBooks

Sober/wasted bracelets

Campusfood.com

Smoking ban

Banished from B-Dubs

Spring break

Dance team

Please, take some time to read these. See if you can pick up any trends or patterns or ideas in terms of structure or ledes or nut grafs or sourcing.

Out-of-Class Story #3 -- The Written Version

Here's one story on texting while driving that has not yet been published by anybody. But I couldn't wait to show you. It really shows strong command of organization, research and the broad use of perspectives. Plus, a wonderful anecdotal lede. What do you come away with after reading this, regarding what you can do to write the best stories you can?

Despite the texting and driving ban that was implemented in Michigan last July, Cody Aiken still finds a way to get around the law.

Aiken, an agribusiness management sophomore from Michigan State University, said he used to text all the time while driving, and he would hold his hands up on the steering wheel.

“Now I try to do it under the wheel, which is a lot harder,” he said.

Aiken said he doesn’t think the laws are working because a lot of people are still going to text, and everyone can have an excuse for why they were looking down.

“I was wiping something off my pants, or something like that,” he said.

The laws banning texting and driving have caused no reduction in accidents so far, according to a report released from the Highway Data Loss Institute last September. In fact, the crash rates have risen slightly.

The National Safety Council website said a minimum of 200,000 crashes each year are caused by drivers who are texting.

Dr. David Strayer, professor of psychology at the University of Utah who researches texting and driving, said the number of text messages sent in general keeps increasing, and some are sent while people are driving.

“It’s a big problem,” he said. “We see that it’s exploding.”

Strayer said the laws aren’t as effective as they would have liked because they are not enforced the best and people try to scam the system by doing things such as holding the phone lower.

He said this poses more risk of an accident because a person’s eyes are off the road and their hands are off the steering wheel for a longer period of time.

Tiffany Brown, a spokeswoman for the Michigan State Police, said officers are trained to observe driving that is unusual, according to an email.

“Just as there are cues that would indicate a driver is impaired behind the wheel, officers can also spot a potential texting driver,” she said.

However, she said between August 2010 and March 2011, the Michigan State Police have only issued 27 citations for texting and driving. Twenty-five verbal warnings have been given.

Jim Miller, safety and health engineer at DTE Energy, said it is difficult to legislate safe driving habits. For example, the law says the vehicle has to be in motion, so people could be texting while sitting at red lights.

“I think it has been effective in curbing the number of drivers who are texting while they are driving,” he said.

Addison Brown, a finance sophomore at Michigan State University, said he thinks the ban is a great idea, but he doesn’t think the law can be enforced well.

He said people pulled over won’t admit to texting, and they may say they were calling or doing something else. He said there should be more awareness out there rather than a ban.

“Use common sense,” he said. “People don’t need to be texting and driving.”

Despite the laws not seeming to work as well as hoped, Dr. David Meyer, a professor of psychology at the University of Michigan and part of the cognition and cognitive neuroscience program, said it is still terrible to be texting while driving.

He said people need to be using the same processes for dealing with information when they are driving as when they are texting.

“The brain has limited capacity for processing this information,” he said.

Miller said texting is particularly dangerous because it involves all three types of distractions - visual, manual, and cognitive.

“It is simply distracted driving,” he said.

According to Meyer, texting and driving is similar to drunk driving. Even though someone’s abilities are highly impaired, they can still keep the car going.

“What matters is the potential for accidents happening under complicated driving situations,” he said.

He said complicated situations include having to make a sudden turn, being in busy traffic, or being in an environment where people are crossing the street. Those are when problems usually occur.

Strayer said a .08 blood alcohol level causes a crash risk increase that is four times higher than normal, while texting and driving causes an eightfold crash risk increase.

He said driving is probably the riskiest activity people engage in on a regular basis, and people tend to get a false sense of security while driving.

“Multitasking to relieve boredom isn’t worth someone else’s life,” he said.

As far as the future of the law, Miller said “I would expect it to be expanded to encompass all electronic devices that would require your use of hands to operate them.”

Meyer said the law ought to say people are not allowed to use other devices while driving.

He said when vehicles are made that operate themselves, then people can text and have cell phone conversations.

Aiken said he has adopted the strategy of handing his phone to a passenger and asking them to read the message aloud. He tells them what to text back.

In Michigan, texting while driving is a primary offense, according to Tiffany Brown. This means officers can pull someone over solely because they suspect they were texting while driving.

According to the Governors Highway Safety Association website, 30 states, D.C. and Guam ban all drivers from texting and driving. An additional eight states ban novice drivers from texting and driving

Out-of-Class Story #3 -- Some Multimedia Highlights

. . . sorted by topic . . .

Value of college

Video

MIPs

Video

Blog

Dubstep

Video/slideshow

Books vs. eBooks

Video

Written story

Budget cuts

Blog

Texting while driving

Video

Women's soccer

Video

Blog

Sexist "Shore"

Blog

Video

MSU runner

Video

Bridge Cards

Video

Ethics -- The Falling Man From 9/11

There's a fine line between showing readers the brutal truth of a situation so that they understand the powerful truth of any story, and showing readers a truth so brutal that readers ignore the point you were trying to make and instead question your judgment.

I can think of no better example of this than the so-called Falling man photo, taken by an Associated Press photographer during the Sept. 11, 2001 terror attacks and published by The New York Times the next day.

This remarkable article from Esquire Magazine in 2003 offers a summation of the complex and contradictory forces at play in deciding if running the image was the absolute right thing or the incredibly wrong thing to do.

If you were an editor on Sept. 11, what would you have done? And why?

Let's talk it out.

Test Story #3 -- An Overview

Seems like all the video stuff made you a bit rusty on your writing. Let's go over some patterns I saw that I feel can be improved upon:

>>> Yes, we did have a fatal. Three, in fact. The essence of journalism is getting it right. That's our first duty; to make sure what we wrote lines up with the facts. In this case, you referred to the Ingham County Commission as both the Ingham County City Council and the City Commission, both of which are incorrect; and you listed the fire truck donation as $60,000, when in fact it was $600,000.

Finally was this slip-up in a lede:

The heroic act of two 15-year-old girls went unnoticed at the latest Ingham County Commission meeting . . .

I know what you meant to say, that the heroic acts didn't go unnoticed. But that's not what you said. And that's a fatal, I'm sorry to say.

I know I've said it before, but I'll say it again: there is no such thing as a small error in journalism. Any mistake erodes your credibility with readers, and gets them wondering what else you may have gotten wrong. If you're going to make it as a journalist, you MUST make fact-checking your top priority.

Don't take fact-checking for granted. Learn to check items, line-by-line and item-by-item.

>>> The news isn't that things were discussed; it's what was done or not done. Too many ledes or section starts defaulted to things were discussed. That's not the news, right?

This was a lede that went in that direction:

Heroic teenage girls, gun regulations and a commissioner pay raise were some of the topics discussed at Tuesday afternoon's Ingham County Commission meeting.

You would have been better off to emphasize what happened -- and de-emphasize the simple fact that they met -- like this:

Heroic teenage girls were honored, a gun regulation was proposed and a commissioner pay raise was rejected at Tuesday afternoon's Ingham County Commission meeting.

Just putting everything into a catch-all category like "discussed" -- when some of the items wet far beyond discussion and resulted in inaction -- falls short of ultimate outcome.

>>> Label transitions to subsections. When ending reporting on one item and beginning another item, use transitional tags at the start of a subsection lede like, "In other business," or "Also at the meeting," so readers can see the transition point clearly.

>>> Fact-checking includes checking for AP Style. I don't still have to remind you of that, do I?

>>> Don't freak out. Oddly enough, looking at last semester's blog after the third out-of-class story, that class had the EXACT SAME PROBLEMS with this assignment. Literally. I just had to cut-and-paste the problem areas and update the exact examples.

A part of me says maybe we should do this test story closer to when we actually work in class on similar stories. But the other part of me says the things we learn we need to retain, as we'll need them every day as journalists. I'm leaning toward the latter.

BTW, the last class I taught had the best overall grades of any class I taught. So if this class follows suit, you'll make up for what was not a very good day around here.

A Reminder: Extra Credit Options . . .

. . . because it looks like extra credit is needed:

FOR GETTING AN OUT-OF-CLASS STORY PUBLISHED, I will replace your lowest test story grade as long as the published story grade is higher. If not, then I will replace your TWO lowest-scoring practice story grades with 4.0s.

For me to count your extra credit, you need to submit to me via email a link to your work, along with a request to have it applied to extra credit.

FOR GETTING AN OUT-OF-CLASS VIDEO OR BLOG PUBLISHED, I will replace your TWO lowest-scoring practice story grades with 4.0s for EACH video or blog that gets published.

FOR DOING A REWRITE OF THE FIRST-DAY IN-CLASS PROFILE, I will replace your three lowest-scoring practice story grades with 4.0s.

FOR DOING MULTIMEDIA AND/OR SOCIAL MEDIA RELATED TO THE FIRST-DAY PROFILE, I will replace your two lowest-scoring practice story grades with 4.0s.

FOR DOING A FIFTH OUT-OF-CLASS STORY, I will replace your lowest-scoring out-of-class story with the extra credit assignment's grade.

FOR DOING VIDEO, BLOG POSTS AND A TWEET STREAM WITH A FIFTH OUT-OF-CLASS STORY, I will replace your lowest multimedia scores with 4.0s.

FOR DOING AN OUT-OF-CLASS MINI-STORY -- which can be between 400 and 600 words, with a minimum of two human sources, in which you can cover ANY sort of event (subject t my approval) like a student group meeting or a speaker on-campus -- I will replace your lowest test story grade with the mini-story grade.

FOR GETTING THE MINI-STORY PUBLISHED, I will replace your two lowest-scoring practice stories with 4.0s.

I will also consider other extra-credit projects on a case-by-case basis. Please see me during my office hours to work out other extra-credit assignments.

THE COMMON DENOMINATOR IN ALL EXTRA CREDIT ASSIGNMENTS is that you are demonstrating to me that you can now correctly apply skills learned in this class that at one time you did not apply as well; that you went above and beyond what we are learning in this class to further educate yourself in journalism; and/or you are demonstrating ability learned on your own prior to this class but applicable here. You can expect any ad hoc extra credit beyond the assignments listed here to include at least one of those components.

I don't care if you messed up earlier; show me you can get it right now and I'm happy to replace earlier grades with something more accurately reflecting where you are at NOW.

I just want to be clear on this one point regarding extra credit: extra credit will be applied to replace the grades of assignments you have actually done, including fataled assignments.

Extra credit will NOT be applied to assignments that you did not turn in, or in which you had a time fatal.

So if you were thinking of skipping an assignment or two toward the end of the semester since you've already turned in some extra credit, then that plan won't work.

Videos/Blogs/Tweets -- More Examples . . .

Let's chime in as we go along . . .

STUDENT BRIDGE CARDS

Video / blog / tweets

DANCE TEAM

Video / blog / tweets

STATE NEWS

Video / blog / tweets

CAMPUSFOOD.COM

Video / blog / tweets

SOCIAL WEB

Video / blog / tweets

Videos/Blogs/Tweets -- All Together Now . . .

Instead of looking at your second multimedia assignments by medium, let's look at things by topic and as a unified multimedia approach using video, blogs and tweets. I'll comment as we go along, and feel free to chime in as well.

But my general comments are these: you guys are quickly picking up multimedia storytelling. I've seen many good videos, original approaches, strong content via sound bites and hyperlinks and telling b-roll and factoid-style tweets and such. I'm very happy with your quick progress in this area that seemed so confusing just days ago.

Here we go:

ALTERNATIVE SPRING BREAK

video / blog / tweets

BW3 UNDER-21 BAN

video / blog / tweets

FOOD WASTE

video / blog / tweets

SMOKING BAN

video / blog / tweets

OFF-CAMPUS LIVING

interactive map w/video / blog / tweets

We'll look at some more combos next week.

If You Need Some B-roll . . .

Then we've got that B-roll!

Videos -- One Last Initial Look

I won't review every initial tweet and blog and video you all did (though you can expect more thorough class reviews in the future). Most were decent for a first try and exhibited the sort of things we've seen in previous reviews.

But I will pull out a couple of videos that I thought stood out.

In all fairness, the producer of this vid had previous video experience, so he had a head start from many of you.

Still, I want you to notice -- and even emulate -- the strong points shown. Look at the creativity and variety of b-roll. Look at the use of captions. Look at the use of fairly short and to-to-point sound bytes. Look at the way the producer went to a bite, then someone else's bite, then back to the original person's bite. It nicely breaks up the first person's bite so the viewer doesn't get stuck listening to one person talk on and on and on. Note the narration at the start of the piece, offering a strong lede to the story.

There's a lot to learn from this vid.

This next vid has a lede that's very fun and produced well but not exactly in the most journalistic style; still, for this first assignment it's fine. But what I really like is the back-and-forth use of sound bites. It doesn't feel like an interview; it feels like a conversation the viewer is having with two students. Very nice way to break up what was time-wise a verrrrry loooooong video.

Making Maps -- Sooooo Easy

Seriously, it's easy as hell.

Let's go to Google Maps and make one now!

This is a map I made a while back. Took me all of about two minutes to do it. Beyond this, you can use different locator tabs, embed pics and videos and links, ect.

Maps work well with stories where geography and location weigh heavily in telling a story, like where crimes happen on campus and such. It also allows readers to interact with the story, clicking on tabs and reading about whatever news happens at that location.

Multimedia -- Something A Bit Different . . .

We've been talking about video, but really multimedia is simply finding an active way to present a story. And it doesn't have to be video.

Here are some options offered by students from my past JRN 200 classes.

One MM presentation was something a bit different: a podcast. That is, an audio-only report kind of like a radio segment. It worked well, except for one thing -- it was a bit hard to keep track of who was saying what. Perhaps the person acting as the show host could have prefaced each new commenter with a quick identifier, such as "What do you think, Dave?" or "Devyne?"

You may ask yourself, "Where do you post a podcast?" I didn't know either. So I Googled "podcast upload" and found something in about five seconds. I used podbean.com, which is free (with registration) and which you can link to here.

That wasn't the only bit of different multimedia done by past students. This person did an audio slide show, where still images are used instead of video, and sound is run concurrent with the person pictured at the time.

Look at how you introduced animation of sort, by having the still image pan back slowly. That's a nice touch, making a static shot a bit more lively.

For your multimedia component, these options are perfectly acceptable, as long as you tell me in advance. So, whaddya think?

Twitter: How To Tweet A Non-Breaking News Story

Tweeting a breaking news story is easy, as you've learned. Just type what you see, as you see it. But how do you tweet something that isn't breaking? Like a trend story, or something about a topic without a specific time peg or an actual event associated with it?

Actually, that's easy, too!

That was a situation a student in one of my past JRN 200 classes faced. She was doing a story about a rash of concussions among student-athletes. And here's her tweet stream, which I reversed so that you see her first tweet first and her last tweet last; the opposite of how it would appear on Twitter. Here we go:

#concussedathletes Over 300,000 sports related concussions occur each year, according to the Brain Trauma Research Center.

#concussedathletes The NCAA, the nation's largest college athletic association, has no guidelines for treating athletes with head injuries.

#concussedathletes The Big Ten is trying to implement its own regulations to deal with concussed athletes.

#concussedathletes Michigan State University is not pushing for the Big Ten to have the regulations.

#concussedathletes MSU soccer goalkeeper Liz Watza has had five concussions and said "The NCAA should create guidelines."

#concussedathletes Sports Specialist Dr. Homer Linard said the main concern with letting injured athletes back in the game is brain injury.

#concussedathletes Suffering a second concussion shortly after the first one can be deadly, according to the Brain Trauma Research Center.

#concussedathletes Incoming freshmen athletes at MSU are given a specific concussion test, called ImPACT. impacttest.com

#concussedathletes Athletic Clinical Coordinator Brian Bratta said "ImPACT assesses memory, cognitive ability and function of the brain."

#concussedathletes Once a concussion occurs at MSU, the athlete takes ImPACT again to gauge the severity of the injury.

#concussedathletes Despite new technology, the biggest indicator is the presence of symptoms, said Bratta. http://tinyurl.com/6cq9dx

#concussedathletes When a head injury occurs, MSU athletes are immediately given SCAT, the Standardized Concussion Assessment Test.

#concussedathletes SCAT is a checklist of common symptoms and tests balance, said MSU Certified Athletic Trainer Yume Nakamura.

Now, please notice a few things. Look at the first four tweets. Each could be a lede, right? For many of you, in writing a story -- especially trend stories -- you may find that you have more than one good lede option, but you can only choose one lede. But in tweeting the news, each lede option can become its own tweet.

Second, the tweeter took telling quotes and made each a tweet, like that of teh player giving her opinion on the subject. Just like a quote in a story, it's not YOUR opinion; it's what somebody who is a subject of your story thinks.

Third, interesting facts are offered as tweets, like those on what the effects of a concussion can be.

Fourth, a mini-series of tweets are used to explain a nuance of the story, like the half-dozen tweets that in total detail how MSU deals with concussed athletes.

Fifth, hyperlinks are offered via tweet. Notice the tweet that uses a bit.ly link. Bit.ly is a URL shortener that will take a long URL and convert it into a shorter one that better fits on a character-restricted service like Twitter.

Let's take a look at what bit.ly can do for you, via this link.

Let's look at some videos!

First up is this one. Note the nice use of b-roll; that is, video of something regarding what an interview subject is talking about, used while the interview subject is talking. B-roll lets you show and tell your viewer simultaneously, while also allowing you to break away from lingering on a static and boring shot of someone simply talking.

Two nit-picks about this vid -- first, the sound quality was poor. Yeah, I know you're working with basic equipment, but make sure that you grab audio in as non-echoey and quiet a space as possible. And get a microphone as close as you can to the subject; in the case of using flip cameras, that means shooting very close-up if you are shooting an interview.

B-roll would have helped this video. I know this topic wasn't the most visual: it's about what you learned in class; how visual can that be? But in an ideal situation where you had more time, you could b-roll students in class, working on stories and keyboarding in assignments and such.

This next one uses captions, but those captions are incomplete. Think about the same standard you'd use for attribution in print: what is the minimum amount of information readers need to know to sufficiently identify the interview subject and know why they are credible on this subject?

I'd say you need a full name and some sort of title; like Makia Brooks, JRN 200 student as opposed to just Makia.

One vid went a bit away from journalistic style and led with a bit of a scripted moment, but for this assignment it's okay. It's cleanly edited and well-structured and offers some telling comments from its interview subjects, once we get away from the start.

Here, I think captions would have helped as a form of attribution. Think of it just like a print story; you wouldn't put in a quote without saying who it's from, and what that person's title and relevance to the story is, right?

This one is fairly raw. Not atypical for a first assignment, and that's fine. I mostly wanted you to simply start getting used to shooting interviews and editing tape. What would you do to beef up this tpe? I'd like to hear some good ideas.

Now I'd like to hear from you guys about this assignment. What worked well? What did not? How easy or hard was it? What was fun and what sucked? What would you do different, now that you have one vid under your belt?

We'll look at some more video Wednesday.

Let's look at some blogs and tweets!

We'll look at blogs and tweet streams in complementary pairs; since each medium was supposed to help tell the same story. First up will be a report on MSU men's basketball. These two blog posts dissect the team in two ways; first, there's an up-to-now season recap, and then a game review.

Nice use of hyperlinks that offer background not only in text, but in video as well. Really, whatever background you offer by hyperlink can be in any other medium, as long as the content helps tell the story or builds upon the story or offers relevant background.

Here's the related tweet stream, which follows the aforementioned game as the score waxes and wanes. That's a basic and effective way of tweeting a game, but think about other observances you can note: substitutions, whether the coach is going batshit crazy at any given moment, player reactions, crowd reactions, ect.

These blogs looked at the comeback of a long-gone sitcom actor from two perspectives; first, the broader view of where he AND his castmates are now; and then a post zeroing in on the one cast member's comeback. Look at the very nice use of hyperlinks to provide background here, allowing the blog to be much shorter in size than a print story offering comparable information.

Now, the tweets, which are about the actor's new TV show. Nice use here of telling moments and pulled quotes. Ideally, you can take a tweet stream, read them from first posted to most recently posted, and be able to make sense of how things unfolded. That you do here.

These blog posts offer a similar inside/outside perspective here. One post i about a specific band; the other is about a club performance featuring several different bands, including the one you profiled. Here, social media offers compelling -- and easy! -- hyperlink connections. Very nice tweet stream with the sort of observable moments I cited earlier as a good thing to look for and include.

There's a very nice personal voice here in these blogs about the TV show Glee. Still, I'll find a couple of flaws. First, make sure that your hyperlinks actually work and that they don't go bad. Nothing more frustrating to readers than a dead end to information, as opposed to a gateway.

Second, your original blog post ends with, (continued in blog 2). Totally unnecessary. A blog is an ongoing conversation, so of course you'll have more to say.

The related tweet stream takes an interesting perspective. Instead of following what's happening blow-by-blow, you offer instant analysis of what's happening. Not a bad use of a tweet stream during an event other people have access to.

Okay, like we did with videos, now please chime in on blogs and tweets. Gimme the good and the bad and what you learned and what you're still wondering about.

We'll look at more blog/tweet combos Wednesday.

Test #2 -- Some General Observations . . .

First off, most of you did well in this assignment, and no one did awful. Lots of good story structure and organization; many good ledes followed by explanatory nut grafs and telling quotes.

Still some problems with attribution. Make sure each graf containing information which you did not observe and which does not aggregate information from multiple sources has an attribution.

Also, using the name of a state in conjunction with a city's name usually is not necessary when the city is within the state of your publication. So adding the state name to Grand Rapids, for example, was unnecessary. If the flight originated from Peoria, Ill., then you would have to add the state ID.

There are some cities, like Chicago, that almost never need a state name,, regardless.

Plus, if the quotes you used in this story were ones you gathered straight from the mouth of the sources, then capitalizing Daddy inside of quotes would have been improper. You can make changes to conform with AP Style with quotes spoken to you, since that would not change the meaning at all.

If these quotes came from a document, though, then you would have to stick with the literal text if used as a quote (but not if you change it to a paraphrase).

Please review AP style under cities and towns, and city, and datelines.

It's also important that you simplify terms for your readers. Some of you noted one of the passengers suffered lacerations. What is a laceration? It's a fancy word for a cut. So, why not say the passenger suffered cuts, then? Try to use layman's terms whenever you can.

Also, make sure that you adequately go over your information before you start writing and find any inconsistencies. How many of you noticed Alyssa was spelled two different ways? Not many of you asked which spelling was correct. And if you did notice but didn't seek clarification, you were in the wrong.

Don't assume anything. Maybe the girl spells her name an unusual way, but someone offering you the information thinks it's spelled the conventional way and passes on an error. If I decided the unusual spelling was the correct spelling, many of you would have fataled this assignment.

Don't assume. Check it out.

And try to find the best and most accurate words to use. One person's lede called the event a "potential crisis." Well, I would argue that a pilot passing out and forcing a kid to take control of a plane is a crisis. What was averted was a crisis turning into a disaster, right?

A couple of you said what was avoided was a "potential tragedy." I think that's far more accurate and correctly descriptive of the event.

Finally, don't overlook the obvious. One story failed to mention the time element until well into the story, and even then in offering a time, the story never said what day the incident took place!

A couple of other people were vague or late in saying where this happened: in Lansing.

Don't forget your 5 w's: who, what, when, where, why (and how). Make sure not only that you have those answered in your story, but that they are listed prominently as well.

Video -- Some Editing Help

One basic video editing program is iMovie, which is available on most lab desktops in this building and for which I have a link to this guide on how to use it.

Hope that helps!