Online Reporting, Research & Writing

I want answers– fast

The Journalist’s Resource’s article on the way graduates approach gathering information is extremely relatable. I find my self getting answers the same way and after reading this article, I see why many people my age and I have a created this habit.

The Journalist’s Resource writes an article on how graduates approach gathering information.

I believe we as a tech-savvy generation are so used to getting answers fast through outlets like Google or Wikipedia that we heavily rely on only retrieving information like that.

It would be a waste of time to search for information through phone calls or databases if the same information can be found online. Time is valuable to workers so why would we, as an innovative and fast-paced generation choose to spend time on searching for one answer while we could be using it to find more important information.

I relate this back to biology. All organisms wish to perform and carry out tasks in a way which will require the least energy. So, with that in mind, it would only make sense with the resources available to us to look towards convenient internet searches for information.

However, this will backfire when our resources are not reliable or if they do not carry the right information. I must know that if the internet can’t give me what I need then I have to put in a little more effort in traditional methods like phone calls in order to get what I need. Sometimes I won’t be able to get answers– fast.

What is FOIA?

Freedom of Information Act (FOIA)

It regulates and sets requirements for the disclosure of certain public records.“Public body” means a state officer, employee, agency, department, division, bureau, board, commission, council, authority, or other body in the executive branch of state government but does not include the governor or lieutenant governor, the executive office of the governor or lieutenant governor, or employees thereof.

Enforcement as to Record Denial

A person may appeal a final decision to deny a request to the head of the public body. The head of the public body has 10 business days to respond to the appeal. It can go to court. That can take up to 180 days.

Penalties for violation of the Act

If the trial court finds that the public body has arbitrarily and capriciously violated the FOIA by refusal or delay in disclosing or providing copies of a public record, they will have to compensatory the damages and could be fined up to 1000.00.

I found a great example of FOIA about social media.The article I found is Social media surveillance I feel the internet and social media will be the new area of laws and FOIA will have a lot of work to do once we set internet laws. I feel we need internet laws.

Interesting FOIA request

FOIA, or the Freedom of Information Act, was introduced in 1967 and allowed the public of the United States the right to request access to records from any federal agency. Mind you that is only request, under certain circumstances the government is allowed to deny those requests to information.

One recent FOIA request interested me because of the way it was handled. A woman by the name of Emma Best requested information on Operation Mockingbird which according to the CIA was an effort to wire tap the telephones of certain reporters, however due to various leaks it is believed that Operation Mockingbird was actually an attempt to control certain news media for the purpose of propaganda.

What was interesting about this request is that because the Mockingbird files were under the holdings of the presidential library before the presidential records act (PRA) they are actually not subject to FOIA, but rather the mandatory declassification review (MDR). As it turns out the files had already been released to the public so a FOIA request was not necessary anyway, the files can be found at muckrock.com.

Ethics of a Journalist

No one ever said journalism was easy. There are times where a journalist can struggle on what their next move will be.

There are ethics on being a journalist. The Society of Professional Journalist gives a break down on some of those ethics a journalist should follow.

Seek truth and report it, minimize harm, act independently, and be accountable and transparent.

One thing that also needs to happen is to not fall into a bias. This can be harder than it sounds.

When it comes to journalism, journalist can end up following a personal path instead of following the right path. There’s always a fight on trying to be the first one to report something, but if you follow that path with inaccurate details, it can be crucial.

Also make sure, to be easy to read or understand so that way there is no confusion on facts and detail.

These are a few of the best practices on ethical journalism.

Verifying images before using them

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Being able to verify an image is crucial in journalism. If an image isn’t verified, it could create misunderstanding between what’s written and the image. On the Verification Handbook, there are ways to prevent these misunderstandings. They are:

Establish the author/originator
Corroborate the location, date, and time
Confirm the image is what it is labeled
Obtain permission from the author/originator to use the image

Being able to know exactly who posted the image first will verify if the image is exactly what is meant to be. Also, when you confirm that the image is what it is, you can double check by using Google Map or Bing Maps to make sure that’s the exact location. Another tool could be checking weather of when the image was taken. Geofeedia is another tool that can be used to check social media post with geographic location. If the image that you want can’t be used, you can ask the author/originator for their permission.

With these ways, we can make sure to double check the images before using them. It is simple to take an image off Google and use it for something else.