Author: Janet Sauter

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We have all used Wikipedia before.  Growing up I was always told that Wikipedia shouldn’t be trusted because anyone could make changes to the pages.  I did not know just how strict Wikipedia made its process for creating edits to articles.

Wikipedia’s online training courses were very helpful in learning how to edit their articles and have your edits kept.  Before posting, I went through the final edit checklist.  This helped me make sure my edits were perfect.

I chose to attempt to make an addition to the Coolidge High School Wikipedia page. I lived in Coolidge for almost 10 years, while attending Coolidge High School for all four years of high school.  I have a lot of knowledge about the school because of how small it was and the extracurriculars I did while attending.  I found out this page had basically no information on it.  It even stated, “This article needs additional citations for verification.”

The first thing I did was go to the Coolidge High School’s talk page to add my suggested improvements to the page. I have attached a screenshot below with my improvements.  However, there hasn’t been anyone else in the talk stream so after not hearing back for a day, I went ahead and added my improvements to the page.

The Coolidge High School Wikipedia page was pretty empty before my edits.  I had added to and fixed the info box located on the righthand side, added a sentence about how the middle school now shares the campus and a section about the sports at CHS. Below is a before and after with my edits outlined in red.

Overall, I thought it was a pretty successful edit.  It is still up so I hope it stays up and doesn’t get reverted because I did correctly cite all the information I added.  With my improvements, I decided it would be smart to look at other more popular high school pages to see how they were set up before starting my edits.

One thing I did not like was how hard it was to post an image on the page.  I tried to post a picture of the Coolidge mascot and because of how strict the guidelines are I was not able to.  That was basically the only complaint I have about editing the page.

I enjoyed editing a Wikipedia page which lead me to wonder why so few women are Wikipedia editors.  I read an article, which was a bit old (2008) which stated only 13% of Wikipedia editors are female.  It was a really interesting read and suggest everyone give it a look.

Before I read about law and media this week in my class, I did not know just how much law truly does affect the media.  It is very interesting just how much I did not know about this topic and how my view has changed just by becoming a little more educated.  I believe that the law gives the government and companies too much power.  This article about why the government should not be able to regulate social media content is an excellent read. We have rights that should be protected and I expland on certain concerns that I have below.

Copyright

We all know that copyright is not allowed.  However, people are allowed to post someone else’s work in limited ways.  Meaning if you do use someone else’s work make sure that you are not using the whole thing and you need to give them credit.  The concern that I have with copyright is: companies are allowed to make claims of copyright infringment against other companies.  If the company refuses to take it down, they could be sued.  That gives way to much power to bigger companies that could bully smaller companies into taking something down because of the fear of being sued.

Privacy

This is one of the most concerning things when it comes to the media and law. We have all seen the meme on social media about the FBI agent watching you through your laptop or cell phone camera.  It is actually terrifing that the government allows this to happen.  They have taken away a sense of privacy from the citizen’s of this country.  Now, everyone does realize that by having social media it does mean you are putting some personal information out there.  However, the fact the government and the companies that provide the technology have the tools to watch our every move is not okay.

Censorship

Many governments spend a countless amount of time blocking or suppressing anything they deemed dangerous, politically unacceptable or a threat to national security.  While in some instances this might be appropriate, this should not be done on an every day basis.  We as citizens have a right to share and create what we want due to the freedom of speech.  The government having the power to block or remove something takes that away.

Defamation

This is a concern for me mainly because I want to become a journalist some day.  If you follow the journalism standard you learn in school will reduce the risk of being sued for defamation.  However, the concern is even if you might be completely correct and did not libel anyone, you can still be sued.  If that happens, it is very expensive to defent yourself.  Which is the scary.

Photography

If you are in a public place there is no law that states you are not allowed to photograph.  However, there are instances where people are getting harrassed for trying to take photographs or videos by mostly private or public law enforcement, workers and security guards.  This is taking away the rights of citizens who are not in the wrong.

I do plan on modifying the way I use media.  I have changed all my social media settings to the more private side thanks to this article with 7 tips to help make your social media more private.  There is so much information that can be accessed by social media.  When it comes to censorship, I am going to throughly start checking that what I post or repost does not put me in danger legally. I don’t need to change anything for defamation because when I do write stories, I make sure what I am reporting on is accurate and fair.  Law and media is a very sticky subject, I will keep learning about it to form more ways I can protect myself from them.

When it comes to having family members sharing dubious information, my grandfather is known for it in my family.  Whether it is sending Facebook posts or tweets that you can clearly tell are not credible, that’s what he does.  Now he is older in age, but that does not give him an excuse to be sharing unreliable news.

This is kind of a sticky situation to solve.  Personally, none of my family members myself included wanted to hurt his feelings or upset him. However, it was a talk that needed to happen because as a journalism student, one thing I cannot stand is fake news.

When I decided to finally talk to him about it, I made sure to come from a very understanding angle.  I told him he should only be sharing things that he knows for a fact to be accurate.  Sharing fake/ unreliable news is not okay and he should no be okay with sharing it.

He told me that “he usually only reads the headlines,” he does not even read the article majority of the time.  Some headlines can be very misleading without reading the article.  When dealing with this issue I believe the best solution to the problem is to throughly read the story.  If you believe that something doesn’t add up or it doesn’t make sense then do not share it.

It is very important for your family members to know when you share this type of imformation, you could be causing other people to start to believe it.  That is why the best solution is to not overshare.  It is better to be more careful and undershare news than to overshare news that is not true.

We know that this will continue to happen because of the amount of information we have at our finger tips.  However, if everyone learns to only share information they would be okay with putting their name on like they wrote it, then it will help stop the sharing of unreliable news.  This is a hard topic to bring up with your family members but if you come from a very understanding view and simply state how sharing untruthful news has a negative impact then they should not be upset.

The sharing of false or misleading information on social media is something that everyone needs to stop and it is our role to imform people of ways to help counteract it.

After spending the past few days reading articles, blogs, scrolling through social media, watching videos I have created a list of some of the most eye-catching, noteworthy media about the NFL.

What now for Antonio Brown? Answering the biggest questions around his release

This was a great article about what lead up to Antonio Brown’s release from the New England Patriots.  It gives a lot of information of what happened, what could happen next for his future and why it happened.  This article was written by Dan Graziano and Jeremy Fowler for ESPN.

Graziano: How NFL players are taking control, and what the league could do next

This article put a great perspective on how NFL players are starting to gain more power in the league when it comes to their contracts.  “It’s a growing trend of NFL players taking more control of their own contract situations than they traditionally have thought they could. And if you think the league isn’t alarmed about it, you’re wrong.” This article was written by Dan Graziano. I came across this article on Twitter.

After a rash of NFL quarterbacks go down with injuries, many are wondering whether Colin Kaepernick will get the call. pic.twitter.com/6S4FfeNOzb

— The Daily Show (@TheDailyShow) September 21, 2019

This tweet is important because it deals with a controversy that has been going on for a while in the NFL if Colin Kaepernick will be picked up by a team.  With all the QB injuries, many wonder if he will get a call from an NFL team.  This is a tweet by The Daily Show.

"Tom Brady has lapped Wayne Gretzky and Michael Jordan."@ColinCowherd on why Brady is the greatest team athlete of all-time pic.twitter.com/MSeIVUGEI7

— Herd w/Colin Cowherd (@TheHerd) September 18, 2019

This tweet is Colin Cowherd talking about how he believes Tom Brady is the greatest team athlete of all-time.  It is noteworthy because this has been a debate going on for a while and he does a great job of using facts to back up his argument.  This video was from his show but then tweeted by The Herd.

Andrew Luck Sets Tone for Players Affected by Mental Health

This is a podcast by Conor Orr and Jenny Vrentas that deals with how mental health does affect NFL players.  Andrew Luck retired very early in his career because of it.  “Not only do we have Andrew Luck talking about the cycle of pain and rehabilitation that he went through, and that’s something that informed his decision to retire at the age of 29.” This is very prevalent so it gives a good insight into this topic.  I found this podcast on SI.com

When the media covers the National Football League, there is a lot of content out there.  It is arguably the most popular and most watched sport in the country.  There is sometimes when the coverage is cloudy when deciding if it is news or opinion, other times it is way more clear.  Below are a few examples of the differences.

News

Brown finds new home, agrees to deal with Pats 

This is a very clear example of news.  When you read this story it states nothing but facts from the start saying “Antonio Brown on Saturday agreed to a deal with the New England Patriots, his agent, Drew Rosenhaus, told ESPN’s Adam Schefter.”  They then went into more detail explaining how much money  the deal is worth, if there is any incentives, guaranteed money, signing bonus and how long the deal is for. The story then goes on to say how Brown was released from the Oakland Raiders, how his guaranteed money with them was voided.  This article is full of stats about Brown, the Patriots roster and key events that happened before the signing to lead Brown to the Patriots.  The author does a good job in reporting nothing but facts.  This is the perfect example of a breaking news story.

A Clumsy Start to the 2019 NFL Season for the Packers and Bears

This article is a very informing article about the Thursday night game between the Packers and the Bears.  At the beginning of the article, it starts off explains how Adrian Amos called the play which led to his gaming winning interception.  Then the article explains how the game was sloppy for both teams.  It describes what happened in the game to a point where if you did not watch the game, you could feel like you did to a degree.  They also used a good variety of quotes from after the game which gave good insight to how the players and coaches felt about the game.  Overall, I think this was a really good news piece on the first NFL game of the season which used facts, quotes and statistics to paint a very vivid picture.

Opinion/Analysis 

Patriots sign Antonio Brown: 8 thoughts on New England’s All-Pro addition

It is stated in the title that this is going to be an opinion story, eight thoughts on the Patriots signing Antonio Brown.  Before even reading the article, you know it will be some one tell you eight of their thoughts on the move.  For example, his number one thought is the Patriots could have one of the top wide receiver trios in modern NFL history.  He has no facts behind this statement, especially since the season has not started and these three wide receivers have not taken one snap together on the field. He uses statistics to back up his thought but that does not mean everyone agrees to this.  Later on in the article, his number seven thought was the Patriots should continue to run a spread offense.  That is clearly an opinion and does not need an explanation.

NFL Predictions 2019: Complete Playoff Picks, Super Bowl LIV Champion, Awards Winners

Here is another example of an opinion article.  This whole article is the MMQB Staff from Sports Illustrated talking about their playoff predictions, Super Bowl LIV Champions and award winners for the upcoming 2019-2020 season.  These 13 reporters go through and list their winners then use facts and statistics to back their opinion on these various topics.  Each of them have a graphic showing each team the believe will win in every round of the playoffs for both NFC and AFC.  After the list the winners of the NFL Awards, they give a detailed paragraph telling why they believe their opinion will be correct.

For this blog post, I decided to write about something that happened a few years ago but still bothers me to this day.  A few years ago, Tom Brady’s reputation was tarnished by the media.  It all started when the New England Patriots played the Indianapolis Colts in the AFC Championship in 2014.  During that game, at halftime, some of the Patriot’s footballs were tested and found to be under-inflated.  This lead to the “DeflateGate” Saga.  In which, Tom Brady was suspended for four games the following season and the Patriots were fined.

The reason I care about this so much is because of how the media handled the situation, it then led everyone to believe Tom Brady was guilty before any of the facts were even released.  Once the facts were released due to the Media leaking false information, the majority of the public already believed Tom Brady was guilty of having the footballs deflated.  Now years later, Brady is still labeled a cheater by many.  Due to the fact, the media and the NFL had a witch-hunt against him.

The tweet that caused the rushed judgment of Brady was by Chris Mortensen.   Who incorrectly tweeted that 11 out of 12 of the Patriot’s footballs were two PSI under the limit.  Which later was found to be inaccurate.  However, Mortensen never bothered to issue a correction to the tweet or an apology for such a big mistake.  His tweet caused a snowball effect, which then led everybody to believe that the balls were, in fact, two pounds under the limit.  When in reality, they were only under by .5 pounds.

This topic maybe a few years old.  However,  I still have people who try to argue that Tom Brady is a cheater because on the impact of that tweets and how the rest of the media covered it.

When it came to tracking my media usage for 24 hours on Saturday, I came to realize I don’t really use a lot of traditional media.  The majority of the media I use does come from social  media.  I also don’t really ever pay attention to the news, I mainly only read about sports.

9-9:30 a.m.- Whenever I wake up the first thing I do while laying in bed is check my emails, messages, Twitter, Instagram and Snapchat. Today the first thing I did was start this blog.  After, I replied to some messages, Snapchats and laughed at some memes, like the one linked below, that my friends sent in our Twitter group chat.

9:30- 10:30 a.m.- I got ready for work and scrolled through Instagram again.  I also opened some Snapchats.  I don’t use Snapchat as much as other social media platforms but I do go on to open snaps that my friends send me. While getting ready for work I usually listen to the Call Her Daddy podcast which is done by two girls who work for Barstool.

11-4 p.m.- I worked my shift for Red Bull.  During our break I went back on Twitter and Instagram.  I read an article on Twitter by Kevin O’Connor from the Ringer discussing his dad’s cancer diagnosis.

4-5 p.m.- I went home, packed a suitcase and read some sports articles on Twitter.  I read one article by Jovan Buha of the Athletic.  It was about everything you need to know about the 2019-2020 LA Clippers.  I read an article from Seminoles.com about Willie Taggart’s practice report for Friday.

6-7:30 p.m.- I headed to the airport only to be utterly shocked at what I was going to findout when I checked Twitter next.  What I saw caused this time to include ALOT of social media usage because of the bomb of the Andrew Luck retirement.  I was definietly posted on twitter looking at all the new tweets about the retirement.  There weren’t any stories out on it yet, just because I don’t think anyone saw it coming.

7:30-8 p.m.- I spent my time texting my friends while I waited for my plane to board.  I did check Twitter a few times and ended up reading an article about how Brooks Koepka rips critics about his ESPN’s 2019 Body Issue written by somebody who works for Bleacher Report. For those of you that don’t know who Brooks Koepka is, he is a professional golfer and I have linked his behind the scenes preview of his part in ESPN’s Body Issue.

8-11 p.m.- I watched Creed II on my flight to Seattle which if you have not seen it, I highly recommend watching.  I really enjoyed the movie.  Rocky IV is my favorite Rocky movie so I loved the ties to that.

11 p.m. -12 a.m.- I didn’t really go on social media during this hour.  My boyfriend picked me up from the airport so we spent this time talking and driving back to his house.

For my rankings, lets start with the podcast.  In case you haven’t listened to Call Her Daddy, it’s two girls talking about different topics so I see no reason why they should not be credible so I give them a 9 because in the rare case they might be making up things but the listeners may never know.  The next two I know personally, Kevin O’Connor and Jovan Buha so I trust that they are 100 percent credible so they are both given 10’s. The article from Seminoles.com is on the FSU athletic website and written by a staff member from FSU so that is also given a 10.  Finally, the lowest ranked is going to be the Bleacher Report article.  I do like Bleacher Report but I rank it a 7.

That was my 24-hour media tracker and after taking an in-depth look at how frequently I use social media, I do think I should try looking at more traditional media more.