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Paparazzi

Posted by: | October 25, 2011 | No Comment |
“I’m your biggest fan. I’ll follow you until you love me. Papa-paparazzi.” – Lady Gaga

The paparazzi as we know it is a relatively new phenomena and term. It originates from Fellini’s film, La Dolce Vita. In it, an Italian photographer named Paparazzo — an Italian dialect word that describes the annoying noise similar to a buzzing mosquito — was a fast talker. By the late 1960s, the word, usually in the Italian plural form of paparazzi, had entered English as a generic term for intrusive photographers.

 

Today, anyone can look at the hordes of paparazzi that swarm celebrities all over the world and see how fitting that term actually is.
This style of gossip news that the public so craves is not a new phenomena, however. How could Anne Boleyn losing her head not be news worth sharing? She broke up a marriage, helped King Henry VIII leave the Catholic Church and create the Church of England, and was killed after all that work.
By reading this schlock, our brains don’t have to concentrate. We don’t have to think. The off switch can be turned off. Without these types of news stories, or even without the use of gossipy details within straight stories, the news would be a lot less interesting.
But what about those celebrities the paparazzi effect?
Lindsay Lohan, for example, is one of those sad stories that people love. They want to see her rise up from her failures and mistakes just as Britney Spears did, but they love to watch her fall deeper and deeper down the rabbit hole. Having the constant attention does not help her with her recovery and the recovering of her privacy and safety.

 

Lindsay Wants Restraining Order Against Paparazzi 

Lindsay Lohan believes she’s being denied driving privileges because the paparazzi are constantly on her tail … so she’s asking her lawyer to get a restraining order prohibiting them from chasing her.As we first reported, the L.A. County Probation Department — along with the DMV — have given Lindsay the green light to drive again.
Lindsay Lohan Seeks Protection Against the Paparazzi – Softpedia 

Lindsay Lohan Seeks Protection Against the Paparazzi
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HWdt2poQZtk

Sometimes celebrities lash back at the paparazzi, just like Travis Barker from Blink-182 did here (NSFW):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=htKWLicTnn8

Celebrity gossip supersite, TMZ, had thoughts to bring that madness to DC. Luckily for us in the DC area, that never really came to fruition successfully. I cannot fathom the mess it would create in traffic, both for pedestrians and commuters. I also couldn’t fathom our celebrities being important enough. I mean who really cares about what burger Obama ate today?

From The Hills To The Hill: TMZ Turns Its Focus To D.C. 

TMZ will soon be giving Lindsey Graham the Lindsay Lohan treatment, as the company sics its “reporters” and camera crews on politicians. Because if there’s one thing Washington needs, it’s more frivolous reporting. Though TMZ dropped its plans to open a Washington office in 2007, it has…
http://twitter.com/ashbylaw/status/128571102522912768
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Fjm-xW2jU8

The paparazzi even were the probable cause of Princess Diana’s death. They were chasing her down to catch her with her new beau, which led to the high-speed crash where she perished.

Such tragedy can happen when we let these people with cameras ruin lives. So why do we let them ruin other peoples lives with their lenses?
Do we just enjoy watching the bloodbath and cannot look away, as if we are in the Coliseum watching the gladiators of the day duke it out against tigers and each other, fighting to the death?
I personally think we hope to see failure. Once we see a celebrity fall, we see they are human and just like us. It’s also that we like to see how they bounce back from that sort of fall from grace. Some do it well… and some… well they are pushed to the edge.

 

under: Comm 455, Storify, Uncategorized
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Where is Matt Lauer, really?

Posted by: | October 18, 2011 | No Comment |

The Today Show is a staple on televisions nationwide and is viewed by millions around the country every morning. The program is mixture of hard news stories, feature interviews and lifestyle segments. For ten years, the Today Show’s lead anchor has compiled a segment for the show that sends him around the world. Where in the World is Matt Lauer? is a segment in which Lauer travels to a new mystery place each day. In the past, just the other anchors guess his location.

Here is a picture from the segment in 2001.

“ I see lots of opportunities for @TodayShow to leverage Where in the World is Matt Lauer on platforms like Twitter and Facebook.
InsideCableNews
October 17, 2011
“ @todayshow Excited for the return of Where in the World is Matt Lauer! 🙂 I grew up to that theme song!
caracara2949
October 17, 2011
“ very excited for where in the world is matt lauer on the @todayshow. another great addition to the morning!
ksneal77
October 17, 2011
allDAY – Matt pranks our Twitter, Facebook fans with big announcement

Matt pulled a fast one on TODAY this morning during his announcement that his popular Where in the World series is coming back in November, and your reactions to the prank on Twitter and Facebook were hilarious.  After teasing a big announcement for days, Matt revealed he wa …

under: Comm 455, Storify
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The original news anchors

Posted by: | October 18, 2011 | No Comment |

[View the story “The original news anchors” on Storify]

under: Comm 455, Storify
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With tablet devices such as the Kindle Fire and the iPad, the magazine and newspaper industry may gain some new legs to stand on.

I recently upgraded my iPad to iOS5, Apple’s newest operating system for their mobile products and watched as my newspapers and magazines neatly fit themselves into Newsstand.

 

Apple has made it easier to find magazines to buy or subscribe to by creating a Newsstand section within the App Store. 

It’s somewhat misleading, however. I saw that I could receive Good Housekeeping for free, so I downloaded the app. What happened when I tried to open it was that it took me to the actual issues I could buy. So I was not getting a free subscription, but just the opportunity to buy other issues. I couldn’t flip through them like I would at an actual newsstand or bookstore to see if it was actually something I was interested in buying.
This app shines with subscriptions you already own. Wired magazine is enhanced on my iPad. In a recent issue, there was a reptile eye on the cover. When I looked at it on my iPad, it was a blinking eye. The articles were interactive with videos and high quality pictures.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_CNto9DfUfA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wwqsdpm7iG4

Android devices, however, for the time being are left out in the cold. Alternatives to the Apple-only app don’t quite exist yet, but five major publishers are preparing to launch their own app marketplace for Android phones and tablets in the near future.

 

It’s very new, so it’s hard to judge Newsstand completely. Give me a couple months and I will revisit this to see where Apple and the publishing industry has taken this app. So far, the masses seem unimpressed.

http://twitter.com/lauraforde/status/126051028364828672
http://twitter.com/jayfanelli/status/124588828236316672
http://twitter.com/_AndrewCampbell/status/126013557107195904

under: Comm 455, Storify, Uncategorized
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With BlackBerry systems being down across the globe, users are left newsless. People who use their device daily are finding it difficult to adjust to life without their BlackBerrys.With the absence of their lifeline, people had to find other ways of communicating with people. They also had to (heaven forbid) use an actual computer for things like Facebook, Twitter and sending e-mails.

Here is what Huffington Post says about the wide-spread outage:
BlackBerry Problems Reported: Services Down In Europe, Middle East, Africa

LONDON — The maker of BlackBerry said Monday that email services have been restored on many of its smartphones, after an unexplained glitch cut off Internet and messaging services for large numbers of users across Europe, the Middle East and Africa. However, Research in Motion Ltd.
The demand for news and communication in our society is so great and it is apparent with this outage. Here is what people were complaining about on Twitter:
“ Not used to tweeting on the actual twitter website due to absence of a working app haha. #blackberry
hannahsophia1
October 12, 2011
“ In the absence of my Blackberry twitter, I came home expecting a wealth of mentions and tweets..but no.Not a single tweet at me..upsetting!
AlanaMarieP
October 12, 2011
“ In the absence of Blackberry, I have spent an extraordinary amount of time on twitter today..Strange that..
Aston__Martin__
October 11, 2011
“ got so much work done in the absence of my blackberry
fiveashleonie
October 12, 2011
Other ways to be productive with a worthless BlackBerry:
Having to adjust and change routine is probably difficult for some people to do. BlackBerry users are having to be more resourceful in they way they live their day-to-day lives. Instead of having all of their news in one place, they are having to enlist other vessels for information.The level in which they demand their news requires them to find ways to replace their BlackBerrys instead of going without the information during the outage.

under: Comm 455, Storify, Uncategorized
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The kidnapping of Charles Lindbergh’s baby boy became a media sensation, quite possibly leading to the poorest outcome of all. Read More…

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View “War reporting: from Herodotus to photojournalists” on Storify

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Creepin at Starbucks

Posted by: | September 19, 2011 | No Comment |

A D.C. area Starbucks’ customer got more than he bargained for when he took his little girl to use the bathroom.

Family Sues Over Hidden Bathroom Camera Taking Pictures Of 5-Year-Old Girl In DC Starbucks | wusa9.com 

WASHINGTON (WUSA) — A five year old girl is now terrified to use the restroom after discovering a hidden camera taking her picture on the toilet in a DC Starbucks. Her parents are furious, suing Starbucks, in part because they say this kind of thing happens at Starbucks all too often.
This wasn’t the first time this has happened at a Starbucks, however.
‘I Was Fuming’: Man Describes Finding Hidden Camera In Starbucks Restroom 

August 12, 2011|By ALAINE GRIFFIN, agriffin@courant.com, The Hartford Courant WEST HARTFORD – – Rafael Zeligzon acknowledges that it’s unusual for someone to look underneath a public restroom sink. But Zeligzon, 57, known to his customers as “The Drain Medic,” does it for a living, spending his days unclogging sewers and drains throughout Greater Hartford.
In May, the same thing happened in a California Starbucks.
Cops: Man Hid Camera In Starbucks Bathroom, Filmed 45 Women And Children 

A California man placed a hidden camera inside a Starbucks bathroom and filmed dozens of unsuspecting women and children, according to police. The camera was disguised as a coat hook and affixed to a wall adjacent to a toilet for two days last month.

Twitter was alive with Starbucks’ related tweets.

http://twitter.com/IAmTashaLee/status/115926467577257984
http://twitter.com/cherollie/status/115954502443601920
http://twitter.com/LaBelMeJai/status/115923348428554240
http://twitter.com/PurduePetesGirl/status/115908040561143808
http://twitter.com/TBD/status/115779312195616768
Moral of the story: Next time you go for your half-caff, part-soy, cinnamon-pumpkin latte and need to use the bathroom, pop into McDonald’s.

under: Comm 455, Storify, Uncategorized
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