“Dynamics of News Reporting and Writing” launched this week, which means a couple things:
- I’ll usually be posting at least once a day, Monday through Thursday. (Friday, possibly. Weekends only if something really weird happens.) You can feel free to subscribe if your professor is making you keep track of this instead of randomly checking in on the blog from time to time.
- I’ll be driving up Amazon’s web traffic exponentially by checking in constantly to see if anyone is buying this thing. (That’s not weird or anything, right? It is? OK, forget I said it.)
- I’m going to screw some stuff up. It’s inevitable.
I was on a call with the publisher Wednesday and I asked if everything was going OK with the book and the blog. Her responses were essentially, “The reps have only had the book for a day. Calm down.” and “The posts are fine, just watch the cussing and the typos.”
I’ve been dialing back on the cussing, although I think we need a running list of things the president is allowed to say, the media is allowed to repeat and that I can’t say on the blog. Maybe we need bingo cards or something. Feel free to get on that.
As for the typos, I’m going to be honest: I read the heck out of the posts before they go out but eventually I go blind to what I write. As I noted earlier in the year, I know everyone needs an editor. In fact, when I made that post, I got an email from a former student who caught a typo in there. Yes, I suppose it proves my point, but good grief…
So here’s the deal in this wonderful world of symbiotic relationships: I’ll do my best to tell you stuff that helps you out and you should feel free to say, “Hey chucklehead, you spelled (whatever thing I screwed up) wrong.” Just hit me with an email or via twitter (@doctorofpaper) and I’ll patch up my stuff and give you a hat tip.
Hope you all have a great start to your semester and let me know if I can be of any help.