Showreel

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PnGIzGInKVM&feature=youtu.be

Innovation in magazine Journalism

Since the Internet has established itself as a more convenient way to receive news all forms of print Journalism i.e Newspapers and Magazines have had to adjust to the changes in the times and make sure that they are still competing with the online mediums. A magazine I believe has managed to acclimatize well is the NME (New Musical Express) which was first published in 1952. Since its formation it has undergone many transitions in order to keep itself up to date. It originally started as a Music newspaper and took on a generic tabloid format until it gradually took on the role of a Music magazine. Even in its early days the NME showed  innovation in order to keep itself circulating by shaking off the rigid type of reporting people were used to and introducing a more Gonzo inspired writing style which back in the 70’s not only stopped its closure but also established the NME as the dominant Music magazine in the U.K. Bringing in writers of this ilk was a fresh change and came at the right time as the general public at the time were starting to become a little more outspoken themselves and consequently appreciated the edgier style of writing the NME were offering.

                In my opinion the NME has shown innovation throughout its existence and has now managed to establish itself as more of a brand than just a magazine. It has managed to diversify itself to great effect which is why it can now sit on its throne at the top of the British music scenes hierarchy. Aside from its primary focus which is of course to keep people up to date with the goings on in the music industry; it now has many other strings to its bow. The NME now has a stage at Reading and Leeds festivals, two of the biggest music festivals in the country which signifies its standing in the music industry. It also has an annual tour which promotes upcoming bands and has been a valuable starting point for bands such as The Killers, Arctic Monkeys and Kaiser Chiefs to name a few. The NME also hosts an Awards ceremony each year which commends artists for their contribution to music and is considered a prestigious event to people in the Music industry all whilst carrying on the spirit of the NME. The winners are voted for by the readers of the magazine

                In 1996 the NME jumped on the bandwagon and launched the online version of their magazine NME.com and it now sits as the world's largest standalone music site, with over 7 million people using the site every month. That in itself is a phenomenal achievement as it is a very competitive market with lots of big websites competing with them. NME has managed to reach this position as the pre-eminent place for music due to its long standing reputation but also with its innovative ideas that constantly attract new readers/viewers. It has added a film and tv section to the magazine that would have naturally attracted new readers and also has a large online merchandise department. Nowadays the magazine sales have dropped but that isn’t necessarily the end of the world as it is still profitable but also the website is what generates the most outcome. The store sells a large collection of music memorabilia including band T-shirts, old magazine editions and records amongst many other products. The site also receives a lot of money through advertisement and as it has a large online presence with not only its main site but others scattered around the world.

                I believe in order for a magazine to show innovation the best way for them to do that is to make sure that they stay relevant to contemporary culture. The NME has spanned several generations and seen many cultural changes it has had to adapt to. Many different movements it has to cater for but also all the changes in technology that a business like NME have to take into account. When the internet came along it introduced lots of opportunities for companies and with the introduction of their sites the NME adapted quickly and since then has also managed to successfully take advantage of the benefits social networking has to offer. They have several Twitter accounts which they use to regularly tweet their newest articles with links to their site. They also tweet competitions to win tickets to concerts and exclusive tracks all of which get seen by their thousands of follows and draw in interest for their site. They also have an equally strong Facebook page which is regularly updated with the latest news which users can then share amongst their friends and generate more views that way. Another benefit of using social media in this way is that it gives the readers and audience a chance to interact and give their opinions on stories or whatever the particular topic might be. Having a good social media department is an important job as any for today’s journalism outlets as they are an invaluable way of communicating with the audience but also finding out information from them. It also makes it a lot easier for the audience to get involved with competitions and polls and obviously this is appealing to today’s society as everything is made easier and efficient and takes minimal effort from someone to apply for a competition or leave their opinion in a comment. A big advance they made more recently came when they made a digital version of the magazine which people get online or on their Ipads as oppose to the hard copy of the magazine. This change came about in 2011 a time when smartphones had just taken over the telephone market and Ipad’s were the must have gadget. The same year it also launched a Festival app that gave festival goers information on the weekends itinerary and that summer was downloaded over 30,000 times.

Obviously some people would say that the changes the NME have made in its 50 plus years in operation were just natural progressions that they would have had to have made anyway to stay competitive. However I think that the way they have gone about it and the extra perks they offer e.g all the exclusive interviews, free downloads and vast amounts of content make them superior to magazines of their ilk. They have managed to dominate their market because of this and diversify into many other fields and become a very healthy profitable business whilst managing to keep the company ethos that attracted so many people to the magazine in the first place. Innovation is quite a loose, subjective term in my opinion but I feel that as far as magazine journalism is concerned NME magazine has shown large amounts of this in its time and continues to today. The main aim of any business in reality is to make money and the fact that the magazine itself still manages to be profitable despite large parts of the companies attentions having turned elsewhere and is the leading website for music speaks for itself. To be able to do this shows that the people working there are showing great amounts of innovation in order to keep them in this position. In terms of content the magazine still offers edgy writing reminiscent of the gonzo writers of their past and as one of the most well respected music magazines in the world they manage to get the best interviews with the best people making for the best read.

Confessional interview with Neil White

There is a scene from porridge in which the Judge says ‘you are an habitual criminal, who accepts arrest as an occupational hazard’  meaning that if you choose to live the criminal life then you must accept that one day the chances of having the Police turn up your door is something that you have to take in to account. Yet when you live your life as an honest man, paying your taxes, child support etc. and still end up having your front door pounded down by several Police officers something is going horribly against you. This was unfortunately the case for me. My whole life, at least working life has been spent working on a passion of mine which happens to be Scooters. I’m not talking about the mopeds you see 17 and 18 year olds ripping around in over summer I mean the finely crafted Italian Lambrettas and Vespas. I got my first scooter at the age of sixteen which was when the love affair started and since then I have managed to establish myself as a well-respected member of the scooter community. Over the years I have helped repair hundreds of bikes and have managed to make my living buying old scooters restoring them and then selling them on. I have made documentaries on the bikes I love and in the scootering world have secured my place now as a trustworthy and reliable person that is very knowledgeable on scooters. Therefore naturally no one was more surprised than I when after a routine trip to Italy I had my life turned upside down.

                I had set off in my van to Modena Italy, home of the finest balsamic vinegar Italy has to offer and also Mary of Modena a former Queen of England. I was travelling over to Italy to go to a scooter jumble which I tend to do several times a year to buy scooters in need of some tender love and care and experience had taught me that these jumbles were where you can pick up some of the best bargains. Obviously travelling to Italy isn’t the most ideal of situations especially when you’re in an old post office van that has seen much better days, but as a great lover of Italian culture and primarily scooters I had grown very fond of these trips. It is hard to describe one of these jumbles and to the untrained eye it probably looks no different to any event of this nature, lots of people stood round trying to sell their rubbish. A lot of times this is the case, you can walk round for hours at a time and not find anything that is remotely useful, however this time in particular I came across a beautiful bike, a Lambretta Silver Special. The bike itself wasn’t in the greatest condition but I knew that once I had spent a bit of time on it in my workshop back home that I would be able to do it up lovely and make myself a bit of money on it. It really is luck of the draw at these markets I’ve travelled down to Italy before and returned empty handed and you get a few ‘marketeers’ like myself travelling over from the U.K for the same reason so it’s competitive as everyone wants to get their hands on the best stuff. I managed to pay for the Lambretta get it at a reasonable price and I thought that was it, I’ll move on and see what else there is to offer. This trip was unfortunately a nightmare from start to finish, there was an ongoing problem with a few people of the people I had travelled with regarding some stolen money, my van blew up whilst driving through some French mountains and I personally was returning somewhat empty handed as I hadn’t managed to buy as much as I had hoped for. All this was just the calm before the storm however as it wasn’t until I got home that the real problems had started.

After what can only be described as a torrid journey back home I finally got back home and was looking forward to a few days of relaxing after the draining trip. I remember thinking at the time ‘thank god I’m home’ and for a few weeks this was the case. I was able to work on the Silver Special and had put the bike on ebay as it was ready to be sold. It wasn’t for a few days later that I had my life turned upside down when I received a knock at the door from Interpol claiming I was selling stolen bikes. When buying bikes abroad it is always customary and in your best interests to get all documentation you need on the scooters you are purchasing which I always made sure I did, so to see two uniformed police officers at the front door of my house came as a massive shock. The officers had been ‘made aware’ that I was selling stolen bikes that I had picked up on the cheap in Italy. This came totally out the blue during the summer period, a time when I do the most of my business as people like to take advantage of the summer weather and get out on their scooters. Yet I had Interpol on my doorstep telling me that I was under arrest for a crime I hadn’t committed, that all my other bikes were to be confiscated and that I was believed to be part of some sort of stolen scooter ring. The following few months I was treated like a criminal, I was constantly being harassed by the Police. They were asking me all sorts of questions and trying to pin me to several bike thefts. I lost all my custom that summer so couldn’t provide for my family. My wife turned to drinking and we were arguing non-stop and consequently divorced, all for nothing. I have always felt that as a human the biggest achievement you can have in your life is to find love, I had that as well as a successful business and it was taken from me. I spent the next few months dumbfounded by the position I had been put in; I was penniless, wifeless and it didn’t look like showing any signs of coming to a favourable resolution for me. I found myself in the worst state of my life until one day I had all my bikes returned to me minus the Silver Special and all the charges against me dropped. It was like a brief fleeting visit from a tornado that just passed through my life and left it in tatters. I was never given any explanation by the police as to why they had reason to suspect me or if they even had any evidence for that matter. I was the victim of sheer Police incompetence and in such a short space of time they had made me lose so much. Other scooter enthusiast’s that might have considered my business as competition started to publish articles in magazines slandering my name so my business and reputation had to be rebuilt from scratch. It was a truly horrible period in my life, one that I still have many of unanswered questions about like; Why did the Police think the bike was stolen? What happened to it?  And why me? But I have now moved on from it and it’s a chapter of my life that I will not remember fondly.

Interview with a senior journalist

An interview with Adrian Drummond, Deputy Sports Editor at The Times

How did your career in Journalism originally come about?

I started in journalism in 1980 after applying and being accepted onto the trainee programme at The News centre Portsmouth where I worked as a trainee for two years. Whilst working as a trainee reporter at The News I also enrolled on a 3 month course at Highbury College which focused on the practical skills I would need as a journalist e.g shorthand and media law. I only did a 3 month course as I was on a graduate trainee programme. I had been to university and was the only trainee there that had to been to university as in those days a lot of people got into the industry after doing a course similar to the block release course I had done at Highbury. After two years or so working as a trainee reporter I took a proficiency test which was administered by the NCTJ and once you had passed this you were considered ready to become a senior journalist and you would get a pay rise and then you could really start your career. The proficiency test itself was a series of practical tests one of them being that you had to be able to write a 100 words a minute in shorthand. As a trainee reporter though you are still given a lot of responsibility and I did still find myself covering some interesting stories.

So do you think shorthand is still an essential tool for a Journalist?

Well, yes I do because firstly technology can fail so I think it’s always helpful to have your shorthand notes as security but also I find that when you are taking notes in shorthand you are paying more attention to the answers of the people you are speaking to. It’s a good skill to develop because once you do manage to get a grasp of it and start increasing your hand speed, even If you find you don’t use it very often it’s the sort of skill like riding a bike that you never really forget. A lot of the younger journalists I work with don’t have shorthand and much prefer to use a Dictaphone etc so really it is down to personal preference but it is a something that most employers will be looking for when recruiting graduates. In a practical sense though I have always found it easier to flick back through my shorthand notes rather than having to keep fast forward or rewinding through an interview that’s been recorded on a Dictaphone to find good quotes.

What would you say the significant differences are for someone trying to make it as a reporter today compared to when you were younger?

I would say that first and foremost there isn’t as much opportunity nowadays as when I was younger for paid work. There has been a proliferation of websites and journalism activity online but a lot of that isn’t generating any income. A newspaper I worked for used to sell a 100,000 copies a night and had 7 editions, nowadays that paper sells less than 30,000 copies and only releases one issue. The paper used to have a much larger workforce but now probably has a quarter of what it used to and this is the case for a lot of companies so there isn’t as many opportunities. There is an awful lot of citizen journalism going on and it is relatively easily to get your output on to the web but that doesn’t mean that anybody is reading it or that its really fulfilling a useful function. So I’d say the biggest pitfalls for someone trying to get there foot in the door nowadays is that people aren’t really given the opportunity to learn their trade, like I did, in a controlled environment a lot of people have to resort to the online free for all to get their work out there.  

What would you say are essential traits to have in order to become a successful journalist?

I would say there are a lot of things that are essential and they’re not always the things that people would think of straight away. A lot of parents have spoken to me in the past about their kids who want to be Journalists and how good they are at English, and whilst they might be very good at English that’s only a fraction of the skills required to be successful in this industry. Much more important is that the person is an outgoing character that has people as that will enable people to get the stories in the first place after building up a good rapport with those you want to interview and then any prowess in English will help them develop from there. The English side of things in my opinion isn’t necessarily as important as being able to think on your feet and react to what is happening in front of you. A lot of the time whilst interviewing you might find something very interesting out and decide that the new information you have received will make for a better story so you have to adapt quickly to this. Not everybody has the ability to operate in these circumstances and it doesn’t really matter if you are fantastic at English if you don’t have the self-confidence or the ability to do so then you will struggle.

So you’ve had a few years in the industry now, what does your current role entail?

At the moment I am currently employed as the Deputy Sports editor at The Times so my job involves editing the Sport in the absence of the Sports Editor and helping to organise the content of the sport on a daily basis. I speak to the writers every day in order to discuss what stories they have and how they want to go about writing it and I advise them and together we put together the best story we can. There is a lot of emphasis put on the pictures so I help select the best ones that I feel are lively and interesting enough for publishing. At the other end of production I also have to make sure that the headlines and captions for the pictures are up to standard and that they are clear in telling the story, so there’s quite a lot of revision in my job, looking at peoples work and making sure that it’s good enough to go out. I also have to be involved in conferences with the editor and other members of senior staff which set the agenda for the day’s paper.

Where do you see Journalism heading in ten or so years’ time?

I think there will be fewer newspapers, I think that that form of news is in rapid potentially turmoil decline. People consume there news today using various other devices and platforms so therefor in say 10 years’ time I don’t think many national newspapers will be selling their product in print form in great numbers.  With the impact technology has on society I can see them moving online and to whatever new devices are engineered in the future, I think this will be the main way people consume their news. That is one of the problems with the industry today and I don’t believe that the content online is being translated as well as it would in print form as articles online tend to be compact and bitesize which suits the audience of today. Articles like the thousand word columns don’t really seem to work very well with these new devices which I think is a problem for society as we need that breadth of opinion rather than just seeing the news displayed in its simplest form.

Law Revision

The Supreme Court is the highest court in the land and has 12 Justices, it is located in Middlesex Guildhall. It is reserved for high profile cases.

3 functions of Crown Courts are to; deal with serious criminal cases, appeals from a Magistrates' court and cases are passed on from Magistrates' court for sentencing or for trials.

All courses start at Magistrates' court but indictable offences are passed on to Crown Court. Magistrates' court normally deal with summary offences and only has power to sentence people to up to 6 months per crime.

A criminal offence must be proved beyond reasonable doubt whereas a civil case works on the balance of probabilities.

When Journalists use the term public interest they're referring to a matter that is of real value and concern for the public to know.

A court case becomes legally active once a person has been charged, the police make an arrest, an arrest warrant is issued or the Magistrates' court issues a summons.

Libel is defined as Identification+ Publication + Defamation.

A statement is defamatory if it; lowers someone in the estimation of right thinking people, causes them to be shunned and avoided, exposes them to hatred, ridicule and contempt or disparages them in their business, trade or profession.

CPS- Criminal Prosecution Service
MOJ- Ministry of Justice
DPP- Director of Public Prosecution

Critical Review

This was my last semester on Winol and by far my least enjoyable. The two previous semesters I had spent on Winol I had enjoyed on the most part. In my first I was swept in by it all, and overwhelmed by the professionalism of the students. I immediately decided that I wanted to produce my packages on sport with a view to trying features in the future. I produced what I consider my best package to date in the first year. I was covering a national sports story in that Portsmouth Supporters Trust were looking to buy the Club. I managed to get interviews with a former Portsmouth player, Vince Hilaire, as well as the ‘most famous football fan in Britain’ John PFC Westwood. To add to this I also managed to get free run of Fratton Park therefore my shots were varied and impressive. I uploaded the package onto youtube and it managed to  receive over 400 views. I was also approached to see if it could be used for a football website. For second year I decided to stay on Sport hoping to get more stories as oppose to highlights. I was given the role of University Sports Reporter. This role wasn’t as simple as it suggests as it was a struggle to get news worthy packages so I found myself looking away from the University for stories. In my opinion my best package of that term was my piece on Olympic hopeful Greg Bridet. Bridet had been shortlisted for the Olympic Boxing squad for the 2016 Olympics in Rio, and as he boxes out of Portsmouth I thought it would make for a good story. I was very lucky in that Bridet’s Coach Quentin Shillingford was used to cameras being in his gym and allowed me to get all the shots and interviews I needed. Towards the end of my second semester on sport I started to find myself feeling aggrieved about the lack of feedback we would get on our packages as the main focus was on Winol. I thought I had produced some good quality packages but had heard nothing back about them.  

Coming into this semester I was hoping to be given a new role as I had stated that I wanted a new challenge on Winol and liked the sound of doing some features for the website. I had come up with several ideas that I wanted to pursue but was left disappointed when I found myself once again as part of the sports team. The problem was I had lost interest in Sport and was struggling to find good stories once again. My first few stories of the year were packages I put together for the sake of having something in and thus lacked content and I had to resort to the sort of 'Mickey Mouse' reporting I had always tried to avoid. My only other package of the year was a breakdancing feature, this was a better piece as I spent a lot more time editing the package and I was happy with the finished product, however at the end of the day I am well aware that I have not been able to achieve my full potential on sport. I personally consider Winol and Sportsweek two separate productions and despite the obvious connections I think people on Sports often find themselves slightly alienated from the rest of the group, which is frustrating. On Sport it is standard procedure to have your work completed by Tuesday, so in reality Wednesdays for people on sport don’t have to be spent in Tab but you still find yourself going in hoping to get some sort of feedback or acknowledgement more often than not to no avail. This was obviously not helped by Angus moving to Dubai as it made communication with him even rarer. At the start of the semester there was talk of having a few guest editors in who specialised in sport which really would have been beneficial to the department. However this never materialised and once again we were overlooked. This has always been an issue for me and has subsequently meant that I haven’t been giving the 100% I would have liked. A large problem I find with Winol is that no one seems fully sure who our target audience is. As we are a university course it makes sense to me to draw views from fellow students. However a lot of the time we deter students with stories that they quite simply will not care about. I was criticised by Gareth Messenger formerly of Winol as he asked why I was doing stories on University sports teams a lot of the time. My reply to Gareth would be that I believe we are overlooking University sport in favour of teams such as Winchester City who have less than 50 people turn up to watch games and doesn't draw people to the website. Whereas if we put together packages of University Sports or at least a weekly results section people from the numerous on campus teams would be interested. If I were Sports Editor, I would make sure that one of the better local teams; Eastleigh or Totton, were filmed but along with that I would make sure at least 2 or 3 Uni sports were filmed and maybe put together into a smaller package. I think establishing ourselves as the best source of on campus news is essential for the Winol brand and yet probably over half of the students don’t even know what Winol is. Apparently at its peak Sports week hit over a thousand views yet nowadays 300 views is considered good. I understand that cracking the University will be tough and probably wouldn't be the right route for Winol to go down but is definitely where I see Sports week’s future lying. I would also encourage people on sport to do as many features as possible, the Sports section can often be pretty boring and dull depending on results, a lighthearted fun feature offers a balance similar to an and finally piece.

       I know it’s been a good year for Winol and some of the work I have seen from others has been brilliant. Some people really have benefited from Winol people like Liam Garrahan and Harvey consistently  produce solid packages and I think they have massively benefited from Winol and will probably go onto have good careers on the back of what they've learnt from Winol. I think that the lack of a major event to cover was a shame because it’s a time when everyone pulls together and works as a team. In my opinion an event in the ilk of the BJTC would have helped the second years out a lot. For me when I helped out with the BJTC awards in my second year it was what originally sold me on Winol, as I saw the quality and professionalism of the Third years and it made me realise where I could be in a years time. The website has never looked better and I know that the website has been receiving a lot of hits. I liked the fact that more time was spent on expanding Winol with Access and Absolutely Fashion as this will undoubtedly bring in a lot more page views which at the end of the day is what we want. On a good day the buzz in the room is evident for everyone and come 5 o clock everyone is feeling good. Part of me will miss Winol as it has given me a good start for whatever route I decide to go down in life. I remember that the reason I decided to come to Winchester in the first place was after I came to an open day and was won over by Brian in the way he spoke about Winol. I immediately knew that this was the course I wanted to be on and I do feel like I could produce good quality packages now wherever I go which will be valuable when I apply for jobs and I feel like I have a good variety of packages that I will happily show to employees with confidence. I will always be very thankful to Brian and Chris for this as Documentary is where I would like to go.

       The whole course for me is too focused on Winol, there are other aspects of Journalism that we are all clearly lacking e.g written stories. Chris spent at least an hour going through the problems with some of the written stories that were lacking basic techniques due to the fact that we've never spent a great deal of time working on them. I can fully appreciate the fact that I’m on one of the best journalism courses in the country but I don’t think I’m the only one that currently feels like I would struggle to work for a newspaper at the moment. As far as Winol goes though I think the statistics speak for themselves. After all the awards Winol has been given since I joined there is no disputing that the course put together by Chris and Brian is a good one but not everyone benefits from putting so much focus on the broadcast aspect of journalism. This year apart from an optional shorthand class the only thing we had on our timetable was Winol. I’m not saying that this is a massive problem as Winol is time consuming but some of us haven’t written practically anything all semester and obviously that comes across in our written stories. This semester has hindered my time spent on Winol but despite that I did enjoy the first and second semester I spent on Winol.

Recently the large part of my time has been spent planning for my final year project; ‘Life after Football’. The plan is to interview ex footballers David James, Linvoy Primus and Lee Bradbury about where they decided to go after retiring from football.I decided upon this after reading the Linvoy Primus auto-biography a few months back. I found his book very inspirational and as it was brought out in 2005 whilst Linvoy was still playing I decided that I wanted to find out what he was up to myself, by interviewing him myself. The rest fell into place afterwards through contact I made with their clubs etc. I’m also hoping to follow each of the players around for a day a, in order to give people a real insight into their lives which I’m hoping will be interesting and also make my documentary more authentic and true to the format. I know David James works for BT Sport as a pundit and Bradbury works as Manager of Havant & Waterlooville who play in the Conference South. I’m hoping to make this Documentary about half an hour long, and I’m hoping to make it as fly on the wall as possible. I will be using all the tools and skills I have acquired on Winol to make this and I am confident Winol has provided me with the knowledge to do so.

Critical Review

The second semester of Winol was always going to be difficult without the help of the more experienced third years. We were used to relying on them to help us with our roles as well as helping us put the finishing touches and polish on our packages, well I certainly was anyway. So upon return I was slightly anxious to see how semester two would pan out. Firstly I was keen to see who would take over Henry's role at the helm of Sports Week. There were people that seemed obvious choices to succeed e.g Liam who consistently produced very good football coverage as well as some interesting Sports features. Initially when I heard Sam was going to be the new editor I was surprised but also keen to hear the direction he wanted to take Sports Week. As well as loosing a few people we also inherited some from other parts of Winol as well as the Masters students. I was hoping that the new fresh faces would be able to add something to the mixing pot and hopefully help Sports Week get more views.

The first week I was asked to take Kirsty along to my familiar saturday night hang out, The Planet Ice Arena. In the first semester the Ice Hockey was my beat and after going there week in week out in the first term I was keen to pass on the torch and go out and get my own stories. I was given the role of on campus sports reporter. I asked for this role as I believed that we were missing out on a lot of views by never featuring University stories, as students are likely to watch if they themselves or friends were in it. My first story in my new role was to cover an event called 'Technocise' in the Student Union. Various clubs from around the University performed and because of the type of event it was, a Techno music based exercise, the pictures came out really well. I was happy with the interviews and the audio and I was generally happy with my package. However on the whole Sports Week was struggling as it seemed Sam was finding difficulties with his new position. We were airing late and sometimes our show wasn't edited in time for the recording of the bulletin. This was an issue that needed to be solved quickly.

It didn't take long for me to realise that covering University sports was going to be tedious and hard work. The reason for this being that nothing was happening. In order to get something for Sports Week I had to interview people on nothing, it wasn't particularly enjoyable and cutting the interviews to make them ready was difficult. I felt that covering campus sports stories just for the sake of it was pointless as it made Sports Week look like we were short and just trying to fill some time. I wasn't totally closing the door on University sport, just made a logical decision that I would only cover it when something of note was happening. After making that decision I decided that i'd like to cast my net a little further and as my best package from the semester before was a story from Portsmouth I returned to interview Olympic hopeful Greg Bridet. Greg had been shortlisted for the Boxing squad in Rio and seemed very willing to be interviewed. His coach also was very keen for his gym to get some air time. I have noticed this quite a bit now, that people see us turn up with cameras and think its a golden opportunity for them to get a bit of publicity. I've realised the best way to get around this situation is to be obliging and say you'll include everything they ask, and then not. Anyway, this was my first decent/news worth story of the term and I was determined to make it my best. I was allowed to go down and film a training session with Greg as well as get interviews from him and his Coach. I was pleasantly surprised by the quality of my footage and when I had finished also very pleased with my finished product. I was looking forward to getting some feedback as my package was going in the bulletin however sports week wasn't completed in time for the bulletin. I was disappointed by this as I remember the Guest Editor that week was a former student and as he was walking around the room I had a good talk with him about Winol and had told him about my package, so I was intrigued to hear his views. One thing I did notice in

semester two was that there wasn't as much communication as there was in the first. Usually on Monday morning the Sports team would have a little meeting with Brian where we would discuss our stories for the week. I always felt these were useful as it meant that we could all put our thoughts together with the long term goal being a better package. We also didn't seem to get much of a mention in the Debrief which could be frustrating when you felt you had put forward good work. I think in future after the bulletin is filmed a separate talk with either Brian or Angus would be very beneficial for Sports. Getting an opinion from a seasoned Journalist like Angus could only help the sports reporters with future packages.

On the whole the second semester of Winol was a fun experience and some brilliant packages were made. I think once he got into the swing of the things Sam made a good Sports Editor. For me personally though I often found myself a little frustrated, whereas before I had the simple task of turning up at the Ice Hockey and filming the game, this time I had to hunt for stories where often there was none. I tried my hand at presenting for the first time which was interesting. Up until that day I had never really been all that bothered with presenting but I knew it was something I'd have to try. It turned out that I did enjoy presenting and in my head I was very good at it, I saw myself in the TV monitors and thought that I could get used to this, unfortunately I was hit by a bit of reality when I actually saw my presenting and realised that maybe it wasn't for me. This view was also shared by many of my friends from home. I did however begin to feel myself becoming more and more comfortable whilst co-hosting the Sports Week radio show. Me and Harvey always met up the night before we were due to go on air and always made sure we had a lot of material to talk about and we had a lot of fun doing so. I had a good two semester run but I think when we return in September I'll be looking for a new role, one with a bit more freedom where I can be released from the shackles of sports 'Man is born free, but he is everywhere in chains'.

The Winol bulletin wasn't something I had to much to do with this time around but I always found the stories impressive. From my view from the back corner of Tab I could always see a lot of people fluttering around like they were desperately trying to make things come together. My contact with the Bulletin was pretty limited to just watching it and sometimes being involved in the discussions about stories etc. Sometimes I find myself in awe of the content of the Bulletin as it is always of the highest quality not dissimilar to what you'd watch at 5 o' clock on ITV. I'm proud to be part of Winchester News Online as it is starting to establish itself as the place to go locally for news. The online website has reached new heights, quashing any competition we had the previous semester. It is easy to see why as well, with the introduction of the Fashion section and The New Winchester Review, which both cater for smaller niches but are always being updated with high quality content. Our online presence has been largely down to Jason redesigning the site to give it a cutting edge professional look. He targeted search engines so that we would gather more readers using SEO's which has generated a lot views. Targeting social networks was also a recent development that paid off as people subscribed to Winol would be updated to new stories and linked directly to them. As far as stories went its hard to see past the Eastleigh by elections after Chris Humes resignation. That was a national story that happened to land right in our laps and for a week or so the usually mundane town of Eastleigh became the Political hotspot of Britain. Winol provided great coverage of this as well as a Winol special that everyone got involved in to help out despite the antisocial hours. That is one of the perks of the Winol experience, in times like this everyone is prepared to help out and there is a big sense of comradery. I thought Spence did a good job as Chief Reporter on this as he managed to gain access to people like Boris Johnson, massive figures in Politics, and get great interviews which is the type of thing that's really going to put Winchester News Online on the map.

In my first year I was battling with inner demons, Freud's ID, telling me that I needed to go to a different University, one that had more to offer on the social side of things. What kept me at Winchester was the fact that I was enrolled in the best Journalism course in the country and I am very glad my superego levelled my thoughts as at the end of the day I want to leave Winchester with the tools to go on and become a good journalist. For me personally I've always admired the work of Gonzo Journalists such as Louis Theroux and I think that Winol and myself would benefit from adding this type of journalism to our repertoire. I am often misunderstood as being lazy but often it is actually due to me losing my passion for a certain subject in this case Sports. I produce my best work when I am doing something I am passionate about and I feel that if I could produce short documentaries in my third year I would achieve my potential, which has been threatening to happen for a long time. In some ways my attitude towards the course is selfish as I want to take what I've learnt and use it for personal gain in the future. I have lots of ideas for features that I would like to pursue and as I am hungry to clear my name and prove that I'm not a dosser this would help greatly. I have spoken to Winol heroes such as Andrew Giddings and he told me that if I wanted to make things happen and achieve my goals studying at Winchester was the right decision. Now that I have a clear head I feel that I am in the right place to push forward and reach my goals. I am very thankful for the opportunity I have been given at Winchester by Chris and Brian and in my third and final year I just hope to prove they made the right decision by letting me on the course.