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.