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Local News Lunch & Learn


GRGridGirl

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Thursday, April 17, 2008

11:45am - 1pm

WZZM 13

645 3 Mile Rd. NW

Grand Rapids, MI 49544

  • We'll watch the noon newscast in action

  • Tour the station

  • Lunch & open discussion about local news coverage with news director

Please RSVP here on this thread or send me a PM. There is only room for 20 people for this event, so please make sure you can attend the event when you RSVP.

Thank you,

TripleG

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Hmm, not sure I'd trust myself to go. I might start asking questions like:

"Why do you have to personalize everything? I don't care what your empty-headed opinion is, just give me the facts!".

Or saying things like:

"Do you really think that story about little Jimmy falling out of the tree is worth taking up time you could be dedicating to real news?"

Or even things like:

"Did nobody ever tell you to - if you feel it necessary - introduce yourself before you launch into the conversation? Telling me the headline then saying 'Hello, my name is Pooty McScooty and here is the news...' is not the way to start a broadcast.

Sorry....[soapbox-off] ;)

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Hmm, not sure I'd trust myself to go. I might start asking questions like:

"Why do you have to personalize everything? I don't care what your empty-headed opinion is, just give me the facts!".

Or saying things like:

"Do you really think that story about little Jimmy falling out of the tree is worth taking up time you could be dedicating to real news?"

Or even things like:

"Did nobody ever tell you to - if you feel it necessary - introduce yourself before you launch into the conversation? Telling me the headline then saying 'Hello, my name is Pooty McScooty and here is the news...' is not the way to start a broadcast.

Sorry....[soapbox-off] ;)

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I hadn't mentioned this before, but WZZM is looking to "partner" with UP-GR to help build their "Community Network" and help bring more traffic to UP-GR. I think this is a generous gesture by WZZM to open up their studios to a tour and lunch for us. It's not every day (for most people) that you get a chance to watch a live newscast and see the technology and work that goes into a local affiliate's newscast. It's amazing how much back-end work goes into bringing just several hours of live TV programming to the masses. Thanks to Rachel Lee, Tim Geraghty (WZZM) and Stanton Tang (WZZM) for putting this together.

I hope a lot of people can make this.

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Great... trailer moms in Sparta will now commenting on this site. Why partner with a station that gets beat in the ratings by a news team in Kalamazoo? Just because they planted a flag at the top of RiverHouse doesn't mean they're "on top" of what's going on locally. :P

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Great... trailer moms in Sparta will now commenting on this site. Why partner with a station that gets beat in the ratings by a news team in Kalamazoo? Just because they planted a flag at the top of RiverHouse doesn't mean they're "on top" of what's going on locally. :P
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I don't want to go into too much detail until things are finalized a bit more. But trust me, I had the same concerns about diluting the quality of UP-GR. WZZM's website gets something like 500,000 unique visitors a month, which is about 15x the amount that we get. More trolls maybe, but definitely more exposure.

I'd really love it if someone would spearhead this whole thing. If anyone is interested in managing this (without compensation, I may add), let me know and I can share some more details.

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You're obviously the person most capable of calling the shots here, but is "more exposure" really what UP-GR is striving for? Take a look at WOOD and WZZM's forums sometime. Not that I see UP getting anywhere near that level, but more people coming to the site isn't always a good thing. And do we really want a formal affiliation with local media? Again, not questioning your judgment, but it'd be nice to hear more about this and open it up to discussion.
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I'm with PBJ, we REALLY don't want the kind of discussion that occurs on MLive and WZZM. RapidGrowth is WAY more up UP's alley than 13. It's not a question of MAYBE more trolls, there will be more trolls and consequently more work for GRDad/JoeDowntown/etc.

If you're looking for a team, personally, I'd prefer you looked where PBJ suggests, not to mainstream media. The non-mainstream-ness of this forum is what we like about it.

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What others said.

As an independent forum, with no reliance on local advertising, we can be honest (sometimes brutally) and forthright. Also, I believe that our accuracy is higher than the "whoops, wrong photo" corrections typical of the mainstream.

(Admittedly I do not regularly read the forums on the news sites. Recently spent some time on the Freep's due to the Kwame saga, and can safely state that those posters are of a completely different caliber than we typically get on here.)

I like the idea of partnering with RapidGrowth or GRNow (they're already on here).

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Due to the timing, this whole Lunch and Learn .... Which might say who needs who more?

PBJ might have some good points there. Although, I would think that our site is very special interest and niche so that would discourage most people from posting and signing up. TONS of Grand Rapids and Downtown haters on those Internets, though. If you go to the news sites you can discuss anything without much retribution from moderators. Of course here, not even Tingley had a chance and he went on a tirade via his blog.

After hearing that it was WZZM as the partner I investigated their online forum. The kind of stuff of discussion on there is ridicules to the n'th degree. For example, there was a thread discussing the horrible death of a young girl who was mutilated by multiple cars on US 131. On their site, members were positing hate against her ethnicity and questioning her citizenship while exclaiming the parents should pay for damages incurred on motorists vehicles. A few other threads featured racists and sexists remarks I wouldn't tolerate hearing face to face from someone. Those aren't the caliber of members I want to see joining our clique. Some here have spent two to three years helping to build and encourage this website for the hope it would be a place to effect change. Could that all be ruined by more exposure?

About the only good I can see happening is putting some community issues in the spotlight that are important to most of our members i.e. public schools, transit, environment, downtown retail, etc. That's partly why I signed on to the whole idea.

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Due to the timing, this whole Lunch and Learn .... Which might say who needs who more?

PBJ might have some good points there. Although, I would think that our site is very special interest and niche so that would discourage most people from posting and signing up. TONS of Grand Rapids and Downtown haters on those Internets, though. If you go to the news sites you can discuss anything without much retribution from moderators. Of course here, not even Tingley had a chance and he went on a tirade via his blog.

.....

Some here have spent two to three years helping to build and encourage this website for the hope it would be a place to effect change. Could that all be ruined by more exposure?

About the only good I can see happening is putting some community issues in the spotlight that are important to most of our members i.e. public schools, transit, environment, downtown retail, etc. That's partly why I signed on to the whole idea.

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This is not about trying to feed people to UP, but more like Rizzo said to put more community issues in the spotlight.

Nothing is even set in stone on the partnership, so put your money where your mouth is and show up to the L&L and ask these questions or voice your comments in person.

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This is not about trying to feed people to UP, but more like Rizzo said to put more community issues in the spotlight.

Nothing is even set in stone on the partnership, so put your money where your mouth is and show up to the L&L and ask these questions or voice your comments in person.

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