Monday, Oct 10

I keep finding myself reading articles about the media, whether it be how the media is affecting the protests and rebellions all over the world or how the media affects education and children, etc. Today I chose to focus on an article from the Business Day section (a section I rarely pay attention to as I mentioned in an earlier blog simply because I never really find articles that I find interesting in it, but lately I have). The article "A Protest's Ink-Stained Fingers" was about the Occupy Wall Street demonstration in Zuccotti Park where demonstrators have created a newspaper and have been handing it out to city-goers on Wall Street. The Occupied Wall Street Journal is a four page document of the demonstration which began almost a month ago. The part of this article I really liked was a few paragraphs in where the writer discussed how uncommon print newspapers are becoming but how this particular publication has been "eagerly received" in the city. The following paragraph is what I really liked about the article. It reads: "Forgive an old newspaper hack a moment of sentimentality, but it is somehow reassuring that a newspaper still has traction in an environment preoccupied by social media. It makes sense when you think about it: newspapers convey a sense of place, of actually being there, that digital media can’t. When is the last time somebody handed you a Web site?" How true is that? I thought the writer did a great job of creating a little bit of sarcasm here about handing someone a web site, but maybe I only found that comment amusing because I, too, suffer with technology and its advances. All in all, it's obvious how present the media is on our lives and this story was just another example of it but in a new, refreshing way because it showed how this small publication is doing well in a time when everything seems to be going paperless.