I feel really guilty I never kept up with my blogging about my internship at NBC. As my time over at Channel 29 is coming to a close, I’m starting to wish that I had a record of how my skills and views about the media have changed during these past few months. I’ve been through a lot over there: drug busts, shootings, going to my first football game… Despite me going into the internship with my idealistic worldviews and aspirations of making a difference (like every young student of journalism that’s never had real experience), I quickly found myself melding into the system that is Big Media. Excitement over the big stories (Death/Destruction/Dismemberment), groaning over the soft stories (graffiti, development, finance)… The job became about the thrill of running after a story, finding a way around the police tape. And I lost touch with everything I’d originally hoped to glean from the experience - the connection with the community that allows you to truly tell stories about the people.

And this is why I loved my internship yesterday. Originally, I was scheduled to help out with coverage on a giant Meth bust that involved dozens of people and years of dealing. “Awesome!” I thought. That was the kind of excitement that kept my adrenaline going well past the 11 o’clock broadcast. 30 seconds later, however, I was reassigned to go ride along in the Santa Van - a group of Charlottesville Police Officers that dress up as Santa Clause and give out toys to kids in poor neighborhoods. Drug bust, or riding in a claustrophobic van for two hours… You can imagine which I would rather have been on.

But as soon as I got in the van with the officers (and an off-duty Daily Progress photog who just loves kids), my entire mindset changed. The van was completely filled with stuffed animals, toys, fruit, and candy canes; not to mention the four officers who had more Christmas spirit than any people I’d ever met. The NBC29 photographer I was with had the filming covered, so I was able to forget about the establishing shots and color balance and the Nat Package we were supposed to be creating. I wasn’t an intern for those few hours - I was just a kid helping Santa help the community.

And it made me remember why I had first become interested in the media, in journalism. It reminded me of what journalists are supposed to do. Because it’s not just about “reporting the news” - or at least the “news” we tend to concentrate on. It’s about giving a voice to those who speak softly; it’s about telling the stories of the people that make the world run, whether it’s on a global or local scale. And most importantly, it’s meant to be a service to the people. Not a business, not an international corporation - journalists are meant to be public servants, helping the communities in which they live by opening up lines of communication between its residents.

That’s what we were doing, riding on that Santa Van, watching the kids literally run up to us, screaming out of excitement to see Santa. To see the love and care that the citizens of Charlottesville are capable of.

We never ended up running that story about the Santa Van - three deaths and a major meth bust bumped it out of the lineup.

So a little more information about my previous post:

Carnegie Mellon has great film and computer science programs, and so does Chapel Hill; NYU, on the other hand, has the Tisch School for film, which would pretty much be my dream program. *sigh* Welcome to the next year of my life…

I wrote that almost a year ago, when I did a post about how the next year of my life was going to be just about as horrible as possible. I’m glad to say that the past year of my life has definitely not been as horrible and stressful as I once imagined it to be. In fact, I’d say it was pretty darn good.

But pretty much exactly a year after I went onto CollegeBoard.com and tried to find the colleges I’d be applying to over the subsequent year, my entire college-search process has finally come to a close. Friday afternoon, after feeling like throwing up all day waiting for it to come, I got a letter from New York University, telling me I’d been accepted into their Film and Television program (that “dream program” I’d been talking about).

So, Ima goin to NYU!

I’m still waiting for everyone else at school to start getting really mad at me for being done with the whole college thing, right when they’re frantically trying to get their applications in. High schoolers can be vicious…

Need I say more?

Over the past year or so, I’ve experienced Facebook’s “relationship status” from many different points of view. First, I was on the oblivious end of a profile who’s owner - according to Facebook - was single (but actually in a relationship). Later on, my first boyfriend claimed he was single for the first month of our relationship, since not everyone knew he was gay. My profile has stated that I was single when I’d actually been in relationships for weeks - sometimes it would just say “In a relationship,” whereas other times it would specify with who. And I’m not even getting into the options of “It’s complicated” “In an open relationship” and “Looking for whatever I can get” which so many people haphazardly throw upon their profiles.

I started thinking about this yesterday when Shawn Decker asked me about the change he recently noticed in my relationship status on Facebook. “Ah, yes…” I thought. You and about 85% of my 292 Facebook friends probably noticed that… Now, I definitely won’t say that’s creepy, and it’s not like I mind, either. I just find it incredibly interesting how Facebook has changed the way we interact with each other. And it’s not just teenagers, either - it seems like everyone from 14 to 40 has a Facebook now. And they can all be notified at the click of a button that “Michael Strickland is now listed as in a relationship” or “Michael Strickland and Oliver Twist have ended their relationship.” Because I obviously wanted the latter plastered over 292 feed walls…

And not only that - but can you imagine me trying to come out to 292 people? Given, many of them would likely have been informed even 20 years ago by word of mouth, but what about my DC friends? My friends that don’t go to CHS? My friends in their 30s and 40s? Even my cousins! Without Facebook, not many people would actually know (unless, of course, I’m far more popular and gossip worthy than I thought).

I’ve written about this before - I just really like thinking about the impact of the internet on face-to-face social interaction - and I’m certainly not saying it’s a bad thing (most of my accomplishments have been digital in some nature). But in the mean time, before I end up writing my college thesis paper on this topic or something, here’s some interesting articles I found on this topic. I like the last one for no other reason than it keeps using the phrase “the Facebook”:

Love in the Age of Facebook
Til Facebook breakup do us part
Facebook Break-Up Tips for Relationships that Never Existed
Crossing Boundaries: Identity Management and Student/Faculty Relationships on the Facebook

So guys, I think it might be about time for another Charlottesville Bloggers Meet-Up. Personally, I had a lot of fun at the last one back in May (has it really been over six months?), and if there’s still interest out there, I’d love to have another one of these things - check in with my fellow bloggers, and what not. I’d be happy to organize it again, but I want to give a chance for someone else to put it together and get all the attention (not to mention pageviews) if they want. Do something similar (get a big table at Mudhouse/Java Java/etc. and talk about random geeky blogging tips), or be creative an come up with something entirely different - it’s up to you! So, the offer is out there for anyone brave enough to organize it [it’s not that much work] - otherwise, I’ll go ahead and try to set something up. Let me - and your local blogging friends - know!

Slash, it’s my first post on my new laptop! Sorry, Mac users, it’s a Dell with Vista. For some reason, people are still surprised when they find out I’m a PC guy, like I’m too cool for that, or something… Well that’s incorrect. I’m *not* too cool for PCs. There! Hmm, that sounded a bit less flattering than intended… Ah well. For those of you that care, it’s an XPS M1730, and it’s a back breaker, weighing in at 12 lbs. Yes, I’m crazy for agreeing to carry that around - but I loved the 1920×1200 screen too much to say no… And honestly, I’m getting used to Vista very quickly. Aside from a few of my codecs not installing properly, I haven’t had any problems thus far.