20 May 2012 So that's it, all over...

 
A week and a bit ago I submitted my final piece of university work. 4 Years all over and done. 

I cried. 

30 Jan 2012 A whole year later, the final stretch.

 
I've been busy, although it feels like I've not as busy as last year, there's still been a lot happening.

So this is my final semester at university, the last 1/8th of my 4 year university era. It's scary to think that this summer I'll be venturing out into the real world to get a job. Or at least spending all my time trying to get one.

Things that make the end of Uni feel very real and very close -



So yes, I've survived University, some hiccups along the way, but it's made it all the more sweeter to get this far.


30 Dec 2010 Long time no update yet again

 
I keep neglecting this, I mean to do it as it is a bit of a diary of uni life I can look back at one day (hopefully it will still exist when once I'm at that nostalgic age).
Its been a very lazy few days back at home home with the family, a lovely Christmas, got a wii fit for Christmas which should be good fun when I get back to Portsmouth, This year I really would like to try and resolve to make some changes in my life, but I know I only break them.
So next year, I want to be more organised, prepared, and sort out some kind of portfolio and a placement for next year.
About the placement, really don't know what I will do about this, I would love to work somewhere relevant for a year but I'm doubtful I will get something sorted out for it, plus all my university friends will have left by the time I get back to university for my last year, but a year back home would be helpful for focusing and building more experience and financially too. Plus my sister will be off to uni so there is a room back here I can move into. Its a tricky one, experience is the most important thing in the career I'm going into.

Personally lifes been good and bad, theres been some great moments and a few that I would rather forget, my friends this year are the best I've had, fake christmas was a particular highlight for me, 7 of us around our house just enjoying christmas together. I've also regretted something properly for once, usually I put everything down to it needing to happen for a reason and learning from it, but with this, I was just really stupid and naive, and I'm still not really free of it. This too shall pass as soon as I've found something else to care about.

Loving listening to my music again, I've been on a radio phase for a while now, but sitting here with spotify and some good speakers makes the world calm.

Off to help my dad cooking, we're having chinese food tomorrow for new years eve, he's doing the full works, crispy duck and everything. Wonderful!

Happy new year
xxxx

5 Sept 2010 Next year & NUS Summit

 
So I stayed in Portsmouth for the summer, lots of pros and cons for this, cons including no one being around other then a select few, but thats going to change very quickly as everyone heads back for the new uni year. Apprehensive about the new year, nervous excitement regarding the arrival of thousands of freshers to Pure FM and me being in charge of making sure everything happens right.

Got back from a two day NUS Media "summit" in London, which, with the different company and the more journalistic topics, was very entertaining and educational. Really great couple of days, met some really interesting people and got quite inspired as well as getting some confidence restored in what I'm doing. I've just opened my notebook, lets see if any of this is useful.

The first breakout session I went to was by Alister Bunkall, currently a news reporter on Sky News. He showed us a promo video which was a behind the scenes look at how the coverage of Gordon Brown resigning and Cameron becoming PM was handled. Which showed how much Twitter is now used to both collect and broadcast news. He was very honest about Sky compared to BBC and ITV, he explained that Sky News doesn't try to compete with the 10 O'Clock news on BBC, it would be wasted efforts, their focus is on being there when people want it, the audience should be able to tune in for 5 minutes anytime during the day and be up to speed with exactly what's going on. Also, tailoring news to whos watching at that time of the day, Lunchtime news is often more "housewives" friendly, health etc, whereas 10pm will be much more business and political driven.

The focus of news is being scattered onto multi platforms, likewise with all media now, he told us that there more and more being put online, on Sky News Radio (who took over from IRN providing radio stations all over the country with news bulletins, he also added that this is often the quickest way to get news out to the largest audience), they've also been looking at the rise of the App, (which he couldn't show us on his iPhone as he'd dropped it on a night out), and they also provide news to Billboards in London.

He told us that TV is often challenging to produce news on, you need a picture, which aren't always easy to come by (Reminded me of the wonderful News Blooper where they failed with a photo of Rodney Stanger http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NxvvdGBBm6E) Radio is much simpler, and just like papers, its quite simple to get quotes, just phone them.

The trick to getting good news stories is getting the best relationships built with the right people, so lots of PR smooching and the such, but only approach your parallels he said, the people you work with now, the people further down the ladder, will, some of them at least, end up higher in the ranks. He said that's how Robert Peston got to where he is now.

(I wasn't planning on writing so much detail! Thats two sides of a little notebook!)

Sunny Hundal - Liberal Conspiracy
Blogger background, no journalistic training.
He told us the way he found success, find a niche! Medias already so crowded, don't be re-churning out stuff people would have already read (which was a piece of advice re-churned out during a few of the sessions when referring to how Student Media should run), don't be general!

Once you have your niche, persevere, get your friends to read and comment, if others see comments, then they'll see it as a community, somewhere they will find people with similar interests, or opposing ones that will spark debate, and they'll want to be part of it.

Tap into existing networks, comment on them, with a link to your blog, similar places will have people looking for somewhere like your blog. Tell them about your new post, tell them why they want to read your blog.

He said that you should be offering people another perspective on things, Britain is made up of so many different identities, you'll always be able to offer a different perspective to someone. Identity's can be class, religion, country... all sorts of things. Again, find your niche.

He said "If I don't have anything interesting to say, I won't say anything", it keeps your blog interesting, don't write them rubbish just because they're asking for something to read. maintain your credibility.



Then we heard from Aaron Porter, ("The lord almighty himself" as he was referred to on the Friday), he talked to us about finances of uni's. He was very impressive, was very engaging and interesting.

The vote for increase of tuition fees during Tony Blairs government was the closest vote in the whole of his government, a swing of 3 votes the other way would have seen the opposite to what was decided.

Aaron told us that Part Time, Post Grad and International Students are still being asked to pay unregulated fees upfront, these are often the student that are the most vulnerable to the cost.

Women are 5% more likely to go to University, but still earn 12% less then Men.

Apparently there are 5% more September born students who go to uni then August, reasons for this were put down them being 11 months less developed when put into school then their September counterparts.

150,000 qualifies students missed out on places in University this year due to too few spaces.

Socio Economic has an impact on whether they go to uni near home or away from home, 22% of A band stay at home, 53% of DE stay at home.

Arts and Lingistic students only earn on average £34,000 and £71,000 respectively more than if they didn't go to University, does this even justify the £28,000ish cost of University?





Niall Couper - Interview Skills
Rules - Code of Conducts - NUJ & Press Complaints Committee
Be Accurate, Honesty, Respect Privacy, Protect Sources & Don't Discriminate

What you want to get out of the interview - Facts
What, Where, Who, When, Why, How... and Entertainment!

Reading Ages - Age who should be able to understand your piece
Guardian - 14 year old reading age
Sun - 8 year old reading age.

ALWAYS GET THE INTERESTING AND ENTERTAINING STORY NUGGETS.

Soundbites - Should be engaging quotes
Visual Imagery - Make images EG Second Fiddle, Chipping away & Drawing a line in the sand, cliches good, but not too many!
Succienct- Reading age, Jargonless
Clear
Punchy
Power of 3 - Three points flow nicely, just ask "can you give me 3 examples" to get these.

Preparing - Before the interview
Equipment - Pens, Paper, Phone, Recording Equipment, Batteries, SPARES of EVERYTHING
Judgement - Know how important the relationship is and how to approach person.

Relationships - Some examples
Long Term
EG - Council Worker, Police
Approach - Cosy, off the record briefing.

Novice
EG - The Witness
Approach - Bestmate

Media Pro
EG - Football Manager
Approach - Feed them lines, such as "so your formation was rubbish", they'll say yes of repeat it back.

The Death Knock
EG - Friends, family of death.
Approach - KNOW YOUR STUFF (Names, Age, Everything), but be sensitive, don't over stay welcome.

Someone with something to hide
EG - The politician (ONE OFFS!)
Approach - Rotteweiller (relentless like Paxman, works on Radio TV, not so well for print unless you get the answer) or Fluffy Assassin (Lure them into false security)

Prepare! Have a list of questions, if you loose your thread ask them a nonsense q to give you time to recatch, such as "where did you grow up"
Double and Triple check facts if you want to keep rep
Be correct and be sure if you are going to take risks
Don't feel the need to fill silence, let them do it, they'll open up



Writing for the Web - Sean Coughlan (BBC)
BBC is now structed by disipline and not by media,
Web articles should be 300 words or less (I've failed with this here!), Web news doesn't stop, but its interactive.

Is a blogger the same as a Journalist?
The amount of information people take in is huge, news comes to the journalist instead of finding it themselves, they process news from professionals whos job it is to provide the news, such as PR People

Should people have to pay for news (RE The Times Paywall), if they don't, online news can only be provided by the really rich who can afford to provide it free, journalist cost money. If only the rich can provide news then only the rich will provide news, becomes very monopoliesd and biased.

A lot of news is case studies and spokesperson, less and less actually asking people involved, whereas student media can get hold of students oppions from them very easily and should do!

Facebook helps cause the "Amplification Process", campaigns from facebook makes the news. Useful for Journalism, can get access to people really quickly.

Make people care about news! Even if it means "london lite"ing it to give papers to them direct. Exploit Niche (again, echoed a lot during the two days, but very true)

Get peoples names in the paper, they'll take a copy, and try and get in it again.

Tailor it to how they feel when they take it, if people pick up the paper when they are bored and stressed out from exams, offer them light hearted relief.




And that'll do, that's all the practical advice I got from the two days, hope it will be useful to you too.

Emma

25 Jun 2010 Updateage!

 
I've been really lazy with this, complete fail.
But yeah, today I'm continuing to pack for moving to the new house for the summer and next year. Its been an interesting year, one of the best ever, so many things have changed, not only the obvious things, just feeling much happier in general and everythings different. Pure FM has given me so much of the changes, now I'm going to be station manager, scary as! But I'm so so excited about it, plus... it's just amazing that I've got to this point, I would have never have thought I'd be in this position when I first stated this blog, or ever.

I'll have to post up to here more often, I'd love to do what my exhousemate that wrote a diary everyday and got it published into an actual book. Thats a bit extreme but also brilliant.

Right, back to packing and listening to Scott Mills Floorfillers.

1 May 2010 Fail

 
Its official, I've failed to update this once a month from the beginning of uni... In my defence its been really busy.
Its been the best of times, its been the worst of times (well not the worst, its been a bit rubbish at points, but not the worst)
Pretty much Pure FM stuff all the way though, its elections next Wednesday, little nervous, I felt confident about it and didn't want to because that's egotistical, but now I don't feel confident I wish I had that feeling back.
Recently I've found a new family in the Pure FM and Pugwash people, Pugwash being the newspaper which I maintain that I've been "adopted" by recently. I've written some things, which I've put up on my new website www.emmacorsham.co.uk (snazzy eh?).
I'm happy having all these people, its comfortable, theres usually someone up for coming out and I'm going to be living with a few of them next year now, so thats a lot better then how I currently feel with this house. It does mean I've been clutching on a bit tightly and going out whenever theres anyone going out, which has been damaging on myself as well as the bank balance. Its the first time I've felt happy with people for a while, so I'm making the most of it. Its also a great way to distract from the scariness of uni deadlines which I'm quite worried about at the moment, should be fine though.

Bring on the next few months :-)

P.S. I'm liking a few people at the moment, of much hushness, but for my own notes I will include this here. <3>

8 Feb 2010 Keele SRA Day

 
Nice 7am start from Portsmouth, we were the first to get there.
Was great company, with the usually faces who tend to appear at the training days and a couple of my favourites, including Matthew Hemmaty and Peter Nicholls.

These are my notes from the day.
I hope they are useful to you.



SESSION 1
Wise Buddah and Independant Radio - Becky and John from Wise Buddah
Wise Buddah does various things, talent agents, production.
Many broadcasters comission external companys to make programming for them
such as wise buddah, something else, unique, smooth operations
www.bbc.co.uk/comissioning



SESSION 2
Performing Rights (PRS) - Music Creators Rights (composers, songwriters, lyricists)
PPL - Label rights, recording studio

RSL - Restricted Service License
Sync rights - to associate work with a brand. E.G. Songs in adverts.
Have to apply to the musicians before useage, very expensive
Production music - Doesnt require sync rights. Allowed to be used for any brand, "mood music" Such as V Production

PRS License for RSL. £463 a year or £1235 with ads.
Internet radio requires a Limietd Online Exploitaion (LOEL)
Can be topped up for listen again/on demand (but PPL doesn't have a license which will allow this)
Interative webcasting (like Iplayer) £107



SESSION 3
Production - Neil Sloan
Forget normal Brain Storming, 3 alternatives

Realated world
Products that represent the target audience as starting point
Things about this product that make it sucessful
Apply these word/ideas to show, work these into features

Revolution
List what the show currently is
Then note along side what they could be instead

Random links
Take two random lines (such as lyrics)
Link them together to think of ideas


Always use SMART Targets for Aims & Objectives
S - Specific
M - Measurable
A - Achievable
R - Resourced
T - Timed

"Creativity if the life blood of our organisation" BBC



SESSION 4
Presenting
What makes great radio
Topical
Relateable
Know your audience -> Connect with them
Reflect life
Dont over analyse what you need to be to be a presenter! Be natural
Observational

Plan what your going into a link with (In), what you're ending the link with (Out) and length (Duration)

"Good presenting is the ability to bullshit well"

Practice analysising small things, build your confidence
Decide your topics, disect them with brainstorm to give you plenty things to say about them.

Restart what you're talking about for late comers
Restate topic from another approach, new opinions/info
Recycle topics which have worked later in the year with a new spin.

TAKE NOTES all the time! Anything you notice could make a link

One link = One idea/topic. Dont do more then that in one link

Always bring things to a close. Can be done in another short link

Always tease forward, but be honest. Never say your going to tell a hilarious story if its not going to be funny.


Tips for shutting up an interviewee
Point! Listeners wont see it, it may sound odd for a moment on air but listeners will apprieciate it. Never do a live interview with someone who are likely to babble on. Pre rec and edit out all their crap.

Use phrases like "hang on a minute" "what we really want to know is" to steer interview the right direction

Dont be afraid to own your own show, its yours. Make it your own.


Let silence happen. It can work too your advantage.

Say things 3 times for it to imprint with listeners, use clips of stuff again twice more throughout the show.

"Suck it in and turn it on!" even if you're feeling awful, its SHOW TIME!

Always SMILE, you can hear it, people will smile with you.

LOvE everything you play, dont be negative about the music even if you do hate it.

NO HATE! Put a positive spin on it.


5 tips
Topical
Relateable
Real
Entertaining
In Touch

Know the end! (Out)
Don't be an Identikit presenter, be yourself
Dont lie!
Be 110% of yourself.

Luck will get you your break, look for it
Rinse your connections
Make the most of every oppurtunity
Work on your demo!!
TRY!






See you at Conference!
:-D