Feature Writing Final

Well, college is pretty much over. I'm stumbling through my last day as we speak, trying to churn out one last story for my public affairs reporting class. But I just turned in my second-to-last story, for my feature writing class, and I thought I'd share it with you, my faithful readers (just a figment of my imagination, I know).

The story is a "News Feature" about the illegal downloading issue on college campuses and the actions of the Recording Industry Association of America against student offenders. It's not my best work, but I think it reads fairly well, I guess, and, well, I got it done, and that's all that matters. For any who are interested, here's the full text, all 1,186 words.

When junior journalism major Liz Granger returned to NIU after winter break her sophomore year, she couldn’t get her computer to connect to the internet. It must have been some glitch with the network in her dorm, she thought.
She brought her laptop to the NIU library to try to log on to their wireless network.
Nothing.
She took it to local coffee shops that provided free wireless internet access.
Nothing.
After a month and a half of this frustration, Granger took her computer to NIU’s Information Technology Services (ITS), hoping for a diagnosis. What they told her had nothing to do broken wireless cards, bad Ethernet cables or fried hard drives. ITS had disabled her computer’s internet capabilities at the behest of the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), who caught Granger illegally downloading copyrighted music.
This was the first time in Granger’s life that she felt like the bad kid. A life-long teacher’s pet and frequent winner of the best-behaved student award, she was finally caught with her hand in the cookie jar.
“It kind of made me feel like a criminal,” she said. “I don’t ever get in trouble.”
Granger was one of millions of people who acquire music for free through a system known as peer-to-peer file sharing. Users get the music from the open hard drives of other users, rather than from a central server. You get music from other users, other users get music from you.
To successfully connect her computer to the internet again, Granger would have to go to the office of judicial affairs and sign a document affirming that she was aware of the consequences if she were to get caught downloading music again.
So what are those consequences, exactly? Direct legal action from the RIAA.
The organization has been aggressively targeting college campuses in its campaign to eradicate illegal downloading practices over the last year. Over 100 NIU students have received RIAA pre-litigation letters. The letters give the students two options: prove your innocence in court, or settle out of court to the tune of $3,000.
No one at NIU has chosen the first option. In fact, only one of the thousands contacted by the RIAA has actually brought her case to court. The jury in that case found the defendant guilty of downloading the music and hit her with $222,000 in damages.
The RIAA says that college students are among the worst offenders of illegal downloading practices.
“Universities are being targeted because that's where piracy is taking place in the most rampant way,” said RIAA CEO and Chairman Mitch Bainwol in a DeKalb Daily Chronicle article.
Despite all the bad news for illegal downloading offenders, the practice persists, and even Granger doesn’t think that will change soon.
“I think people are always going to do it,” she said. “I don’t think college students want to pay or think they should have to pay.”
Granger’s words underscore an important phenomenon about mp3-hording college students: they feel an entitlement to any music that they want. This entitlement, of course, has no basis in copyright law and little basis in the capitalist system, but it is very real to the students who get their music for free online, and it is very unlikely that they will be surrendering it any time soon.
“They’re going to have to start suing a lot more people if they want to make a significant change,” Granger said.
Senior English major Andy Mitchell has downloaded tens of thousands of songs illegally. A musician himself, he feels neither guilty nor afraid about the consequences of his downloading activity.
“I’m not really worried about them finding out,” he said. Again, it’s the sense of entitlement that keeps him feeling safe: “It’s kind of my own moral belief that they’re wrong and that makes me less afraid of them.”
Donald Henderson, director of the NIU Students’ Legal Assistance Office, has spoken with and advised some of the students who have been hit with letters from the RIAA.
As an attorney, Henderson said he really couldn’t comment on whether or not the RIAA is “right” or “wrong” in its actions. As far as he is concerned, the Copyright Act is the law of the land – the black-and-white, cut-and-dry rules. It says the unauthorized reproduction and distribution of music is illegal. To him, the issue couldn’t be clearer.
“It’s unmistakable that there is this comprehensive statute that is intended to protect the rights of creative people… [the] law is enforced in courts across the country every day,” he said.
He did acknowledge, however, the general sense that things are getting out of hand. Once big corporations start suing thousands of college students, you know something isn’t quite right. How to rework the copyright laws, he couldn’t say.
Mitchell and Granger agree that things will have to change soon. Granger’s solution is of the simple variety.
“Mostly I think it should be legal and they should just put up with it,” she offered.
Granger is a typical poor college student, working part time jobs and saving up for a car. She can’t make room for music in her budget. Now that she’s scared out of her wits to download music for free, there is a void of new, exciting music in her life.
The music on her mp3 player is from her days as an illegal downloader – almost a year ago now – and it hasn’t withstood the test of time.
“Everything that’s in there is kind of old and stale and I’ve listened to it a thousand times,” she said.
After getting used to accessing all the music she wanted for absolutely free, she feels paralyzed, not sure whether to start paying for music, asking friends to download CDs for her, or try her luck again downloading. Thus, the copyright law should change for her, her logic goes.
Mitchell’s proposal didn’t offer much more in terms of practicality.
“I’m just hoping eventually the copyright rules will be rewritten,” he said.
Kelly Sill, applied artist in the NIU jazz studies program, has mixed feelings about the RIAA’s practices. As a full-time professional musician, every penny he makes from a CD sale counts, and the thought of downloaders acquiring music without paying for it troubles him. However, the RIAA doesn’t get a whole lot of sympathy from him either.
“They’re trying to use fear to get people to not use their stuff. I’m not a big fan of using fear. However, it is their stuff.”
How long the public will be able to put up with the scare tactics is another question. College students show little sign of responding to it as of yet.
Mitchell is holding out that things will change soon enough.
“The way people listen and distribute music has become so crazy that you kind of have to figure out a new business model rather than shake down people who don’t buy into your old one.”
That new model seems as elusive as ever, and the very people who would be responsible for heralding it – the RIAA – continue fighting the change with every pre-litigation letter they send out.

Shirazette Tinnin article

Here's a story I wrote about NIU jazz studies student Shirazette Tinnin, who just secured the drum spot in the prestigious all-female jazz group Sisters in Jazz.

It didn't get published in the print edition of todays Star, since the school was closed due to weather and security problems. It is, however, online for your viewing pleasure.

Candidate Match Game

I haven't written an article for The Northern Star in a little while, so my blog has been neglected as of late. I apologize, but I have a little treat for you today.

I took a little time out of my busy writing schedule today to take a little test created by USA Today called the "Candidate Match Game." It asks you multiple choice questions and then compares your answers with the ones they think the various candidates would have given. It was fun to do, and, honestly, was probably the first time I've given more than a fleeting thought to some of the biggest issues involved in the elections.

The test covers the main areas of 1)The Iraq War 2)Immigration 3)Health Care. It also includes a smattering of questions on topics like gay marriage and more general questions about what you look for in a candidate.

The trouble was that oftentimes I agreed with more than one of the multiple choice answers. It tells me I "match" with one candidate more than another, but I also dig what the other candidate is saying.

Anyway, it was interesting to take, and very informative because you can see the positions for every candidate, not just the ones you are "matched" with.

For those of you dying to know, I was ultimately matched with Chris Dodd, John Edwards and Hilary Clinton, matching with all three of them on 7 of the 11 questions. I thought Obama was my man, but we only hooked up on 5 of 'em, though, as I mentioned earlier, I still agreed with his answers on some of the other questions, even though we didn't pick exactly the same one.

I was least matchy with Ron Paul and Tom Tancredo, only answering one question the same with each. Guess I'll stay away from those guys.

Another Art Review

Who do they think I am, Robert Hughes? I wrote this story about the current faculty exhibition at NIU.

Again, I didn't really know how to approach it, and I probably should have taken a "newsy" angle and researched how the reception to the exhibition has been thus far (it has been running for a few weeks already). This might have included interviews from faculty with their art on display, quotes from students checking out the exhibition, and maybe input from the university's president about what an exhibition like this does to further the school's positive image and get people out to DeKalb.

Instead I took an hour to check out the exhibit myself, take notes silently, and pretend like I really am an art critic.

Track of the Day 5

TOTD 5. I felt like I had to return to jazz after my foray into popland with Rufus on TOTD 4. I took my brother Cooper's suggestion and went with "Cherokee" by Clifford Brown and Max Roach from their "Study in Brown" album. The song features, I think, one of the best bebop trumpet solos on record.

Latin Jazz and Percussion Ensemble Story

I wrote a story about the Latin Jazz and Percussion Ensemble concerts taking place this week. I wasn't quite sure what to focus on with the story, because there a lot of elements: two different concerts, two different sets of music and different sets of students, and, most importantly, a big, important guest artist, Valerie Naranjo, percussionist with the Saturday Night Live band.

So anyway, I just wrote the story kind of plain and newsy, inserting little tidbits of info I deemed notable. Hopefully it'll do the job and get some folks out to the concerts. I'll be there.

Jazz Ensemble Story

Here's a story I wrote about this fall's incarnation of the NIU Jazz Ensemble. The story could have been more newsy, telling folks to come out to the concert to hear some great jazz, etc. but I decided to go a feature route, focusing on the new director and the new aesthetic he brought to the band. Of course, to do this issue justice the article would have been about five times as long, but whatcha gonna do?

I also didn't have room to include info about the news aspect that most people probably thought was most prescient: the guest artist on the Jazz Ensemble's tour is renowned drummer Peter Erskine. So instead, I included a little "sidebar" article about Erskine that's only in the online edition of the newspaper.

Hope you like it.