Should we expand UMASS football?

"Football Delusions in Amherst" was featured in the Hampshire Gazette a few days ago and honestly, I agree with the majority of what it said. The columnist talked about how most universities who spend a lot of money in their football divisions end up using it as a means of gambling. He compared it to a game of craps and said UMASS could never afford it. He's right. UMASS has never been a huge football school, if anything people's favorite sport here would be hockey. Building a new stadium for football would be a waste of money and cause a lot of trouble for students already struggling to make ends meet financially. The columnist says if they were to build the stadium, the university would have to charge more in student fees to compensate for such a vast amount of money spent on it. However, I don't agree with a couple things mentioned in the article. He quotes a man saying the campus is run down and dangerous, but besides some construction, the campus is in good shape. We could potentially afford it, but to put so much money into something that lacks the fan base necessary to make it worth while, it would only make the school lose money.

CBS news vs. FOX news: protests on wall street

CBS and FOX have always been, in my opinion, on completely different wavelengths when it comes to news. CBS tends to deliver the news without much fluff; while FOX news usually adds in a lot of side comments that take away from the story. Both channels did stories about the protests on Wall Street. CBS started by talking about an interview on 60 minutes and showed a clip to support the argument that people should support big businesses instead of protesting against them. They went on to interview a democratic senator from Wisconsin who also held to the argument. He did something different though, he acknowledged the reasoning behind why people should be protesting but still managed to be convincing that people shouldn't be protesting against GE.

Eventually in the interview he even admitted he didn't actually know what exactly people were protesting about, but he supported how "American" they were being. FOX news on the other hand started off by making a joke in "Envy Driving Wall Street Protests?" They didn't really seem to take the matter seriously and showed pictures that looked down upon protestors. They showed pictures of a man relieving himself on a cop car and the anchors had a sarcastic tone throughout the entire story.

         The difference in the quality of reporting and respect for the protesting was obvious. FOX news took the matter lightly and drained all seriousness from it. CBS took more time to give viewpoints other than their own, which to me gave them a better resulting broadcast. FOX really only showed their side of what was going on. They were very opinionated and their jokes and sarcasm made it seem unprofessional. Personally, I don’t watch FOX news for this reason. I would rather get the facts from an unbiased source and make my own opinions instead of hearing someone else’s.

"When Scientists Fail, It's Time To Call In The Gamers"

Journalism in the form of radio can be entertaining and sometimes more informative than news print. I found this radio broadcast on National Public Radio and decided to listen to it, at first, for its title. "When scientists fail, call in the gamers," it sounded exciting and interesting so I gave it a shot. That's one thing that no matter what form of media it is, is a constant lure. As it turns out, this broadcast was about scientists creating a three dimensional game that helps figure out the correct way to form a protein. The game was called "Fold It," and helped scientists predict the structure of a protein that causes aids in monkeys. This new technology can also be used to find new drugs and vaccines for other diseases such as the flu. This would be an interesting story no matter what means of media used, but the real hook was that in the beginning of the broadcast they played the sound effects from the video game. This really sucked me in and made me curious about the actual methods and outcomes in the game. The tones and inflections used by the host and the scientists who were interviewed really helped paint a picture of how important this milestone is. This importance may not have come out as easily in a newspaper article and in a newspaper article it is harder to pick out the humor and excitement in what they are saying. The scientists joked about how they popped open a bottle of champaign with colleagues over Skype, and their vocal inflections gave a better image of the situation than a newspaper could have. The broadcast was also a lot different than television broadcasts. On television, they can simply show you a model of what they are talking about and not have to go into as much detail, but on the radio they need to give you a mental image of what they are talking about. That's exactly what the scientists who were interviewed did. They compared the game to a three dimensional tetris, and by doing that it made it seem more familiar than just seeing something. All in all, I think the radio broadcast was informative and gave me a pretty good understanding of the technology they were talking about. I didn't have to rewind it and figure out what they were trying to say, because it was clear the first time and put into simple enough terms so that everyone listening could follow along.