NewsTrust.net Essay

http://newstrust.net/members/christopher-jordan-smith

This semester I was able to participate in the News Trust assignment in which we used the social networking site to enhance our journalistic skills.  This website was very helpful for me and it helped me further understand what it takes to be a successful journalist.  The Newstrust.net reviews helped me think like a journalist in many ways.  When reading the articles I was able to learn more about grammar and how to write a good story because the article on News Trust are all from a respectable source and from respectable journalists.  When reviewing the articles on News Trust we had to check for the important things that a good article should have such as whether or not the article is insightful, informative, well written, showed context, cited sources, enterprising, and relevant.  All of these are important to have and News Trust helped me look for examples of that and helped me think like a journalist.  I was able to read the articles and find out what quality journalism is and that it requires you to do the research, make the story interesting, as well as informing the public on the subject that you are writing about.  I think that bad journalism fails to do that and there were examples of bad journalism in some of the essays that I read on News Trust.  Throughout this process I tried to review many different types of stories.  Majority of the stories were not very interesting to me but I was able to learn a lot from them and eventually I learned to like some of the articles that were on News Trust.  When reviewing the articles I try to read it more than once so that I can understand it better and then I review it according the criteria that they have set.  I feel that the News Trust site is a good tool to use for people who want to become journalist.  It takes the social networking idea and uses it for articles from some of the most prestige news sources.  This site is something that I would recommend for others and using it has been a great experience.