If you ever had a doubt about how important it is for your
newsroom to be able to tap into user-generated content, the Virginia Tech story
will change that.
Look at this collection from CNN's I-Report.
Students text messaged one another while hiding under desks.
Read
some of those messages here.
In stories like this, journalists have to go to new places
to look online to find students talking to one another and sharing their
stories. Some
students are gathering on Facebook. CollegeMedia.com has a
collection of cell pictures taken by students. More
than 150 tribute groups have formed on Facebook.
Other students went right to their blogs
and wrote about what they saw.
When I went to MTV.com, I found this collection:
MTV also
is building connections to the college community through this blog page, on
which students can leave messages about the shooting.
Resources for Covering the Shooting
The Casey Journalism Center on Children and Families pulled together a collection including:
Trauma source at Virginia Tech: Psychology professor Russell T.
Jones has expertise in psychological effects of trauma and natural disasters on
children. He has spoken at previous CJC conferences. 540.231.5934;
rtjones@vt.edu.
The American Psychological Association also created a brochure to make young people aware of the "Warning
Signs of Youth Violence."
Profile of Rampage Attackers
In
2000, The New York Times tracked the
backgrounds of more than 100 rampage killers to see if a profile emerged. That
story said:
They are not drunk or high on drugs. They are not racists or
Satanists, or addicted to violent video games, movies or music.
Most are white men, but a surprising number are
women, Asians and blacks. Many have college degrees, but most are unemployed.
Many are military veterans.
They give lots of warning and even tell people explicitly what
they plan to do. They carry semiautomatic weapons they have obtained easily
and, in most cases, legally.
They do not try to get away. In the end, half turn their guns on
themselves or are shot dead by others. They not only want to kill, they also
want to die.
That is the profile of the 102 killers in 100 rampage attacks
examined by The New York Times in a computer-assisted study looking back more
than 50 years and including the shootings in 1999 at Columbine
High School in Littleton,
Colo., and one by a World War II veteran on a
residential street in Camden,
N.J., in 1949. Four hundred
twenty-five people were killed and 510 people were injured in the attacks. The
database, which primarily focused on cases in the last decade, is believed to
be the largest ever compiled on this phenomenon in the United States.
We are always looking for your great ideas. Send Al a few sentences and hot links.
Editor's
Note: Al's Morning Meeting is a compendium of ideas, edited story
excerpts and other materials from a variety of Web sites, as well as
original concepts and analysis. When the information comes directly
from another source, it will be attributed and a link will be provided
whenever possible. The column is fact-checked, but depends upon the
accuracy and integrity of the original sources cited. Errors and
inaccuracies found will be corrected.
