Kevin Goldberg’s presentation on “The 7 Deadly Sins” of journalism really floored me. Who knew that words such as allegedly could be used incorrectly?! I was surprised to learn how doubling checking every word and implication is of the utmost importance when writing stories. Goldberg also surprised me when he discussed the over-use of the Fair Use act and Creative Commons. I must admit that I am guilty of relying on them because I know I can in college because it’s for educational purposes. However, the real world doesn’t allow for that kind of leeway, so I’m trying to mentally prepare for the legal hoops I’m going to need to jump through to convince people to let me use some of their work when it’s necessary.

Applying the topics Goldberg covered in his lecture to our group blogs, I’ve taken my own photos of the construction for Campus Drive to avoid using copyrighted materials. However, I think I am still going to use the diagrams from the university and the county but credit them directly. I believe this will make our story more credible because we are drawing information from the people who designed the project– I’m not simply creating my own interpretation of what it will look like.