JMSC 6070 Online Journalism Bootcamp

STOP PRESS: BOOTCAMP DELAYED UNTIL MONDAY AUG 25 DUE TO TYPHOON:

WHERE AND WHEN:

The first JMSC6070 Bootcamp starts on Saturday, August 23, Monday, August 25, 2008, at 9 am. You should have received an e-mail from Iky Choi telling you whether you are in Bootcamp A or Bootcamp B.

Those of you attending Bootcamp A should muster at the DM Lab in time to be ready to go at 9 am. Your Web Skills portion of the bootcamp will be on Aug. 25, 26, and 27th.

Students assigned to Bootcamp B should go to the Foundation Chamber for the Video portion of Boot Camp. Your Web Skills portion will run from Aug. 28-29, and Aug 31.

JMSC6070 is a for-credit course. In order to receive a passing grade, attendance and participation are mandatory.

EQUIPMENT:

Those who own a digital camera or camcorder are requested to bring it along (with the appropriate USB cable / card-reader) because we will be taking, adjusting and uploading photos as part of the course.

Those who own a thumb drive (also known as a flash disk) should also bring it along; files stored on JMSC computers are cleared every night and you cannot save your work beyond the end of that day’s class.

It is not a requirement of the course to provide such equipment, however you are advised to obtain a thumb drive if you do not already own one.

CONTACTS:

A Google group has been established at http://groups.google.com/group/jmsc6091-fall08

This is the official e-mail list for students attending the Online Journalism Workshop (JMSC6091) in Fall 2008.

You should have received an invitation to join this group over the weekend. If you have already accepted your invitation to join the group, great! If you haven’t seen your invitation in your e-mail inbox, please check your spam folder. If it’s still not there, please click the link above and ask to join the group.

Please keep in mind that when you reply to e-mails sent to the group, your reply will also be sent to the whole group. If you want to contact somebody privately make sure it is that person’s e-mail address in the “to” field – not the address of this group.

You can send and receive e-mails to this group without logging into the Google Groups interface. However, if you need to access your account online to change settings, you don’t need a Gmail address – use the same e-mail address through which you are receiving this e-mail.

Please log on before boot camp starts and check that you have been approved.

COURSE OBJECTIVES:

The aim of this intensive course is to ensure that everyone is equipped with the basic practical web skills necessary to take and fully benefit from the JMSC 6091 Online Journalism Workshop.

Some of you will already have some or all of the skills. If so, can we urge you to be generous with your knowledge and share tips and experience with the class. This is a fast moving industry and is in a constant state of development.

Those who don’t, please do not be shy about asking for help or clarification. That’s what we are here for.

REQUIREMENTS:

This is a practical lab class. You are required to attend all your sessions unless specifically excused. You will be required to complete assigned tasks in class. These tasks cannot be completed or made up outside of class. Therefore, if you miss class you get a “zero” for the day’s in-class assignment. Exceptions will be considered in cases of legitimate personal emergencies.

Grading scale (per class): 0 – not done/not present; 1 – incomplete; 2 – completed satisfactorily.

COURSE OUTLINE

We will kick off by examining the web-based tools to be utilised on the course. These will include, but are not necessarily limited to:

Blogs:

Every student will set up a weblog (blog) that will be used throughout the course to collate, submit and store your work.

Before class, please give some thought to the NAME of your blog, bearing in mind it is a publicly accessible document. For teaching purposes, instructors must be able to identify the blog’s owner so you should choose a name or nickname that we can relate to you. However, you may wish to consider whether or not you wish to use your full name.

Wikis:

We will be using a wetpaint wiki at http://jmsc6091-fall08.wetpaint.com/ throughout the course of the semester to share information and collaborate on stories.

If you are a student in the Tech Skills Bootcamp, please set up your account on this wiki so that you can log in and start contributing!

Other:

Other technologies to be addressed in the course include:

• Adobe Photoshop (photo and imaging software)
• Fire FTP / WS-FTP (File Transfer Protocol)
• Dreamweaver (web site authoring)
• Audacity (audio software)
• Google Newreader (RSS aggregator)
• We will use Firefox as our default browser.

The class website for both JMSC6070 (Web Skills) and JMSC9091 – on which your syllabus, requirements, assignments, class notes, assigned readings, and other essential resources for the entire semester will be posted – is currently under construction. We will unveil it to you by Saturday morning.

Good luck and we look forward to meeting you all in the DM Lab.

Rebecca, Kevin and Diane