This article provides an interesting way into the tensions between Palestinian Arabs and Jewish Israelis by getting at the issue on a personal level, through the likeable character of Charka. It gives us an opportunity to look at these issues not just in terms of the extremists, but in terms of the average citizen who really desires peace. On one hand this is good journalism because it brings a relevant issue to light in a way that people can connect to on a personal level. However, there are a couple of grammatical errors that make the article lose credibility for me, such as the sentence "The settlement are sitting on top of a giant bomb." This is not a bad example of adaptation to online journalism, because it has an image ... More »

Of the eight characteristics that Ryan Thornburg identifies in his book, "Producing Online News Digital Skills, Stronger Stories," the most relevant ones to this article are magnitude, conflict and novelty. Google, commonly referred to as a "web giant" is a site visited by millions of people across the globe on a daily basis, therefore the demographic affected by the integration of Google+ with the search engine function is large. Novelty and conflict are interrelated in this story. Social media networking is still its primitive stages of development, it is an "unusual subject" as Thornburg describes it in his book. The novelty of the subject matter, inevitably creates areas of dispute and as social media continues to unfold, ... More »

This article frames health as a medical responsibility because the author explains how doctors are helping people survive cancer. Also, the quote from Dr. Tom Frieden helps supports my statement by saying that doctors cannot cure everything, but they cure as much as they can. The article can be frame differently in showing how cancer can be prevented thus focusing more on personal or societal responsibility. The author could have also spent more time on explain why each number is the way it is instead of listing a lot of facts with no support behind it.

This article frames health as a medical responsibility because it provides information about a medical problem called "metabolic syndrome" that the United States and people around the world face today. "Fifty million people are believed to have the metabolic syndrome, according to the American Heart Association - and that's just in the U.S." However, this article doesn't seem to come to an answer for this "metabolic syndrome" or why Americans aren't eating this way. This article could be framed differently into a societal responsibility by exploring why individuals with bad health aren't eating this way based on the community they live in, their race, and their social status. Food deserts are common in low income communities ... More »

This article frames health as a societal responsibility. I make this claim primarily based on the fact that the article discusses why people in the U.S. have a higher instance of bipolar disorder, not because of their genetic makeup, but because of the cultural instances that may cause this statistic. For example, the author suggests that there is a negative stigma associated with this disorder in many countries, whereas American society is acutely aware of psychiatric disorders, and much more comfortable talking about them. However, it is important to keep in mind the dangers of attributing health trends to cultural differences, as Paul Farmer points out in his book Infections and Inequalities: The Modern Plagues. Both medical ... More »

When our media is saturated with advertisements and campaigns displaying only the male sex playing video games, it is easy to see why the general public would assume that the digital sport is played predominately by men. However, the hard numbers disagree. Almost half of the top earners are now female, a fact that most people probably do not appreciate. This article attempts to educate the general public and address stereotypes that have been proliferated for so long. With solid factual evidence and a rampant spokesperson in Katherine Gunn, author Michelle Castillo takes a bold step in the right, more politically correct direction.

The "Don't Ask Don't Tell" law, activates stereotypes and encourages discrimination. The law prohibited military officials from asking a recruit's sexual orientation, but threatened to release soldiers whose homosexual orientation was exposed. What stereotypical expectations did the military hold about a homosexual person's behavior in the military? And, while Judge Phillips issued injunction against the law, the author writes that "the government is expected to appeal the injunction to the Court of Appeals...". Although she didn't state any evidence to that effect, she may have had evidence that suggested it. One could question however, whether that statement was derived from information that she received or her own ... More »

This piece is good journalism because it is relevant to today. this issue of illegal immigration and the rights allotted to persons of that status is a big debate all over the country. It gets you thinking about the pros and cons of granting rights, such as higher education, to those who, legally, aren't suppose to be here. With that said it also lacks the human side of the story. Although one quote acknowledges the struggle of an illegal immigrant, it fails to show the harmful effect these new rules may have to the undocumented student themselves.