As far as first week assignments go, this one isn't so bad. I had been meaning to start a blog for some time now, not necessarily about being a journalism student, but at least this way I get my feet wet!
This being the third day of classes, I have nothing really to report about the class so far, but there has been something journalism related on my mind. I read this article this morning (by Tim Cuprisin via @OnMilwaukee) and it reminded me of something my News Media Writing professor said in class yesterday. For every factual error on our assignments for that class, he will automatically deduct 20%. Now, the article discusses this difficulty in journalism as it is related to bias. The Glenn Beck Washington Mall rally was reported as drawing a crowd of anywhere from 1 million (according to Michele Bachmann, a Beck fan and a U.S. representative - R., Minn.) to a modest 87,000 (according to CBS News).
Firstly, there is the obvious problem of how to estimate crowd size accurately (the article suggests using physical markers - from Main St. to College Ave.). Unless an event takes place inside an arena of some sort or has a recorded admission, it is easy to get an estimate very wrong. What is more disturbing, however, is how estimates are used to further a particular bias. "A million-strong crowd" sounds much more impressive than "87,000, plus or minus 9,000."
That definitely sounds like B-level reporting.
Well, we'll just have to make these assignments bad! As to crowd estimates, you correctly spotted the problem -- no one has an idea. See the AP Stylebook for some ideas on how to do crowd estimates.
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