Generally speaking, the people I encounter, and subsequently interview on-camera during the day don’t have the same opportunity to prepare that I have. And many times I forget that what is a casual, run of the mill interview for me is a rarer occasion for my victims.

Let’s face it; we all have things about our physical appearance that we’d like to change. Whether it is your physique, complexion, nose size or those pesky bags under your eyes, you may think that by changing that one thing about yourself, you’d be better looking.

Yesterday, I was working on a story on the current unemployment problems and its effects on men. Nationwide, the unemployment rate among men is 10 percent while among women it is 8 percent.

Industries that have been dominated by men like manufacturing and construction are disappearing and that means a lot of men are being forced into a new job: stay-at-home dad.

It turns out radio host Jimmy Baron has been there before. So, he was inspired to create a play date for “Dads Between Gigs”.

Baron was the victim of one of my interviews yesterday. The gracious professional that he is, he patiently answered my barrage of questions about a topic that many would find uncomfortable: his own unemployment.

But, it turns out the topic of discussion wasn’t what made Baron nervous. It was the commonly feared close-up cutaway shot.

On his blog this morning, Baron posted a freeze frame of that close up. That shot revealed what Baron described as a “muskrat” living above his eyes.

Labeled a “Big Fat Fail” Baron enticed his listeners to view the “terrifying” picture on his blog.

The truth is, I never even noticed Baron’s allegedly ungroomed eyebrows. I thought he was perfectly “TV ready”.

And just for the record, Baron was more concerned with being interview weather 92.9 Dave FM apparel and standing in front of a Dave FM banner than he ever was about his eyebrows.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=68kSse3m0SU

I have to admit, it’s a real bummer to get excited about reporting a story, only to have it fall through.  The bummed out feelings are only exacerbated when I have Live Apartment Fire sitting a few feet away, constantly admonishing me to go shoot a story.

But this morning’s assignment really exemplified the circumstances and frustrations that I have been feeling lately.

I should have known from the moment the assignment was made.  It was born out of an e-mail from a viewer:

“A high rise office building… has one of those giant inflated gorillas on its roof with a sign on it that says “I’m Barack”… I find this offensive and racist and I think most people would agree with me…are they comparing our President to a gorilla??

Fueled by the desires of our newsroom and the newsrooms of our national affiliates and smelling a story that would bring outrage and conversation to the viewing masses, I set out on my trek to find this inflatable gorilla.  It didn’t take me long.

An inflatable gorilla sits atop an office building near Powers Ferry Road.

As I approached the office building, sure enough, there was a large inflatable gorilla, menacingly looking down upon the masses with a frightening message: “I’M BAAACK!”

An inflatable gorilla sits atop an office building near Powers Ferry Road with a sign that says "I'M BAAACK!"

I had to smile to myself.  Clearly this would not be a story of bigotry and outrage.  Clearly this would not be a story at all.  I got a couple of shots of the building and the cartoonish inflatable gorilla, just to cover myself. (A wise Executiver Producer once told me “Never come back to the station with nothing.”)  It’ll never air.

I called back to the station.  Eager voices awaited my early report.  “It says ‘I’m back,’” I told them.

“It’s a bust,” the assignment editor called out to the newsroom.  “Come on back, Chris.”

“B-roll” is apparently an “old film term” which I am too young to understand, and you probably don’t care about the details anyway.

Here’s what’s interesting: Sometimes reporters will find themselves assigned to cover a story that is “weak on video”.  Usually that means the story is about an event that was not visually capture, or a story about an issue.  These are often referred to as a “great story for newspapers”.

Apparently, an Asian media mogul has developed a way to fudge that b-roll by making news reports look like video games.  As this report from CNN shows, his company creates animations to depict the news.

Wouldn’t it just be easier to call these guys?

www.youtube.com/watch?v=SItFvB0Upb8

The proliferation of the OMB/BPJ has caused much consternation among old school reporters.  “How can I do all of this?” they ask. “The quality of my work will surely suffer!”

Now, with the growth of social media, reporters are finding one MORE task to add to their daily workflow: updating Twitter, Facebook, etc.

But, I contend that there are plenty of OMB/BPJs out there getting the job done and getting it done well.  Case in point: Julie Wolfe.

Take a look at this picture.  That’s Julie, sterilized and scrubbed in for a story she’s working on.  In the picture you can also see the tools of the trade: two cameras.  What’s that?  You only see one camera?  Look closer.  That’s right, she’s holding the other camera in her hand.

Armed with her iPhone, Julie (@juliewolfe on Twitter) has been Tweeting her way through covering her stories.  She posts messages and updates regularly, and has developed quite a following.  Afterall, Julie’s job is to communicate stories, ideas and information to people.  That’s what a journalist does.  Even though she’s employed by a TV station, she knows she needs to reach her audience on different platforms.

You might call Julie (with all of her gadgets) the Journalist of the Future.  But I’d say you’re wrong.  I’d say she’s the Journalist of Today.  And a darn good one at that.

By the way, the story she’s working on is remarkable.  It’s scheduled to air Friday morning.  But of course, you can follow the developments online:

Quinn’s Transplant: Photos and twitter transcript
Atlanta (11Alive) – On Tuesday, September 29th, 8 year old Quinn underwent surgery and got a new kidney.

Quinn has Polycystic Kidney Disease (PKD). PKD is a life-threatening genetic kidney disease affecting 600,000 Americans.

11Alive reporter Julie Wolfe spent the day in the OR with Quinn. Julie and others posted surgey updates throughout the day using twitter.

Rundowns that producers had worked all day to lay out were tossed out the window to make room for breaking news coverage. Reporters (myself included) were reassigned and asked to work double shifts. For the most part, news people are OK with all of this. In fact, despite the furloughs, and pay cuts, most of us stay in this business for high intensity moments brought by breaking news.

But there is a new dynamic in the coverage of breaking news, and it is being brought on by… you guessed it… social networking and the Internet.

During periods of national breaking news, local TV news outlets rely heavily on their network of national news affiliates. We look to the newsgathering resources of CNN, NBC, CBS, ABC and Fox to help us put together the facts.

Almost all of the national news outfits were quick to report Jackson’s hospitalization. The news spread like wildfire on blogs, Facebook and Twitter. Tens of thousands of messages were sent between friends.

To the best of my knowledge, TMZ.com was the first to report that Michael Jackson had died. At the same time, tradition news outlets like CNN and the Los Angeles Times couldn’t confirm it. It didn’t matter.

TMZ’s report spread across the Internet at lightning speed. Within moments, the news of Jackson’s death was essentially a common knowledge.

Immediately, news outlets were presented with a dilemma: Should continue reporting the facts that they know are true, waiting to independently confirm Jackson’s death? Or should they accept TMZ’s report as true, and report that Jackson has died?

Many of the traditional news outlets chose to wait for independent confirmation of Jackson’s death, a journalistically prudent decision. But, for every minute between TMZ’s breaking of the news and CNN’s confirmation, CNN became less relevant in the coverage. They were no longer part of the conversation.

News consumers had already moved on. Tributes were posted to Facebook. Tens of thousands of messages were streaming across Twitter. Jackson had died, no matter what CNN was reporting.

But hindsight is always 20/20. “What if TMZ had been wrong?” many journalists might ask. The answer to that question is uncertain.

The important lesson for journalists is this: We can no longer consider only reporting the facts. We should also consider the conversation. That conversation is a part of our coverage now. If we choose to ignore our audience, we’ll soon find that our audience is ignoring us.

CLAYTON COUNTY, Ga. -- A Barnesville woman is in a Clayton County jail this morning after leaving her infant twins in a car while she went shopping.

Despite the continuing heat wave a set of 4-month-old twins was found at about 10 p.m. Saturday, locked in a car.

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