Whose Story Is It?

Okay, I will finally pay attention to the story behind the driver who Youtubed his confession of killing a man while driving drunk.

Certain media content is blocked on this computer, but I believe the link to the Youtube video (if it hasn’t been taken down yet!) is here.

In a NBC News story written by Simon Moya-Smith, Simon writes, “The victim’s daughter, Angela Canzani, told NBC News that she believes Cordle is attempting to mitigate punishment with the video.”

Ater reading that, I had my WOW moment. Instead of curating the point of his confession (to take drunk driving more seriously), Canzani makes the story more about Matthew Cordle.

“When I get charged I’ll plead guilty and take full responsibility for everything I’ve done to Vincent and his family,” Cordle says in his video confession.

Before jumping into all the details of prosecution and degree of detainment, can we take a moment to focus on the point of his confession. Can we hear his plea for us to all make the promise not to drink and drive?

Figuring out the number of years Cordel will be imprisoned will not save lives, making the promise not to drink and drive will.

Come on, Media. This is your moment to do good and you’re ruining it.

We’re All Reporters, Seriously

I check Yahoo! news every day and chuckle when I see a story that I already caught on Imgur, an image uploading site. Consider it an Image only version of Reddit.

People from all over the globe can upload images… immediately. Especially, eye witnesses.

The argument has been whether everyone is a journalist or reporter now that we can Tweet, take pictures, and upload videos of what will (when “legitimate” reporters get on the scene) be breaking news.

Now, NBC News is working to purchase Stringwire. A video sharing service that will allow users to stream videos directly to NBC News.

Let the conversation continue. Are we all citizen journalists? Deserving the same respect of a paid journalist?