From: Stephanie Garry
To: Christian Duque
Subject: no subject
Message: You know, Christian, you really back yourself into a corner when you overuse superlatives - worst Alligator writer ever, worst editor ever. I'm not sure how concerned you are with the longevity of your blog, but you might want to consider toning back the language a little if you don't want to come out looking like a fool.
Best, Stephanie
Coming off as a fool has never much concerned me. I didn't ask for the hits, they come here for a variety of reasons. I tend to have strong opinions and I tend to be very protective of SG, mainly because I believe SG performs a great deal of good by the side of the students. I have always looked with contempt towards anti-SG articles but usually hold my tongue. I contacted Drew Harwell whom replied with thanks and offered I write a letter to the editor -- but I know better. It's been lightyears since any Alligator editor (much less ole' Jim Osteen over at the GS) would print anything I ever wrote -- hence the blog title: THE RADIKAL.
Ms. Garry...when I brought you the Sam Green story you sat on your hands. Between you and Ms. Lewis not only did you sit on your hands, but you gave me the run around. Mike Gimignani also left much to be desired. I found the bold-faced line in your message to be somewhat threatening...but even if the blog goes down, I will still be TR, you can't kill ideas by simply taking down a website, doesn't work that way. I appreciate all emails and I'm glad you're reading along (as well you should) because you weren't a very good editor (imo) and the current editor over at the Alligator must not be playing with a full deck either, if she put an article that's the very antithesis of awareness on a front page Public Safety column.
9 comments:
You take the hits too seriously. Lots of people read gossip columns in tabloid too, does not make it all that reputable. And if it does depend so much on numbers, Alligator must be a better publication than you based on the circulation.
Naw, but she is the worst editor ever.
Lets see what happened last year.
They ignored two College Republican press releases (one about Mr. Card and the other about the wilderness), reported on a college democrats protest a day before it occurred then missed the fact around 20 Democrats were out and being interviewed by the Sun, radio, and even television.
When it came to SG they failed to really look into Chomp the Vote, had an SG reporter who covered the CIngular BIll instead of the back-room dealings (where is Cohen when we need him?)
And as an editor she seemed to think face book was a legit way to find every story and a facebook message with a two hour wait period was an acceptable confirmation period before they could print "no comment" replies.
She was crap.
8:42 you do have a point. He has an ego.
No, no, that's just it. I have never taken "the hits" seriously. When I started the big blogs were Reitz Rambler, UF GDI, and NAGAS. TR was a joke to most and rarely got more than one or two comments.
I wrote and continue to write solely as a way to vent as an alum, from outside the scene, and purely for fun. Whether I get 50 comments or none, 10 hits or 1,000 I'm going to be doing this. Coming off as a fool or being seen as 'credible' is of no real concern to me.
However, I do have but one concern and that is to be fair. So I called upon people with much higher SG cred than myself (Chris Carmody, James Argento, Nick Capezza, Charlie Grapski) to monitor my stuff, to give me feedback, and they have. I didn't want to be the angry Access kid on here, I wanted to be fair and I feel that in '06 TR has been much more fair than in '05. Now in '07 I'm looking to start shedding the current events nature of TR and transform it more into a historical page for a historical period 2004-2007.
Here I am talking about different years and eras of a blog. For anyone to speculate on its 'longevity' is quite silly.
p.s.
Comparing the Alligator to TR in circulation is nonsensical. Still arguments can be made that my polls get much stronger responses and that comments to my entries all but crush replies to their dead-on-the-vine message board posts hands down. The Alligator also gets to litter campus and Gainesville with 70,000 papers a day & it's free...you need a computer and an internet connection to get to my blog...I can't 'compete' with that, though it's not much of a competition if you know what I mean...
p.p.s.
Ms. Garry you wasted my time for the Sam Green leak. You told me you'd seriously look into it, sat on it, then you gave it to Ms. Lewis she then sat on it, then in the end you told me you couldn't get anyone to talk, I got you people and tried to tell you and then you flat out wrote you wouldn't cover it.
I didn't call you out, I stated an opinion and you send me a facebook message that left me wondering your intentions, quite frankly it sounded mildly threatening. Mr. Harwell, whom one could argue 'I tore him a new one' on my post critiquing his article was pleasant enough to write back, thank me for my opinion, and invited me to write a letter.
When you put yourself in the public eye you have to be ready for public scrutiny, I don't know if the two over-paid senior members of the Alligator staff told you this, but it's how it works. I would have enjoyed a nice email from you and given you space on this site to defend yourself (this offer still stands as an open invitation to you).
No more threatening or nasty emails please. Some of the people that visit this blog are like wild dogs, the things they know, the things they say. There's plenty I don't allow here. I like doing things the SG way, the professional way, so let's strive to keep things civil.
8:52... I don't understand why writing off-record stories about "back-room dealings" is considered preferable to covering an actual piece of legislation.
The Green thing never was and never will be a story. Thank Christ she was a good enough editor to pass on that.
The Green Case could have been a ground-breaking story. Not so much against FBK as an organization, rather, to show that FBK in and of itself has factions, factions with converging opinions and with varying loyalties. She could have blown the roof off the AEPi/TC rivalry, she could have spoken with people whom I would have provided to her (literally taking all work off the Alligator) to come out publicly and speak of this.
It would have shed important light on the myth that FBK controls key Greek houses which in turn control the Greek community which in turn do not control, but greatly influence the outcome of SG elections and the way student-run government is run.
Had Ms. Garry covered the Green case, no one would have been maligned and FBK would not have been victimized (neither the point), but it would have served for posterity and the findings would have been invaluable historically.
Watergate made the career of some very crafty journalists. Green, for me, destroyed Garry's impression for me. The way she comported herself lacked professionalism and quite frankly almost seemed to be a journalistic-filibuster...she made me feel as if she was looking into it, then passed the story to an underling, then said to wait, then said she'd do nothing. Had I known she was going to wait it out like this, I would have taken the story to a close friend that works w/ Satellite but by the time I'd received the decisive answer, it was already old news and my contacts had nor the desire or the courage to come forward, much less to a publication that most students would not have access to.
Christian:
http://www.wsu.edu:8000/~brians/errors/who.html
Please make sure you know how to use who and whom correctly, you often hypercorrect and use whom when the relative pronoun is the subject of the clause. Whom is only to be used in an oblique case.
That's hard man. I'll try. How's Portland btw?
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