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Al's Morning Meeting

Home > Al's Morning Meeting
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Al Tompkins
Story ideas that you can localize and enterprise. Posted by 7:30 a.m. Mon-Fri.


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A dozen sites
I'm diggin'


*1. How to carve a pumpkin that shows your political leanings.

*2. ESPN's The Journey of Richard Jensen -- the comeback of a wrestler -- is an extra good video.

3.  You can lay subtitles or text bubbles on video -- any video. I will be using this to teach about storytelling.

4. Canon responds to the Nikon D90 with its own SLR still camera that records HD video.

5. Why do 97 percent of this railroad's workers get disability checks?

6. I now use Utterz to file audio reports. You can use your computer's mic or any phone. It's simple and would be a great reporter's tool.

7. I used Monitter to monitor what people said on Twitter about Ike. Just change the subjects to whatever you want to look out for.

8. I'm reading all about the Nikon D90, which shoots photos and HD video with the same $1K body.

9. Qik streams live video straight from a cell phone.

*10. Use Tweetbeep to keep track of conversations that mention you, your products, your  company, anything! You can even keep track of who's tweeting your site or blog.

11. This site watches TV and Web mentions of candidates. It also monitors Tweets and more.

12. This fall many PBS stations will air this documentary on whether there is a water crisis in the Southwest.

Sites marked with a * have been added recently.

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EDITOR'S NOTE: Al's Morning Meeting is a compendium of ideas, edited story excerpts and other materials from a variety of Web sites, as well as original concepts and analysis. When the information comes directly from another source, it will be attributed and a link will be provided whenever possible. The column is fact-checked, but depends on the accuracy and integrity of the original sources cited. We will correct errors and inaccuracies when we become aware of them.


Public Defenders Strained
This story comes from a discussion on ABCNews.com. In the video, criminal defense lawyers say the practice of providing attorneys for those who can't afford them is under stress because it is so unpopular to use tax dollars to fund lawyers for suspects.

One person on the panel, Malia Brink of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, says some Chicago public defenders handle 1,600 misdemeanor cases a year. That means each lawyer must prepare for and resolve four or five cases every day.

That kind of caseload, she says, leads to a "meet and plead" system, not a justice system in which a lawyer can interview witnesses, explain the charges to the accused and determine if the arrest was proper.

Go spend some time at your public defender's office:
  • What is the caseload like?
  • How much time do lawyers spend on individual cases that are not high-profile crimes?
  • How do public defenders deal with often representing clearly guilty and not very nice people day after day? What keeps them going?
  • How often, do they suspect, a person who is not guilty gets chewed up in the legal sausage mill while the lawyers are handling so many cases every day?
Posted by Al Tompkins 11:57 AM Jun 4, 2008
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