SEJ2006

Hook, Line and Singer

By A. Adam Glenn

One of the more serendipitous aspects of the network lunch gatherings on Friday, Oct. 27, was the impromptu appearance by Peter Singer at the discussion on "Animal Rights: Where Creatures, Ecosystems, and Societies Collide." Singer, a professor of bioethics at Princeton and at the University of Melbourne, is perhaps the leading thinker in the field of animal rights, so having him at the table was a little like a group of high school science students having a sitdown with Steven Hawking.

Hudson River Tour

By Matt Hund

Wow, what an amazing tour!  This is the tour of "America's First River" I'm speaking of, in which we saw the GE plant responsible for PCB pollution of the Hudson, a large portion of the river (including locks 7 and 8) and Saratoga battlefield.  It was so great to hear all of the different sides of this issue. 

First up was GE representatives at the water treatment facility on the Hudson.  Very good presentation of a plan to fix the river that has apparently been in the works for 25 years or so.

Then across the river to the hydro plant to listen to scientists from the DEC, et. al., discuss the river and local implications.

Next, we headed to Saratoga battlefield...

Jim Bruggers, Conference Blogger Extraordinaire

As I was doing my post-conference roundup of coverage, I checked back with SEJ board member James Bruggers' Watchdog Earth blog. WOW! So far, I count 14 posts he did from the conference! I'm impressed.

Jim definitely represents one of the most encouraging things I saw at the SEJ conference -- talented, longtime journalists from print or broadcast media who really "get" blogging and other aspects of online, social, participatory, or conversational media. They aren't all actively participating as much as Jim is, but I rarely heard a journalist express the view that blogs and other new forms of media are a threat or inherently sinister. That's major progress.

Click the "continue reading" link below to see a list of Jim's SEJ2006 blog posts.

But first: Here's an open question to you, Jim Bruggers: How did you manage to post so frequently and so well from the conference? Literally, how did you handle this process? I'd love to see your answer in the comments below.

And now, Jim's posts...

More SEJ2006 Coverage

Well, I got slammed with a major cold as soon as I got home from Burlington. So I'm gradually catching up with my backlog. First of all, there's been a lot of interesting coverage of SEJ2006 in blogs and elsewhere. Here's a roundup of what I've found so far -- there will be more later, of course.

I'm tagging all this stuff as "SEJ2006" in the social bookmarking service del.icio.us, by the way. If you're a del.icio.us user, you might consider using that same tag to denote any SEJ2006 coverage or reflections you create or find.

Anyway, here's the roundup so far: Climate Science Watch:

• Oct. 31: Global warming and the media at the Society of Environmental Journalists conference

more coverage...

Shelburne Farms Party Time!

By Madison Hall

Shelburne Farms Rocks!! The party was terrific, and gave me a chance to meet in a fully social setting many of the people I'd only seen during the conference or read their work.  What an amazingly talented crew!  This was 500% better than the party in Austin, Texas in 2005.

The Die Hards partied & danced until they kicked us out & locked the doors.  Many of us wound up afterwards at Tuckaways (Home Away From Home) and found there was more fun to be had! Add into the equation that the clocks were set back one hour at midnight, and many of us were up until 3am+ (Pizza Time! - they DO deliver to your room at the Sheraton - I know.)

Here, then, are misc. pics that I thought captured the (many) moments & moods of the night.  My thanks to all the people who willingly posed for me again and again.  You Rule!

Amy Gahran - Intrepid Reporter & Uber Blog Meister (Left)

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

Danielle Casavant - MSU Knight Center - "Show Me The Money" (Left)

.

.

.

.

More photos...

My Humps, My Humps, The Lovely Camel's Humps

Along with fellow SEJers, I spent a cold, snowy Thursday at Camel's Hump learning about the continuing problem of acid rain in northeastern forests, or acid snow as the case may be. I had no idea this was an ongoing problem, and several people expressed the same sentiment.

Although I completely wimped out on hiking up the mountain (blame it on my frozen toes and the fact that I'm from Texas), in between times spent warming my toes on the bus I learned that sulfuric acid has become less of a problem, but nitric acid is now a big concern.

And so I had to ask, why do we not have acid rain in Houston, where we have oodles of pollution and lots of forest? The answer...

Pre-Awards Ceremony Meet & Greet Photos

By Madison Hall

Opening night was wonderful, even before the Awards Ceremony began, with new and familiar faces meeting & greeting. Here are some photos I managed to capture of the people & festivities. (My thanks for recent name info [Peter T.- Birds do cry...], and my continued apologies in advance for not knowing all names & faces! Forward the info to me & I will correct any mistakes!) 

Madison Hall & Governor James Douglas (Left)

.

.

.

.

Jim Detjen, Ben Cohen, Madison Hall, Hannah Northey (Left)

.

.

.

More photos....

Lake Champlain & Champ Sightings

By Madison Hall

Champ Sightings Unconfirmed...That was the conclusion I was forced to come to after personally keeping a sharp eye out for the elusive but  famous denizen (Left) of Lake Champlain.  The Truth Is Out There.....

The Lake Champlain: Ecosystem at Risk event was highly interesting and  great fun, which is the best combination in my opinion. Tom Henry of  The Toledo Blade and Candace Page of The Burlington Free Press kept  the tour moving briskly along.

Although the weather was windy, threatening rain and raw, spirits were cheery and a "hale fellow well-met" mood was the order of the day.

Read on for more details and pics of our adventure on the high seas of Lake Champlain........

Visualizing Your Story

By Jessica A. Knoblauch

Everybody knows that people are engaged in multiple ways, one of which is through visuals. In this super-busy world, journalists must catch the reader's attention even faster than ever before. One of the most efficient ways of doing this is using graphics in your story-telling.

The session I attended, Visualizing Stories: Moving Beyond Words When Covering the Environment, covered all the basics that journalists need to know when using visuals in their stories. Here are some of the highlights...

Endowment progress & more: Peter Thomson, part 3

In the final part of our Sunday morning wrapup chat, independent radio producer and SEJ board member Peter Thomson reflects on how SEJ's endowment effort is going, and how the mindset of this nonprofit organization's board is evolving.

More from Peter Thomson: See parts 1, 2

Local climate change & continuing conversations: Peter Thomson, part 2

This is my favorite part of the chat I had with SEJ board member and independent radio producer Peter Thomson about SEJ2006. here he discusses what happened in the Friday morning breakfast panel on covering climate change, and how SEJ might extend the conversation that started at that session.

Incidentally, the impromptu hotel lobby session with New Yorker reporter Elizabeth Kolbert that I covered earlier here was part of the overflow of that session.

More from Peter Thomson: See parts 1, 3

Behind-the-scenes scrambling at SEJ2006: Peter Thomson, part 1

By Amy Gahran

Part one of a great talk I had with SEJ board member and Boston-based independent radio producer Peter Thomson about how remarkable it is that this year's conference in Burlington came together so well.

Peter's also the author of a forthcoming book Blue Crescent, about his trip to Siberia's Lake Baikal, which you can pre-order on Amazon.

More from Peter Thomson: See parts 2, 3

GE Hudson Superfund Story Unfolds

By Joe Davis

Richard Bopp, Environmental Geochemist, Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute explains (enthusiastically) to SEJ tourgoers (smiling but skeptical) how the porous rock below the now-closed GE Hudson Falls plant acted as a sponge for PCBs which are still seeping into the river. (Click to enlarge)

Pix From GE Hudson Falls Ground Zero

By Joe Davis

This photo (click to enlarge) shows a crowd of venturesome and inquiring SEJ conference-goers at the overlook next to the now-closed GE capacitor plant at Hudson Falls, NY.

They are less than 20 feet from the outfall from which much of the PCB contamination that created a Superfund site out of the Hudson entered the river. When the river is a little higher, water spills over the dam at lower right onto the dark-colored rocks beyond the overlook.

Why disappearing info will be making more headlines

By Amy Gahran

James Bruggers, environmental reporter for the Louisville Courier-Journal, reflects on how events at this conference show how FOI/information access issues are becoming mainstream fodder for the media. And about time, too!

UPDATE NOV. 1: Despite the hopefulness expressed in this video about Jim's trip back to Louisville, turns out he had a travel nightmare ahead of him...