Prank, CSU v. UNM, and my Rocky Mountain News visit

Okay, I've been working on a lot lately between school, more articles for the Collegian (click here for the article in tomorrow's Collegian), and the Free Spirit Network, a little experiment Aureli Sinsuat and I have been working on. Let's see if I can deliver everything I promised.

Friday, after finishing classes I went back to my dorm room and found this on my roommates side:

So surprised that all his things were gone I immediately jumped to conclusions, thinking he decided to move out and not tell me. Standing there in shock, a friend from across the room came in and killed my suspicions, telling me that he took all of my roommate's belonging and left a note on the door as a prank.

"Illegal contraband was found in your room in the form of weapons, such as knives. CSU has taken the liberty to remove your weapons as well as your personal items. To arrange a meeting with the Dean of Students and retrieve your items please contact Connie downstairs... CSU Police Department"

Realizing this was a prank, I gladly played the part of the pissed off roommate who was angry that my stuff was rummaged through while my roommate's was confiscated. The kid across the hall took EVERYTHING my roommate owned, including the clothes in the closet.

When my roommate returned and read the note, he freaked and started slamming things and cursing. When I told him to go talk to the kid across the hall, and eventually saw all his stuff he laughed, but his violent reaction made it all worth it.

Saturday was our last home football game of the season against the University of New Mexico. The game wasn't even close as we crushed the Lobos with a 20 - 6 victory. The most eventful part of the game was when one very drunk student puked about 20 feet away from us, and then sat in it for a good 40 minutes afterwards. He cleared out a section of stands better than the police could.


Sunday finally came and it was time for Society of Professional Journalists' trip to Denver to watch "Stop the Press - The American Newspaper in Peril," a documentary on the economic pressures found at daily newspapers. It features interviews with journalists such as Ben Bradlee, Dave Barry and Ken Auletta. It was a part of the Denver International Film Festival. Afterwards was a panel discussion between some professionals.

The film was shown in the Denver Newspaper Agency building, which is home to both the Denver Post and the Rocky Mountain News, where they share production costs but still compete rigorously. The building is in Civic Center Park, just north of the capitol and the City and County Building, and across the park from the Denver Art Museum.

The documentary was interesting, and yet depressing to hear all this talk about the death of newspapers. I don't think newspapers need to die, I just think that newspapers need to learn how to wrangle Internet content so their information isn't just being given out freely. In order to create a standard for newspapers online, I think the newspapers in the country need to create an agreement between each other that they will all only offer online news at a price. Those who already subscribe to newspapers will get content online with an account name and password. Subscriptions for both a printed edition and an online edition should be available for purchase, including information scrounged from newspapers for stories that appear on television networks. Instant revenue generator, and a new standard for online news content. I'm sure this has some loopholes I'm not seeing so I would love to hear others weigh in on this idea via comments.

The panel was painfully boring and was unfortunately hijacked by an audience member pushing a political agenda. Oh well. The tour of the Rocky Mountain News made it all worth it. Here are some highlights. Forgive my photo quality. I think my poor, loyal camera is meeting it's maker very soon:


The Rocky Mountain News flag. Can I get one of these in my dorm room?

One of the Rocky's Pulitzer Prizes. I thought it was interesting how small a Pulitzer Prize was, but I really like it. Is it foolish to already want one?

Some shots of the newsroom. It was more empty than I expected for a Sunday evening. I didn't think to ask how late most people stay.

The office of John Temple, Publisher and President of the Rocky Mountain News. I couldn't help but snap some photos, as his door was ajar even if the office was empty. At least I didn't barge into it like I did Al Neuharth's in Washington D.C. It's hard to see but he has this amazing view of the state's capitol building and Civic Center Park, much like Al Neuharth's view of the nation's capitol building.

The conference room where all the budget meetings for a day's paper take place. I found it really interesting when the man who was giving us the tour said that most them know each other so well that they don't really argue much over things in those meetings.