Politics and Writing

I think I'm going to start a trend where the first thing I post every time will be stories that are published online....

That being said, I just noticed today that I have three pieces published in Indiana University's Homepages, an internal publication that highlights people, events, and research throughout the university. The first two pieces deal with the Large Hadron Collider and provide great detail and background into what it is they're doing with that multi-billion dollar machine. One is on the detector that IU helped build and the other is on the computing systems required to process all of the data. The third story relates to Michael Crichton's newest novel "Next" and talks about contemporary genetic technologies and politics.

Beware, all three pieces, especially the first one, are pretty long. You might want to grab a bowl of popcorn first.

Moving on, yesterday I mentioned having written a story that had been affected by politics. While true, this may have been a bit of an overstatement.

Here's the scoop. An earlier article about a project at a particle physics lab in Japan called KEK ran several weeks ago. It failed to mention a group from Fermilab, currently the most powerful operational particle accelerator in the world and is based outside of Chicago, that installed the hardware as part of the project. One or two people felt a little insulted that the group didn't get any props.

Now, the article basically had nothing to do with the hardware that the Fermilab group installed, so the oversight was understandable. But, just to be safe, my follow up article that dealt solely on the remote participation set-up that was used included a shout-out to the Fermilab group anyways, just to make sure nobody is rocking the proverbial boat.

This is a major aspect of writing for an institution as opposed to a media outlet. You have to make sure everyone is happy and nothing negative is being said about your work place. You are to always shed events in the best light possible, and sources always screen articles before publication. Much, much different from reporting where, some may argue, it is part of the job description to ruffle some feathers in a good story.

This doesn't bother me in the least though. Maybe its because all of my experience is in public affairs writing and I've never done any hard journalism. But I enjoy working in an environment of cutting edge science where the researchers are always happy to talk to you and teach you about what they're working on. And it's a pleasure to be able to bring their blood, sweat, and tears to light in a well-written, accurate story.

On a side note, the remote participation story is actually pretty cool. Using internet set-ups and readily available software, research teams could collaborate in real-time across the Pacific Ocean to get good science accomplished. For more detail, the story is here, if you didn't read it yesterday.