san francisco chronicle

the trip to the chronicle was very interesting for all of you that couldn't go...i've never seen so much clutter--there was stuff everywhere piled up, and there were the weirdest things on the walls. i didn't expect it to be like that, i don't think i could ever concentrate on writing in an environment like that, i would be too distracted. it seems to work for them though, there were a lot of people busy typing away to meet their deadlines. nanette was very nice and took us around the chronicle and to talk with some of the other writers. we talked to one of the editors in the datebook section who also wrote some feature stories. he talked about how a lot of newspapers don't like their editors to do any writing, they feel it's giving them too much power. i don't remember why but i guess he's an exception. another writer we talked to is specifically writes science stories. i thought that was interesting, i didn't realize there were so many areas that had specific people writing in them. like nanette writes stories dealing with school issues. if i ever were to become a journalist i would much rather write all different types of stories. but as the science writer was saying, since he was getting older he wanted to specialize in something so that it would be harder for him to be booted out of the paper. speaking of age, there was one writer in the science department that is almost 90 years old! that might have been the most surprising part of the trip! we also went to see the sf gate section of the chronicle. we talked to one man that was in charge of designing the website. he was said how important online media has become and said it would be beneficial for our generation to know a lot about it because it will most likely continue to grow as the main form of media of the future. i thought the trip was really interesting and i'm glad i went. there is just so much to be learned from observing people and talking to them about what they do.