Q&A: Esther Cepeda

Esther Cepeda is well versed in many fields of work she has been a publicist, marketing executive, and after two years of being a teacher realized she wanted to follow her dream and become a columnist. After getting a column in a small local paper she pitched to the Chicago Sun-Times and received a weekly column. Since then, Esther has moved on from the Chicago Sun Times which she still frequents with a column, but now publishes her own blog, 600 words.

Cepeda reports on many issues that are unheard by many and focuses much of her stories on the second generation Hispanics/Latinos in America who are not the focus in everyday media. Today Esther is also Chief Marketing and Communications Officer for the Illinois Student Assistance Commission as well as a blogger for the Huffington Post and frequents many television and radio programs in Chicago and around the United States.

I was given the opportunity to interview Esther Cepeda over the phone.

Q: How did you become such an influential columnist after being a publicist, marketing executive and teacher?

Cepeda: Well they weren't in that order. I did some marketing and publicity and decided it wasn't for me so i quit and became a teacher. I originally wanted to be a columnist and in my second full year of teaching I decided to become a columnist. I shopped around and started writing a column in a small local paper. I started to do some good reporting and then pitched for the Sun Times.

Q: How has journalism changed since you first started at the Sun Times?

Cepeda: It is like night and day. I started writing my first column in 2005 and back then the web site was a complete after thought. 9/11 basically brought the web portion onto the radar but besides that there wasn't this 24-hour news cycle nothing was constantly being updated. There wasn't all of these other voices in print and broadcast journalism, bloggers were around but they didn't come into the scene until 2007 then it really broke out. they started breaking news and reporting, when bloggers were allowed at the DNC blogging completely changed to this grassroots thing.

Q: Many people say that newspapers are dead and journalism is a dead field to go into, what do you think about this?

Cepeda: Newspapers may in fact be dying but journalism is not dead it will always be around. It will always live and mutate with whatever new technology is brought on. Newspapers, print and even magazines may die but there is always a need for storytelling.

Q: Nowadays most people have a Twitter and Facebook, how are these are can these be used journalistically ?

Cepeda: Absolutely, I get sources for stories and new story ideas all the time, people share many news articles with me. Its not a substitute for the shoe leather reporting that you should do, its a tool, much like a calculator its a great tool but you still need to know how to add.

Q: Why do you think people are so drawn to social networking sites?

Cepeda: It gives people an opportunity to form a community, I don't have time to get together with people I don't know very well, however having this virtual community opens up opportunities to interact with other peoples opinion and what they have to share without taking time out of your day and also being able to respond on your time within a comfortable community.

Q: What do you think about companies who are putting Twitter policies into effect?

Cepeda: You can have an opinion on whether it is right or wrong but they are employees of that corporation and they can limit how their employees speak about their products or services. If they work for someone and they tell you that you can't do that you don't have much of a choice.

Q: Has social networking had an effect on your career?

Cepeda: Absolutely my distribution network has grown a lot because of Facebook and Linkedin, people have been able to find me with free tools and give feedback and I can promote my work this way.

Q: What changes do you see in the near future for journalists?

Cepeda: The most important thing that any one can do is to learn to tell stories through multimedia through audio, video and pictures. Most journalists can put together a one dimensional story but to be successful one should be able to tell a story in many different ways. Journalists also need to market themselves and their stories, they have a cache that they need to maintain, and its critical for the reporters to show the value in what they do.

Q: Your "600 Words" blog is a very well known blog, what made you start this blog and where does your inspiration come from?

Cepeda: As a once a week columnist at the Sun Times I was constantly frustrated that I had 300 or 400 words in my column to talk about something when I had real topics to get into! When I got laid off there I realized that I can't not do this anymore and not talk about these issues. If everyones blogging why can't I be my own publisher too, thats why I started this blog.

Q: What has made you so focused on the Hispanic/ Latino community?

Cepeda: I'm Hispanic but I was born in the United States with a typical American upbringing. I'm a regular American girl who happens to be second generation Hispanic. The largest amount of Hispanics in the United States are second generation Hispanics but the media is so focused on immigrants legal and illegal. No one was speaking for the second generation Hispanics.

Q: What has made blogs like yours so succesful?

Cepeda: The information that I talk about, the viewpoints that I take you can't find anywhere else, people come to me because they will find relevant good information and they know they won't find it anywhere else. When you have an unfulfilled need and you fill it people notice.

Check out Esther Cepeda's 600 Words blog, read her column in the Chicago Sun Times, and check out her Huffington Post articles!

No Games Chicago 2016 Olympic Protest

As the day draws closer when the 2016 Olympic city is announced cities prepare for the big announcement and yes that even means dealing with the protests that are taking place in Chicago. The group No Games Chicago is opposing the bid for the Olympics in Chicago in 2016 claiming that the city of Chicago does not have enough money to finance a massive worldwide event like this and that instead of spending large quantities of money on this even it should be invested in better schooling among other things in the city.

Also the group is stating that there are going to be too many people of a lower class in the Washington Park area who are kicked out of there houses in order to build structures for the Olympics.

On Tuesday September 29 the group held a protest outside of Chicago's city hall trying to inform the city that Chicago is not ready to hold such an even like the Olympics.

On Friday Oct. 2 the International Olympic Committee will announce the winner of the 2016 Olympics. At 9:00 a.m in Daley Plaza there will be a celebration for the announcement.

Mashup Websites, A Journalists Favorite Tool

Being a journalist in the world today requires much more than just having an uncanny ability to write and interview but to also be able to produce graphs, statistics and push your articles with whatever social media needs possible. So what ways do journalists produce the graphs that we see everyday featured with an article, and how do they journalists get these massive worldwide statistics without having to wait every 10 years for a new census to be published. There are some websites that many journalists are using to find this specific data.

StateMaster.com does a very good job to help any journalist or anyone simply interested in finding nearly any statistics. The best part about this website is that when you search a specific subject it breaks the information down by state and into graphs. Say you want to look at the rate of change of the number of people with healthcare. Simply enough you use the two pull down boxes to find health and in the second box % change in individual insurance. It is that easy to search a large database of information and have it broken down into mapping of health insurance information.

The problem that I have with this website is that the only way to view the information is in either a bar graph that is a bit confusing to read, or in a map broken down by state. I feel like there should be an easier way that they could show this information, but other than that this is a great tool for any journalist seeking tons of information or anyone simply curious about specific statistics.

Another website that I like titled This We Know, is a great site for anyone interested in a compilation of facts that would seem simple to find but simply aren’t easy to find. Its very easy to use all you do is type in the location you would like to know more information about, and it compiles this information into a nice list accompanied with a map, population and even mileage to nearby cities.

This site is fantastic and is a great tool for any journalist looking to find those hard to locate facts. I really like this site because of its simplicity and how there is even a link to the side of the fact that you can link that information straight to your Twitter.

The last website that I looked into is a great tool for anyone interested in a surplus of factual government information about activities, rule changes and proposed activities. GovPulse gives you the option to search nearly any information one can imagine as well as even search by location to find out what is going around in your city.

I did a quick simple search by city and looked at the most recent information about what is happening within 50 miles of Chicago. The information is published with an interactive map of where the certain activity or rule change takes place and you can even click on the location to find out more information about this activity or whatever it may be.

This is a great website with few flaws, and is great for any journalist trying to find information for an article that deals with any rule changes or proposed activities and where all this will take place.

These three websites are great tools for journalists trying to expand simplistic articles into interactive articles with great visuals and also a great way to fact check any information that they have received.

Chicago Police Investigating Series of Muggings in Lincoln Park Area

Recently in the Lincoln Park area the Chicago Police have reported a total of seven muggings involving, with all of the suspects being male in their early to mid twenties all walking alone. These victims have all been asked for their wallets and then severely beaten in the head and face. Two of these victims were hospitalized after the incident.

Chicago Police are still investigating to whether or not all of these muggings are linked and they suspect that five out of the seven are linked, the ones in question are the muggings that took place on Halsted in Boystown, and near the 400 block of W Deming Place.

FLYPmedia, Break New Ground in Online Media

As many newspapers and magazines see declines in there sales due to the rapid expansion of online news and media sites one website stands taller than the others. FLYPmedia is redefining and breaking new ground in an ever changing online media market.
This website doesn't limit itself to one subject matter instead it draws people from many markets who are looking to go to one website that is easy to use and yet has a wide variety of subject matter.

Well look no further FLYPmedia is here to stay. What seems to make this website so great is the simplicity that the reader feels when navigating the website. The website flawlessly combines text, photography like any print magazine, but gives the reader the advantage of being able to flip a page with one click.

Also this media outlet stands out among the bunch because not only do they have articles with pictures to explain more about the subject matter but they use video, audio and animation to their advantage to give the reader even more information on the subject. FLYP even allows there users to search through blogs, download their podcasts or simply search their archives with ease for older articles.

I was most impressed with FLYP's music and arts section because they not only have an article about the subject but give you the option to click on an animation to here this musicians music or see a video about them. The article that really displays FLYPmedia's muscles is there interview with director David Guggenheim who recently directed It Might Get Loud about guitar greats Jack White, The Edge and Jimmy Page. This beautifully written article combines all of these elements to tell a story not only textually but visually and audibly.

There are other website magazines like Rolling Stone who have tried to be successful by using there website as a media outlet like this where an individual can find a wide variety of subject matter as well as videos and music with the article but do not have the ease and simplicity that stands behind the FLYP name. Rolling Stone watch out FLYPmedia is catching eyes and is here to stay.