The Print discussion thread

TouchingVirus wrote: »

Love the fact the paper gets dropped in to the Iontas Building, love the look of it too so a big thumbs up. The leading article is poor though.

The delicious irony of it is rather disappointing. The SU know by word of mouth of several attacks yet ask people not to spread unsubstantiated rumours because there are no Garda statements. The bits about that, including the whole last paragraph could have been left out. The mention of a rape with no qualifiers makes it seems like drag-into-an-alley type attack which is frightening as f*ck, but an attempted rape can also happen at a party when a girl is drunk off her ass and a lad thinks he's getting the go ahead. One is clearly more sinister and worrying, one less so (both are wrong, obviously).

Also not fond of the digs yer man got in on the Gardai. I'm not a Garda, and I do think Maynooth needs a full-time post but to essentially say if they bothered to look they'd find something is just bullsh*t. He didn't get faces, he was on Parson street which you'd swear is O'Connell street by him saying "It's hard to miss a fight". I spent 5 years in Maynooth, many nights I walked home on Parson Street and over Bond Bridge with not a soul to be seen. There were no cameras and no motives. Where does he think they should start investigating? Door to door enquiries, maybe shake down the local scumbags and get a name? This isn't the USA

The verbatim quotes including the word "like" were a bad idea, they can be left out. When I speak I tend to look for acknowledgement by popping in a "yeah?" every now and then. It's a habit, it adds nothing to the quote therefore I wouldn't expect when I give a quote for it to contain my yeah?'s.

The one other issue that I have with this is the delay in disseminating information on the assaults to students. Obviously anything in the Print was finalised at least a few days ago, in order to get design done, and off to the printers, so given the seriousness of these assaults, surely it would have been prudent to sent out an all students email with whatever information could be confirmed at that point, if not before, when the information was confirmed?

I appreciate that not all the content contained therein lends itself to such a medium, but giving indications of where the assaults took place up to now (especially as they are so spread out) as has been done now would probably have more impact to many people using those routes than the general message from before, as well as making people in other areas think twice.

Just to answer a few peoples questions, you'll find them all over campus, but mostly around the arts block, John Hume building and the SU. And they're completely free too. There's loads of copies of it so whoever it was that asked about getting one on Sunday, that should be no problem.

EDIT: also glad to hear everybody really enjoying it. I have heard that in past years it hasn't been great, so I'm delighted for the improvement! Big big big props to banquo for this, among some others.

I'm very impressed by it, it's much better than the spoke.

leopoldbloom wrote: »

The SU sent out an all student email last week, and heavily used facebook for that entire week to get people to walk home in groups. Reporting incidents is best for a paper. Warning and counselling caution is what we did, to avoid any repeats if at all possible.

Furthermore, if we said Bond Bridge and Parsons Street are dodgy - what's to make someone in Lawrence Avenue think twice about walking home alone?

I didn't get that e-mail and the only things I've seen recently on facebook are about the student march and the Halloween bar ex. On one day there were numerous warnings about not walking home alone but from what I can tell they were not mentioned again and no other information was released. Obviously for legal reasons there isn't a huge deal that can be said but put simply if I did not check my facebook on that particular day I would not have known anything about it.

I think the point that was being made was that by saying the attacks were spread all over everybody would be on alert no matter where they were rather then thinking ah sure it only happened on such and such so I'll be fine.

Paper looks great guys But what's up with the Archery photo? The guys were made pose for about 30 seconds at full draw, which is not easy to do, and then a blurry photo of people who aren't staff members was used instead?

Cool cool, just wondering- seemed like a waste of a good and difficult pose, glad you're using it!

Who's your photographer, juts out of curiosity?

online version plox

leopoldbloom wrote: »

The SU sent out an all student email last week, and heavily used facebook for that entire week to get people to walk home in groups. Reporting incidents is best for a paper. Warning and counselling caution is what we did, to avoid any repeats if at all possible.

Furthermore, if we said Bond Bridge and Parsons Street are dodgy - what's to make someone in Lawrence Avenue think twice about walking home alone?

Ok, you sent an email, but to be honest, I've just looked at that mail, and as funky penguin said, it was item 2, on a list of 6 or 7 items - easy to get lost in the middle, tbh. I also notice that two versions of that mail were sent to me, the second because item 7 had been omitted. Surely, since the limits on the number of these emails seems to be flexible, this issue could have been given its own mail, or at least made more obvious in the last one? People have already said on here that they missed it where it was.

Also, while I see facebook as useful for getting information out there, I don't believe it should be relied on so heavily as it seems to be, seeing as it's not a site that the computer centre are fond of, and as I recall, it is not to be accessed from certain computer facilities on campus. The SU have recently put up posters warning students not to engage in anti-social behaviour, in some cases 2 of the same poster beside each other - why not replace one of these with a poster warning of the assaults?

And as for your comment on specifying Bond Bridge and Parsons Street, the paper mentions other localities, and as I pointed out, the variety and separation between those areas, in most people I know, would mean more than the same vague blanket warning as was issued last year, and as has gone out on other occasions in the past. It is perfectly possible to mention cite examples while clarifying that they are not exclusively the locations where attacks took place.

This is my 8th year here, and I know plenty of people who have heard that blanket warning, both this year and in the past, and (wrongly, I admit, but it still happens) they jump to the conclusions of it being the usual areas. Pointing out any example that shakes that notion as early as possible would be a good thing, IMHO.

mickstupp wrote: »

Do people expect someone to verbally announce a thing in every single class?

Not every single class, no. In years gone by though, when it suited them, they were well able to have people talk in enough/a wide enough variety of classes to have the word spread. I'm not saying that people haven't gotten up in front of classes regarding this issue, I don't know, just that it IS possible because it has been done many times before. Failing that, class reps could be encouraged to have a quick word at the start of a lecture.

Sigh.

/puts on sandwichboard.

Any word on the online version, yet?

Is it something ye actually plan to do or, have things just got very busy of late?

The NUIM SU facebook page has nearly 5k friends + I'm sure using that the print would reach far more people if it was posted on-line.

I think because you can't ftp from the office, put up pdf's for the interim. I will still reach more people. When you can, ftp!