I decided to go out on a limb and click ‘random article’, because why not? I ended up reading about how Instagram is ruining vacation, which is somewhat true, for my generation especially. I could go on and on about how much time people spend trying to portray a perfect lifestyle, but that’s a different story for a different time.
As I read this article, I felt it best connected with Clark’s tool 25, ‘Learn the difference between reports and stories.’ A lot of this article is an opinion, almost like a column, but it does contain information found from reporting. Clark emphasizes that the balance between reporting and stories is important to creating the best overall piece, as it levels our emotions with our knowledge.
If Pilon would have written this whole piece based around her opinion, I probably would not have credited her as a legitimate source on the matter. But she backs up her opinion and her own personal experiences with facts about what is happening around the globe, like the ban of selfie sticks at Disney and the increase in deaths by selfie.
The reporting and facts that she presents opens the reader up to feeling emotion, as Clark notes as being important if the reader is going to connect to the piece. To an extent, while her own experiences definitely qualify as stories, they can also qualify as reports. That exact reason is why it is important to understand both the difference and the necessary balance when writing. A story comprised of anecdotes will only go so far if it has no fact.
Pictures can also tell both stories and reporting, which is one of many reasons why having a good photo editor who can tell them difference can be so important.
Pilon does a good job of using stories to draw emotion from the reader. The emotions, in this case, can be anywhere from anger to curiosity. If I’m being honest, it could have used a bit more reporting to could less column-like, but either way, she demonstrated why the differentiation between stories and reporting are important.