This evening was the first of the four candidates' question times, with video being recorded (I think?) for the first time. Tallie Kane (reviews editor), Jacob (news editor), Luke (web editor) and Hannah (Pure FM sec) came along and helped out, broadcasting the evening's events to literally billions* of listeners, and videoing the night's proceedings - hopefully the videos should be up on our YouTube stream soon (i.e. once I or another kind soul processes them).

The evening is always scary for the candidates, so a big pat on the back to the girls and guys for doing so well tonight. A few are going to need to be trained to talk louder into the microphone, but that's nothing a little adjustment of the mixing desk can't fix. Alternatively, the "sound engineer's limiting stick" can be used to similar effect... 

Tomorrow night we're doing something very similar over at Rees halls for their residents. I'm told space there is limited, so it's more an opportunity for residents to come down, wonder what the hell we're doing and ask the candidates some questions rather than a bring-all-your-supporters-along-and-make-lots-of-noise night. Not that I mind either way - all I have to do is sit behind a sound desk and try not to get into (any more) trouble!

Thursday and Friday night will see the elections candidates at the Union, so that should be a really good night and will see Pure FM "OBing" (broadcasting live) and the Pugwash News bods recording and interviewing. Ooh, that reminds me, we have loads of interviews from tonight we need to sort out, as well as the candidates' segments.

If only I had half a clue about video editing... Oh dear...!

In other news (ahem), the latest issue - issue 11 - of the newspaper arrived today. It's looking good, although the editorial/pre-press process still needs a little tweaking.

Newspaper "oopses" 

This also appears to be as good a place as any for me to publish some "oopses" from the newspaper... 

I'm guilty as charged of cocking up Jacob's article with the inaccurate 'Frewen Library wins "Best New Building"' headline - apparently the Frewen part is the old building - the new building is simply The University Library. Sorry Jacob!

We also have some images on the PWs front page of the paper credited to "some guy with a camera", and an article has been attributed to the vaguely-titled "Union Council Chair". My apologies to the two hard-working bods involved. The cause of the mistakes will be looked into, and a suitable scapegoat found and made an example of. Possibly...

* potentially, of course ;o)

The Union Council report of a Media & Publifications Numpty, aged 19 and 36/4...

This month, UPSU’s media bods have mainly been focusing their attention on…

Pure FM

• The 24-hour broadcast is looming - as February’s Union Council happens, the broadcast will be underway, with charity fund-raising eBay auctions taking place every hour throughout the day. Tune in! www.purefm.com
• The Pure FM Masterclass - with radio professionals including Radio 1’s BB Aled - is pretty much booked up now, and everyone’s getting ridiculously excited at the prospect of seeing Real Live Celebridees talking radio… ;o) Well done, Pure!

Pugwash magazine

• Issue 3 is out - well done to the team for working so hard on this issue, especially as the end-of-semester period is horribly packed with exams and coursework deadlines, so huuuuge thanks go to everyone who worked so hard. You can pick up a copy around campus now, visit www.pugwashmag.com to download it, or drop into the Union to get yours!
• Distribution of the magazine has been good again, although I think there is a general awareness that we can be more proactive in getting the magazine to a wider audience - watch this space!
• Thanks go to the Pugwash team for their extra hard work in re-jigging the magazine to take into account the change in space availability due to advertising.

Pugwash News & PWs newspaper

• Issues 9 and 10 came out on deadline (although issue 10 then went back in, had a think about it, took off its front cover and came out again…) and both issues received widespread distribution.
• Issue 9 was also a first as we had advertising for the first time - woohoo!
• Sadly, issue 9 fell victim to a very unfortunately-worded article, which resulted in us having to print a full apology and retraction to the University. Here’s what I had to say about this matter in my editorial in issue 10 of the newspaper:“You may have spotted that the front covers from the last issue were conspicuously absent. As you may also have spotted, this issue carries a sincere apology to the University from the Union, relating to the article printed in the last issue which we had to cut out. The last two weeks have been very stressful for a number of the newspaper team and Union staff, as we worked hard to put new systems in place to try to prevent any reoccurrences of the problems which beset that issue.

• “As Media & Publications Officer I want to extend my thanks to all the staff and students involved with the Union, and the staff at the University, who have shown a great deal of patience and understanding while we worked to fix our mistakes, and I am happy that we can now move on with a lot more confidence problems like this one should be avoidable in the future.
  “Once again, many thanks to everyone involved for working so hard this issue, and I hope you as our readership haven't lost any faith in the Union's youngest publication just yet.”

• As a result, a new system for tracking content submissions has been put in place for both publications, and is mentioned below...

Contributor teams - features, news and reviews

• Pugwash and Pugwash News are both supplied by the same three teams of news, features and reviews bods. Due to the newspaper’s issue 9 problems, we have a funky new paper-based tracking system which has - understandably - caused a lot of headaches for the editorial teams as we work together to put theory into practice. However, despite having only three days’ warning and a lunatic sleep-deprived MAPO to guide them, everyone involved in issue 10 of Pugwash News managed to put out a great issue, and one which I intend to be one o...
  
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A happy new year to you all out there in readerland. We're in the middle of putting together issue 7 of Pugwash News, the first (hopefully of many!) for 2008.

I hope you all spent at least some of your free time over the holidays taking a break from coursework and/or the obligatory part-time job almost every University student I've ever known has had to take on to pay the bills.

Students are generally regarded as one of the most hard-core groups of job-hunters, accepting offers of employment as diverse as turkey inseminators (eww) and deckchair assistants (a position better suited to the summer months, admittedly), and anything in-between.

I've spent my Christmas taking a good look at what makes student employment tick, looking at students' union "job shop" websites across the country, as well as some of the larger ones including Monster and The Grauniad... sorry, The Guardian.

This hasn't been because I'm getting cold feet in my current position as Media Officer, but because I've been working hard on the new UPSU JobShop website. The old website's done us proud, with thousands of students finding part-time work each year through the Union - and not a single turkey-farm job in sight - but for technical reasons, the old JobShop website hasn't seen any development over the last few years, and has to run on a separate web server away from the rest of the UPSU.net website, making it difficult to really highlight the wide range of part-time jobs our JobShop is so popular for across the rest of the website.

Hopefully it’ll all be done and dusted and ready to turn on (at upsu.net/jobshop) around the third week of January, fingers crossed!

We’ve also got a massive archive of back-issues of Pugwash magazine and Pugwash News online on the Pugwash website - there’s loads of great articles in there from previous years which are still as relevant today as they were when they were published, and are well worth a look (during breaks in revision, of course!).

I've also spent some of my hard-earned on a new pair of DJing headphones, as my last pair fell apart after 12 years' use, so at last I should be able to start putting together some new mixes to listen to, play on Pure FM, and annoy everyone in the Sabb office with ;o)

There’s a point to this rambling stream-of-consciousness, of course: with the Sabb Elections beginning in the next couple of weeks, and voting in the first week of March, I’ve been thinking about what makes a good Media Officer.

I’ve got a bit of a web design background, have a passing acquaintance with DJing and radio production, can use Quark and Photoshop to knock out something approaching a half-decent publication, and even know which way round to hold a camera.

Similarly, previous Media Officers have boasted skills as wide-ranging as video production, radio presenting, news journalism, management experience (and something they call “people skills”, although I’m not convinced they’re any more real than the Tooth Fairy or Santa Claus… ;o), artistic flair… the list goes on.

There doesn’t seem to be any particular “theme” here though - UPSU Media Officers don’t seem to have a common interest, hobby, past-time or skill, apart - possibly - from a masochistic streak when it comes to working hard.

Generally speaking, what sets Sabbatical Officers apart from your average student? It’s as simple - and as vague - as this:...

Tomorrow afternoon, I'm hopping on to a flight to Ibiza for a couple of days of being "PR"'d by Making Waves, the PR company tasked with promoting the forthcoming Malibu Soundclash event at the Union on the 19th October.

The basic plan is to take a gaggle of student journalists over to the White Isle for a couple of nights. The first night is a mini (I think?) version of the Malibu Soundclash event, with us journos embarrassing ourselves on the decks doing some, err, "mixing" - followed by a responsible drinking lecture once we're all three sheets to the wind. After that, it's off to Café Mambo on the second night... I think that's something resembling the plan, anyway. Spice Girls anyone?

My job out there is to report back on how wonderful the night was, and to promise how wonderful the Malibu Soundclash event is going to be when it comes to Portsmouth.

The thing that's worrying me is that I don't do lying very well, so I can't exactly promise it'll be good. Disclaimer aside, I reckon it'll probably be a great time, with bells on, and going on last year's event, the Malibu Soundclash night at the Union should be awesome.

The whole principal of the PR industry is a bit of a strange concept to me; "surely, if a company's paying for me to go an lounge about on a hot, foreign island enjoying myself, there must be a catch or something questionable going on?" I've wondered out loud many times.

The reality here is that Malibu, being a heeyowge company, are very keen to see their University Soundclash tour promoted to within an inch of its life. The UK clubbing scene is cut-throat at the best of times, and Malibu simply don't want their night to sink into oblivion because the marketing (or the event) is half-arsed.

Ok, I can understand that.

This isn't the first time the Soundclash has come to Portsmouth, and last year saw former MAPO Fraggy being sent out to the White Isle for a 24 hour stint on the same PR tour. The Soundclash event was then held on a Wednesday night which, let's face it, needs no help to be a packed-out night; because it's being held on a Friday this year, it should be a great addition to the Union's Orange Fridays brand.

Here's the only thing that remains a bit of a worry for me: what I know about journalism could be written on the back of a postage stamp. With a blunt crayon. In a form of blind over-compensation, I've been out and bought myself a shiny new Red 'n Black notepad and a few biros (I lose or eat every pen I own eventually, so buying anything more expensive is just stupid), so at least I might look the part, even if I spend my time drawing doodles instead of writing journalist-y things. Wish me luck...!

One last thing: I've always wanted to go to Ibiza. Now I'm going, I'm hoping it won't be like meeting your hero and then realising (s)he has chronic dandruff, halitosis, and wears socks with sandals... You get the idea...

Anyway, I'll be back in a few days. While I'm gone, make sure the cat's fed & watered, and don't leave the gas on. If you don't hear from me by the weekend, I've either been refused entry ...

There's a line of energetic, suntan-sporting, beach apparel-wearing students queuing outside the Union already - it's not even 8pm yet - reaching at least to the entrance to Blackwells. Meanwhile, the downstairs of the Union's pretty much full, and people are stacking up in the beer garden outside Waterhole.

Cheers everyone! Enjoy your night, and enjoy the last few days of the year :o) /al