ASU Downtown Election Saga Ends
Finally, the controversy that took place during the 2010 Arizona State Downtown Phoenix ASASUD elections has come to an end. Two days ago, Vaughn Hillyard and Andres Cano announced that they were conceding from the race.
While I'm happy they've decided to move on, I can say that the drama that this eleciton brought about will be missed.
It all started when ASASUD sent out an email on the day that the results were supposed to be announced saying that Cano/Hillyard were disqualified because of one line in a facebook message. Cano/Hillyard gathered 454 votes, while Vasquez/Abercrombie only gathered 321. Because of the decision that was made by certain [biased] members of the ASASUD elections committee, it was announced that despite gathering nearly a 60% margin in the voting, Cano/Hillyard would not be seated as ASASUD President and Vice President.
The outroar from students brought about several new pages in this thrilling story. Let me first say that I was an active member of the Cano/Hillyard campaign, as if you cannot already tell by this post.
The day that the disqualifications were announced, facebook and the internet went wild. A group and fan page were launched in protest to the occurrences.
Stand Strong with Andres & Vaughn
I hate it when ASASUD doesn't count my vote
Then ASASUD had to do something. They announced that they would be holding a Q & A session to discuss the events that happened, so an event page was made.
ASASUD Elections Committee Q & A Session
Uh-oh, once they hit 70 confirmed guests, ASASUD knew it had a problem that couldnt be marked over with white-out or disappear from the books. Then, they changed their event without notice. No longer was it listed on ASASUD.com as a "Q & A Session", but it was now just an announcement.
Oh no, Cano and Hillyard weren't about to just let themselves be stifled. They issued a letter stating that their questions would be answered, whether fielded by the Elections Committee or not.
The result? This.
And these.
Finally, the concession comes to an end.
Andres & Vaughn, you fought the good fought, and in the end the corrupt government still one. I guess ASU can really teach you about the real world, right?
Drunk Software Engineer loses iPhone Prototype
For those of you who may not know me well, I'm a geek and follow tech news all the time.
I couldn't help but feel sorry for 27-year-old Gray Powell who got drunk at a bar in Cupertino and lost the next-generation [2010] iPhone prototype.
Not only does this scar his professional reputation for the rest of his life, but knowing Apple's practices regarding hardware leaks, he might be driven to suicide. That is, after all, what happened to 25-year-old Sun Danyong who was working in Apple's Foxconn manufacturing facility overseas and lost one of the iPhone 4th generation prototypes. You can read about that story here.
Even worse is that Gizmodo published everything about Powell (his university, facebook, and myspace pages) and did a complete breakdown of the new iPhone that Powell lost today. Wow, I bet Steve Jobs broke an iPad or two when he saw that one.
You can read the complete article on Gizmodo about Powell at this link. Or, if you want to check out all the info on the phone, you can see that too.
Below is a picture of Powell fresh off of his MySpace, just for kicks.
Joe Arpaio Controversy: An ASU Love Story
A couple weeks ago in my History 110 class, we were reminiscing on the lack of significant controversy taking place at ASU.
This got me thinking about one event, which in retrospect was quite the contrary.
In short, Joe Arpaio visited the "First Amendment Forum" on the ASU downtown Phoenix campus to do a "Meet the Press" styled panel. It got interrupted, and they caught his reaction on video. Now that there are rumors about Arpaio running for governor, I've gathered the video story which can hopefully speak for itself.
Meeting Steve Kroft
Through the NATAS organization at ASU, I had the opportunity to attend the NAB and RTDNA journalism conferences that took place last week in Las Vegas.
Quite possibly the biggest highlight of the trip for me personally was having the chance to meet 60 Minutes reporter Steve Kroft. I attended both the session in which they held titled "The Kraft of Kroft" and the reception where he received the Paul White award.
Meeting Kroft and going through this experience in particular I think reminded me of why I chose journalism as a profession to begin with. On a fairly regular basis peers are quick to share their distrust in the media, and at a time when more Americans trust Jon Stewart to deliver their news than a local station it can seem like a grim field to go into. The starting salary for a journalist in a low-tiered market is around $17,000. Newspapers are a thing of the past, and more and more people are trying to jump on this bandwagon of digital media.
Kroft has done it all, and I want to do it all. He's done stories ranging from exposing the exorbitant cost of dying (through health care) in the United States to casual interviews on the set of Seinfeld. Barack Obama knows Kroft by name.
It's definately not about the money or the fame, but to hear his stories and zoom out to the current state of media in the US is almost a challenge for me.
Steve, if you're reading this, congratulations and thanks for the inspiration. 
Welcome to JEG Media!
Hi there!
My name is John Genovese, and I'm the guy that runs this website.
I'm currently studying Journalism & Mass Communication at the Walter Cronkite school at Arizona State University. I also produce video packages for The State Press (http://www.statepress.com) and am an intern at Univision 33 in Phoenix, AZ.
This blog is my home to share my videos and ideas. Mostly it will give me the opportunity to share interesting tidbits that I encounter with the rest of humanity.
So, to be formal- welcome, and enjoy.