Pine Needle editors use iPads to report
By Staff Reports
Senior editors of The Pine Needle student newspaper are working with iPads this semester with the acquisition of 12 Apple tablet computers, according to Dr. Judy Curtis, associate professor of Mass Communication, and faculty adviser to the campus paper.
"The iPads are allowing the students to find new ways of developing and covering news stories," she said.
"These small portable computers provide a convenient and productive way to communicate with each other and check information," Dr. Curtis said.
The iPad tablet is marketed by Apple as a lightweight tool, and among the application software programs (apps) available for iPads are many suitable for journalist productivity.
"The newspaper's editors use their iPads to communicate with each other from remote locations, to work on the paper's website, cover sports events, process photographs, track circulation and manage advertising sales," Dr. Curtis said. "They also use them for copy editing and creating electronic news reports in various forms like podcasts."
At the beginning of this semester, the paper's web editor Shawn McCain wrote an app to download and display news from The Pine Needle website on iPads. The app is available from iTunes.
"I'm eager to see what concepts and innovations they can produce," Dr. Curtis said.
"This technology puts our journalism students at the forefront of the latest technology," Dr. Curtis said.
