Well, I am a happy camper this week. The latest little video I made for NIGMS was done under embargo — that’s when papers are released to the media ahead of publication so journalists can prepare stories beforehand — so it was newsy. Because we worked with the researcher and his public relations guy to have it included in the university’s press release, and, more so, because the finding and the images were cool, the video got picked up by New Scientist, Technology Review and Popular Science. Seeing (and hearing) my work pop up there when the embargo lifted yesterday afternoon was great.
Since I interviewed the principal investigator a couple of weeks ago and am working on an article about the research, it has also been interesting to see how the three magazines covered the story — and how one of them fell into several traps you want to avoid when reporting new findings in general.
Next step: get more of my freelance writing in those mags!
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