It’s time for Lavar Ball to be quiet

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By JOSH WHITE

If you’re a college basketball fan, you saw the tremendous skill set of freshman Lonzo Ball this season at UCLA.

Ball was one of the best players in the nation and has already declared for the 2017 NBA draft and is currently projected to be a top three pick.

However, it isn’t Lonzo who is making headlines for his play on the court.

His father Lavar is taking the spotlight from his son and running with it.

Day after day, Lavar is on talk show after talk show, makes appearances on ESPN and other sports outlets just talking up a storm making preposterous claims.

The news media keep gobbling it up like it were turkey on Thanksgiving Day.

News media outlets love having Lavar Ball talk on their shows because he brings a controversial opinion, which generates viewers. However, enough is enough. I understand it is a business, but this is bad journalism.

Ball doesn’t bring any relevant sports topics to the forefront. He just makes claims about how his sons are the greatest in the world and that he could beat Michael Jordan 1-on-1.

Anyone’s dad would say their son is the best, why do you need to put an arrogant man on the air?

It baffles me that media outlets would rather have that man on the air or as the lead stories rather than an top line analyst grade talent. Putting Lavar Ball on the air cuts into the content sports fans are looking to see.

Lavar it is time for you to be quiet and let your son play ball.

MLB tries international branding

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By JIHAD SHATARA

There is nothing better than the sound of the crack of the bat and a bag of peanuts being opened.

The sounds of opening day bring joy to many ears and has become not only a country wide phenomena, but a global one as well. What is different from back then to now though? It really is a simple answer: the coverage by the news media.

Events like the World Baseball Classic bring so much national attention to the sport and other countries love it. Although the event is held in the United States, it involves countries that predominantly play baseball.

ESPN and the MLB, along with their own network, have done a fantastic job of coverage as far as international baseball has gone. They have shown tremendous love to players like Ichiro and they help not only the player brand themselves but the sport.

Brexit ‘diet’ arises as snacks get smaller

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By VERONICA SPAGNA

What if you were to pay the same amount of money that you usually pay for a bag of M&Ms, but with fewer M&Ms? Well, this is happening in Britain and not only with M&Ms. Because of Brexit, big American food companies have acted under pressure in accordance with the decreasing value of the pound, by diminishing the sizes of their products but leaving it at the same price.

The term Brexit comes from Britain’s decision to exit the European Union. The voting was held June 23 last year and the decision of leaving Europe was a very close call as “exit” won by 51.9 percent to 48.1 percent.

Since June, the pound has dropped 17 percent against the U.S. dollar. This is changing foreign exchange rates and is impacting the cost of commodities, such as ingredients and materials, increasing the price of imported goods such as food and electronics.

The chocolate industry seems to be one of the most impacted, as cocoa is priced in dollars and so producers in the U.K. pay more.

The process of shrinking the packages or decreasing the amount of the product in the packages is called “Shrinkflation.” Firms use shrinkflation hoping that their consumers do not notice, in fact, most of the time consumers do not seem to check the quantity or weight of the product on the packages.

Companies such as PepsiCo and Mars have been downsizing their products to make up for the decrease in values of the pound, which is why reporters in news articles have been calling this situation “Brexit Diet.”

For example, the 160 grams bag of M&Ms has been downsized to a 145 grams bag of M&Ms, but has remained the same price. Another example is the bags of Doritos, Tostitos, and Fritos, which now have 20 percent fewer chips than before but at the same price.

The retail sales have dropped significantly in the U.K. for three consecutive months. Many articles seem to focus mostly on how companies are decreasing the packaging, but not the impact that this is having on the British economy.

There doesn’t seem to be as much coverage on American news sites on this issue. The few American articles that do feature this topic, lack to mention how Brexit and how these current events also impact the American economy. Yes, the dollar is getting stronger, but this only makes American products more expensive outside the country, making them less attractive in the U.K.

Lady Gamecocks win NCAA title

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By ERYKAH DAVENPORT

One of the big stories in sports this week is the South Carolina Lady Gamecocks winning their first national basketball championship. After losing a prime piece to their team, 6-foot-4 Alaina Coates, the Lady Gamecocks were not expected to make such a run in the NCAA tournament.

The Portland Press Herald covered South Carolina’s history-making debut. The article mentioned how Dawn Staley, SC’s head coach, had never earned a national championship while playing for four years for Virginia. She also coached the Gamecocks to the national semifinals two years ago before losing to Notre Dame.

“You have to give tribute to the former players,” Staley said in the story. “Go back to my Temple days, they believed in our vision. We took that vision to South Carolina, and that vision was we’ll be national champions. If you stick with us and if you’re disciplined, if you believe, all these players believed in that. Happy our words came true to them.”

USA Today also published coverage on the record-breaking team. The article discussed how Mississippi State had all the momentum on its side after a shocking win over UConn on Friday night that ended the Huskies’ record 111-game winning streak. MSU was expected to pull off another upset, however, the Bulldogs fell short.

NCAA.com explained how this women’s basketball team has built its reputation on defense. The stellar defensive effort propelled the team past a nine-point halftime deficit in the Final Four.

“So, we were fortunate to be down nine,” Staley said. “But I just wanted to get our kids to the locker room at halftime because I knew, no matter how many points we were down, we could utilize our speed to get back into play — whether that’s trapping in the half court, whether that’s picking up full court, whether that’s coming off ball screens, setting our players up in positions where they could be effective.”

ESPN also covered this story in which Staley described her emotions the night she was crowned a national champion versus the emotion she felt in 1992 after losing her senior year in the semi-finals.

“I was exhausted, because I wanted it so much,” Staley said. “I put so much work and energy into being a national champion that the emotion was just to cry. To let it out. And 25 years later, no tears. Just going to enjoy it.”

New Marvel superhero is lesbian Latina

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By SHELLIE FRAI

Marvel’s newest comic-series is all about America Chavez, an 18-year-old college student who studies, hangs out with friends and fights evil aliens all in her signature gold hoops.

America is the first lesbian Latina superhero with her own comic series, making Marvel one of the most diverse comic book publishers.

Marvel also features comics of diverse protagonists like Muslim Mr. Marvel, an African-American Iron Man and a female Thor.

What is different about America Chavez’s comic, is that her writer, Gabby Rivera is herself a lesbian Latina.

Rivera, 34, is Puerto Rican and a proud member of the LGBTQ community.

While she did not set-out to be a comic book writer, her novel “Juliet Takes a Breath,” about a lesbian, Puerto Rican teen, was picked up by a Marvel editor and later became the basis for the comic series.

America first appeared fighting in across dimensions in Marvel’s “Vengeance” in 2011, now in 2017, she has her own popular comic series.

With the rise in political tension and threatened Hispanic community, America’s character seems all the more appropriate.

To keep up with her growing audience and popularity of America, Rivera has been learning more and more about comic writing, forming America’s identity as both a Latina and a lesbian.

Students arrested for prostitution

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By CHELSEA LOVELL

University of Miami students Acacia Friedman, 23, and Maury Noun, 21, along with Florida International University student Samara Charlotin, 19, were arrested last week after Friedman and Noun were surprised by an undercover cop.

This all took place at the at the Colonnade Hotel. The undercover policeman then asked them to verify “what he was getting” for the money he handed over and, while at first, the women said that it would be a “hang out,” they did agree that there would be sex with a condom.

Both women were charged for prostitution. Charlotin was also charged with possession of one gram of cannabis and one Oxycodone pill. Noun was hit with a charge of aiding and abetting.

Judge Mindy Glazer ordered Charlotin in court on Thursday to stay away from the other two, saying, “You’re a smart girl, and if you want to see age 20, you need to find a new line of employment. A very risky thing you are doing, alright, for someone with a lot of potential such as yourself. You need to stay away from them.”

Noun met with the undercover officer at the restaurant at the hotel. He then directed his girls to a room after the officer paid the $3,000. Noun was arrested on charges including deriving proceeds from prostitution.

Every local news station featured the story on their evening newscast, including NBC6, CBS4, Fox Channel 7 and ABC Channel 10.

Robot responds to president’s tweets

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By VERONICA SPAGNA

We should all be at least a little familiar with Donald’s Trump famous Twitter account; @realDonaldTrump.

The president’s tweets are bold and mostly childish, they can be categorized as a form of entertainment, mostly because they are hard to take seriously. He attacks anyone who offends him and twitter seems to be his main medium of expression.

But how will Donald Trump respond to an offense made by a robot?  I’m talking about a robot’s Twitter account responding to the president’s tweets with videos of a robot designed to print and set fire to them.

Since Donald Trump has opened his Twitter account in March 2009, he has gained more than 27 million followers and sent out around 35,000 tweets. His tweets bring with them a lot of controversies and are very condemning, leading to disappointment in the president even among people who voted for him.

This Tuesday a new account was introduced on Twitter with the description “Giving Trump’s tweets the attention they deserve.”

Since it went live, the account called @burnyourtweet, has posted a video each time @realDonaldTrump has tweeted. The videos posted consist of a robot printing the tweet on a piece of paper. The paper is then moved above a lighter, which sets fire to the paper and tosses it in an ashtray.

The video captions “I burned your tweet.”

After just one day of replying directly to Trump’s twitter, @burnyourtweet gained more than 10,000 followers. Many seem to praise this ritual and numerous reporters called it genius. I feel like it can be seen; as a work of art, a form of expression. A message that can be interpreted in various ways, but that shows clear disapproval in Donald Trump’s statements.

Behind the twitter account and the building of the robot is engineer David Neevel. A creative technologist from Portland who currently lives in Amsterdam.

He reasoned that Donald Trump’s tweets continuously cause negative emotions and the robot can isolate feelings because of its immunity to them.

Trump’s tweets depict his thinking. He is supposed to be a leader and an inspirational figure as he is the president of one of the most powerful countries in the world. His Twitter topics are improper for his position. His tweets can be inflammatory and, in this case, the response is a robot that turns his words into ashes.

Live action Lion King in the works

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By ISABELLA HALILI

“The Lion King” is one of Disney’s most beloved storylines. It’s originally an animated musical movie that has been adapted for the theater stage and is now going to be Disney’s newest computer graphics project.

Pre-production for Disney’s live-action remake of “The Lion King” has been in the works for a couple of months now, but the production team has just announced that director Jon Favreau’s top choice to voice the character of Nala is Beyonce.

The film has already cast the voice of Simba to the Golden Globe winner and star of the television series “Atlanta,” Donald Glover and also the voice of Scar to the original voice James Earl Jones.

The original movie premiered in 1994 and, with the inclusion of the Broadway stage adaptation, “The Lion King” is still the top grossed film in the world.

There has been no recent update as to when this remake will arrive in theaters, but it is a much anticipated film for Disney.

Articles from Variety and Time have been written revolving around the casting of the film, but there has been no recent updates as to when production will start or when then the film is expected to hit the theaters.

There needs to be more news media coverage as soon as production does start.

New York Times curates artisan writing

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By AMANDA PRATS

In the age of fake news, alternative facts and Facebook feeds, attempting to filter through the deluge of media we are faced with can be overwhelming.

For many, the difficulty of this task unfortunately translates into a complete lack of filtering.

Simply put, it’s often easiest to take the information presented to us at face value rather than critically examining our sources. This has led to what some have called a misinformation crisis, with “fake news” stories become a story of their own, particularly during the 2016 presidential election.

Beyond simply trying to find information that is at the very least reliable, challenging our personal views takes a step further. Many have referred to social media as an “echo chamber,” and have criticized it’s functionality as a source for news because we tend to receive information that falls in line with our personal opinions and the opinions of people in our social circles.

There is an incredible value in reading opinions that challenge ours, which is why The New York Times compiled a list of quality partisan writing to expose readers to diverse viewpoints. The list included links to articles from the right, left and center from a variety of sources. The list can be viewed here.

Dallas hosts NCAA Women’s Final Four

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By ERYKAH DAVENPORT

As March Madness is gradually coming to an end, this first week of April will mark the day one out of the final four teams remaining will be crowned national champions.

Four elite teams have managed propel pass very talented teams in search of winning the NCAA women’s basketball championship. The championship tournament is being held in Dallas. Dallas is home to one of the top WNBA teams, the Dallas Wings, and many of the players will be in attendance to check the immense talent present.

The four teams remaining are South Carolina, Stanford, Connecticut and Mississippi State. With final four match-ups taking off soon, a variety of news media outlets are making their predictions known in regards to how things will turn out. In a story published by USA Today, each of the four teams received coverage in regards to why they may win it all.

The South Carolina Gamecocks are back in the Final Four for the second time in three years. Led by two time SEC player of the year, the Gamecocks are a solid team. Accompanied by a ton of athleticism from Kaela Davis and Allisha Gray, this versatile team has every bit of reason as to why they are a special contender.

Being eliminated in the Sweet 16 in the previous year, Stanford has proven this postseason to be a gritty team. They defeated Notre Dame by one point in the Elite Eight. With the exclusion of drastically elite scorers, the Cardinals are well-balanced and have several talented perimeter shooters, including senior guard Karlie Samuelson.

The talk of the town is the matchup between the Samuelson sisters. Power forward, Katie Lou Samuelson, is averaging more than 20 points per game while shooting exceptionally well from behind the arc. The Huskies arrive in Dallas as the overwhelming favorite to win their fifth consecutive national title, while riding a 111-game winning streak.

The Mississippi State Lady Bulldogs might be the only other team in Dallas that can score enough to keep up with Connecticut after averaging nearly 93 points in four NCAA tournament games. This talented team is led by guard, Morgan William, who scored 41 points in the game against No. 1 seed Baylor. This is the Bulldogs’ first trip to the Final Four, so a just an NCAA championship appearance will be record breaking for them.

UM, FIU students arrested in Gables

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By COURTNEY ADELMAN

Students from the University of Miami and Florida International University were arrested yesterday during a prostitution sting in Coral Gables.

Acacia Friedman, a 23-year-old from UM, Maury Noun, age 21 from UM, and Samara Charlotin, a 19-year-old FIU student were all charged with prostitution after an undercover police investigation on Wednesday night.

Friedman and Charlotin were said to have met with and undercover detective at the Colonnade Hotel after they agreed to have sex for $5,000.

Once inside the Colonnade, the detective handed Friedman the money and asked for reassurance as to what was happening.

Both Friedman and Charlotin faced additional charged for having drugs on them.

Noun was charged with aiding or abetting prostitution.

Local 10 news reported the judge saying, “You’re a smart girl, and if you want to see age 20, you need to find a new line of employment…. A very risky thing you are doing, alright, for someone with a lot of potential such as yourself. You need to stay away from them.”

UM has declined information about the ongoing investigations.

The Pro Day craze out of control

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By JIHAD SHATARA

Pro day is a special event sacred to schools, coaches, scouts and most importantly, athletes.

After the NFL Combine that is held annually in Indianapolis, many teams want to see more. Players are more than happy to showcase their abilities all over again repeating the drills they just did a month ago; but why are they so eager to do these drills all over again? It is due to the high volume of news media exposure. For some players, they do not receive an invite to the combine, so this is their one and only chance to showcase their skills.

Pro day has become an event so big it is unimaginable to think that players would deny participating unless they could not walk. And the news media has allowed this to happen. The NFL Network along with ESPN sends multiple correspondents to schools all over the nation to cover these pro days. The schools holding pro day announce what scouts have representation at pro days, along with head coaches. It has become beyond crazy how much attention these days garner.

Yet, it only helps the schools and players. Potential recruits look at this as an opportunity to participate in these pro days one day. Maybe it can be them getting this attention one day.

The debacle that is the New York Knicks

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By JOSH WHITE

Carmelo Anthony has been the face of the New York Knicks since being acquired from the Denver Nuggets in 2011. However, times have changed.

Although the Knicks were never contenders to win the NBA title, they were playoff contenders. Anthony and the Knicks had been a team that battled for a bottom spot in the Eastern Conference making the playoffs in Carmelo’s first three seasons in New York.

Since then, diddly squat.

While Melo has aged and the supporting cast around him has diminished, there has been one other clear change: Phil Jackson.

Yes, the former 11-time NBA champion head coach stepped into a front office role for the first time in his career as the new president of the New York Knicks in 2014.

However, this experiment has failed. Jackson has introduced his trademark triangle offense. An offense that has worked with some of the greatest players of all-time, has been a case gone awry since he took the helm in 2014.

The Knicks had their worst year in franchise history finishing 17-65 in the 2014-15 season and haven’t looked all that much better since.

New York has already been mathematically eliminated from playoff contention and are on their way to another losing season.

This power struggle between Carmelo Anthony and Phil Jackson has been well documented by the New York news media.

A story that the journalists in the big apple have eaten up and chewed out multiple times over.

Jackson and the Knicks have made front page headlines numerous times after being one of the worst teams in the NBA something that wouldn’t happen in a market like Portland and Minnesota.

The New York news media continue to grill the Knicks and rightfully so.

I think the news outlets in the city that never sleeps is doing a good job from a journalistic standpoint because they are covering stories of a somewhat comedic franchise as it burns to the ground something that creates a lot of views from readers that generates a lot of cash for these news organizations.

From the athlete (directly) to the fans

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By LUIS GONZALEZ

The Players’ Tribune, founded by New York Yankee legend Derek Jeter, gives athletes the platform to speak directly to the fans, without input from the news media.

“My goal is for the site to ultimately transform how athletes and newsmakers share information, bring fans closer than ever to the games they love.” Jeter says on the website’s About page.

Athletes, from a wide variety of sports, have reserved the website to use for big announcements. One of the their most popular posts came from NBA Forward Kevin Durant, when he announced to sign with the Golden State Warriors during last summer’s free agency period.

Durant is one to be known for not being completely transparent with the news media and the reasoning behind using the Players’ Tribune but opened up about the press on Bill Simmons’ Podcast on the Ringer.

“I wonder like, what are your motives when you talk about this stuff?” Durant told Simmons. “What are you trying to get out of it? I know that me, I love talking about basketball. My thing is, I want the casual fan to understand what we go through because it’s not as easy as you think.”

The two later discussed how Simmons did not get angry when he and Durant got into a Twitter fight.

“You’re a real guy.” Durant told Simmons. “Some of these guys are so sensitive. Their egos are too big. But, you know, we can talk about that another time.”

The website has changed the way athletes are able to communicate with fans, in less serious ways as well.

NBA Hall of Famer, Shaquille O’Neal, collaborated with the Lakers’ team photographer to go through their archives and pick his favorite pictures from his time in Los Angeles.

It is interesting to note how a mistrust in the news media lead to Durant using the website as his platform to the fans.

Jeter may have wanted to change the way athletes and newsmakers share information, but his website and bad experiences between athletes and the news media members may have created a different result. The Players’ Tribune can inadvertently lead to a slimming down of the newsmakers to his equation.

Uber’s diversity report focuses on a truth

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By VERONICA SPAGNA

Uber is one of the most important ride-hailing services worldwide. With the value of nearly $70 billion, this company has been having some trouble with its image and its company culture.

Because of its current negative public perception. Uber conducted an internal investigation because of its desire to change. It consequently released a diversity report this Tuesday. This is the first report the company has ever released and it makes sense why it was kept hidden.

Uber clearly needs to step up its game, especially after the numerous scandals that occurred in the past months. The scandals include cases of female employees being sexually harassed, a viral video showing of Travis Kalanick, the CEO of Uber being disrespectful to a driver, and other unprofessional business practices.

The report shows the diversity of the company employees, not including the Uber drivers as they are freelancers.

The report depicted that nearly 50 percent of Uber’s employees are white, 31 percent are Asian, 8.8% are black, and the other 5.6 percent are Hispanic.

The report also showed that 36 percent of the employees are women, 15 pefcent of tech and 22 percent of leadership positions are held by women.

Uber wants to make progress by being transparent and states that there should be a balance in the ethnicity and sexes in the positions offered by the company.

Many journalists and reporters reacted with no surprise to the unbalance of female employees in Uber. In fact, many seemed to be supportive of the idea that Uber wants to fix this issue. This could be correlated to the fact that the diversity in numerous tech companies is very unbalanced and most employees, especially in higher positions consist of white males.

It’s not just Uber that has a low level of diversity. Many articles mentioned that tech companies such as Google, Microsoft, Facebook, Apple and more, seem to have very similar numerical figures. For example, 67 percent of Facebook employees are men, 69 percent of Google employees are men, and so on.

The focus of most articles that I read on the issue did not focus on criticizing Uber but focused on the lack of diversity in many tech companies. Some titles of articles based on Uber’s first diversity report were: ‘Uber’s first diversity report reveals no surprises.’ Another article title on the topic ‘Uber looks like the rest of tech: White, Asian and male.’

Tech companies and their importance in our developing world continue to become more important.

Scary clowns? Go see ‘It’ this fall

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By CHANTAL ALBA

Fun fact about me: I am terrified of clowns. Now half of you are probably thinking something like, “wow, scared of clowns, such a cliché”, while the other half of you are probably thinking something like “wow, me too, girl.”

But I do know you are all thinking, “How bad is the fear and where does it come from?”

Well, first off, it’s not anything crazy, just like “send chills down your spine / can you hold my hand please?” type of fear. Second, it comes from Stephen King’s “It,” the movie, released in 1990.

Those of you have seen the movie know exactly where I’m coming from and know where this post is going. (Side note: if you haven’t watched it, make it a point to, it’s a great movie even though I’m scarred for life from it).

There’s an It remake coming out this fall. Yes, a remake if you haven’t watched the trailer yet here’s the link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PN8il_zxNWM.

Just from the trailer you get the same creepy vibes and see some iconic scenes from the original which is great. I’m definitely excited to see this movie because (1) I love scary movies and (2) I’m expecting the movie will scare me enough to question why I would even dare put myself through the torture (in a good way) of watching the remake. I’m also glad this first trailer doesn’t give us a very long look at Pennywise the Dancing Clown, because it gives us more to look forward to when It finally premieres in theaters.

The remake will star Bill Skarsgard, who will be playing the clown in addition to “Stranger Things” actor Finn Wolfhard and “Midnight Special” actor Jaeden Lieberher. Directing the film will be Andres Muschetti and it will apparently be the first part in the two-part film series.

In the first part, Muschetti will be showing the audience Pennywise’s intentions he has in store for the Derry and the Loser club (the main kids in the story). So make sure you guys add this movie to your “must watch” list of movies, and don’t worry you have plenty of time to prepare yourself for the terror because it releases on Sept. 8, 2017.

Vogue highlights mental health

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By SHELLIE FRAI

For Vogue’s 125th year anniversary, Anna Wintour, the editor-in-chief, decided that in light of the recent societal tension and due to the predominant audience of the publication, the magazine would highlight women that are impacting the world for better in each issue for the rest of 2017.

To debut the plan, March’s issue was titled “Women Rule!” and it featured a cover with seven models of different ethnicities, sizes and race, with a caption that read “the beauty revolution: no norm is the new norm.”

In the latest issue of Vogue that debuted this earlier week, pop star and fashion icon, Selena Gomez is on the cover.

While that might not be shocking to some, the story that was featured next to her photographs surprised many.

Gomez not only talked about the facade celebrities must put on when they are watched by most of the world, but how common it is to not only people of influence and how the lack of conversation about that facade is detrimental.

Gomez talks for the first time about checking into a psychiatric facility herself and how therapy changed her life. She goes on to say how mental health awareness and therapy shouldn’t be stigmatized but encouraged.

This topic has not been talked about to this extent in the magazine before, and for it to come from a person of such influence is new to not only Vogue but to many fashion magazines.

Vogue emphasized that many see Gomez as just a million-dollar actress and a singer. However, she is also the executive producer of “13 Reasons Why” a mini-series about mental health and suicide awareness, and an advocate for dialectical behavior therapy, which focuses on borderline personality disorder.

Gomez is using her fame and stature to break down walls that say your mental health is not important. She is giving a voice to many that feel they aren’t good enough.

I believe Anna Wintour chose to tell Gomez’s story as part of her “Women Rule!” movement to highlight the fact that just as women are powerful and strong, they are allowed to breakdown and cry. We are all only human.

This issue is sending a message that in an environment where it is frowned upon to look vulnerable and weak, sometimes those can be your greatest weapons, which makes Gomez the perfect person to highlight for Vogue’s 125-year anniversary.

Another heartbreaking Hollywood split

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By CHELSEA LOVELL

Everyone was heartbroken after word got out of the split between one of the most iconic couples in Hollywood. The news of the d word (divorce) between Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie took over the media. From social media to entertainment news and even major news networks everyone was talking about it.

According to reports, Jolie decided to end their marriage after 12 years because she was “extremely upset” with the way Pitt has been parenting the kids. She sought out joint legal custody, but not joint physical custody.

“This decision was made for the health of the family,” attorney Robert Offer said in a statement. However, other reports say their split could have been brewing for years.

Despite everything, Angelina has said they will “always be a family”.

Dailymail.com reports that Pitt has been spending around 15 hours a day in a Los Angeles studio, where he is working on an art sculpture. A source has said “he spends all night working on his art and listening to emotional songs. Everybody knows it’s related to what’s going on with him personally, but nobody says anything. He’s a quiet guy, and very humble. He’s learning at a fast pace.”

CFDA unveils fashion award nominees

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By SHELLIE FRAI

With film award season over, a less publicized, yet equally as important, award season commences, American fashion award season.

Every year during the spring and early summer, fashion designers, retailers and brands join forces to celebrate the winners of the CFDA Fashion Awards.

The CFDA stands for the Council of Fashion Designers of America and was founded in 1962. Each year the council awards America’s future and established fashion talent at their fashion awards.

For the 2017 CFDA Fashion Awards, chairwoman and former creative director at her namesake label, Diane von Furstenberg, unveiled the list of nominees.

The nominees were not surprising due to the brilliance and beauty of the collections they have displayed throughout fashion month in February. The list includes, Joseph Altuzarra, Raf Simons, Marc Jacobs and Thom Browne and past winners Mary Kate and Ashley Olsen.

However, to some in the fashion industry, the amount of designers from abroad being honored were staggering.

Robert Geller, a Germany-based designer, was nominated for the first time in the Menswear Designer category. He is up against big names like Calvin Klein, Thom Browne and Todd Snyder.

Demna Gvasalia, the Belgian wunderkind that launched his millennial hit label, vetements, just a few years ago will receive the International Award for his work at Balenciaga and vetements.

Finally, Franca Sozzani, Vogue Italia editor-in-chief who recently passed away last year, will be honored posthumously with the Fashion Icon Award.

The award show will take place June 5, giving the fashion industry a season to wait anxiously.

However, until then the CFDA will keep busy.

Throughout the year the foundation provides monetary assistance in the form of resources and support to students at high schools to the graduate level. The CFDA also kick-starts fashion designers careers through the CFDA / Vogue Fashion Fund that provides business opportunities and publicity to emerging designers.

March Madness draws big numbers

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By ERYKAH DAVENPORT

March Madness is one of the leading sports stories throughout the news media currently.

News media outlets such as CBS, TNT, TBS and ESPN Sportscenter have been booming since the start of NCAA play. As brackets are busted as a result of many upset, the basketball world remains highly attentive to games played day in and day out.

On the women’s side, there has been a significant amount of tragic injuries causing some to miss the remainder of the season. Journalists and news anchors make it their priority to try to get in touch with those who have any type of inside information about injuries that may potentially hinder players from engaging in play.

Being first to the punch is ideal because as fans are tuned into games, they are dying to receive immediate follow ups and  coverage in regards to unknown or hidden information.  Once this news is released by a credible source, they in turn receive an immense amount of credit which is a vital component in the media world.

This time of the year, there is a ton of basketball played both on the men’s and women’s side. Therefore, every game cannot be aired at once. ESPN works around this by focusing on one pairing in which it thinks is a game that will attract more viewers, while still cycling through other games either during timeouts or at halftime. This coverage gives each team a chance for an adequate amount of TV time.

Currently heading into Sweet 16 play for the women as the men just started up yesterday, sports channels are responsible for a ton of coverage for the NCAA tournament. Until the first week of April, when all the brackets are finalized and a winner is known on the men and women side, this tournament is responsible for attracting lots of viewers and a ton of revenue being generated.