In tomorrow’s paper we rolled out our begining coverage of Bloomington’s very popular Lotus Fest. Since it is an event that attracts thousands to our community and features plenty of talented performers and artists, we planned our coverage on several fronts.

First, we devoted the Arts front in Thursday’s paper to the Lotus Fest, which included an entire listing of the schedule and a story previewing the events and telling what readers should expect if they go.

On the Web, we revived our Lotus blog that was started last year. The blog will feature our reporter’s first-hand impressions of the event, and you’ll be updated through the week on what they think was the most interesting, weird or any other observations they come away with.

And finally in WEEKEND, that comes out Thursday, we tell you about the top 10 attractions of Lotus Fest that you can’t miss. So if your a longtime fan of the fest or just hearing about right now, we hope you’ll enjoy our coverage.

Once again the Indiana Daily Student is rolling out a new, exciting and awesome blog. This time, however; it is from our opinion staff. Sample Gates will provide a new interactivity for you, our readers, and the opinion staff to sound off on some of the most controversial issues.

With several columnists dedicated solely to updating the blogs, look for constant posts, as they will generate topics for discussion and respond to your comments. So get ready and please visit The Sample Gates.

Every semester the Indiana Daily Student receives at least a couple of requests from people asking for us to remove an article from the Web that mentions them in some kind of unflattering way. Typically their name is mentioned in a police story, where they were arrested for some crime, and years later a Google search will have that article come up. Many say as a result it has caused them embarrassment or difficulty in finding a job, being forever linked to a story that happened years ago.

While I can emphasize with those concerns, our policy is that unless a story is inaccurate, we will not remove it for our site. If we did remove content, it would set a dangerous precedent. Also as a historical source and the paper of record for IU, it is important that what we publish remains up.

With the news that the famous Washington Post reporter and author, Bob Woodward, was coming to IU, the staffers at the IDS were some of the most excited. However, with his visit coming last night on a production day for us, the staff worked hard to get their copy in extra early so many, including myself, were able to slip away for a while and see his speech at the packed IU Auditorium.

Here are some of the most interesting points I left Monday’s speech with:

1) Woodward stressed several times that the best interviews come at night. Away from the office, he said, is when a source will really open up and give you information that is away from the public eye. From the master of cultivating sources, this is an important lesson for journalists of the need to develop and really Talk to sources, instead of quick hit interviews that really are not able to go much farther than the surface of a story.

2)  Journalism is an antedote of the threat of what he calls a “secret government.” He said this secrecy in our elected office is a threat to democracy and journalists should always be working to shed light on this, especially using the build-up and exuction of the Iraq war as an example of the government not being totally forthcoming to the public.

3) Confidential sources should be used more, not less, in newspapers. While many say that anonymous sources hurt the credibility of a story, Woodward made the point that when a newspaper uses a confidential source they put the burden on themselves, as well as the source, that their information checks out and is legit. Because of this the journalist must push farther for the truth and not just blindly print whatever information a source spits out.

Did you see Woodward speak Monday? What did you think of his presentation and the points about journalism and the war in Iraq that he made?

There are few situations when we will use an anonymous source in the Indiana Daily Student. However, today was one of them. In the story, “Measuring a sex offender,” that ran on Thurday’s page one, we profile an IU student, who was convicted previously of second degree sexual assault, after he had consensual sex when he was 18 with a 13-year-old. We examine how his life has changed, and how has being listed on the sex-offender registry has effected him.

The only way we convince the subject to tell us his story, however, is if we promised him confidentiality. To make this decision I took many things into account from our Code of Ethics:

1st, I determined that this was a story “of vital public interest” because of the importance of the subject and the debate it could create. 2nd, I assessed that the subject could claim to face “read danger of physical, emotional or financial harm” if his name was used. 3rd, it was “used absolutely necessary,” because with out it, we could not get the story. Finally, the information from the subject was “confirmed by credible sources” after we checked his story with court documents and his parole officer.

While any story would be strengthen by using real names for sources, in situations such as this, I feel that it was our best option to make sure we tell this important and interesting story. What do you think, should newspapers refrain from using confidential sources at all or is the criteria above satisfactory?

There are not many dates that stand out in the minds of Americans like 9/11. Six years removed from that day, almost anyone you ask can still recall with amazing percesion what they were doing or where they were when they learned of the attacks.

Our coverage this year of the Sept. 11 anniversary was unconventional. As the only local event surrounding the date that we were aware of, we decided to put a cover panel discussion of a group that questions the truth of 9/11 on our page one today. While we acknowledge there are many who disagree with the panelists at the event, we felt the event was still significant. What do you think? Should we have played the event so prominently or is hearing other opinions – even when very unpopular – still a good thing to cover?

I’d like to introduce two new blogs at idsnews.com. First this week we started “Under the Rock,” a blog devoted to the IU football team. With one of the best chances in years to make a bowl appearance our two football beat writers and columnist, will keep you up to date on all the inside information surrounding the team.

Next we have a very special temporary blog, called Empire Waistland, from an IDS staff writer who is chronicling New York Fashion Week live from the Big Apple this week. Our writer will be behind the scenes, by the runway and talking to some of the top designers in the industry.

These blogs aren’t there just for you to read, they are there for you to comment and join the discussion. Feel free to add your opinion on any post, or pose your own question to our writers. With that join the debate, and enjoy!

Unknown to most readers, today’s paper saw the first product of our newly created Special Projects desk. The top story on Page One, “Hiring practices might ‘burn’ IMU Dining Services” was an article Special Projects had been working on since before the semester even started.

The intention of this new desk is to allow writers to focus on long-term, hard-hitting journalism that tends to be ignored in the daily rush to fill a given section. Brian Spegele, the editor for this new desk, works with his staff editing and crafting the story to its full potential. While normal stories, go through the regular rounds of edits, stories that go through Special Projects are able to be examined under a microscope to make sure all details are correct, and to ensure we are giving our readers all the information they need.

I was particularly proud of this story that ran as it brought an important issue into the public debate, while examining both sides of the controversy. Stay tuned for more investigative and enterprising reporting from this desk in the coming days and weeks.

Tonight was an unusual one. Typically as the clock ticks towards midnight, we are scrambling to check P1 and any other page still out. But tonight by 11 p.m. we were basically done and had plenty of time to double, triple and quadruple check our work.

This brings me to our deadlines and how we work with them. Every section has a different deadline in which they are supposed to be done by, for example Opinion is supposed to be done at 7 p.m., while Sports should be done at 11 p.m. because of late scores and finally Page One is to be out by midnight. When we hit each of these staggered deadlines, things usually go smoothly. But when we have a late event cover or get a story in later than it should be for any one section of the paper, it drags back the time of everything.

Some nights it’s 11 p.m. and we still have 8 or more pages that are still out, needing to be checked and worked on. While other times, such as tonight, everything goes according to plan and we get out a little early. Every day is different and each day presents its own challenges, and that is what makes journalism so exciting.

As newspaper circulation across the country continues to decline, we are still seeing some positive news for the industry in terms of the Internet. Our Web site, idsnews.com, continues to thrive and grow with each passing month. In the latest Web statistics for the month of August, the data shows a 51.6% growth of pages views this month (258,839) in comparison to the same month last year (170,792). Another notable stat is that out blogs are on the rise as well. We had one of the best months for the IDS Basketblog, which recorded 20,653 views in August, up from 6,363 the prior month.

With job cuts in newsrooms all over the country, this is encouraging data to see that newspapers might just survive if business models are able to be reworked to take advantage of the Web. Also for you, the readers, it shows the new content and opportunities the Internet provides. And hopefully we will continue to expand that new frontier by developing new and innovative content.