Author: Virginia Martin
Meet the Alabama Scientists Connecting Soaring Global Temperatures to Carbon Dioxide
Two Alabama researchers study ice cores and fossil records from Antarctica, helping connect an alarming increase in the earth’s temperature to rising levels of carbon dioxide. Read more.
AI Spreads in Journalism. Remain Calm, Everyone.
The issue of how artificial intelligence programs will affect journalism is an interesting and complicated one. Some say they could have benefits. Others say they might be harmful. It depends on how they are used.
Did you think this was yet another article about AI for which the writer cleverly asked an AI program to write the lead? Fooled ya! This was actually my trying to write like an AI program.
Either way, pretty lame, eh?
The use of artificial intelligence in journalism is spreading rapidly, and debates over what newsrooms should and shouldn’t use it for are spreading even more rapidly. Read more.
In the Shadow of Brother Bryan: Homeless Living in Park Draw Ire, Sympathy
Sometimes the tears welled up in Brother Bryan’s eyes
The Rev. James Alexander Bryan, a Princeton-educated pastor, is known in Birmingham as an advocate for those facing homelessness.
“They are all dying for a little bit of love, for a kind word, for a warm handshake,” Brother Bryan was quoted in the book “Religion in Shoes” as saying of those he served. “Beneath that torn coat or ragged shawl, the life may be torn, but there is a soul for whom Jesus died.”
This week, Terrance Smith sat in a Birmingham park named after Brother Bryan. Smith is among hundreds facing unsheltered homelessness in and around Birmingham, many of whom frequent the city’s parks, including Brother Bryan in the Five Points neighborhood.
Earlier this month, Birmingham city councilors discussed individuals facing homelessness in Brother Bryan Park after a member of the public asked that city officials do more to address what he described as a “real problem.”
“It’s just horrifying what goes on over there,” Councilor Valerie Abbott said at the body’s meeting on Aug. 8. “There are people living in the park, and no other people will go in there.”
On Tuesday afternoon, Smith reacted to the council’s comments, saying he felt some of the discussion was offensive. Councilors, Smith said, should “get to know their neighbors.”
“I think they’re wrong,” Smith said, an etching of Brother Bryan on a stone facade just a stone’s throw away. “They just push us aside like we’re not people, but they forget. God created me. God created them. So what’s the difference?” Read more.
Proposal Would Create 36-Mile Trail Loop Around Birmingham
The loop would connect Ruffner Mountain, Railroad Park and Red Mountain Park. Read more.
Alabama First Grade Readiness Gets Support From Governor’s Education Commission
The future of a bill that would effectively mandate kindergarten in Alabama still faces an uphill battle, even as members of a state education commission said that they support the bill. Read more.
WBHM 90.3 FM Wins National Edward R. Murrow Award for “Deliberate Indifference” Podcast
The Radio Television Digital News Association’s Edward R. Murrow Awards are among the most prestigious in broadcast and digital news. This is WBHM’s second National Murrow Award in the past three years.
We’re Not in Kansas Anymore
The many powerful people who don’t like the news media have all sorts of ways to make life harder for them. Publicly attack credibility. Pass laws restricting information. Take away public notices. File a lawsuit. And the occasional physical assault.
There’s also the option to steal their equipment and kill their mothers.
The journalism community across the country is rightly up in arms about Friday’s raid on the newsroom of the family-owned Marion County Record in Marion, Kansas (population 1,900). Acting with a search warrant approved by a judge, local law enforcement seized computers, cellphones and other reporting materials. One reporter had her cellphone taken from her hand. Read more.
Birmingham City Council President Dissents From Vote Pledging Financial Support for Birmingham-Southern College
It’s not about Birmingham-Southern College; it’s about the residents of Birmingham.
That’s what Birmingham City Council President Wardine Alexander said Tuesday in her dissent from passage of a resolution pledging city dollars to support BSC, a private college, if the institution is able to obtain additional funding from the state. Read more.
Alabama Argues Its New Standards — Not SCOTUS Order — Should Dictate Congressional Map Redraw
Lawyers for the state defended Alabama’s new congressional map before a panel of judges who previously ruled the 2021 map violated the Voting Rights Act. Read more.
7 Cases of Tuberculosis Found in 4 Alabama Chicken Processing Plants
Alabama state health officials are asking workers in the region’s poultry industry and their close contacts to get screened for TB after the outbreak. Read more.
