Logging of www.dailybruin.ucla.edu

Sunday, June 9, 1996

This is what we celebrate, from a book by William Metz called
"Newswriting from Lead to ’30’":

THE ORIGIN OF "30"

* the first message sent by telegraph to a press association
­ during the Civil War ­ contained 30 words.

* when newspaper stories were written in longhand, X designated
the end of a sentence, XX the end of a paragraph and XXX the end of
a story.

* the maximum length of slugs a typesetting machine could cast
was 30 ems, so "30" meant the end of a line.

* when the AP was established, member newspapers got 30 messages
a day, the end of the quota marked by "30."

* a reporter named Thirtee sent a story with his name at the
end, which the telegrapher changed to "30."

to all the 30s leaving this year, congrats to surviving several
natural disasters, starting over on the new system and pulling more
all-nighters than you ever would have pulled for school. i have a
trunk full of favorite issues, where we got the shot, the quote and
the story. i’ve gone from the most conservative job (copy editor)
to the least conservative (electronic media) and cursed the office
many times, but never have i regretted being on daily bruin staff,
and it was worth it because of you. thanks for supporting my lack
of sleep, coffee fund, bar tab and the website, laurel laurel

TO: Electronic Media ([email protected])

CC: [email protected], ffernandes, maccurdy

SUBJECT: survival of the web

BEGIN MESSAGE HERE:

there was no EM before you ­ your spontaneous combustion
made this happen. we started with zero and now we’re celebrating
our first anniversary. the bruin took a chance on us this year, and
we gave them a website. we made a gateway to ucla for the rest of
the world, and the world is looking.

the skeptics will not disappear, so it’s up to us to convince
them that the future will come from the network. already, it’s
changed the way i write (the copy desk is going to hate this
column), the way i find information, the way i look at technology
and computers and the way i see myself, and what i can accomplish.
it may not be the Great Equalizer yet, but the net is allowing a
hell of a lot of people to have a voice, us included.

i’ll miss EM the most, because what you are creating will define
the way we know each other in the next century. all those hits from
the south bay next year? that’ll be me. props to the posse ­
ldavis

TO: New School Staff ([email protected])

SUBJECT: "The Paper": the movie

BEGIN MESSAGE HERE:

if you haven’t seen this film, watch it. all of you are in this
movie somewhere.

nothing i can say will ever prepare you for next year. best of
luck for your fresh start; you wouldn’t be at the bruin if you
weren’t worthy of the legacy it stands on. duck when there’s flying
debris.

there’s no place like the bruin, there’s no place like the
bruin, there’s no place like the bruin …

TO: The L.A. Sucks Club ([email protected])

SUBJECT: no doubt: an open letter

BEGIN MESSAGE HERE:

you’ve come here for school, work, fantasy, fame, anonymity, a
clean start and hate it anyway. you are responsible for L.A.’s
reputation as a rootless, godless, artless city. here’s a
challenge:

read the firefighters’ plaque in the lobby of the central
library. look at L.A. from the top of mandeville canyon just after
the morning fog clears or surf at nickels beach on saturday and
snowboard in big bear on sunday.

talk to the guy that sells oranges on your freeway exit; ask how
his day went. scrub graffiti off the traffic sign on your street
the day it appears, and watch it stay clean. learn slang from a
10-year-old in culver city who translates for her parents.

read the Weekly or listen to Which Way L.A. on KCRW. go to a
movie on opening night in westwood or a concert at the hollywood
bowl. see "Blade Runner," "Chinatown," "L.A. Story" and "Stand and
Deliver." go to a UCLA basketball game.

appreciate the irony of palm trees blowing gently over a fierce
and visceral city that refuses to die. see it as a phoenix in a
desert at the ocean’s feet, new adobe or glass buildings rising
from old, exposed foundations next to structures of some old and
different design. just like the souls who occupy them. accept the
whimsy and humanity within her borders and the preview of the next
stage of society that you get as an Angeleno.

then tell me Los Angeles is a rootless, godless, artless
city.

i thought so.

davis was the 1995-96 electronic media director, and she’s
forgotten all the grammar she learned as a copy editor. she is now
going to go delete all 314 old messages from her email account.