When I first heard about the show iCAUGHT I thought it was network’s weak attempt at trying to ride the YouTube wave. The name and graphics just screamed that they were trying to hard. Tonight I watched the last part of it by chance. It was great.

The last package was the most moving. It was called Your 3 Words or y3w (see what I mean by trying to hard). It actually made me tear up. The premise is simple. People send in a video of their week summed up in three words. I thought I was nuts so I sent it to my friend Jenna and she cried too. What’s most amazing is that you know nothing about these people yet with three words you can feel their pain and in some cases relate to them.

The first story that I saw was on these two guys who do special effects. Was pretty neat but not really my cup of tea. The next package was on Second Life. I’m not a huge fan of Second Life (granted I’ve never tried to play it) but this was the first story that made me realize how people can become so attached to it. John Berman et. al. did a great job showcasing various people who really treat Second Life as well a second life. Click here to watch that story.

A job very well done. Just change the name of the show and the graphics it feels too much like Extra or Access Hollywood.

This past summer I wrote a story for ABCNews.com. I wrote the story, titled “How Old is Too Old to Rock and Roll?,” because the Beach Boys were scheduled to perform on GMA as part of their summer concert series. Apparently the photo that someone picked was a photo of the Beach Boys performing for the Today shows summer concert series. I never noticed it and apparently no one did until now when it was posted on Media Bistro. I guess it’s a good thing that my story is getting more exposure, but what a cheap shot…now, almost a year later.

There has been ample discussion as to the showing of the Virginia Tech killer’s “multimedia manifesto.” Those who appose it being shown say, “I just hate that a lot of people not used to seeing that type of image had to see it.“ That’s a quote from Virginia State Police Col. Steve Flaherty. Those who are in favor of the manifesto being shown claim the obligation of journalists. “When they have news value, we have an obligation to show them,” ABC News Senior VP Jeffrey Schneider said.

With that said, it seems we can make everyone happy. Had the networks just put the video online, they can fulfill their obligation and not offend or disturb those who do not wish to see the video over and over again. Was this ever a thought? If so what are the reasons for not doing this?

I do have one pending question NBC continues to contend that they had a journalistic obligation to show the video and to make it available to the public. That I agree with. How then can they turn around and say, there are parts that are so horrific that they “will never see the light of day?” You comments are welcome on this.

Jeff Jarvis’ take.

A couple days ago Lucus Grindley posted a nice letter ‘Dear editor, anit-gay slur isn’t quotable.’ His point was that the f-word should not be printed in stories. It is just as offensive as the n-word. The story that ran in most papers about the “Grey’s Anatomy” situation included the word (New York Times excluded).

On of the top stories on ABCNews.com today is “The Other ‘F-Word’: When It Comes to Reporting on Hate Speech, All Slurs are Not Treated Equal.” I was delighted to see that Laura Coverson with ABCNews.com had picked up on the story. It would appear that she may have even read Grindley’s post (She uses a lot of the same examples). In her story she quotes a representative of NLGJA questioning if the word is necessary to tell the story. Most of the time in her story instead of spelling out the word, she wrote “f-word” or “f – t.” Yet, twice in her story she spells out the word. Why? She herself even noted that “it’s considered hate speech when used to describe a homosexual.” (We’ll have to work on not using the term homosexual at a latter date). If it’s hate speech, why publish it?