In the mood for a little libel?

That will be $650,000, please.

That’s what a civil jury has awarded Robert Astley, a director of the Bank of Montreal, for defamatory comments by shareholder activist and former journalist Robert Verdun, the legal website Law Times reports.

Verdun is unrepentant, judging by his “censored” blog.

There are lots of angles here to debate, from the role of blogs to the brand-new defence of responsible communication, which the jury rejected.

And debate it we shall, in my Editing Print and Online Media class Tuesday.

Note to the legal profession: No need to attend. This class will be defamation-free.

The New Yorker screws up, too

For 90 years The New Yorker has been North America’s epitome of stylish journalism.

As an intriguing weekly package of writing and drawing, one of the few remaining general-interest magazines to publish fiction and poetry in every issue, it has no competition.

There’s a dandy website, too, with intriguing blogs and daily news updates, as well as an iPad edition.

The magazine charges for much of its content, and most Tuesdays I eagerly pay $7 for the paper copy. The eclectic mix of topics and exemplary fact checking and editing create a rewarding read.

But reader, I have found a mistake in The New Yorker.

In the May 9 issue the fourth letter to the editor discusses political campaign spending. It contains this sentence: “The other two largest sources, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and American Crossroads, spent approximately $140 million dollars.”

Which should it be? $ or dollars?

The answer is $, judging by the previous sentence and by other articles in that issue.

That’s the thing about copy editing: Do it well and hardly anyone notices. Screw up and any schmuck can catch you.

Canada’s best multimedia journalism

One of my enjoyable responsibilities – honours, actually – is judging journalism awards.

This year my favourite was the multimedia feature category of the National Newspaper Awards, which were presented last weekend in Ottawa.

Yes, these awards are for newspapers, not broadcasters.

Other than cbcnews.ca, no Canadian broadcaster is creating consistently strong journalism that exploits multiple media including text stories, video, still photos and blogs, and creating communities of intelligent online commenters.

But several newspapers are committing the resources of money, time and professional staff to do just that. So is the news agency The Canadian Press.

Judges Colette Brin of Laval University, Ingrid Bejerman of McGill University and I read, watched and listened to the best multimedia journalism created in Canada in 2010.

For the top award we selected The Globe and Mail's Project Jacmel: The Disaster, the Rebuild, the Future. It’s a comprehensive and moving report on how Haitians are coping with the aftermath of the most recent earthquake.

We were impressed that the newspaper stayed with the story, keeping its staff in Haiti after most other international journalists had moved on to the next disaster.

In the multimedia world, Twitter is informative, instant and fun. It propagates breaking news as no other medium can. Sometimes that news is even true.

But to fully realize the possibilities of multimedia journalism you need a much longer attention span.

Congratulations to The Globe and Mail and other forward-looking organizations that are in multimedia journalism for the long haul.

Hey, Whipple, edit this

On Tuesday morning eight adventurous students will start my Red River College Intersession course, Editing Print and Online Media.

For seven weeks, two mornings a week, we will practise editing – making print and online materials make sense for audiences.

There will be some spelling and grammar and a bit of numbers.

We will spot screwups in written work from books to billboards to building walls, and in online material from everywhere.

But, more importantly, we will look at how editing and organizing can improve all sorts of writing and other activities.

You can follow the students’ weekly blogs on the list on the right side of this screen.

The last time I taught this course, in the fall of 2010, I was impressed by how broadly students were able to define editing. Check out some of their blogs:

Neil Babaluk wrote about editing video, a time-consuming but rewarding task.

Shelley Cook discussed editing political priorities (are you listening, newly elected MPs?).

Stacia Franz edited Europe (Napoleon and others tried but failed).

Sandy Klowak considered the editing that should go into novels but often doesn’t.

Kimberlee Lawson edited time (I wish I could).

Keep spotting those screwups!

'Make the language sing'

Photo by John Pura, Red River College

Armin Wiebe includes plautdietsch, Low German, in the dialogue of much of his work, including his play The Moonlight Sonata of Beethoven Blatz.

Today he explained his motivation to Creative Communications students at Red River College.

"I like the way that I think I can make the language sing."

Meet The Arminator

This week Creative Communications first-year students will attend a play with the funkiest name of the year – The Moonlight Sonata of Beethoven Blatz.

They will talk with the actors and the author, Armin Wiebe, and next week they will blog about the experience. And then their semester will be over.

So what and who are Blatz and Wiebe?

“Mennonites in lust! But not talking about it,” is CBC reviewer Joff Schmidt’s capsule take on the play.

Armin Wiebe (The Arminator, to some of his friends) is a Manitoban who has written four novels.

The setting for three of them, and for this play, is the imaginary Mennonite community of Gutenthal, one mile from the U.S. border, a million miles from reality and one inch from truth.

Wiebe writes in his own blend of, mostly, plautdietsch – Low German – and what he calls “buggered-up English.”

The result is funny on the page, hilarious and touching when spoken. That is the strength of the play.

The genesis of Blatz lies in the story And Besides God Made Poison Ivy, published in Due West (Turnstone Press, 1996).

In Spring 2005 Prairie Fire published a revised version called The Moonlight Sonata of Beethoven Blatz.

Now Scirocco Drama has released the play as a book.

Kevin Prokosh of the Winnipeg Free Press recently interviewed the playwright. He also reviewed Blatz very positively, writing in the spirit of the play.

But hold a minute on!

Blatz also features sex, transgressive and otherwise, cross-dressing, and a brummtopp.

A brummtopp? You have to hear it.

O joy! O delight! An election assignment!

With a federal election set for May 2, can the elections assignments be far behind?

Of course not.

This week my Creative Communications journalism students will choose one of a dozen or so topics, then do some research and present their findings to their class.

Here’s a preview:

Who are the leaders of the federal parties? What are their personal and political histories? Tell us something we didn’t know about each of them. Tell us about a couple of past leaders: the good, the bad (always more interesting) and the otherwise. Finding fun facts is encouraged.

Funny, eh? Show us current and historical examples of interesting cartoons, satire or other humorous takes on Canadian politics.

Wild card: Show us at least 10 interesting things that we did not know about Canadian politics and elections.

Research early and research often!