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Chris Masters is one of Australia’s most impressive investigative journalists with his career racking up a range of achievements including three Walkley awards and a Logie award for his groundbreaking stories.
These exciting stories involved chasing secret service agents to uncovering police corruption in Queensland.
Despite all this success Chris still remains a country boy at heart growing up as one of seven children in the small town of Grafton.
“I worked at a range of ABC stations in big country towns where I learnt so much,” he says.
“It exposed me to the best training in investigative journalism, when you wake up every day and again nothing has happened,”
“You learn to get out there and find out what is going on; as my mother says the best stories come from the heart,”
“I engaged with the people I reported on and without knowing my sense of public responsibility grew,”
“Sometimes I think it is difficult for reporters who are constantly in the city and bombarded with stories when they have to go out there and find stories.”
Chris smiles and reflects on his unusual introduction into the world of journalism in the big city of Darlinghurst Sydney.
“I had the good luck to win a job back in 1966. The first day I arrived I was waiting nervously and there was a bit of fuss and commotion and a woman rushed into the foyer distraught that a man flashed at her,” he says.
“She started to shriek even louder and the bloke that flashed at her went in through the door on his way to work,”
“That was an early initiation at how broad minded my work place is.”
Chris says Four Corners was the job for him and working there gave him license to get out there and pry into other people’s lives.
“I remember being caught up in a real life spy thriller when I was doing the Rainbow Warrior program that moment where I actually recognised that I was chasing these service agents was a real thrill that kind of journalism is very exciting and should not be forgotten that it is often formed around tragedy,” he says.
“There are little moments I remember doing a program the Dead Heart which is about two boys who went missing in the outback,”
“I asked a young station of the court to tell me about the boys and as she was talking to me and relating the story, I just sensed her going back to be with them,”
“She lost all conscious in the present and I love that kind of generosity, I love the honesty and the reveling.”
Chris laughs at the thought of luxurious accommodation working for Four Corners.
“It is not always the big moment when you work for Four Corners and you don’t stay in four star hotels,” he says.
“I remember sleeping in goat pens in Sudan being shot at in the air by Russian helicopters. I remember the horror of the holocaust in Rwanda,”
“There are a lot of memories that I will take with me for a long time for what it is worth I don’t regret anything.”
Inevitably Chris leaves big shoes for next generations to fill retaining the record of being Australia’s longest serving reporter with over 100 memorable shows for Four Corners.
Currently Chris is working on a project with Swinburne University to form an investigative journalism resource centre with the idea to make the centre available to all media and universities.
“I wish young journalists will have the opportunities that I have been given by a great organisation,” he says
“It is wonderful to say in my working days that I did have a go and I hope in a generation’s time that these young journalists will say the same.”
Technology savvy author Louise Curtis is starting a new trend using imagination and a bit of cunning to promote stories that can be read in bite sized pieces.
The idea to publish tales of pirates, emos and spies through social networking site Twitter evolved from the need to compete within the publishing industry.
Louise says publishing is very competitive and writers often need a web presence.
“I was on the lookout for a way to become better known, I heard about people taking regular novels and releasing them tweet by tweet on Twitter,” she says
“I thought that’s dumb why not figure out the strengths and weaknesses of Twitter and treat it like its own medium, because Twitter is on the news a lot at the moment I knew I had a unique opportunity.”
While writing in small chunks may seem like an easy task it can be hard for readers to indulge in a detailed fantasy world.
“Worse Things Happen at Sea was my first Twitter story, each tweet took a couple of hours to write and edit,” she says.
“A lot of people really enjoyed it, piracy is a great hook, but the story itself was too complex it is not easy within 140 character chunks,”
“The most important thing is to write something people want to read, Twitter stories need to be entertaining and simple.”
Ideally Louise would like to reach a critical mass of followers where word of mouth is enough.
“I would like to be at the point where I don’t have to do anything but write stories,” she says.
“There is nothing as fun as inventing worlds and writing in my pajamas it is the ultimate job.”
Professional change giver and bar tart are popular jobs for university graduates to haunt while embarking on the career job hunt.
Often it can become frustrating after spending three years completing a bachelor degree to have employers state that you must have three-five years industry experience.
All we want is a great opportunity to break into the industry and show that we have potential to kick butt in a job that we are passionate about.
Sometimes we bump into other graduates who we used to share a beer with at the university bar or even gripe with over a frustrating assignment.
It is sad when we must look at each other as competition but not friends, however sometimes it is a great opportunity to collaborate over failed or even dodgy interviews.
Just recently I went for an interview at a not-for-profit charity where they expected candidates to work for free on a trail basis for two weeks.
For those successful to be granted a trail they will be expected to bring their own laptop and work Monday to Friday from 9 – 5pm.
If the candidate thrives in the position then they will receive commission based pay, what was really concerning was that the employer said they have not been paid for a month.
I am tempted as a successful interviewee to find out what goes on in this sinking ship of a charity and come away with a good story!
While the job was not appealing I did meet up with fellow graduates who had been looking for that elusive public relations job for one year.
One graduate said the job she had just recently applied for had such a response that after two days the employer had to take down the advertisement as there was over 300 applications.
Even though this statistic is disheartening it is important not to lose faith and keep pimping those connections because one day you may be that employer looking at the fresh young graduate.
The number of overweight children is continuing to rise with lack of physical activity and independence becoming core contributors
[ Click here to read more ]
My name is Bev Wilkinson and I am a post graduate from Griffith University on the Gold Coast.
In 2008 I earned my under graduate degree in Bachelor of Arts with majors in journalism and public relations
[ Click here to read more ]
A kind heart and a passion to help war torn family’s start a new life is what spurs this volunteer to spend 11 years setting up homes.
One of the families that stand out in her mind is of a young single mother who took on the role of carer to eight children after her sisters were killed overseas
[ Click here to read more ]
In a relatively plain room sits a group of women sharing much needed me time laughing, knitting and collaborating on the latest gossip.
It could be mistaken as a mothers group however these smiling energetic women hide a past of violence, abuse and torture
[ Click here to read more ]
My name is Bev Wilkinson and I am a post graduate from Griffith University on the Gold Coast.
In 2008 I earned my under graduate degree in Bachelor of Arts with majors in journalism and public relations
[ Click here to read more ]
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