Quite Possibly the Most Relevant Blog I Will Ever Write

I was fairly impressed with myself after last week's blog. Politics and sports? My own political baseball team? Genius! I have to be one of the highlighted blogs of the week! (Each week the lovely Jenna, aka the woman in charge of keeping me and the other bloggers in line, emails us telling us how much we rock and gives us links to other blogs of note that week).

Sadly, I did not make the cut. You cannot imagine how much that impacted my life.

After a week of laying in bed, watching reruns of "America's Next Top Model" while eating tubs of Cookie Dough ice cream (I'm partially lactose in tolerant, so you can imagine the health effects of that decision), crying myself to sleep every night, I decided it was time to snap out of it. So, I peeled myself from between my dirty sheets, kicked the cartons of ice cream out of my path, sat down in front of my computer and said to myself, "self, what makes a blog noteworthy to Jenna, the Queen of the Bloggers?"

Then it hit me, maybe if I wrote a helpful/informative/actually sports related blog, maybe I would make the cut! That must be it! Maybe all it takes is for me to write a sports blog that actually benefits up and coming sportscasters like myself! Who would have thought that writing a blog based on what my job description entails would be all I need to satisfy the Great and Powerful Jenna!

So here it is folks. Today I am going to talk about something that you should actually know about: demo tapes. Even if you are a mere sophomore like myself, a demo tape is a good thing to have on your possession, especially if you are looking for an internship this summer. But don't thank me for relaying this information, thank Adam Harding.

Adam, oh Adam, how can I put into words the madness which is Adam Harding? For those of you that don't know Adam, he is my enthusiastic, at times overwhelming, Sports Director for EIV and actually pretty regularly pops up in this blog. Although he hasn't yet this semester so, unless you were reading past blogs, you wouldn't know who he is. And I'm guessing you don't searching the blog archives that much over here at Experience.com.

Anyway, yesterday Adam dragged me to the dining hall mostly because he didn't have any meals so he had to mooch off me for a guest meal. And how does he repay me? He drags me to the Convenience store and uses my board bucks for some hummus and then forces me to watch his demo reel. After watching 3 minutes of sports Adam, serious Adam, funny Adam, and informative Adam on the computer (he's like Barbie!) he turned to me and asked, "Do you have a Demo reel?" To which I replied, "uhhh...what?" Adam didn't appreciate that one so he proceeded to lecture me on what a Demo tape is and why it is important. Here is what I learned:

A demo tape is a tape showing your range on camera that you send to different stations when you are trying to get a job. You usually start off with a few standups from packages, or from the desk, to show how you look on camera and how you interact with your surroundings. Usually you want a few different kinds of standups (one from a sports package, a news package, etc) to show that you are versatile. Then you want to include some of your best packages to show that you can produce a story, write a script, and that you not only have the face for TV but the voice. Adam also included really cheesy rock music to the beginning of his demo tape, but that just seems unnecessary (but awesomely funny. If it were me, I would have used "Fernando" by ABBA, for no particular reason except it totally rocks and I bet no one else would use it. But, then I would probably get sued for copyright infringement, so maybe licensed cheesetastic rock music is the better way to go.)

So, you may be asking yourself, why do I need a demo tape? I'm not looking for a job yet, I can barely get an internship!

Well, that was exactly what I was thinking but, of course, Adam had an answer for that. He told me that through an internship, I would meet people that may be interested in hiring me in the future and will ask for a demo tape. A demo tape helps to show them what you look like on TV and shows them things they may not learn about you through a basic internship. Also, if you are a sophomore like me and not planning on using anything until your senior year for your demo tape, it's still a good idea to put one together because anyone asking for a demo tape will realize this, but it still gives them an idea of where you are at and they can give suggestions on how to improve.

And also, being able to hand someone a demo tape just looks cool. And I know you want to be cool. So, in conclusion, listen to me and therefore listen to Adam. Throw together a demo tape (with or without rock music); a simple tape with one of your packages will do the trick.

So there's my two cents on demo tapes. I expect some email love from you Miss. Jenna, and even if I still didn't make the cut, a gold star for staying on topic will do the trick.