Type Weekly student paper Founded 1970 | Format Paper Website www.rutgersmedium.com | |
Headquarters New Brunswick, NJ 08901 | ||
The Medium is the student-run weekly entertainment and comedy newspaper at Rutgers University with the purpose of promoting the message of free speech. It is the second largest newspaper in Rutgers University and the paper refers to itself as "The Entertainment Weekly of Rutgers University."
Contents
- Recent Changes
- News
- Features
- OpinionsEditorials
- Arts
- Personals
- The Back Page
- History of The Medium
- Other Media
- Notable alumni
- References
During the 2000s, as a result of frequent attacks on their right to print offensive material, the editors and contributors of The Medium had turned the paper into a veritable exercise of their First Amendment Rights, often in ways that resulted in protests from the student body and pressure from the administration. Nearly all protests against The Medium have been largely ineffective because of the University's commitment to democracy.
The current version of The Medium is purely satire and humor based on events on the Rutgers University campus, current events, and popular culture.
Recent Changes
The Medium traditionally contains eight pages and is divided into six section: news, features, art, op/ed, personals and the back page. Starting from spring semester of 2014, The Medium has abandoned the old format by replacing the back page section with the new sports section while shortening the personals to just one page due to the similar purpose between the back page and the features sections. Moreover, the Medium has abandoned the famous Medium monkey logo by replacing it with the newly elected mascot by the executive board-- "the Fratypus".
News
The front pages of The Medium is the news section provides articles that are satire of news on the Rutgers University campus, current events, and popular culture. Usually these articles are twisted out of real occurrences, the normal exception being The Daily Medium issue where many of the articles may be completely false for the shock reaction of the readers.
Features
The features section includes normally recurring content every week. Examples include a piece by the editor giving a humorous opinion or point of view on events on campus, a Student of the Week piece featuring students around campus, and the Cute Thing of the Week which shows images of cute things submitted by students.
Opinions/Editorials
The opinions section contains in-character and real student submitted opinion pieces commenting on current events and occurrences at the university. A popular feature of this page is the Point/Counterpoint which gives two views of things occurring simultaneously.
Arts
The arts section includes staff artist and student submitted comics and art pieces. People also submit images of graffiti found around the campus. Occasionally, a writer or editor may also review music or movies here.
Personals
In the personals section, anonymous messages are printed in the newspaper, classifieds style, allowing students to freely criticize Rutgers administration, other students and national establishments.
As just one example of the many, many times the Medium has been sued, the personals editor in 1991 altered a personal placed in the year's final edition. The original personal ("If you've been assigned to Room 104 in Lippincott next semester, please contact me at XXX") was modified (to "If you've been assigned to Room 104 in Lippincott next semester, we need to speak - I am HIV positive and perpetually flatulent. Please contact me at XXX"). The resulting suit, Edwards v. Rutgers, was dismissed after the paper agreed to run a front-page apology.
The Back Page
The newest revisions to the paper have been the replacement of the former What's Shakin' page, which during the early 2000s listed on-campus events such as underground concerts, comedy shows, and other events submitted by readers. As submissions to this section decreased, it took on a more variety style with the editor of the section having the freedom to carry the page out as they saw fit, making it similar to the Arts and Features sections at times.
The new page was initially named Wine & Lifestyle, but was later changed to The Back Page. It is distinguished from the features section by its presence of diversions such as puzzles and games. It also regularly contains faux-reviews of eateries (including the Rutgers dining halls), movies, and campus events. As a homage to the earlier What's Shakin' page, the Mini What's Shakin' section is mainly intended to promote the meetings of The Medium, but also pokes fun of other odd events occurring on campus.
History of The Medium
The Medium printed its first issue on September 1, 1970 as the campus newspaper of Livingston College. During the 1980s, the newspaper began to abandon the traditional news-gathering and reporting activities in favor of its current, satirical format. This was partly due to The Daily Targum becoming the official college daily newspaper across all of the New Brunswick/Piscataway campuses.
In 2004, the paper came under fire for a cartoon published on the cover of a Spring issue. The cartoon involved Holocaust Remembrance Day and resulted in the resignation of senior staff members.
Although at one time it stood as standard practice, The Medium no longer prints pornographic material. This has come at the request of advisors, and with mixed feelings from past editors and current readers.
Other Media
The paper is produced weekly throughout the academic year, and distributed on the Rutgers campuses. In addition, the organization makes the paper available as a PDF on their website. In addition to the regular paper, throughout the year there are special issues and features:
The paper also maintains a Twitter account and Facebook fan page and has occasionally released videos.