The Five Percent Rule

The amount of effort Sally Herships put into her first
investigative journalism piece….. well, it’s enough to drive you
to smoke!

“The Five Percent Rule” is Sally’s 10-month-long foray into
investigative reporting, a story on the under-pricing of tobacco
on military bases. The piece aired on Marketplace in June of 2011
as part of a series on tobacco.

On this edition of HowSound, Sally talks about some of her
behind-the-scenes work on the project. It’s a bit startling,
actually. Huge spreadsheets, hundreds of phone calls…. even a new
pair of special glasses to prevent the headaches she was getting
from looking at a computer screen too long.

Sally says she received assistance from I.R.E. — Investigative
Reporters and Editors. They were a tremendous help for this kind
of deep reporting and exacting work.

Have a listen then let us know about your investigative
work.

Here’s Sally’s blog for “The Five Percent Rule.” And, no, Sally
doesn’t smoke.

This edition of HowSound was produced on Hindenburg software
rather than ProTools, my usual audio editor of choice for a good
dozen years. I haven’t switched to Hindenburg, but I sure like it
a lot.