Classmate Blog Response - Stephanie's Why Movies are Still a Thing

     I recently made a post that briefly covered how different forms of media have survived through demassification at the hands of television. (See that here.) Stephanie Little also made a post similar to this on her blog, but she focused solely on the movie industry. She went in-depth in her explanations, organized her points neatly, and emphasized the ideas with pictures and examples. It's lightly humorous, very informative, and interesting. She describes things in detail, but with simple explanations so that it is easy to understand.

A+

Gold Star

Classmate Blog Response - Kaylee on the TV Lecture

     Our classmate Kaylee recently posted a blog entry about Mr. Miller's  lecture about television. She went into great depth on the topic, explaining the effects of TV--including those on society. She gives a detailed recap on how it affects the way we dress and act, and also how it affects things like elections. She does all of this with a sarcastic sort of humor that makes it not only educational but also very entertaining.
     I especially like her picture of Barack Obama with the caption of "that's right friends i won." (Just saying.)

Class Response - PR and Advertising

     In class today, we were introduced to our new unit on PR (Public Relations) and advertising. I'm very excited for this unit, because I'm interested in PR.

     We had worksheets to do today, and we were told to think about the worst and best advertisements we'd seen. I thought this was interesting and it got me thinking. Either way, I wanted to share my favorites and least favorites.

Worst:
Head-on: Apply directly to the forehead.

Well, it definitely captures the "repetition" method of advertisement. This repetition is probably to make up for the fact that the commercial is boring, lacking information, and just downright annoying. In just the thirteen seconds of the original version, it manages to irritate me. This, however, is a ten minute long version. Enjoy!

Best:

Public Service Announcement: Dumb Ways to Die

I love this! It's actually a public service announcement, but I'll still count it. Throughout the whole time I was watching it for the first time, I thought it was just a cute little video. Then at the end, where it was revealed that it was a PSA from Metro, I was pleasantly surprised. It's cute, memorable, catchy, and you don't even think of it as an advertisement at first! I show it to my friends just because I think it's cute, and they love it too! There's even an app for it now. That is really great marketing!

News Source Review - Camm Trial Verdict

     As I'm sure that we all know, on October 24 of 2013, David Camm was found innocent after a long, expensive, and much-talked-about trial. That day, every news station and the Courier Journal's lead story revolved around the trial's outcome.

     WHAS spent such an extensive period of time discussing the trial, in fact, that on that day, there were only two real news stories when you exclude the sports and weather. The lead story alone lasted almost nine whole minutes. Combined with the long breaks and excessive amounts of weather and sports stories, there was only time for one more, very fast and barely relevant story.

     However, it was not a slow news day. Every other news station still had at least seven stories that day, despite the Camm Trial. On top of that, The Courier Journal's archive shows clearly that the two stories featured were not the only newsworthy of the day. A list of news stories from the courier-journal.com's archive for the 24th is shown below.

While not all of these stories are relevant and several are sports related, there are many significant stories that viewers of WHAS news would have benefited from hearing. Things such as a new bullying protection order in JCPS, a vote to ban alcohol sales after two a.m, and a program aimed to prevent teen car crashes. These stories have more impact than the unnecessarily lengthy story covering the Camm trial, and are also far more interesting.

On October 24, 2013, WHAS violated the yardsticks of newsworthiness (it told about things that had little to no impact for only a short period of time) and enterprise (they did not seek out answers; they asked "what" rather than "why"), and they principle of making the important interesting (rather than making the interesting important).

Class Response - How Other Forms of Media Survived the Television Apocalypse

     With the intense popularity of television, all forms of media were forced to demassify. However, we still see these mediums today. Each medium had something about it that kept it around, and they each demassified into something that people would still have an interest in.

Newspapers
     Newspapers are still used today for various reasons. You can see these reasons in detail in a previous post by me by clicking here.

Radio
     Radio was forced to demassify and focus on a niche audience. However, this demassification is not the primary reason that radios are still around. What really saved radio is music--rock and roll. In the 50s and 60s, as television grew more prevalent, it seemed as if radio would be doomed. The music industry's involvement in radio got people interested in radio again, despite TV's popularity.

Movies
     There are many reasons as to why movies are still very popular. For one, Hollywood began making big-budget, extremely expensive productions that television could not afford. The movies also had a large variety of genres as well. On top of that, there is a cultural influence--the need to be first. Going to the movies also became a social experience, where you could spend time with friends, family, and romantic interests. The setting made it an immersive experience--the large screens, dark room, surround sound--which also appealed to people.

Classmate Blog Response - Alyssa Durbin Media Critique

     Alyssa's blog recently featured a media critique that reprimanded the WLKY news station for their lack of news--in multiple ways. She not only mentions the absurd amount of time that is spent in a thirty minute show with just advertising. With so many breaks, there is only twenty minutes left available for news. Between five to ten minutes of this, Alyssa claims, is spent on sports and weather.

     She also explains that the news that is actually featured in the news is not even good, relevant news. She elaborates by providing details about the David Camm murder trials--which we all know by now has been made to seem far more important than it is.

      I agree with all of Alyssa's points. However, her argument could have been made stronger if she had told which principles or yardsticks of journalism were violated by her station. Another thing I noticed was some sort of typo, where she ends a sentence abrubtly and with no punctuation before continuing with her next paragraph.

She trails off in the middle of a sentence, which is something that no blog should ever

Class Response - How TV Took Over the World (and/or caused many forms of media to demassify)

     The invention of television in 1927 changed mass communication massively. Previous forms of mass communications--newspapers, magazines, radio, and movies--were all forced to demassify after the incredibly quick growth of television. See below how each type of media was affected.

Newspapers
     As TV grew more popular, newspapers quickly became old news (pun intended). TV took both newspapers' audience and their advertisers. TV provided news faster than newspapers. Since TV reached a broader audience for a far cheaper price, businesses favored TV for advertising, which meant less money for newspapers. Magazines had a similar problem--TV did not actually take their audience, just their advertisers.

Radio
     Television, as with newspapers, took radio's audience. For radio, however, TV also took much of the radio's talent. Most major radio stars were easily convinced to jump in the bandwagon and become television stars, where their faces could be seen along with their voice.

Movies
     TV also took much of the movie industry's audience. It allowed the same entertainment, but from the comfort of your own home, and for free.

Class Response - Movies

     Movies were invented in 1888 by William Dixon, who worked for Thomas Ediso. He was the first person to take motion pictures. His motion pictures captured both sight and sound, by taking not just one picture but many pictures each second to provide the video. However, Dixon's invention could not easily be played back, and could not be played on a large screen for an audience. It required a carousel.
     However, the 1891 invention of flexible film, which allowed film to be put on a reel, played, and projected, fixed this problem. The Lumiere brothers were the ones to figure out how to project these flexible film reels onto white screens, in 1895.
     It wasn't until 1922 that Fox Studios managed to figure out how to project film and sound in sync. This allowed for movies with sound--known as "talkies", at the time. 1927 introduced the most popular talkie, called The Jazz Singer.
     Movies, especially the talkies, grew incredibly popular. By 1930, there were over nine thousand theatres with sound. Already, silent films were becoming a thing of the past.
     Movies in general made a large impact on media. People had never seen anything like it, even when it was just black and white. The idea of moving pictures was astounding and all new.

Class Response - Radio's Introduction and Growth

     Radio was the first form of mass communication that was live. This was a huge innovation--live communication allowed for truly "breaking news". Prior to radio becoming popular, you could not hear about an event almost immediately after it occurred. Newspapers had to be written, printed, and distributed, taking at least a few hours after an important news story before the people could hear about it. This did not only change news, however. Radio provided entertainment for very cheap. A wide range of stations were available to many, all at the same time, through the one object.
     While radio in general contained a wide variety of different stations, each different station was targeted toward a niche audience. With the many stations available, there was something for everyone on the radio.
     Radio had fairly speedy growth. In 1922, there were about one hundred thousand radios and five hundred different stations. Two years later, in 1924, the number of stations had tripled to fifteen hundred stations. By 1947, there were over forty million radios.

Class Review and Response: Conglomeration Pros and Cons

     Conglomeration, which is when one big company buys may small companies in order to become even larger and wealthier. All you hear these days seems to have to do with one of those huge companies, like Disney. This is because of conglomeration. In class we had a big visual map displaying which mega companies owned which smaller company, and none of us could think of a single well-known American company that was not actually owned by a larger company. 

     There are several pros and cons to conglomeration, which I will discuss briefly.

Pros: Why is Conglomeration Good?

     Conglomeration makes a lot of money, for one thing. This is, of course, the main reason for doing it. It's also much more efficient, and gets rid of redundancy.

Cons: Why is Conglomeration Bad?

     Conglomeration causes a loss in jobs when one company buys another. The main problem, however, is that it gets rid of diversity. Whereas previously there would be a large variety of merchandise, news, media, etc., after conglomeration, the many companies owned by the mega corporation are all doing something similar. Conglomeration causes a monopoly.

Class Review and Response: Internet and Music

 In class recently, we discussed how the introduction of recordings changed the music industry. We talked about how, before recordings, music was used to spread news and information. It could only be heard live, could not be distributed, and was spread from person to person. Because of this method of spreading the music, it was often distorted. Inventions such as the phonogram and gramophone introduced recordings. We discussed this thoroughly in class, but what other technology, primarily the internet, has had an effect on music?

Internet
     The internet became a whole new way to share information and media. With these new methods of exchanging information, music and music distribution were changed greatly. Below are various websites and services that had an effect.

Legal Digital Downloads (iTunes, etc.)
      iTunes and other digital download services provided an all new way to access music. Now, you don't have to purchase a whole album; you can download as much or as little as you want for a low price, directly onto your phone or MP3 player, from your home.

Illegal Digital Download (Music Sharing Sites)
      Of course, the internet isn't all necessarily good. The internet also provides a way to share and access a variety of music for free downloading. It is illegal, but is widely used nonetheless.

YouTube
     YouTube is a way to listen to music as well as multitudes of other videos. It created an easy way to see official music videos, lyric videos, and new artists. With YouTube, aspiring artists don't have to have a record deal to gain fame. Many people are well known just from homemade videos of themselves covering a popular song. They receive fame in the form of millions of views and payment from advertisements.

Classmate Response: Florida Boy Finds Ancient Canoe While Scuba Diving

      Skye Spalding's blog recently had a post critiquing an article about a seven year old boy who found a canoe. Skye does well in pointing out that the article isn't completely newsworthy, saying that it doesn't impact a lot of people for a long period of time. After reading the article, I definitely saw her point. While it was sort of interesting, it didn't have any information that would affect many people. If the canoe was anything that potentially significant historically, it would have been important. However, it was just a plain canoe. The only thing of interest was that it is being tested to see what type of wood it is made from and how old it is. Whatever information is determined will still not have any lasting effect. Skye showed this very well. I did have one critique, which is that she failed to include the link to the original story in her blog post. The link is, however, in the comments of that post.

Media Critique: I'd Tell You to Get to the Point but There isn't One

     I was looking through different news websites and found this article about smartphone shipments and couldn't resist the opportunity to write a media critique on the article.

Smartphone Shipments to Surpass One Billion for First Time By Jennifer Booton 

     I felt that this "news" article deserved a critique because it ignores both one yardstick of journalism and one basic principle, both having to do with the same main problem. That problem is:

     What is the point of this article?

     Exactly. There isn't one. It probably won't come as a surprise to you that this article was brought to you by Fox News.

     Anyway, one of the yardsticks of journalism, titled "Newsworthiness", makes it clear that any and all stories should have a "direct and lasting...informational impact on a wide audience". This just means that any article that you are thinking about writing should only take up your time and energy if it will actually affect a large amount of people over a long period of time. Otherwise, the so-called "news" is just pointless. This article just has a few random statistics that someone somewhere might possibly find vaguely interesting, but has no effect on anyone for any length of time, let alone six or more months.

     Related to that yardstick of journalism, this story completely ignores the basic principle of journalism that we know as "Make the Important Interesting". The main idea of this principle is to make important things seem interesting, rather than making interesting things that have no effect on anyone outside of the event seem important. This article clearly does the latter, making an interesting story into something more important than it is. There's still a problem in saying that, however, because this article is neither interesting, nor important. Nobody cares, and nobody needs to know this.

     Normally I wouldn't be this hard on (or sarcastic toward) an article, except for the fact that this absolutely irrelevant and pointless article was on the top of Fox News' United States front page.

     I kid you not. Was there anything in this article that was even remotely newsworthy, let alone enough for it to be one of the first things you see when you go to the U.S. news.

     I can't honestly say I'm surprised. After all, this is coming from the same organization that had this beauty:

Fox News: The most important news that is always relevant always and is definitely not pointless ever.

So it seems that the struggle against bad journalism continues.

Class Review and Response: Why Are Newspapers Still Around?

     With newer innovations such as the radio, TV, and the good old internet, you would think that newspapers would be an idea of the past. Yet still, newspapers are everywhere and well-known. So the question is, why aren't they long gone? There are several reasons for this, which we discussed in class, and I will describe below.

Diversity
     Newspapers also offer a wide variety of material, including news, sports, comics, crossword puzzles, and a lot more, all collected in one publication. There's something for everyone!

Non-Linear
     You can read newspapers at your own pace, and you can skip to the parts that interest you without having to sit through parts that you don't.

Affordable
     Newspapers are far cheaper and therefore much more accessible than internet and computers, or cable and televisions.

Depth
     Each story goes into greater detail than if you were just listening on the radio or watching TV. Aside from the internet, newspapers have the most detail for each story or article.

Credibility
     Because journalist's number one priority and main duty is to tell the truth, you can always trust newspapers to be credible and truthful. While not everything on the internet is true, newspapers are rarely incorrect.

Easy and Low Tech
     The only technology used in newspapers is literacy. You don't need any knowledge, training, etc. outside of being able to read in order to read newspapers.

Physicality
     Saving what I believe to be the most important for last, the physicality of newspapers is a key part of why newspapers are still used. With newspapers, you can take it with you to read on your own time, wherever you are. You can save it for years, preserved and laminated for future use. You can share news much easier from person to person this way, unlike with newer technology. It can be kept for long periods of time.

Classmate Response: Rape Culture

     Stephanie Little recently made a media critique regarding rape and rape culture in the media. In this post, she goes into detail about the media's view on rape by providing examples of stories such as that of the Steubenville rape case. Stephanie's article is spot on, calling the media out on their failure to keep up with their promises as journalists. She emphasizes the principle of journalism that states that loyalty is first to the citizens, and the yardstick of journalism that states that reporters get multiple perspectives so as to give accurate and fair information. Referring to these rules, she explains how the media and our society have failed at following those rules, as shown in the events in Steubenville. While I'd already heard about this event, Stephanie pointed out not only the absolute idiocy of it, but also the ways the media failed as journalists to cover the situation accurately and fairly.
     To accompany this response, I'm including this amazing video having to do with rape. Although it isn't about entirely the same thing, it does have to do with the media only finding and showing one perspective, the "fairness" yardstick.

  "Do not confuse one story for all stories. Do not stare at a red dot and say the whole painting is just one color."

Class Review and Response: Magazine Innovations

          Magazines weren't always the glamorous, glossy-paged things filled with celebrities and fashion that they are now. While the very creatively titled General Magazine back in 1741 and the Saturday Evening Post in 1821 were not what we are used to today, but these early magazines did bring many innovations that are still used now.

National Media
     Magazines were the first ever national media. This created the idea that one media could be spread and used nationally.

Investigative Reporting
     Also known as "muckraking", investigative reporting was an all new way of going about reporting that included the reporter scraping through personal information with the goal of finding some sort of scandal or story. It is a strong aspect of watchdog journalism that both serves the people and makes lots of money.

This is an example of photojournalism; you can

clearly see what's going on without an article to

explain it. Instead of just being an illustration, the

picture in itself is the story. [X]

    Photojournalism
          Magazines introduced the idea of using a picture and caption rather than an entire article to tell a story. National geographic was the first group to really get involved in using photojournalism. Now, many people, including newspapers, use photojournalism.

     Personality Profiles
          Personality profiles are detailed profiles about someone. They are formed through not only talking to the person, but also to others who know them. This offers multiple perspectives when trying to go in depth.