White Blog #2: Media and Technology

Option 2: Evaluative Question

How has advancements in technology and social networking(smartphones, twitter, facebook, etc.) impacted new media?

Technology has changed the way we communicate with other people, interact, and our friendships/relationships with other people around us.

Technology is constantly changing the ways we hear what is going on around us. "Technology has exploded access to news for the public." (http://www.ehow.com/about_6454148_technology-impact-communication_.html)
The way we view news is constantly changing and expanding. For sources of news back in the olden days, there was newspapers to read and radios to listen to. Now days, there are telephones, cell phones, televisions, computers, ipods/ipads, internet. and so much more. Not  only can you access all these things on a regular basis, there are so many helpful websites that offer very good information about anything you need to look up.


Technology has also affected our friendships and relationships in ways that may or may not be positive.
"...we find ourselves subtly substituting electronic relationships for physical ones or mistaking our electronic relationships for physical ones." (http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/happiness-in-world/201006/the-effect-technology-relationships) Technology has made it possible and very accessible for people to have relationships over electronic devices. Many people are used to not having to actually talk to someone face to face and watch their facial expressions as they talk. Soon, people will not see the need to have physical relationship with someone, unfortunately.


Technology has changed the way we communicate with other people, interact, and our friendships/relationships with other people around us. Technology is constantly changing, not just changing physically, but changing us, as human beings too. Technology has shaped us into who were are today. Technology has some positive and negative attributes to it. For example, technology has changed the way we can learn about things, it is very easy to access many important things via the internet. But technology has also made it easier for people to become more lazy and not motivational people anymore. Overall, technology has given people the privilege to live that other people have not lived.

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Natural Disaster Reporting

Natural Disaster reporting is when a person records and reports on certain subcategories in the whole overall topic. I chose Natural Disaster Reporting because I wanted to know the significant differences between Hurricane Katrina and Hurricane Sandy.Hurricane Sandy was a very large, impacting Superstorm that took over the media's eye for weeks, comparing Superstorm Sandy to Hurricane Katrina in 2005."That puts Sandy at No. 2 in terms of shear size since 1988, in the news for weeks and weeks on end..."(huffingtonpost.com/2012/10/29/http://www.livescience.com/24402-natural-disasters-sandy-ranking.html) Superstorm Sandy was categorized as No. 2 in the World, since 1988. Sandy was more impactful  had more economic damage, had more housing and commercial properties damage, and will be entered in the pantheon of top disasters of the country has ever faced. Katrina faced not as much economic damage because it didn't hit as many states as Hurricane Sandy did, didn't have as many housing and commercial properties damages, and was not qualified to be entered in the pantheon of top disasters of the country has ever faced. Overall,  Hurricane Sandy was a more impacting storm, in many ways,  than Hurricane Katrina. It did do the most damage overall in several categories and it killed thousands more. Hurricane Sandy's victims will be remembered forever and their lives will live on forever. Hurricane Sandy truly was a tragedy in the United States of America.



http://www.disaster-report.com/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Media_coverage_of_Hurricane_Katrinahttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/10/29/http://www.livescience.com/24402-natural-disasters-sandy-ranking.html

(I'm sorry about the font sizing issues, I couldn't get it to remain one size)

My Identity,Culture, and Experiences/Understanding the Novel Feed

My Identity,Culture, and Experiences/Understanding the Novel Feed

I am a 16 year old girl. I live and have lived in South Minneapolis, Minnesota all my life. All my life i have been attached to technology. When I was little, we had a T.V., computer, radio, and a land line phone. As I grew up, the technology level increased in my house. We still had a T.V. but a new improved high tech version of it. We had a new computer and a better radio. A few years later, my mom got a cell phone. I got one a few years after her.  Then, iPods were invented and I got my 1st one in 2008. Now my family has a high tech flat screen T.V., a laptop PC computer, at least five radios, two iPods, and two cell phones, along with two iPod speaker docks. I am used to technology all around me by now, its just apart of my regular day life.

 In the novel Feed, the main character Titus is a teenager who has a lot of the same likes that teenagers do nowdays. I think this is why I could relate more to him while I was reading. Titus was a typical teenager who got into fights with his parents and acted like he hated his brother. He loved messing around with his friends; doing stupid stuff with them."..Unit! you are so--!" And then they would be all big laughing and I felt like a complete bonesprocket for trying to sleep when there was fun"(Pg. 6). He was quick to fall in love and loved typical relationships, like the one with Violet. He liked music, surfing the Feed, and going mal. "...is this malfunction?"(Pg. 86). I think the author made Titus this way to make sure that the reader got the teenager stand point on life, during that time period. I totally could relate to him with everything, except for is experiences about going mal and having to deal with Violet's trauma/ what happens with her and how it affects their relationship.

 In the novel,the aspects of the futuristic societies language and translations of words was very hard to comprehend when I read this book. The language is very very different than what I am used to so it was hard to determine and understand what I was actually reading. Readers just have to get used to the language used and try to figure the words out based on context clues. The author substituted words like friend for "unit" and getting drunk for "going mal" meaning malfunctioning the feed. Even though these different words made it difficult to understand the book, it did give me a better standpoint as to where the author thinks our society is coming to and how it will be different.

(472 words)

Analyzing an Advertisement

     The form of this advertisement is big and bright, trying to get your attention. It uses very bold colors, reds, golds, bright whites, and models to get your attention. Many different words are bolded and in different fonts to mean different things. For example, Kohl's bolded and in that font because it is the store title and that is there title font. Biggest really catches my eye because it is in a different color than the rest of the words, in gold. 60-70% also catches my eye because it is in the biggest font on the advertisement and takes up more space than the other words. There are 4 words that really stand out to me because they are bold. Kohl's biggest, clearance, and 60-70%. There are less pictures than words on this advertisement, only four pictures on the bottom modeling what could be 60-70% off vs. 16 words and a star symbol. 

    The content of this advertisement is just trying to get your attention. Kohl's mainly wants you know know that there is the biggest clearance sale,60-70% off, what its saying literally. But what its saying figuratively, underneath the surface is harder to understand. I think its saying that there is new items that you NEED to buy, so they made an advertisement implying this. This advertisement's audience is who   whoever waits for discount, who needs to shop for things but needs the discount in order to buy things. 

     This advertisement does actually very convince me to go and shop at kohl's for this discount. I am one of those people who wait until discounts like this come around, so I would go to kohl's for this clearance sale in an instant. I also regularly shop at  kohl's. 

Big Ideas of Media

Media is a very big part of my life. Recently, I have learned that there is more to media than just watching it or starring in it; there is this whole other industry that many people don't regularly think about. Television uses Photoshop to make models look even more beautiful on the outside. Advertisements on television or on paper often times use certain colors to stimulate your feelings into feeling happy. Advertisements use certain things or people in advertisements to touch people "soft spots" in their hearts, to make them want to feel sorry for the things/ people in the ads, therefore making them want to buy more products. I was very intrigued by the fact that they use color to stimulate people's feeling, I hadn't know that they did that before. It is very interesting to think that our actions could be made off of just a color that our eyes see that makes us "happy". Also, certain advertisements are geared at certain groups of people. I know that I connect more with the advertisements that have catchy musical jingles in them because I'm a musician. I also connect more with the advertisements that have little kids or babies in them, because I love kids and instantly am drawn to them.

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Advertisements

We see advertisements every day,every where we look . Street signs,signs on cars, billboards; everywhere. We see advertisements advertising food, clothes, household products, skin/hair products, and the list could go on and on. Usually these ads make the item look better for you than it actually is. Sometimes these advertisements are not something you see, but hear as well. On the radio, there is an advertisement about 20 minutes out of every our. On television shows, there is an advertisement break about every 7 minutes.

These ads affect my life in every possible way. In my mind, advertisements just make me want more materialistic things that I don't. Especially, if the product says "New" on it.  But you don't have to feed into what the advertisements are telling you; you don't have to buy them. It all depends on your priorities. If you have the time, money, energy, and think its the right decision for you.

Technology, What Would I Do Without It?

         Technology, What Would I Do Without It? 

      All around the world people are influenced by television, movies, the internet, etc. to make certain decisions, just because the media says that it will make your life better. You think that it will make your life better. You think to yourself, "Wy do I make these choices and do they reallymake my life better or could I have made a better choice?" The thing is that you really have better choices to make for yourslef; anytime you make a choice, there is always a better choice.
        Imagine a world without these things. I would be spending my time doing so many other things that I wouldn't normally do. I am typically an outdoorsy kind of gil so I would do many more things outside. I would go hiking, biking, canoeing, kayaking, and be more active. I would do more reading, scrapbooking, and take up other hobbies in my spare time. I would also continue my passion violin playing and dancing, since I do not necessarily need media and technology for those activities.
        I would have grown up differently without these technological things but not that differently. When I was young, I watched only a few little kid shows and movies; I didn't watch a lot of television though. As I got older, I learned to depend on internet more and more, so that would be harder for me to cope with not having internet.