Week 7: Internet

There are at least 15 different networking sites that are listed on Wikipedia. I have heard of a lot of them including facebook, twitter, myspace, nexopia, hi5, orkut, Friendster. I have never heard of Mixi, Multiply, XING, Skyrock, renren, cyworld, and iWiW. Out of all the social networking sites I use only Facebook. There have been a number of times where I have gotten in trouble because of immature facebook status updates I made so I constantly get reminded by my aunts and uncles to tone things down when it comes to language. There have also been advantages because sometimes you get requests from friends that you haven’t seen in a long time and its good knowing that they are doing well and the fact that you could still keep up with them.

Week 6: Television

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7HfRzQBHIP4
Length: 2:09
Description: This video is basically a scene from the sopranos where one of the main characters uses violence to get money.
The corresponding chapter is in chapter 9: Television (Perpetuating Violence)
Question: What percent of basic network T.V has violence?
Answer: 44%

Week 5: Movies

My favorite movie of 2009 had to be The Hangover. I remember going to the movies and I wanted to see another movie that was out at the time but we ended up watching the hangover and it turned out to be my favorite movie for 2009. The characters in the movie (especially alan) were the best part in my opinion. I watched it again a few weeks ago on DVD and it was still pretty funny.

My favorite movie of all time has to be Lord of War. I think I really liked this movie because it actually tells it how it is. The movie follows a business man who begins selling guns for a living and it follows him along his journey to the top. This movie is entertaining, funny, and realistic (to some extent).



The Hangover: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1119646/
Lord of War: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0399295/

Magazine Proposal

If I were to make a magazine I would call it "Outside the Game". This magazine would basically be a sports magazine that gives the public an athletics point of view from any given situation. This magazine would only have articles that were written from professional athletes and their take on certain subjects. More often than not the Media criticizes athletics for their mistakes on certain issues but it doesn't give the athletic who is being criticized a fair chance to voice their opinion and I feel like this would be the magazine for them to do that. The readers of this magazine would be mostly sports fans from any age, gender, or ethnicity as long as they have an interest in sports. Other magazines that I would be competing against are Sports Illustrated and ESPN.
Five advertisers that would be interested in advertising in this magazine are Nike, Reebok, Adidas, Puma, and Spalding. Five articles that could be written on my first issue are: 1)Gilbert Arenas point of view from the locker room. 2) Brett Favre on retirement. 3) Kurt Warner and his recent retirement news. 4)Greg Oden and his injuries. 5) Reggie Bush and his preparation for the Superbowl.
The cover of my magazine would have a prominent professional athlete giving his point of view from a controversial issue during that month. I would highlight a short sentence from the article that was controversial and put it on the front page so I could attract more readers. I would also make sure that the front cover had bright colors so it could be more eye catching.

Three Books

There haven’t been too many books that have really influenced me in my life to be honest. Every once in a while I’ll come across a book that really changes my way of thinking. The three most influential books in my life that are really inspiring are:
1) Rich Dad, Poor Dad by Robert Kiyosaki. This book was really influential to me because it compares how a rich dad values money while compared with a poor dad. Even though there was a lot of over exaggerated points in the book I still learned a lot about the values of money and investing.
2) Of Mice and Men by John Steinback. I really liked this book because it had a good story about friendship. The journey with the characters was really funny despite the bad ending but this is one book that I will always remember.
3) One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest by Ken Kesey. This book along with the movie have always been really influential because it reminds me of how too much authority isn’t always a good thing.

McLuhan's Theory on Technological Determinism

McLuhan’s Theory of “Technological Determinism” proves how reliant we are becoming on technology. Technological Determinism helps us classify our relationships with modern tools in a simple chart that consists of four categories. I will apply McLuhan’s Theory with a new device that is known as an Electronic Book Reader.

An Electronic Book Reader enhances our ability to carry around and read gigabytes worth of reading material into a small electronic device.

An Electronic Book Reader reverses social activity. If someone is always reading that leaves a lot less time to take part in your daily social activities. It can also reverse some of your vision if you spend too much time staring at the screen.

An Electronic Book Reader retrieves reading in a society where reading books is on a decline. Maybe this new way of reading books will get more people into reading again.

An Electronic Book Reader makes physical hardcopies of books obsolete. Since people are going to have a device that stores all the books into it, there won’t be any need for carrying around a load of books.

Media Autobiography

I started getting in touch with the media at a very young age because I remember watching Power Rangers when I was around 3 years old. Watching TV is probably my earliest memory that I have with the media and it was probably the most influential to my life out of the eight types of mass media. I remember going outside and pretending I was a power ranger with my friends and that was what we used to talk about all day. I also remember begging my parents to buy the power ranger toys and VHS movies because the hype surrounding power rangers had me wanting to buy all their products at a very young age.
As I started going to school, I started becoming familiar with other forms of media such as reading books, newspapers, and magazines since I was 5. Although it was fun reading cartoons and books nothing compared to watching television. As time went on I started becoming familiar with the Radio and the Internet. The internet is probably at a close second at playing an influential role in my life. I use the internet on a daily basis and my life would probably be a lot different without because I’m able to communicate to friends and family all the world.
I know that my future job would involve me using the media because I plan to be a business major and I know that I will have to eventually market my product. I plan to learn more about the most effective advertising methods from this class and I want to be able to communicate effectively with the media when the time comes in the real world.