Med104 Module 3.2 Summary – Networks of Information

3.1 Networks of information: blogging, citizen journalism & collective intelligence

1. Summarise the main points in the readings noting your agreement and disagreement with the ideas and opinions of the author/speaker.

Melissa Wall, (2005). Blogs of war: weblogs as news. Journalism 6 (2), 153-72.

Wall’s article investigates the state of journalism in the 21^st century in light of the emergence of current events blogs. In her study Wall samples a number of blogs that provided commentary of the war in Iraq during 2003. She sees these blogs as providing an alternative view to the mainstream media which at the time she says was not very critical of the government and presented as a propaganda machine supporting the government’s narrative of events.

She explores the shift from 20^th century journalism to 21^st online writing as one “away from traditional journalism’s modernist approach to… a form of post-modern journalism” (p. 154). Post-modern journalism is based on post-modern ideas of subjective truths and of reality being created through performances. In contrast modernity hailed grand narratives and elite control over knowledge.

News blogs outside mainstream journalism are less detached and more subjective, rejecting a meta-narrative, and this according to Wall is welcomed by audiences who contribute to and help shape stories rather than being passive recipients. Wall goes on to say that news blogs have established new conventions for news construction, and they are not subject to the same gatekeeping and filtering as mainstream news: “The voice of the typical current events blogger is personalised, opinionated, and often one-sided” (p. 161).

Wall’s article, written in 2005, describes the participatory culture that has emerged with Web 2.0 through her analysis of news blogs. The Web in the 21^st century has opened the way for anybody to publish and disseminate knowledge, challenging traditional gatekeepers of knowledge and information. I agree that blogs represent a move to a post-modern world of news journalism, where many individual stories are told and there is no one prevailing central narrative. I also think this is a positive shift because blogs can help keep both the mainstream media and politics in check – something the mainstream media traditionally has done with politics but which has arguably become compromised with the corporatisation of mass media outlets and the focus being on profit as much as impartial news.

Gordon, J. (2007). The mobile phone and the public sphere: mobile phone usage in three critical situations. Convergence 13(3), 307-319.

Gordon’s article attempts to explore the role of mobile phones during critical emergencies, by looking at the Chinese SARS outbreak (2003), the south-east Asian tsunami on Boxing Day 2004, and the 2005 London bombings. She claims that Chinese authorities were able to control the news agenda during the SARS outbreak and mobile phone usage was mainly confined to local communities providing support amongst each other. On the other hand the tsunami and the bombings resulted in a lot of amateur footage being captured and citizen journalism taking place which helped set the news agenda. In spite of this the conventional news media subjected these materials to the editorial process once they got hold of them, ultimately shaping the final stories.

While Gordon finds the contribution of the mobile phone to the public sphere is limited, this article was written 4 years ago and in that time there have been major advances in mobile technologies which have arguably changed this. Internet access on mobile phones at that time was in its infancy and few people had access to it and for those who did it wasn’t fast or user-friendly like it is today. Also people can access social networks such as Twitter on their phones today and news can be accessed and disseminated to large numbers of people very quickly which in turn helps set the news agenda. Evidence of this was seen during the various natural disasters that have afflicted the globe this year in which primary reports have come through mobile social networking services and then reported by news organisations.

The government still has a stranglehold on communications in China however and access to smart phone technology in developing countries affected by the tsunami would not be the same as in Australia or the US. I think as mobile technology and services improve and go well beyond simple voice calls and SMS which they are have already done in developed nations the more people will be equipped with the tools to engage in citizen journalism and play a larger role in setting the news agenda.


2. Make note of the blogs you visit and the features of these blogs that attract you.

I don’t have any particular blogs that I visit regularly. Most of the blogs I visit are through links from Twitter, either from bloggers themselves or recommendations from those I follow (Everett Bogue is one blogger I read a fair bit of). Most of these tend to be lifestyle blogs on such topics as minimalism. I read these for motivation and inspiration.

Another attraction of blogs in general is they provide alternative perspectives outside the mainstream media, and because they aren’t limited by the conventions of traditional media I often find highly creative and enlightening posts that resonate with me.  I like to hear the writer’s true voice coming through and not being restrained by corporate or editorial agendas.

Med104 Module 3.1 Summary – Inform Me! News Media

3.1  Inform Me! News Media

1. Summarise the main points in the readings.

Christopher Harper (2003). Journalism in a digital age. In H. Jenkins  & D. Thorburn (Eds), Democracy and New Media (pp. 271-280). Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press.

Harper’s article, written in 2003, explores the shift taking place in journalism in light of developing digital technologies and the Internet. He looks at how the media plays an important role in “agenda setting”, which highlights the “events, ideas, and values” that its audience should think about. Harper asserts that the Internet unlike print and broadcast media cannot set an agenda, mainly because the audience is too small. This is not the case today however, as Internet access is a lot more widespread then it was back in 2003 and more people now get their news online (up from 2% in 1998 to 34% in 2010) than they do from newspapers. Social media had barely arrived at the time this article was written, and has since become a crucial source of news information.

I would also argue that today people outside the media are capable of setting the agenda due to the rise of social networking sites such as Twitter and YouTube which allow ordinary people to engage in citizen journalism. Many people can pick up on user contributions on these sites and make them go viral. As Harper states the gatekeeping role of journalists is challenged online as there is more interactivity and the user is not a passive recipient of information. I would agree with Harper’s claim that viewers of television news and more particularly newspaper audiences are becoming increasingly older. I think this is only natural as older generations who grew up without computers and the Internet have developed news consumption habits, whereas this is not as ingrained in younger generations especially those who have grown up with online news being commonplace.

Harper explains how the Internet has made storytelling more dynamic, as more types of media can be used (for example images, videos, audio, text). He believes that journalists need to be more involved in the whole process of publishing online because the medium shapes the story and it goes beyond just text. Harper also questions where newspapers will get their revenue from in the future with profit margins declining. He mentions the idea of a paywall where people pay a subscription fee to access their news online. Personally I don’t think I would be willing to pay to get news online. I would expect a leap in quality if I was paying, and I wonder if that increase in quality would cost online news providers as much as they would gain from subscription fees. I think profits should continue to be made through advertising, but perhaps there will be some niche news providers that will be able to go behind a paywall and succeed.

 
2. Compare the form and content of the on-line news sites you visit with traditional newspapers.

I tend to visit News Limited websites when I’m looking for general news. I would say I get more than 90% of my news online, the rest I get through TV or radio. I very rarely read newspapers these days unless they are laying around somewhere.

The major difference between online news sites and newspapers is that online sites are a lot more dynamic and interactive. Online news is digital and does not have the physical properties of a newspaper. It’s easy to retrieve and like the mp3 isn’t subject to physical deterioration. In addition to text online news sites also incorporate videos and multimedia which means news stories can be presented in a rich and wider variety of ways than newspapers can. Hyperlinks on websites make it possible to trace the sources used, whereas information in newspapers is more static and passively received by readers.

Another feature of online news is that stories can be easily shared through social networking sites such as facebook and Twitter and many allow commenting and discussion. In newspapers the letters to the editor provide opportunity for reader discussion but user input and interaction online is vastly enhanced. In addition online news normally has content that is more up to date because newspapers are usually published once a day whereas online stories can be updated as they come to hand and as they develop. Although online newspapers are gearing up to move beyond paywalls as seen in The New York Times’ recent introduction of a subscription access fee, another distinguishing feature of online news is that it is predominantly free while most large newspapers have a cover charge.

Med104 Module 2.2 Summary – Copyright

2.2  Don’t touch that! Copyright, ownership and institutional control

1. Summarise the main points from the reading and the talk by Lawrence Lessig.

Steve Collins, (2008). Recovering fair use, M/C Media Culture 11 (6).

• Copyright law first introduced in England in 1710 with the Statute of Anne. It is later exported to the US.

• Principles of fair use formed from 1841 onwards by the English judiciary.

• US Copyright Act 1976 establishes ‘fair use’, which attempts to balance private and public interests in creative works.

• Widespread availability of the Internet, digital media and file-sharing networks has led to prosumerism, a concept pre-dating the Web which highlights the convergence of producer and consumer roles.

• Prosumerism involves mass customisation of media texts, and in the digital age this has resulted in scrutiny of copyright law and discussion of what fair use is.

• Corporations have taken a propertarian approach, defending their intellectual property with litigation, takedown notices and technological enforcement.

• Collins argues that enforcement of copyright law has moved away from promotion of free expression toward a system where intellectual property is increasingly considered in the same light as real property, with courts taking punitive action when it is used by anyone other than the rights holder.

• Collins claims courts today bend to economic factors, giving copyright law too much weight over fair use when fair use should be at least of equal concern. This is highlighted by a US legal case with a copyright infringement verdict following the transformative use of a three-note guitar sample.

• Collins believes that despite the bleak, propertarian state of copyright and fair use, recent judgments in the US provide evidence of a resurrection in the original ideology of copyright and fair use. He argues more cases must come before the courts for the balance to shift.

Lessig, L (2007) on “laws that strangle creativity.”

• 20^th century was a read-only culture driven by top-down consumerism. Previously it was read-write and participatory, but ‘infernal machines’ or ‘talking machines’, as John Philip Sousa predicted in 1906, changed this culture. Creativity became professionalised.

• Lessig believes Internet is reviving the read-write culture that Sousa romanticised.

• User-generated culture – people produce for the love of what they’re doing rather than the money.

• Lessig asserts remixing through music videos isn’t piracy. Television and film producers have done this for ages, but now the technique has been democratised. Everyday people can do it now with digital technologies.

• The law has not greeted this with common sense, treating copyrighted material like physical property.

• Lessig proposes that artists and creators need to embrace the idea that their work can be made available freely for non-commercial/amateur use.

• There needs to be a balance between prohibitionists and the generation of today which rejects copyright. This balance, Lessig claims, will help revive creative culture.

2. Identify any problems about copyright that you are likely to encounter in your remediation assignment.

My remediation assignment is an academic item which is covered by “fair dealing for the purpose of research or study”. This is specified under the Fair Dealing provisions of the Australian Copyright Act.

The Australian Copyright Council details in the Act how copyrighted material can be used for educational purposes.  Seen as I will only be submitting my final text to my tutor for marking and it will not be made widely available, I do not envisage encountering any problems with copyright for my remediation.

Med104 Module 2.1 Summary – Entertain Me!

2.1  Entertain Me! Who makes your entertainment? Institutions, audiences & participatory culture.




1. Summarise the main points in the readings noting your agreement and disagreement with the ideas and opinions of the author/speaker.

Cucco, M. (2009). The promise is great: the blockbuster and the Hollywood economy. Media, Culture and Society, 31(2), 215-230.

Cucco’s article highlights how movie blockbusters operate in the Hollywood economy, noting the leading role played by distributors. Some of the features of blockbusters include:

• High production and marketing costs;

• Design for use on a global market;

• The promise of being spectacular (the wow factor);

• Special effects are favoured over narration and artistic expression;

• They are thought of as a commercial product rather than an artistic one;

• The use of movie stars to guarantee access to and penetration of the market;

• The promise of novelty by attempting to surpass the previous blockbuster, offering new visual experiences through the use of technology;

• A simple message that can be relayed in one sentence or image to make marketing easy;

• The concentration of advertising costs (80%) in the week before release of the movie into cinemas;

• Simultaneous release in a large number of cinemas on opening weekend (saturation booking strategy – concentration of consumption is on opening weekend). This is when it makes most of its money and this helps avoid word-of-mouth advertising which can limit profits;

• The common use of sequels and pre-sold identity movies which occupy the list of all-time highest grossing films at the box office on opening weekend;

• They tend to be released during summer in the US when network competition is lower, people are more likely to go out and young people have more free time.

I tend to agree with what Cucco has said about the Hollywood blockbuster. Evidence of the blockbuster’s use of superior special effects and a simple message is seen in the recent splurge in 3D films. Avatar, for example, was a massive success which revolutionised cinema viewing and paved the way for many more 3D films. Its storyline was relatively simple – based on the concept of good versus evil.

I can identify with the observation that advertising costs and consumption of a blockbuster are mostly concentrated in the week before and the week after box office release of the film. There have been movies in the past I wanted to see which have had a lot of hype around their release and when I have thought about going to see them sometimes only a few weeks later they have completely disappeared from the cinema. This just shows how drastically the life-cycle of cinema film has reduced in the age of blockbusters.

The use of pre-sold identity is certainly a factor in my movie-going choices. When I heard about the upcoming release of yet another Pirates of the Caribbean movie, I was instantly sold as I have enjoyed all the previous sequels. The upcoming sequel attempts to improve on previous versions by being shot in 3D.  Sequels are an attractive option for producers and distributors because they already have a committed audience.







2. Identify the individuals, organisations and technologies involved in the production, delivery and consumption of the text you chose last week. You may use any source to identify this information, but you must reference your sources.

24 Music Video: Coping With Death

This video clip involves combined still images of video footage and audio from a few different sources. Some images have been taken from 24, and others have been taken from the movies ‘Mirrors’ and ‘Dead Heat’. The audio track is from the movie ‘Inception’. The video editing software used to put this video clip together was iMovie ’09. YouTube user ‘virginieb20’ edited and uploaded this video clip to the video sharing site. YouTube viewers then became the audience of this text.




3. Incorporate any of your reflections, ideas, opinions about issues addressed in lectures, readings and/or tutorial activities.

Leaver, T. (2011). Lecture 3: 2.1 Entertain Me! [Lecture]. Retrieved from http://dbs.ilectures.curtin.edu.au/lectopia/lectopia.lasso?ut=2908

The lecture for module 2.1 explores how entertainment media audiences are changing, with a shift from what Jenkins (2006) describes as ‘zappers’ to ‘loyals’ – the former watch television while the latter watch series. This is symptomatic of a larger shift toward participatory culture which has largely been brought about by people’s use of the Internet and more specifically Web 2.0 tools. The idea is that television viewers want to be part of a larger conversation and in a digital world this is much more viable. Fans can go online and create conversation in all sorts of different ways, with just one example of this being through fan sites.

Focusing in on this concept from the lecture, I will go against the grain and consider myself more of a zapper. This is because I’m not a big TV viewer. I think I spend so much time on the Internet now that the TV has become a non-essential item for me. I do sit down in front of it most days but I am usually on the Internet at the same time or doing something else and it is like background noise. When I do have my full attention on the TV I surf channels and watch whatever is on at the time – I have no commitments to any series or programs.

Having said this I was a massive fan of the drama series ‘24’, which concluded after its 8^th season last year. I was heavily invested in it almost to the point of obsession, and would go on to Fox’s official 24 page after most episodes and follow the discussion boards. As brought up in the lecture Global Conversation Vs National Distribution was a problem for me with 24, as the episodes aired in Australia anywhere from 2 weeks to months after screening in the US. Lets just say I got around this problem!




4. Identify a text that you consider to be particularly interactive. Note the features that make the text interactive.

For this I have chosen the website OkCupid. This is an online dating site which allows users to match up with others by taking all different kinds of interesting tests and quizzes. As you complete more of these your compatibility is assessed with others who have also built profiles by adding their own answers. There are advanced options for finding particular users and a rating system to make notes on and rate individual users. Users can also send messages or smileys between each other. The site can be accessed through a mobile app, making it more versatile. The site seems to be built around improving your match with other users by inputting data, hence it relies on interaction to connect users.

Med104 Module 1.2 Summary

Lessig, L. (2006). Four puzzles from cyber space. In L. Lessig Code version 2.0  (pp 9-30). New York: Basic Books.

In this article Lessig examines how cyberspace is governed by a different set of rules to offline spaces. He uses 4 stories to highlight these themes: regulability, regulation by code, latent ambiguity and competing sovereigns. The nature of the Internet makes it harder to regulate by those in authority because it isn’t as easy to pinpoint “who someone is, where they are, and what they’re doing.” Lessig proposes that regulation can occur by altering the architecture of the Internet, or in other words changing its code in order to control behaviour: “A rule is defined, not through a statute, but through the code that governs the space.”

Another important point he raises is the difference between rules in real-world, physical spaces and virtual online worlds. For example, in our offline world we are limited by physical laws such as gravity and by socially constructed rules or “norms.” In virtual worlds such as multiple multiplayer online games (“MMORPGs”) rules are created predominantly by the architecture of the space in addition to the choices of characters which “make the laws of that space real.” Hence virtual worlds are much more flexible in structure to real-world spaces, even if they do bear similarities such as interaction and the forming of communities.

Lessig argues that the American Constitution is ambiguous when it comes to “searching” in cyberspace. Whereas its interpretation is clearer in a real-world context – for example there must be reasonable suspicion for authorities to undertake a search of property or person – in the virtual world technology allows searching to take place via Internet “worms” without burden on those being searched and without invasion of privacy as it is programmed to find only that which is illegal.

Finally Lessig goes on to discuss who should be regulating the Internet. While he is sceptical of the government’s current ability to carry out regulation, ultimately he believes this role falls into their hands (though he seems to acknowledge this is more an ideological viewpoint based on  the potential of government rather than a practical one based on what the government would do if given this sovereignty).

Video: Henry Jenkins on Participatory culture

In this video clip Jenkins explores the shift from 20^th century old media to the participatory culture of today brought about by people’s use of digital technologies. These technologies and the Internet have transferred the exclusivity of storytelling away from traditional media institutions toward ordinary citizens, resulting in a complex media landscape where knowledge is manufactured by collective intelligence. “Convergence culture” has emerged through people taking control of media as it enters their lives, and media playing itself out across the maximum number of platforms.

This process is evident in the recent natural disasters that have taken place around the world. For example during the floods in Queensland much of the information was coming from Twitter and social networks as ordinary people reported on unfolding events. People weren’t reliant on journalists and media outlets to tell the story: ordinary people constructed the story amongst themselves, across many platforms. Traditional media looked to social networks for information (even if not all of it was reliable). Knowledge was established collectively and disseminated through multiple media channels rather than through a few dominant media establishments.

> Identify one of your favourite media texts. Make notes about the features of this text that you enjoy.

 

 

I like this video clip not only because I’m a huge 24 fan, but I like the way in which it was constructed. This remixed video incorporates scenes from the movies “Mirrors” and “Dead Heat” as well as 24, and uses voice-overs from various seasons to capture Jack’s journey in 24 from the perspective of its creator. The background music taken from the movie “Inception” also makes it more powerful and engaging. I really like this as it shows the emotional and vulnerable side of Jack, something that we don’t get to see very often in the series as he is the battle-hardened hero who is too busy saving lives and moving frenetically from one plot to another. This video puts together rare soft moments, allowing us to reflect on another side of Jack.