Wow. It is hard to believe that the semester is coming to an end.  Blogging is something I barely knew about before entering college.  I never thought I would have to create my own for this new media class.  I even ended up blogging in another one of my classes, Political Science 101.  When I first heard that we had to make our own blog, I was not excited.  After three months, I have come to enjoy it.  It has let me share my ideas to the world.

Before this class, I thought that blogs were just a way to write down your thoughts, which they are, but they also have a lot more to offer.  You can offer your opinion to anyone who wants it.  You are able to gain feedback as well as comment on other people’s, by agreeing or disagreeing, and even by proposing a new thought to the previous one.    On blogs you can add pictures, videos, hyperlinks, and more to add emphasis on what you are blogging about.  Pictures, videos, etc.  also allow you  express your ideas without writing.  This allows the reader to interpret what you are trying to say more openly.

I still agree with what Andrew Sullivan says in “Why I Blog“, “blogging is more free-form, more accident-prone, less formal, more alive. It is, in many ways, writing out loud. ” Blogging allows you to write down your ideas without having to make sure they are perfect. No you should not have stupid grammar mistakes, but   you do not have to have your writing edited, nor do you have to proofread it 800 times, unless you are getting a grade for it, like in this class.
Writing using video and images has helped me to better understand new media and writing.  For me, it is a lot easier to see something concrete, like a picture or a video, than to just read about it.  It is fun to see what the blogger can come up with when looking for ways to show their writing instead of writing their ideas down.

This class had advanced me into the blogosphere and I will continue to blog in the future.

In the past, I have done some work with GarageBand.  In high school,  I took a class called Imaging.  The class consisted mainly of using Photoshop, but if you continued to take it, you would work with more programs.  It was my third time taking the class.  One of the assignments was to take photographs that went a long with a poem.  I used the poem, “Where the Sidewalk Ends” by Shel Silverstein.  The photographs I took all had to do with sidewalks and the outdoors.  I had to record someone speaking the poem,  so this is where Garageband came in.  My friend and I went in a quiet room, where there was a microphone set up.  I recorded her voice using GarageBand, but that is all.  I did not have to edit the piece.  Also, I added music to the recording in iMovie.  That is the only time i have used it.

About a week ago, I got to learn how to use GarageBand, specifically for podcasts.  There are so many features you can use with GarageBand; you can cut out part of the recording in case you messed up, you can add music and let it fade in and out, you can add sound effects, and more.   It is not very difficult, you just have to take the time to learn how to use it.

Another feature of GarageBand lets you change how your voice sounds.  Here is a video so you can check it out.

I am excited to work with GarageBand for my podcast.  Learning about how to use it in class was very helpful.  I know now exactly how to edit my piece.  I am interested to see how it will all turn out.

“How I Work: Writing An Audio Script” by Mari gave great advice for writing a podcast.  I definitely agree when Mari highlighted that, “the first draft is always the one that takes up the most time.”  This is so true.  The first draft is where you have to get your ideas out on paper.  It is the beginning of your argument.  Every time you edit it you usually are staying within the same topic of that first draft.    Mari also makes good points in “Putting It All Together”.  He talks about how you need to read your paper out loud to hear how it sounds.  Your paper will change because of this to keep your reader’s attention and make it easy for them to follow.

Storytelling is fairly new to me.  Watching to Ira Glass talk about Storytelling was very helpful because he has had so much experience and he knows how to story tell effectively.  I liked how he talked about how storytelling is not like writing in high school, there is no topic sentence with evidence to support it.  You use “anecdotes”, which is a sequence of actions.

I also listened to “This  American Life”, also narrated by Ira Glass.  He talks about Plan B discussing how “most of us start off our lives with some Plan A which we abandon…switching to a Plan B, which becomes our life.”  In his different plans he discusses how people had to turn to Plan B.  In Act Three, Glass is talking with Barry Keenan because of his Plan B.  Keenan had achieved a lot of Plan A by age 22.  He was making a lot of money. but then he started drinking and became addicted to strong painkillers.  He went broke when he was 23, and  he then came up with Plan B, kidnapping  Frank Sinatra Jr., because he needed money. Glass explains the story in a well manner.  It is funny because towards the end of this Act, Frank Sinatra’s song  ” All of Me” is playing.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n7KQ4vkiNUk&feature=related

http://nerdk0r3.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/02/glass.jpg

It was interesting to read everything about podcasting.  Before I read these articles and listened to the podcast, I thought of a podcast as a recording of someone’s voice about some particular event or issue.  I was actually right.  Podcasts are pre-recorded, audio files.

As the Economist asks, “Does podcasting therefore spell the end of radio?”  No way.  Radio enables the listeners to listen to live people talk about events and issues, thinking on the spot.  Where as podcasts are prerecorded, so they are clearly edited beforehand.  Podcasts do not include advertising, but is that necessarily something good?  How will viewers hear about new products, only by the TV?  The radio displays advertising, songs, news, and more.
Podcasts are a relative new media where as the radio can be considered old media.  However, the advancements made in technology on the basis of podcasting is not necessarily good.  It enables the users to do more than they used to, but the world does not need podcasts as they need the radio.

Listening to “The Moth Podcast” made me dislike podcasting even more.  The podcast was about eight minutes long and very boring.  The speaker’s voice was not enthusiastic and not fun to listen to. Yes it did give me a great example of what a podcast is, but it was not a good one in my opinion.

http://www-tc.pbs.org/mediashift/files/Podcast_CTAP_small.jpg

Manovich states that “the user can interact with the media object, and in this way the user becomes the co-author of the work” (1).   This is displayed in the M&M interactive advertisement, Become an M and M.  The user creates an M&M however they want it.  The user can design their own M&M by customizing its shape, arms, legs, face, and even accessories. This enables the consumer/viewer to engage in M&Ms.  This interactivity highlights the product being sold.  It lets the user customize their ideal M&M.  Obviously you cannot buy an M&M with hair and shoes, but it shows that there are a variety of M&M products.  As you can see to the right, this it the M&M that is customized.

The audience for this ad leads more towards younger people, although anyone who is computer savvy can participate in the advertisement.  Younger people tend to like chocolate more than adults, however adults can love chocolate as well.

The Barbarian Group highlights how “interactive advertising is not people” (1).  This interactive is a good example of this.  The user is not interacting with a specific person, they are interacting with the product, customizing it to their liking.  This ad was very fun for me.  I liked being able to change the M&M to my liking.  I had fun with it, as you can tell.

M&Ms remind me of my mom because she  loves chocolate.  Whenever I see her, she is holding a different king of bag of M&Ms.  One day she will have almond M&Ms, the next day peanut.  It is like my mom is a walking advertisement for M&M because of how much she loves them.  They have so many different kinds, that it is hard not to try them all.

http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://candyaddict.com/blog/candy_pictures/custom_mm_character.jpg&imgrefurl=http://candyaddict.com/blog/2007/01/21/create-a-custom-mm-character/&usg=__YRnNXUJGOpAouTvBC4wMVYph9s8=&h=296&w=250&sz=13&hl=en&start=10&sig2=2-rvkGkKe2fiVrCpYhDzIQ&tbnid=uj919v4ETQh9xM:&tbnh=116&tbnw=98&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dcustomize%2BM%2526M%26gbv%3D2%26hl%3Den&ei=jeD5Sq6tGYjmMZevmc4K

An advertiser’s goals is to get consumers to buy their product.  They create their ads to appeal to certain types of people: men, women, heterosexuals, homosexuals, old, young, etc.  Companies like Diesel, Rolling Rock, and Levi Strauss & Co. all have advertisements that display these things.

In Malcom Gladwell’s essay, “Listening To Khakis”, he highlights how Levi Strauss & Co. takes a different approach to advertising  to promote Dockers, new men’s khakis. A lot of the clothing advertisements you see for men, show skin bearing women and or men. Instead, the Dockers ad takes a different approach. Dockers are selling “conformity” and “male friendship” to make men feel comfortable about the clothes they are buying (50) .  They appeal to the men that are more average and care more about their family and friends then the clothes they buy.

Diesel jeans advertisements show more of a sexual side. They use advertisements that show skin and very good looking people to catch the attention of their audience.  In the advertisements above and below you can see the different between the Dockers advertisement and the Diesel jeans advertisement.

In the “Sample Image Analysis” the Rolling Rock Beer Ape commercial is dissected to reveal the satire of the ad.  The ad displays how a party is boring as well as a man until the Rolling Rock Beer Ape arrives.  The women are drawn to the Ape because of the beer.  Men are drawn to drink this kind of beer because it shows that attractive women will want to be around them.  Drinking beer will spice up a party and not leave it to be boring. Here is a video of the Rolling Rock Beer Ape advertisement.

Advertisers catch the attention of their viewers in a variety of ways.  What advertisement has gotten your attention?

I read an article called “Picturing Texts” that allowed me to see the similarities and differences between alphabetical text and visual text.  The article gave me different ways to break down the advertisement shown here.

As you can see, the advertisement shown is for Absolut Vodka.

Balance:  There is art work on both sides of the ad with bright colors which also shows how they are similar. The artwork is of people.  As well the ad shows balance as you can see where both pedestrian signs say walk and both traffic lights are green.

Description:  No actual text is given for the description of the advertisment.  Because the advertisement is called “In An Absolut World”, it allows the consumers to fill in their own desire. The setting is Times Square,  New york, which is a prime example of a busy, fast paced lifestyle.  It is never slow and always moving.  New York also has many different kinds of people, rich, poor, and of all ethnicities. This fast paced lifestyle shows a common desire among the population for an opportunity to escape.  Absolut invites the consumers into a world of their own fondness with no stress.   Stress is common in an urban setting which is a major reason people drink.  They can escape from reality of a capitalist/ consumer driven society into a more culturally appreciative society.  The usual billboards in Times Square, New York  are replaced with artwork, showing a world without the  technologically advancing and fast paced world into a slower more appreciating world, things people take for granted.

Emphasis: There is a light/dark pattern shown.  The artwork is emphasized because of the brighter lights and coloring.  The street is darker so your eyes are not drawn there first.

Point of view:  The advertisement converges to one point.  This shows how Absolut wants its customers to end up at the same point and have the same views after looking at the ad.  They obviously want the consumers to buy their product, like it, and come back for more.

Like I said before, Absolut is showing an  escape out of reality into more of a fantasy.  Its title “In An Absolut World” is not completed… so the ad lets the consumers complete the sentence. As you can see by my title, I said “In An Absolut World.. I Would Have A Million Dollars”.  How would you complete “In An Absolut World” with your own fantasy?

Here is another advertisement for Absolut Vodka.  It also shows an escape into a fantasy, the fantasy being Kanye West.

My essay about social media is far from being a completed final draft.  I plan on doing a lot of revision to it.  I have already written a second draft because my first one was not good academic writing.  My second draft I have completed is better.  I know that I have to add more specific examples instead of just general ones.  I also need to add a conclusion.  My thesis also needs revision because I include a quotation and that is not an original idea of my own that has formulated an argument.  I know after reading the critique letters of my classmates I will get more insight on how to make my essay stronger.

I read two essays that give great advise on revising essays.  These essays gave me so many new ways of how I can improve my essay even more.

I first read”The Maker’s Eye” by Donald M. Murray.   This essay gave advice on how to “rewrite or revise effectively”.  I always thought that once I wrote my first draft I considered the “job of writing to be done”(Murray).  Learning from “The Maker’s Eye” this was just the beginning.  I never knew what I should be looking for when I read over my draft.  Murray highlights that “the first thing writers look for in their drafts is information, next for meaning, ..audience, form, structure, development, dimension, and voice.” I do not think I have ever looked at my essay in these ways before.  I also think it was very interesting when he said, ” A piece of writing is never finished.” That kind of makes me nervous.  You can edit your paper for so long and it still may not be done.  Even the most perfect essay still has room for improvement. 

I then read “Simplicity” by William Zinsser.  This essay focused more on the “simplicity” and “clutter” of writing, which was very interesting.   I always thought you wanted very complex sentences and not simple ones.  “But the secret of good writing is to strip every sentences to its cleanest components” (Zinsser).  I think that in my essay I can make my sentences a lot more simple. I also clutter my writing.  When I revise my essay again I am definitely going to be looking on how I can change these things.

I loved how Zinsser ended his essay so I am going to do the same … “If you find that writing is hard, it’s because it is hard.  It’s one of the hardest things people do.”

This class has opened my eyes to new media and technology.  I never used to think about everything that has changed in technology.  This class has totally changed that.  I now notice everything that is different.  The definition essay of a new media term helped me broaden my horizon even further with new media and technology.

It took me a while to figure out what I wanted to write about.  I was first going to define the word “new media” but I thought that term was too broad because our whole class is revolved around that term.  I then came to the term “social networking”.  This term ended up being my topic, but I changed it to “social media” because that is how it has advanced into new media.  I chose this topic because we have not really talked about it in class that much nor have we read many articles on it.  I wanted to chose a topic that I was familiar with so I could fully define the term effectively.  I use Facebook daily and that is a very popular social media site that helped me define social media more thoroughly.  Part of my thesis was about how social media allows people all over the world to connect with one another and how they form a community where he or she can share his/her interests, hobbies and other personal information by way of the World Wide Web.

For some examples of social media,  I talked about Facebook and Twtter.  I read articles about both applications that included “How Facebook Ruins Friendships” and “Putting Twitter’s World to Use”.  Both of these articles gave me great insight to what the applications have to offer that I didn’t already know.  I even made a Twitter account so I could browse the site.  I already have a Facebook account so exploring this site was a lot easier because I was more familiar with it.

This essay was difficult because you had to get across your own meaning of the term you chose.  So I am going to leave you with this question to ponder… How can you effectively define a new media term?

- specific examples

-evidence— quotations

-complex thesis

-significance