The man who never looks into a newspaper is better informed than he who reads them, in as much as he who knows nothing is nearer the truth than he whose mind is filled with falsehoods and errors. Today, we contend with a mass media that extends far beyond newspapers, a media system that is among the biggest and most powerful institutions in the country. Unfortunately, it is also a media system that too often envisions us as consumers of capitalism, not citizens of a democracy. Media sociologists Herbert Gans argues that the media alone can not guarantee a democracy. Despite much disingenuous talk about citizen empowerment by politicians and merchandisers, citizens have never had much clout. Countries as big as America operate largely through organizations.
But in a country as big as America, the media constitute one of those critical organizations that can help or hurt us in creating a more economically and politically democratic society. At their worst, the media can distract or misinform us with falsehoods and errors. But, at their best, the media can shed light on the issues, tell meaningful stories and foster the discussions that can help a citizens' democracy flourish.
Thursday, December 16, 2010
Chapter 11
Although media consumers have not always been comfortable with advertising, they developed a resigned acceptance of it because it "pays the bills" of the media system. Yet media consumers have their limits. Moments in which sponsors stepped over the usual borders of advertising into the realm of media content, including the TV quiz show and radio payola scandals, complimentary newspaper reports about advertisers' businesses and product placement in TV and in movies have generated the greatest legal and ethical debates about advertising.
Still, as advertising has become more persuasive and consumers more discriminating, ad practitioners have searched for ways to weave their work more seamlessly into the social and cultural fabric. Products now blend in as props or even as characters in TV shows and in movies. Search engines deliver paid placements along with regular search results. Product placements, some permanent, some networked to change with the user are woven into video games.
Among the more intriguing efforts to become enmeshed in the culture are the ads that exploit, distort, or transform the political and cultural meanings of popular music. When Nike used the Beatles' song "Revolution" (1968) to promote Nike shoes in 1987 ("Nike Air is not a shoe... it is a revolution," the ad said). Many music fans were outraged to hear the Beatles' music being used for the first time to sell products.
That was more than 20 years ago. These days, having a popular song used in a TV commercial is considered a good career move, even better than radio airplay. Similarly, while product placement in TV and in movies was hotly debated in the 1980's and 1990's, the explosive growth of paid placements in video games hardly raises an eyebrow today. Even the lessons of the quiz show scandals, which forced advertisers out of TV program production in the late 1950's are forgotten or even ignored today as advertisers have been warmly invited to help develop TV programs
Are we as a society giving up on trying to set limits on the never ending onslaught of advertising? Are we weary of trying to keep advertising out of media production? Or are we now less concerned about the integration of advertising into the core of media culture?
Still, as advertising has become more persuasive and consumers more discriminating, ad practitioners have searched for ways to weave their work more seamlessly into the social and cultural fabric. Products now blend in as props or even as characters in TV shows and in movies. Search engines deliver paid placements along with regular search results. Product placements, some permanent, some networked to change with the user are woven into video games.
Among the more intriguing efforts to become enmeshed in the culture are the ads that exploit, distort, or transform the political and cultural meanings of popular music. When Nike used the Beatles' song "Revolution" (1968) to promote Nike shoes in 1987 ("Nike Air is not a shoe... it is a revolution," the ad said). Many music fans were outraged to hear the Beatles' music being used for the first time to sell products.
That was more than 20 years ago. These days, having a popular song used in a TV commercial is considered a good career move, even better than radio airplay. Similarly, while product placement in TV and in movies was hotly debated in the 1980's and 1990's, the explosive growth of paid placements in video games hardly raises an eyebrow today. Even the lessons of the quiz show scandals, which forced advertisers out of TV program production in the late 1950's are forgotten or even ignored today as advertisers have been warmly invited to help develop TV programs
Are we as a society giving up on trying to set limits on the never ending onslaught of advertising? Are we weary of trying to keep advertising out of media production? Or are we now less concerned about the integration of advertising into the core of media culture?
Chapter 10
Except for their earliest incarnation as clay tablets, books have been printed on various forms of paper, papyrus, parchment, or pulp. But as the printed word becomes digital, it actually is not printed on anything, just represented on a screen. In this case, will the content still be considered a book? Think about how newspapers and magazines are continually changing, how Facebook has rendered the college yearbook almost extinct, how digital photos have done the same to bound photo albums, or what a recorded music album means in the era of the music download. How has content and accessibility changed with these evolution? In the light of all of this, what is the meaning of the bound book in our culture? How do we interpret a lush paneled room full of literary classics, a large glossy "coffee table" book, or a well worn in textbook? Will we still buy books based on their covers if there is no actual paper cover? If the primary reading medium becomes a screen, will we still want to read text on a screen that reminds us of a book, or will the small screen of an iPod or mobile phone suffice?
In this review of Amazon's Kindle, author Ezra Klein wrote in the Columbia Journalism Review that "just as the early television shows were really radio programs with moving images, the early electronic books are simply printed text uploaded to a computer." If that is the case, what will the coming generation make of books? Will the solitary pursuit of reading, as Klein notes, become a social activity, with immediate connections to other readers and the author? Will a book purchase be an admission fee for an ongoing relationship with updates or new chapters from the author.
Printed words on paper, bound together, creates a natural enclosure to the communication of reading. It is just the individual reader interpreting an author's story, long after it has been written. Is that activity the essential nature of the book as a mass medium? Or can the book, with words released from paper, evolve into an entirely new communicative practice?
In this review of Amazon's Kindle, author Ezra Klein wrote in the Columbia Journalism Review that "just as the early television shows were really radio programs with moving images, the early electronic books are simply printed text uploaded to a computer." If that is the case, what will the coming generation make of books? Will the solitary pursuit of reading, as Klein notes, become a social activity, with immediate connections to other readers and the author? Will a book purchase be an admission fee for an ongoing relationship with updates or new chapters from the author.
Printed words on paper, bound together, creates a natural enclosure to the communication of reading. It is just the individual reader interpreting an author's story, long after it has been written. Is that activity the essential nature of the book as a mass medium? Or can the book, with words released from paper, evolve into an entirely new communicative practice?
Wednesday, December 15, 2010
Chapter 9
There are more than nineteen thousand magazine titles in the United States. But the largest and most profitable magazines are typically owned by some of the biggest media corporations. Time Warner, for example, counts People Time, Sports Illustrated, In Style, FORTUNE, Southern Living, and Real Simple among its holdings. Even niche magazines that seem small are often controlled by chains. Supermarket tabloids like Star, the National Enquirer, and Globe are all owned by Florida-based American Media, which also publishes Shape, Muscle & Fitness, Men's Fitness, Fit Pregnancy, and Flex.
High revenue magazines, especially those focusing on fashion, fitness, and lifestyle, can also shamelessly break down the firewall between the editorial and business departments. "Fluff" story copy serves as a promotional background for cosmetic, clothing, and gadget advertisements. Digital retouching makes every model and celebrity look thinner or more muscular, and always blemish free. This altered view of their "perfection" becomes our ever hopeful aspiration, spurring us to purchase the advertised products. Yet, the huge number of magazine titles means that magazines span a huge range of activities and thought. Each magazine sustains a community, although some may think of readers more as consumers, while others view them as citizens and several hundred new launches each year bring new voices to the marketplace and search for their own community to serve.
So there is the glitzy, commercial world of the big magazine industry with Time's Person of the year, the latest Cosmo girl, and the band on the cover of Rolling Stone. But the long list of smaller magazines, like Multinational Monitor, Edutopia, and E-The Environmental Magazine, account for the majority of magazine titles and the broad, democratic spectrum of communities that are their readers.
High revenue magazines, especially those focusing on fashion, fitness, and lifestyle, can also shamelessly break down the firewall between the editorial and business departments. "Fluff" story copy serves as a promotional background for cosmetic, clothing, and gadget advertisements. Digital retouching makes every model and celebrity look thinner or more muscular, and always blemish free. This altered view of their "perfection" becomes our ever hopeful aspiration, spurring us to purchase the advertised products. Yet, the huge number of magazine titles means that magazines span a huge range of activities and thought. Each magazine sustains a community, although some may think of readers more as consumers, while others view them as citizens and several hundred new launches each year bring new voices to the marketplace and search for their own community to serve.
So there is the glitzy, commercial world of the big magazine industry with Time's Person of the year, the latest Cosmo girl, and the band on the cover of Rolling Stone. But the long list of smaller magazines, like Multinational Monitor, Edutopia, and E-The Environmental Magazine, account for the majority of magazine titles and the broad, democratic spectrum of communities that are their readers.
Chapter 8
With the coming of radio and television, newspapers in the twentieth century surrendered their title as the mass medium shared by the largest audience. However, to this day newspapers remain the single most important source of news for the nation, even in the age of the Internet. Although many "readers" today cite Yahoo! and Google are only directors that guide readers to other news stories, most often to online newspaper sites. This means that newspaper organizations are still the primary institutions doing the work of gathering and reporting the news. Even with all the newsroom cutbacks across the United States, newspapers remain the only journalistic organization in most towns and cities that still employs hundreds of people to report news and tell the community's stories.
Newspapers link people to what matters in their communities, their nation, and their world. No other journalistic institution serves society as well. But, with smaller news resources and the industry no longer able to sustain high profit margins, what will become of news papers in 20 to 30 years? Who will gather the information needed to sustain a democracy, to serve as the "watchdog" over our key institutions, and to document the comings and goings of everyday life? And, perhaps more importantly, who will act on behalf of the people who do not have the news media's access to authorities or the ability to influence them?
Newspapers link people to what matters in their communities, their nation, and their world. No other journalistic institution serves society as well. But, with smaller news resources and the industry no longer able to sustain high profit margins, what will become of news papers in 20 to 30 years? Who will gather the information needed to sustain a democracy, to serve as the "watchdog" over our key institutions, and to document the comings and goings of everyday life? And, perhaps more importantly, who will act on behalf of the people who do not have the news media's access to authorities or the ability to influence them?
Friday, October 22, 2010
Chapter 4
In this chapter, I found a lot of things to be similar to what I am learning in my COM 130 class. In chapter four, they examined the scientific, cultural, political, and economic factors surrounding radio's development and perseverance. They explore the origins of broadcasting, from the early theories about radio waves to the critical formation of RCA as a national radio monopoly. They then discuss the evolution of commercial radio, including the rise of NBC as the first network, the development of CBS, and the establishment of the first federal radio legislation. Reviewing the fascinating ways in which radio reinvented itself in the 1950's, they examine television's impact on radio programming, the invention of FM radio, radio's convergence with sound recording, and the influence of various formats. Lastly, they survey the economic health, increasing conglomeration, and cultural impact of commercial and noncommercial radio today, including the emergence of noncommercial low power FM service.
On page 116, the evolution of radio was an important yet useful piece of information. When Westinghouse engineered Frank Conrad to set up a crude radio studio above his Pittsburgh garage in 1916, placing a microphone right in front or a phonograph to broadcast music and news to his friends (whom Conrad supplied with receivers) two evenings a week on some experimental station 8XK, he unofficially became one of the medium's first disc jockeys. In 1920, a Westinghouse executive, intrigued by Conrad's curious hobby, realized the potential of radio as a mass medium. Westinghouse then established the station KDKA, which is generally regarded as the first commercial broadcast station. KDKA is most noted for airing national returns from the Cox Harding presidential election on November 2, 1920, an event most historians consider the first professional broadcast.
Older media forms do not generally disappear when confronted by newer forms. Instead, they adapt. Although radio threatened sound recordings in the 1920's, the recording industry adjusted to the economic and social challenges posed by radio's arrival. Remarkably, the arrival of television on the 1950's marked the only time in media history in which a new medium stole virtually every national programming and advertising strategy from an older medium. Television snatched radio's advertisers, program genres, major celebrities, and large evening audiences. The TV set even physically displaced the radio as the living room centerpiece across America. Nevertheless, radio adapted and continued to reach an audience. While reading this chapter, I was bored because I had basically already talked about this stuff in my other class. Nevertheless, I now know this information like the back of my hand.
On page 116, the evolution of radio was an important yet useful piece of information. When Westinghouse engineered Frank Conrad to set up a crude radio studio above his Pittsburgh garage in 1916, placing a microphone right in front or a phonograph to broadcast music and news to his friends (whom Conrad supplied with receivers) two evenings a week on some experimental station 8XK, he unofficially became one of the medium's first disc jockeys. In 1920, a Westinghouse executive, intrigued by Conrad's curious hobby, realized the potential of radio as a mass medium. Westinghouse then established the station KDKA, which is generally regarded as the first commercial broadcast station. KDKA is most noted for airing national returns from the Cox Harding presidential election on November 2, 1920, an event most historians consider the first professional broadcast.
Older media forms do not generally disappear when confronted by newer forms. Instead, they adapt. Although radio threatened sound recordings in the 1920's, the recording industry adjusted to the economic and social challenges posed by radio's arrival. Remarkably, the arrival of television on the 1950's marked the only time in media history in which a new medium stole virtually every national programming and advertising strategy from an older medium. Television snatched radio's advertisers, program genres, major celebrities, and large evening audiences. The TV set even physically displaced the radio as the living room centerpiece across America. Nevertheless, radio adapted and continued to reach an audience. While reading this chapter, I was bored because I had basically already talked about this stuff in my other class. Nevertheless, I now know this information like the back of my hand.
Chapter 3
Chapter 3 brought a long some very interesting topics. Music for one, is something that I enjoy and is a hobby of mine. To place the impact of popular music in context, this chapter begins by investigating the origins of recording's technological "hardware," from Thomas Edison's early phonograph to Emilie Berliner's invention of the flat disk record and the development of audiotape, compact discs, and MP3's. In addition, we study radio's early threat to sound recording and and the subsequent alliance between the two media when television arrived in the 1950's. We also examine the content and culture of the music industry, focusing on the predominant role of rock music and its extraordinary impact on mass media forms and a diverse array of cultures, both American and international. Finally, we explore the economic and democratic issues facing the recording industry.
On page 80 they discussed U.S. popular music and the formation of rock. Popular or pop music is music that appeals either to a wide cross section of the public or to sizable subdivisions within the larger public based on age, region, or ethnic background. For example, teenagers, Southerners, and Mexican Americans. U.S. pop music today encompasses styles as diverse as blues, country, Tejano, salsa, jazz, rock, reggae, punk, hip-hop, and dance. The word pop has also been used to distinguish popular music from classical music, which is written primarily for ballet, opera, ensemble, or symphony. As various subcultures have intersected, U.S. popular music has developed organically, constantly creating new forms and reinvigorating older musical styles.
This chapter discusses a changing industry, referring to the music industry and it also speaks about popular music and the reformations about that music. Page 88 talks about these things in depth and it really got me thinking, what categorizes music to become popular? As the 1960's began, rock and roll was tamer and "safer," as reflected in the surf and road music of the Beach Boys and Jan & Dean, but it was also beginning to branch out. For instance, the success of producer Phil Spector's "girl groups," such as the Crystals ("He's a Rebel") and the Ronettes ("Be My Baby"), and other all female groups, such as the Shangri-Las ("Leader of the Pack") and the Angels ("My Boyfriend's Back"), challenged the male dominated world of early rock and roll. In addition, rock and roll music and other popular styles went through cultural reformations that significantly changed the industry, including the international appeal of the "British invasion"; the development of soul and Motown; the political impact of folk-rock; the experimentalism of psychedelic music; the rejection of music's mainstream by punk, grunge, and alternative rock movements; and the reassertion of black urban style in hip-hop.
On page 80 they discussed U.S. popular music and the formation of rock. Popular or pop music is music that appeals either to a wide cross section of the public or to sizable subdivisions within the larger public based on age, region, or ethnic background. For example, teenagers, Southerners, and Mexican Americans. U.S. pop music today encompasses styles as diverse as blues, country, Tejano, salsa, jazz, rock, reggae, punk, hip-hop, and dance. The word pop has also been used to distinguish popular music from classical music, which is written primarily for ballet, opera, ensemble, or symphony. As various subcultures have intersected, U.S. popular music has developed organically, constantly creating new forms and reinvigorating older musical styles.
This chapter discusses a changing industry, referring to the music industry and it also speaks about popular music and the reformations about that music. Page 88 talks about these things in depth and it really got me thinking, what categorizes music to become popular? As the 1960's began, rock and roll was tamer and "safer," as reflected in the surf and road music of the Beach Boys and Jan & Dean, but it was also beginning to branch out. For instance, the success of producer Phil Spector's "girl groups," such as the Crystals ("He's a Rebel") and the Ronettes ("Be My Baby"), and other all female groups, such as the Shangri-Las ("Leader of the Pack") and the Angels ("My Boyfriend's Back"), challenged the male dominated world of early rock and roll. In addition, rock and roll music and other popular styles went through cultural reformations that significantly changed the industry, including the international appeal of the "British invasion"; the development of soul and Motown; the political impact of folk-rock; the experimentalism of psychedelic music; the rejection of music's mainstream by punk, grunge, and alternative rock movements; and the reassertion of black urban style in hip-hop.
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