Film

As a kid my access to television was limited to PBS and recorded nova shows that we rented from the local library for special occasions. One movie we rented was a "classic" movie entitled "It's A Wonderful Life". I could watch this movie over and over again without tiring of it and always gaining a new message from it. It is about a small town and a man who lives there named George Bailey who spends his whole life putting those he loves ahead of his own passions and interests. Celestial beings narrate the movie and watch George struggle to make ends meet and attempt to kill himself so that his family may benefit at least from his life insurance policy. An angel from above gives George the opportunity to see what the world would be like without him, inspiring a new love and appreciation of his life in him.This movie is touching, inspiring, thought provoking, sentimental, funny, and sad. It is difficult to pinpoint why this movie even today brings a huge smile to my face.

The storyline is incredible, encompassing love, struggle, heros, evil, self sacrifice, and friendship. It goes beyond the cookie cutter plot lines that exist in new movies. My copy of the movie is in VHS, a testament to its ancient quality. The values presented in it though, are timeless. It is in black and white, making the content even more important to fill in my imagination of colors that must have existed. It is an older movie, but it is not boring or dry. The language is entertaining and captivating, while remaining true to its era. My friends often roll their eyes at me should I put them through watching this movie with me, but the magic still works on me. I still cry at all the same parts and grin at the end. It comforts me I guess, in a nostalgic, simplistic way. It is after all, a wonderful life that each of us lives. That sounds corny. Maybe that is the appeal of this movie. It is corny while retaining values that are important to me and appealing to my own personal nostalgia.

Newspapers and their struggle

In a day and age where new technology rules, traditional paper newspapers are struggling to keep their readers and stay alive in the media shark tank. Consumers of news still trust newspapers to provide them with the most accurate information, however the daily printed new york times delivered at your doorstep technique no longer holds sway with new age consumers. One problem is time and accelerated schedules. The biggest problem is the switch to the internet.

How can newspapers maintain their credibility and influence in an online forum? The truth is, they struggled at first. Newspapers treated the web as though it were a regular newspaper-following a set template and arranging the sections (sports, arts, international news) much the way they would be found in a paper form. What they didnt realize and eventually adapted to was that readers of news online are more apt to seek out the articles they are most interested in. Search bars enable readers to find articles pertaining to a specific subject. They have access to archives, video streaming news clips, and advertising blurbs.

As we read in the Wired article, some newspapers are recognizing their readers urge to make news about them, placing an emphasis on local issues that truly matter to its consumers. Cincymoms is a perfect example, giving local moms an online blog forum to put pictures and news pertinent to them. Readers appreciate this reach into local venues, giving the newspaper the advantage of creating more specific niches.

I looked at the website for my town in Vermont, the Brattleboro Reformer to better gauge my understanding of this subject. It has a simple layout, one local side bar advertisement, and links to local, sports and more global news stories. There are local photo galleries on the right hand side of the page. This is apparently a new feature that allows readers to purchase photos that have been in the reformer. I imagine parents will buy photos of their high-school age children in the local sports section. This will create more revenue for the paper and also emphasizes the value of small town living/community.

The Bristol Phoenix has an even simpler setup, with a movable headline reel and links to sections below. It has advertiser support on the right side and bottom.

Larger newspaper websites such as the new york times are set up much like the front page of a newspaper, with a large feature story picture and links to breaking news stories. As I mentioned before, it is readily searchable so that internet savvy consumers can locate the exact stories and topics they are really interested in.

The problem seems to be that people enjoy the traditional newspaper for nostalgic purposes, however their lives dont allow for them to sit down and read old news that isnt updated with the click of a refresh button. At this point I'm not sure if I can designate a prognosis for the future of newspapers. They are still the most reliable source of news, but as demanding consumers we can't wait for our news. We want specific news, from around us. We want to be able to have a say in what is published. Newspapers will have to continue their struggle to identify the needs of their ever changing readers.

Books

I began to approach this assignment with the goal of finding a book I once read and recounting some romantic story about how it changed me. The reality is, no one book had that kind of impact on me. Maybe I'm just being cynical. I am not saying that books in general have not made an impact on me, just no single piece of literature.

As a child, I veraciously read anything I could get my hands on, from adventure to love stories to science fiction to mysteries. I couldn't read enough. Reading so much helped my context development, vocabulary, and understanding of different cultural standards. It expanded my intellectual boundaries, and for that I am grateful. Some books that I enjoyed immensely growing up were: Nightmare on Nantucket by Joan Aiken, Julie of the Wolves, Wuthering Heights, To Kill a Mockingbird, Schindler's List and of course Harry Potter. Each book that I read told a different story and perspective. I was able to escape into another world for an hour or two.

My perspective on books has changed in the past few years however. Instead of reading books for pleasure, I read them for classes because I have to. The material is focused on something I am responsible for, which takes the fun out of reading it. I wish I had more time to read for pleasure, but until I am done reading books that are required of me to read and have more free time-I cant see myself doing so.

I feel like in our culture reading is being replaced with other forms of media which makes me sad. People seem to identify the movie before the book and act surprised when/if they find out a book even existed before the movie. This is characteristic of the shifts in media today I suppose, where more visual and exciting media take the place of more tactile media which requires one to create their own mental imagery to follow along with the text.

The result seems to be a decrease in imagination, in the ability to employ the skills we possess to associate powerful words with imagery. I guess we have the opportunity to do so while interpreting advertising now. It's not quite the same.

I look forward to a time in my life where I have a place in my schedule to read for pleasure. Books carry a wealth of knowledge and simple perfection that is untouched by other forms of media. It seems impossible to pick just one, when the more you read, the better your appreciation gets.

Cable TV Beat

For last class, we were asked to find a New York Times article that relates to our "beat" assigned the first week of classes. My assigned beat is cable television, which I am excited about for many reasons. Primarily, I took a class this summer entitled "TV and American Culture" which explored television from its birth to contemporary times. I learned a lot about the values of Americans as seen through the evolution of television in our history. It will be fascinating to explore cable television through a different lens-taking the broader perspective of mass communications into account.

The article I chose to read and comment on is entitled "Cable Channels Gain on Broadcast Networks" by Brian Stelter and can be found at this link:

http://biz.yahoo.com/nytimes/080625/1194788183535.html?.v=19

This article, as the title suggests, discusses how cable channels are surpassing broadcast networks in popularity and advance advertising sales. These gains represent a shift already in place from broadcast to cable influenced by several key factors. First, the ratings gap has been narrowing, resulting on some cable networks setting new ratings records. Second, this increased popularity of cable channels can be attributed to the fragmentation of media, which encourages advertisers to spread their reach across many media and venues. Third, many new niche channels have been developed with the hopes of accruing more viewers in specific interest topics rather than general programming. Finally, the writer's strike that broadcast channels suffered last winter allowed cable channels to produce fresh programming that looked more attractive to viewers.

An important element that I noticed toward the end of the article is the integrated television and online packages that cable channels are employing. This way, they can accumulate revenue and viewers from a variety of media sources. This strategy struck me because it reminded me of our recent discussion of media multitasking. The media is clearly taking steps to exploit our short attention spans and ability to absorb partial media messages in multiple forums.

Response to first week of classes

I was intrigued this past week by our exploration of the idea of communication as defined in its simplest form extended through the concept of mass communication and our system of language as a fine tuned and potentially problematic cascade of messages, receivers, media created thought triggers and visual patterns that constantly test a viewer/interpreters ability to read between the lines and create their own full picture/conclusion.

The dodge ad was a prime example of this media system, letting us know that they know we are smart enough to read between those lines. They poke fun at the system almost, a system which can't come out and say what they want all of the time. This is an effective method because it acknowledges our abilities, which catches our attention and makes us laugh.

I was particularly struck by the exercises we conducted in class, creating images on the blackboard according to descriptions constructed of language. This in conjunction with the Rene Magritte "c'est n'est pas une pipe" piece brought the contradiction that exists between visual representation and language as a human construct/channel of communication at even the simplest level. The movie we watched in class talked about how we turn to language to communicate everything that is important to us which sometimes becomes problematic when we try to explain ideas that are abstract, such as emotions (love). We forget that words can never truly represent a deep emotional feeling just as Magritte cannot recreate a pipe by painting one. There is a distance between the communication systems we cling to and the true reality of the messages we are receiving.