10 Revelations
1. Free Advertisement through Social Networking
Watching the video, Generation Like, I was introduced to the idea that large and corporate companies are able to create free advertising through social networks like Facebook. The teenage demographic are the biggest supporters of this advertisement. We are voluntarily advertising companies through the "like" button found on Facebook. By doing so they are able to get their products and company name splattered all over millions of news feeds. We are all marketing developers for these companies with no pay roll in return, and we don't necessarily know we are doing so.
-"Perhaps the most visible examples of social media are social networking sites like Myspace, Facebook, LifeJournal..on these sites, users can create content, share ideas, and interact with friends." (Campbell, pg. 54)
-"Facebook is now the most popular social media site on the internet. Facebook grew at an astonishing rate, and by 2012 it had more than one billion active users and was available in more than seventy languages." (Campbell, pg. 54)
Find out about Facebook interaction with advertising: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/generation-like/
2. Individualized Media
There is now a very specific demographic that media is focused on. There is websites, television shows, and product commercials available for different types of demographics. Instead of generalizing what people view, companies categorize specific television shows to attract the most popular demographic at that time. Companies are able to insert their online ads on someones personal computer pages due to recently searched topics to that specific person. When a young girl logs onto Facebook, an ad may be on the side of the page for a new princess backpack and when a Dad logs onto his Facebook, an ad for a new lawnmower would pop up.
-"A typical basic cable system today includes a hundred-plus channel lineup composed of local broadcast signals, access channels, regional PBS stations, and a variety of cable channels." (Campbell, pg. 203)
-"By far the most popular site for viewing video online is Youtube, remaining at the center of video consumption online."(Campbell, pg. 207)
Demographic specific Networks:
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| Demographic Specific for Mothers/Wives |
It is important to understand and track the media convergence that takes place over the years. Keeping track of the enhancements that come from new technological advancements is crucial to keep customers using, and businesses at the top of their game. Because of Media Convergence, people are able to search, obtain, and understand information, news, etc. through such a wide range of sources that are so easily accessible. The internet has made grave changes in how we get information, which also creates more opportunities for those businesses who control so many search engines to make ad-specific money.
4. Strategic Advertising
-"The first definition of media convergence involves the technological merging of content across different media channels- the magazine articles, radio programs, songs, TV shows, video games, and movies now available on the Internet through laptops, tablets, and smartphones." (Campbell, pg. 11)
-"Google does not produce any of the content, and most consumers who find a news story or magazine article through a Google search pay nothing to the original media content provider not to Google. instead, as the "middleman" or distributor, Google makes most of its money by selling ad stat accompany search results." (Campbell, pg. 12)
You can now get magazines by searching online:
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| Read books online with new Tablet |
There are specific patterns to commercials that attract different people to products. There is a formula set up that follows techniques to influence viewers to buy a product, that I was unaware of until this year. The matrix shows how companies use specific principles and persuasive techniques to attract someone into buying whatever they are advertising. Commercials are not just put together to get people to laugh or enjoy television, they are to influence the viewer to buy a product without forcing it down their throat that they should by their product.
-“As U.S advertising became more pervasive, it contributed to major social changes in the twentieth century. First, it significantly influences the transition from a producer-directed to a consumer-driven society" (Campbell, pg. 387)
-“…we should remain critical of what advertising has come to represent: the overemphasis on commercial acquisitions and images of material success, and the disparity between those who can afford to live comfortably in a commercialized society and those who cannot” (Campbell, pg. 415).
10 Best Commercials to analyze using the matrix:
Advertising through nostalgia and beautiful people
5. Technology increases threaten social interactions
It has been becoming more and more apparent that the world has been moving into the technological world and embracing all that it offers. It is also apparent that because they have been embracing the technological world, that they have been leaving behind the social and personal interactive world. Phones seem to be a huge part of a person's life, to the point where friends have to make up a game that forces everyone at the dinner table to put their phones in the center and not touch them. There is a current question asking whether the technological advancements are helping or hurting the human race.
-"The Internet and social media have let to significant changes in the ways we consume and engage with media culture." (Campbell, pg. 13)
-"But while we might be consuming media, are we really engaging with it? And are we really engaging with our friends when we communicate with them by texting or posting on Facebook? Some critics and educators feel that media multi-taskers means that we are more distracted.."(Campbell, pg. 13)
6. Public Relations can make or break companies
Public Relations has a lot more power than I previously thought about. It seems that people who work in PR firms have the ability to save a celebrity, company or product by making sure that they advertise the specific target in a positive way. It seems that they have an overpowering ability to influence how the public thinks about certain people and things. As much as PR firms can help, they can also destroy a reputation of all of the listed above.
-“Public relations refer to the total communication strategy conducted by a person, a government, or an organization attempting to reach and persuade an audience to adopt a point of view” (Campbell, pg. 421)
-“Historically, public relations practitioners have tried to earn news media coverage (as opposed to buying advertising) to communicate their clients’ messages to the public. While that is still true, the internet, with its instant accessibility, offers public relations professionals a number of new routes for communicating with publics” (Campbell pg. 437)
An example of successful PR:
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| Positively enhancing Adele |
7. Privacy is no longer guaranteed
By submitting yourself to all of these online websites, you are also allowing the entire Internet world to have access to your personal information. There is a limited amount of privacy in the technological world that people do not realize. Everything that you put on the Internet can be traced too and looked at. Industries are able to tap into your personal computer and upload personal ads and gain information about the demographic they are advertising too. People are willingly letting themselves become test dummies for companies and large corporations to gain information and influence.
-“However, when you use the Internet, whether you are signing up for an email account, shopping online, or even just surfing the Web, you give away personal information-voluntarily or not" (Campbell, 68)
Is this the news we really need?
-"Youtube is the most content community, with hundred of millions of users around the world uploading and watching amateur and professional videos." (Campbell, 53)
Type in my name, and all my personal information is available.
8. Stimulating News is overpowered by One-sided News
News reports today do not seem to offer the entire story, which sets up the scene for viewers to interpret and analyze what is happening in the world in their own way. Instead, due to time constraint and lack of actually going out and reporting, stories seem to be lacking information and substance. Today, the news is based around really sad stories, next to really uplifting and hopeful stories. Nothing really surfaces that has one story with all information needed to make a legitimate opinion on the matter. Today, most people admit to find out their news on shows that incorporate humor into the stories, which is an entire different problem in itself. There is really no serious source of news anymore, because it is not as appealing for the audience.
-“For most journalists, balance means presenting all sides of an issue without appearing to favor any one position. The quest for balance presents problems for journalists. One the one hand, time and space constraints do not always permit representing all sides; in practice this value has often been reduced to ‘telling both sides of the story." (Campbell, pg. 502)
-“Even though journalists transform events into stories, they generally believe that they are – or should be – neutral observers who present facts without passing judgment on them,” (Campbell, pg. 489).
Ways people get news today:
Is this the news we really need?
9. Shifting Media from Mass to Personal
Everything that I do today with the internet is done personally through my own computer or phone. Technology has made it possible for me to view and share almost anything that I find interesting or necessary. By making the shift from mass to personal, everyone is able to have access to news that they previously would have to search for or hear from word of mouth. Switching from mass to personal has made the experience of the internet completely enhanced and interactive. By switching to personal, I, like so many others, are fortunate enough to create work or share it with whomever we like with a click of a button. It has brought the old world into a completely new one.
-"While almost all U.S. college students use Facebook everyday, they are rarely posting or reading the same experiences. In a world where we can so easily customize our media use, the notion of truly 'mass' media may no longer exist." (Campbell, pg. 5)
-"The former mass audience is morphing into individualized users who engage with ever-narrowing politics, hobbies, and entertainment." (Campbell, pg. 5)
Watch whatever you like, whenever you like.
10. Once growing successful jobs are now being lost due to technological advancements.
Journalism and reporting was one the most needed and prestigious job. People relied on others to go out and explore the world and be able to write a report on it for others to read. Newspapers were the main source of obtaining news, and was in high demand. This was all before radio, television, and now Internet came into play. Because all these things offer easy and fast access to news happening, newspapers and reporters for those papers are no longer necessarily needed. Once very important jobs, are now dying down. The only positive thing about this is that even if newspapers die, news never will. Instead, newspapers have to alter their normal ways to stay in the technological world.
-“Publishers and journalists today face worrisome issues, such as the decline in newspaper readership and the failure of many papers to attract younger readers. However, other problems persist as newspapers continue to converge with the Internet and grapple with the future of digital news” (Campbell, pg. 301)
-“The marketing of news as a product and the use of modern technology to dramatically cut costs gradually elevated newspapers from an entrepreneurial stage to the status of a mass medium.” (Campbell, pg.281)
Online newspapers:
The Movie that explains it all:
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