Cross Media Ownership

Hearst Communications is one of the biggest communications companies in the world, having over 49 weekly newspapers, 28 television stations and close to 200 magazines. Hearst Communications owns well-known magazines such as The Oprah Magazine, Cosmopolitan and Popular Mechanics. The media company owns a variety of different magazine genres; The Oprah Magazine focuses on middle aged women, Cosmopolitan is specifically teenagers to young women and Popular Mechanics interests a variety of people both male and female. Hearst Communications also attracts people to participate in its product by owning different companies that deal with different mediums in the media. While magazines focus on advertising pictures and reading articles, Hearst owns television channels such as A&E, ESPN and Lifetime. They also own music organizations such as LiveWorld, Exodus, Netscape and Sirius/XM.

The problem with cross media ownership is too much varied information is coming from an exclusive source. If the information we read is the opinion of only a select few of individuals then people’s right to know the truth is taken away. As an example, Heart Communications owns a wide variety of media companies. Because Hearst owns so many different companies, they are able to be in control of a great range of demographics. This comes in handy when Hearst wants to alter the opinion of a large group of people.

John Malone owns 23% of the world’s cable stations. He owns the Discovery Channel which runs shows that deal with more serious issues rather than gossip and entertainment. Rupert Murdoch owns 34% of the daily newspapers and owns 37% of Sunday newspapers. Murdoch is able to lower his prices on newspapers because he owns over a quarter of the newspaper industry, causing his competitors to do the same and even potentially putting them out of business. Cross media ownership allows certain individuals to have a monopoly over the media industry, which in effect limits people’s knowledge.


http://www.cjr.org/resources/?c=hearst

Mitra, Asim. "Cross Media Ownership." Organizer July 2006 27. 15 Nov 2008 .

Buy Nothing Day

Buy Nothing Day was created in Vancouver in September 1992. It was originally organized to show people the power consumerism has upon the population as well how we do not need to rely on money to get us through the day. It was first advertised nationally by Adbusters on CNN, though many other companies refused to participate. What started out as a small protest against overconsumption has spiraled into a world event, over 65 countries in the world participating.

I decided to participate in Buy Nothing Day last year only to find out I bought everything that I needed or wanted the day after. So is Buy Nothing Day really an effective solution for promoting overconsumption? I think the day is already pointing out a well known fact that people are bombarded with advertisements that make them want to buy products. I don’t see the point in having a day of non-consumption when the next day I know I will be consuming again. I cannot find a reasonable way to effectively get the point of overconsumption across. At first I started thinking that there should be some sort of “Buy Nothing Week” but then people would stock up on what they believe they’ll need in order to not spend money for a week, so that cancels out.

I also feel people need to take advantage that they have money, unlike many people in the world that do not. I imagine the poverty-stricken countries would love to be able to spend $25 on a shirt but cannot, so why do we deny ourselves the right to purchase simply for the sake of “awareness”. People are too concerned with being apprehensively enlightened by their constant feeble attempts of helping the world instead of appreciating what we have and not being critical. People should not need one day of the year to remind them that the public spends far too much money on their wants but instead be constantly aware of the situation and try to control their spending. We cannot escape advertising so I don’t see the point in trying to fight it.

bibliography

http://www.adbusters.org/campaigns/bnd
http://www.buynothingday.co.uk/

The Issue of Net Neutrality

Net neutrality is a principle that allows users to do whatever they want while on the Internet. Many phone and cable companies are trying to eliminate net neutrality because they argue it will provide a safer and more controlled online experience while others argue that it takes away from people’s freedom which does more harm than good in a democratic society.

Companies such as AT&T, Verizon and Comcast, all leading telephone and cable providers, are in favor of getting rid of net neutrality and creating stricter rules when accessing websites. An obvious reason as to why companies would be against net neutrality is because of the profit they will make. They wish to implement a system that makes people have to pay in order to have faster search engines and downloads. If companies can control what we can and cannot access on the Internet, this means that the telephone and cable companies could block off websites from their competitors to eliminate the competition. This distracts people from what the Internet was originally supposed to be. When the Internet was created, it was meant to assist everyone not just the wealthy.

The term “gatekeeper” was coined by social psychologist Kurt Lewin in 1947. The theory of gatekeeping described the act of controlling the information that is let out to the public, much like a sheep herder controls the actions of sheep. If companies control what we know and what we do not know then there is little chance of people being able to discover what the truth behind a story really is. The Internet allows people to discover on their own whether what they heard or not is true and if this ability is taken away then people will have to believe whatever they are being told without question.

There is a pro to net neutrality, that being it can censor people from viewing certain websites that are immorally wrong. There are many websites on the Internet that are not safe for younger people and much like school computers, they can block websites that contain inappropriate words or images. That also raises the other problem that people should have the right to click on what they want to see, despite it being objective to others. As well, certain words would automatically block the website, but the word could be taken out of context, such as a website that contains the word “breast” referring to a website promoting the awareness of breast cancer.

While the battle of Internet freedom continues, there is progress being made for people in support of net neutrality. Recently elected President Barack Obama has showed his outspoken support and stated his campaign will continue protecting the freedom of the Internet. In the future, we should look to expect the principle of net neutrality to continue providing people with the internet experience in which they are familiar with as well make people aware of the privilege they have regarding internet access.

Bibliography

www.savetheineternet.com
www.internetforeveryone.ca

Satirical Fake News

In 1729, Jonathan Swift wrote a satirical essay called A Modest Proposal which offered an unrealistic solution to deal with the economic troubles of the Irish. He proposed the idea of poor people selling their children to the upperclassmen who would then eat the kids. Swift’s economic views were not taken seriously unlike today where his essay is known for inspiring the ironic editorials we read in the paper.

The reason why satirical fake news influences my opinion and that of so many others is a result of our inability to pay attention to ‘generic’ news. In other words, the audience relies on jokes and funny anecdotes to maintain their concentration. Though more and more people are relying on humorous satire to deliver their news, it is not necessary a bad thing. People are still being educated on the events taking place in their country and surrounding countries. As well, it removes the typical serious attitudes people see on news stations. South Park is known for its harsh script directed at the functionality of the United States but rather than having 20 minutes of people reading you words from a TelePrompTer, you are watching a show about 4 boys saying rude jokes while pointing out the immorality of the country. People are paying less attention to the satirical implications of fake news and instead focusing on the amusing joke. To understand the joke, the viewer must understand the issues the joke is surrounding.

"Jonathan Swift- A Modest Proposal." The Art Bin 1 Nov 2008 .

6. Social Uses/Implications of Technology and Media

The medium that effects my life the most is photography. I took an interest in photography 3 years ago and there hasn’t been a day that goes by in which I don’t think about it. I wake up every morning and look through people’s images on flickr, update my photography website and decide what I’m going to create using photoshop. Before my interest in pictures, I rarely used the computer, but since my discovery of the medium the technology I use has branched out. I own a camera, camera equipment, computer, graphics tablet etc simply so I can focus most of my life on photography. I’ve also become a lot more technology-savvy since I started photography as a hobby. I also don’t see the way I used to. Specifically, I am always looking to see if a scene would look good confined in a rectangle. If so, I take a picture.

One of my weaknesses is my lack of ability towards giving instructions or giving details. Ever since I discovered my talent in photography I have improved on both those abilities because when I work with people I have to specify what I want them to do.

It’s either a good thing to have a strong passion for something but at the same time a bad thing that I spend the majority of my life being completely reliant on technology.

5. Theory/Praxis

What has always fascinated me is the theory of knowledge known as epistemology. We were discussing the idea in one of our classes, stating that it was the study of the origin and validity of knowledge. To expand more on that idea, epistemology is not about understanding facts but rather why we accept them as facts. It is the study of relationships between people and truth and why we believe what we believe. Epistemologists tend to be ahistorical, meaning they believe the past can be altered to a certain extent and when coming up with ideas, they do not consider historic details.

Applying the theory of epistemology to our daily lives allows us to see how sheltered we are from knowing if the truth is really the truth. The big news corporations are run by a very small amount of people, so if these few people are the only ones telling us what is the truth, we have nothing else to compare the truth to. If every news channel on television told us that scientists have 100% proven that in 2 years Antarctica will have melted, us as the viewers do not have the means to determine if what they’re saying is true or not. This also relates to Michel Foucault’s idea that “knowledge is power”. To expand more on that idea, whoever controls the information people are hearing is in control of everything.

We mindlessly listen to information without confirming that what we’re hearing is valid or not. If everyone’s philosophy of life was centered on the idea of epistemology, a rumor we heard on the streets would be quickly proven as true or false. Instead people quickly jump to the assumption that it is true, partially because we have such a great need for knowledge that we cling to whatever “truths” we receive without bothering to see if our “truths” are valid.

References:
Foucault, Michel. Power/Knowledge: Selected Interviews and
other Writings 1972-1977. Ed. Colin Gordon. New York:
Pantheon Books, 1980.

Heylighen, F.. "Epistemology, Introduction." Principalia Cybernetica. Sept (1993). 29 Sep 1993 <>.

Lechte, John. Fifty Key Contemporary Thinkers. 2nd Edition. New York: Routledge, 2008.

4. Decoding/Deconstructing Advertising

I was watching a commercial for Lucky Charms while trying to find an advertisement for my 4th blog. When I was little and watching the Lucky Charms commercials they always seemed appealing to me because of the bright colours and the funny leprechaun running away from the children. I didn’t realize until now how highly stereotypical Lucky Charms is towards Irish citizens.

The most noticeable stereotype is the Irish-speaking leprechaun running away from people in order to protect his gold, or in Lucky Charm’s case, his cereal. He has the typical four-leaf clover on his hat, red hair and wearing all green. There are also 4 rainbows on the cereal box. One of them is bursting out of the leprechaun’s hand and leading into the cereal which he conveniently keeps in a pot of gold. There is a big explosion of colour on the box so when a kid is in the grocery store he/she will immediately be attracted to the box. The box is far more noticeable than that of Cheerios or Frosted Flakes. The marshmallows that are are mixed with the cereal are also very generic. There’s one marshmallow that vaguely resembles a volcano, but besides that the marshmallows are all related to the stereotypical Irish culture, such as the clover, horseshoe, rainbow and pot of gold.

When you’re little you buy the cereal because maybe you feel some sort of magical Irish connection but really you’re purchasing something a big American corporation created to get kid’s parents’ money.

References:

http://www.luckycharms.millsberry.com/