The Content Makers

I am happy to admit that I am a Sunrise fan. Almost every morning when I get up I switch on the kettle and switch on the TV to Sunrise while I eat my breakfast. After reading The Content Makers I tried to think what made me watch Sunrise over the Today Show. All I can put it down to really are the presenters. I like Kochi and Mel. I like the way they talk, and what they talk about. They are friendly,at ease on the set and their personalities shine through. It was very interesting to read about the show in The Content Makers, to find out why the show is run as it is. That it wants to make audiences feel included and at home. Well they got me, I fell for it hook, line and sinker.

 

I guess the average Australian isn't thinking about the huge inter-channel wars when they flick through channels each day looking for something to watch. What we choose to watch and why is all about personal taste, deciding what we do and don't like. But companies like Channel 7 and Channel 9 have to take all this on board, and they do on a level I was never really aware of. I was amazed reading The Content Makers at how much thought goes into what is shown. Remote controls rule what we can watch on tv. If too many people flick the button on a show, that show is history. Its seems pretty harsh action but I guess these companies want the 'biggest bang for their buck'.

I found myself feeling sad that Australian documentaries and drama were on the downfall and will possibly be scrapped altogether is current legislation is changed. But thinking about it, do I actually watch any Australian docs or dramas? I admit guiltily, no. Maybe one documentary every few weeks. So I am supporting the decline myself. At the same time I don't like the idea of more cheaply run panel shows, reality shows like Australian Idol. Its got me wondering will there be anything I want to watch on TV in a few years time? Just Sunrise in the morning perhaps? The Content Makers said that most people my age were now on the computer much more than the watching TV and I think one of the reasons is that there really isn't much left on TV that interests my age group anymore.

Below I have written down the first eight news segments of Channel 7 news as told in The Content Makers:

Cross City Tunnel
The drug, ice
Death penalty on drug smuggler in Singapore
Sydney cult leader
Sex shop opening near a school
Bird flu story
Kyoto conference

Which of these am I personally interested in?They all sound relatively interesting to me, so Channel 7 has pretty much hit the nail on the head. They also know what we don't like:

- People turn off the tv if they see blood (no dead bodies)
-People don't want to know just about  the event but what lies underneath it too
-You can't put politicians on tv anymore
-Shows that aren't interactive,  Sunrise is such a success because of interactivity
- Drama is less popular now and it is expensive to produce


I still think its a little freaky that companies can predict what will be news 'hit' and what won't. And is this a good thing? I'm not convinced it is. At the end of the article there was a mention of Q-scores that measure the level of attachment people have for the programs they watch. It starts to feel like these companies are mind-reading us. Where could this lead? Mind-washing? Privacy invasion? Who knows, but I'm not sure I like the way all this is heading.

Hungry for the Hunger Games?

I went and saw the much talked-about movie The Hunger Games on the weekend and thought I' d give my own little review/thoughts on it. As someone who has not read the books I went into the cinemas not really knowing what to expect. Many of my friends have raved about the books so I admit I had fairly high expectations. I was imagining something along the Harry Potter lines, yes that is how much my friends talked it up, but it lacked the spark I find in JK Rowling's creations.

The Hunger Games is set in an imaginary land that is divided into twelve districts. Each year one boy and one girl are chosen from each district to play in the 'hunger games'. This is basically a fight-to-the-death battle watched by all of the nation.

The movie focuses on a teenage girl called Katniss who is the unlucky female contender from the twelfth district. Though the movie is filled with plenty of tension and some interesting themes I found myself unattached to most of the characters (though I did like Katniss) and the plot was predictable. We already know that there can only be one person alive at the end of it, and of course its going to turn out to be Katniss. By the way sorry if I just ruined the ending for anyone who hasn't seen it. I came out feeling like there needed to be something more, some extra twist, or depth, or something. I was told afterwards that it is a series so perhaps the next movie (if there is one) will reveal more.

Overall I enjoyed it but it didn't live up to all the hype I have seen around it.

3 and half stars from me.

Belated Happy Easter to Everyone aswell!! Hope you had a good one :)

Lecture 6 - Commercial Media

 The lecture for Week 6 was all about Commercial Media with emphasis on Australia. We learnt that commercial media  exists so that advertisers can promote their products and the media companies can make a profit on this. I found it interesting to discover which major companies run the commercial media show in Australia. When the names Fairfax, APN, WIN, Nine Entertainment Co., Ten etc came up it was no surprise. I think everyone has heard of these guys. But what did surprised me was how many different kinds of media they produced. For example I always thought of Nine entertainment as the TV channel but the company also dabbles in magazines, digital media and events too!

Commercial media can come in different forms: Subscription (such as Foxtel), Sponsored (Such as Nine) and even subsidized (usually by the government). Its functions are also a combination of commercial, propaganda and social benefits but which functions are emphasized most and least is debatable. Many people believe commercial media, because it is driven by profit, cares little for social benefits. But it also relies heavily on its audience numbers to receive advertising so cannot risk falling out of favour with them. Commercial media must also abide laws set down by Government Agencies to ensure that its content is suitable.

A quote given in the lecture: Comment is free, but fact is sacred

I liked this quote a lot. Anyone can give an opinion or spin a story, but knowing the facts is far more valuable.  In today's world the programs and news shown on commercial media seem to be spiraling ever downwards into the trash can. How much of what we perceive to be fact actually is? How do we know that what we are being told is truth since the companies main goal is to make money?  Bruce discussed this in our lecture, talking about how 'dumbed down' programs are becoming. We get 'Mickey Mouse News' and news 'intended to please' rather than the real stuff but the only plausible reason commercial media would do this is because the audience watches it! There must be a lot of people out there with a hidden love for "A Current Affair" and other trashy news shows. Or maybe it is just very cheap to run.

Here is John McManus opinion: Commercial = Corrupt, lack of quality, profit over-rides social responsibility


I think there is some truth in what John McManus says, though of course he is making a huge generalization. Commercial media is facing some serious challenges in modern society, with less investment from advertisers and greater competition in the market. With less money how can we expect commercial media to produce quality material? And we know that this form of media is driven by profit rather than social gain so the cheaper shows will always win out. That is unless there is a large enough audience and budget worth spending extra money on.

 Less revenue = less investment = less money for quality production = more bought-in content = More repeats of US sitcoms, more reality TV

Not what we want right?!

We ended the lecture with some ideas about how this problem could be solved: Better quality, greater competition, move existing customers over to digital, the government can buy out some of the newspaper

White rhinos wiped out?

So apart from majoring in journalism in my Arts degree I am also majoring in Zoology in Science so the recent story about the death of the white rhinos at Dubbo zoo really sparked my interest. If you haven't read the story here is a link:

http://www.news.com.au/national/dubbo-zoo-mourns-loss-of-four-white-rhinos/story-e6frfkwi-1226306101785

Basically four rhinos died for unknown reasons at the Western Plains Zoo, Dubbo. Scientists and vets are still trying to figure out exactly why. With only 14,500 of these animals left this is a real scare for everyone. Could there be a new disease spreading that will wipe out the population? Rhinos in other zoos, like the ones up here at Australia Zoo, are now being closely monitored.

Week 5 Lecture - Sound

Sound is something I think I have underestimated for a long time when it comes to ways of telling a story. I am naturally a writer and therefore the majority of stories I tell are written with perhaps a few photos. This weeks lecture really changed my perspective of the significance of sound and the way it can be used to create a powerful story for listeners.

Richard made a really good point that radio (which is the main way we use sound to tell stories) is much more intimate than TV, and includes you rather than coming at you. I found myself nodding as I listened to this, noting that while I was sitting listening to this interview I was also having a cup of tea and munching on a biscuit. It feels very noninvasive and captures more of my attention than TV. Maybe this is because there is no picture to distract me.

Richard also mentioned that often the best people to interview in fact just ordinary people like you and me. People who are not necessarily famous but who have interesting stories and who can evoke emotion from the listener. I took note of this too because we will soon be beginning our Factual Story Telling assignment. Bruce also mentioned something along the same lines in one of our first lectures: You can tell an amazing story from anyone if you know enough about them.
I guess the trick is to make them feel comfortable and that they can trust you.

I was pleasantly surprised to discover that radio is in fact not in decline but increasing in popularity. As mentioned in the first interview it is one of the oldest media forms but it is keeping up in our 'new media' world of today. With technologies like podcasts and the fact that people can multitask really easily while listening it sounds like radio is a form of story telling not to be underestimated!

Finally here are some notes of interest that I took down while listening to this week's lecture:

- The interviewer should be genuinely interested in the story
- The way you ask questions is very important
- Give guests space and time to speak
- Don't be afraid of silence
- Listeners can tell if you're lying or being fake on radio
- Enunciation matters
- Don't do anything on radio that you wouldn't do in real life
- A good radio story creates emotions and responses
 - DON'T GIVE UP IF YOU REALLY WANT IT!!!

Assignment: Media Diary and Analysis

The youth of today live in a very different world to their grandparents and even parents. If the words Ipod, Mac, Tablet or Facebook had been used back when our parents were young it would have been met with a raised eyebrow and quizzical look. What the hell are you talking about?

But in the 21^st century these have become everyday words and they have integrated themselves so heavily into our society that many people would struggle to get through even one day without them.

I do not pretend to be an exception to this rule. Recently I took a diary of my entire media use and production for ten days, taking note of exactly which media I used and produced and for how long. My results showed me that I spent at minimum an eighth of my day using or producing media and at most over half of my entire day. The details of my results can be seen in the table below.

As we can see from my diary many things can be classified as “media” but I have broken them down into five major groups: audio, computer, hardcopy texts, TV and phone. Of these I use and produce most of my media through TV, followed by the computer. The graph below shows I spend 1845 mins watching TV and 1320 mins on the computer in ten days. I also spend a significant amount of time listening to audio media (980 mins) but only a very minute amount of time reading hard-copy texts (395 mins) or using the phone (34 mins).

From this graph we can conclude that I am a modern day media consumption/production freak but how do I compare with most other people my age? Do most people rely on their TVs and computers as much as I do? And if so, what does this media reliance mean for us all?

A survey was conducted of 432 people all currently undertaking the JOUR1111 subject at the Univeristy of Queensland to answer several media use and consumption questions. I have used some of the results from this survey to answer my questions above.

 

From this graph we can see that the majority (29.9%) of people surveyed watch 1-2 hours of TV a day and a staggering 94.9% watch at least some TV every day.

 My TV consumption per day is just over 3 hours, putting me in a relatively small category of high TV consumers (4.9%).

 Next I was interested to see how I compare when it comes to computer use and production.

In this case I am with the majority of my peers, spending between 2-3 hours on the computer each day (see graph below). It is remarkable to note here that 96.8% of people surveyed spend over 1 hour on the computer every day. That is a lot of data being both consumed and produced via this new technology.

 

Clearly new media such the internet, ipods, mobile phones etc. are beginning to take the place of older media like the TV, newspapers, radio and books. This is very apparent for me, as can be seen by the graph below. Over 75% of the media I use and produce is 'new media'.

But what does this change mean for everyone? As a future journalist how does this influence the way I communicate and receive news and other information?

The results of the survey above, showing where the majority of JOUR1111 students get their news from, comes as no surprise. The majority of people get their news either from the computer (via online newspapers, Twitter or Facebook,) or from the TV and this correlates perfectly with the amount of time spent on the computer and watching TV. We can therefore assume that whatever media people use most of, is where they get the majority of their news from.

While some may think that new media is taking over our lives and one day we will rely on it so heavily that we will become the ultimate couch potatoes, I can think of a much more positive perspective. New media has given us the ability to consume and produce media on a much larger scale. This means, as a journalist, if I have something to say or a story to tell I have the potential to reach people all around the world at the click of a finger. I no longer have to grovel to a newspaper publisher or wait to be interviewed on the radio or the television (though these are still both great things to aim for). Ultimately it gives journalists more flexibility to tell a story how we want to (the internet allows for videos/slideshows/photo slides), as quickly we want, and perhaps most importantly, to reach the people who will be interested.

Watermelons as Art, Who would have thought?

So this was forwarded to me by a friend and seeing as we have been looking at picture stories and photography this week in JOUR1111 I couldn't resist putting it up. Below are a series of photos from a watermelon festival in Italy at the end of 2011. Who knew you could do so much with a watermelon?!

Week 4 Lecture - Picture Stories

Lecture 4 Reflection: Picture Stories

This week's lecture was all about telling a story through pictures. As I posted at the very end of last week's blog, I have a keen interest in photographic journalism and so I was excited to learn more about it this week. I took this image from the lecture slide as I liked it and thought it was worth sharing.

We learnt that pictures have been used to tell stories for over 40000 years with Australian Aborigines being among the first users. Holy books such as The Book of Kells (which I have seen) in the year 800 used mostly pictures, as the majority of people couldn't read. Also stained glass was used to tell stories. Photography only emerged as part of a newspaper in 1879 and the first published news photo didn't occur until 1880. Now photos dominate our world, they are everywhere!

I actually found the short clip Dr Redman showed us of the woman being photo-shopped into a supermodel really powerful. If you haven't seen it watch it now! Click on the link below!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hibyAJOSW8U&feature=related

“No wonder our perception of beauty is distorted.”

Self-image and self-confidence of both women and men are so often lowered by these images and they (like me before I saw how much editing was involved in that one picture) think this is real. I for one struggled a lot with self-image through high school and so being able to see how much manipulation goes on in a picture helps remind me that what I perceive as real, actually is not. That woman was just like anybody else before they put make-up on her, did her hair, made her eyes twice as big, her neck a little longer, her lips fuller and so on. Basically they changed everything that made her her! You can't get much more sickening really! The other thing is video shows us is that photographic manipulation is now commonly used and virtually unnoticeable. A scary thought to me! Here are some more examples incase anyone didn't get enough in the lecture.

Once again new media technology has allowed for more flexibility with images and videos. We now have better quality photos, galleries rather than single images and easy ways to give and receive them (on the internet or by downloading).

Here's an interesting question I thought of while in the lecture: What would you prefer to look at if you had the same photo and it was the same quality, a hard copy of it, or an image of it on a computer?

Perhaps I'm old school but I still feel like there is something more satisfying about holding a photo in your hand, or seeing it on the wall.

My thoughts on the three different photos of Jonathan Thurston (as I am not at the lectures to discuss it):

I found the first one to be the worst of the three, not particularly interesting to look at as Jonathan is in the background, only just visible. The second was much more intriguing because of the interesting angle from behind the cross. The last one was the most engaging me though, with so many people focusing on Jonathan and looking so sad and unhappy it captures my attention straight away and gets me asking lots of questions to myself.

Another topic discussed in the lecture was what makes a good photo to which we discovered: Frame, focus, angle and point of view, exposure, timing (sport photo), capture the moment (find some great photos)

I have therefore endeavored to find some pictures on the internet that fulfill some of these criteria.

They are located below. Finally I just wanted to mention this quote from the lecture as I thought it was true and worth thinking about.

“A picture has no meaning if it can't tell a story” 

 Angle and Point of View:

Frame:

Timing:

Exposure (lighting):

Capture the moment:

 Focus:

Week 3 Lecture - Text

Lecture 3 Reflection:

So this week we had a guest lecturer, accomplished journalist Skye Doherty come in to talk to us about the power of text. Because I do not attend any of the actual lectures I was only able to hear her voice on the lecture recordings that Friday and here is what I feel I have learnt from her.

First of all, I began to see text in a whole new light. To see it more like a weapon, or a tool that can be used to produce something in whatever way you desire. For a journalist, this ability to structure text in a way that people will want to read it, is vital. If we can't do that, then ultimately, we suck. I have previously posted my reflections after reading about the inverted pyramid in our weekly reading task and Skye went over this in the lecture. These were my notes on how she structured it:

At the Top: Who, what, where, when, how, why – it should also appeal to news values such as conflict, international relations, death, power

In the middle: Develop ideas and add background

The bottom: Detail about what's happened

News is also structured differently depending on where it is being read eg. newspapers are structured differently to online news. Online we have the use of hypertexts that allow readers freedom to visit related news, or certain aspects that interest them and this format is very much the direction news is taking. As modern journalists we must therefore market our stories in a flexible way so that no matter what mode they are published in they will be appealing.

Some overall tips I took from Skye:

• Use words efficiently to tell the storyteller
• There is a lot of teamwork involved in journalism
• What makes a person read your story: Images, subtext, headlines of varying lengths, short lead, strap, navigation headlines
• Getting it out there: tags, excerpts, metadata for search engines, keywords

Thanks Skye for coming along and talking to us!

I would also just like to quickly apologise if my blog appears a little scattered right now. I was a little confused as to how the whole blog thing worked (I think there were a few of us), so dates and so on are a little muddled up as I have added past lecture reflections.

I missed out on Jellybeans :(

Lecture 2:

This last week has been a bit of a shake-up for me as I found out I will no longer be able to attend lectures due its rescheduling and consequent clash with another of my subjects. After an initial freak-out I was reassured by the man himself (Dr Redman) that I will be just fine if I listen to lectures via Lectopia each week. I have therefore dedicated each Tuesday morning to lying bed listening to my JOUR1111 lecture.

So this week's lecture focused on news, with emphasis on “old media” and “new media.” Many forms of old media such as radio, newspapers, television and magazines are beginning to lose popularity in favour of new technological ways of communicating, namely on the internet. When I think of my own media uses I agreed with what was being said. The comparison between Web 1.0, Web 2.0 and the newly emerging Web 3.0 was a large focus of the lecture. While Web 1.0 is a maybe a species destined for extinction Web 2.0 is thriving in the 21^st century with the invention of social networking site like Facebook, Myspace, Twitter. However there is now a new beast arriving on the scene (I was unaware of this up until today) that will change how we use the internet once again. It will allow for much more individual and personalised information and when I first heard this it all seemed a little scary to me. Too personal perhaps.

So this was all interesting stuff but I was wondering how it related to me, in this course, doing journalism. But of course I soon found out it relates a heck of a lot to journalism as it changes how news and media reaches people, is exchanged and shared. If we are now getting most of our news online and without having to pay much, if anything, for it then how do journalists get paid for their stories? Do we have a job?

It is indeed an exciting time to be a journalist, as Dr Redman told us last week. I do believe there is a bright future for journalism, it is just a new one that must be adjusted to and we will have to continue adjusting. I can now understand why we will be keeping a blog and getting a Twitter account. Its all part of the process of being a journalist in the 21^st century.

On a different note, I'd like to post a link to an article I read about a photographic journalist working for National Geographic. I've often dreamed of being a journalist along these lines and I found what she had to say honest and interesting. While many people may think its a job where you simply wonder around taking thousands of photos until you get a few good ones, there is a lot more hard work involved than that, not to mention a lot of stress with deadlines to meet and money budgets. By the end of the article though I was thinking, “wow, she has a pretty amazing job. Hard work, but hopefully rewarding.” Have a read if you've ever considered photographic journalism or even travel journalism.

http://digitaljournalist.org/issue0105/pinneo.htm

Also this website allows you display your own photo journalism portfolios and features some amazing photographs. I would love to be able to go to some of these places and bring back stories to share. Here's the link to the website if you want to have a look at some of the photography other than the ones below.

http://greatphotojournalism.com/

“A picture tells a thousand words” - I couldn't agree more!