response to Jay's blog

I recently read Jay's blog on plagiarism and agree 100% with everything she said. She mentioned how easy it is to plagiarize and how many people don't even realize they are stealing someone else's work, which is illegal. She also referenced the consequences of plagiarizing in high school and college with is very useful. I also appreciate how Mr. Miller took the first week and a half of school to focus on plagiarism and how to avoid it.

Check out Jay's blog at http://jaytfarrow.blogspot.com

BBC media critique

While I was searching the internet for a news article that violated one of the seven yardsticks or ten elements of journalism, I came across an article from BBC that was titled, "Seal spotted surfing humpback whale in Australia". This article violates the "Newsworthiness" yardstick of the seven basic yardsticks of journalism. In a nutshell, the article provides a few paragraphs and pictures all relating to animals standing/holding onto backs of other animals which do not have a direct and lasting informational impact on a wide audience. While the article was quite interesting, it was not informational. BBC was trying to make the interesting informational, while they should focus on making the informational interesting. My suggestion for BBC is to ask yourself before you publish an article to the public, "Is this newsworthy?".

Check out this article at http://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-34276032

response to Eli's blog

I agree with every Eli had to say in her blog about magazines. I like how she mentioned how we talked about why telegraphs are no longer used in the present day and how buying the newspapers were traditional. I also think it's pretty cool to relate to something that we talked about in class to our own homes.

Check out Eli's blog at http://smallblueblogger.blogspot.com/2015/09/news-paper-lecture.html?m=1

Magazines

In my house we have so many magazines, probably because my brother pesters my mom about buying a bunch for a school fundraiser until she gives in all because he can get a keychain with a monkey on it, anyways, the point I am trying to get at is that most people don't read magazines anymore. Yes, they read the articles on an electronic device, but they don't buy the paper product and read from it. This topic never really interested me until the lecture in class, but when it was first introduced, I wondered why those magazines my mother bought remained where they were for the past three weeks. Later in the lecture, Mr. Miller mentioned something about in the 1950's, when television became a thing, that magazines became more exclusive, or demassified. I imagine this was because most of the subscribers to magazines, switched to television because everyone else said it was so cool and very slowly drifted away from them.

Printing Press

Before this lecture, I have never really actually thought about the most important invention in the world. If you would have asked me what I thought it was before this lecture, along with most young people, I most likely have said the internet or something in that genre, but I have been proven wrong. Without Gutenburg's printing press, we obviously would not have the modern day printing press and most mass communication. Before the printing press, most people who were literate were either super rich and could afford to hire someone to teach them how to read and write, or they were affiliated with the church so they could read from the bible. A lot of people were lied to and told they had to pay a great sum of money to get a ticket to heaven because the literate people told them the bible said it, but it didn't. After the printing press, more people were literate, anything that could be put into words spread more quickly, accurate maps were produced, history was accurately recorded, and the world became a more cultural place. Without the printing press we would most likely not have as much technology as we do today and you would probably not be reading this blog right now if it wasn't for Gutenburg.

Demassification

Demassification interesting because it singles out a specific group of people, which makes the product seem more personalized which people tend to like these days. This topic in our lecture made me rethink every magazine I have ever read and basically profile it and put it into a category. For example when I thought about the magazine, Highlights, I immediately connected it with my childhood and realized it was made for children aged to about 5-10 years old. But, just because something is made for a certain group of people, does not mean that if you do not fit the mold the producer was intending the buyer to fit in, that you cannot read/watch/buy it. In class, we analyzed that Reader's Digest was intended for old people because of the type of advertisements, but I bet a handful of teenagers my age also read it. I appreciate how Mr. Miller mentioned that in class.

Conglomeration

All of the lectures are so new to me, and things have never heard before, mostly because I have never took a Journalism class, but the lecture on conglomeration really intrigued me. I was so amazed by the fact that huge companies, like Disney, own other huge companies, like ESPN. I knew that Disney was a very big company on it's own, but before the lecture I had no idea that they basically owned everything. I guess that's why there is now so much advertising on disney for other companies that do not relate to it. The main con of conglomeration, in my opinion, is that the quality decreases because if one company is in charge of what other companies produce, there is a product that is bound to be repeated by a different company. But, conglomeration is also great too. If you like pop culture and the mainstream, basic products, the world is your oyster. It also brings in more money for the company that owns other companies, which benefits the employees. Overall, it is one of my favorite lectures so far.