Hmm…invasion of privacy

Imagine if one day you were waiting in line at the grocery store and then you see yourself in a tabloid except you are entirely nude! How would you feel? Degraded, distraught and horrified are just some of the emotions that come to my mind. Well in June of 2008, that is just how actress Sienna Miller felt.

In June of 2008 two British tabloids News of the World and Sun, both run by News International, published pictures of Sienna Miller in which she is nude or wearing scantly clad outfits. The pictures were taken while Miller was vacationing with her new boy, actor Balthazar Getty. The actress claims that the tabloids are completely out of line and she also accuses them of breach of privacy. She has previously sued British tabloids for publishing nude photos taken of her during her nude scene in the movie Hippie Hippie Shake. In October of 2008, Miller agreed to accept $26,722 in damages from the Daily Star for violation of privacy and then she went on to decide to sue for the pictures of her and Getty. Clearly, Miller knew what she was doing in suing for an invasion of privacy.

According to some reports the pictures terrorized her and caused constant harassment. The judge involved in the case, Judge Justice Eady, said that a trial should be heard on the first available date after January 12^th, 2009.  You can read the whole story here.

There is no news stating the discussion of the court as of right now but I do have strong opinions on the subject. I feel that there is no need for celebrity news and so should technically not care anything about Sienna Miller’s situation. But, I do. If I were a celebrity or even just a normal person that happened to be surrounded by paparazzi, I would hate it. It is not acceptable to detail every moment of someone’s life and publish it for the public. Especially if one party involved had not sorted out his or her own situation. By this I mean Balthazar Getty. Just prior to the incident, Getty had separated with his wife and the mother of his four children; he said that the separation was hard and emotionally difficult to handle. Then shortly a few weeks after the separation, the press stalked and stole moments of an intimate trip to Italy with Sienna Miller to post on display for the entire world. How would you feel if pictures from a special time were put out there for the world to see? Especially if you were topless, scantly clad or even totally nude! I think it is horrendous that a tabloid, magazine, newspaper or television program would be allowed to do such things. Yes, there are times when seeing up Britney Spears’ skirt is definitely damaging to her reputation but in the Miller case the publication of the photos damaged the reputation of the media and newspapers/tabloids involved.

I would really like to hear your thoughts on this situation even if it is about a year old. How do you think the tabloids should be punished? Also, do you think that Miller has a right to sue the individual photographer of the images?

Chris Brown…say what!?

In the early hours of February 8^th, 2009, singer Chris Brown allegedly assaulted his girlfriend, Rihanna. Word of the situation spread and soon thousands of fans were protesting Chris Brown’s work and supporting Rihanna completely. On June 23^rd, 2009, Brown plead guilty to one count of assault to avoid jail time and instead must serve up to five years of supervised probation and at least six months of community labor. The whole story can be read here.

Ever since the attack fans of both Rihanna and Chris Brown have rallied against Brown—refusing to purchase his CD’s, songs and videos. Now Chris Brown’s career is in jeopardy and if I were a public relations professional, it would be my job to turn around his negative image and make the public see him in a new light. How could he possibly reverse his image though?

My public relations campaign for Chris Brown:
Chris Brown presents Domestic Violence Awareness Month.

One public relations strategy the campaign could use might be advertising. His face up close publicly stating that he knew he was wrong and then at the end of the commercial he could ask his audience to join him in celebrating and education against domestic violence. Every week there could be a new commercial released Brown stating a common statistic dealing with domestic violence and at the end say something like, “Don’t silence the violence—speak out.” And also, in each commercial Brown would say “join me at my celebration of non profit organizations working to end domestic violence.” These organizations could include The National Network to End Domestic Violence, National Coalition Against Domestic Violence and the Faith Trust Institute. This celebration would take place at the end of the month after all the commercials had been aired and after Brown had reached out to the victims.

There are many ways that Chris Brown could get the attention of the public. One way he could reach out would be to collaborate with other artists like Beyonce, Taylor Swift, and Mariah Carey to create a CD with touching songs dedicated to the victims of domestic abuse. In each CD case would be a purple ribbon to support awareness of the cause. Another way to reach out and show that he is dedicated to the cause would be to have famous fashion designers create at least 30 outfits that feature the color purple; Brown would wear these outfits everyday of the month. Another idea that is being discussed is the release of a hat that Chris Brown could create. The hat would definitely be purple with an embroidered ribbon on the back and possibly the campaign slogan—“Don’t silence the violence—speak out.”

At the end of the month, Chris Brown would host an event celebrating survivors and victims, spreading awareness and empowering the public with knowledge about domestic violence. The entire event would be purple and there would be ribbons handed out and the hats could be sold at the event. Victims could speak about their experiences, performers from the CD could dedicate songs to those attending, the press would be invited and at the end of the event—Chris Brown could perform and then speak about everything he has learned from his horrible error. He would apologize and then donate all the proceeds from the event, hats and CD to non-profit organizations I mentioned earlier. After the event ends, I would have a magazine cover the events of the entire month and do an in-depth interview with Brown and possibly even get Rihanna’s thoughts on the awareness month.

If one wrong word is spoken, this whole thing could backfire on Brown and on my public relations company. If he tried to get out of his community service or attempted to lower his probation time, if he spoke wrongly and apologized in a non-genuine manner, the entirety of the month could backfire and his career could collapse. Also, if Rihanna did not forgive him afterward or if the victims found if offensive to be invited to such an event that Chris Brown was hosting, then the whole thing could go wrong. It would be a risk to do this but if it all worked out then the public would slowly begin to support Chris Brown again.

According to the PRSA ethics code, the campaign would have to be entirely truthful, accurate, fair and show responsibility to the public. If Brown went through with this Domestic Violence Awareness Month then he would have to be entirely truthful about the situation on both the stage and in any interviews. It would definitely be a fair way to gain a positive reputation because all proceeds would be donated to non-profit organizations. Also, by standing up and taking responsibility for his actions it would demonstrate to the public that he truly is a “Changed Man” just as one of his songs tells.

You can also see Chris Brown’s public apology on YouTube:
Part 1
Part 2

One movie with a side of subtle advertising, please.

I have recently been exposed to the method of advertising called product placement. For those of you readers who don’t know what product placement is, let me explain. Product placement is a subtle way to advertise or expose brand name goods in to the context such things like movies and television shows. In the last five years product placement has become one of the most popular ways to advertise goods. But it is difficult to understand how this method is put in to place, how it affects an audience and whether the method is good or bad.

The method of product placement begins with a company wanting to market or advertise their name or one of their products. Some companies that do this are soda companies like Pepsi and Coca-Cola, stores like Target and even other movies can be seen being viewed in a movie. After the company decides it wants to use product placement as a form of promotion, the company then must approach the producer(s) of a popular television show or new movie in the making that is expected to be a big hit. Sometimes this relationship can be flipped wherein, the movie or TV show needs revenue to support and keep their program going and they do this through companies that pay to have advertisements placed into the program. For example: the “ad-free” airing of the TV show “24″ wasn’t really free of advertisements because Ford supported the program. Ford aired two three-minute advertisements that began and ended the show. Also, ford vehicles were incorporated into the popular program. In fact, the main character, Jack Bauer, drives a Ford Expedition. This doesn’t seem like negative product placement but some critics argue it is stealth advertising and need to be more tightly regulated.

In my MCOM 101 class we discussed the effects of product placement and how it can cause concern or evoke no concern at all. Because of the discussions of product placement in my class, I decided to watch a popular movie that was released in the last five years and take notes of any time I saw product placement in the film. The movie I chose was The Ugly Truth. Just in case you haven’t heard of it or seen it yet, I’ll give you a small plot summary.

The Ugly Truth is set in Sacramento, CA where Abby Richter (Katherine Heigl) produces a morning news program that is struggling to stay afloat. In attempts to boost their ratings, Richter’s boss hires Michael Chadway (Gerard Butler). Chadway is a host on a local cable call-in show who promotes the “ugly truth.” According to Chadway, the ugly truth is that sex is the only—ONLY glue in a relationship, men cannot change and they only respond to a woman’s hot body and good looks. The night prior to Mike Chadway’s acceptance onto the news show he offends Abby’s sensibility: she has a checklist about the perfect man. When Abby finds the checklist perfect man it happens to be her new neighbor, a hunky doctor, named Colin. To prove his theories regarding relationships, Chadway offers to help Abby Richter win over her new man but eventually; his clever ploys lead to an unexpected and surprising result.

The Ugly Truth came out in theaters on July 24^th, 2009 and was just recently released to DVD in the past few weeks—so luckily my school’s movie store had it in stock. I saw the movie in theaters but who ever thinks to look for product placement in a movie…so I revisited the film and this time I had a notepad and pen ready to mark down every time there was possible product placement.

The notes I took looked somewhat like this:
Red Bull-first scene-sipping it
Beer-Budweiser
Mac laptop-front cover shown with the apple emblem-easy to recognize
–shown a couple of times repeatedly
Pepsi-zoomed in on- 3 times
Lots of coffee
BIG BUD LIGHT ad at the baseball game- focused in on and held there for 10 seconds
Lots of Pepsi drinks seen at the game and in the studio-Sierra Mist
Sprint!!-printed very clearly on Abby’s cell phone.

 

After the first revisit and note-taking part of the movie, I re-watched it, again, to see which products were most effective in their placement. This time I noticed that the drinks in the movie seemed most effective—like Pepsi and Bud Light. This is mostly because they were seen multiple times throughout the movie. Also, the product names were very clear and there was time to read the name and recognize the product. Pepsi and Bud Light are easy, popular names to remember. These products were most likely chosen for this particular movie by the advertiser and producer because they fit; the products weren’t out of place being put in the movie. The Pepsi soda cups and Sierra Mist bottle look normal while the actors in the movie sipped from them or held them in their hands—they fit in at the baseball game and in the scenes from the back stage of the set. Also, the Bud Light ad was clearly an ad but it was perfectly placed in the baseball stadium. Most baseball stadium walls are covered in ads like that. Seen here in the DC: RFK stadium are signs for Geico and Toyota. Although the Bud Light ad was the background focus for a good 10 seconds, it was not out of the way for the movie producer to slip it in.

Overall, The Ugly Truth had no product placement that was negative for its target audience. The movie is R-rated for language and sexual humor, which means that the target audience is 17 or 18 years of age and above. Although the movie does have a beer advertisement in it, it does not promote under age drinking in any way. This is a perfect example of how product placement should be…not concerning and smooth fitting in the movie.

Now think, what movies have you seen that have subtley exposed you to brand name products? Were any of these advertisements inappropriate to the movie’s particular target audience? How do you feel about product placement now that you’ve learned more about it? Feel free to post your comments, questions and/or concerns!

The Truth…

My all time favorite book.

My all time favorite book: The Truth About Forever — written by Sarah Dessen

The Truth About Forever is a teen fiction book and is totally amazing. I’ve read it multiple times- the first time was Spring 2007, Summer 2008 and then last week. =]

Before reading The Truth About Forever, I read a few other Sarah Dessen books that I really enjoyed. At first I borrowed my friend’s copy of the book and then, eventually, got my own copy just to have.

It began winter 2006 during my freshman year in high school. My best friend Darcie and I called ourselves “book- whores.” We shared books, mostly teen fiction, with each other. We used to go on Borders and Barnes & Noble adventures and buy at least one book each. After our purchases, the adventure really began. We would go sit, sometimes side-by-side and sometimes separate, and devour, relish, and completely absorb every page, every line, and every word of each and every book we got our hands on. We took pens, pencils, highlighters, crayons, and even markers to the pages of these books; we wrote our own story in between the lines. We even wrote the ends of our stories on the extra empty pages of every book. Darcie and I obsessed; we underlined things we thought were significant or meaningful to us or our own personal lives and dilemmas when we were reading the books. We used the books we shared as a journal, a very deep, very personal journal. And because of our book sharing days, we became connected- not just as friends but as best friends, as hearts and physically connected at the hip.  Some of the books I remember sharing were: The Realm of Possibility, Sharing Sam, Lets Get Lost, This Lullaby, A Mango Shaped Space, Empress of the World, Easy, White Oleander, Nick and Norah, Someone Like You, Speak, Cut, Paint Me Like I am, Dreamland, Stranger With My Face, Keeping You A Secret, Crush, The Night I Disappeared, The Notebook, Where The Red Fern Grows, Drowning Anna, Just Listen, Bleed, Home, Lost it, Romeo and Juliet, Another One of Those Hideous Books Where the Mother Dies, Miss American Pie, Hypocrite in a Puffy White Dress and A Dad Shaped Hole in My Heart.

The Truth About Forever was one of these books we shared.  Here’s a short summary of it: Sixteen-year-old Macy Queen is looking forward to a long, boring summer. Her boyfriend is going away. She’s stuck with a dull-as-dishwater job at the library. And she’ll spend all of her free time studying for the SATs or grieving silently with her mother over her father’s recent unexpected death. But everything changes when Macy is corralled into helping out at one of her mother’s open house events, and she meets the chaotic Wish Catering crew. Before long, Macy joins the Wish team. She loves everything about the work and the people. But the best thing about Wish is Wes—artistic, insightful, and understanding Wes—who gets Macy to look at life in a whole new way, and really start living it….

This is a link to a Sarah Dessen blogger. The blogger wrote about each chapter of The Truth About Forever while she read it. Click here to read it.

When Darcie and I first read The Truth About Forever, she had a boyfriend who was absolutely the worst and I had a boy that was just as horrible. She and I repetitively underlined sentences, words and fragments that described our assholes –“…if I were you, I’d be glad to be rid of him. Because anyone that can make you feel that bad about yourself is toxic…”- and the lines that described what we wanted to hear or feel from a good boy- “He wants to be with you, Macy.” The parts in the book about Macy’s relationship with her mother hit me in a peculiar sense as my mom and I didn’t get along freshman to sophomore year of high school. When I revisited The Truth About Forever, it really hit me hard. I had a new boyfriend this time and he was incredible. He broke me free from the chains that my ex burdened me with and really, totally changed not only my view of life but also my life in general. “Everyone had a forever, but given a choice, this would be mine. The one that began in this moment, with Wes, in a kiss that took my breath away, then gave it back—leaving me astounded, amazed, and most of all, alive.” And with that The Truth About Forever meant so much more to me, especially after six months of not reading it in almost two years.

When I most recently re-read this book, I feel I related to the author, Sarah Dessen, when she talks about her feelings on The Truth About Forever in this interview. And also, I felt as if I were on an emotional rollercoaster. It was as if I got a chance to watch the way my life changed throughout high school. The lines that made me angry so many years ago were still darkened and underlined. The lines about mothers and daughters were still there, standing out, underlined in a different ink. And then there were the notes about Josh—the boy who saved me from self destruction, the one who taught me how to be me, how to make my own decisions, how to stand up for myself, how to be fully loved and how to find God among chaos.

I’m still dating Josh. Our two-year anniversary will be on New Years day.
This past summer, and still continuing today, was one of the toughest times I’ve been through with my mother.
As for the ex… I have just finally told someone all the wrongs he did to hurt me and how truly awful it is to remember three years after.

Ever since my 2008 read of The Truth About Forever, I haven’t gotten hold of a truly moving teen fiction book. It may seem strange to you but The Truth About Forever really made me think about my future and made me want to netter myself. So now, I favor a book that my church gave to me. It is a book for college freshman and it gives advice on how to handle certain situations and how to survive freshman year.

“‘Look. We [all] know life is short. Too short to waste a single second with anyone who doesn’t appreciate and value you.’” Life can be short or it can be long, “‘It all depends on how you choose to life it. It’s like forever, always changing.’” “‘For any one of us out forever could end in an hour, or a hundred years form now. You can never know for sure, so you’d better make ever second count.’’

Now…”‘What you have to decide is how you want your life to be. If your forever was ending tomorrow, would this be how you’d want to have spent it?’”

Ya Gotta Keep Dreaming

“Mom! I wanna watch it again! Again! Again!”

As a young child, I was never completely immersed in Disney movies but when I was three years old, I practically watched “Beauty & the Beast” on repeat.

I LOVED this movie

We all remember when we used to dress up and play pretend. Disney movies have helped augment children’s imaginations since humble beginnings in 1923.  As a learning media critic, it is now easily to see that Disney movies can greatly influence the lives of people at a very young age. This is a growing concern for parents in today’s modern age.

Most of Disney’s movies have very similar themes in them. For example, “follow your dreams,” “pretty girls get the prince,” basically happy ending themes. A large majority of Disney’s movies are fairytales. But as I began to look deeper into these movies I found other reoccurring themes and similarities. Some of the things that I noticed were the lack of mother figures in the animated movies, the vision of women as submissive to men and the incorrect portrayal of female bodies.

At first, I didn’t understand it—why would there be a lack of motherly figures in several Disney movies? Ariel, Hannah Montana, Nemo, Snow White, Belle and Cinderella all lack their true mothers. There are a few stepmothers that are portrayed as evil. Upon further review of this matter, it could be due to Walt Disney’s loss of his own mother after his rise to fame. Also, technically, the evil stepmothers could be a literal symbolism that shows, yet aggrandizes, the negative aspects to divorce or widowing.

Disney depicts males, as dominant in many movies—“Beauty & the Beast” is one of these movies. Belle in “Beauty & the Beast” has it hard. She is given the responsibility to take care of her incapable, idiotic father and tame the horrible beast in his castle. Belle stays with the beast even though he is violent and very dominant in his actions. Eventually due to her calm, submissive actions, the beast turns into a human after her kiss. This is a very good example of how Disney could possibly corrupt small children. Another example is the body image of all the princesses in the animated movies.

All the princesses are skinny, fit and busty. They are the only women who attract the attention of the prince. Whereas, the peasants are short, fat, ugly women and men that don’t get any attention from anyone.

Although when you look deeply into the Disney stories there are these or could possibly be these underlying factors, it is not likely that these things all have meanings. In written literature, most everything does have a symbolic meaning and a purpose but Walt Disney’s main objective was to entertain the world and create happy fairytale stories.

The animated movies are aimed at a young target audience and as a child you do not recognize all these themes or characteristics in ever movie. You may understand that most of them have happy endings but it is okay to have an active imagination as a child—as long as you realize, one day, that life is not a fairytale.

I was never completely invested or deeply rooted in Disney culture as a child. Therefore, I don’t agree this thought that Disney is corrupting children and undermining parents. I think it is just made an issue by the people that over analyze things and over protect their kids.

A fairytale is just a fairytale and they’ve been written and told since the beginning of time. They distract from the hardships of reality and bring joy to our lives.

But come on, don’t you believe that “anything is possible if you put your mind to it”? I most certainly do.

"A dream is a wish your heart makes.."

All I Ever Wanted..

All of my life, I wanted a pony. It started when I was two months old and my mom sat me on a horse. Then when I was four years old I had my first riding lesson. My love affair with horses continued until I fell in love with the barn when I was 15 years old. It has been a year since I’ve ridden and I desperately miss my horses, Jackson and Boogie Boo.

Jackson

Boogie "Boo"

Because I miss my barn experiences and horses so much, I often read equestrian articles online. I recently found four excellent equestrian blogs from a beginning rider, an expert and two owners of an equestrian facility.

Here are my initial reviews of each blog after browsing through them:

Beginning Rider: “A Girl and Her Horse”:-Purpose of the blog- to share horse stories and document her achievements.

-Audience- the overall, equestrian community and any others who are interested in horseback riding.

-Style- written as a personal diary.

-Credible because… her knowledge about horses is accurate, correct use of jargon, pictures and videos of her and her horses.

This blog is a day-to-day documentation of her improvements, general stories and frustration as an equine rider. She is clearly aware of her audience as she often asks questions and recently put up a for sale ad for her horse on her blog. The layout is easy to navigate and accessible. I thoroughly enjoy her stories, improvements and pictures that she includes in her posts.

Expert: “Piaffe Dreams”:

-Purpose of the blog- She writes, in her “About-Me” section, “Please allow me to share with you this passion, my process, and my Piaffe Dreams.”

-Audience- riders aspiring to be experts and/or riders looking for dressage advice.

-Style- written as a personal diary with an informative edge to it.

-Credible because… of her background stories, pictures and videos of her as a competitor and of her students in the riding ring.

This second blog is informative; it gives the reader a look into the life of an expert competitor, instructor and dressage trainer. It shows the dedication, the rewards and how much time she doesn’t have to herself. Her blog is full of good advice and a lot of jargon mixed with simple language; she uses exclamatory phrases like, “WHEEEE!!” and “Yippee!!” whenever she gets excited. The layout of the blog is excellent and very easy to use. I liked this blog best because of the style she used. Her language was a balanced mixture between jargon and simple diction; she had detailed stories and a clear overall knowledge of helping experts and beginners.

Facility Owners/Experts: “Tack n’ Talk”:

-Purpose of the blog- I searched for a blog that detailed the barn management side of the equestrian world and I found this one. There are two bloggers posting on this blog; they own their own equine facility in Canada. These two women post blogs about anything, ranging from- tips to go from rider to dinner-party ready while at the barn and how to improve your lateral movements, to how to have quality facility management in a recession.

-Audience- barn owners (new or old), advanced riders, beginning riders, horse admirers and barn parents.

-Style- not a diary and not a news blog but a blog that recognizes that its audience is active and listening. It is more of an advice blog.

-Credible because…of the business the own, the way to contact them, pictures of their facility and their backgrounds.

I don’t like the way the blog is organized because it seems too cluttered but one comment from a follower says, “You are so well written & make it easy to understand.” Another comment says, “Wow! This is awesome Libby! …I love to read your stories, and you have such a way with words! As a rider, I can sure use all the tips that are available too!”

I very much enjoyed all three blogs and found even more interesting equestrian blogs because of them. I tried to find three different viewpoints of the equestrian world and I think these blogs represented all ends of the spectrum- rider, instructor and business owner.  Each blog had similar characteristics but they were all very unique.

Here I did a more in depth analysis of each blog and included excerpts from them as well:

Blog #1: was more youth oriented and definitely a personal diary. I thought she told very engaging stories and there hasn’t been a dull moment in the two years that she has been posting blogs. It had a level of personal connection- every rider has been through the goal lists she had, and most have had to sell their horse at one point or another. I felt like I was reliving my time with my horses while reading her blog. Because of the diary style she used I felt I got to know her on a very personal level; I read about, not only her horses, but her other stories about daily life as well.

Blog #2: …Just the title got me dreaming. Every rider hopes to have the success this trainer, instructor and competitor has. Thankfully, as an expert, she shares her knowledge with her audience like she wrote about here- “brain training.” This blog differed from the first because although she did tell a lot of personal stories, she also gave helpful tips on how to improve your riding. It gave an idea of how dedicated you have to be in order to succeed in the equestrian community. I am glad that she is not a self-absorbed, uptight, expert and instead is willing to help and teach others.

Blog#3: was very informative and packed with words of wisdom and advice. It contains interviews with new barn owners and artists that focus on horses. One of the women wrote about her pet peeves that she called “dangerous practices.” This third blog gave its audience a glimpse into the difficulty of running a horse facility especially during these hard economic times. I liked this blog and hope that one day, maybe, I’ll be blogging about my day at my own barn.

Reading these blogs made me wish I blogged more often or had as exciting of a life to blog about. I used to write in a journal everyday but it got hard to keep up with when I had minimal amounts of spare time. If I were to keep blogging I would definitely make it a personal, day–to-day thing. I would detail my weekends, what I ate that was good or bad, what movies I like or want to see, revelations I had and I’d probably even use my blog to help stick with personal goals like, being a better Christian, having a more healthy diet and getting back into old hobbies (horseback, dance, running). My blog would include outside media like links to websites I liked, YouTube videos I enjoyed and I would definitely include pictures, lots of them. I wouldn’t necessarily target a certain audience but would just let people who were interested in my chaotic life read my blogs. I would also ask a lot of rhetorical questions and ask for advice or for my audience to share similar stories with me. I love to write and I love updating my WordPress blog so I can see myself continuing with it throughout the summer, when I, hopefully, get to ride again. I miss horseback riding. What are some hobbies that you miss? No matter what the reason, I think today is a good day to pick up old hobbies where you left off.

Oh, another blog that I found that was interesting was a wonderful rehabilitation story. Read it here.

A Note from the Future…

Do you ever find your mind off track imagining what things will be like in the future? Do you imagine life being much easier and aided by technology? Well, today we often find ourselves reminiscing about the past. Today is June 20th, 2035- my 44th birthday. This is my note…my note to those of you in the year 2009 and in this note I am going to tell you about the two different worlds that exist here- in the future.

What do you want the future to be? Do you imagine the future having all the answers? Can you even picture the future? Thinking back, I don’t believe anyone could correctly predict my present; a lot has changed over the last 26 years.

-Vocabulary of 2035-

“HoverSeats”- mandatory, hovering chairs that are capable of doing any function it is told.

“HoverScreen”-part of the “HoverSeat.” It began as a portable Internet screen and quickly became a necessity.

A “Line”- is the pathway “HoverSeats” follow to get to your destination.

“SleepDome”- similar to a bed but much more advanced. It allows you to fall asleep to calming sounds or silence and wakes you up however you would like it to. It conforms to your body, relaxes all muscles and joints and has forever ended snoring.

The “Space”- is basically Web 3.0

The next few things I tell you might be shocking, so you should probably sit down in those things you call “chairs.” Life here is complete perfection.  Don’t be jealous…yet. Where should I start? Oh! “Chairs” are now called “HoverSeats” and you they aren’t four-legged objects that you sit on. Instead they are where you eat, nap, relax, socialize, and learn. “HoverSeats” can do anything and everything you want them to do with either a spoken command or the touch of your “HoverScreen.”

An idea of what a "HoverScreen" would look like.

Your “HoverScreen” makes up your daily life even though it started as just a portable Internet screen. As a result of these advancements, today’s children never enter school buildings or go to class; their homework takes ten minutes and is automatically corrected by their “HoverScreen.” Mothers don’t ever do dishes or laundry because the “HoverScreen” takes care of it all. It does practically everything, including the following:

-        changes the color of your clothes, makes you smoothie meals, organizes your day, functions as a social networking site and connects you to other “HoverScreens,” controls your “HoverSeat” and keeps the “HoverSeat” on the proper “Line,” cuts your hair, does your make-up, gives you a massage when you feel stressed, flashes important news stories and keeps you entertained all day long.

There is never a dull day here in the year 2035 because there is always something to do that is accessible and fun. You all, in 2009, might have indoor pools but we have indoor beaches (and even miniature indoor worlds) where the temperature is always set at a balmy 74.6 degrees Fahrenheit.

Indoor Beach.

If you are woken up one day by your “SleepDome” and decide, after being transported to your “HoverSeat,” that you would like to go to Paris- you get virtually inserted into Paris and can stroll the streets in your “HoverSeat.” Even if you want to escape the world, you can zip out to outer space or create your own personal world. My world is green. The sky is bright blue, the birds sing, the trees sway with the breeze and I’m right back at home.

My World, my home.

It is times like this that I miss the year 2009.

It seems I have misled you; my society is not a utopia but merely a world where perfection and chaos have collided. There is no perfection, everything, everyone and every society is flawed because perfection is impossibly hard to attain.

So far, I have mentioned some differences in daily life and advancements in technology but have not explained the drastic changes our lives have gone through since the move from our Earth.

Because going “Back to the Future” isn’t possible anymore.

Think of a world with a weakened democratic system. In your time you are currently experiencing an economic crisis and the United States is attempting to solve the health care problems. Eventually, due to the focus of most international governments on the recession and other problems like health care, your governments practically hibernated. The governments of the world were more concerned with other problems that they neglected to enforce polices prohibiting conglomerations from becoming monopolies. Deregulation continued to be a trend in public policy and eventually the world was owned by a select few monopolies. Wal-Mart, The Britney Spears Foundation and Apple Inc are the three conglomerations that became monopolies and bought out all competition by the year 2022. With small businesses consumed by large corporations, consumer choice became non-existent. When Britney Spears declared her favorite color had changed, it was significant news and the entirety of the public goes along with the “status quo.” The public by this time will be completely brainwashed due to their total acceptance of the elites dominant values. When Apple announced late in the year 2022 that they had created a new and better world in outer space, Wal-Mart claimed that robots, similar to a Roomba, would take care of us and pick up after us. Nine years later, the world will be covered in waste products, infrastructures will be collapsing and we will be blind to all of it. In December of the year 2031, our lives were moved into outer space.

Skip ahead, today is the fourth year living on our new world with no hope of our beautiful Earth being home again. To make matters worse, everyone is overweight, everyone is blind to their surroundings and there is no direct, personal, contact. Today is the first day I broke free from my “HoverScreen” and saw the vast outside that we live in and the small dot that we used to call home.

As much as the technology advances in my present are nice and make life easy, it’s hard to believe that it is making our lives better. Some people probably disagree but I actually feel that in small doses, with more strict regulations, similar to the Clayton Anti-Trust Act, that these advances would better our society. But because of our lack of democracy in 2035, I feel our world has molded into a “Dumb and Dumber” movie- like the movie “Idiocracy.” We need someone to prevent this future. Change!

I hope, for the sake of our society that I can help us and help everyone else see something other than a talking, hovering screen. Or maybe, just maybe, someone will read this in the year 2009 and prevent the horrid destruction of our planet by the year 2022. Even if the view from up here looks pretty spectacular, 2009 needs to stop the deregulation of big business and promote public policies that will bring a brighter future controlled by the people, for the people. What do you think?

…To go without.

As I discovered in my first blog, it is difficult to really pinpoint the exact amount of media consumed due to involuntary recognition of advertisements or signs. Unlike my struggles to notice all the media surrounding me, here I had difficulty trying to ignore all media and attempt to completely control my intentional consumption.

Unfortunately, my need to complete assignments and contact my Grandma through email, led my computer mouse to open up Firefox, check my email and do research on Iran. BUT! I restrained myself from Twitter and Facebook. =]] So I would consider myself 98% successful in avoiding intentional media. How successful was I in avoiding all mass media? Considering I consciously walk to class instead of sleep walk, I could not avoid the sidewalk chalk or the flyers; they are everywhere you go on campus. Overall, I’d say I was about 82% successful.

The advantages and disadvantages I experienced were directly connected to the passage of time and my increase of frustration.  During both days I had ups and downs, but in general here are my advantages and disadvantages of going without mass media:

Advantages & Feelings: I was more productive and more focused without the distractions of websites like Facebook and Twitter. I participated more in class because I wasn’t physically attached to my cellular device. =]] At first I felt relieved about not having to respond to emails but as I got further into this assignment my relief turned into frustration.

Disadvantages & Feelings: While I felt productive typing my notes, doing math and reading from textbooks, I became frustrated with not being able to get all my work done. I couldn’t do any research for two speeches due this week and I couldn’t use my itouch. -iphone and itouch users media consumption- I love my itouch; I use it on my walks to and from classes, I use it before class starts, I use it to check my email and Facebook and most importantly-and newly noticed- I need it to check the weather. I think I may be addicted to knowing what the weather is; I check it right when I wake up to know what to wear, I double check after my first class everyday to see if it changed, I usually triple check it after lunch because…I don’t know why and then I have to quadrupled check it at night so I can start thinking of what to wear the next day…even though I check it when I wake up. It’s an addiction and a weird one at that. After my feelings of relief had subsided I became frustrated seeing other people consume all the mass media they wanted. Quickly those feelings of frustration turned into anxiety. I was focusing so hard on my work that my brain was running a million miles a minute (second!) and I had no way to calm down and not stress so much. Normally I log onto Facebook, Oovoo and sometimes Twitter when I turn on my computer so that if I get stressed out over a writers block I can just easily switch over to Facebook, stop thinking about the problem and it usually works itself out and I have a light bulb go off. While I was going without mass media every spare second I had I was trying to work through a block or making lists of things that, even if they weren’t due until NEXT Friday, I’d start to freak and add it to my list of things to get down as soon as possible. It’s an issue. At this very moment, I don’t even want the Internet; I want to keep working.

Oh-disadvantage and advantage at the same time- being overly connected to mass media. I get Twitter and Facebook updates sent, by text, to my phone. Seeing that Facebook texted me makes me want to logon and check it. Wait, really!? Facebook sends alert texts my phone? I really need a life; I’m way too connected to mass media.

Reflecting on the “cool media” video we watched in class previously informs me that there are people that are worse than me; people who are literally addicted to their technology. I mean, sometimes I hear phantom phone beeps but there is now a “cure” for addiction to Blackberries. Watch this: “Crackberries”

OK, seriously though, there is such a thing as an addiction to mass media. Check it: Addiction to technology.

In fact, I think that if every piece of modern technology shut down for an hour worldwide…there would almost definitely be a mass hysteria experienced in every town, every city, every county, every state, every country throughout every continent across the entire planet. But that’s just my opinion. =]

From this assignment, I have made multiple conclusions: you can be addicted to or obsessed with mass media, the modern world can not function without technology, and there are two ways by which media can be consumed- intentional exposure and unintentional/involuntary exposure. Intentional consumption is choosing what you want to consume- TV shows you watch, books you read, music you listen to, websites you participate in. It is rather easy to control these intentional variables-if you’re not addicted. The unintentional forms of media are seen rather than read, heard rather than listened to and subconsciously stored instead of purposefully memorized. Instead of noticing all the unintentional media, as I did in my first blog, I had issues blocking it out. For example, it was easy to choose and execute my decision to not watch television but it was almost impossible to tune out my roommates’ music playing in the background of my dorm room. Another situation I couldn’t avoid I discovered while waiting for the elevator early in the morning, I saw signs about clubs and events and did not read them but definitely zoned out while staring at them. It’s very hard to control all the media you are consuming at any given time and whether you are aware of it or not, you consume more media in any given day than you would expect to. All of this talk about unintentional or involuntary consumption got me thinking- it is impossible to avoid all media unless you thoroughly remove yourself from our media obsessed world.

Sarah meets Mass Media

Task: track all media consumed hourly in two consecutive days.

Easy? Not at all.

It is often difficult to wrap your head around the concept of the actual amount of media you consume or are exposed to in one day, one hour or even in one minute.

Over the past two consecutive days I have logged all the media I consumed. (I think)

Halfway through my first day I realized how difficult it is to know how much media I was exposed to and then I remembered my professor saying something about intentional consumption of media versus unintentional consumption. Then I began noticing how often I unintentionally consume media and was alarmed. For example, when you log into Facebook, advertisements are now woven into the sides of the site** and these ads can be tailored by the business to target a specific group of consumers. Even after attempting to notice these tiny details it is still near to impossible to know if I was able to log all the media I was exposed to. Anyway, after this realization I had, I looked back at my blog and started calculating.

Upon reflection of my log, I found my consumption results were rather ridiculous.

In the last 48 hours:

I slept for 18 hours…(I went home for the weekend!!) was online for 10 hours, watched TV for 6 ½ hours and listened to music for 3 hours.  Overall, I spent 40.6% of two days intentionally consuming media.

*Also, I began to notice numerous brand name products like- Jif peanut butter, Nutella, Old Spice Deodorant and Dr. Pepper. For some reason these products are stuck in my head.

I was really surprised at my Internet usage and my moderate addiction to Facebook. My TV consumption was definitely higher than normal because I don’t usually watch TV. I think that my consumption rate is higher now that I am in college due to feeling separated from my home life and best friends. I would say that now I do most of my learning about the world through social networking sites; I always want to know how my friends and family are doing and what they have been up to. At home I spend more time reading the newspaper and certain magazines. Meanwhile, here at Towson I think that I am less motivated to inform myself about what is on the news and instead I focus my attention on happenings just on campus. I feel that this was an important exercise because it puts into perspective where our generation is going and how much media is impacting our future or even what tomorrow will be like. Oh, tomorrow-day one of going without my mass media. –sigh-

**I found this Facebook advertising page and look!!! Facebook allows any business to create an advertisement and then help the business maximize their targeted audience. Woah. http://www.facebook.com/advertising/

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