This semesters Emerging Media class offered a diverse subject matter which I found to be very helpful. I learned about up and coming media that I can use in my personal life and when entering the work force. The construction of the weebly as well as maintaining a personal blog was something that I had not done before which I really enjoyed and plan on keeping up with.

I also really enjoyed creating a personal interest site surrounding my passion for horses. I have a lot of content on this page that would be useful to show future employers in the form of writing and design samples.

Although this class was not taught in the traditional academic matter I still found the content to be valuable. Many interesting speakers were brought into class with a diverse range of interests and expertise. I enjoyed the speakers a lot. I found many of their stories of success to be very inspirational and hearing about how they built their businesses from the ground up was wonderful.

I look forward to learning more about emerging media in the future and felt this class gave me a good foundation. The only thing I wish were different about the class would be having check points through out the semester so students know where their grades are at instead of only receiving one letter grade at the end of the semester.

 
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December first is the World AIDS Day. AIDS affects hundreds of thousands of people in the United States alone. This illness is very serious and life threatening, as the majority knows. The causes and preventions should be made known to the public in order to help stop the spread of this fatal illness.

In honor of World AIDS Day many non-profits are turning to social media to raise awareness. Active celebrity social media users such as, Lady GaGa, Ryan Seacrest, and Justin Timberlake are going silent on their social media sites in order to help raise over a million dollars for AIDS research. This project was started by singer/ songwriter Alicia Keys on behalf of her charity Keep a Child Alive. The celebrities will start using their social media sites once a million dollars has been raised.

I find this use, or non use, of social media to be very cleaver. Twitter users are addicted to what their favorite celebrities have to say, and depriving them of that entertainment is a great idea in order to encourage people to donate to an honorable cause. The preparation behind doing so must be key in order to for to know why the use of social media has stopped and what they can do to help donate.

Great use of social media for a good cause!  

 
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  Last week something unspeakable happened my beloved Blackberry was attacked by the most horrific animal know to man! No, not a lion, tiger, or beat but far worse… my father’s African Grey parrot, Max. I know, I know, and how unlikely does that sound? But I assure you it is not only a heart breaking story but a true one.

A little background on how my phone happened to become a chew toy for a 6 month old parrot. My father is an attorney in Appleton, Wisconsin.  Since he is the owner of his small firm there is not a no “massive phone eating bird” policy. I often go to my father’s office to work on school work when I am home for the weekend. This way my mother can’t talk my ear off and I actually can get some work done. I love animals, so I have no problem with Max hanging out while I do my work. He will often sit on my chair, play with my glasses, or walk across the key board trying random messages as his feet hit the keys.

I got up from my father’s computer for less than 3 minutes to write a note to his legal assistant wishing her a happy birthday and when I came back Max’s fat feet were holding my phone down as he ripped 13 keys out of my phone. I could see him laughing to himself as a few choice words flew out of my mouth. He even sent some random texts to my boyfriend, I think they went something along the lines of “dada jghoagag”. Regardless I was not happy. I have a serious problem of breaking my phones. I have never had a cell phone for more than a year, if even a year at all. And I was doing so good with this new phone! It was going to be our one year (I sound like I am talking about some boy I am dating) in March! But nope, attack of the killer phone eating parrot took that away from me. At least it wasn’t another episode of me knocking the phone in the toilet, or having it fall out of my pocket (while on silent) when I am riding my horse in 30 acres of farm field never to be seen again.

I guess I should get to the point about why I am writing to give praise to AT&T. Shortly after the attack, I brought my poor phone into the AT&T store to see what kind of help they could offer. In the past when I have murdered my cell phones it took nearly a week and a frustrating phone call to get a new phone sent my way. But not this time. Although my phone still worked it was very hard to get information off of it. I had to take my ear ring out in order to push the buttons if I wanted to text or make an outgoing phone call. Very frustrating and I was not looking forward to the week of annoyance in doing that. But the day after I called in for a new phone, I came home from work and a brand new Blackberry was by my front door waiting for me!!! It was the best part of my week. And I am still singing praises of AT&T for their fast customer service. My new phone came all the way from Texas and still managed to be at my front door in 24 hours. Thank you, AT&T!!


 
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Facebook has started to get a bit much for me personally… I know, you never thought I would say that did you? I am addicted to the “FB” but lately I feel like they are trying  to monopolize everything, much like Apple has in the electronic market. Although I do think Mark Zuckerberg is a genius and I wish so badly I could think of something awesome like Facebook that could make me some serious bank, I think he may need to take a step back and let the Facebook community breathe a little.

Facebook users currently send more than 4 billion messages a day. That is a lot of messages… All users will be able to have the opportunity to snag the @facebook.com for their email address. Much like how facebook started in stages and spread to everyone the mail service will do the same coming to its users in stages. Users will also be able to request access on the Facebook page.

This mail service is not  quite the same as traditional email and focuses more on short conversations then lengthy e-mail messages. There will be no more cc option or subject lines but will be more like Facebook chat. Zuckerberg said that he is doing this in a noncompetitive fashion and is not trying to shut down popular sites like Yahoo Mail or Gmail.

But what I wonder is then why create this email function if you are not trying to take over the email arena? I already think that the Facebook messaging function has somewhat taken over email. I know that I use the Facebook messaging function far more than traditional email to communicate with my friends and family. The only real time I use my email account other than getting coupons from retailers is when I am communicating with my professors or my boss…

Thoughts?


 
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It is no surprise that print advertising is not as popular as it once had been. Currently the leading way to advertise has been though cellular phones and not television, radio, or print like it had been in past years. Although I had mentioned in my past posts that print is not dead I keep reading other wise. I wondering if that has a lot to do with major print sources like news papers and magazines not being as popular as they had been in previous years…

 Anyways… These questions came to me when I read an article about Rhythm NewMedia, a company who is looking to throw iAd and AdMob out of their leading positions in the cellular advertising market. Recently Rhythm Media has dropped a whopping 10 million dollars towards advertisements that will be linked to cell phones all over the country. I am not sure I fully understand how this will work as I don’t recall ever seeing an ad on my cell phone before. But then again, all I really use my phone for is facebook (go figure) and texting (addicted) with the occasional app for to look up a phone number.

I really don’t think I enjoy the idea of having advertising on my cell phone. I feel like there are ads everywhere which can often be very hard to avoid. But coming from an ad major I can see the appeal of wanting to reach every person and the majority of people carry cell phones so it works…. Doesn’t mean I will be happy about it though!

Have you seen any advertisements on your cell phone?

 
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Sony has been quietly constructing a phone that has the potential to knock the iphone and the droid out of the water, the Play Station Phone. Although this news has only come in the form of rumors floating around, a statement was recently released from Sony:

"We started out with the PSP – that was our first mobile gaming console. But, since then, the market as you know has expanded into bigger arenas, in that gaming on mobile phones, gaming on tablets, gaming on all sorts of mobile devices.” Followed by, “Now, PSP being a proprietary platform, was more concentrated on, how do you say, [the] core gaming segment rather than the light gamer. But now we are addressing that market as well."

I am not a big gamer (although I do own a Wii and find that to be very fun) I still think the idea of having a PSP phone is really awesome. It has not yet been released about the functions or the game options for the phone but I am going to keep my eyes out for updates.

 It is just amazing how the electronics industry is able to create a phone that will cater to every type of ADD a person can have. For me it is Facebook, my horoscope, texting, and the occasional pack man game, but now you could play legit video games on your phone at any time. I think that is beyond awesome.

 

What do you think?


 
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Facebook seems to be the topic of most all my posts lately, but I am always fascinated with the new ways they are improving and making their site match the exact needs of its users. Currently, Facebook has stopped showing pictures of a person’s ex boyfriend/ girlfriend in the photo memories section of their page. This was done after several users had complained that seeing old photos was hard for them and made them not want to frequent the site as often. Facebook listened and has removed all of the photos of the ex’s, which has been shown to make their users much happier.

I noticed the photo memories box that Facebook added in the past couple of months. Some of the people they would show I did not talk to any more nor did I care to see their photos. Yet instead of unfriending them, I just kept clicking “X” to delete the current photo memory. Although no matter how many times I “X” people out, some still kept coming back. Rather annoying.

I am glad Facebook made this change, as I can see how seeing ex’s photos with out making the effort can be hurtful. Yet, this action on behalf of Facebook has brought me to two questions…. 1. If you really can’t handle looking through an ex’s Facebook pictures (even though you know all of you stalk your ex’s, even if you don’t want to admit… you do, its okay) why are you friends with them still? 2. Has Facebook turned into a dating site and lost its focus on being a social network? Oh wait, I lied. One more question. 3. What if you dated a person and then unfriended them just to refriend… does Facebook have the ability to recognize that or will photos still come up? I wish they did that. It would make things a lot easier. How many times do people break up and one of the first things they do is unfriend the person, just to refriend when either they work things out or become civil.

Maybe the moral of the story is, if we don’t want to see pictures of your ex, or people in general you do not care about… why not just unfriend them?

 
I keep thinking about a comment our speaker (Tonise Paul, President and CEO of BBDO Chicago) made last week regarding the 30 second TV spot. After a man in our class asked Tonise about how to keep media fresh in people’s minds and that he felt that TV and more traditional forms of media were dead, Tonise responded with an informative piece about the use of traditional media. She told us that the 30 second TV spot is not dead, in fact it is still very powerful. It is all about how we use certain forms of traditional media; the message we send to our audience; most importantly if we are able to make a significant connection with them.

I was thinking about this message and the impact that television ads still have on their target audience. Lately, there has been a commercial that has really bothered me and I feel that there are ethical issues surrounding its message. Chef Boyardee has currently been running a series of TV spots that claim that their ravioli has a full serving of vegetables, which is fine and good, until they say “but don’t tell your kids that.” Another commercial shows a young girl on a time out for almost telling her other friends that there are vegetables in their food, and was then punished by the surrounding parents for her attempt.

If the TV spot is still so powerful, then why is this major food company trying to tell not only adults but the children that see their ads that vegetables are something that should be hidden away or something to fear and that children are not able to learn what is beneficial to their health. The United States has been facing a health crisis related to poor dietary and activity choices for several years with no real positive light at the end of the tunnel. Having food companies encourage parents to not educated or feed their children vegetables (because no kids like them?) is completely irresponsible.

V8 Fruit Fusion is also a company who makes claims that their product offers a whole serving of vegetables, but that the taste is covered up by fruit flavors that are also in their product. I know this does not have a lot to do with emerging media, but it does present a valid ethical dilemma that some advertising agencies may have to deal with in the future. 

Where has the line been drawn between making a profit and what is over all the best message to send to your current or potential consumers?  Further will ethical concerns for the target audience actually yield long term benefits for your customer?

 
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I just viewed the Social Network less than a half an hour ago and I thought that I would blog about it now while it is still fresh in my mind. Overall, I give the movie 2.5 stars out of 4. Meh, not something I would have paid to see given my taste in movies. But it was informative none the less. It gave good background on how Facebook started and the people behind what is now a major addiction to many people not just in the US but the world.

I liked the overall make up of the cast, good chemistry between the characters and the drama between them was believable. I just do not understand all the reviews I had read about the movie prior to seeing it where it is claimed to be the best movie of the year and will be up for many grand awards. Maybe it is because I started using Facebook when it first came to be and the topic of social media, which I love, is talked about so often in my group of friends (seeing as we are all communications nerds) and in the media that I didn’t really feel a big connection to the movie. I had a totally different reaction to the film then I thought I would have. I was very excited to see it but I left feeling kind of bored and not impressed.

I love Facebook, I do. But after seeing the movie and really learning how badly Mark treated Eduardo, whether intentional or not, made me not admire him as much and start to think he was a jerk. Facebook made in vain? Maybe that is just me…

Anyone else have a similar view of the movie? I would be interested to hear what you have to say.

 
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As I write this it is roughly 3:50 pm on Thursday, September 23, 2010… And I am not happy. Not happy at all. My beloved social networking site, Facebook, is down for the count and I feel a deep void. Okay maybe not a “deep” void but I am a little bit agitated with the fact that I can’t update my wall with this awesome 90’s music video  that Kristi Schwartz and I just rediscovered while avoiding doing our Quantitative homework for tonight’s class.

“Here’s a shovel. Can you dig it fool?” --- That would have been my wall update, but nope. Can’t update my status because the FB IS DOWN!

I am trying to imagine what the Facebook headquarters is looking like at this very moment. I picture everyone running around the office screaming, phones ringing off the hook, babies crying, smoke coming out of computers, sirens going off… pure and utter chaos.

I am starting to feel a bit ashamed of myself actually. How can one website have this must effect on my mood? Well… end of that thought. It just does. Social media has become such a stable in my life that with out it I feel like I have forgotten something very important at home after leaving for a month on a long vacation, and all you can really do is be annoyed. Some people need coffee and CNN every day to feel whole. Me, I prefer Diet Coke and stalking random people on Facebook to feel complete. So sue me.