News Analysis 2 (Norris 5)

Royal Wedding date chosen by Prince William and Kate

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-11818049

Informative vs Superficial
Very Informative. 
In this news article, not only did it talk about the wedding, it talked about how it will be a national celebration, and a party. The article covered all sides of the story. A lot of information. 

Accurate and Truthful vs False and Deceptive
Accurate and Truthful. 
The article gave all accurate facts. 
Objective vs Biased
Neither Objective nor Biased. 
There is nothing in this article to be bias off. There is no argument present in this article, hence there are no sides of the argument. 
Pluralistic vs Insular Viewpoint
Insular Viewpoint. 
Although Royalty is sort of an international thing, I believe that only people in the UK would care about the crown prince's wedding.    
Balanced vs Weighted Side
Weighted Side
Although the journalist quoted Prince William once, Prince William did not really talk about details of his wedding, it was the journalist who was "speaking"/writing.   

Content Analyses

Skins

Medium: Television

Genre of Program: Comedy-drama

Skins', a British teen drama, is created by Jamie Brittain and Bryan Elsley. In this show, it follows a group of teenagers in Bristol, South West England, through the most important two years of sixth form (Prep for GCSE' A levels). It covers what "English" teenagers go through during their teenage life. Issues such as dysfunctional families, sexual orientation identity, drug abuse, death, and mental illness; including eating disorders. Skins also portrays British teens trying to grow up, find love, and happiness despite the influence of their parents, and other adult authorities.   

Name of Character Viewed	Effy	Cook	Freddie	Katie	Emily
Male or Female	Female	Male	Male	Female	Female
Main Character?	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Occupation	Student	Student	Student	Student	Student
Level of Education	High School	High School	High School	High School	High School
Race	White	White	Hispanic	White	White
Marital Status	In a relationship. (Off and on with Freddie and Cook)	Single (Fooling around with a lot of girls)	Complicated (Does not know whether he was dating Effy)	Single (Fooling around with boys)	Single
Age	17	17	17	17	17
Number of Children	-	-	-	-	-
Appearance	Very attractive	"Cool" looking	Handsome	Pretty	Pretty
Body Type	Skinny	Healthy/ Buff	Healthy	Average	Average
Personal Characteristics	Emotional Goth Calm Very sexually- active Independent	Violence Havoc Trouble maker Daring Sexually - active Independent Stubborn	Gentlemen Nice Caring Smart Independent	Must look pretty for the boys Happy Stubborn	Confuse Nice Caring Sad Not as popular as the twin sister, Katie
Role of Character in Narrative	Mischievous, Drug addict. A girl that does not care about anything.	He is a student who doesn't care about anything. He is rude, and also love starting a fight. He is very sexually active.	A gentlemen, who respects girls a lot. Generous. Very sensitive.	A girl who gets a lot of boys. Her twin sister is the total opposite of her.	She is really confuse of her sexuality; whether she is straight or gay. She is not as popular as Katie.
Impact of character in Narrative	Positive	Positive	Positive	Positive	-

Dove's Real Beauty campaign

In the world today, females are getting huge influence by the media on how they portray a "perfect" lady. A lot of girls are going on a diet, getting plastic surgery, and even breast implantation.  The idea of beauty have became so distorted till the point that, it went overboard. The Campaign for Real Beauty hoped to send a positive message to females of all ages, who had trouble or are trying to be a "perfect" lady. The campaign used advertisements, videos, workshops, sleep over events, and even published a book and a play to reach the public. Although it is hard for women to not care about their appearances and figures, I feel that they should not altar their appearances by surgery as, it is not really their true self. All women should know that they are equally beautiful, and there are different kinds of beauty; not only appearances. I strongly believe that having a beautiful heart is the most important, as if you have a great heart, you automatically become beautiful.

Don't ever EVER let the media influence you on the definition of beauty.
BE STRONG!

Stereotype Media Product

TESCO; a huge supermarket chain in England. TESCO express, TESCO mega, TESCO etc. TESCO sells almost all kinds of products, such as, foods, fruits, electronics, clothing, furniture and more. In this advertisement, TESCO was trying to promote its company, but instead of showing the locals its freshness of their product or even the spaciousness it have in their store, it showed a coloured woman. Next to the coloured woman, it had a statement saying, "Fruit Picking: 38 pence/hr", and a slogan, "Every little helps". By using this advertisement, the company is hoping that many consumers would feel bad, and start buying products from TESCO. It used sympathy to get its customers. What TESCO is unaware of is that, it portrayed out the wrong message.

When I first saw this advertisement, I was in utter shocked. I found the ad really ignorant and sad. Not only was TESCO taking advantage of that coloured woman to get buyers, it did not try to fix the problem of their workers low wages. I believe that TESCO should look for ways to change the wages of their industrial workers, and should not put up advertisement like this in the media, as it would only cause more people to be against it.

TIVO IS WATCHING!

TiVo, a digital video recorder, was introduced in 1999 in America. TiVo features include "Season Pass" schedules which, record every new episode of a series, and "WishList" searches which allow the user to find and record shows that match their interests by title, actor, director, category, or keyword. Now, TiVo is available in Canada, New Zealand, Mexico, Australia, Taiwan, and the United Kingdom. 

1. What information is being sought by advertisers and television industries?

By consumers using this TiVo digital video recorder, the advertisers and television industries could find out a lot of information. They could track what kind of show you are watching, how many hours are you spending on the TV, and around what time of the day you are watching the shows. 

2. Why might advertisers and television programmers want to know which commercials viewers watch and/or skip? 

Advertisers and television programmers want to know which commercials viewers watch and/or skip for several reasons. They want to know whether advertisements that they are spending on are worth it, or if people are just skipping it. If a lot of people skipped a particular commercial, the industrial would be aware of the "type" and "style" of advertisement people are not interested in. Moreover, the industrial could know from the data which types of commercials are most effective at drawing an audience.  

3. Why might TiVo be uniquely able to provide this data?

TiVo is uniquely able to provide this data because, they have lots of users. Users spend nearly half of their television time watching programs recorded earlier. Those users who record shows, tend to skip about 70% of the commercials (Todd Juenger). About 8 to 10% of America's 110 million television households have TiVo. Although getting the data is a complex process, TiVo still manage to get it.

4. How does TiVo profit from selling data about its consumers' viewing behaviours?

Since TiVo would know the data from their consumers, many companies would approach TiVo for its data. Company would pay TiVo a huge sum of money for the data as, it would help them with the improvement of their commercials.  

5. How has digital video recording technology affected advertisers and views? 

Digital video recording technology allows people to record shows that they want to watch, due to inconvenience of their schedule. For example, if someone wanted to watch a show, but don't have the time to watch it, he/she could record it, and play it after he/she is free. In addition, with this technology, advertisers would know whether their commercials are effective or not. 

Exposure to Advertisement

From the time when I head home from school, I saw lots and lots of advertisement. Advertisements such as H&M, Orange phone company's internet USB, Magnum Gold ice cream, Peugeot Cars, Cartier watches, Ed hardy Hoodies, Lacoste shoes, ClubMed, Dolce & Gabbana, etc. Most of these advertisements were extremely explicit and straight to the point, but one or two ads were a bit subtle. For example, the H&M ad next to the high way in a huge portrait banner. It was obvious that H&M was trying to sent out a message that they sell nice-looking and reasonable prices clothing, as they got a model to wear their cloths, and even stated the price of it next to the ad. Sadly, not a lot of clothing designers these days advertise their clothes in a explicit way. Designers such as Dolce & Gabbana, Tom Ford, and Diesel, are known for their subtle ads. In the Orange internet USB advertisement, it had a boy jumping forward real fast on a pogo stick, and at the bottom, it had the Orange internet USB. This ad was a bit subtle for me, as it took me awhile to realise the message Orange was trying to send out to the public. Orange was telling the viewers that its USB internet goes really fast, and have a lot of gbs. In the night, I watched a film on TV called, "Mall Cop". At one scene, there was a long pause on the Ed Hardy store, and it made me browse the internet up for its hoodies, as I liked its design. 


Who might be the target audience?
H&M - Teenagers and even Adults, who loves to follow the fashion trends.
Orange USB internet - Businessman, Adults in general
Magnum Gold Ice cream - Children as they made it glittery Gold in colour, and also Adults. Anyone who have a sweet tooth. 
Peugeot Cars - Adults who can afford a decent car
Cartier Watches - Adults, or people who are working. 
Ed Hardy Hoodies - Teenagers
Lascoste Shoes - Teenagers and Adults
ClubMed - Families, or a group of friends.
Dolce & Gabbana - Teenagers and Adults who can afford them. 


How might the ad influence your decision to purchase this product or service?
Ads influence people's decision, by using different tactics such as logos, ethos, pathos, and photoshop. For example, an ad could make a person feel that she needs help with her oily face, so she would go to the shop and get the face product immediately. Another example, could be if someone sees something that looks attractive, and he likes it, he would go to the store and purchase it. Moreover, sometimes ads would have celebrities in it, in order to lure the public into buying their products. 

At the end of the day, Media still somehow manage to manipulate us. 

"Nobody is Perfect" (Mirror Experiment)

When I started to look at my reflection for just 5 mins, a lot of questions ran through my mind. Do I look more like my mum, or do I look more like my dad? All these random and weird questions started to pop up. What if I was born with grey eyes, or with a sharper nose, or with thicker eye browns? How would I look like? What if I have a beard, or a smaller nose? What if I were taller, bigger, or just a midget? How would my life be different? But after 2 mins into this experiment, I started to look at the brighter side. I told myself that I am Sean, and nothing could change me; I am an individual—I am who I am, and nothing that I do can change that. I saw many good traits about me, for example having a good straight teeth, and a nice smile. Soon, all that I could see was myself as a whole, and I decided that I was very happy with whom I was.

To be honest looking back at 4 years ago, when I first came to WBAIS, I was individually comparing everyone to myself. Saw what they would wear to school, their style, and how they talked (slang). I thought by following their style, I would get accepted more, and have more friends. But in fact, looking back, I was just a instrument of peer pressure. I did what I did because other people did the same, not because it was what I wanted to do. Now, I do what I want to do, and am not pressured one way or another based on other peoples actions.

The Corporation vs. Ad and Ego

What do you think is the impact on of consumerism on our/your media environment the public's ability (or lack thereof) to remain informed?

Consumers impact the world in several ways; the economy is one of them. With the help of the media today, we consumers are the reason why the economy is rapidly rising and dropping. Advertisements are the main source of provoking us, consumers, into buy a product. Companies find consumer's weaknesses and use them to make consumers buy their product. Firstly, the companies lower our ego, then after, boost our ego up by showing us their "effective" product. For example, if the company is selling acne cream, in its advertisement, it will say something like "Do you get laughed a lot in school because of your ugly pimples? And want to get rid of it? Use this pimple cream now, and within days, all your pimples will be gone". Also, the company will include a before and after picture of a person with a really bad acne, to show the effectiveness its product had on that person. Most of the time, these  advertisements lie about the statistics of the product. Using their products are not 100% guaranteed effective. In addition, I feel that sometimes we, the consumers are getting brain washed by the media. Seeing perfect people on Televisions and Magazines makes us feel that we should or have to be like them in order to feel good about ourselves. Because of the media, we have lost our confidence. A few classes ago, Ms B told us about an experiment a girl did. She had to look into a mirror and stare at her reflection for 15 minutes. In the beginning, the girl saw positive things about her face, but after a few minutes later, she started seeing negative things and became annoyed. Because of the way media portrays perfect people, we are now affected on how we view ourselves. I believe that we need to learn that in the real world, nobody is perfect. Lastly, we consumers are lost, as we are not well informed about the advertising world. We are unaware of what the media is doing to us, making us feel insecure. Humans should believe in themselves, and not get influenced by the media's perfect world or their "effective" product.