Reflection

(Source : pics-site)

This will be the final post for this blog. By posting issues in publication and design, I have gained knowledge on media. I am more receptive and aware of the concepts, theories and principles of the media. While writing the blog I also gain a more in depth understanding on theoretical perspectives and editing for web and print media.  

It is important that one needs to have a basic knowledge of web posting and particular decency when posting. The facts on how to post are essential also, as Bell and Garrett (1998) sates that it is ‘no longer just written, but “designed”, and multimodally articulated’. Thus, it is necessary to know how to deal with the multimodality of the blog. As it Reep (2006) mention ‘the principles of design are qualities important to any visual presentation regardless of topic or audience.’

In sum, the blog posting was interesting and informative.

Thank you for reading!

References:

Bell and Garrett 1998,  Approaches to media discourse, Wiley-Blackwell, USA, viewed on 5th November 2011, <http://books.google.com.my/books?id=ujGG6FQha98C&pg=PA187&lpg=
PA187&dq=no+longer+just+written,+but+%E2%80%9Cdesigned%E2%80%9D,+and+multimodally+articulated%E2%80%99&source=bl&ots=EWHiqB8HGP&sig=31WwyC5OCUGWM3wJcdoP9i_sJ28&hl=en&ei=KZS2TqKVGM6srAfJv4j2Aw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CBsQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=no%20longer%20just%20written%2C%20but%20%E2%80%9Cdesigned%E2%80%9D%2C%20and%20multimodally%20articulated%E2%80%99&f=false>.

Reep 2006, Technical writing: Document Design, Pearson/Longman, New York. 

Pics-site 2011, Awesome Reflection Lake Photos, viewed on 5th November 2011, <http://www.pics-site.com/2011/03/15/awesome-reflection-lake-photos/>.

Advertisement banned in Malaysia?

(Source: Youtube)

As seen in the video above, it portrays how a non-muslim behaves during the Ramadan festival. Public have claimed that the commercials is racist and flooded the television station facebook pages with complains.

In addition, Media Prima chief operating officer Ahmad Izham Omar apologized in Twitter and announced that the advertisements will be removed. Just minutes after the apology, Omar had tried to shift the topic asking for opinions and had asked the citizens to calm down.

(Source: Youtube)

This is another advertisement controversy that Media Prima was caught airing a Hari Raya commercial with a Christmas overtone. The public criticize again and the commercial was removed.

Due to a wide range of ethnic groups in Malaysia, the culture context for each individual is widely different. Hofstede,  1980; Hofstede, 1991; Markus & Kitayama, 1991 states that an ‘individual social attitudes, such as those related to a sense of belonging and identification, individual  distance, emotional connections, and a sense of community, rely  heavily on one’s social context and cultural background’ (Huang and Deng 2008). It is hard to please the viewers yet to ensure that multiple ethnic groups can co-exist together, it is important for the media to take responsibility.

The International Chamber of Commerce has came up with a few advertising ethics and one of it is decency. They state that ‘marketing communications should not contain statements or audio or visual treatments which offend standards of decency currently prevailing in the country and culture concerned’ (ICC 2011). This is why the media needs to have ‘the knowledge, experience and discriminatory ability of the typical consumer to whom it is directed, as well as social, cultural and linguistic factors’ (ICC 2011). By those abilities, the media will be able to produce a good commercial for the public to enjoy. Again as stated from the previous post, ‘everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression which includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers’(The Universal Declaration of Human Rights 2011).

Click here for the original article of Media Prima pulls out ‘racist’ Ramadan ads.

References:

Huang and Deng 2008, Social Interaction Design in Cultural Context: A Case Study of a Traditional Social Activity, International Journal of Design, Vol.2, No. 2, pp. 81-96, viewed on 5th November 2011, <http://www.ijdesign.org/ojs/index.php/IJDesign/article/viewFile/%0b341/154>.

International Chamber of Commerce 2011, Consolidate ICC code, viewed on 5th November 2011, <http://www.codescentre.com/index.php/icc-code#genmain>.

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights 2011, Preamble, viewed on 5th November 2011, <http://www.un.org/en/documents/udhr/index.shtml>.

Youtube 2010, Iklan Raya tv3 yang diharamkan, viewed on 5th November 2011, <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tl8MrUrBBEI&feature=related>.

Youtube 2011, News: Malaysia TV station Ramadan Ads sparks up debate - 03Aug 2011, viewed on 5th November 2011, <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ke7p5rp-nbI>.

Online videos preferred

(Source: York 2010)

The nonstop evolving mass media has brought a lot of changes. Instead of waiting for the news on television or waiting for a hardcopy of a newspaper, everyone is able to get hold of the latest news online. It is said that 85% of media websites now uses online to produce their cover news videos. The multimodality provides audiences ‘multiple options for inputting and receiving information’ (Kirusa 2011). The multimedia news lets the audience ‘interpret any new text, whether words or images, then produce new interpretations, new responses, and new meanings’ (Walsh 2006). Media companies are currently monetizing their online media, by selling advertisement. It has been monetizing for the media company as more and more users are using the online media.

The audience will ‘go through a recursive, interactive process as we read words or look at images, negotiate electronic screens and hyperlinks’ (Walsh 2006). With these new online media there will be new responses and interpretations base on the content. As stated by Bruns (2007) produsage is a ‘collaborative communities the creation of shared content takes place in a networked where all participants to be users as well as producers of information and knowledge’. This means that, audience now can be the producers as well as the users. For example, the Japan earthquake this year, people in Japan could video record the incident as it happens and then upload it online later on. The below video is taken during the Japan earthquake.

(Source: Youtube 2011)

Web genres, are usually divided into various categories like interest, news, gossip, talent and more. The web audiences generally choose the genres they like and keep up to date with it. Like in youtube, users can subscribe to the channel they like. By subscribing, they will be notified if there are any new video uploaded. In this way, it shows how subscribers are highly anticipating a video from the channel. Hence, in order for more users to subscribe, the channels usually post regularly to keep the users interest. For example the Wong Fu Productions, they have currently hit a million subscribers by posting short movies, web series, and their segment called Wong Fu Weekends. The below video is the summary segment Wong Fu Weekends season 4.

(Source: Youtube 2011)

Click here for the original article of 85% Of Media Websites Now Use Online Video To Cover News.

References:

Bruns.A 2007, Produsage: A Working Definition, viewed on 5th November 2011, <http://produsage.org/produsage.>.

Kirusa 2011, Multimodality, viewed on 5th November 2011, <http://www.kirusa.com/about_kirusa.html>.

Walsh 2006, The 'textual shift': Examining the reading process with print, visual and multimodal texts, Australia Journal of Language and Literacy, Vol. 29, No. 1, pp. 24-37. 

York 2010, Our Social and New Media Un-strategy, viewed on 5th November 2011, <http://dyn.com/social-new-media-un-strategy/>.

Youtube 2011, Japan Earthquake Rare Video recorded by a civilian during 8.9 Magnitude Earthquake Hits!!! 2011, viewed on 5th November 2011, <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HHMoAfNJH3Y>.


Youtube 2011, WFW 65 - End of Season 4, viewed on 5th November 2011, <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZC53kjTLLaQ>.

IPad-only newspaper?

(Source: Youtube 2011)

Above is a review on Rupert Murdoch’s new iPad-only newspaper.

Rupert Murdoch together with Apple Macintosh launched the new iPad-only newspaper. As stated by Kress and Leeuwen (2006), ‘each feature of a landscape has its history, as does the landscape as a whole; each is a subject to constant remaking’. No longer, readers need to hold on to the rough hard copy, now it is all about scrolling the newspaper on an Ipad. Reading the newspaper from an Ipad is a new idea where people need to get use to. It’s different from reading a newspaper as there is no flipping but only scrolling. Also stated by Kress and Leeuwen (2006) ‘the semiotic modes in such texts can interrelate in different ways’.

The idea of the traditional newspaper being put into the new technology is to mainly gain back the readership. In 2010 the newspaper circulation fell about nine percent because readers prefer reading online, from pages like facebook, twitter, google or yahoo. As Chandler (1997) says ‘the generic corpus ceaselessly expands, genres change over time; the conventions of each genre shift, new genres and sub-genres emerge and others are discontinued’. However, newspapers are still long lasting as there are readers who prefer reading the hard copy. ‘The genre may be considered as a practical device for helping any mass medium to produce consistently and efficiently and to relate its production to the expectations of its customers’ (McQuail 1987, 200). The audiences still have choices; nevertheless, the new change is to attract the others who prefer reading online.

As mention by Nielson (2011), ‘Ipad applications are much improved, but new usability problems have emerged’. It is mostly due to navigation overload yet Ipad still sold over 40 million this year. This means that the idea of reading the news online will still sell. Hence, our technology is always evolving and the media needs to keep up in order to fulfill the audience expectations. As the ‘multimodal texts, compared with print-based texts, the reader will use various senses to respond to other modes’ (Walsh 2006). In sum, audiences now prefer having it all in one like an Ipad where one can read the article, pictures and videos. 

Click here for the original article of iPad-only newspaper furthers media trend.

References:

Chandler 1997, An Introduction to Genre Theory, viewed on 6^th November 2011, <http://faculty.washington.edu/farkas/TC510/ChandlerGenreTheory.pdf >.

Kress & Leeuwen 2006, The semiotic landscape: language and visual communication, 2^nd edn, Routledge, United Kingdom.

McQuail, Denis (1987): Mass Communication Theory: An Introduction (2nd Edn.). London: Sage.

 

Nielson 2011, iPad Usability: Year One, viewed on 6^th November 2011, <http://www.useit.com/alertbox/ipad.html>.

Youtube 2011, The Daily: First look at Rupert Murdoch’s new iPad-only newspaper, viewed on 6^th November 2011, <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oR2cZNpBgbw>.

Orthodox Jewish paper apologises for Hillary Clinton deletion.

(Source: theguardian.co.uk)

The above photo shows you a picture by the New York paper Di Tzeitung in the White House situation room where Obama and his national security team are gathered around a table monitoring the Bin Laden raid.

Now look at this photo below.

(Source: theguardian.co.uk)

As seen in the first picture Hillary Clinton and Audrey Tomason have been removed. 

The newspaper provided an apology, saying that the photo editor did not read the fine print about how the White House forbids any changes in their photographs. However the newspaper states that they have to abide to their editorial policy of not publishing women's images. As majority of the readers from Brooklyn are Orthodox Jewish who believes that women need to be recognized through their skills rather than showing how they look like. The beliefs of the Orthodox Jewish have cause controversy among the others. As not all readers are Jewish, one might not be able to understand the reason of the altered image.

Although it is the newspaper’s editorial policy for not publishing a women’s image but by altering the picture might not be suitable. As mention by Meltzer (1997) ‘even positive intent could lead to distortion.’ The editor should have gone through the fine print before the picture was release. Even if the photo is being altered, the newspaper should at least state below and let their readers know that the photo have been altered. The code ethnics of National Press Photograph Association (2011) mentions that ‘as photojournalists, we have the responsibility to document society and to preserve its images as a matter of historical record.’

A photo in a newspaper or magazine, usually lead readers to an idea on what the article is about. It is the main reason why editors place pictures in their article, to give readers an image on what is going on. Last but not least, the editors should definitely place a clause under the photos that it is edited in order for their readers to understand. With the clause or caption under the photo, the readers will have in mind that the photo is being edited due to the reason given. In addition, the original message of the photo will be delivered to the readers. Thus, the photojournalism must take responsibility for their editing style. 

 

Click here for the original article of Orthodox Jewish paper apologises for Hillary Clinton deletion.

References:

Meltzer 1997, Digital Photography, viewed on 4^th November, <http://www.fno.org/may97/digital.html>.

National Press Photograph Association 2011, NPPA Code of Ethics, viewed on 4^th November, <http://www.nppa.org/professional_development/business_practices/digitalethics.html>.

The Guardian 2011, Orthodox Jewish paper apologises for Hillary Clinton deletion, viewed on 4^th November, <http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/may/10/jewish-paper-apologises-hillary-clinton>.