Amelia Rae Koethen
Understanding Media Studies- Fall 2009
Academic Plan
By the time I complete my program at The New School I will hopefully have met several of my goals. While I understand that the education process is always fluid and I’m not expecting to stick to any strict guidelines there are a few things that I believe are essential to my overall goals for my career and my education. The first goal I have set for myself is completing the Media Management certificate. While my primary post-graduate focus is not on working in production or running a business I am not ruling out working as a consultant and feel that this certificate would be a great advantage to me. More than just the business aspect of earning this certificate, I feel that gaining a better understanding of media management will provide me with perspective as I study media ethics and human-computer interactions. I also feel that having a background in the commercial aspects of media will help me relate to potential students I am sure to encounter if I become a professor or any other teacher of Media Studies. My second goal is to learn more about web design and coding. I believe that the internet is the new media of our day and that a basic understanding of this technology should be essential to any media theorist’s coursework. On that same note I am eager to begin taking courses in documentary research and production so that I can learn how to express my research to a wider audience. I am going to pursue the thesis track and am hoping to create a documentary as part of my final thesis. With the skills I obtain through the Media Management Certificate I can then market and distribute any documentary or other form of media I create, which in and of itself would be an incredible learning process as well.
Ideally when I am done with the MA program at the new school I will be prepared to advance to a PhD program either at the New School for Social Research or another university. In particular I have been interested in the Department of Communications and Rhetoric at Rennselaer Polytechnic Institute, The Modern Culture and Media program at Brown, and the Communications departments at UMass Amherst and SUNY Albany. I would like to focus my studies on ethics, human-computer interactions, and cyber psychology. I have been very interested in the role that the internet is playing with contemporary theology and would love to explore cyber theology in my thesis. I believe that this would translate to a career working as a professor of digital media culture and perhaps consulting with non-profit and religious groups on how to brand and market themselves online and where they fit in regards to social networking. Ideally I would also like to give back to my community by teaching youth about media literacy issues and perhaps creating a youth-run media outlet for the students of my former high school.
This semester has been very challenging for me. I’m currently working in magazine publishing which is a hectic and stressful environment. At the beginning of the semester we received pay cuts and had a few rounds of lay-offs. This led to a strain on my financial situation and a doubling-up of my workload. I found that working 10-12 hour days while juggling financial stress and graduate school to be a significant challenge. Due to a recent second wave of lay-offs and a cutting back of all employee hours I have decided to quit my job, move back home and take courses online next semester. This originally threw me for quiet a loop but as I am from upstate New York and only about three hours away from the New School campus I do not see it barring me from coming in to New York about once a week to attend Saturday classes, special events, conferences and to do research. I am unsure as of right now whether I will complete my entire program online, commute in for classes, or move back to New York but either way I feel confident that I will be able to obtain my goals and complete my program and thesis.
My primary concern with moving out of the area is maintaining and developing connections within the program and staying “in the loop” at The New School. I am planning on becoming more involved with conferences sponsored by the school and would like to speak with other online students in the hopes of creating a network. I am also very interested in attending guest lectures and conferences on other campuses as a visitor, in particular RPI’s program in Human-Computer interaction which allows visiting graduate students from other Universities to sit-in and audit sessions. I’m interested in working with several faculty members at The New School, in particular Deirdre Boyle who analyses death and media. I’m also interested in Paolo Carpignano’s work in sociology and Robert Berkman’s work in social media. If I am able, I would be very interested in Douglas Rushkoff’s course, Technologies of Persuasion. Currently I am taking Media Studies: Idea with Christiana Paul and, while I am overwhelmed by the world of cybernetics (an entirely new subject to me); I enjoy learning about the relationships between man and machine and will hopefully be able to take more courses with Professor Paul in the future. I am also very interested in the conference on Digital Labor and would like to become more involved with that and the Mixed Messages program put on the Media Studies department.I would like to volunteer for, and ideally eventually exhibit my work at that showcase. There were a few professional societies that I have been researching, two I found very interesting were The Society for Technical Communication and The Association for Computing Machinery- Special Interest Group on Computer-Human Interaction. Through attending conferences put on by these and other organizations I can network with other professionals in the field and gain insight into the research processes used in this field.
I have no specific timeline for the completion of this project. While in Albany I will be substitute teaching while I take my online courses full time so my primary focus will be on my academic career. Aside from subbing I will also resume work with a community theater I assisted in establishing where I am currently a board member. I feel that working as a substitute teacher and drama coach are wonderful ways to begin my career in education and will allow me to develop my teaching style and prepare me for teaching on a collegiate level. If I can find research internships in the field of cyber psychology or perhaps work with an online church that would be a very interesting development, but I haven’t begun researching those possibilities as of yet. I would also like to work as a TA as I progress through my academic program but I’m not certain given my distance limitations how realistic that would be. Ideally I will be able to complete my certificate in Media Management by the fall 2010 semester, when I am close to halfway through my credit requirements. I don’t want to limit the amount of time I will take to write my thesis but I will be able to focus on my research and writing full time at that point due to the money I saved in subsequent semesters by moving.
There are several classes within in the Media Studies department that I would love to take, Projects in Advocacy Media, Interactive Media, Media Literacy, and Corporate Responsibility, Media and the Law to name a few. Within the New School for Social Research I am interested in taking Fundamentals of the Sociology of Media, Political Economy of Media, and Ethics. I’m also interested in the Psychology departments Social Psychology course. The course offerings from Parsons, particularly the program in design and technology are a possibility, although, while I would love to become a proficient programmer and web designer I am not sure how realistic this goal is or how relevant to my overall career-goals it will be.
I’m not certain that there are any ways the program can help which are not currently available. To be perfectly honest I’m disappointed in the path my current job has taken and how it has pulled focus from my academic goals. I am looking forward to being much more proactive in subsequent semesters and may be better able to recognize the needs of myself and my fellow classmates then. The one thing I would like to see is a forum for online students to network and socialize. Perhaps that is something I simply do not know exists or something I could assist in creating. I feel like it would be a great addition as I’m aware of how essential having a good support network is to any type of study. I feel confident in the tools provided by the Media Studies department and am excited about working with the available faculty.
Friday, December 11, 2009
Friday, December 4, 2009
Lit Review
The news last week was saturated with a new study from Sonoma State University regarding facebook and self-image. The MSNBC.com article, “What your Facebook photo says about you” outlines the process researchers at Sonoma State underwent to analyze people’s perception of strangers facebook photos and guidelines on how to shoot the perfect “candid” photo to project your personality; be it religious, aggressive, shy or gregarious. An article published earlier this year by The New York Times, “At First, Funny Videos. Now, a Reference Tool.” Further piqued my interest in the relationship between people and the internet; especially in regards to how certain websites were evolving as people use them in different ways than originally intended. The article describes how nine-year-old Tyler Kennedy uses the popular video sharing website, YouTube.com as a reference tool when he needs to research a topic for school or for fun. Tyler seems to find this to be second nature, but when the Times interviewed his father, the attitude was one of confusion. From a business standpoint this article is interesting in that it highlights the progression of an entertainment website from frivolous fun to a viable research tool. It also makes an interesting point that children are now seeing video as not just an entertainment media, as there parents did, but as something that can teach, train and inform in new ways not always possible in traditional printed educational material.
With these recent stories in the headlines it made me interested in what kind of research had been done in the field of user-generated content. I wasn’t sure where to begin my research but eventually turned to Clay Shirky’s Here Comes Everybody: The Power of Organizing Without Organizations and found chapter 6, “Publish, Then Filter” to be an incredibly informative overview of the genre. Shirky at times plays the devils advocate while debating the pros and cons of user generated content, at one point using a metaphor I found to be to be particularly apt of a shopping center food court. In the food court, as is also the case on social networking sites such as Myspace, facebook and Twitter, you have unlimited access to the comments and conversations of those around you. While it is entirely possible for you to sit at the next table and eavesdrop, there is a question as to why you would want to. Shirky touches on the difference between broadcast media (radio, TV, movies) and communications media (telegrams, telephones and faxes) and how the distinctions between these forms of communications are blurring. “Publish, Then Filter” argues that as we become more and more active in the creation of content for the web, we develop a greater sense of ownership in our media and believe ourselves to be not only consumers but active participants. Shirky is quick to point out that this will lead to a restructuring of the media business as we know it, not a complete end of the media industry as some pundits are quick to deduce.
While user-generated content and the effects of web communities on the human psyche was a new topic to me, I was sure there was an extensive breadth of literature on the topic and was not sure how to advance with my research. In the end I decided the most logical thing to do when researching any foreign topic was to start at the beginning.
History:
The oldest available work I could find on the topic of the relationship between man and the (modern-day) internet was Internet Culture, by David Porter, published in 1997. While this book is only 12 years old it was very interesting to read Porter’s interpretation of the internet and its effects on society and perhaps even more intriguing to review the un-answerable questions Porter poses to the reader. In his chapter, “An Archaeology of Cyberspaces, Virtual, Community, Identity” Porter examines the roots of the word “virtual” and the correlation between the religious term virtuous; implying that both terms represent concepts of the un-seen; likening Christians in their belief of Christ being present through belief and virtue to the idea of community being present through web chat room users belief in the creation of a virtual community. While most modern-day studies of media terminology would find this to be a bit far-fetched, I found it to be an interesting study in the fear of the unknown that the internet was provoking in the mid-to-late 1990s. Porter goes on to describe the internet as a venue of escape while at the same time pointing out that, at the time, the internet was still generating a frontier mentality which would surely affect the types of community conditions one would find within. The most interesting thing I took away from Internet Culture was the questions Porter left unanswered as room for further research. He touches on the ideas of changing communication and community as well as the potential for the internet to affect our perceptions of identity, race, gender and class. Porter also voices his concerns in the conclusion of Internet Culture regarding the creation of the “Information superhighway” and how it will further exaggerate the digital divide and morph the internet from a platform for the free-exchange of ideas into a marketing tool for major corporations.
Seemingly picking up directly where Porter had left off is the 1999 publication, The Control Revolution, by Andrew L Shapiro. Shapiro’s work is solely interested in the potential of the internet to inspire and aid individuals to re-gain control of the research, writing and distribution of news as well as other media. Shapiro addresses several of the less-glamorous aspects of the internet such as the politics and ownership of computer code. Ownership of code is still an issue today and many, Shapiro included, are concerned that corporations are shaping code in order to maintain control and “authority” over their users. In the chapter, “Masters of our Own Domains- Personalization of Experience”, Shapiro lists the benefits of living within a digital community. He lists global business practices, political activism and education as benefits but then moves on to discuss the potential of the internet to re-create yourself into how/whomever you desire. Experimenting with identity, according to Shapiro, in 1999 was “generally believed to be a safe and productive way for people to explore alternative viewpoints and experiences” (Shapiro, pg 51) by psychologist. Shapiro touches on the use of online avatars as a means of masking the physical self. This relationship between sense of self and the internet caused me to look deeper into the psychology behind the relationship between man and the internet.
Cyber Psychology:
The 2001 publication, Towards CyberPsychology, edited by Giuseppe Riva and Carlo Galimberti, seemed to be a good starting point for my studies on the more technical end of the study of man’s relationship with computers and the internet. While many publications focusing on the issues surrounding cyberpsychology are approached from a purely therapeutic viewpoint (the internet as a therapy tool, virtual reality as a means for guided mediation and visualization, etc) Towards Cyberpsychology provides an in-depth history of the field, including theory and methods, studies of the impact of the internet and the psychological effects of virtual reality on internet consumers. While Towards CyberPsychology agrees with Shapiro in the potential of the internet as a tool to re-create oneself, it further investigates the pit-falls related to how people present themselves online and their lack of ability to judge how others view them in online environments. This book also features an interesting study, written up by Steven Stanley, on the issues of loneliness at play in online conversations and is a sort of pre-curser to the idea of using the internet as a platform for online dating.
Loneliness & Problematic Internet Use:
Stanley’s loneliness concept led me to the 2004 publication, Shades of Loneliness, by Richard Stivers. While Stivers focuses primarily on the potential for internet usage to create a social disconnect in avid users, I found his chapter on narcissism and internet usage to be particularly interesting. Narcissism, as well as depression, is described by Stivers as “pathologies of the will, not the mind” (Stivers, pg 105) which are both greatly exaggerated when lived out via second life, or social networking on the internet. He goes on to correlated modern technology as a device which simultaneously creates an illusion of power while actually stripping the consumer of power. Stivers claims that the “myth of technological utopianism” (Strivers pg 108) is created and enforced by advertising; leading the average consumer into a spiral of consumption as a measure of self-worth. Stivers leaves us with the argument that due to the internets abstract and impersonal format it can, in fact, aggravate the average persons narcissistic or depressed tendencies; tendencies which they generally believe to be using the internet to correct.
The average person will at times use social networking to cure temporary loneliness or boredom. The 2008 CyberPsychology and Behavior Journal article “Loneliness, Depression, and Computer Self-Efficacy as Predictors of Problematic Internet Use” by A. Aykut Ceyhan, Ph.D. and Esra Ceyhan, Ph.D. focuses on a study of University students attending Anadolu University in Turkey and how their levels of loneliness and depression predicted their use of the internet. While the study resulted in the seemingly obvious conclusion that students who were lonely ended up developing a greater addiction to social networking or, as this study refers to it, problematic internet use; I found the process to be quite interesting. Before reading this study I was unaware of the industry standards and scales in place to measure internet use as it relates to mental illness. Some of the instruments used were, PIUS- Problematic Internet Use Scale (developed at Anadolu University), UCLA Loneliness Scale, Beck Depression Inventory (BDI) and the Computer Self-Efficacy Scale (CSES). These modes of research and analysis led me back to the original study in the news last week about Facebook photo selection and how people present themselves on the internet. While the study released on November 9th may have been the first widely publicized report on the topic, I was certainly not at a loss when researching how people choose to represent themselves online.
Self-Presentation:
The Journal of Psychosocial Research on Cyberspace’s 2008 article, “User Descriptions and Interpretations of Self-Presentation through Facebook Profile Images” by Michele M. Strano focuses on how “impression management” changes with age and gender. Strano focuses solely on the selection of facebook user’s main profile image for this study, and for good reason. While facebook users can “lock” or block-access to other photos they may post, the main profile picture is viewable to anyone who comes across not only the user’s facebook page but also sees comments they may have posted on another user or group’s page. It is the main, and at times, only visual representation a facebook user has for the outside world. Strano’s findings are not particularly remarkable, young girls were more likely to emphasize and include friends and family in their photos, whereas older users were less-likely to change their photos on a regular basis; but it is interesting as an example of how, despite the fact that we are all using the same networking sites, we use them differently depending on our age, gender and sub-culture. I believe this highlights my belief that we use online communities as a reflection of who we are in our actual lives instead of a tool for the re-creation of ourselves into something new and different from our actual selves.
Another method of social networking and conveying ourselves and our ideas on the internet is blogging. The Journal of Cyberpsychology & Behavior’s 2008 article, “Blogging as a Social Tool: A Psychosocial Examination of the Effects of Blogging” by James R. Baker and Susan M. Moore, Ph.D. examines the effects of blogging on the writer’s sense of well-being. Baker and Moore surveyed new members of the social networking site Myspace over the course of two months to “examine the psychosocial differences between bloggers and nonbloggers over time.”(Baker & Moore, pg 1) The obvious result was that the subjects who steadily blogged about their daily activities and problems experienced the same cathartic effect that one would receive from keeping a written journal. The aspect that I found interesting was the addition of feelings of social support, alliance and community that the Myspace bloggers felt from within the Myspace community. I am unsure whether to compare this to Stivers’ study of narcissistic tendencies played out on the internet or to optimistically hope that future generations will utilize online blogs and chat rooms for more than gossip and cyber-bullying and will perhaps create mutually beneficial communities of social support and friendship. This led to my final stage of research which was to review modern usage and interpretation of the internet, particularly of user generated content.
The Cult of the Amateur:
The June 29, 2007 books section of the New York Times featured an interview with Silicon Valley entrepreneur and author Andrew Keen. Keen had just come out with The Cult of the Amateur and was touting the dark side of web 2.0 and the concept of user generated content. While I’m sure Keen makes several valid and interesting points in his book, the venomous language used in this Times interview was fascinating to me. Keen harps on his lack of faith in “the wisdom of the crowd” (Kakutani, pg 1) citing slavery, infanticide, the War in Iraq and vapid popular culture as examples of how amateur content being allowed on the internet will lead to “ignorance meeting egoism meeting bad taste meeting mob rule” (Kakutani, pg 1) and also voices his concerns regarding intellectual property law and the very concept of ownership and authorship. While I agree that there are very real concerns and legal issues involved in the creation and distribution of user-generated content I believe that to dismiss the entire genre as frivolous and damaging does a great disservice to the field of media studies. Like it or not, this is how people are operating on the internet and these practices are not likely to change any time soon.
A more optimistic article on the effects of internet usage on human behavior comes from the Washington Post. “On the Internet, everybody’s a sit-down comic: commentators and bloggers hone their humor one line at a time”, by Monica Hesse, focuses on the art of the blurb as it relates to facebook status updates, tweets, and blog comments. Hesse interviews a popular Jezebel contributor, Erin Ryan. Ryan has over 1,000 followers on Jezebel despite the fact that she does not write for them, she is a commenter. The article examines the learning-curve Ryan, as well as other funny amateurs of the internet, face when beginning their web-careers. Hesse then begins to examine whether or not the internet has made all of us a little bit funnier (at least in our writing). After speaking with FMlife.com creator and Editor Alan Holding, Hesse is torn between wanting to believe that the average blogger and contributor has evolved into a funnier person through practice and critique or, the more likely scenario, that through the rigid format of websites like texts from last night and fmlife contributors have simply learned how to mimic a style which has been proven to work. To me this is similar to the studies on facebook photo selection in that people are not simply choosing the photos/comments/shared content solely based on the fact that they like them, but are considering how the content they supply will be interpreted by others. I like to think that even if the internet is not causing us all to become “sit-down comedians” as the Washington Post implies it is in some small way encouraging us to appreciate the humor found in our daily lives and providing outlets for us to laugh at ourselves.
This was one angle to the study of user-generated content that I could not find much research on. While it is fairly abstract, I believe that studying how we select which content to share with the web would be an interesting course of study which would benefit not only the fields of psychology but could be used in a media literacy aspect as well. With greater understanding of not only how we use the internet, but how we interpret ourselves and our daily lives in relation to the internet, I believe we can be more knowledgeable consumers of everything the internet has to offer.
References:
Clay Shirky (2008) Here Comes Everybody, the Power of Organizing Without Organizations, the Penguin Press
Jeanna Bryner (2009) What your Facebook photo says about you, beyond pure science, a new study has practical implications, too, MSNBC.com
Miguel Helft (2009) At First, Funny Videos. Now, a Reference Tool, the New York Times
David Porter (1997) Internet Culture, Routledge Press
Andrew L. Shapiro (1999) The Control Revolution, Perseus Books Group
G. Riva and C. Galimberti (2001) Towards Cyberpsychology, IOS Press
Richard Stivers (2004) Shades of Loneliness, Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.
Aykut Ceyhan, Ph.D. & Esra Ceyhan, Ph.D. (2008) Loneliness, Depression, and Computer Self-Efficacy as Predictors of Problematic Internet Use, Cyberpsychology and Behavior, Volume 11, Number 6
Michele M. Strano (2008) User Descriptions and Interpretations of Self-Presentation through Facebook Profile Images, Journal of Psychosocial Research on Cyberspace
James R. Baker & Susan M. Moore, Ph.D. (2008) Blogging as a Social Tool: A Psychosocial Examination of the Effects of Blogging, CyberPsychology & Behavior, Volume 11, Number 6
Michiko Kakutani (2007) The Cult of the Amateur, the New York Times
Monica Hesse (2009) On the Internet, everybody’s a sit-down comic: Commentators and bloggers hone their humor one line at a time, The Washington Post
With these recent stories in the headlines it made me interested in what kind of research had been done in the field of user-generated content. I wasn’t sure where to begin my research but eventually turned to Clay Shirky’s Here Comes Everybody: The Power of Organizing Without Organizations and found chapter 6, “Publish, Then Filter” to be an incredibly informative overview of the genre. Shirky at times plays the devils advocate while debating the pros and cons of user generated content, at one point using a metaphor I found to be to be particularly apt of a shopping center food court. In the food court, as is also the case on social networking sites such as Myspace, facebook and Twitter, you have unlimited access to the comments and conversations of those around you. While it is entirely possible for you to sit at the next table and eavesdrop, there is a question as to why you would want to. Shirky touches on the difference between broadcast media (radio, TV, movies) and communications media (telegrams, telephones and faxes) and how the distinctions between these forms of communications are blurring. “Publish, Then Filter” argues that as we become more and more active in the creation of content for the web, we develop a greater sense of ownership in our media and believe ourselves to be not only consumers but active participants. Shirky is quick to point out that this will lead to a restructuring of the media business as we know it, not a complete end of the media industry as some pundits are quick to deduce.
While user-generated content and the effects of web communities on the human psyche was a new topic to me, I was sure there was an extensive breadth of literature on the topic and was not sure how to advance with my research. In the end I decided the most logical thing to do when researching any foreign topic was to start at the beginning.
History:
The oldest available work I could find on the topic of the relationship between man and the (modern-day) internet was Internet Culture, by David Porter, published in 1997. While this book is only 12 years old it was very interesting to read Porter’s interpretation of the internet and its effects on society and perhaps even more intriguing to review the un-answerable questions Porter poses to the reader. In his chapter, “An Archaeology of Cyberspaces, Virtual, Community, Identity” Porter examines the roots of the word “virtual” and the correlation between the religious term virtuous; implying that both terms represent concepts of the un-seen; likening Christians in their belief of Christ being present through belief and virtue to the idea of community being present through web chat room users belief in the creation of a virtual community. While most modern-day studies of media terminology would find this to be a bit far-fetched, I found it to be an interesting study in the fear of the unknown that the internet was provoking in the mid-to-late 1990s. Porter goes on to describe the internet as a venue of escape while at the same time pointing out that, at the time, the internet was still generating a frontier mentality which would surely affect the types of community conditions one would find within. The most interesting thing I took away from Internet Culture was the questions Porter left unanswered as room for further research. He touches on the ideas of changing communication and community as well as the potential for the internet to affect our perceptions of identity, race, gender and class. Porter also voices his concerns in the conclusion of Internet Culture regarding the creation of the “Information superhighway” and how it will further exaggerate the digital divide and morph the internet from a platform for the free-exchange of ideas into a marketing tool for major corporations.
Seemingly picking up directly where Porter had left off is the 1999 publication, The Control Revolution, by Andrew L Shapiro. Shapiro’s work is solely interested in the potential of the internet to inspire and aid individuals to re-gain control of the research, writing and distribution of news as well as other media. Shapiro addresses several of the less-glamorous aspects of the internet such as the politics and ownership of computer code. Ownership of code is still an issue today and many, Shapiro included, are concerned that corporations are shaping code in order to maintain control and “authority” over their users. In the chapter, “Masters of our Own Domains- Personalization of Experience”, Shapiro lists the benefits of living within a digital community. He lists global business practices, political activism and education as benefits but then moves on to discuss the potential of the internet to re-create yourself into how/whomever you desire. Experimenting with identity, according to Shapiro, in 1999 was “generally believed to be a safe and productive way for people to explore alternative viewpoints and experiences” (Shapiro, pg 51) by psychologist. Shapiro touches on the use of online avatars as a means of masking the physical self. This relationship between sense of self and the internet caused me to look deeper into the psychology behind the relationship between man and the internet.
Cyber Psychology:
The 2001 publication, Towards CyberPsychology, edited by Giuseppe Riva and Carlo Galimberti, seemed to be a good starting point for my studies on the more technical end of the study of man’s relationship with computers and the internet. While many publications focusing on the issues surrounding cyberpsychology are approached from a purely therapeutic viewpoint (the internet as a therapy tool, virtual reality as a means for guided mediation and visualization, etc) Towards Cyberpsychology provides an in-depth history of the field, including theory and methods, studies of the impact of the internet and the psychological effects of virtual reality on internet consumers. While Towards CyberPsychology agrees with Shapiro in the potential of the internet as a tool to re-create oneself, it further investigates the pit-falls related to how people present themselves online and their lack of ability to judge how others view them in online environments. This book also features an interesting study, written up by Steven Stanley, on the issues of loneliness at play in online conversations and is a sort of pre-curser to the idea of using the internet as a platform for online dating.
Loneliness & Problematic Internet Use:
Stanley’s loneliness concept led me to the 2004 publication, Shades of Loneliness, by Richard Stivers. While Stivers focuses primarily on the potential for internet usage to create a social disconnect in avid users, I found his chapter on narcissism and internet usage to be particularly interesting. Narcissism, as well as depression, is described by Stivers as “pathologies of the will, not the mind” (Stivers, pg 105) which are both greatly exaggerated when lived out via second life, or social networking on the internet. He goes on to correlated modern technology as a device which simultaneously creates an illusion of power while actually stripping the consumer of power. Stivers claims that the “myth of technological utopianism” (Strivers pg 108) is created and enforced by advertising; leading the average consumer into a spiral of consumption as a measure of self-worth. Stivers leaves us with the argument that due to the internets abstract and impersonal format it can, in fact, aggravate the average persons narcissistic or depressed tendencies; tendencies which they generally believe to be using the internet to correct.
The average person will at times use social networking to cure temporary loneliness or boredom. The 2008 CyberPsychology and Behavior Journal article “Loneliness, Depression, and Computer Self-Efficacy as Predictors of Problematic Internet Use” by A. Aykut Ceyhan, Ph.D. and Esra Ceyhan, Ph.D. focuses on a study of University students attending Anadolu University in Turkey and how their levels of loneliness and depression predicted their use of the internet. While the study resulted in the seemingly obvious conclusion that students who were lonely ended up developing a greater addiction to social networking or, as this study refers to it, problematic internet use; I found the process to be quite interesting. Before reading this study I was unaware of the industry standards and scales in place to measure internet use as it relates to mental illness. Some of the instruments used were, PIUS- Problematic Internet Use Scale (developed at Anadolu University), UCLA Loneliness Scale, Beck Depression Inventory (BDI) and the Computer Self-Efficacy Scale (CSES). These modes of research and analysis led me back to the original study in the news last week about Facebook photo selection and how people present themselves on the internet. While the study released on November 9th may have been the first widely publicized report on the topic, I was certainly not at a loss when researching how people choose to represent themselves online.
Self-Presentation:
The Journal of Psychosocial Research on Cyberspace’s 2008 article, “User Descriptions and Interpretations of Self-Presentation through Facebook Profile Images” by Michele M. Strano focuses on how “impression management” changes with age and gender. Strano focuses solely on the selection of facebook user’s main profile image for this study, and for good reason. While facebook users can “lock” or block-access to other photos they may post, the main profile picture is viewable to anyone who comes across not only the user’s facebook page but also sees comments they may have posted on another user or group’s page. It is the main, and at times, only visual representation a facebook user has for the outside world. Strano’s findings are not particularly remarkable, young girls were more likely to emphasize and include friends and family in their photos, whereas older users were less-likely to change their photos on a regular basis; but it is interesting as an example of how, despite the fact that we are all using the same networking sites, we use them differently depending on our age, gender and sub-culture. I believe this highlights my belief that we use online communities as a reflection of who we are in our actual lives instead of a tool for the re-creation of ourselves into something new and different from our actual selves.
Another method of social networking and conveying ourselves and our ideas on the internet is blogging. The Journal of Cyberpsychology & Behavior’s 2008 article, “Blogging as a Social Tool: A Psychosocial Examination of the Effects of Blogging” by James R. Baker and Susan M. Moore, Ph.D. examines the effects of blogging on the writer’s sense of well-being. Baker and Moore surveyed new members of the social networking site Myspace over the course of two months to “examine the psychosocial differences between bloggers and nonbloggers over time.”(Baker & Moore, pg 1) The obvious result was that the subjects who steadily blogged about their daily activities and problems experienced the same cathartic effect that one would receive from keeping a written journal. The aspect that I found interesting was the addition of feelings of social support, alliance and community that the Myspace bloggers felt from within the Myspace community. I am unsure whether to compare this to Stivers’ study of narcissistic tendencies played out on the internet or to optimistically hope that future generations will utilize online blogs and chat rooms for more than gossip and cyber-bullying and will perhaps create mutually beneficial communities of social support and friendship. This led to my final stage of research which was to review modern usage and interpretation of the internet, particularly of user generated content.
The Cult of the Amateur:
The June 29, 2007 books section of the New York Times featured an interview with Silicon Valley entrepreneur and author Andrew Keen. Keen had just come out with The Cult of the Amateur and was touting the dark side of web 2.0 and the concept of user generated content. While I’m sure Keen makes several valid and interesting points in his book, the venomous language used in this Times interview was fascinating to me. Keen harps on his lack of faith in “the wisdom of the crowd” (Kakutani, pg 1) citing slavery, infanticide, the War in Iraq and vapid popular culture as examples of how amateur content being allowed on the internet will lead to “ignorance meeting egoism meeting bad taste meeting mob rule” (Kakutani, pg 1) and also voices his concerns regarding intellectual property law and the very concept of ownership and authorship. While I agree that there are very real concerns and legal issues involved in the creation and distribution of user-generated content I believe that to dismiss the entire genre as frivolous and damaging does a great disservice to the field of media studies. Like it or not, this is how people are operating on the internet and these practices are not likely to change any time soon.
A more optimistic article on the effects of internet usage on human behavior comes from the Washington Post. “On the Internet, everybody’s a sit-down comic: commentators and bloggers hone their humor one line at a time”, by Monica Hesse, focuses on the art of the blurb as it relates to facebook status updates, tweets, and blog comments. Hesse interviews a popular Jezebel contributor, Erin Ryan. Ryan has over 1,000 followers on Jezebel despite the fact that she does not write for them, she is a commenter. The article examines the learning-curve Ryan, as well as other funny amateurs of the internet, face when beginning their web-careers. Hesse then begins to examine whether or not the internet has made all of us a little bit funnier (at least in our writing). After speaking with FMlife.com creator and Editor Alan Holding, Hesse is torn between wanting to believe that the average blogger and contributor has evolved into a funnier person through practice and critique or, the more likely scenario, that through the rigid format of websites like texts from last night and fmlife contributors have simply learned how to mimic a style which has been proven to work. To me this is similar to the studies on facebook photo selection in that people are not simply choosing the photos/comments/shared content solely based on the fact that they like them, but are considering how the content they supply will be interpreted by others. I like to think that even if the internet is not causing us all to become “sit-down comedians” as the Washington Post implies it is in some small way encouraging us to appreciate the humor found in our daily lives and providing outlets for us to laugh at ourselves.
This was one angle to the study of user-generated content that I could not find much research on. While it is fairly abstract, I believe that studying how we select which content to share with the web would be an interesting course of study which would benefit not only the fields of psychology but could be used in a media literacy aspect as well. With greater understanding of not only how we use the internet, but how we interpret ourselves and our daily lives in relation to the internet, I believe we can be more knowledgeable consumers of everything the internet has to offer.
References:
Clay Shirky (2008) Here Comes Everybody, the Power of Organizing Without Organizations, the Penguin Press
Jeanna Bryner (2009) What your Facebook photo says about you, beyond pure science, a new study has practical implications, too, MSNBC.com
Miguel Helft (2009) At First, Funny Videos. Now, a Reference Tool, the New York Times
David Porter (1997) Internet Culture, Routledge Press
Andrew L. Shapiro (1999) The Control Revolution, Perseus Books Group
G. Riva and C. Galimberti (2001) Towards Cyberpsychology, IOS Press
Richard Stivers (2004) Shades of Loneliness, Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.
Aykut Ceyhan, Ph.D. & Esra Ceyhan, Ph.D. (2008) Loneliness, Depression, and Computer Self-Efficacy as Predictors of Problematic Internet Use, Cyberpsychology and Behavior, Volume 11, Number 6
Michele M. Strano (2008) User Descriptions and Interpretations of Self-Presentation through Facebook Profile Images, Journal of Psychosocial Research on Cyberspace
James R. Baker & Susan M. Moore, Ph.D. (2008) Blogging as a Social Tool: A Psychosocial Examination of the Effects of Blogging, CyberPsychology & Behavior, Volume 11, Number 6
Michiko Kakutani (2007) The Cult of the Amateur, the New York Times
Monica Hesse (2009) On the Internet, everybody’s a sit-down comic: Commentators and bloggers hone their humor one line at a time, The Washington Post
Reaction Paper
The Cost of The Times- Robber Barons, The Old Grey Lady and Ethics in American Media Investments
The April/May 2009 Issue of the American Journalism Review featured the article, “A Dubious Benefactor” by AJR Senior Contributing Writer Sherry Ricchiardi. In this article Ricchiardi contemplates the “journalistic ramifications” (Ricchiardi, pg 1) of the New York Times relationship with its most recent investor, Carlos Slim. “On January 19, the Times Co. accepted a 6.9 million loan at 14 percent interest from Slim, who already owns a 6.9% stake in the company.” (Ricchiardi, pg 2) In fact, before Slim became a potential benefactor for the Times, they themselves had doubts regarding his credibility as a legitimate business man. Eduardo Porter summarized Mr. Slim’s business strategy in his August 27, 2007 opinion/editorial column, “Mexico’s Plutocracy Thrives on Robber-Baron Concessions” as such: “Like many a robber-baron- or Russian oligarch, or Enron executive- Mr. Slim calls to mind the words of Honoré de Balzac: ‘behind every great fortune there is a crime.’ Mr. Slim’s sin, if not technically criminal, is like that of Rockefeller, the sin of the monopolist.” (Porter, pg 1)
Carlos Slim Helú is a Mexican businessman whose investment interests lie primarily in the field of telecommunication. Upon writing this paper he is currently the third wealthiest person in the world whose total net worth, according to Eduardo Porter “is equivalent to slightly less than 7 percent of Mexico’s total production of goods and services- one out of every 14 dollars’ worth of stuff made by all the people in the country.” (Porter, pg 1) Slim has recently made attempts to change his public perception from that of the greedy monopolist to one of a corporate philanthropist by contributing to several charities and acting as the head of the Latin American Development Fund.
Ricciardi’s article focuses primarily on the backlash caused by Eduardo Porter’s article and the ramifications of Slim’s investment in the New York Times and its current reputation as the paper of record. Her concerns are twofold- will Slim’s involvement in the Times lead to censorship, either externally or via self-censorship out of fear of reproach? As well as- how will Slim’s business practices, often deemed ruthless, affect operations at the Times?
The intimidation machine has already begun to churn; Ricchiardi opens her article by describing a telephone call received by Times Editorial writer Eduardo Porter from Slim’s office regarding his 2007 “Robber-Baron” article. Ricchiardi goes on to bring up a separate incident involving David Luhnow, Latin American Bureau Chief of the Wall Street Journal. Luhnow describes being asked to meet with Slim himself regarding an interview series Luhnow published referring to Slim as a “genius monopolist” who has a fascination with “Genghis Khan and deceptive military strategies.”(Ricchiardi, pg 3) According to Luhnow’s account of the meeting Slim presented an itemized list of grievances he had with the article and inquired as to why Luhnow “harbored ill-will against him.” (Ricchiardi, pg 4) This obviously points to Slim’s intent to intimidate and influence the press, including members of the press corps with which he has a cordial relationship. Since Slim’s “rescue” of the Times there has been little to no coverage on the New York Times either in print or online speaking about Slim or his businesses with the exception of mentioning him in passing as a new primary shareholder. There is also no mention of his companies, the largest being Telmex, which is currently in Congressional regulations hearings in Mexico. The recent Congressional hearings and there effects on the stock value of Telmex was picked up in Reuter’s business as well as other world and business publications. The lack of any mention of regulatory hearings, the recent changes in Mexican telecommunication laws, or the endless stream of Mexican FCC probes into Slim’s business practices point to the Times staffers self-censoring.
In terms of Slim’s business practices, there are several wary spectators to this business deal, including the Seattle Times, who recently editorialized that “The New York Times is not just a company, but an institution. It is a major player in American democracy. It should not fall into the hands of a capitalist with loyalties to a foreign state.” (Ricchiardi, pg 2) However, Columbia University Journalism and Sociology Professor Todd Gitlin told Reuter’s he believes “to invest and not seek influence would bolster Slim’s reputation outside Mexico. It would be foolish of him actually to meddle with the paper. He would benefit from a global reputation of being above mere meddling.” (MacMillan/Randewich, pg 2) Personally, I would like to believe that this was true, but with his proven track record of “meddling” with the editorial content, I find it hard to believe that Slim has the best interest of the New York Times at heart.
Like any investment, interest rates rise and fall and a patience and savvy investor will reap the benefits of a long-term relationship in due time. Whether Slim is willing to sit patiently (and silently) by and wait for his investment to turn a profit has yet to be seen, but the signs in place are indicating that the answer is no. A $250 million loan at 14 percent interest to one of the most notorious businessmen in the world is a difficult thing to pay back. Monday morning the New York Times announced “plans to eliminate 100 newsroom jobs- about 8 percent of the total staff—by year’s end.” (Perez-Pena, pg 1) While this is sad news for the Times and its staff, it speaks to the cost of doing business in today’s global economy and the cost of doing business with a man like Carlos Slim.
Works Cited:
“A Dubious Benefactor”, Sherry Ricchiardi, American Journalism Review, April/May 2009
“Mexico’s Plutocracy Thrives on Robber-Baron Concessions”, Eduardo Porter, the New York Times, August 27, 2007
“New York Times May Find Benefactor in Slim”, Robert MacMillan and Noel Randewich, Reuters, January 19, 2009
“Times Says It Will Cut 100 Newsroom Jobs”, Richard Perez-Pena, the New York Times, October 19, 2009
The April/May 2009 Issue of the American Journalism Review featured the article, “A Dubious Benefactor” by AJR Senior Contributing Writer Sherry Ricchiardi. In this article Ricchiardi contemplates the “journalistic ramifications” (Ricchiardi, pg 1) of the New York Times relationship with its most recent investor, Carlos Slim. “On January 19, the Times Co. accepted a 6.9 million loan at 14 percent interest from Slim, who already owns a 6.9% stake in the company.” (Ricchiardi, pg 2) In fact, before Slim became a potential benefactor for the Times, they themselves had doubts regarding his credibility as a legitimate business man. Eduardo Porter summarized Mr. Slim’s business strategy in his August 27, 2007 opinion/editorial column, “Mexico’s Plutocracy Thrives on Robber-Baron Concessions” as such: “Like many a robber-baron- or Russian oligarch, or Enron executive- Mr. Slim calls to mind the words of Honoré de Balzac: ‘behind every great fortune there is a crime.’ Mr. Slim’s sin, if not technically criminal, is like that of Rockefeller, the sin of the monopolist.” (Porter, pg 1)
Carlos Slim Helú is a Mexican businessman whose investment interests lie primarily in the field of telecommunication. Upon writing this paper he is currently the third wealthiest person in the world whose total net worth, according to Eduardo Porter “is equivalent to slightly less than 7 percent of Mexico’s total production of goods and services- one out of every 14 dollars’ worth of stuff made by all the people in the country.” (Porter, pg 1) Slim has recently made attempts to change his public perception from that of the greedy monopolist to one of a corporate philanthropist by contributing to several charities and acting as the head of the Latin American Development Fund.
Ricciardi’s article focuses primarily on the backlash caused by Eduardo Porter’s article and the ramifications of Slim’s investment in the New York Times and its current reputation as the paper of record. Her concerns are twofold- will Slim’s involvement in the Times lead to censorship, either externally or via self-censorship out of fear of reproach? As well as- how will Slim’s business practices, often deemed ruthless, affect operations at the Times?
The intimidation machine has already begun to churn; Ricchiardi opens her article by describing a telephone call received by Times Editorial writer Eduardo Porter from Slim’s office regarding his 2007 “Robber-Baron” article. Ricchiardi goes on to bring up a separate incident involving David Luhnow, Latin American Bureau Chief of the Wall Street Journal. Luhnow describes being asked to meet with Slim himself regarding an interview series Luhnow published referring to Slim as a “genius monopolist” who has a fascination with “Genghis Khan and deceptive military strategies.”(Ricchiardi, pg 3) According to Luhnow’s account of the meeting Slim presented an itemized list of grievances he had with the article and inquired as to why Luhnow “harbored ill-will against him.” (Ricchiardi, pg 4) This obviously points to Slim’s intent to intimidate and influence the press, including members of the press corps with which he has a cordial relationship. Since Slim’s “rescue” of the Times there has been little to no coverage on the New York Times either in print or online speaking about Slim or his businesses with the exception of mentioning him in passing as a new primary shareholder. There is also no mention of his companies, the largest being Telmex, which is currently in Congressional regulations hearings in Mexico. The recent Congressional hearings and there effects on the stock value of Telmex was picked up in Reuter’s business as well as other world and business publications. The lack of any mention of regulatory hearings, the recent changes in Mexican telecommunication laws, or the endless stream of Mexican FCC probes into Slim’s business practices point to the Times staffers self-censoring.
In terms of Slim’s business practices, there are several wary spectators to this business deal, including the Seattle Times, who recently editorialized that “The New York Times is not just a company, but an institution. It is a major player in American democracy. It should not fall into the hands of a capitalist with loyalties to a foreign state.” (Ricchiardi, pg 2) However, Columbia University Journalism and Sociology Professor Todd Gitlin told Reuter’s he believes “to invest and not seek influence would bolster Slim’s reputation outside Mexico. It would be foolish of him actually to meddle with the paper. He would benefit from a global reputation of being above mere meddling.” (MacMillan/Randewich, pg 2) Personally, I would like to believe that this was true, but with his proven track record of “meddling” with the editorial content, I find it hard to believe that Slim has the best interest of the New York Times at heart.
Like any investment, interest rates rise and fall and a patience and savvy investor will reap the benefits of a long-term relationship in due time. Whether Slim is willing to sit patiently (and silently) by and wait for his investment to turn a profit has yet to be seen, but the signs in place are indicating that the answer is no. A $250 million loan at 14 percent interest to one of the most notorious businessmen in the world is a difficult thing to pay back. Monday morning the New York Times announced “plans to eliminate 100 newsroom jobs- about 8 percent of the total staff—by year’s end.” (Perez-Pena, pg 1) While this is sad news for the Times and its staff, it speaks to the cost of doing business in today’s global economy and the cost of doing business with a man like Carlos Slim.
Works Cited:
“A Dubious Benefactor”, Sherry Ricchiardi, American Journalism Review, April/May 2009
“Mexico’s Plutocracy Thrives on Robber-Baron Concessions”, Eduardo Porter, the New York Times, August 27, 2007
“New York Times May Find Benefactor in Slim”, Robert MacMillan and Noel Randewich, Reuters, January 19, 2009
“Times Says It Will Cut 100 Newsroom Jobs”, Richard Perez-Pena, the New York Times, October 19, 2009
Friday, October 16, 2009
Abstracts
Amelia Rae Koethen
Article Abstracts Assignment
Understanding Media Studies, Fall 2009
1. American Journalism Review, June/July 2009
A Porous Wall, Natalie Pompolio, Philadelphia Enquirer
Abstract: Difficult economic times combined with plunging advertising sales figures in the publishing industry have led some publications to seek creative revenue sources to stay in business. In light of the recent controversy involving a front-page “advertorial” style advertisement in the Los Angeles Time, Philadelphia Enquirer Reporter Natalie Pompilio examines the ever shrinking divide between editorial departments and advertising sales at publications across the country. Pompilio explores how aggressive sales tactics such as integrated ad units, sponsored content and over-wraps can help the bottom line while hurting the overall integrity of news publications. A Porous Wall also hints at how these relationships will change as traditional print journalism continues to progress into the online market.
2. American Journalism Review, April/May 2009
A Dubious Benefactor, Sherry Ricchiardi, American Journalism Review
Abstract: In August 2007 Mexican Businessman Carlos Slim Helú surpassed Bill Gates as the richest man on the planet. Slim, aside from owning a monopoly share of Teléfonos de México as well as over 200 other Mexican Companies recently became the newest benefactor for struggling new publication, The New York Times. The NY Times $250 Million loan from Slim raised questions throughout the journalistic community as to what control this “Mexican Robber Baron”, as the Times once referred to him, would have over the editorial content of the publication. American Journalism Review contributing writer Sherry Ricchiardi examines the issues of investor control and self-censorship in the relationship between journalist and benefactor.
3. American Communications Journal, Vol 10, Issue 03, Fall 2008
The Freedom to Choose a Personal Agenda: Removing Our Reliance on the Media Agenda, Jennifer Brubaker, University of North Carolina
Abstract: ACJ Contributor and Assistant Professor of Communication Studies at the University of North Carolina, Jennifer Brubaker compiled a report to determine if new media outlets had an effect on the controversial topic of media agenda setting. This article sites the rising popularity of online news and social networking sites with creating a more diverse portal for the average American voter to receive their news and candidate information. Through focus groups and questionnaires Brubaker concludes that agenda setting may not be as prevalent in the modern news media as is generally assumed and that the origins of agenda setting may trace back to campaign staff, as opposed to individual media outlets.
Article Abstracts Assignment
Understanding Media Studies, Fall 2009
1. American Journalism Review, June/July 2009
A Porous Wall, Natalie Pompolio, Philadelphia Enquirer
Abstract: Difficult economic times combined with plunging advertising sales figures in the publishing industry have led some publications to seek creative revenue sources to stay in business. In light of the recent controversy involving a front-page “advertorial” style advertisement in the Los Angeles Time, Philadelphia Enquirer Reporter Natalie Pompilio examines the ever shrinking divide between editorial departments and advertising sales at publications across the country. Pompilio explores how aggressive sales tactics such as integrated ad units, sponsored content and over-wraps can help the bottom line while hurting the overall integrity of news publications. A Porous Wall also hints at how these relationships will change as traditional print journalism continues to progress into the online market.
2. American Journalism Review, April/May 2009
A Dubious Benefactor, Sherry Ricchiardi, American Journalism Review
Abstract: In August 2007 Mexican Businessman Carlos Slim Helú surpassed Bill Gates as the richest man on the planet. Slim, aside from owning a monopoly share of Teléfonos de México as well as over 200 other Mexican Companies recently became the newest benefactor for struggling new publication, The New York Times. The NY Times $250 Million loan from Slim raised questions throughout the journalistic community as to what control this “Mexican Robber Baron”, as the Times once referred to him, would have over the editorial content of the publication. American Journalism Review contributing writer Sherry Ricchiardi examines the issues of investor control and self-censorship in the relationship between journalist and benefactor.
3. American Communications Journal, Vol 10, Issue 03, Fall 2008
The Freedom to Choose a Personal Agenda: Removing Our Reliance on the Media Agenda, Jennifer Brubaker, University of North Carolina
Abstract: ACJ Contributor and Assistant Professor of Communication Studies at the University of North Carolina, Jennifer Brubaker compiled a report to determine if new media outlets had an effect on the controversial topic of media agenda setting. This article sites the rising popularity of online news and social networking sites with creating a more diverse portal for the average American voter to receive their news and candidate information. Through focus groups and questionnaires Brubaker concludes that agenda setting may not be as prevalent in the modern news media as is generally assumed and that the origins of agenda setting may trace back to campaign staff, as opposed to individual media outlets.
Thursday, October 8, 2009
Intellectual Autobiography
Amelia Rae Koethen
Understanding Media Studies, Fall 2009
Intellectual Autobiography
I’ve always enjoyed speaking to large crowds. I MC’d my first event when I was five years old. Well, it wasn’t so much a rehearsed performance as it was that I simply knew the music the Zydeco band was playing at the rustic Maine concert hall my family was vacationing at and felt they weren’t doing a proper job explaining the Creole lyrics to the New England audience. I then proceeded to stay up and sing a few tunes, just for clarification. (You can get away with a lot when you’re five.) This pattern continued throughout my childhood, becoming less precocious and more patronizing with age. A brief stint in gymnastics classes came to an abrupt end when my mother picked me up early from class one day to find me pacing the balance beam performing a lecture series on musical theater to the perplexed parents waiting to pick up their more kinetically inclined children. In short, I was a born teacher. At five years old I had everything figured out, I wanted to be a “smart person” when I grew up; it then took me roughly twenty years to understand what that meant and how to go about obtaining that goal.
From my personal experience, people who come from tough backgrounds have a decision to make- stay angry or make change. Growing up in Albany, New York, I received quite the education in racism, crooked politicians, corrupt cops, violence, and a manipulative local media that in my opinion kept the whole sham system running. Or, as Architect Stanford White would refer to it “Misery, wretchedness, ennui and the devil…of all the miserable, wretched, second-class, one horse towns, this is the most miserable.” (Kennedy, 1) On top of being from a place that Stanford White wasn’t alone in considering a pretty depressing place to hang your hat, my home life was not fantastic. This led to a great relationship between me and my TV. I had a tiny little black and while portable set that I would hide in my closet. My tv helped me fit in at school, helped me know what was going on in the outside world, and exposed me to family dynamics that at times were inspiring (The Huxtables sure did seem great) and reassuring (I am surely not the only young person who watched shows like Married With Children and Roseanne and felt less alone.)
From about third grade to freshman year of high school the only effort I put into school was on not getting picked on and/or beat up; most of the time this involved not participating in or attending class. Things changed in freshman English class when I had Ms. Moscheo. She realized that I had a passion for more modern media outlets, and incorporated it into my assignments. My first attempt at a multi-media project was due to her encouragement. We were reading Fahrenheit 451 and, instead of writing a traditional book review, I created a mock up storyboard for a screenplay based on the book (the one in existence being horrible, if you’ve seen it) and a corresponding soundtrack with detailed descriptions of how the songs were relevant to the scenes in the book as well as the overall theme of the novel. It was the first time I cared about an assignment in about a decade, and I credit this experience with the beginning of my interest in the relationship between different fields of communication and their consumers.
By my junior year I was recovering from my earlier academic set backs and was exploring in greater detail the relationships between music, film, and literature. I was heavily involved in theater, DIY promotion projects for local bands, and even established a film appreciation society. In my senior year of High School I was part of a “career explorations” program where I took education courses and student taught at local schools for college credit. Originally I chose this program because I had an interest in becoming a high school history teacher, but larger issues within the system made me realize that it would be impossible. While working at a public elementary school downtown I chipped in with fellow teachers to buy breakfast for the 30 students in a third grade class who came from families who could note provide for them delivered by a city school bus which did not get them to school in time to receive the government mandated free-breakfast. I worked at an alternative school for children who had been forced out of public school because they refused to take ADD or ADHD medication. Towards the end of the program I ended up substitute teaching freshman English to a group of students at my own high school because the administration couldn’t retain a permanent teacher for these “at-risk” students. I learned early that the education system in America is broken, but I believe that it is only a symptom of a bigger problem. I believe we’ve lost touch with our values. Without a sense of community and civic engagement; I truly believe we’re being lulled into complacency and a complete loss of our ethical ideals by our mainstream media.
When I first went away to college I was completely burnt out on trying to help people. As horrible as it sounds, I wanted to make movie soundtracks and leave the whole “helping people” thing to my Albany friends who have predominantly ended up working in education and politics. But, there were a few problems with this scenario, the first being that I was not then, and am not now, a very good composer. The second being that I felt an obligation; an obligation to my five year old self, to my teenage self, and to the kids I had worked with and struggled with and especially to the kids I knew and grew up with in a system that set them up to fail. So, I changed my major to Mass Communication, Critical Analysis. I felt as if the root of a lot of the problems I faced growing up were related to mainstream media and, more specifically, my local news media. In studying propaganda, media law, advertising ethics and the history of journalism I felt like I was getting part of the story, but not the whole picture. This is when I developed my action plan- to see how many fields of communications I could work in and how they related to each other. In high school I had worked in promotion and even started a community theater company. In college I was active in the local radio station WONY and held an investigative journalism internship at the Albany Metroland Alternative Newsweekly. Post-grad I temped at several offices, the most interesting being an assignment where I managed the telecom for a contracting company, and then settled at the International Council of Shopping Centers (i.e.: the Evil Empire) where I originally began working in member and investor relations, and then received a promotion to a position in the media relations department. This was 2006. I worked with an economist and my primary job was to take his research papers and re-write them to make it sound like the economy was doing great. Not only was this a waste of their money (why pay the guy if you won’t publish his work?) it was unethical and demoralizing. There were times when I would have to keep him occupied so that he would “miss” his interview appointment and my boss could speak for him in his place. The entire 14 months I worked in this position not a single journalist asked me for a research document. Not a single fact-checker called my desk. No one questioned a single source, statistic or sound bite. The majority of my press releases were published word-for-word or (even more horrifying on my beloved friend, TV) read verbatim from my prepared statements by anchors across the country.
Luckily, since I was apparently the only person listening to said economist, I got out of that business before the market tanked and it would have been impossible for me to get another job. Currently I work in advertising finance for Time Out New York Magazine. It’s an interesting world where I feel slightly less morally compromised but still see ethical issues between editorial and advertising departments arise on a daily basis.
This is what led me to create my current action plan, develop the education and the tools necessary to instill some sort of ethical barometer in the future business leaders of America. I am still working out the logistics of what that would entail but I believe that change can easily come from inside the system. I am interested in obtaining the certificate in Media Management and perhaps working in a few more fields of media, but my end-goal is to obtain my PhD in Sociology focusing on mass media or business ethics and teach, research, and perhaps even work as a lobbyist in an attempt at someday leaving the world if not a more ethical place, then hopefully a slightly more media savvy one.
Works Cited:
[O Albany! William Kennedy, 1983, print]
Understanding Media Studies, Fall 2009
Intellectual Autobiography
I’ve always enjoyed speaking to large crowds. I MC’d my first event when I was five years old. Well, it wasn’t so much a rehearsed performance as it was that I simply knew the music the Zydeco band was playing at the rustic Maine concert hall my family was vacationing at and felt they weren’t doing a proper job explaining the Creole lyrics to the New England audience. I then proceeded to stay up and sing a few tunes, just for clarification. (You can get away with a lot when you’re five.) This pattern continued throughout my childhood, becoming less precocious and more patronizing with age. A brief stint in gymnastics classes came to an abrupt end when my mother picked me up early from class one day to find me pacing the balance beam performing a lecture series on musical theater to the perplexed parents waiting to pick up their more kinetically inclined children. In short, I was a born teacher. At five years old I had everything figured out, I wanted to be a “smart person” when I grew up; it then took me roughly twenty years to understand what that meant and how to go about obtaining that goal.
From my personal experience, people who come from tough backgrounds have a decision to make- stay angry or make change. Growing up in Albany, New York, I received quite the education in racism, crooked politicians, corrupt cops, violence, and a manipulative local media that in my opinion kept the whole sham system running. Or, as Architect Stanford White would refer to it “Misery, wretchedness, ennui and the devil…of all the miserable, wretched, second-class, one horse towns, this is the most miserable.” (Kennedy, 1) On top of being from a place that Stanford White wasn’t alone in considering a pretty depressing place to hang your hat, my home life was not fantastic. This led to a great relationship between me and my TV. I had a tiny little black and while portable set that I would hide in my closet. My tv helped me fit in at school, helped me know what was going on in the outside world, and exposed me to family dynamics that at times were inspiring (The Huxtables sure did seem great) and reassuring (I am surely not the only young person who watched shows like Married With Children and Roseanne and felt less alone.)
From about third grade to freshman year of high school the only effort I put into school was on not getting picked on and/or beat up; most of the time this involved not participating in or attending class. Things changed in freshman English class when I had Ms. Moscheo. She realized that I had a passion for more modern media outlets, and incorporated it into my assignments. My first attempt at a multi-media project was due to her encouragement. We were reading Fahrenheit 451 and, instead of writing a traditional book review, I created a mock up storyboard for a screenplay based on the book (the one in existence being horrible, if you’ve seen it) and a corresponding soundtrack with detailed descriptions of how the songs were relevant to the scenes in the book as well as the overall theme of the novel. It was the first time I cared about an assignment in about a decade, and I credit this experience with the beginning of my interest in the relationship between different fields of communication and their consumers.
By my junior year I was recovering from my earlier academic set backs and was exploring in greater detail the relationships between music, film, and literature. I was heavily involved in theater, DIY promotion projects for local bands, and even established a film appreciation society. In my senior year of High School I was part of a “career explorations” program where I took education courses and student taught at local schools for college credit. Originally I chose this program because I had an interest in becoming a high school history teacher, but larger issues within the system made me realize that it would be impossible. While working at a public elementary school downtown I chipped in with fellow teachers to buy breakfast for the 30 students in a third grade class who came from families who could note provide for them delivered by a city school bus which did not get them to school in time to receive the government mandated free-breakfast. I worked at an alternative school for children who had been forced out of public school because they refused to take ADD or ADHD medication. Towards the end of the program I ended up substitute teaching freshman English to a group of students at my own high school because the administration couldn’t retain a permanent teacher for these “at-risk” students. I learned early that the education system in America is broken, but I believe that it is only a symptom of a bigger problem. I believe we’ve lost touch with our values. Without a sense of community and civic engagement; I truly believe we’re being lulled into complacency and a complete loss of our ethical ideals by our mainstream media.
When I first went away to college I was completely burnt out on trying to help people. As horrible as it sounds, I wanted to make movie soundtracks and leave the whole “helping people” thing to my Albany friends who have predominantly ended up working in education and politics. But, there were a few problems with this scenario, the first being that I was not then, and am not now, a very good composer. The second being that I felt an obligation; an obligation to my five year old self, to my teenage self, and to the kids I had worked with and struggled with and especially to the kids I knew and grew up with in a system that set them up to fail. So, I changed my major to Mass Communication, Critical Analysis. I felt as if the root of a lot of the problems I faced growing up were related to mainstream media and, more specifically, my local news media. In studying propaganda, media law, advertising ethics and the history of journalism I felt like I was getting part of the story, but not the whole picture. This is when I developed my action plan- to see how many fields of communications I could work in and how they related to each other. In high school I had worked in promotion and even started a community theater company. In college I was active in the local radio station WONY and held an investigative journalism internship at the Albany Metroland Alternative Newsweekly. Post-grad I temped at several offices, the most interesting being an assignment where I managed the telecom for a contracting company, and then settled at the International Council of Shopping Centers (i.e.: the Evil Empire) where I originally began working in member and investor relations, and then received a promotion to a position in the media relations department. This was 2006. I worked with an economist and my primary job was to take his research papers and re-write them to make it sound like the economy was doing great. Not only was this a waste of their money (why pay the guy if you won’t publish his work?) it was unethical and demoralizing. There were times when I would have to keep him occupied so that he would “miss” his interview appointment and my boss could speak for him in his place. The entire 14 months I worked in this position not a single journalist asked me for a research document. Not a single fact-checker called my desk. No one questioned a single source, statistic or sound bite. The majority of my press releases were published word-for-word or (even more horrifying on my beloved friend, TV) read verbatim from my prepared statements by anchors across the country.
Luckily, since I was apparently the only person listening to said economist, I got out of that business before the market tanked and it would have been impossible for me to get another job. Currently I work in advertising finance for Time Out New York Magazine. It’s an interesting world where I feel slightly less morally compromised but still see ethical issues between editorial and advertising departments arise on a daily basis.
This is what led me to create my current action plan, develop the education and the tools necessary to instill some sort of ethical barometer in the future business leaders of America. I am still working out the logistics of what that would entail but I believe that change can easily come from inside the system. I am interested in obtaining the certificate in Media Management and perhaps working in a few more fields of media, but my end-goal is to obtain my PhD in Sociology focusing on mass media or business ethics and teach, research, and perhaps even work as a lobbyist in an attempt at someday leaving the world if not a more ethical place, then hopefully a slightly more media savvy one.
Works Cited:
[O Albany! William Kennedy, 1983, print]
Friday, October 2, 2009
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