Champlain in 60 Seconds - Save Yourselves!

Check out this awesome video by the BusyBeavers - Ally Russo, Samuel Curry and me.

Media and Me: A Day in My Life

After silencing the alarm clocks, the first thing I do is reach over to the side and turn my MacBook Pro on. With blurred vision and a desire to return to sleep, I go through my morning laptop ritual: the Internet. Once I open Google Chrome, I surf through skysports.com for soccer news, nytimes.com for the headlines, gmail.com and xkcd.com, my favorite web comic. It is my way of jump-starting the day - introducing external information to stimulate my interest and eliminate the slumber. In fact, “by 2008, 75 percent of American adults used the Internet” (Media and Culture). What better way is there to find a trove of fresh, new information instantly than the Internet?

Recent XKCD comic

(Source: XKCD Comic 829)

On my way to class, I pick up a copy of the New York Times. If I forget to pick one up, or do not pass by a newspaper rack, I use my laptop to read the online version of the New York Times (during the boring classes mostly). After skimming through the newspaper and reading through the interesting articles (while looking up and pretending to listen to the professor), I continue news-sniffing by going to yahoo.com.hk, where I read news regarding Hong Kong, and gizmodo.com to read up on the articles they have, which are always interesting and surprising. The change in the reading habits of people creates competition that “challenges newspapers, forcing their traditional role to change” (Media and Culture 262).

An introduction to Gizmodo

Once I get back from class, I turn my iPod and iHome on, blasting my play list (aptly named ‘GOOD MUSIC’). I generally do work accompanied with music, although there are moments where ‘GOOD MUSIC’ is so good that it needs to be paused in order for me to actually be productive. Recently, I’ve been listening to various forms of dubstep, electro and house music. I have taken a general disliking of commercial music. Today, there are “fewer major labels” that “control more music”, and a global reach “gives these firms enormous influence over what types of music gain worldwide distribution and popular acceptance” (Media and Culture 96).

Yukar by Michita, a pretty sick song in my opinion.

When my work is done, or when I get bored of it, I naturally switch my attention to TV. The first channel I check is FOX Soccer. I love watching football, especially the Premier League. If FOX Soccer channel, being an American channel, does not broadcast the good games, I resort to surfing the Internet for live streams instead. Recently a friend of mine told me about ESPN3, a channel that offers live matches on the Internet. I watched Barcelona’s 5-0 thrashing of Real Madrid using ESPN3 and was thoroughly satisfied with the video quality, speed and match result. “ESPN earned more than $4 billion in revenue in 2007”, and is “one of the success stories of narrowcasting on cable television” (Media and Culture 196).

Barcelona vs Real Madrid on November 29th, 2010

Final score 5-0 to Barcelona

After the match is over, I decide to head over to my friends’ place. I hop into my white Prius (named ‘Snowflake’, unchangeable due to my threatening sister), and of course, turn the radio on for the short drive. I have yet to discover a radio station that I like, but for the time being, 96.7, 90.1 or 95.5 will do. 96.7 and 95.5 are both “top 40 format” stations, with lots of ads. These stations play the same popular songs endlessly. ”Pay-for-play is a promotional strategy that typically involves up-front payments from record companies to radio stations that play a song a specific number of times” (Media and Culture 137). One can only wonder how much record labels pay for such promotion.

My friends’ place is endowed with various consoles for media enjoyment. In addition to a projector, they have two laptops, an XBOX 360 and a PS3. Unless it’s a party, one of those machines is most likely turned on to offer us entertainment. They have been hooked on HALO: Reach recently. I, on the other hand, like to play FIFA 11 or Call of Duty. In this house, losing in a game will swiftly yield humiliating insults, the strict requirement to follow orders from the victor, and constant reminders that you indeed lost in a game for the rest of the day, although sometimes this phenomenon may extend up to a week. The winner earns the privilege to, in short, terrorize you while in the premises. In terms of games, we are amongst the statistics – “some of the best-selling video game genres in 2007 include: Action (22.3%)” and “Sports (14.1 percent)” (Media and Culture 38).

Trailer for FIFA 11

After losing repeatedly, one of my friends decide that enough is enough, and puts on a movie from Netflix instead. Both the XBOX 360 and PS3 have Netflix installed, allowing us to stream movies and various TV shows instantly. In 2008, “Netflix began offering “instant viewing” of movies and videos by streaming some rentals to customers’ computer screens” (Media and Culture 241). The most popular shows on our screen so far have been Family Guy and South Park.

Typical Family Guy moment - hilarious and crude.

Once I’m ready for bed, I prop up the pillow and grab a book to read before I sleep – it’s been a habit of mine over the years. Right now, I am reading through the Wheel of Time series, starting from the first book. Personally I dislike e-books and audio books. I am simply more comfortable with the book as a medium, especially paperbacks. “Mass market paperbacks… represent the largest segment of the industry in terms of units sold” (Media and Culture 325). Although, I feel that there has been a recent surge of trade books.

UK Cover for Towers of Midnight

(Found on Amazon)

I read until I get tired or when it is too late, usually the latter. And finally, I enter a moment in my day where I am not interacting with technology.

Media Meditation #4: I *am* a Manager!

My favorite sport all time is definitely football (soccer in the US). It is unfortunate that there aren't any football matches near Vermont.

But not to worry! Football Manager 2011 is arriving soon, on November 5th. Although I am rather new to the series, having only played Football Manager 2010 before, no other video game I have experienced has had me hooked so badly.

Cover of Football Manager 2011

(Courtesy of Sports Interactive)

Football Manager is a game where you take on the role of the Head Manager of a football team, rather than playing on the field. The game contains many features (some of which will be understandable to only football fans), but most importantly, the game enjoys a very good reputation as a football management simulator. Mainly, this is because there are an enormous amount of features that managers must manage, making the game complex and very dynamic.

Here's a video of the Football Manager 2011 announcement:

Secondly, and perhaps one of its most amazing and jaw-dropping feature, is the wonderful database. To illustrate, Everton FC, a Premier League (the highest football league in England, and one of the best in the world) club, and one with an extremely long and prestigious history, signed a deal with the developers of Football Manager, Sports Interactive, to use the Football Manager 2009 database to scout potential players for the club.

David Moyes, the Head Coach for Everton

(Image courtesy of SkySports)

Now, consider the enormous amount of information in the game, covering staff, scouts and players from 117 different leagues around the world. This information was gathered through voluntary researchers and Sports Interactive's own research network. All around the world, these scouts have provided data regarding the abilities of countless players. Without knowing it, Football Manager have achieved an amazing phenomenon where users are not only willing to participate, but eagerly provide personal knowledge (or observations).

To illustrate even further, Football Manager 2011 now comes with a new feature - uploading of match highlights to Youtube or Twitter. The game will be automatically tweet updates regarding the progress of your team as they advance in leagues, competitions or win important matches etc.

For Youtube, match highlights can be uploaded straight from the game itself, streamlining a previously tedious and fairly annoying process and allowing others to share in the joy (or tears) of winning/losing a match. This is an excellent display of the trend towards media convergence, and one in which many video games overlook easily.

Here's an example of Newcastle United (my favorite team) thrashing Sunderland (haha, losers):

The Football Manager 2011 demo is out, and it is free to download, of course. I encourage you to try this game out if you are a football fan!

Media Meditation #3: Colors galore with Flying daggers

One of the best directors (and possibly my favorite in the country) in China is Zhang YiMou. Recently, under the enchanting effects of a large HD projector, my friends and I watched House of Flying Daggers, a film directed by Zhang YiMou in 2004.

Picture of Zhang YiMou at the Hawaii International Film Festival in 2005

(Image courtesy of Wikipedia)

Before I talk about the film itself, Zhang YiMou's achievement should be noted. Some of his most famous works include Hero (with Jet Li in it, and also another excellent film)

Promotional poster for the movie Hero

(Image courtesy of wikipedia)

... and Not One Less (in which he won the Golden Lion award) and he was also the director of the Opening and Closing Ceremony of the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing. So needless to say, anything produced by this man would be quite interesting.

Now, a little information on the movie I watched. House of Flying Daggers is an action film that takes place during the late Tang Dynasty. Rebel groups, especially the House of Flying Daggers, have formed against the government. Two local officers of the government decide to uproot the House by devising a plan, sending in one of the officers as an undercover along with a known agent of the House. But, of course, as most movies go, plans are thrown out the window and plot twists are introduced. For me to explain or even lightly touch upon the rest of the story would do the film no justice.

One of the features I must talk about regarding the film though, is the director's excellent use of various production technique. For one, the soundtrack of this movie has been met with critical acclaim, and after watching the movie, I must say that the music goes extremely well with the flow of the plot. Scenes are not only accompanied, but are enhanced through the music - a feature that few films are able to achieve in my opinion.

In addition, not only is the plot quality itself, but the delivery of the plot is amazing. Suspense is created through intentional pacing, with cinematically appealing slow-motion at crucial moments. It is a shame that I cannot offer any examples, but spoiling the movie would be even worse.

The best production technique employed, however, is the use of color by Zhang YiMou. If you have seen Hero, then the technique will be familiar. Zhang YiMou employs a masking color theme for important scenes.

A scene in the movie, depicting the director's vivid use of color.

(Image courtesy of filmexperience.blogspot.com)

The colors in the scenes vary in intensity, but the spectrum of colors is spectacular, especially in the last scene where snow is used in the background.

Anyhow, not only did I think this movie was well made and of quality, but what is so unique about the film is its delivery of the story. I implore each of you to just kick back and, literally, enjoy the vivid cinematography of this film. If you liked it, try watching Zhang YiMou's earlier film, Hero, which employs a similar technique.

The Wall Street Journal: An elementary analysis

Thesis:

The Wall Street Journal covers primarily US and International business and financial news and issues. Its aim, according to then WSJ Publisher Louis Gordon Crovitz, is to “earn and keep the trust of the world’s most demanding readers by delivering the most essential news and analysis”.

Five Facts*:

1. The Wall Street Journal is the largest national daily newspaper in the US.

2. Journalists for the Wall Street Journal have been awarded 33 Pulitzer Prizes.

3. The Wall Street Journal has over 2,000 journalists reporting in 58 countries.

4. WSJ.com, the Journal’s website, is the largest paid subscription news site on the Internet.

5. The Wall Street Journal is part of the Dow Jones Company, which is owned by News Corp.

*Fact sources from Dow Jones.

Triune Brain:

The Wall Street Journal is Neocortex intensive, with a large amount of technical vocabulary, financial terms, numbers and data. In addition to advertisements, there are also images and pictures, giving the Journal a dose of limbic experience, most of them serve only to accompany text or highlight an involved party.

8 Trends:

As most newspapers and journals do in order to form convergent media, the Wall Street Journal has a digital version of its journal. Not only is the digital version an exhibition of the Journal’s efforts to offer a convergent media, with updates of information and real time reporting, but so is the paper itself, in its own way. The Wall Street Journal publishes stock prices – evidence of how even the physical paper itself adapts to becoming convergent media.

In addition, the WSJ.com front page also has a Market Data widget, once again showing how directed the Journal is towards financial readers.

Another trend exhibited by the journal is its introduction of subjective, or more opinionated and personal journalism in the form of blogs. Both in the newspaper itself and especially on the digital version, WSJ publishes blog articles with varying topics, such as health and wellbeing, or politics, injecting a more subjective perspective into the journal.

7 Principles:

The Wall Street Journal is owned by Dow Jones, which is a subsidiary company of News Corp. Although the Journal emphasizes its impartial reporting of the news, it also has a rather conservative editorial.

While the news may be impartial as they say, the value message displayed through their editorial paints a less liberal picture as their news reporting does.

Rupert Murdoch

As a newspaper heavily involved with numbers and financial data, the journal helps readers by employing certain production techniques such as employing graphs, charts or tables to display information in a more efficient and understandable fashion.

29 Persuasive Techniques:

First and foremost, the Journal utilizes Scientific Evidence to back their articles, displaying an array of graphs, tables or diagrams in order for readers to better grasp the situation.

In addition, the WSJ uses testimonials, by inviting writers with a respectable background in their field to author articles or blogs, presenting their viewpoints and opinions.

Another persuasive technique employed by the journal is the use of plain folks. The journal publishes letters to the editors frequently, showcasing the opinions of other Wall Street Journal readers.

Mid-Semester Reflection

1. After studying 21st century media for eight weeks in this class, what have you learned? Please be specific.

Aside from the information and knowledge gained through textbooks, powertools and quizzes, perhaps the most important thing that I have learned in the importance of a critical mind, and how it relates to society - especially one similar to the US (a democratic and capitalistic society). I believe the lack of critical minds is the crippling

factor of this nation.

2. What is the most important thing you have learned about yourself as a critical reader, a writer, and a thinker in this class so far?

I generally believe that I am a rather critical thinker, owning to my upbringing, education and the society I have lived in. Perhaps the most important thing I have learned in this case is how to critically analyze new forms of media. Previous forms of media such as text/books/movies are rather one, or two, dimensional. New media, on th

e other hand, has a lot more dimensions.

3. What's one thing you would do differently this first half of the semester if you were to take this class again?

- I would read "What the Internet is doing to our Brains" before the class.

- Install TweetDeck before class

- Try some Yak Meat

A Yak!

4. What's one thing you like me to do differently this first half of the semester if you were to take this class again?

Allow for more flexible responses and observations. Although the power tools are useful, we should also be careful in overusing it. THe best tool is in fact the brain itself. Responses, therefore, should not be restricted to simply what is found int he packet.

5. Please comment on the usefulness of the power tools, our course blog, your personal blog, our in-class quizzes, our films and our books as learning tools.

Power tools - Interesting list of analytical tools and very useful in guiding us through different forms of media. BUt it is, admittedly, limited in scope, as mentioned in Qs. 4.

Course Blog - A good way to make students read. However, I am unsure as to the efficacy of the chapter blogs in terms of students actually absorbing knowledge.

Personal Blog - Excellent way to force students to get in touch with new media. It is surprising (very surprising) that a lot of students have no HTML experience or simple blog writing experience. Perhaps a cultural difference, but shocking to say the very least.

In-class quizzes - Don't like them, but as an old chinese saying goes: "Bitter medicine is good medicine". It certainly helps students synthesize the power tools.

Films - Good selections, especially "Reel Bad Arabs", what an eye opener!

Books - The textbook is surprisingly fun to read. Stick with it.

Camp Champ Radio Spot: The Deadly UVM Syndrome

Script:

Announcer: Are you suffering from long lectures, boring classes and professors that don’t know your name?
You must be suffering from Unscholarly Violent Mental Syndrome, or UVM Syndrome, a cruel and inhumane condition. Listen to what this UVM inflicted student has to say:

UVM Student: It sucks.

Announcer: That’s right! It sucks! Your solution? Come to Champlain College! Champlain offers a chance to study abroad, a wide variety of courses and zero exposure to UVM syndrome. Just listen to what this Champlain student has to say.

Champlain Student: It’s awesome! Before and after every class we witness the beautiful view over Lake Champlain. The campus is small and personal, just like all our classes, and there are so many different activities! Go red team dodgeball! GO BEAVERS!!

UVM Student: How can I feel real again?

Announcer: Come to champlain. It’s Champlain, or suffer from UVM syndrome for the rest of your life. It’s a no brainer.

Media Meditation #2: To tweet or not to tweet?

The answer to this question is difficult. But I have found a compromise.

The twitter logo that I have tried so hard to avoid.

From twitter.com

Recently through my Media and Society class, I have been bombarded with twitter. And I must admit, the only thing that has been stopping me from playing twitter is my preconception (or misconception, depending on if you think my preconceptions are untrue) of it.

In my mind, twitter and facebook are both excellent tools in mass communication. The only problem is that most people don't use it to its full potential. Here is what I used to think twitter was:

Yes, before I used twitter, it was just an annoying tool for people who demanded attention, spouting useless little details about their daily lives. It certainly did not help that commercials such as these were popping up on TV:

"Cool it with the twitter updates."

"I'm sitting... on the patio..."

That Verizon commercial was what I thought of twitter in a nutshell. And before twitter, I had the roughly the same attitude towards facebook. Until now.

A friend of mine once mentioned TweetDeck, in fact, he probably learnt about TweetDeck from the same class I'm taking now. Since it was about twitter, I quickly disregarded what my friend said about TweetDeck. However, after watching my professor play with it on the projector screen in class, I realized the potential of twitter.

TweetDeck - What made twitter make sense all of a sudden.

From www.tweetdeck.com

You see, TweetDeck's organization allows for twitter's potential to be realized. Twitter itself is the embodiment of the trends we are experiencing. First and foremost, it is convergent media at work - where information from different sources, different technology and in different forms merge at one point. There is a plethora of information that we can observe simply looking through tweets (minus the boring, small details of life that no one really cares about). Useful tweets are passing on information that few people know of, making it available for whoever it is that seeks that type of knowledge.

Secondly, tweets embody how participative our technology is today. While it is true that you can use tweets to tell everyone what kind of sandwich you eat for lunch, it is even better if you choose to tweet about events that you know of, or first hand news that you have heard of.

Twitter is a representation of how information, especially information found or shared on the internet, can be organized and categorized. This organization is another step in the right direction for modern media, and should definitely be taken note of by everyone.

Media Meditation #1: Fusing Daft Punk and Visuals!

So, recently two of my friends and I decided to embark on a highly limbic adventure one night - watching a movie based on Daft Punk's Discovery album.

For those of you that don't know what Daft Punk is...

Daft Punk is an electronic music duo consisting of French musicians Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo and Thomas Bangalter

Daft Punk performing at a concert.

Wikipedia image.

Previous to this film, I had only listened to a few Daft Punk songs, and only a few of them were from the Discovery album. I was pleasantly surprised at the music, as I genuinely liked most of them.

Just a basic overview of the film:

Interstella 5555: The 5tory of the 5ecret 5tar 5ystem (yes, those are 5s) is an Japanese animated film involving the story of a musical band of extraterrestrials, in a parallel universe, being abducted and taken to Earth, and their subsequent escape.

Each song in the Discovery album accompanies a specific scene of the film - sort of an imagining of the music. Taken as a film, however, consider it as the music video for the album. On an intriguing note, aside from the first song One More Time, which is played by the band in the story, every other song is a soundtrack - not part of the story, instead accompanying the events that unfold.

You may want to start at 1:30 if you want to skip all the boring stuff

Interestingly, production techniques were limited in the audio department. Aside from the album itself, there were very few sound effects. Overall, the music and visual quality melded together fairly well (although others may argue as to the style of the cinematography). In addition, the pacing of this film allowed audiences enough time and mental "space" to ponder a bit further beyond pure visual enjoyment.

Here, I will refrain from stating the value message of this film, as I believe it changes depending on how you view this film. I do believe that some of the appropriate things we should learn from this film is the power of animation and also how crucial it is for the soundtrack and the cinematography to meld together.

In conclusion? Interesting... Very interesting experience. In fact, to label this Interstella as a film would be wrong. It should be an adventure or experience.

Dipping in the media pool...

Hi everyone! Just a little bit about myself -

1. Where are you from? State or province, and town?

I was born in Hong Kong, then moved to Vancouver, Canada for 6 years. After that I returned to HK once again.

2. Describe a fun media experience you had during your summer vacation.

I watched Toy Story 3 in 3D. It was a really good movie - uplifting and satisfying. I don't remembe

r the last time when I saw a movie and came out feeling like a happy customer.

3. Describe one thing you LIKE about our 21st century media culture, and one thing you DON'T LIKE about our 21st century media culture.

I really like how expansive and fast information can spread throughout the world. I am not marveling at simply the speed or how extensive it is, rather I am amazed at how information is so readily available and easily used.

I dislike how people do not digest their information carefully. The volume of information available seems to have lowered the capacity for people to analyze and think about what they are given.
4. What vision do you have for your future, professionally?

I am currently a Business Management major. In the future I hope to start a microbrew in Hong Kong, work in the investment field and start my own company.

In the future I hope to bring in some fresh insight regarding today's media pool, stay tuned for more information!