Thursday, October 29, 2015

Freedom of Expression

The First Amendment. One big reason why America has become a world power. Freedom of Expression lets us, as citizens, do exactly that- express ourselves. We can almost say whatever we want. We can use photos and music that we didn't create ourselves, to an extent.

But some take their Freedoms to the extreme and enjoy pushing the boundaries. There are endless examples of social media accounts being distasteful and hurtful with their Tweets or status updates. Racism, bullying, hate, etc have an easier way to reach their audiences and offend others, via the internet. Of course, most sane people are against this; myself included. But, these blogs, status updates, tweets, all seem to get plenty of views and upvotes. There is almost no way to stop this. Almost every person in the US has access to the internet. All these people with unique voices, unique blogs, unique social media pages. It isn't reasonable for us to expect people to be able to monitor all of these people to make sure nothing hurtful is being said.

RIP!: A Remix Manifesto is a documentary film on copyright laws that affect DJs, and other people's creative outlets. The manifesto presented in the documentary is:

1. Culture always builds on the past.
2. The past always tries to control the future.
3. Our future is becoming less free.
4. To build free societies you must limit the control of the past.

The documentary is so interesting because what most people would listen to and not think twice about, could very well be illegally made due to copyright laws. It is shocking to me that copyright laws have the power to hinder somebody's creative abilities to the extent shown in the film. One of my favorite rappers said it better than I could, and it seems to reiterate #4 in the manifesto. At the very end of J. Cole's 2014 Forest Hills Drive album he is saying his thank you's. Hopefully you can get past the language and hear the message:
"And all the mothaf***in' samples that cleared, thank you
Y'all be tryin' to give a n**** a hard time on the samples, man!
I'ma go to the f***in' Supreme Court
And try to make this s*** easier
For n****s like me to clear these samples, man.
If you made the f***in' music, and you made the art
And you put it into the world
I should be able to use it however the f*** I want.
I'ma pay you, I'ma give you a percentage
But you shouldn't be able to tell me I can't use it.
Ya, that's f***in'... that's f***ed up n****.
You was inspired by the world
Allow the world to be inspired by your s*** and to use your s***.
So all them people like, or whoever that don't let n****s use they s***
F*** that man. It's 2014, 2015 by the time you might hear this s***.
F*** that man we movin' on"





Topic #2:
In reply to Nolan's Blog post:

I am a little saddened by the fact that you are displeased with Ken Jeong's performance in The Hangover. Which was one of the best comedy movies in the recent years. As for the sequels... No one can argue in their favor. In my opinion he can only play one role, and everyone got enough of that one roll in the first Hangover movie. I'm also here for because I loved Community and Troy and Abed fill me with happiness. Here is a link to Troy and Abed mainly for my grade but nobody can get enough of these guys in my opinion: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CpT4ChomJ7E
But as far as your review of this show, completely agree. My favorite line is "...the child actor playing the son, who must to be a nephew of a producer because there’s no other explanation for why they put him in front of a camera." 

Oh and thank you for your blunt honesty. That was refreshing.

Wednesday, October 21, 2015

South Park Review

South Park is an adult cartoon series that seems to be withstanding the tests of time. Now on their 19th season, the show always relates to the current events and news. South Park is about four elementary school boys, Cartman, Kenny, Stan, and Kyle, who do outrageous things in their town. The episode I watched aired on October 14th, 2015, titled "You're not Yelping". The episode follows Cartman, Randy (Stan's dad), Gerald (Kyle's dad), as well as many others in the town who use Yelp. In this episode the little town of South Park has grown and with the new found growth, comes new business. With the new business comes people who are reviewing the businesses on Yelp. Each "Yelper" in the episode goes to the businesses and says they are a "food critic" and ask for the best seat, free dessert, etc. The business owners are intimidated by the "Yelpers" at first, only to eventually band together and start a "No Yelpers" campaign in the town; hanging up signs saying things like "We don't care if you are a food blogger". Once the "Yelpers" lose power, they begin to take down businesses in a more literal sense by destroying buildings. The show quickly takes a dark turn and associates the "Yelpers" with terrorist groups like ISIS, even showing ISIS clips at one point in the episode. Eventually the major of the town gives each "Yelper" a gold badge to make them feel special, and businesses let them back into their establishments. With a convenient gold badge to make the "Yelpers" stand out, cooks begin to wipe boogers, defecate, and do other unspeakable things in the "Yelpers" food, all the while making them feel special. This creates a balance where the "Yelpers" still feel important and the businesses are able to get revenge.





The ads that were played during the episode were as follows:
-Ritani.com                                                     -Rock the Kasbah
-CheapOair.com                                             -Tostitos
-Wicked City                                                  -Joe's Crab Shack
-Joe's Crab Shack                                           -Sketchers
-Scion                                                             -Starbucks
-Kentucky Fried Chicken                               -WWE
-Moonbeam City                                            -Xfinity
-Avvo                                                             -Madison-reed.com
-Steve Jobs (the movie)
-Anti-Smoking campaign
-Rock the Kasbah
-Apple Watch
-Hulu
-MoneyMutual.com
-Xout
-Moonbeam City
-QuickenLoans
-Realtor.com
-Our Brand is Priceless
-Kia Optima
-MetroPCS
-South Park
-NBA
-Burger King
-Gamefly





The style of South Park is clearly satirical. In fact, its satirical approach on the episode poking fun on Yelp has put the creators of South Park and Comedy Central in the middle of a 10 million dollar lawsuit. Yelp issued a statement and quickly after, South Park released a statement showing just how sarcastic they can be. I found their response at NBC's website and it read “We’ve taken a hard look at the information presented to us, and after reviewing it, we have given Yelp and their lawsuit only one star. Their lawyers delivered us legal documents in a very unprofessional manner; not bothering to smile or even a quick handshake. The writing on the envelope was barely legible and in two different colors. It is our personal opinion that Yelp could do a much better job by not suing us for ten million dollars.” Kind of have to love their sense of humor. 

South Park is similar to the popular show The Simpsons. Although South Park is a lot more edgy and seems to say whatever they please. After all, here is the warning they display at the beginning of their show:



South Park is one of the few shows that doesn't try to avoid stereotypes, but chooses to embrace them. They have the stereotypical: Jewish family, single mom, Asian restaurant owner, African American family, etc. Essentially, the creators of the show chose to include every stereotype that comes to mind. 

The commercials during the show were clearly directed to men, ages 18 to about 30. Income level of middle class, perhaps even lower middle class with the multiple websites for taking out loans. I don't think I need to get too in depth as to why it is for men 18-30. Fast food, Junk food, Car commercials, I mean they even had a WWE commercial. Showing these commercials on Comedy Central, more specifically, on South Park works well because the adult humor in the show attracts older audiences. But the childish vulgarity generally turns off the female viewer. 

South Park has many strengths. It is a cartoon that has plenty of childish jokes and dark humor for those who enjoy that. Aside from its comical exterior, it also appeals to those who are up on current events. Most episodes are poking fun at current events. For example, one episode bashes on the healthcare.gov website that consistently crashed, as well as pop star Miley Cyrus. The genius of making fun of current events is that most people are already discussing it among each other, making it easy to throw a "Did you see what South Park said about it last night?" into the conversation. 

The weakness of South Park is that it isn't very appealing to wide audiences. For example, if I tell my mom about something clever the show did she is usually interested. But if she sits down to watch it with me it, it takes about 10 minutes for her to say "This show is stupid" and leave. I think older generations dismiss cartoons as "kid shows" whereas my generation takes them for what they are and warm up to them easier.  South Park tends to appeal to a very specific audience and seems to have no interest in broadening it. 

IGN reviewed this episode with a rating of 3 stars out of 5. Although I am somewhat biased to South Park, I would say this is a fair rating. Personally I would give it another star or at least a 3 and a half. But I would agree that this episode didn't make me laugh out loud as much as usual. Making it an average episode. As IGN said, some of the jokes that continued throughout the episode were beat into the ground. 

According to Den of Geek this episode only earned 2.5 stars out of 5. Although where IGN actually picked apart the episode and explained its rating, Den of Geek's review seemed to be a insulted Yelp reviewer who was going to "stick it to the man" by writing a poor review of the show. The review even ended with "But what the hell do I know, I’m just some asshole giving things star ratings on the internet." At least you understand that you are just some unqualified reviewer giving out stars on the internet. 

Personally, I am a pretty big fan of this show. I don't tune in to catch the newest episode every week, but when I see re-runs on, I always watch them. Another great thing about South Park is that you can watch it for free on Comedy Central's website. South Park does a very good job on Social Media posting clips, pictures, updates, and links to watch their show for free.

South Park is a great show for those mature enough to wade through the vulgar and profanity ridden jokes. It doesn't take long to appreciate the deeper political satyr that the show has hidden under the surface. 

Wednesday, October 14, 2015

Week 3 post

The first thing that came to mind when thinking about how companies utilize social media for advertising, was Nike. On twitter, Nike responds to a bunch of random people who tweet about their new Nike shoes, or a run they went on, giving them motivation. This is effective because it is giving people who already support Nike, a reason to continue to do so. It also gains a lot of publicity for Nike being in people's Twitter feed who might not even follow them. 
 In "What Would Google Do?" Jeff Jarvis talks about concepts of advertising. The most interesting being "Make money through the side door." He says Google and Apple make their money by essentially giving away most of their services for free, then make money on something else, or in the "side door". I find it interesting that these companies are giving away the bulk of their services for free. Where other companies assume that what they are providing is their revenue; and therefore, should be paid for it. It "Breaks through the clutter" because it is refreshing to see companies that are willing to give without expecting to immediately receive.






One advertising campaign that has stood out to me for the past few years is Doritos. It stands out to me because it very humorous.  This ad was played at the super bowl a few years back. And Doritos is known for having some of the best super bowl ads. Doritos launched a "Crash the Superbowl" campaign where they picked their favorite videos that their consumers created, then put them in the Superbowl. Seeing as how they were calling on consumers to record and submit videos, I would assume their target audience was a more tech savvy one. Ranging from age 15 to about 30. Also, the light hearted humor has the ability to appeal to almost any audience. So although the the main target was 15 to 30 year olds, I believe the Doritos campaign stretched to a wide audience on Superbowl Sunday. Not to mention the millions of views the videos have on YouTube.




The amount of Ad campaigns that I find annoying are somewhat endless. Most of the ones that bug me tend to be the ads that utilize the "Plain Folks" pitch. For example, FanDuel and DraftKings commercials, Weight loss commercials, acne commercials, and the list could go on and on. FanDuel and DraftKings makes it seem like anybody can win, but in reality, if you read the little text at the bottom of the screen and see the odds they are not in your favor. Of course anybody with half a brain should know it's a gamble playing right? But perhaps that is not the case. Maybe viewers are blinded by the sex appeal in some of the commercials. For example, one DraftKings commercial says "Just your average accountant but after winning he went from a guy with holes in his underpants, to a guy with bikini models in them." The scariest thing about this is that I didn't have to look that up. The sheer amount of times I have heard this commercial in the background of whatever more important thing I was focusing on is unbelievable. So, according to DraftKings, if you win you not only have money, but you also have all the women you could desire. This makes it clear who the target audience is. Men. More specifically, middle aged men who enjoy sports. But FanDuel and DraftKings have overplayed their commercials to the extent that most people I know change the channel to avoid them, and if they decide to stay on the same channel they role their eyes at the absurdities and unlikelyhood of what is presented in the commercials.

Thursday, October 8, 2015

Topic 2

Twitter. The time consuming monster I uninstalled from my phone about a month ago, along with all my other social media. While useful in moderation, I usually find myself looking at the clock and it is suddenly 1am when I went to bed at 10. But now that I am back in the world of twitter, I decided to follow @nasa, @TheDailyShow, and @nike. I chose NASA because I am always interested in anything space related, and it seemed like a good source for exactly that. I also went with Nike because they are the most valuable sports brand in the world. As for The Daily Show, I followed this account because it's a source of news that doesn't bore me and usually provides a good laugh. The tweets that I usually retweet or favorite would fall into the comedy category. I tend to like tweets that are making fun of others' tweets, or other comical pictures. Basically, I almost never find myself on social media for anything serious. I tend to retweet and follow things that will make me laugh. If you follow the right accounts though, social media can be an amazing source of news. For example I have a picture of one portion of my feed. NASA has a link to information on their Journey to Mars mission, and The New York Times retweeted a link on Homicide and Suicide rates. I also have another not so serious picture of the other things you can find on twitter. Like this account @TheTweetOfGod that has over 2 million followers. Social media can be good to help participate in democracy and government, but it seems most people tend to follow the wrong things if this is the goal. Democracy can be boring. God tweeting, Basketball highlights, or other hilarious pictures are all far less boring. I suppose it's just like Jeff Jarvis said, there is junk on the internet. But there is also a lot of great information. You can get whatever you want out of twitter, you just have to look in the right places.
























One topic from What Would Google Do that really stood out to me was in the New Economy chapter. When Jeff discusses making a living with a blog. Where in the past a writer would be paid by a big publisher, now anyone can start a blog for free. My poor excuse for a blog would be exhibit A. Anybody and their grandmother can make a blog almost effortlessly. To put how easily it is to make a blog into perspective, my professor said "if it takes more than 5 minutes to make your blog, come see me on Thursday." Jeff started his blog and made $13,855 in ad revenue. And his blog on Buzzmachine eventually got him enough recognition to become a journalism professor at the City University of New York Graduate School of Journalism. Jeff also boasts that after a few years his blog was worth easily seven figures. All this for the cost of $327 a year for his internet hosting. It is mind boggling to me that the internet has given anybody with a computer or even near a public library, the opportunity to share their thoughts with the world. And maybe even make a living off said thoughts.

 One question Jeff addresses in the video is "Anyone can say whatever they want on the internet" and this is true. He then says that the internet is the first amendment brought to life, which he says is beautiful. I definitely agree with him. The fact that anyone can share their opinions and ideas with almost the whole world is truly powerful. I think the internet is still young in a sense. And that as it continues, it will only get better. Everyday there is a new amazing website to help with homework, teach people to program computers, raise money for charities, etc. There will always be junk on the internet, but the junk can't get junkier. The positives will only keep increasing. I'm lucky to be born when I was, being able to witness and live in the evolution of the internet. And I can't wait to see the future of the internet.

Thursday, October 1, 2015

About me and Online Gaming

My name is Justin Burke. I recently moved out to Corvallis to attend Linn Benton. I chose Linn Benton because my goal is to transfer to Oregon State University as soon as possible. My major is currently undecided. My career goal, much like my major, is also undecided. I am hoping to learn about how the media is affected by social media and cell phone use. I am very competitive and enjoy playing sports in my free time, basketball being my favorite. I also enjoy playing video games, snowboarding, and riding dirt bikes.


Second skin is a documentary on online gaming. More specifically, MMORPGs (mass multiplayer online role playing games). This documentary actually hit home for me. My older brother is a lot like the "gamers" in the movie. Not to the extent where he has lost control of his life like some of the gamers that were presented. But, it seems he is content with working a minimum wage job, even though he has a college degree. Probably because it leaves more time for gaming. And I was the exact same way. Currently I don't play much online games. About a year ago I used to play a popular game called Dota 2. I actually quit playing because it was all I did. To the extent that when I quit I managed to rack up about 2000 hours. Once I saw that number it was suddenly easy to quit cold turkey. And the craziest part of 2000 hours was that I was still considered "new" to the game, my brother and my friends all had thousands of hours more than me. 2000 hours is roughly 83 days. In that time I could have learned a new language, worked out seven days a week, one hour a day, for almost five and a half years. The reason I got so into online gaming is because it was an easy way to bond with both my older, and my younger brother. Not to mention all my other friends who also play. But one thing is for sure, I don't regret quitting gaming one bit.