It's the Audience Stupid, All the Aggregation That's Fit to Aggregate, & Photojournalism in the Age of New Media

It’s the Audience Stupid:

What is the new approach to storytelling and how is it being used to broaden audiences?

The new approach to storytelling is taking topics and issues that affect all and comparing situations involving them in one place in the world with what’s going on in other areas. For example, a story in London can be told with comparison to what’s going on in similar situations in places such as Italy, Germany, or Poland. In the article, the author “crowdsourced,” found out that even though the majority of people she interviewed thought that politics was boring, they wanted to learn move about the lives of those in other European nations and how they deal with issues that affect everyone. By telling the stories of people and not just the situations themselves, it expands the potential audience size.

How is digital media being used to engage audiences?

Because of digital media, we can now connect to places one thought to be too far to reach out to with newer technologies. We can call upon experts from around the world to talk about issues and topics, international debates can now be triggered all over the world based on these issues and topics and the potential audience that can be “crowdsourced” has greatly expanded. For example, the article points out the situation about health care reform in the United States sparked debate involving the health care systems in other countries, such as Canada, Britain, France and Japan. Also, doctors in America may have worked around the world and health insurance companies are global entities; they don’t just cover Americans.

Give three specific examples of how you can incorporate storytelling into an article you write.

1. When talking about how to deal with a terrorist organization, there can be comparative journalism to see how other countries, if they have, dealt with the organization.

2. When talking about minimum wage and if it should be raised, there can be comparisons to how other areas dealt with minimum wage issues.

3. When there’s a debate on the type of sentencing a criminal should face, such as life in prison versus the death penalty, there can be a look at other people with similar crimes and what happened to them.

All the Aggregation That’s Fit to Aggregate:

What does aggregation mean?

Aggregation, as described in the article by Bill Keller, is taking other people’s words, putting them on your own website and gaining the revenue and attention that the other people deserve.

Why does the author describe Arianna Huffington as “the queen of aggregation?” Go to the Huffington Post and provide an example.

He describes Huffington as such because, according to Keller, she takes things such as gossip news, viral videos, blogs, and news reporters and puts them all on her own website to her own liking. Keller claims that Huffington, along with other aggregators, has realized that if everyone is aggregating, no one will be able to find stuff to do so. Therefore, she hires other journalists to produce original pieces.

An example from the Huffington Post is: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/03/20/richard-branson-tesla_n_6910526.html?utm_hp_ref=business

Is aggregation a threat to professional journalism — why or why not?

Yes, aggregation is a serious threat to professional journalism, especially since this is a time where every news source is rushing to be the first one to get the story out there and people, likewise, are racing to find the first reliable thing they have to give them all the information. If people go to a site that’s aggregated for the story, they are stealing the attention from a news source that actually was the one to truly break the story and a journalist who actually got first-hand information and sources. By getting the story from a second hand source, facts may be skewed or not as accurate. Aggregating stories take away credit from the journalist who was actually doing his or her job.

Photojournalism in the Age of New Media:

A professional journalist receives a photo captured by a citizen journalist….

• ·      What are the positives?
• ·      Why does the professional journalist need to be careful?
• ·      Why might the content of the photo be called into question?
• ·      How does the citizen photojournalist impact the job of the professional journalist?

• ·      The positives are that is that journalism organizations have more eyes on ongoing and breaking stories than ever before. In areas where there is little journalist access for reasons (such as communication interruptions in areas of natural disasters [ex: Haiti earthquake in 2010]), the citizen journalist who took the photo is giving a first-hand account of the ongoing story or its aftermath.
• ·      The professional journalist needs to be careful when it comes to giving correct attribution to the photo. With social media sites today and how quickly news and photos can spread, the same photo can be spread all over the world in just a short time. It’s the professional journalist’s responsibility to give attribution to the correct person — the one who actually took the photo.
• ·      If the person who took the photo cannot be accurately and definitely be determined, or if there is any suspicion that the person claiming to have been may be lying, then the content of the photo comes into question. According to Santiago Lyon, director of photography for the Associated Press, these situations are dealt with on a case-by-case basis and questions are asked such as if the person is in a position to deal with the content or if the content and quality of the photo is so much better than any photo the news agency has.
• ·      With all the technology available today, any ordinary person can become a journalist. It gives the professional journalist more of a chance to get a photo that is a first-hand account of the newsworthy material. Of course, the professional journalist has to be careful and make sure he or she has got the right person to attribute the image to.

Youtube as a participatory culture

Questions for the article “Youtube”

1. How does the interaction online become the key for Youtube video production community? Please use the media convergence concept to explain it.

Interaction is the key component of Youtube because of the producer-consumer concept of media convergence. The producers make a video and then get views, ratings, and comments on the videos. As the publisher views his comments (making the original consumer a producer and the original producer a consumer), he or she can also reply to the comments. There also is (or at least used to be) an option to make a video response to a video, so that is another way for a consumer to become a producer. This cycle is continuous and is what connects all of Youtube together as one online community.

2. The article mentioned that the teens are mainly passively consumers of Youtube being on the periphery. But seven out of 10 most subscribed partners are teens and young adults. How do you explain this use of Youtube in youth?

For youth, Youtube is another alternative to television, just like how Netflix is now. The youth view Youtube videos out of their own entertainment, or to watch exclusive series that is produced by either a company or several videos produced by one Youtube star or partner. They may also fear arguments and cyberbulling for what they comment and/or publish.

3. How does Youtube use different techniques to create an online community that is different from other websites?

Youtube has different techniques that make it more different, and arguably more powerful, than other social media sites. On Facebook, you can only like, comment, and share, and friend request. On Twitter, you can only follow, re-tweet, and favorite. But on Youtube, you can do more. You can make and upload videos, like videos, add them to your favorites playlist, subscribe to Youtubers, post comments on videos and pages, add video responses to videos, rate videos, and share videos onto other social media platforms. Youtube arguably has more producer-consumer interaction than any other social media site.

4. What is the next step for Youtube development? Please use the concept of participatory culture and media development theory we discussed to explain your answer.

With so much participatory culture and many companies starting to actively use Youtube to promote their product, Youtube will have to continue to grow. The Youtube of 2006 was different than the Youtube of 2009, which was different than the Youtube of 2015, which will be different than the Youtube of 2020. The seeds of Youtube knowing what a specific person would want are already being planted. Now on Youtube, the website recommends channels and videos for you while still giving you your usual subscriptions and promoting their own choices of videos and channels. This is similar to the approach of Web 3.0, making technology more human-like. That is what will happen to Youtube in the future.

Social Media Use Is Soaring Questions

1. While I was not aware of the specific statistics of usage in terms of PCs vs. phones, I feel like it should be the other way around. I've seen more active usage of social media on phones and other mobile devices rather than PCs, unless it's taking into account any inactive tabs with social media open. Another stat I have learned is the amount of social media usage in restrooms. I do usually have my phone near me when showering in the event I get a text or phone call, but to know that that many people have a dependence on social media while in the bathroom is…interesting, to say the least. Finally, and the statistic that gave me the most shock, was that 76% of people feel more positive after looking at social media. I would think there is still a good amount of people who look at their social media accounts and get depressed. For example, I've seen people get upset from their social media after getting jealous seeing someone they know get into a relationship, or getting sad at a friend's death in the family.

2. I've learned that even though I knew social media took out a huge portion of people's lives nowadays, it seems like it is going to have a complete takeover one of these days. It seems as a society, we are becoming more and more dependent on our social media daily for entertainment and informational purposes. Soon enough, anything and everything will be involved with social media if it isn't already. TV shows use social media to create and analyze its audiences and their reactions to the show, and social media creates a sort of interactive chatroom for people to talk about a show, product, etc.

Web 3.0

            Web 3.0 is the stage in which computers will begin to pick up humanistic qualities. With Web 1.0, a producer simply makes a product and a consumer simply takes in that product and that is that. Then came Web 2.0 and the lines that were between producer and consumer became blurred. A producer still made a product and the consumer took it in, but now there’s more to it. The consumer can now also be a producer. The author of the article, Miko Coffey, used Facebook as an example for Web 2.0. With Facebook, not only does a person take in information, but also produces his or her own with status updates and photo and video sharing. Produces can also be consumers on Facebook through things such as reviews.

            Coffey used an analogy about soup to describe Web 3.0, or what she calls the “semantic web.” In the example, she says that you can take two pots — one with a carrot and one with pasta — and label them as such, and a computer can understand that. What the computer can’t understand, however, is what exactly is contained in the carrot, that the pots are right next to each other, or any specific details about the guests you’d have coming over for that dinner.

            That is where Web 3.0 would come into play — the computer understands the bigger picture and all the more in-depth, meaningful details. Web 3.0 would see the computer be able to take details and information from various sources and put it all together. This also allows the computers to think more human-like. With Web 3.0, not only would computers be more knowing and analytical, it can allow you to get more answers to more questions.