Reflection of Weblog Assignment

From the completion of this assignment, the key takeaway that was obtained was that publishing and journalism is shifted from traditional media into a more modern internet centric media that is widely being used today. As such, existing companies that used to handle with traditional media will need to strategize their shift onto online media as soon as possible or suffer from catastrophic losses.

In addition, I have learned that today, people are able to act more individualistically with the freedom of the internet. Making it possible to work from home, and make a decent living by simply using blogs, live streams or posting up videos on Youtube. Perhaps this is a plausible future career for the generations today and to come.

Lastly, technology users are no longer confined to old beliefs, with the introduction of social media, people are getting more informed and are no longer subject to one dimensional promotions – but rather desire to be more involved in their interests and put value onto things that are well intended and follow their beliefs.

Generation-Z of News Readers

PODCAST: The news 'likes' of young people

Today’s generation, namely the young people, are growing up in a totally different infrastructure as compared to that of several decades ago. The young peoplde of today are exposed to the internet from young and are extremely savvy with the ‘new’ technology – which indeed has brought up the reasons as to why young people nowadays opt not to simply read traditional newspapers or listen to news on the radio. (Susskind, 2013)

 With the improvements made to web coding and the innovation of communication technologies, social media have become a daily necessity for the young people. Companies such as Twitter, Facebook, Google+ or Instagram allow the youngsters to simply glance across their news feeds in order to get updated with the news. With the introduction of RSS or ‘Follow’ feature they are also given the choice as to which news that they choose to subscribe to making ‘news’ of today, no longer what it used to traditionally be (economy, happenings, sports) (Schroer, 2014). What more, the internet has opened up the young generations to the global internet society, making their interests more dispersed as compared to the past where interests would be somewhat similar in terms of career, money and family. (Day, 2005)

Following up on the RSS and ‘Follow’ features of social media, they are able to subscribe to their interests news. Moreover, today followers are not simply informed of new things, they in fact, are able to gain benefits from subscription; getting perks and deeper access to the community. This is different from the more “just to let you know” style of traditional news in the past which had almost no personal interaction with the reader.

As the Human Resource Director of my club, I interviewed new students applying for committee; having asked them a recent happening such as to give their opinion on MH370, I was given responses that they simply did not care about it. Asked why, they said that they could do nothing about it and would rather not think about it; however when asked about their hobbies, they could talk about all the latest news and trend about it. 

This shows the young generations are in fact still reading news, the only difference is that they are reading news that interests them and that is the perks that have been bestowed to them by communication technologies today. (Schroer, 2014)

References

Schroer J.W. (2014), Generation Y, Echo Boomers or MillenniumsGenerations, “X,Y, Z and the Others”, Social Marketing.org. Web. Date accessed: 7^th June 2014.

Link: http://www.socialmarketing.org/newsletter/features/generation3.htm

Susskind J. (2013), Internet Winning the Online News vs. Traditional Media War, IVN.US. Web. Date accessed: 7^th June 2014.

Link: http://ivn.us/2013/03/20/internet-winning-the-online-news-vs-traditional-media-war/   

Day, M. (2005), Online players come of age, Australian. Web. Date accessed: 7^th June 2014.

Link: http://p8080-130.220.236.155.ezlibproxy1.unisa.edu.au/fedora/get/changeme:931315/CONTENT

Brand Value vs Brand Awareness

For fcuk's sake – brands are swearing more than ever

Marketing, branding, image and salience are terms used together. Today, economies are blooming greatly around the world, resulting in an improvement of lifestyle for many urban societies; that has led to an increase of branding and imaging awareness amongst marketing managers and even the consumers themselves. Comparing with the past, consumers are now more able to think about the brands and their inherent meanings; having a separate thought for simply ‘knowing’ the brand, and ‘purchasing’ the brand.  (Romaniuk, 2004)

In the past decades, marketing managers or businesses have been focusing on creating an impact on buyers, be it by creating exciting catch phrases I.e. using suggestive words like FCUK, making loud and colorful advertisements, or even having questionable logos; all these actions are in the name of making people aware of their brand, and perhaps in hopes to buy their products as a form of loyalty or subscription to its cult. Ultimately, their goal was to garner as much sales as possible, with the help of a one dimensional marketing tactic. Undoubtedly the first step of marketing is to gain awareness with potential customers, however managers have sometimes also left out the most important part of marketing – that is, marketing ‘value’. (Chen, 2012)

Value can come in many forms, value for money, valuation of the brand, value of information, value of services – as a modern consumer, I am exposed to a myriad of brands, however even if a brand has a catchy slogan, logo, or advertisement, it does not mean that I will be a loyal customer; in fact, I would rather look at the perceived value the product can give me. I believe that this is a result of a long exposure to the internet and marketing concepts – causing me, and many net users to be immune to simple tactics.

Branding, like any other, should always be conveying a value to people. For instance, an improement in lifestyle, an experience, a status symbol, cutting edge technology, state of the art are all ways that brands coerce people to buy their product today rather than simply using explosive tactics.

References

Romaniuk J., Sharp B. (2004), Conceptualizing and measuring brand salience, University of South Australia. Web. Date accessed: 6^th June 2014.

Link: http://marketingscience.info/assets/documents/62/9419.pdf

Chen H., e.t. al (2012), When More Is Less: The Impact of Base Value Neglect on Consumer Preferences for Bonus Packs over Price Discounts, American Marketing Association: Journal of Marketing. Web. Date accessed: 6^th June 2014.

Link: http://www.carlsonschool.umn.edu/assets/166774.pdf

The War of The Giants, and The Artist.

Kim Dotcom and Megaupload sued for copyright infringement by music labels

            Regulations and governments are perhaps quite synonymous in meaning as they both come together. If I were to argue on the reasons why human beings and society required or should not be governed by law and regulations this blog post would probably be too long – let us take that regulations are a norm today and that it is alright for the way regulators are doing things today. (Sanchez, 2012)

The internet is a relatively new technology introduced into the world a few decades ago; was perhaps only about 15 years back that it made it to the consumer market. In fact it isn’t even fair to say that half the world has access to the internet as it is unable to reach really rural communities. That said, regulators today are still facing with a challenge that is internet law and regulations. With the internet being widespread across the globe and that government are unable to extend their regulations outside of their countries, it is becoming exceedingly difficult for regulators to tackle the issue of infringement of intellectual property and data (Sanchez, 2012). To add on, even accounting regulators are facing issues with newly invented assets I.e. virtual assets and their accounting treatments.

That said, with this high amount of regulation grey area, it is no wonder why there are so many loopholes and exploitations happening in the internet law today; this is especially prevalent with computing innovators such as KimDotcom, the creator of Mega, or even ThePirateBay. However so, some may argue that the internet should be a place where information moves freely; I would definitely agree so – however I would disagree that copyrighted materials be shared without the consent of its owner(s).

Some may argue that the allegations made by the music labels and governments are simply corporate red tape in order to shut down internet freedom – this may hold true in some aspects however the real concern is really, the people whom are not doing the legal stuff, but creating the artworks. (Ahrens, 2011) Metaphorically speaking, wars will always involve two parties, but it’s the third party that gets all the damage, the party that contributed to abundance – the artists; unfairly paid, not getting recognition and having their properties stolen, be it by pirates, or the corporations and their legal methods.

References

Ahrens, J. (2011), STOP CENSORSHIP: THE PROBLEMS WITH SOPA, The Centre for Internet and Society. Web. Date accessed: 5^th June 2014.

Link: http://cyberlaw.stanford.edu/blog/2011/11/stop-censorship-problems-sopa

Sanchez, J. (2012), SOPA, Internet regulation, and the economics of piracy, Law & Disorder. Web. Date Accessed: 5^th June 2014.

Link: http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2012/01/internet-regulation-and-the-economics-of-piracy/

The Intentions of Journalism

M'sian Journalists Slam "A Current Affair" For 'Whoring' Over MH370

With the creation of the internet, journalism has been revolutionized in ways never imagined; this is especially noticeable with the introduction of the World Wide Web. With the improved reach, as well as the reduced barriers of entry for the industry, many new newspaper and journal websites began to surface – inclusive of older companies hopping on to the internet journalism bandwagon. With the increasing amount of news and journal sources available on the internet today, readers need to be wary that they are exposed to potential misinformation.

Recently, Malaysian Airlines had been struck with a disaster relating to the mystery of disappearing flight MH370. It was a global sensation which caught the attention of many online newspapers and journals. One report which caught the attention of journalists in Malaysia was the report by A Current Affair – which revealed pictures of the pilot of MH370 with an Australian woman in the cockpit, inclusive of other allegations by the Australian that the pilot had invited her into the cockpit and was also smoking during flight.

On the surface level, this seems to have revealed something about the pilot and his bad behavior, however so, with the absence of the pilot, he is unable to defend for himself on the allegations, and perhaps some may say that the story had been skewed in order to stir up a controversy. In fact, some even asked why was this only brought up when the tragedy happened and not years back; this had implied that the story was brought up simply to gain attention and create excitement.

When it comes to journalism and news, it is of utter importance that the report comes in the most neutral and two-sided point of view; allows the reader to be informed of both sides, then only will the reader be able to evaluate for him/herself. In addition, the intention of a report should never lean towards stirring up excitement or controversy but instead, focus on revealing the truth and informing people of what has happened. (Morton, 2010)

References

Morton, J. (2010) Staying Neutral. American Journalism Review. Web. Date accessed: 9^th June 2014.

Link: http://ajrarchive.org/article.asp?id=4837

Malaysian Digest, M'sian Journalists Slam "A Current Affair" For 'Whoring' Over MH370. Malaysian Digest.com. Web. Date accessed: 7^th June 2014.

Link: http://www.malaysiandigest.com/news/492721-m-sian-journalists-slam-a-current-affair-for-whoring-over-mh370.html