The End Of The Journey

After completing this blog for my assignment purpose, I am beginning to see that blogging is not a waste of time and blogs are just not known as a personal dairy where people just blog about their daily life but I find myself relying on other blogs that has assisted and helped me in this assignment. As a blogger, I believe the key aspect of a successful blog is the ability to create a blog that keeps drawing people attention, besides that an excellent blog must be able to stand out and be different compared to other blog. As a blogger is important to write ethically to avoid defamation or offend other people, which is why a blogger must always be sensitive to cultures and religious.

Now I am able to understand my readings better and are able to apply theories and ideas from the readings into full use. Through the experience gain creating this blog, I feel the satisfaction when I am now able to argue on some relevant media issues that I used to never pay attention to.

Video Blogging on Mobile Phones

Video blogging is a form of blogging in a video medium, now video blogging on mobile phones has become a familiar sight.

With the faster mobile connections and inclusive data packages, people do not need a load of cash to upload at any time and anywhere. Now people are able to add text, voice track, drop in photos and send their portfolio trough youtube. With the advance technology, people can be more personalized and interactive. Video blogging on mobile phones has gives advantage to business industry, as they are now able to transfer file through phones rather than using a pc

The issue that arises here is that whether audience can accept video blogging. Even with the new advance technology to provide better service, some people might not try or accept it. Not everyone are using advance handphones and what about for individual’s with learning disabilities might not be able to keep up with the trend.

Based on my opinion, we are living in a world of innovation, where technologies are always changing and improving. What I am trying to say is we can’t always change and keep up with it but we can slowly adopt to it step by step so that e will not be left out.

Reference:

Simmons, D. 2008, Rise of the mobile video blog [Online, accessed 10 November 2008].

URL: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/low/programmes/click_online/7392594.stm

Makkal Osai Daily Times

The Makkal Osai is a Tamil daily newspaper based in Malaysia. On 21 August 2007, the Makkal Osai printed a caricature of Jesus Christ holding a cigarette in one hand and a can of beer on the other hand. The caricature was placed at the front page of the paper with a caption quoting Christ as saying “ If a person repents his mistakes, heaven awaits him.” The Internal Security Ministry made a decision to punish Tamil daily Makkal Osai by

Shutting them down and suspending them for one month. The minister has also explain that Makkal Osai has disobey a permit condition under section 6(1) of the printing presse and Publication Act 1984, as this section is to prevent newspaper from publishing articles or pictures that would offend the public security, harmony and morality.

The issue here is ethical publishing, communication and cultural context. The caricature of Jesus Christ in the Makkal Osai has offended local religious community, predominantly Christian groups as the caricature has desecrates the image of Jesus and thus hurtful to Catholics. Publisher must not misrepresent the facts, use discriminatory language.

Based on my opinion, Makkal Osai needs to be punished in accordance to the law as they have offended the religious disharmony. If actions are not taken, this mistake will likely to be repeated by others.

Reference:

Indian Malaysian Online 2007, Makkal Osai Suspended for 30 Days [Online, accessed 9 November 2008].

URL: http://www.indianmalaysian.com/makkal_osai.html

Blog Revolution

Journalist and author Antony Loewenstein who has just release a book title “ The Blogging Revolution” , which talks about the power of blogging in six different countries such as China, Cuba, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Syria and Egypt did an interview on ABC radio interview. Over the past decades industrial revolution has marked a major turning point in human society in almost in every aspect, but here comes the new blogging revolution where people use their social power of the internet to communicate with each other and outside the world. Bloggers are quietly bringing changes, by using modern technology to bring about a more open-minded or at least self-governing transformation. People at countries such as Cuba or Iran which are hated by the west also has access to the internet, but with restrictions control by the government.

The issue arising here is the freedom of speech and internet censorship. Many journalists around the world have been jailed or suffered form brutal consequence for criticizing bout their government. According to Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), the number of journalists jailed worldwide for their work increased for the second consecutive year, and they are mostly Internet blogger, online editor, or Web-based reporter.

Based on the source http://www.cpj.org/, most of these journalists were abducted from their homes after their work has been published due to criticizing their government or publishing unsure political events which the government believes to be “offensive to the state institution and publish information that could harm the national unity.

Based on my opinion, everybody should have the freedom of speech but not be restricted by the government. As a journalist, I felt that people have the right to express or write about their opinion, as I always asked myself why the government should have the rights to clamp down all articles criticizing about them just because of their pride and image and then just putting the blame that it will harm the national unity. I do feel that internet censorship do play as an important role if the government were censoring negative issues that are threats in the protection of the community.

Reference:

ABC Fora 2008, The Blogging Rvolution [Online, accessed 4 November 2008].

URL: http://www.abc.net.au/tv/fora/stories/2008/10/23/2392620.htm

Committee to Protect Journalists 2006, Journalists in Prison 2006 [Online, accessed 27 Oct 2008].
URL: http://www.cpj.org/attacks06/pages06/imprison_06.html

The New Facebook

Old Facebook

New Facebook

Facebook has recently redesigned their layout and this has upset many facebook users. Over 30 million of facebook’s users are force to switched to the new format. These 30 million user are force to change to the new facebook, but they prefer the old layout better as the simple, streamlined design of the homepage has now have been converted into a jumble of tabs, unwarranted advertisements causes displeasure or annoyance to users. Conversely facebook engineer Mark Slee believes that this changes are useful as pages becomes more lively and better organized once users are familiar with it.

The issue here that facebook is facing is that audience adoption towards the new layout, personalization and interactivity. The new introduction and adoption of the new layout will be more personal and interactive as users are given application such as “walls” and ‘graffiti” to express or write about things.

Based on my opinion, the audience acceptance here is really important, as we can’t expect everybody to except changes, even though new interfaces are aimed to provide better services but some might not try and accept especially if there are faults in it. Is not that changes are not good, but changes should not be made quickly but rather stage by stage so that people can adopt towards it step by step and this will avoid all problems and misunderstanding.

Reference

Williams, P. 2006, MySpace, Facebook attract online predators [Online, accessed 4 November 2008].
URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11165576/

Blog

A blog is a web site, where individuals usually use to update entires of commentary, descreption of events, or other material, eg graphics or videos. According to Robin Nobles, Blog is also used as a verb, meaning to maintain or add content to a blog and entries are usually displayed in the order of reverse-chronologically.

Why blog?

Why are people so interested in blogging and what motivates them to update every single day? Well, there are many reasons why people choose to blog, and one of the main reasons is because he or she wants to voice out and wants to be heard by the publics. Some bloggers do it because they love to write, or share their opinions and they are certain people ho blogs just because everyone around them is blogging and they want to follow the trend. Today, some bloggers are earning money just by blogging, for example for famous and most visited blogs, those blggers are given opportunities to travel around the world with sponsor by companies or generating revenues by having advertisement posted on their blogs.

The current phenomenon

Blogging used to be basic and simple source of information, but today’s blogging has progress form a boring and dull technical or inspired dialogue to a different and creative web phenomenon. Based on the information given by Technorati, the size of the blogosphere has increase continuously.

The size of blogosphere per day for the past 90 days

Blogs nowadays are not categorizing as a form of personal journal but increasingly becoming and developing a stand for industry opportunities. Back in those days, advertising can only be in the form of paper materials, ink and word of mouth, but today blogs are also used to market products and services through online advertisement to reach wide range of audience around the world. The advantage of online advertising is saving time, as users can get immediate customer feedbacks and editing is much more simple and quick,

Blogging communities

Based on my opinion online communities is a meeting place where everyone has the same interests. Dictionary (2008) explains that a community is a group of people sharing the same environment. With blogs, people are able to communicate and connect with one another by having the same interest. Members do not necessarily need to have a strong bond with one another, they may be relatively strangers. Through blogs , these communities communicates with one another by giving comments and ideas. There are several types of blogging communities, such as The Blogosphere, Blog Search Engines, Blogging Communities and Directories and Blogging and Advertising (Cohen, 1985). Blog search engines are used to search blog contents, for example Bloglines, BlogScope, and Technorati. Technoati is one of the most famous search engine blog, as it provides information on popular searches and tags used to categorize blog posting.

Print designing vs online designing

According to Miller (2008), designing for print media and designing for the web are both completely different experience. These two can be compared based on different topic arrears, such as types of media, audience, layout, color, technology and careers. Nielsen (1999), print design is 2 dimensional, which means that readers are able to turn the page but for web design is 1 dimensional and N-dimensional. A web page is basically a scrolling experience for readers. Nielsen (1999), also stated that the contents posted online has to be brief, understandable, easy to read and has to be half as short as compared to print materials, as he did a research saying that people read 25% slower online.

Print materials can only daze readers with high-impact visualization, but the online medium has the better advantage as the web can show moving image control by users and allows user to control interactive widgets. For example, web technology can make maps more intresting by allowing users to click on a city and region or to excess to another page for further information. Schriver explains that it is important to have visual to support the text; he believes that “Most of the time prose and graphics are integrated as part of the body text in order to help users represent the content.” Anyhitng that is a great print design is probably going to be a lousy web design, as there are so many differences between the two media (Nielsen, 1999).

New forms of media publishing

Most technologies defined “new media” as digital, with the characteristics of being manipulable, networkable, dense, compressible, and impartial (Wkipedia, 2008). According to flew (2002), the result of the evolution of new media technologies has created new form of writing and publishing. Today’s newspapers are not only in the form of print materials but based on online version. Traditional newspapers and magazines are now accessible via online and this enables magazines to target a wide range of target audience. Nowadays people do not have any problems in reading international newspaper everyday. Besides that, business, social groups and communities now are forming blogs to get hat ever is out there. As the cyber world now not only connects people but also give great opportunities for advertiser and marketers to market their product and services. Ramona Koval aired on ABC Radio National says that, the digital world has brought all sorts of new possibilities for ways that allows people to communicate their opinions, experiences, ideas and dreams to share with people near or far through blogs, online forums and internet (Big ideas, 2005).

Reference:

Big Ideas 2005, New Media Publishing [Online, accessed 10 November 2008].

URL: http://www.abc.net.au/rn/bigidea/stories/s1485827.htm

Technorati 2008, The size of blogosphere per day for the past 90 days [Online, accessed 10 November 2008].
URL: <http://www.technorati.com/chart/the+size+of+blogosphere?language=en&authority=a4>.

Nielsen, J 2007, Writing for Web [Online, accessed 25 Oct. 2007]
URL: http://www.sun.com/980713/webwriting/.

Nielsen, J 1999, difference between print design and web design [Online, accessed 3 November. 2008]
URL: http://www.useit.com/alertbox/990124.html

Wikipedia 2007, New Media [Online, accessed 10 November 2008]
URL: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_media

Purpose of Blogging

Why do people blog? If you ask me blogs are like another form of journal and dairy that made it available to the publics, is where people decides to share things and information about themselves and life to who ever are interested. But times have changed, where blogs not only function as an online personal diary, but I do rely on blogs to provide me latest commentary or news on a particular subject.

Target audience:

Communication students will be the main audiences of this blog, as communication students are always require to be updated on media issues due to information purpose. Besides that, this blog will also catch the attention of people who are interested in keeping themselves updated on internet issues or to those who just enquire a brief and easy read.