Bivins- Lets get ethical

Bivins piece on ethics starts with talking about what he calls “stakeholders.” A “stakeholder is defined as anyone who is effected by our decisions or who is effected by our decisions. We are linked to our stakeholders by the effect our actions have on them as well as them as well as vise versa. As members of society we have different moral obligations to different groups of society. Though I found that it was interesting that there are four primary claimant groups that we are have different obligation towards, those being either clients or customers, the organization for which a person works, the profession of which we are a part, and society as a whole, the part of the reading I found really intriguing was the theory by James Grunig.

 

Educator James Grunig, who has a very interesting theory regarding linkages

 Grunig’s Theory

Grunig says that there are several linkages that are common to most organizations: providers, suppliers, receivers, associates and issue-defined associates.

. Providers- Provide the authority and resources necessary for the organization to exist. Examples include: Government agencies, legislative authorities, and board of directors.

Suppliers- furnish materials and other sources of needed input for the organization to exist.

. Receivers- Simply use the output of the organization

. Associates- The Organizations with similar interests or that have similar problems

Issue-defined constituents- Are those that arise as issues-dictate.

WHY DO i FIND GRUNIG’S THEORY SO INTERESTING?

.  I find his theory interesting simply because I can apply his linkages to my life here at Furman University

The providers for me here have been the people in the Admissions Office that accepted my application and enabled me to come here.

. The Suppliers that have been her for me while I have been at Furman have been my Professors because they have supplied me with the knowledge that it takes for me to exist in socieety

The Receivers during my time at Furman have been myself and my fellow students because we are acting like sponges and taking in all the knowledge that the Professors are providing us with.

. The associates during my time at Furman have been my friends and my fellow students because we all face similar challenges such as taking exams and trying to get the best grade point average possible.

The Issue-defined constituents during my time here at Furman would be anyone that comes from out of town to watch a particular sporting event

Engaging readers in a conversation

In this new world of social media, it has become common for people to want to always become interactive, and engage in conversation. That desire to become more interactive has spread to News rooms across the nation, as they try to engage their readers.

Different approaches to increase interaction

• Allowing users to customize their site.
• Opening up to users databases such as those for public spending and hotel reviews
• Providing extended coverage that would otherwise not be available on print or air.
• Administrating bulletin boards and chat.

The paper called the News & Record has been really making an effort to become more interactive. One of their editors named Lex Alexander, said that their goal in doing so hope to “better understand how we can work with the internet to expand the quantity and quality of the local news information, and dialogue we provide.”

Different proposals the News Paper has considered

• Assigning local bloggers to cover events that the paper does not.
• Recruiting one blogger per neighborhood
• Making “Letters to the Editor” into a blog.
• Digitizing Activities and making them, available online, free

The Lawrence-Journal World

The Lawrence Journal World is a newspaper that is experimenting with customizable newspapers and allowing its subscribers to tailor their own addition of the paper. While this may be a great idea and most people love these new innovations that newspapers are trying, for me it is terrifying.

Why is this terrifying to me?

These new innovations of newspapers where the direction is headed more online terrifies me, because I am not technically gifted when it comes to dealing with doing things online. I know that is awful for me to say for many reasons, not the least of which is the fact that I have been taking this Digital Communications class, and I should be feeling more confident with doing things online, like blogging, but the truth is, I am still not confident in my abilities. I am also petrified because I have an internship this summer at New England Sports Network, where they will probably ask me to do a lot of digital stuff, and I do not want to let them down.

That headstone is almost correct, what it should say instead is, “The Traditional” Newspaper Industry R.I.P.

The meaning of images

After reading this article by Sturken and Cartwright, which was about how images can have different meanings to different viewers, It struck me how appropriate this article was given that yesterday was Super Bowl Sunday. This year was a viewing record for the Super Bowl with a reported 14.4 million viewers per minute. Aside from the game, a large percentage of the viewers watch the game just to see the commercials. I know commercials are not exactly the same thing as a still photograph but commercials still leave room for viewers to interperet their meaning. For instance, the Budweiser commercial with the puppy and the horses. In my opinion, Budweiser always makes great commercials but this years was particularly touching. Watching the puppy traverse the country, run away from his owner, and even risk getting eaten by a wolf, all in an effort to reconect with the horse was unbelievable to me. However, I am also aware that some PETA members, had a problem with the commercial because they felt that it was mean to put the puppy in life threatening situation. I had the opposite reaction. In fact,the commercial made me want to go out and buy every puppy I could afford. The fact is that images can have different impacts on different people.

This picture is very fitting because that is the same question that each person has to ask themselves when watching a commercial.

                                                                                  Targeting Audiences

Another concept that this article discussed was the fact that images can target specific audiences. For instance there was one Doritos commercial that featured an attractive woman and a baby. In this commercial, the guy in the commercial tried to convince the attractive woman to come sit next to him, but when the guy so that the woman had a small baby with her, the guy quickly tried to take back his offer but it was too late. I thought this commercial was not only hysterical but it was also a great job by the Doritos company to come up with an commercial that would appeal to men, which is the primary audience of the Superbowl. It was a great job of advertising because now it will be hard for me to forget about Doritos, as a result of seeing that beautiful woman, and the more I think about Doritos the more likely I am to buy them.

It is amazing to me the amount of thought, time, effort and money that these companies spend to make a 30 second commercial. In the end though, as long as the company sees a return on their investment then it is worth it for them.

I

Character Development

It has been has been said that the two things in life that are guaranteed are death and taxes, however, I think that statement needs to be changed. There are three things in life that are guaranteed: you will die, you will have to pay taxes, and at one point in your life you will both hear and tell a good story. However, even though everyone who has a pulse can agree that they love a good story, many people disagree on what the most important aspect of a story is. For writers like Eudora Welty, the most important aspect of a story is the plot, and for directors like Quentin Tarantino, the most important aspect is the “character-driven” stories. I would never thought I would say this because I am not a big fan of his movies because I find them overly gory and gruesome, but I agree with Tarantino that character development is the most important part of a story because it enables you to become emotionally invested in the story.

“Shawshank Redemption”

One of my favorite stories, which was adapted into my favorite movie of all time was “Shawshank Redemption” by Stephen King. “Shawshank Redemption” tells the story of a man named Andy who is wrongly convicted of killing his wife and sentenced to life in prison. Not only is it a great story because it is a true story but also because the character development.

In the movie, the main character Andy is painted as an authentically smart, nice guy. The movie and book not only show his life at the prison but also the fact that he was a banker on the outside, which shows that he was a normal guy. The movie and book also go into the fact that Andy proposed to his wife under a huge Oak tree at a park in the dead of winter. This shows that Andy had a romantic side. Thirdly, the movie and book, describe how Andy helped another inmate get his GED, in order to graduate High School, while he was behind bars. This shows that Andy was capable of helping people. Thanks to this great character development, this caused me as a viewer to feel compassion and sympathy for Andy and become captivated by his struggles. I could watch “Shawshank Redemption” over and over again, and currently have seen it at least ten time.

Tim Robins and Morgan Freeman in the movie. “Shawshank Redemption.” Tim Robins plays, the main character Andy, who is convicted of killing his wife. Morgan Freeman plays his best friend and fellow inmate named Red.

                   “UNBROKEN”

An example of where, in my opinion, the character development fell short was in the new movie “Unbroken”which was adapted from the book by Laura Hillenbrand. The movie was such a let down in comparison to the book. Hillenbrand did a masterful job in giving all characters layers upon layers of a back story, which not only made the book unbelievably captivating but also helped created imagery for the readers.

The movie failed to develop any characters to the extent that I was even the least bit emotionally invested in the movie. I will never watch “Unbroken” again.

This picture shows Louie Zamperini, the main character in “Unbroken”  at a Japanese prison camp.