Citizen Journalism

Citizen journalism, that is the keyword, and as every keyword research we should first know, and explain who, or what we will be talking about. I could by myself at least figure out what citizen journalism was. A kind of journalism created by and for regular people. There is a lot more than that. The most interesting thing I found was the eleven layers, or steps to citizen journalism, written in a article by Steve Outing.
1 - The first step would be “opening to the public comment”. That would mean for companies and networks to let their audience comment on articles on news on-line and on the TV.

2 – The second step is called “the citizen add-on reporter”. In this second step networks use small articles, footage or advice from regular people who have something to add to a journalist’s story.

3 – Number three is called “open-source reporting”. In this step the journalist will get involved with one of his/her readers so they can collaborate into a story together, off course this reader has to be knowledgeable about that particular subject.

4 – The fourth step is the blogging phenomenon. Although a lot of people go on-line to look at “real” news and all, the majorities of hits are always of bloggers, because people want to read what other people like them have say. It is becoming more and more popular to have blogs or websites, where people write what they think, comment on news, or give the new themselves. That how the Huffington post works

5 – The “newsroom citizen ‘transparency’ blogs” works in this specific way. They are bloggers from ordinary people, but they give other ordinary people the power to be a part of it, is citizen journalism double timed. They are becoming more and more popular, some people don’t want to simply read the news, and they want to be a part of writing it, commenting and sharing it.

6 – This sixth step is one of the greater one for citizen journalism on-line, called “stand alone”, this website is usually created for a specific society, and it is written by the people in this city. The posts can be about anything that happened in the city. Subjects can be about soccer-games, the violence going on, the new playground, the new hospital that is being built, it can go very wide. That is how mymissourian.com works. But, before being posted all the text is edited by someone and then added to the website, and this makes us go one step further.

7 – Number seven would be identical to number six if it wasn’t for one difference, this “stand-alone” is unedited, that means that whatever the writers submit to posting, will be posted just the way they wrote it. This is a great responsibility to citizen journalists, because something like this has the potential to go horribly bad, and that could end up with all the credibility some citizens have acquired with time.

8 – Number eight is a combination of steps six and seven. But this time they go even further, an added a printed edition. It actually surprised me a lot that someone would be able to print a newspaper, with citizen stories. That just proves that this is a growing industry. Can we call it industry? After reading number eight a bunch of questions ran through my mind, now I wonder if this citizen journalists, are simply common people, or if writing is actually their job and this is for their free time? Do they make money out of citizen journalism? Is it easy to become one? So just because I am being posted in a newspaper or web-site I could be consider a journalist? These are questions that I hope were answered in class, it is unfortunate I couldn’t be there to talk my mouth out again. Hahaha.

9 – Number nine is a mixture, where professionals and citizen journalists work side by side. In this combination they work together, some of the citizen stories and pictures get posted, and just some of them get paid. But then again, wouldn’t people who have their stories and pictures posted be now professionals, or at least free-lancers?

10 – Number ten is like number nine, but they would work even more together. While in number nine, is a professional company, that takes some of citizen journalism, this would be a true mix of those and they would be truly side by side, and one story above the other.

11- For last is the “wiki-journalism”, where the citizens take even more parts in the whole thing, now they are not only the writers but also the editors. It is a very complex thing to understand. Even while reading I was confused how will we end up differentiating professionals from citizens?

This is all really interesting and I will be even more excited trying to look for good thing to write about and see if I can be posted somewhere. Who knows?

This information is top security. When you have read it, destroy yourself. (McLuhan)

Well, when researching for Marshall Mchulan on Google, the first web-site that they show is Marshall’s official website, there was no better way to find out who he was then looking at his official web-site. I hate to feel ignorant and to actually be ignorant regarding some issues. I did not know who he was. I didn’t even know that he was dead. =P

Marshall McLuhan

Marshal was Canadian he was born in 1911 and passed away in 1980. He was a very well educated man that taught in various different Universities. He graduated from the University of Manitoba and University of Cambridge where he also got his second Masters Degree and Ph.D. When a student, McLuhan said he would never become an academic, and that he was learning besides his master, and that he would be an English professor beside himself. In his first job, although his students were not that much younger he noticed a difference. They belonged to different generations. McLuhan decided to research what created that difference. Already pointing towards media at Cambridge he leaned even more to media and media analysis at his teaching job. He then found out that media and new technologies affected the new generations.
Marshal coined famous sayings and expressions such as “the medium is the message” and “global village”. McLuhan believed that the medium that is present in a certain time will affect society in different ways. With the first sentence, he means that we should be paying attention not only to what is being said and showed by the media, but the medium itself. So, by his point of view, what affects our society today wouldn’t be what we get over our cell phones, or what we look up on-line in our computers or phones, but the telephone and the computer itself. The convergence of the two of them is what affect society not what else they will be able to check or do on that. The expression Global Village pretty much defines what we are today, the whole world communicating in fast speed no matter the distance, the time difference, or where you are. He meant that the world as big as it is would adopted the same organization as a village where everybody knows about everyone`s life and here all the news instantly as it is happening.

Researching other blogs and looking at what they say about McLuhan I found mostly his words being cited by other people. One boy in particular was mentioning McLuhan amazing “premonitions” that he had about the world`s evolution, technology wise. He was astounded that someone in the sixties would have such good a guesses, theories, and studies about something that would happen years and years later.

I would like to finalize this post analyzing some of McLuhan quotations:

"The story of modern America begins with the discovery of the white man by
The Indians."
I think it is really interesting to see someone taking that view to the other side. It is not a very original sentence, but it is interesting to see that he though this way because probably that really affected the way he saw and analyzed anything else.

"Only puny secrets need protection. Big discoveries are protected by public
incredulity."
This was definitely my favorite quotation. It is something I had never thought about it before, and if you pay attention is the most complete truth. Area 51 was the first subject that popped into my head, because I believe it follows exactly what he said.

"Food for the mind is like food for the body: the inputs are never the same as the outputs."
I just found this saying really funny, although very much true. By his quotations we can see how much of a fascinating person he was, he truly looked at everything from different angles.

"Tomorrow is our permanent address."

Award Shows: Special, but Not All That Special

Award Shows: Special, but Not All That Special

The article talks about how the ratings for all the awards shows, including movies, TV and music, have been going down in while. They compare the ratings from 2008 2009 to others from years past. They mention that the medium age of the viewers are becoming higher, and how younger generations don’t like to watch those kinds of shows anymore. The prices to air a commercial on the time of these shows have been going down from year to year. Other than these reasons the article also gives others possible causes for this to be happening. They say that the shows are running too long and that if people watch it because of who won, what were they wearing and what did they say, they can find it all on-line. Even for music shows you could probably download the songs that were performed live on stage.

I love it!

This article caught my attention because I belong to the small percentage of people in my generation that really enjoy and love watching these kinds of show. I watch it for all different kinds of reasons. Yes, I want to see what people are wearing, the choice of the dress is a tremendous marketing tool for an actress and it should be very carefully decided by the actress itself and her P.R. I also like to know and who wins, to lose or win a Academy Award can change careers, who doesn’t remember Adrien Brody kissing Halle Berry, Roberto Benigni going crasy or Whoppy Goldberg making fun of Bjorks dress? Phillip Seymour Hoffman’s career really began after his first Academy Award win in 2006, and Marisa’s Tomei career went downhill after she didn’t win in 2002. But it is all really different for me, because I am in love with the movie industry. Waiting for the names of the winner to be announced makes me anxious like when someone is running for a touchdown. I get really happy when the ones I wanted to win actually do, and I know how to appreciate when another very good nominee wins instead. I watch it because I dream of some day being there. Nothing can compare to watching the emotion and excitement of the nominees live. At least for me is not the same.

Why care?

Current and future media professionals should care about this issue because of various reasons. If you want to be a PR there is nothing better in your clients’ career then being nominated to an award no matter if he or she is a musician, writer or actor. If you are in the movie, music industry yourself there is nothing like being nominated to one of these awards shows. It could be the highlight of your career, being appreciated by the industry you work with is amazing, and even if you are not in music or movie industries. There are awards for the whole media business, books, news, internet, advertisement, newspaper, television, musicals. If you work in the advertisement industry you should know where to announce your product. Is one of the awards shows watched by your primary consumer group? It is all involved, in an award show all types of media come together. The television shows being awarded or the network who is transmitting the show, the movies that are nominated, the PRs worrying about the red carpet, the songs in that movie, or the musicians and songs being nominated, the commercials on each break, the access on websites that covered that event on that same day or the next one, the news on TV and newspaper, the gossip and scoops on the magazines. We should all be connected and paying attention because some day, you will, or I will (hopefully) be a part of it all!


Well if you have never seen or just don't remember here are the moments I mentioned:

Roberto Benigni

Adrien Brody

And here is one of my favorite Grammy Performances ever:



Hope you guys like it!

Key Word!!!

We all know that Freedom of the press is something every country should have. Actually freedom is a word necessary in every country. People need to know that what they think and what they have to say is important, people are suppose to trust each other and be able to share with other their feelings and opinions about whatever subject they feel like talking about. Of course there is something we call common sense, and there is a place and a time for everything.

Being in a country and coming from a country that have Freedom of the press I feel like sometimes people don’t actually appreciate this. We take this for granted. Here we can right most opinions and thoughts in magazines and newspaper. We can write what we actually want, although sometimes, there are some people that maybe don’t to hear about a particular subject. Here and in Brazil you can talk well about the president, but if you just don’t like what he is doing in the cabinet you can just say that. There is a difference thought between saying your opinion and what you think about a subject and blasphemy. It is okay to say you believe something might be true, but from the moment you affirm that you know with absolute certainty that something happened, you better have evidence or else people can sue you and just give you a really hard time, and I completely agree with those actions.

Last semester I was in a class where we had a student from Zimbabwe, and out teacher used to ask her how was television in our home countries. She said that her in her country the government controls whatever goes on TV. The situation there is really really bad. Nowadays Zimbabwe lives a nightmare. Their president, Mugabe is a dictator, and whatever goes on TV need to go through a filter before, they try to filter any shows or news that have something that is not of their liking, not only national material but also international. Although the country has a constitutional act that protects the freedom of expression, the people in charge of this specific area of the dictation ship have an extremely hostile attitude towards the whole media and whoever tries to go over the “law”. They even obligated every journalist or media involved companies to register in a Commission so they could analyze their material and decide if they could or not publicize or air one or more subject. TV networks and publishers had their license denied. Other countries that also suffer from the lack of freedom in their press are, Russia, China, North Korea, Angola, most countries in Asia and Africa have a flawed freedom of press, in the American Continent only Venezuela has the press controlled by the government.

I believe that it is of most importance to have freedom of the press. That is definitely one of the things that would determine me visiting or living in this country. We should all have the right to speak, to live and to be free.

Very interesting website called freedom house.

International Student = Myself

I feel like the media in my country is pretty much the same as the one here in America. I am just going to analyze each of the Media forms and write the differences and similarities between the two cultures in these countries.

Television – Television is the same here and there. On cable we have all the same TV shows, sometimes we happen to be a season late or so, but still we have easy access to that. Now, if you don’t have cable you are stuck with two or three decent networks. The major television network in Brazil is Globo, which is actually a very good network. In this network you can get very good soap operas. Soap operas by the way are a huge thing in Brazil, and they are really different from the ones here. I feel like the soap operas here are really over-acted. Other big network in Brazil is SBT, based on Mexican soap operas, dubbed TV shows, and copies of American game shows. The news in Brazil are very much like the news here, but I feel like we pay more attention to international issues then the American news.

Movies – The movie industry in Brazil is getting better and better with time. We have excellent actors and actresses, but we have lack of support in the movie industry. We have had a lot of good movies, but thanks to very creative people. We have some amazing directors like Fernando Meirelles who had his movies The Gardner nominated to the Academy Awards, there is also Carlos Saldanha who was responsible for the Ice Age trilogy. Actors like Rodrigo Santoro, Sonia Braga and Fernanda Montenegro who actually was nominated for the Academy Award of best actress are some of the artists really growing in the American movie business. We watch the same movies, sometimes we get them with delay because of problems with the production or the distributor. Again I feel like we pay more attention to international movies then the Americans do.

Internet – Well, internet is something very much international. We have the same culture of talking on-line, reading everything on-line, downloading music, movies and clips, watching YouTube videos. We also have a social on-line network but we use this one called orkut instead of facebook. Few people have facebook back in Brazil.
Phone – There is one thing that is really different from Brazil. In Brazil only few people have phone with easy access to internet and we barely have services that offer text messages, internet, GPS and more.

Advertisement – Adds are very much like here, we have stars endorsing products, usually we have national starts for the national products, but when an add is international we usually have the same adds as here. Famous movie starts for makeup adds, famous clothes lines and perfumes. A recent happening in Brazil was when Sarah Jessica Parker a big star in America did the advertisement for a big chain of malls.

Music – The music we hear in Brazil varies. Most people my generation or younger usually listen to American music. Everything that plays here plays there. Older people usually listen to Brazilian music. I do appreciate our music, but personally I have always liked American music better. In Brazil we are very used to download music on-line and burning CDs. In Brazil it is only illegal if you are selling material that is not yours to sell. Or at least I believe that how it works.

Free Press – We do have free press in Brazil, nothing is controlled by the government. The media there definitely affects the population. Usually the products that are showing on TV are the ones people want to have, usually on the major network. We also say that sometimes the television affects the politics, usually the candidate that the major network decides to support is the one that wins. Although they are not suppose to be open about their support we can tell who they are supporting.

Millennials!

When I first saw the power point and its content I was actually surprised. Last thing I have seen about the Millennials was a video with this one old guy that had the power to make me doze off by the sound of his voice. It was good to see a different point of view to the so called Millennials or also known as us, me, we. Everyone of my friends and most of the people that go to this school and so many others in the US and in the world. After the power point I hear that we are going to see a little video. Guess which one? Yes, the old man again. Well I already know what is it about and I already know that I will be upset, and in some way angry about. I know it is not exactly the old guys fault but still, he is the physical representation of all the content in that show. So we had to write a five hundred word reply to that. Okay, here is my reply, and I promise I will try and make it as coherent as possible, but I might just let myself go for one moment and express what I feel in a non grammatical and lyrical way.

First I think it is stupid, truly, extremely imbecilic bothering about something that cannot be changed. GET OVER IT! I mean that is the way we were raised. Let us all agree, that it is not our fault. I am not trying to get away with anything, but if I grew up getting trophies for participation and not having winners or losers (which I actually didn’t), that was not my choice. I am sorry if we have the ability and courage to dream. In the show it sounds like they are all bitter just because they are now sixty and haven’t achieve some goals that people half their age did it when they were younger. Yes, we actually understand how it is to wake up at seven and to be at some place you actually despise at eight. We do know about work. What they do is generalization, and apparently they did not pay attention to English classes because that is something you just not do in an argument (got that this morning), or maybe they are just too old to remember. We do know that most of the times we have to start from the bottom and raise up, but if we want to take a risk and try to begin our own business when we are twenty, or if we don’t settle for a lousy job that pays poorly and it will make us unhappy, that is our own problem. I will admit usually when we don’t have a job we live with our parents expenses, but still if they paid our way to college and believe in us I am sure they will not think twice about agreeing that some job is not good for you. The greatest example of a company that has adapted not only to its younger employees but to everyone of them, so they can work and be happy at the same time (Yes, it possible).Google, that "little" company, whose creators rank fifth in the list of richest American, yes, that company that places as the top media empire. Adaptation, that is a word that everyone should have in mind.



Okay, some of just cannot afford to not have a job. What we ask, the least we want from and employee is respect and understanding. And guess what companies? Sometimes you too have to adept is it not a surprise? The older generations should understand one thing, WE ARE THE FUTURE. Yes, in capitalized letters. And our future is your future. It should be of your interest, so instead of putting us down and complaining about subjects that cannot be changed you should support us. Your companies will be in our hands, your grandchildren are our babies, the world will be ours one day, so instead of showing us our ugly parts, go and be our friends. Try improving what we have, our creativity, our multi tasking, and our acquaintance with technology. We can learn from you, from your mistakes and from what you did right. You can learn from us. We should all just respect each other and always try to be positive with the other side, negative attitude does not bring any good, to anyone.