Monday, November 15, 2010

Reflection

Though out the process of all these blog post, I have learned that in Publishing and Designing materials or documents have its different formats and methods to do it. Not only that, there are also many ethical considerations that has to be done to avoid offending people.

The most important issue in publishing and design documents, it is mainly the content. Make sure the content will suit the general context, we also have to consider others feelings and write professionally, ethically in a non-offensive language that is well understood by others.

Also, i think referencing is very important, if you have taken some other people's idea or thoughts, you must solely credit them and cite them into your document. Referencing is also important for students to refer whether is it a credible source. At the very least when you have references and citations, we know that you source of information exists and credible rather than just words.

impersonate no more!

From what I understand from Simon Owens' article 'How Celebrity Imposters Hurt Twitter's Credibility', it is said that many credible people like the Dalai Lama, being such a nice human being, some impersonator opened up a twitter account and impersonate Dalai Lama. Now the question here is, is it ethical to impersonate someone that you're not?

No it is not ethical, in fact it is violating the Twitter's Terms of Service.  and also it also makes us Twitter users very hard to differentiate or we will no longer believe who is real and who is fake. It also ruins the credibility of the celebrity. 


To help solve this problem, Twitter's Co-founder Biz Stone said: "In the end, though, he encouraged celebrities to not only join the micro-blogging service, but to run their accounts themselves." 


This will not only reduce the numbers of impersonators on Twitter and also celebrities could use Twitter as a tool to communicate directly with their fans. It is very hard for Twitter to tackle this problem. According to Simon Owens (2009) he said, "Because there are thousands of new users signing up every day, it's virtually impossible for Twitter's relatively small staff to monitor accounts for imposters. Instead, they often have to rely on the person being misrepresented contacting the company."


This is why i think it is a very good idea for Twitter to introduce a news system which verifies celebrities as real celebrities and not impostors. With this new system, it is also easier for me to find and follow my favourite celebrities without worrying whether he or she is a fake.


Verified account symbol




References: 


Owens, S. 2009, "How Celebrity Imposters Hurt Twitter's Credibility", [Online] PBS.org, viewed 14 November 2010, <http://www.pbs.org/mediashift/2009/02/how-celebrity-imposters-hurt-twitters-credibility051.html>






Twitter and its usage!

Photo Courtesy: Google


Twitter have been emerged into a new micro-blogging application where it could be installed in our mobile phones or it could also be accessed using a laptop or a computer using the old school web browsers.

Twitter is normally used to just post about our random daily lives, it only allow 140 characters, so imagine in that tiny space, how many tweets(posts) a person could tweet a day. Twitter is used by many because not only you can connect with your friends but also if you were to start your own business, twitter is the choice for you to have zero cost publicity.

Twitter is the new black, blogs are so yesterday. Reason why I think is because Twitter, a micro-blogging application is easy accessed, it could even be accessed on mobile phones now. Whereas blogs are so old school where you have to launch it with a web browser and then wait for it to load. Twitter could be done anywhere at anytime.


As for news agencies, Twitter is also widely used. According to Nic Dawes, the editor of the Mail & Guardian, when asked about what values had twitter add to news operation, he mentioned said:” On a news level, as I have mentioned, it helps with tip-offs, sourcing, alerting us to breaking stories, and a sense of one slice of public opinion. It also makes us part of a networked news community that includes other journalists, bloggers, ordinary readers, public officials, sports stars, entertainment world figures and politicians. It helps to turn us from an oracular source to an active participant in that community.” (memeburn, 2010)


According to Syed Jaymal Zahiid from The Malaysian Insider, he said that politicians in Malaysia now turn to Twitter to further promote their blog.

“A microblogging site like Twitter allows political leaders like Anwar, DAP stalwart Lim Kit Siang and Umno maverick Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah to send short instant updates, ideas and thoughts on current affairs instead of long personal journals”, he said.


In my opinion, Twitter is not only useful but also it disseminates message really fast and easy, but that also depends on the person who is tweeting. We have to consider who is tweeting, and based on thier tweets, how credible are they and also are they who they are as mentioned.

I myself am a twitter addict, I used to think it is an application where you use it because you have excess time and also love telling the whole world about yourself. But after I used it, the effects of us using it to the extent we get hooked to it. Mainly I think it is because it is simply a great way to build connections and also at the same time re-connect with your old friends.


References:

Zahid, S.J 2010, "Blogging is so yesterday, politicians turn to Twitter", TheMalaysianInsider.com, viewed 14 November 2010, <http://www.themalaysianinsider.com/malaysia/article/Blogging-is-so-yesterday-politicians-turn-to-Twitter/>


Daniel, J 2010, 'Twitter and its impact on journalism', memeburn.com, viewed 14 November 2010, <http://memeburn.com/2010/08/interview-mg-editor-discusses-twitters-impact-on-journalism/>

Invasion of Privacy?

Friendster and MySpace had been completely gotten over by the social networkers. They got abandoned when people discovered the new in-trend social network, Facebook. Try asking your mates, who does not own a Facebook account?

From primary school kids to senior adults in their 60s, they all have Facebook accounts and probably very addicted to it.  Providing personal information in your account with creepy strangers in your friend list. Now you have a reason to be afraid.

“Facebook has admitted that some of its applications have been transmitting user information to advertising companies. The admission comes after the US newspaper, The Wall Street Journal, uncovered that the company was violating its privacy policy. The paper found that popular applications were providing access to Facebook members' names and, in some cases, their friends' names, to companies that build detailed databases on people in order to track them online.” (AEDT, 2010)

Photo Courtesy: Google

Girls upload their photos and accept friend requests from people that they barely know. They give stalkers chances to misuse their photos and also putting themselves in danger by revealing their personal information to strangers they barely know.

Maureen Walsh once quoted, “Internet sites vary in the modes they use, but they have the potential to combine words and images in complex structures with logos, menu bars, hyperlinks, hot spots, video clips, animation, graphics, music, sound effect, voice over or write over.

As ‘readers’ or users of these sites we are able to take the cues from a home page to navigate to multiple sites with non-linear pathways. A reader’s pathway can be multi-linear and multi directional. (Walsh, 2006)

However, Facebook claims to have come up with a new technology to protect its users privacy and will block any applications that violate their terms and regulations. This matter has costs Facebook quite a number of users as it has somehow betray the trust of its users privacy policy.

Facebook engineer Mike Vernal said “In most cases, developers did not intend to pass this information, but did so because of the technical details of how browsers work. Nevertheless, we are committed to ensuring that even the inadvertent passing of UIDs is prevented and all applications are in compliance with our policy.”

Yes, it is a big mistake, what Facebook has done but we as users should too comprehend what is safe to reveal and what is not. Signing up for a social network is similar to signing up for a bungee jump. You take the risk and nobody is to be blamed at the end of the day.



REFERENCES

AEDT, 2010, ‘Facebook Admits its privacy breach’, viewed 14 Nov 2010, <http://www.bps.org.uk/downloadfile.cfm?file_uuid=224B55CC-1143-DFD0-7E9A-408F74B75795&ext=pdf>


ABC News 2010, ‘Facebook Admits its privacy breach’, viewed 14 Nov 2010,
< http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/10/19/3042594.htm>


Walsh, M, 2006, ‘The ‘textual shift’: Examining the reading process with print, visual and multimodal texts”, page 30.



It's always she's pretty, it's never she's smart!



Gender inequality has long become the torn in advertising, but many choose to suck it in due to the fear of being marked as shallow minded. What good will it bring to advertising if women are offended by the way advertisers twist and misuse or I shall say insult their gender?

Writer, Kathryn Perera has voiced out her anger over this sexism matter. She quoted “From now on, whenever an ad makes me feel insulted, angry or intimidated on grounds of sex, I'm going to make a further complaint. We have the power as consumers to tackle the ASA on its interpretation of the codes regarding images that are sexist and/or derogatory towards women. We have the power to define perceptions of what amounts to "the prevailing standards" of our society.”

Photo Courtesy: Google



Women are portrayed as sex roles to fulfill men’s desire not only in pornography but also in the world of advertising. It is unethical to have women seen as a sex tool and the weaker gender, which may seem too explicit to some thus lead to a boycott.


According to Hans Laven, “advertisements should not portray people in a manner which, taking into account generally prevailing community standards, is reasonably likely to cause serious or widespread offence on the grounds of their gender; race; colour; ethnic or national origin; age; cultural, religious, political or ethical belief; sexual orientation; marital status; family status; education; disability; occupational or employment status.” (Hans Laven)

Well some may say, advertising is supposed to be a mean of insecurity, so somewhat, somewhere, someone will come into the way and sell solution. Sexism in advertising happens to both sexes but it has become such an explicit issue when it comes to women because women symbolize beauty. Women are so sacred and have such high value thus when they are put down, the fall is greater. 


Writer, Cowie once said “It is in the development of new or different definitions and understandings of what men and women are and their roles in society which produces readings of images as sexist.” (Cowie, 1977)

Speaking from my personal point of view, I strongly believe that advertising is a very subjective matter. It never satisfies anyone. Men are seen as a gender that has nothing to lose, and women are seen as otherwise. If advertising could stop putting women on the lower ground, be it as sexual medium or the weaker gender that would be great because offending groups of people in advertising is very unethical. You don’t need to offend people to sell products.



REFERENCES
Perera, Kathryn, 2010, ‘Time to kick sexism out of advertising’, viewed 14 Nov 2010, <http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/jun/29/kick-sexism-out-of-advertising>

Laven, H, 2008, ‘Sexist ALAC Advertisements’, viewed 14 Nov 2010, <http://menz.org.nz/2008/sexist-alac-advertisements/>

Cowie, 1977, ‘Sex Roles Portrayals of Women in Advertising’, viewed 14 Nov 2010, <http://www.allbusiness.com/marketing-advertising/advertising/114611-1.html>





Friday, October 1, 2010

A New Era of the Media

With the current advancement of internet, human produced the New Media. The current New Media that are widely used are youtube, Facebook, Twitter and Blogs. Why so? It caters to a huge mass of people as everyone now is on youtube, Facebook and Twitter. The new media have altered the communication in a new media ecosystem, where everything is just a click away, all these application could be downloaded on to phones for easy and convenient uploads.

During those days, when political parties in Malaysia wants to disseminate a story or event, they waste money and print flyers and banners. Why use that when you can now use the new media. It not only reaches a wider range of audiences, it will also hook the non-related audiences to be interested in it.
The new media now is fast, convenient, and most importantly, it is FREE!

Now in Malaysia, politicians are slowly shifting toward the new era, not stuck in the old method anymore, they would try to promote campaigns and other issues using the new media such as Facebook and Twitter.
By doing this, they are actually aiming more on the younger generation as most of them uses the new media.

The new media is also recognized as the alternative media, because there is freedom of speech availability. Many people used them to express their true feelings and thoughts.


References:


Naughthon J, Blogging and the emerging media, viewed 1st October 2010,
<http://reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk/fileadmin/documents/discussion/blogging.pdf>

Blogging Community

A blog community is a group of blogger who links each other on their blog. A blogger community often blog the same genre. A blogging community will make a good blog famous. There are many more people reading your blog, therefore it makes you more known.


There are many blogging communities in Malaysia such as Nuffnang, Blogged.my, malaysiastory.com and many more. they might differ from genre, but their aim and goals are the same.


How to create a blogging community?


It is very simple, always leave a chatbox or comment box on your blog, so that when people visit your blog and comment, in a way its like they are dropping their contact card. Always reply, their comment and also provide your blog link or information to them, and by doing that, others will also go view your blog and from there you will gain more followers. (Nikkis 2008)


Be active with your blogging, always find good topics to write about, remember not to bore your audiences. I think also include more pictures as more people would prefer to see pictures rather than read lengthy words.


However, the most important thing to do is to know the audience, purpose and context of your blog. Then you blog according to your audiences and purpose.




Reference:


Nikkis 2008, How to Build A Blogging Community, Ehow, Accessed on 1st October 2010, 
<http://www.ehow.com/how_2152382_build-blogging-community.html >


problogger.net, How to build community on your blog, Accessed on 1st October 2010,
<http://www.problogger.net/archives/2008/04/26/how-to-build-community-on-your-blog/ >

A Taxonomy of Blogs

There are many many different types of blog catering to different users for different aims and goals. There are Phampleteering blogs such as Political blogs, Popular Mechanics blog, which is the How-To-Blog or DIY blog, Exhibition blog for the craftspeople, artists or writers to exhibit their work and many many more.

In Malaysia, bloggers are branching out to different aims, such as fashion blogs or what they call the blogshops. Besides that, there are also exhibition blogs that show their art and crafts artwork to the public. Personal diaries, informational and political blog. Due to the many types of blog, it is very hard for us to identify certain specific kind of blogs.

In my opinion, to make identifying type of blog easier, bloggers should provide a space at the side columns, providing the readers a clear idea on what is this blog about, and of course the first post to start off your blog (Introduction) is important.

Also, the blogger should determine before setting up a blog, what is the content of the blog going to be, and find the most suitable blogging website to blog, this will also makes identifying types of blog easier.


Reference:

abc.gov.au, A taxonomy of blogs, accessed 1st October 2010,
<http://abc.gov.au/rn/mediareport/stories/2008/2372882.htm >

The Current Phenomenon : Blogging

I am going to discuss about the size of the current blogosphere, the trend in Malaysia, the type of blogs that are prevalent in certain countries, and also what are the benefits of those prevalent blogs to the community.

First of all, the current blogosphere is very strong and according to The Future Buzz, under the Blogosphere stats, you can see that there are 133 million blogs found online, and this research was done by Technorati since 2002. that was the number of people who own blogs, but as for blogs readership, the is a number of 346 million people globally who read blogs, this research was done by comScore in the year 2008.

These numbers are seemingly increasing year by year, as internet users are starting to find out that blogs are essential and could reach a very wide target audience around the world.

As you can see below, this picture was taken from Infrographiclabs

This is the State of the Blogosphere for year 2010, and of course, year 2010 have not end yet, so at the end of the year, there might be changes with the information.

State of the Blogosphere info graphic by Infrographiclabs.
The blogging trend is very famous in Europe but it is now in Malaysia too. Many Malaysians pick up blogging as a hobby, and some even blog to earn profit.
The current blogging trends in Malaysia are political blogs, food blogs, fashion and makeup blogs, and of course also personal blogs.

In Malaysia, I think political blogs are more prevalent due to the tight media censorship, the nation tend to not know the truth. Some of them took the alternative way to find out what is happening now by reading political blogs. Political blog authors have their own views of the government, and when they have opinions towards them, the author would write publish it online, so that it will be scattered and spread out for those alternative media seekers. It is some sort like a win-win situation where the author gets to express how he/she feels and also spreading out to the readers, and those readers who do not believe in mainstream media due to media censorship, they can also read political blogs.

Jeff Ooi and Lim Kit Siang are a few of the most influential political blogs in Malaysia.


References:


thefuturebuzz.com, Blogosphere stats, accessed on 29th September 2010,

<http://thefuturebuzz.com/2009/01/12/social-media-web-20-internet-numbers-stats/ >


Blogingbloging.com, State of the Blogosphere in 2010, accessed on 29th September 2010,
<http://www.blogingbloging.com/state-blogosphere-2010 >


Sabahan.com, 50 Most Influential Blogs in Malaysia, accessed on 29th September 2010,
<http://www.sabahan.com/2007/02/06/50-most-influential-blogs-in-malaysia/ >


Pingdom 2010, Internet 2009 In Numbers, accessed 29th September 2010,

<http://royal.pingdom.com/2010/01/22/internet-2009-in-numbers/>


Technorati.com, Richard Jalichandra Keynote: BlogWorld 2009, accessed 29th September 2010,
<http://technorati.com/blogging/article/richard-jalichandra-keynote-blogworld-2009/ >





Friday, August 27, 2010

What is good powerpoint presentation?

Greetings!


Last week, me and my group mates did a presentation about Composition and meaning by Kress, G. & van Leeuwen, T. 2006.







Based on our presentation slides, I am going to propose on how to improve on the writing and layout of the group presentation.

From what I know, visuals and texts ARE important to people nowadays. And both visuals and texts should be integrated together to create greater emphasis hence greater understanding to the readers. You may have a only text in an article but it would be better to have also images to support the text. 

How to create a good powerpoint presentation? 

First of all, you must have planning. Effective presentations needs planning.
Know your issue or main topic well. Why are you presenting and what is the message that you want to deliver.

Good planning will make you understand your topic better hence better writing for your presentation. When you know your topic well, you will slowly find out what are the main points to include in the slides and what are not necessary. Do not use long sentences in slides, use short points and explain to the audience while they read your short points, provide examples for better understanding for the audience. Be specific and straight to the point when you write your content.

Besides writing your presentation content well, the design and layout of the presentation must be good. As I have mentioned earlier, you must include visuals and images to support the text, or else the whole presentation would be boring. 

In short, these are the points you MUST REMEMBER







  • Easy to read 
  • Clear title on each slides 
  • Simple background 
  • Slide layout must be appropriate 
  • Include graphics/charts 
  • Use contrasting colours with fonts & background 
  • Avoid fancy fonts 
  • Avoid capital letters 


Here are some examples of clear and good slides, from my group's presentation: 












Use one slide for the sub topic's title. 

Use images to support your point


Use models/diagrams to aid explanation
Highlight font to show emphasis. Use short points and support points with own understanding


Use capital letters only for emphasizing


Use simple and readable fonts.



But what our group can improve is that, we should have chosen another colour for the background. Instead of white, maybe we can choose to use peach colour or navy blue to portray professionalism. The white background makes the presentation look dull and incomplete. 

To conclude, text and visuals are needed together to support each other. The design of the presentation should also be well considered. The value and the placement of the presentation design is pretty much very important. Follow the pointers, and you'll be on the right track. :)



References:


http://presentationsoft.about.com/od/powerpointinbusiness/tp/bus_pres_tips.htm, 10 Tips for Creating Successful Business Presentations, Accessed 27th August 2010.


http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/9447/error, What makes good scientific technical writing?, Accessed 27th August 2010.


http://ezinearticles.com/?How-to-Make-a-Good-PowerPoint-Presentation&id=4313178, How to make good powerpoint presentations?, Accessed 27th August 2010

Thursday, August 26, 2010

Preface

Greeting peeps!

You must be wondering, what is this blog about?

Basically, in the upcoming blog posts, I'm gonna discuss about different media issues that are revolving around us now. Any issues that are faced now by us youngsters.

My blog is targeted to those youngsters or the Generation-Y people. College student, and also, those who come across this blog by accident, and full with curiousity, you guys should stay tune too!

Just a brief intro for now, more postings up soon!


Cheers!