NDM case study: Globalisation

1) Is our news influenced by American cultural imperialism? What examples can you think of?
In a way, yes our news is being influenced by American culture. Although we aren't fully there yet. Some examples would be how the BBC published a story on a viral video which was entirely entertainment, another example would also be how the BBC prioritise the royal family first even though the story isn't as important as other events going on. Something like America does with the Kardashians etc.
2) Has the increased globalisation of news improved the audience experience? How? Why?
Yes, now that there is much news available it has made it easier and quicker for us to access news. It allows us to find out news live as it happens and keeps us connected with the world. One example would be the Paris attacks and how witness footage from smartphones made us feel like we are there.  

3) Has globalisation benefited or damaged major news institutions? How? Why?
Yes it has, its now a much more competitive market and there is so much news to choose from. Organisations must keep alert and be the first to publish stories to survive to gain attention, they must also try and keep unique in order to keep themselves in the market.

Marxism & Pluralism: Alain de Botton on the news

Answer the following questions on your blog:

1) To what extent do you agree with Alain de Botton's views on the News?
I  believe with Alains point that the news only prioritises news that will catch audiences attention. That maybe much more less important news such as celebrities etc will be the front and main news and that the more important but very boring news will be at the back. It shows how news has turned into a marketing strategy to keep it running.

2) How can you link Marxism and Hegemony to de Botton's criticisms of the News?
This links to Marxism as news industries are controlled via the elite and that they showcase more of the elite people as a appose to less fortunate people. News will showcase something bad that has happened to a celebrity but wont bother to cover news on starvation of kids or the amount of innocent deaths due to war.

3) How could you use Pluralism and new technology to challenge de Botton's views on the News?
Alains views of a classless society show that now, everyone holds a smartphone. We can access news quicker and easier ever than before. We can now also become a reporter due to citizen journalism and platforms such as blogs, youtube, twitter and so on have allowed us to express our opinions and views more than ever before.


4) Choose two news stories from the last six months - one that supports de Botton's views and one that challenges his belief that the News is used for social control.

The development of new/digital media means the audience is more powerful in terms of consumption and production. Discuss the arguments for and against this view.

In recent years, new and digital media has grown rapidly year after year. New technology and the internet has made us, as the audience more powerful in terms of consumption and production. New and digital media such as social media has allowed for us to be more connected but it does have its affects, it has deeply affected newspapers as we have now become reporters and journalists ourselves. This essay will discuss how production and consumption has been affected by new and digital media.

Firstly, Pluralists argue that we live in a classless society and that media organisations are responsive to an audience and are economically determined. They believe that there is a market in the media, and without the audience organisations wouldn't be able to run or survive. They believe that we make good media. Pluralists would believe that we are now more powerful in terms of consumption and production. We have many new platforms to express our opinions on and now have the ability to widen our views due to the vast amount of content online. The development of new and digital media has allowed us to engage with media texts and have also given us the ability to challenge and manipulate the media. Audiences can now conform, accommodate or reject media oppressed by the elite. This proves that we are more powerful than before when it comes down to how we consume and produce media, we can challenge and argue with the elite media and how they can manipulate the masses. Pluralists challenge the hypodermic needle theory. One example would be with the devastating terrorist attacks in Paris. The media have always linked the word terrorists with the religion of islam. If it wasn't for the negative ideologies that the media portray on muslims, there wouldn't be such a thing as Islamophobia. In the recent attacks, media outlets tried to convince mass audiences that muslims believe in killing the innocent, but they're wrong. Now, audiences challenge this view that media outlets inject into us. There was a social outburst online with protests that every religion doesn't believe in killing the innocent and that islams are not to blame. Audiences can now choose what to believe as reality can hit them much harder as new and digital media "has allowed for us to be connected together" Bill Thompson - Technology Expert  Also, Rupert Murdoch has once said that "The internet has given readers much more power... The world is changing and newspapers have to adapt."

Secondly, a Marxist doesn't believe in a Pluralists view and that this "Information Revolution" hasn't given any audiences power at all. This is because they believe that the media are the elite and that the mass media are a tool used by ruling bodies to maintain hegemonic control over the masses and a divided class society. Marxist believe that the ruling class can control what we find "normal" and whats okay in society. Lin & Webster claim that "57% of 9 - 19 year olds never question the accuracy of online information." This shows how the youth will believe any information they may read online through media organisations. Google is now the end to a debate for the youth. Marxists also believe that "Web pages and blogs are like a million monkeys typing nonsense" - Andrew Keen This links to how the Jan Moir from Mail Online's tabloid print edition wrote a homophobic article on the death of Stephen Gately in 2009. This received a social protest online on Twitter and Facebook but the Mail Online didn't make any editorial decisions, they kept their views intact and didn't change the way gate keeping was taking place within the newspaper.

Also, the newspaper industry has had a big decline in the recent years, because of the rise of new and digital media. One of the biggest cases is that traditional, print news papers have been falling in terms of making its revenue as "by the end of next year mobile advertising will account for half of the £8.94bn that will be spent on digital marketing in the UK." This shows how companies and organisations are spending a lot more money on digital marketing compared to traditional print papers. This is because of new technology shifting audiences to reading news on line compared to paper. One of the reasons why news industries don't make as much revenue is because of the mistake they made during the prime time growing years of the internet. They believed that by posting their news online for free will make people buy the paper as well. This obviously didn't work out as everyone read news online but didn't even bother reading newspapers, why would they pay if it was free online?

As Pluralists believe that we can challenge the media and form our own views, new and digital media has allowed for us to become more powerful in terms or producing media. Now, we can become a reporter, journalist or even a news crew... all from one device. Citizen journalism has become so important and vital for how genuine a news story can be. Due to the rise of social media and technology almost everyone carries a fully functional video camera in their pocket due to smartphones. They can also instantly share these videos to millions of people with a click of a button. One key example of this would be with the amount of police shootings and brutality exposed in america. This has been a on going racial subject for years. But now, witnesses are able to expose corrupt police officers due to new and digital media. The death of Trayvon Martin, Eric Garner and many more have been recorded by witnesses, shared online and was able to create very large protests in the USA. It allowed audiences to conform and question the us government and also reject news institutions such as CNN as they tend to be with the police in this horrific cases. "Rebellion is encapsulated in the internet" - Keen. 

Overall, the media has always been able to manipulate the mass audience for years, what ever the elite media groups produce for us, we will tend to believe and become brainwashed to what they say. The media is what will always keep us informed and entertained. Its the first tool we go to in order for us to find out whats going on in the world, but its the way in which these stories are written and who they're written by which can change the way we think and feel. Marxists have a solid view on the media and how the elite can control us, in a way i feel that they are correct and are able to brainwash the mass audience with what they believe. Although now, new and digital media is allowing us to become more and more against the elite. We can challenge these views like never before and we can even create our own news. Making us much more powerful. We also have a wider variety of news and can believe in what we want to see and consume. Now, organisations such as Vice produce realistic and hardcore news. Its almost like citizen journalism.They're news footage is simply cameras on the scene of an event showcasing whats going on. No commentaries, no interviews, no editing, just footage. Making us feel like we are there. New and digital media has allowed for this as we can upload what we wish. Before the outburst of new and digital media it would be unacceptable for institutions to publish simple camera footage of an event. Now, its necessary for us to believe in whats going on.

Developments in new/digital media mean that audiences can now have access to a greater variety of views and values. To what extent are audiences empowered by these developments?

Audiences now have a greater variety of views and values, this is because of the internet and how pluralists believe that we live in a classless society, also how we have much more freedom and are able to rebel against co operations and governments, although this can have a downside as it can affect the news we get as a whole. Marxisists believe that the elite control bodies and are able to control our views, in a sense this is true as recent studies show that newspapers have helped the general election. Also how "top 5% of all websites accounted for almost 75% of user volume" (Lin & Webster, 2002) Also, marxisists believe that the internet is dumbing us down and that  its like a million monkeys typing nonsense. 

I still believe that the internet will also have a minority of media producers that will serve the mass media, controlling views. Although at the same time I agree with the fact that pluralists are able to argue with the media very well, for example with the recent Paris terrorist attacks, new and digital media such as social media has proved that the Internet has allowed for a much more easier and vital way to express opinions and feelings. 

The Islam community has always had a negative effect in the media, showing that the elite are able to create a propaganda and are able to control our views on Muslims, although now, many of us know that this is the case, and there was a social outburst on Twitter, many people Muslim and non Muslim tweeted negatively towards the media how unfairly they treat religions. Many tweets were published explaining how no religion intends to kill innocent people and that everyone is equal. This was a prime example of how new and digital media has allowed us to challenge the elites views in media & that more and more people may be becoming pluralists because of this. Its also proving that Marxists may be the ones that are dumbing down because they're tactics to control the media just aren't working well enough.

Why the Daily Mirror pulled its exclusive story on The Voice

Paper was given incorrect information about the BBC hanging on to the show

In that posting I took the Mirror’s TV editor, Nicola Methven, to task for having written a story headlined “BBC axes The Voice in £55m row.” It was her paper’s splash in the first edition but vanished after that.

 “got it hopelessly wrong”

“They have given up on screening a sixth run in 2017, leaving the door open for rivals ITV to snap up the show, which pulls in 8m viewers.”

A journalist was lied to and was given false information when writing up a headline for the daily mirror news paper, the information she published was hopelessly wrong and lead viewers to having false assumptions. This shows how new and digital media can lead to hoax information and can cause bad press, this can always ruin the representation for the daily mirror.

Sun website traffic recovers as Mirror slips back

News UK site boosted by 16% rise to 1.29 million daily unique browsers in October, as rival’s national titles fall by 4.9% to 3.7 million

"The Sun website bounced back in October, adding more than 180,000 daily unique browsers to take its total to 1.29 million."

"increase of more than 16% after a 14% fall in September"

"The Sun remains one of the smaller national newspaper websites after two years of charging for online access."

"The Guardian was down by 2.6% to 8.15 million daily unique browsers following a record month in September."

MailOnline 13,246,053 (-0.89)
theguardian.com 8,153,603 (-2.59)
Telegraph 4,285,687 (-3.03) 
Mirror Group nationals 3,702,001 (-4.93)
The Independent 2,634,560 (-5.25)
The Sun 1,286,605 (16.03)
express.co.uk 1,209,801 (-0.27) 
Metro 1,159,637 (25.29) 
dailystar.co.uk 623,977 (9.35)

Developments in new and digital media mean that audiences can now have access to a greater variety of views and value. To what extent are audiences are empowered by these developments.

New and digital media have allowed for much more news to be produced and available to read. Mostly everyone has the ease of access to analyse news from a range of institutions and organisations from one device and they can even view other peoples opinions and express they're own... from this same device. New technology has allowed for this to happen as this wouldn't even be an option in the past. Now, more and more recently this same device has turned into a full on news crew. This device has caused less and less news crews to be pushed out in the scene because of citizen journalism.

Can dropping the paywall and upping the story count boost Sun’s website?

Rupert Murdoch, the media mogul previously known for his refusal to give editorial content away free, has bowed to the inevitable by dismantling the Sun’s paywall. It was a flawed decision at its inception in 2013 and has proved to be disastrous ever since. Even a partial lifting of the wall in July made little difference. Indeed, it tended to frustrate non-paying visitors to the website who were uncertain what was, and was not, freely available.

"More journalists are expected to be hired to join the Sun’s digital team and to help boost the quantity of its content."

'Sport will, of course, be another major component.'

"The answer is that they will also be available free. It is thought that certain outstanding rights problems will be finalised by 30 November, the day when the paywall is demolished."

this article explains how the sun has lost a lot of viewers since the introduction of the paywall Murdoch has initiated on his news sites, they now have to try and bring the digital views up by a high number.

Newspapers go on the hunt for a safe place to pay

"Will their future be ruled by subscriptions, limited access, cash online before information? "

"The New York Times’s latest survival plan involves keeping its paywalls in place – a million readers pay now to roam beyond them – and keeping journalist numbers up: a 1,300-strong newsroom stays."

" It’ll need to double digital revenue from $400m a year to $800m by 2020"

This article explains how the news industry is finding ways to survive in the digital age, it discusses how they predict that paywalls are the way forward and that the new york times now has 1million paid subscribers, this has helped keep the job of journalists and also increase them. Also that the paywall as enabled for much greater content being produced.

Playing video games doesn’t make you a better person. But that’s not the point

Games have that same electric tension you might find in the theatre, but instead of watching the actors, you are both the actor and the audience.

Games can be eerie, surreal, joyful, quirky, terrifying and hilarious. If you never engage with them, you’re missing out on part of the richness of contemporary culture

As games become more complex and their algorithms interact in unpredictable ways, there’ll be things you experience that no one else has or ever will

who wouldn’t want to feel as though they are Ezio Auditore, the absurdly fit, tower-climbing, parkour-running roof-jumper of Assassin’s Creed? 

This article goes through the audience pleasures you receive when playing video games and discusses how they are actually good for you, they will allow you to experience more things in life compared to someone who doesn't play games and that gaming helps increase the way you think and how your reactions and day to day decisions are improved.

Facebook ads are about to get even more personal

"Site is offering small businesses new location-aware adverts, to let them distinguish between users in different places"

"The first allows small businesses which have multiple locations to target their adverts based on where their customers actually are: for instance, Facebook says, “a cafe with multiple locations … could choose to automatically populate the city name in their ad copy, depending on where the people seeing the ad are. So, people in Glasgow would see ‘join us for lunch in Glasgow’, while people in Bristol would see ‘join us for lunch in Bristol’.”

"The feature is an update to what the company calls “local awareness ads”, which let businesses target users when they check the site within a certain distance from their store. "

This article explains how far advertising is willing to push it in order to keep business going, although facebook is helping small businesses which will help the economy, its just weird. Facebook will find out where you are and pop up adverts for you.

Call of Duty: Black Ops 3 campaign verdict – is Call of Duty devouring itself?

"Black Ops III, like every Call of Duty before it, is a throbbing mass of blockbuster movie cliches, masquerading as a cogent plot line"

"The problem is, the level design is not quite as open and arena-like as many had hoped."

"The enemies too, are rather disappointing. The futuristic setting has naturally meant the arrival of giant robot soldiers"

"Playing Black Ops III campaign is like trying to simultaneously watch every Tom Cruise sci-fi movie ever made while being punched in the face by the universe."

This article explains how a mass billion dollar entertainment franchise call of duty, it also explains how the industry is falling into a decline of quality as its going against its competitors to stay in the market, also how the story line is very  cliché and is copying blockbuster films plots. I agree with this as i think call of duty has just transformed into this geeky sci fi futuristic war game, I much preferred a more realistic modern day war zone type of theme. The game is much more complex now.

Ofcom is not currently equipped to regulate BBC, says trust director

"A BBC Trust director has said that Ofcom is not equipped to regulate the BBC because it is held to a “different standard of accuracy and impartiality” than the broadcasting watchdog applies to commercial rivals."

“The BBC is consistently held to a different standard on accuracy and impartiality than other broadcasters,”

Alex Towers said that he is “agnostic” on exactly who should regulate the BBC – the BBC Trust, Ofcom, “OfBeeb” or a hybrid

This article explains how Ofcom isn't equipped to regulate the BBC because the BBC has a different level of accuracy that it produces to its audience. The writer also claims that he doesn't know who should regulate the BBC's stories, and that he wants to make sure everything is always reliable and factual. I agree with him.

NDM: News Values

Galtung and Ruge (1981) defined a set of news values to explain how journalists and editors decided that certain stories and photographs were accepted as newsworthy, while others were not. 

The following list is adapted from their work:

Immediacy: 

has it happened recently?

Familiarity: 

is it culturally close to us in Britain?

Amplitude: 

is it a big event or one which involves large numbers of people?

Frequency: 

does the event happen fairly regularly?

Unambiguity: 

is it clear and definite?

Predictability:

did we expect it to happen?

Surprise:

 is it a rare or unexpected event?

Continuity: 

has this story already been defined as news?

Elite nations and people: 

which country has the event happened in? Does the story concern well-known people?

Negativity:

 is it bad news?

Balance: 

the story may be selected to balance other news, such as a human survival story to balance a number of stories concerning death.

How has new and digital media technology changed Galtung and Ruge’s news values? How would you update them for 2015?

Immediacy:

Changes in technology has allowed news to be spread a lot more quickly compared to previous era's, this is due to the uprising of social media, networks such as snapchat, twitter and facebook has allowed for breaking news to be shared and made viral a lot more quicker then before, news institutions are really only used for proof checking and for full information.

Familiarity:
Social media has allowed for the whole world to be in one place, its brought many voices and opinions together and has allowed for a more democratic way of news being distributed.

 Amplitude:
NDM has allowed for bigger events to be distributed to a more larger audience and more local news can target those in a area, for example, snapchat distributes "stories" from large big events around the world to everyone and also has "stories" for people in a specific area like London only.

Frequency:

Social media usually makes new stories go viral and spread to larger audiences, regular stories are still always talked about too, examples like tv shows is a great way for NDM to help the entertainment industry.

Unambiguity:
NDM has allowed for us to become citizen journalists, we can now report our own news and get it heard quickly and to a large amount of people, this does also mean that loads of people make up hoax stories and false info for attention, genuine news is now also more raw and un edited, making it much more straight up and heavy to watch.

Predictability:

NDM has allowed for more unpredictable news to be spread quickly, in the event, anyone can pull out there phone and record news, before a crew would be needed and in some cases they may arrive too late, therefore meaning not many stories are covered.

Surprise:

As social media means news will be distributed much more quickly, we get news instantly, meaning bad news can be a quick surprise to us.

Continuity:
NDM allows more constant fresh news to be produced due to citizen journalism.

Elite Nations and People:

This means that more central countries and stories are put forward compared to others, such as USA news.

Negativity:
NDM has allowed for more news to be produced, this means we will find out about much more negative news than before, a good example would be the police beatings and executions in USA.

Balance:

NDM has no balance, anything is shared, this is much different compared to traditional tv news which had a playlist to be shown which had balance for viewers.