Media Review: Courier-Journal

After an approximate 20-day study, I have figured out that the Courier-Journal is only capable of doing one thing: supplying its audience with miscellaneous fluff, poltics and irrelevant crimes.

The fact that the majority of stories is politics is not what is upsetting. After all, we are close to the election, and the audience needs to know where to place their opinions. The thing truly frustrating is the fact that the news is not proportional; there are no substantial news pieces on the CJ.

What is not politics is related to some performance, celebrity, or murderous crime. These things have no relevance to the audience, therefore, they do not belong on the news.

At least one good thing will come out of this illegitimate news: I will have inspiration toward the Media Critique to come.

Blog Response: Olivia Evans

YI recently read Olivia Evans' post on the radio lecture. I also found the lecture intriguing. It's almost surprising how something so seemingly small was such an essential piece of mass communication in the 1930s.

Radio had a rough start, but had nothing but smooth sailing after it had gained reputability. It's funny to imagine such a small piece of mass communication being so earnestly important to entertainment and the only late-breaking source of news might I add.

Olivia did a good job of reiterating what the lecture was about, and I was grateful for her touching bases on all of the content and refreshing my memory. I also agree that it's extremely fascinating that radio grew at such a massive rate.

Link:
http://evansolivia.blogspot.com/?m=1

Class Lecture: Radio

Our journalism class recently discussed the topic of radio. Radio was an evolutionary piece of history, still present (but not as prominent) today. Being the first live, late-breaking medium, radio was the pioneer for modern techniques of spreading news. It gave inspiration and a lasting impression of what the seemingly endless possibilities in more recently distributed news.

Unfortunately, news started to demassify because of movies and television, and all talent and entertainment moved toward the visual representations of media. The ability for the audience to depict images in their head was lost to the image of actors. Radio is still extremely essential in the realm of music. Unfortunately, for my generation, the campfire skits and entertainment of such will never be a familiar aspect of entertainment.

Class Lecture: Television

Today's class topic consisted of television. I found the topic highly engaging, and the class discussion left me with food for thought. Television seems like just another aspect of life; it's something that our culture is submerged in. Therefore, it is almost expected of everyone to own one of these "marvelous" things. Television is something so common, we often don't think of it as a fairly new medium that changed our culture massively.

The people of America were abundantly more interactive with one another before the rise of television; just imagine living in a world where the local community center was your main means of entertainment. When television made it's peak, people around the country--around the globe, became less social with one another.

Styles, fads, and trends also were majorly influenced by those found on serial TV shows. Audiences felt almost as if the shows were realistic, and felt like duplicating the life of a star would bring some form of satisfaction. Things found on television would shortly be found in stores and shops around the country.

The thought of life without television is an odd but compelling one. The thought of people creating styles and trends without the inspiration of a TV is interesting, which is something I think the US is walking back toward today; the idea of individualism is becoming less of an abstract subject.

Just imagining the more social and vibrant interaction that happened before the dawn of television is enough to get one's mind depicting images of a completely different culture. The thought is strangely appealing. It was a very interesting topic.