Wednesday 4 May 2016

Weekly New/Digital Media homework Week 32

WEEK 32
1. Google given access to healthcare data of up to 1.6 million patients

Lord Darzi, centre, performing surgery.

  • Artificial intelligence firm DeepMind provided with patient information as part of agreement with Royal Free NHS trust
  • A company owned by Google has been given access to the healthcare data of up to 1.6 million patients from three hospitals run by a major London NHS trust.
  • DeepMind, the tech giant’s London-based company most famous for its innovative use of artificial intelligence, is being provided with the patient information as part of an agreement with the Royal Free NHS trust, which runs the Barnet, Chase Farm and Royal Free hospitals.
  • It includes information about people who are HIV-positive as well as details of drug overdoses, abortions and patient data from the past five years, according to a report by the New Scientist
  • DeepMind announced in February that it was developing a software in partnership with NHS hospitals to alert staff to patients at risk of deterioration and death through kidney failure.

SoundCloud Go launched in the US in March, and has quickly crossed the Atlantic.

  • Streaming firm hopes to persuade some of its 175m listeners to start paying £9.99 a month by being ‘less spreadsheet, more Snapchat’
  • Music-streaming service SoundCloud is launching its £9.99-a-month SoundCloud Go subscription tier in the UK and Ireland.
  • The company hopes that features including track downloads for offline listening, and a bigger music catalogue courtesy of label licensing deals, will persuade some of its free listeners to start paying.
  • SoundCloud Go launched in the US in March after lengthy negotiations with labels, music publishers and collecting societies.
  • As in the US, it will have a catalogue of 125m tracks: licensed recordings as well as the remixes and mash-ups that have helped SoundCloud attract a monthly audience of 175 million music fans.

Tuesday 3 May 2016

Section A Improvements

iHave30 Occupy Movement and Sky News report


Section A
Contrast the techniques used by each product to communicate its message
Both texts catches the attention of the audience through the on-screen action. For instance, the first text ‘iHave30’ uses brisk-pace editing, along with fast jump cuts in order to capture the attention span of the audience and educate them within 30 seconds. The second text uses a variety of techniques, such as multiple interviews with the protesters and the visual violence between the police and prosecutors, which forms a binary opposition.  It also creates an enigma code, linking to theorist Barthes, which makes the audience wonder ‘will the prosecutors get evicted?’

How can audiences use YouTube and other social media sites to create their own identities? You may also refer to other media texts to support your answer.
The iHave30 video can influence other viewers to create their own channel and make quick videos educating the audience about themselves. This has been done successfully through many beauty vloggers (slang for video bloggers), such as Huda Beauty and Zoella, who started out making their own homemade videos about makeup and fashion and now are famous and have celebrity endorsements and a line of makeup as a result of receiving a lot of attention, through the millions of views. This may influence their fans that also have the same interest in beauty and makeup as well, creating a personal identity for the fans.

How has new technology changed the way individuals and groups can challenge dominant and hegemonic ideologies? You should refer to other media products to support your answer.
New technology, especially social media sites like Twitter and Facebook enable individuals to be free in their speech and this allows the audience to have the authority to challenge dominant ideologies. This is most evident through the 2015 elections, where the majority of Twitter users argued David Cameron had absolutely no chance of winning the elections and people criticized Cameron for his “pointless policies” which proved wrong as in the end he won the elections. However, it could be argued that the audience do not have the power, typically hegemonic control as it’s proven that Twitter can remove any comments which are seen as a violation. 

Friday 29 April 2016

Essay

New and digital media offers media institutions different ways of reaching audiences.
Consider how and why media institutions are using these techniques. (48 marks)
With the advances in new and digital media it’s easier to reach audiences and audiences can reach content easier and more efficiently. A massive change in the media landscape creates a symbiotic relationship, whereby audiences influence institutions and vice versa. The case studies this essay will primarily focus on is the music industry, in particular ‘Tidal’ a music streaming app created by hip-hop entrepreneur Jay-Z, the music industry overall and the news industry and the decline of newspaper sales.

With the dramatic decline in the newspaper industry, institutions are forced to reach the target audience. It is noticeable that many newspapers have moved digitally online, such as The Independent, which is a big British institution and no longer sells paperback newspapers. Also, The Sun which 10 years ago used to sell 3 – 4 million copies a day has gone down to 1.6 million.  The most significant figure is from The Guardian which has gone down to selling 200,000 copies a day in comparison to 20-30 million a couple years ago. As many newspapers have moved online it is also significant to notice that there is a decline in the music industry. For instance, figures show that in 1999 to 2009, the amount of records sold in stores has gone from 14.6 billion to 6.3 billion. This is a massive drop and displays that there is not as much hype and excitement to by records in store when you can stream and download them online.

There are many new methods to access news more efficiently and with the ‘technical convergence’ it’s easier through our smartphones especially. Also, there are many news apps, such as ‘Mail Online’ and ‘The Guardian’ and anybody with a tablet our smartphone can access it. It’s normal to question how institutions still make money; this is done through advertising and the invention of paywalls, paying a monthly subscription fee to access the newspaper online in order to receive the best articles and stories. American TV producer and former Journalist, David Simon who wrote the book ‘Build The Wall’ stated how paywalls are a good thing and encouraged institutions to keep paywalls up. David Simon demonstrated his passion for paywalls as his theory was that institutions with paywalls are delivering top quality news.

Furthermore, social media is a fundamental method for institutions to reach their core audience. The idea of ‘News of the Tweet’ which is receiving news from Twitter is most prominent as many newspapers have Twitter accounts delivering news articles, this drives traffic to institutions and it’s prime to recognise that the audience trust verified Twitter accounts and well-known institutions such as the BBC. Twitter has changed the dynamic of news and encourages the idea of a symbiotic relationship, where there is an exchange between the audience and institutions. People are free to challenge and debate/discuss the news on social media and some news accounts may reply back to audience members. The issue for debate is whether or not the news can be trusted as the idea of citizen journalism is more apparent.

‘Citizen Journalism’ is the idea where the audience creates the news and social media is used as a function to help spread news quicker. With this news brands are losing trust as it’s hard to know which news is reliable or not. Citizen journalism has been implemented through the #BlackLivesMatter campaign which was created in 2012 as an international activist movement originating in the African-American community after the death of Travyon Martin, where he suffered police brutality. This created much awareness on social media and was a way to gain justice which was needed. Social media is a quicker way to reach a larger target audience. Audiences are now driving the news agenda and many cases of police brutality have been made more prominent. For instance, the Eric Garner case which was recorded on a camera phone was immediately uploaded on social media; this is a method of user-generated content. This links to the theory of ‘hypperreality’ as the style of the footage recorded was taken on a shaky camera phone helps to make it more realistic and a serious issue which needs to be addressed. The idea of Galtung and Ruge’s ‘News Values ‘reinforces the element of familiarity, how close to home the issue is and how negative it’s portrayed makes it a case which needs to be addressed.

The idea of pluralism is crucial to consider and it proves there is an open exchange of sharing ideas, especially on social media. There is that equality of power between news institutions and audience members. There are many methods of reaching the audience; however the power and choice lies with the audience as institutions make the audience feel like they have authority too. The theories of Marxism and Hegemony are useful too as they give alternative interpretations to news as they prove how the nature of the media is not changing. For instance, the 2015 elections proved this as many people on Twitter were saying how David Cameron had no chance of winning the elections, in the end he won and many right-wing newspapers supported this idea. This proves that institutions have a mass impact, they also have the power to remove any hateful, negative comments on their online articles and this makes the audience consider whether or not they do have the freedom to challenge.

In terms of the independent case study being analysed, the music industry is slowly declining when it comes to selling records in store. Music streaming apps such as “Tidal” have taken over, with competitors such as Apple Music and Spotify; Tidal can be downloaded on any app store and has a monthly subscription fee between £9.99 - £19.99 depending on the type of service you want. The service has over 25 million tracks and 85,000 music videos and offers a wide variety of genres. Tidal makes it easier to access music compared to ten years ago when people would buy CDs. As Tidal is referred to as a "luxury hi-fi music streaming service" the demographic would be an ABC1.Teenagers are the more focal part of the target audience as they would be more up-to-date with new music and interested in discovering new types of music as TIDAL includes all genres. In terms of digital revolution, users are streaming music from their mobile devices by the app instead of buying records. Also, cultural convergence, Tidal is providing all genres of music to target a wide audience. Social media was sued top promote the a there are pages on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook and when Tidal was first launched, many music artists put an aqua blue Twitter header up to show support for Tidal as that in the theme colour. Also using the hashtag #TIDAL many twitter users joined after exploring that hashtag and finding out what it's about. Social media beneficial as it promotes the service as evidentially the hashtag became a worldwide trending topic. By creating an app, rather than using an internet desktop to use Tidal this has encouraged many users to join as it's more efficient to use. It’s easier to stream music wherever, whenever as it's cross-platform and is also available in many different languages.


To conclude, intuitions ultimately have the control as their main motive is monetary-based. Social media plays the biggest role in reaching wider target audiences, especially with the main themes of news and the music industry. Institutions can be seen as ambiguous in terms of allowing the audience to question and challenge the news they receive, as ultimately institutions have the power to remove content. The idea of a “million monkeys” typing behind keyboards also proves not all news is reliable and not to trust everything you read and believe online unless it’s from trusted and verified news institution. The music industry has made is much easier to access music from anywhere but some argue this takes away the “classic” idea of owning a sentimental CD, which loses the value of good music which is being released , as music can be downloaded and streamed illegally. The censorship on music and news is much be liberated and makes it questionable whether the audience really do have the same power as institutions. 

Friday 22 April 2016

Weekly New/Digital Media homework Week 31

WEEK 31
1. Revealed: the $2bn offshore trail that leads to Vladimir Putin

  • A massive leak of documents shines new light on the fabulous fortunes of the Russian president’s inner circle: Putin’s best friend: the cellist who holds the key to his fortune and Iceland’s PM faces snap election over revelations.
  • A network of secret offshore deals and vast loans worth $2bn has laid a trail to Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin..
  • .An unprecedented leak of documents shows how this money has made members of Putin’s close circle fabulously wealthy.
  • Though the president’s name does not appear in any of the records, the data reveals a pattern – his friends have earned millions from deals that seemingly could not have been secured without his patronage.The documents suggest Putin’s family has benefited from this money – his friends’ fortunes appear his to spend.
  • The files are part of an unprecedented leak of millions of papers from the database of Mossack Fonseca, the world’s fourth biggest offshore law firm. They show how the rich and powerful are able to exploit secret offshore tax regimes in myriad ways.
  • The offshore trail starts in Panama, darts through Russia, Switzerland and Cyprus – and includes a private ski resort where Putin’s younger daughter, Katerina, got married in 2013.
  • A new ‘smart mattress’ uses motion sensors to detect whether your other half is being unfaithful. It’s just one of the many ways you can now stoke your real-world insecurities online
  • Durmet’s new £1,200 matress – the Smartress – comes with 24 motion detectors built into the springs – a “lover detection system” that is guaranteed, the makers say, to scan for “suspicious activity” and offer real-time updates, via a phone app, on anyone playing break-the-bed outside of the marriage unit.
  • It’s certainly not the first product of a coming wave of tech-enabled personal paranoia. Child-tracking apps have been around for so long that they are increasingly accepted as a legitimate part of the parenting process.

Weekly New/Digital Media homework Week 30

WEEK 30
1. Your phone number is all a hacker needs to read texts, listen to calls and track you


German security expert Karsten Nohl demonstrated the hack by tracking a brand new phone given to US congressman Ted Lieu using only its phone number.

  • Weaknesses within mobile phone network interconnection system allows criminals or governments to remotely snoop on anyone with a phone
  • Hackers have again demonstrated that no matter how many security precautions someone takes, all a hacker needs to track their location and snoop on their phone calls and texts is their phone number.
  • The hack, first demonstrated by German security researcher Karsten Nohl in 2014 at a hacker convention in Hamburg, has been shown to still be active by Nohl over a year later for CBS’s 60 Minutes.
  • The hack uses the network interchange service called Signalling System No. 7(SS7), also known as C7 in the UK or CCSS7 in the US, which acts as a broker between mobile phone networks. When calls or text messages are made across networks SS7 handles details such as number translation, SMS transfer, billing and other back-end duties that connect one network or caller to another.
  • Retail giant makes shows such as Transparent and The Man in the High Castle available via monthly fee as well as annual payment
  • Amazon is to offer video streaming of exclusive shows such as Transparent and The Man in the High Castle as a standalone service in the US for the first time as it tries to make up ground on Netflix.
  • The online retailer had previously offered Prime Video in the US as part of its Prime package, which also includes next day shipping and other perks, for $99 (£70) a year. It has quietly offered a monthly version for £5.99 in the UK, but will begin promoting the option more strongly, according to reports.
  • US users will now be able to pay $8.99 a month for Amazon’s video, and get Prime as a monthly option for $10.99.
  • The move is a clear attempt to catch up with Netflix, which has led the way in video streaming by offering a cut-price monthly service while also spending big on original content such as House of Cards, Better Call Saul and Marvel superhero spinoff series including Daredevil and Jessica Jones.
  • It comes as Netflix begins moving longer-term subscribers over to new, more expensive packages, having given early adopters a price freeze when it introduced a new pricing structure last year.

Weekly New/Digital Media homework Week 29

WEEK 29


The print circulation of British newspapers has fallen steadily in recent years, claiming victims such as the Independent along the way.

  • Newspapers have been "battered" by the internet - but the industry could be about to fight back with help from websites that aim to be the "iTunes" of journalism.
  • Last week a group of 17 American news organisations, including the New York Times and Washington Post, served a cease-and-desist legal order against a start-up news platform. 
  • The platform, called Brave, was launched in January by the creator of JavaScript, Brendan Eich. The Brave browser had been created in part in response to two recent trends in news delivery: the emergence of mobile platforms such as Apple News and Facebook’s Instant Articles, and the growing use of software that allows readers to block advertisements from news content.
  • Labour MP, who was a target of online abuse, says authorities and web companies need to use their resources to tackle issue.
  • Trolling is still not being taken seriously enough by police and technology companies who already have the tools to take action against internet abusers, the Labour MP Stella Creasy has said.
  • Creasy, who was targeted three years ago by one of the most high-profile Twitter trolls to be jailed, said the key to dealing with online abuse was challenging the underlying inequality, misogyny and prejudice that fuels the problem.