Reflections

This past week updating this blog has been every enlightening. I have already own a blog so this assignment did have a little surprises. It has thought me many things and many different issues which concerns Issues in Publication and Design. The process of creating a blog was very easy using blogspot.com by providing us templates. The applications from blogspot made it easy to post blogs, upload images and videos. This blog i decided to used a fair amount of videos to explain my facts because in my opinion i believe since we have a multimodal landscape like the Internet its best to exploit all the outlets. This is in response to Shriver(1997) as he states according to each mode me must maximise to its usage. We place their emphasis on the special functions to gain maximum benefit.

Reference

Schriver, KA 1997, Dynamics in document design: creating texts for readers, Wiley Computer Pub., NY.

The power of Youtube

YouTube is the world’s fastest growing website, with 100 million YouTube videos being viewed per day and traffic increasing by an eye bulging 75% just last month. For those not in the know, Youtube is a video clip hosting site where anyone can upload and tag a video clip for others to watch and share with friends. (Z. Skinner 2007)

Youtube has become extremely popular and has become a new and powerful alternative media. Though why is it so popular among teens. This proves Kress and Van leeuwan( 1998) That multimodality is the conquering form of reading and interpreting. The fusion of sound and moving images and text gives Youtube the edge.

Z. Skinner (2007) believes why Youtube is also so popular due to its equations. "The equation is very simple: user generated content + personal contextual reputation index + community aided classification + profile based targeting = A cheap vehicle for creating a viral flow of traffic to your website"

According to J. Nielsen(2006), All people who go online read the F formation. Youtube cleans up pretty well with its simplicity in its website complyin go to the the F formation. "Obviously, users' scan patterns are not always comprised of exactly three parts. Sometimes users will read across a third part of the content, making the pattern look more like an E than an F. Other times they'll only read across once, making the pattern look like an inverted L (with the crossbar at the top). Generally, however, reading patterns roughly resemble an F, though the distance between the top and lower bar varies."

References

Skinner, Z. (2007, June 28). Uncovering The Power Of Youtube. [viewed at] http://ezinearticles.com/?Uncovering-The-Power-Of-Youtube&id=625676

J. Nielsen (2006) F-Shaped Pattern For Reading Web Content [viewed at]http://www.useit.com/alertbox/reading_pattern.html

facebooked

Taken from the ABC radio national presented by Anthony Funnel talks about the large influence that Social networking website have affected our youth for more check out http://www.abc.net.au/rn/mediareport/stories/2008/2248917.htm

Facebook, Friendster, Hi5 are a few of the many social networking websites in the internet. Social networking has becoming very popular in the coming age. The most recent Facebook has grown into popularity. These social networking websites we are able to share personal details,play games and use all sorts of applications.



L. Grossman (2007) Facebook has grown into popularity because of its classy and upmarket feel to it. Most people in Facebook use their real names compare to other social networking websites. They declare their genders, relationship's statuses and job affiliations.

Facebook Ceo Mark Zuckerberg decribes Facebook as "A lot of companies get grouped as social networking," says Zuckerberg. "Lots are dating sites, or media sites or sites for community. But our mission is helping people understand the world around them." (D. Kirkpatrick 2oo6)

Facebook also gives u a level of privacy compared to Myspace. For example So you can enable members of your school or work group to learn about you, but prevent anyone in a high school group from seeing anything, if you choose. These settings are all set by you.

The next reason is Users on Facebook use it has a "utility". More than 60% return to Facebook to find out what there friends are doing, check messages, send messages to others, and upgrade their profiles. These applications give facebook the edge compared to all other social networks.

References

L.Grossman (2007) Why Facebook Is the Future, Time [viewed at] <http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1655722,00.html>

D. Kirkpatrick (2005) Why Facebook matters [viewed at] http://money.cnn.com/2006/10/06/magazines/fortune/fastforward_facebook.fortune/index.htm

Emoticons ;D

As taken from the radio talk show ABC radio national as presented by Anthony Funnell as he discusses the how it is hard to interpret what we write to each other using text based messages without the use of emoticons. For more check out http://www.abc.net.au/rn/mediareport/stories/2007/2064342.htm

Emoticons give a significant impact in non-verbal communications. They are used to give out symbols of emotions.

Miscommunication can happen during sending non-verbal text to each other for example


An innocent email like this can have two interpretations:

Enthusiastic reader
“Dear John, the carnival was great. Thanks for all your help and contribution. You were of great help.”

Sneering reader
“Dear John, the carnival was great. Thanks for all your help and contribution. You were of great help.”


People become over confident and perceive these text to their own liking without knowing the true emotions behind them. Emoticons give these mere text symbols give a non verbal cues and help readers undestand the true meaning of these messages.



"Nonverbal communication adds nuance or richness of meaning that cannot be communicated by verbal elements alone. Given time and experience, some of the same richness of real-time, face-to-face communication can occur in a virtual, text-based medium."

Just by combining different alphabets and text symbol, they can resemble emotions and faces.

(J.Gajadhar and J. Green 2005)



references


J.Gajadhar and J. Green (2005) The Importance of Nonverbal Elements in Online Chat
<http://connect.educause.edu/Library/EDUCAUSE+Quarterly/TheImportanceofNonverbalE/39942
>


Wikipedia.org<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emoticons>

OBAMA WINS

What are the factors which lead to Obama's victory? It may have been his great views and great charisma but i will focus on his political posters which made an impact to the public. Firstly i will discuss the power of posters and then the semiotics behind the posters.

According to Wikipedia.org, A poster is any piece of printed paper designed to be attached to a wall or any vertical landscape. A poster which is the mix of both image and text combine together to pass a messsage because they are bright and catch people's attention. A poster can be used for any purpose, Advertisers use them for upcoming events or ablums release or promote their company. Propagandist, protestors and groups use them to communicate a message. Their are also educational posters which help educate public for example the dangers of breast cancer.

The posters above done by Shepard Fairey for more of his work please visit http://obeygiant.com/.

This poster which have been sold out and raised up to $40,000 in the Obama campaign. This was done by the amazing the design that Shepard Fairey has implemented. As Kress and Van Leeuwan (1998) Salience is important, the tone and size of this poster gives impact to the viewers. Like the Obama poster have 3 main colours which are red,white and blue which to Americans reminds them of their American Flag. This also according to Kress andVan Leeuwan (1998) Where intrapersonal factors come in where a viewer uses his own experience and memories to relate him or herselve to the poster.

Like all the poster they are centred and this is extremly essential to a create awareness. Kress and Van Leeuwan (1998) Like in Western visualisation it is not uncommon for things to be centralised. Eastern visualisation having things centred signifies unity, harmony and stability. It shows the importance is in the middle like in the posters is Obama's face, the word vote and the symbol of Obama's campaign badge. All of this theories come to play to when designing a poster which helped Obama to the White House.

References

Kress, G & van Leeuwen, T 2006, Reading Images: Grammar of Visual Design, Routledge, London.

Wikipedia.Org, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poster

http://www9.georgetown.edu/faculty/irvinem/CCTP748/IntroTopics.html

New Media Publishing

The evolving user generated media has become a major publishing trend and it will also effect our professional publishing trend. It has given birth to new media.

"User-generated media is creating new patterns and rhythms in content aggregation and composition that capture the pulse of human intellect in ways that are oftentimes fundamentally different than today's professional publishing methods." (John Blossom 2005)

As specified by wikipedia,
a. Device/media types of blogs:
• Moblog – mobile blogging, e.g. mobile.antonypranata.com
• Vlog – video blogging, e.g. askaninja
• Splog – spam blog, e.g. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spam_bloghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spam_blog
• Linklog – URLs (hyperlinks) blogging, e.g. www.geekhideout.com/wlog.shtml
• Sketchlog – sketch blogging, e.g. Karin Rindevall’s sketch log
b. YouTube
c. Online newspaper
d. Online magazine
e. Online books

example of vlog

The availability of tools online are one of the reasons why this new form of media publishing is existing. Eventhough each one differs in quality all of them show that this form of publsihing will continue to grow and remain a dominant role in the media as it does today.

References

J. Blossom, (2005) User-Generated Media And Its Future Next To Traditional Publishing December 20, viewed at <http://www.masternewmedia.org/news/2005/12/20/usergenerated_media_and_its_future.htm>

Wikipedia.org, viewed at <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blog>

Print Versus Online

The differences in designing online and designing for print lies directly in their dimensionality. As suggested by Nielson (1999) Print design has a 2 dimensional lay out for the readers. This lay out is limited by the pages the paper has and the size of the canvas. Whereas online print is simultaneous 1 dimensional and N-Dimensional. The N-Dimensional or Navigation-Dimensional gives online the edge where it has features such as hyperlinks, unlike its predecessor these links gives you the ability to move around the web and not be limited by just turning a page. (Nielson 1999)


These differences in basic design also changes the way articles, stories and etc. are written on print or online. According Kress andVan Leeuwan (1998)Information on print such as newspaper and magazine has to be given in full. The readers must have all the information on the limited space f the canvas given.




Online print has a different take on writing. Parker (2003) Since Online publication has links and larger canvas to play with. The information can be scattered in different pages. For example, the first page would have only the important information, u can later press on a link for more information or relating stories.

References

Nielsen, J 1999, Print vs. web design, 24 January, viewed 7 November 2008, < http://www.useit.com/alertbox/990124.html>

Kress, G & van Leeuwen, T 1998, Approaches to media discourse, Blackwell, Oxford

Parker, C. 2003, Looking Good in Print, 5th edition, Paraglyph Press, Scottsdale

Blog, blog, blog and blog

There are 6 types of blogs according to Wikipedia.org. The six are divided into personal, corporate, question, media, device, and genre. All six are divided not only by content but also how they are presented and delivered. Different types of blogs is how bloggging communities are created. Blogs ithe the same type of style or same interest could link with each other and create a blogging community.


techtarget.com defines a blogging community or blogosphere is created by bloggers working together in an interactive journalism environment.This is made possible by the symbiotic relationship made possible by links creating their own ecosystem.

An example of a blogging community is nufnang. This blogging community enables bloggers to connect and build communities with the same interest in local region. Nuffnang also enables bloggers to earn an income by becoming a base of advertisments from big companies.

An image representation of the blogosphere taken from discovermagazine.com

References

Nuffnang 2007, Nuffnang, viewed November 4th 2008, <http://www.nuffnang.com.my/>

Wikipedia.org, viewed at November 4th 2008, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blogs

Techtarget.com. viewd at November 4th 2008, http://searchsoa.techtarget.com/sDefinition/0,,sid26_gci1007574,00.html

Blog phenomenon

The growing popularity of blogs has due to its multifuctional role on the Internet.Kress and Van Leeuwen (2006) suggest that the Internet gives a multimodal functions with modes such as written text, images, sounds, and other graphic elements. Bloggers are able to give their own opinions on specific topics and or become a diary on daily experiences The bloggers can also work together in one blog on particular issues and a type of forum.

Survey done by Pew Internet & American Life Project say that blog readership has increased to 58% and now stands 27% of Internet users. This survey was done during 2005 for information please visit http://www.pewinternet.org/PPF/r/144/report_display.asp


Even though we live in a media overload environment, blogs are becoming a force to be reckoned with. C. Prius (2005) The reason why blogs have become so popular is because blogs has features which enables users to interact with the blogger. This ability to give almost immediate feedback by giving a comment makes this different from other media.

G. Perera (2008) Blogging has contributed by creating a powerful online communtiy. Bloggers are able to connect and link with each other who have the same views. Blogging also has helped countrys such as Malaysia give a new freedom of speech and has become new media. (Tan Tarn How 2008).

References


Kress, G & van Leeuwen, T 2006, Reading Images: Grammar of Visual Design, Routledge, London.


Tan Tarn Haw, 2008, New Media: Trends and Opportunities at the Menara Star, Petaling Jaya, Malaysia, organize by the Asian Centre for Media Studies.


Ceder Pruitt, 2005 The Blogging Phenomenon: Who? How? Why? [viewed at] http://www.digitaldivide.net/articles/view.php?ArticleID=86


Lee Rainie, 2005, The State of Blogging [viewed at] http://www.pewinternet.org/PPF/r/144/report_display.asp


Gihan Perera, 2008, The Personal Benefits of Blogging, Article Alley [viewed at]
http://www.articlealley.com/article_669123_15.html

The birth of a blog

This blog's pupose is to discuss, review and analyse issues relating to publication and design. This blog will discuss on issues such as the popularity of blogs, semiotics and etc. This blog entertains users who would like to learn or comment on the issues at hand. This will also help discuss issues with peers and other professional designers.