The Internet as a New Forum For Democracy….I Think Not!
When the Internet first appeared on the scene, it was promised to bring with it a more equal society by helping to create a new forum for democracy. This new forum for democracy was believed to come about because the Internet allowed for global communities as well as social movements and not for profit organizations to send their messages to large groups of people.
This is all very true, however what about the people who do not have access to the Internet? They do not have equal opportunities as those who do. This is a problem as it creates inequality between the people who have access to the Internet and those who do not.
Those who have access to the Internet have great advantages over those who do not. For example they have quick and easy access to information, entertainment and research tools. They also have the capability to put their ideas and opinions online for a large audience therefore making themselves heard. People who don’t have access to the Internet do not have the same forum to make themselves heard and therefore do not have the same opportunity to get their opinion out there.
The Internet also provides hate groups and terrorists with the opportunity to spread their message among the millions of Internet users. This is not acceptable as they are using the Internet to spread messages of hate and instill fear in the group that their hate is directed towards.
They also use the Internet to spread black propaganda and recruit new members to their group. This should not be allowed as these groups do nothing to benefit society, they just divide it by putting people against each other.
Although freedom of speech and opinion are part of democracy, it is not right that people who want to use the Internet in a more productive manner than the one mentioned above, do not have the opportunity, but those who want to spread messages of hate have the opportunity.
Until everyone has equal access to the Internet it cannot be known as a tool used to make things equal because if anything it has created more inequalities.
Muted Videos….What is the world coming to…..?
“The Internet is a field of unconstrained expression” (Strangelove, 199). This freedom of expression that allows people to be themselves has helped to create “a new type of public space” (199) that is not controlled by the market. People think freely and develop their own meaning, which allows them to resist control.
Corporations do not like this freedom as it makes them feel as though they have lost control over their audience. They feel this control is necessary in order to sell their products and the lifestyle that comes along with it.
The freedom of the Internet is under attack and it has started with YouTube. Users make videos and use their favorite songs as the soundtracks and this has been done since the beginning of YouTube.
However, lately YouTube creators have decided to start muting videos that use unauthorized copyrighted material, such as songs because of a copyright infringement.
Videos that this has been done to have the official YouTube notice:
“This video contains an audio track that has not been authorized by all copyright holders. This audio has been disabled”
If YouTube starts being thorough and following through with this on every video then there will be a lot of amateur videos that will be muted and without sound videos tend to lose their appeal. I don’t think that any users are going to be happy about this as it limits their creativity as well as the freedom they once had on the Internet.
The Internet is known as a place where private property became public property, this however is changing and one day may no longer the case. The freedom of the Internet is under attack. If we do not start to fight back and put up more resistance, than the Internet may one day fall under corporate control.
It starts with YouTube and then from there it could expand. I think that corporations want to control human communication and social networks so that they can use them to their advantage while selling their products.
It is very difficult to find an example of these videos online because once they have been muted, the creator will usually take the video off YouTube because it has lost much of its appeal and meaning.
The videos that I have posted are examples of this new phenomenon. Both of these videos were once accommodated by a song that the creator felt represented the video and made it exciting.
I am sure that the Jenga Pistol would have been a lot more exciting to watch if there was a soundtrack. It would be like watching a silent movie, and that is never good.
Media Giants…..When will they stop???
“Convergence is a utopian business dream of a perfect marketplace where one company delivers all content to all audiences” (Strangelove, 59). It would be most ideal is this could be done through one “box that combines the interactive capabilities of a computer with television’s mass-advertising audience” (Strangelove, 59).
According to Mike Gasher this convergence of media is an economic strategy used by communications companies seeking financial benefit by making the various media properties and outlets they own work together.
The strategy of media convergence developed as the result of three elements:
(1) corporate concentration, where a small number of large companies own the majority of media properties and outlets
(2) digitization, which is when media content is produced using a universal computer language that can easily be converted and applied for any medium
(3) government deregulation, a process where the government’s control over businesses is reduced or removed, which has allowed media corporations to own several different kinds of media in the same markets (Gasher).
The strategy has many advantages for organizations, such as saving them money by reducing labor, administrative and material costs. It makes it possible for companies to used the same media content across several media outlets as well as attract increased advertising by providing advertisers with package deals because they can offer them a variety of media platforms.
It also attracts advertisers because having more advertisement spaces and outlets allows them to increase brand recognition and brand loyalty among audiences through cross-promotion and cross-selling. Last, but not least and probably one of the most beneficial aspects of the strategy is that it makes it very difficult for competition to enter into the media markets (Gasher).
A really good example of this convergence is when AOL and Time Warner merged when AOL purchased Time Warner in January of 2001 for approximately $182 billion dollars. This acquisition created AOL Time Warner, a digital media powerhouse, worth $350 billion.
Together these two companies hold dominating positions in the music, publishing, news, entertainment, cable and Internet industries. This domination gives them a lot of power over the information that is distributed to the public as they have control over what content they are going to release to the public.
This type of media control in my opinion should not be allowed as it give certain organizations a great amount of power over the audience as they control the information made available to them. This gives them the majority of control over public opinion as they can put whatever spin they want on the story.
While the corporate benefits of this strategy are being realized, the social costs are slowly becoming apparent. Media content is progressively being treated as a product like everything else, and “notions of public service take a back seat to private enterprise” (Gasher).
Convergences such as these also take away consumer choice by limiting the entrance of competition into the market. Also as mergers such as these are quite costly organizations have started creating new budgets and focusing on cost-cutting ventures instead of increasing their investments in communication services meaning that people lose their jobs and the human aspect of the organization takes a back seat to technology development.
I do not like the idea of convergence and if it came to a vote I would not support it. However, I know that it will not come to a vote and that one day it is just going to happen as media giants continue along the same path as AOL and Time Warner.
Source : Gasher
http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.com/index.cfm?PgNm=TCE&Params=A1ARTA0009695
And it Never Ends…..
Appropriation is taking elements, such as techniques or aspects, of something and using them in the creation of something new. This happens in the music industry all the time and is known there as sampling. Musicians sometimes borrow beats, melodies and rhythms from other songs when creating a new song. It is sometimes done because they love the melody and believe that it can help them convey the meaning of their song to their audience and therefore they are in a sense giving the melody a new meaning. They are assigning their own meaning to the melody when the original may have had a different meaning. However sampling is legal as you need permission from the original artist.
In the commercialized world the appropriation of Barbie is a hot topic. Barbie is redone in so many different ways on the Internet, such as, Gangsta Bitch Barbie and Lesbian Bondage Barbie, that it amazes me that Barbie continues to be such a popular toy and that the meaning behind it has never faltered. All of these appropriated Barbie are created by people who want to change the meaning behind Barbie.
Not everyone is happy with the meaning associated with Barbie. After the release of Barbie and her quick rise to popularity she became an American icon of what beauty is and many girls and women alike aspired to have the impossible body of Barbie. Women began associating blonde and busty with beautiful when beauty can be defined in many different ways.
According to Dr. Strangelove “Barbie has a very specific role in the economics system- the eroticization of female identity and socialization of each new generation of consumers” (140). It is hard to believe, but Barbie actually has an alarming effect and influence on the buying power of consumers. Barbie is a huge brand that associates its name with other products than just the doll, such as lip gloss and hand creams. Girls that love Barbie will want to buy these products because they have a picture of Barbie on them and in this sense they influence the purchases of consumers.
I personally never had a Barbie, but almost every girl that I know had at least one and now my younger cousins have quite the Barbie collection and Barbie was around even before my time. Barbie has incredible staying power as well as the ability to put her name on a product in order to sell it. I would not be surprised if my granddaughters were asking for a Barbie one day.
Empowerment
As the saying goes, imitation is the highest form of flattery. YouTube is full of videos that imitate others. There are videos that imitate other YouTube videos, there are videos that imitate music videos, there are videos that imitate movies and the list goes on.
This video is an imitation, but also a remake of the music video for ‘Single Ladies’ by Beyonce. The women in this video got the opportunity to be on the Tyra Banks Show as she dedicated an entire show to dealing with YouTube sensations, and the ladies got the opportunity to explain why they made the videos and speak out against the negative comments they received.
This video is trying to send a message of empowerment. The women in this video want to tell other women that it is ok to be larger because it is still beautiful. I think their message has been delivered as the video has received more than 5 million views.
They wanted to stop larger women from being afraid to dance and be free. They want these women to love themselves and be proud of who they are and not what they look like.
Tyra asked the women what the responses to their videos were like and whether or not they had received any negative feedback, and of course they had.
They had comments such as “fat girls can’t dance”, “please stop and don’t make another video” and “ok that’s enough”. They received a lot of negative comments pertaining to their weight, which is horrible because the message they were trying to send is that women should not be ashamed of their body.
The fact that YouTube is anonymous makes it easy for people to leave negative comments, as they know that there are really no consequences for their actions. I think that people need to be aware of the effect that their comments could have on someone. The negative comments can have serious psychological effects on people.
Constant negative attention and comments can cause stress, self-image issues and can lead to serious depression. According to Dr. Ken Rigby people who experience put downs start to feel victimized and are less likely to relate to their peers. Also it can affect them all throughout the day at work and at home. It is something that weighs heavily on a person’s mind. If they are being putdown about any aspect of their lives it can often leak into and start affecting other aspects.
However these women have decided not to let the negative comments bring them down or even affect them. They told Tyra that they simply remove the negative comments for their page and do not think about them. They focus on the positive comments and on getting their positive message out to their viewers.
After being on Tyra’s show the video’s views increased greatly and many of the comments became more positive and surrounded the fact that they were on the show, such as “I saw you on the Tyra show and just had to see the video…” The Tyra show gave these people a little touch of fame on TV, which made them stars within the YouTube network and also changed the negative comments into positive ones.
Funny but Serious….
This video is very well done and looks like an actual movie preview. It tells the basic plot of the movie and introduces the characters as well as insinuates how the movie might end. It is a very high quality video where the image and lighting are very clear and the sound levels flow very well.
This is a very funny video that parodies a movie preview. The plot of the movie surrounds Facebook and how it can be used in a malicious fashion to ruin someone’s social network and social life.
In the movie two college guys are breaking into each other’s Facebook pages and changing information as well as sending their friends weird messages and gifts. The one guy starts it because he is in love with the other guy’s girlfriend. This parody is meant to be funny, and it is, however it does raise a very serious issue, breaking into people’s online social networks, whether it be Facebook, MSN, MySpace or any other site.
The bigger issue however is why people are breaking into people’s accounts and the answer is cyber bullying. According to the National Crime Prevention Center over 40% of all teenagers with Internet access have reported being bullied online during the past year. Also girls are more likely to be bullied online than boys, but girls are also more likely to bully others online than boys. However this is expected as other studies have demonstrated that girls spend more time online than boys do as well as they are more likely to be members of a social network.
Cyber bullying is just as hurtful as face to face bullying and kids are less likely to tell an adult about cyber bullying. The National Crime Prevention Center discovered that only 10% of kids who experience cyber bullying tell their parents about it and only 18% of the incidents are reported to police.
This is terrible as being bullied can really affect a person’s self-esteem as well as their desire to socialize. I think it is important to educate children on the consequences of cyber bullying as well as how to deal with it if it ever happens to them.
I think humorous videos, such as the one posted in the blog, are a great way to introduce the subject to kids before moving on to the more serious aspects of the problem. This way the conversation is not too serious or boring, but the message gets across.
Attack on Online Mesogyny
We watched this video in class and something about it stuck with me. It is very interesting to see the way that people can express themselves within YouTube and I like the way this women presents and defends feminism. She does it in a way that is not offensive to those who are not feminist and even men who have no interest in feminism can listen and learn something.
This video is about online misogyny, something that I knew existed, however I did not know to what extent. Just looking at the responses that this video received, I believe she has a valid point as some of them are very offensive. One of the videos for example simply asks her “What the fuck are you doing out of the kitchen?” I couldn’t believe it! I think he was only doing it for the shock value and attention however comments like that are very offensive.
Many of the comments on this video were from other men telling him that he was wrong and that women should be equal to men. They acknowledge that there are still inequalities which means that her message is not lost on everyone, specifically men.
According to feminists theorists such as Dow, there are two different views that feminists hold of the media. The first is that they believe that the media supports and tries to enable women’s secondary status in societies and the second explores the way the media could be used to promote and spread their ideas, status and political power. It is clear that she has used the second view and is using the Internet and YouTube in order to share her thoughts, ideas and ideology with others.
I think that the Internet is a very powerful tool for expressing thoughts and feelings with a large audience. It has opened up the door to the audience who is not converted as it is easy to stumble upon videos and websites when not meaning to. I think her videos are interesting and a lot of different types of people can watch, learn and be entertained.
I hate to say this but sometimes there are feminists who get on my nerves because in a way they just put men down, which really is not fair and does not help their cause. In this video she simply talks about the behavior of particular men online and is able to keep this in perspective that it is not all men!
Men vs. Women in Cyberspace
The women and men of society use technology differently. This is interesting, but also expected, as women and men do everything differently. Men use technology in order to be powerful where as women use it in order to socialize. Men want to dominate and control everything around them in order to feel powerful and they use technology to boss people around. Women love to socialize and feel involved within their social network. They use technology in order to maintain current relationships as well as develop new ones.
This different use of technology is important when looking at the difference between the way men and women blog. Men’s blogs are more impersonal and they do not try to connect with their readers. They just want people to read their opinions and take them in. They are not worried about receiving responses and engaging in conversations. Women on the other hand enjoy blogging and tend to reveal more personal information about themselves and therefore tend to make connections with some people who read their blogs. They sometimes even have conversations through the posting of comments on blogs as well as response blogs.
Reapleaf conducted a study in 2008 that looked at the difference in the connections of men and women in the online world. They studied online social networks such as Facebook, MySpace, Bebo, Flickr and Hi5. In this study they found that women have more friends than men, however men tend to have more contacts. They also discovered that women had more interactions and conversations going on within these social networks than men did. This demonstrates that men tend to use these networks for business and women tend to use them to form relationships.
It is not shocking that men and women use technology in different ways, however it is interesting to study how they use it differently in order to make generalizations about men and women in cyberspace.
Making Our Own Meaning
Culture jamming involves taking a company’s ad and altering the meaning behind it. The changes are usually obscene or pornographic in order to shock and amuse the viewer. By doing this it destroys the commercially produced meaning behind the ad and the product. Once organizations lose control of the meaning they lose control of the consumer and this is the last thing they want (Strangelove).
Since culture jamming uses corporate material that is trademarked without their permission it is illegal. Some corporations work really hard to make sure that their product is not used for anything that does not promote a positive image of it. Dr. Strangelove gives the example of Mattel, the company behind Barbie. They work very hard to remove negative images of Barbie from the Internet. It is true that they have some success in that people do have to remove the images, however the images usually reappear very quickly on another site. Therefore they truly have no success as the images are never truly removed from the web.
Consumers are taking away some of the corporations’ power. The meaning behind the product is usually why consumers buy the product and if people change that meaning to something negative, people may be less likely to buy it.
The Internet is not a stable environment for identity or meaning as new meanings are constantly being created and everything is out of control (Strangelove), therefore corporations need to rely on other mediums to communicate their meanings and new methods of making them stick in the consumer’s mind.
According to Dr. Strangelove the main social function of the Internet is to enable public interpretation of privately owned messages and meanings. This is exactly what is going on on the Internet today. Things are being reassigned meaning constantly to the point where one thing can have many different meanings depending on the context and the situation. This means that corporations and capitalism are losing the power they once had over consumers through the meaning behind their products.
The Internet vs. The Corporations
Before the Internet “consumers had very little access to information that was not produced by the economic system, and the physical range of their discourse was limited to their local social networks” (Strangelove, 99). This meant that whatever capitalism wanted us to know was what we knew and talked about. The messages of the corporations were absorbed and the meanings given to things through the economic system were not questioned, but accepted.
Then the Internet came along and people’s social networks expanded as people all over the world have access to the Internet and messages could be sent much further and much more quickly. People now have access to different opinions and viewpoints than just those that surround them in their everyday life.
The Internet is a public sphere, which is a place in the social structure where people can share their opinions and identify and discuss social issues.
It is a place where people can present corporate resistance, which many of them do. They can put their ideas in a blog, on a web site, in a response to another blog or post a diary video. There are more web sites now that speak poorly of corporations’ products and behaviours and that talk
This new found consumer freedom and control greatly worries corporations. They do not want consumers hearing or reading negative things about them as they do not want to lose any customers. The messages found on the Internet may have a greater impact on how the consumer feels about a particular organization because it comes from people with experience – other consumers.
Corporations have an image to maintain and the Internet is a great threat to this image through the freedom of expression and information that it allows. Not having any control over the content about them on the Internet is very frustrating for corporations and is a problem for capitalism. These web sites try to prevent organizations from achieving their goals, such as selling products, because they try and are somewhat successful in rallying consumers to boycott certain products for whatever reasons.
Corporations are going to have to find a way to start using the Internet to their advantage because until they do, it will continue to try and take them down by destroying the meanings they attach to their products.
