Content is Free but Facts are Sacred - Commercial Media Week 6 Review

 This weeks lecture was on Commercial Media in Australia. 

When thinking about the media landscape in Australia a few corporations come to mind. Televisions such as 7, 9, 10 and their affiliates (e.g 7mate, GO!, etc) cable television (Foxtel, Austar) , and companies such as Fairfax media, SBS, abc and the Australian National Radio are all elements that make up the landscape. 

The main and sole purpose commercial media exists is because it provides eyes and ears to advertisers. Advertisers are the real customers of commercial media not readers listeners or viewers.

So, what is commercial media anyway?

Its profit-driven media production that is not government funded or license funded. It only survives or fails depending on its business success. This business success is measured by how much of an audience is generated thus how much profit is made from advertisers.

Some of the major players in commercial media include: 

 ·      News Limited

·      Fairfax Media

·      APN

·      Nine

·      Win

·      Southern Cross

·      Seven West Media

·      Ten

·      Telstra

·      Optus

·      Macquarie 
·      Austar 

There a several challenges that commercial media have to overcome in order for it to continue comfortably. The advertising revenue for broadcast media (radio) is down and is continuing to decrease, a trend that is also occurring in television. Because of this loss of revenue there is a loss of investment therefore less money for quality production.  This is why there is more bought it content (American sitcoms) and reality television.

 So what does this mean when looking at the future of commerical media? one must ask these 4 questions:  

1.   how does Commercial Media contie to make profits if advertising revenue is declining?

2.   How does it continue to serve the advertisers audience and the public good?

3.   What kind of audience are we expected to get?

4.   What cumulative effect does this have on the practice of journalism and public communication? 

Before we see the end to commercial media completely, there are some solutions. The main thing to consider is quality as it is believed people will pay for it. some other ideas include: greater competition, moving existing customers to digital and paywalls on internet (which is no longer and idea but a reality)

GRIMES.

I have a giant chip on my shoulder.
Why you ask? Well...

After waiting (impatiently) for months for the magnificent GRIMES to announce her Australian tour she finally did ANNNNNND that she was coming to Brisbane.(which never happens as Brisbane is a long way from being the musical hub of Australia)

Squealing with delight like a little girl at christmas, I raced to my facebook profile to ask someone to join me. However, while this was happening the tickets when on sale and sold out. bummer.

So here I am, crying my chubby eyes out while listening to oblivion on repeat. sigh.
In case you have not come across her glory here it is: 

If for some reason you refuse to watch this video (I have no idea what led you to think this is not awesome in it's finest form) then here are some pictures of heaven on earth. 

GRIMES!!

GRIMES AGAIN!!!

Magical right?

'A Picture Has No Meaning At All If It Can't Tell a Story' - Lecture Review Week 5 Telling Stories with Pictures

This week's lecture was based on well, you guessed it - pictures that tell stories! 

When you really think about it, picture stories are everywhere - magazines, television, movies, youtube, newspaper, computer screen, phone screen, facebook, twitter, memes, flickr, computer games, advertising, graffiti and even money

The concept of using pictures to tell stories have developed dramatically over time too. From Australian indigenous and Lascaux painting in France dating back to 15 000 BC then to biblical illustrations and stained-glass windows across Europe and China dated from 800 - 868 to the first illustrated newspaper in the 1860's, the first photograph in a 1979 New York newspaper, first coloured photography in Scotland 1936 and all the way to the first picture on the internet in 1992 and first video on Youtube in 2005 - a time that isn't really that far away in retrospect. 

Other developments of photography include the ability to capture and upload your images immediately, digital manipulation (photoshop), digital publishing and the ability to post photo galleries on websites not just one photo.

Some statistics on how Instagram and Youtube is used (from 2011) provided some results that I found very hard to comprehend : 14 million instagram accounts were created and 60 photos are uploaded per second. On Youtube (2012), users upload 72 hours of videos every minute!

So, what makes a good photo?

Well, there are MANY aspects one must consider before one tiny 'click'. Framing, focus, angle and point of view (POV), exposure or light, timing or shutter speed, rule of thirds and most importantly 'Capturing the moment' should all be taken into consideration if a good shot it desired by the photographer.

There's not just still pictures y' know, but moving ones too!

yep, more commonly known as movies! 

It all started in 1895 but the Lumiere Brothers who introduced cinematography. This was then expanded in 1925 by Sergi Eisnestien who edited his films. News reels were also popular as people only went to the cinema just to watch the news - a routine, I'm sure seems strange to everyone in my generation.

I think it's safe to say that at least 90% of my generation has some sort of recording device on their phone. It is because of this amateur and eyewitness recording has dramatically increased. For example, most of the 9/11 footage was filmed by amateurs alone.

Finally, this weeks lecture was left with two, very fitting, inspirational quotes

‘if it makes you laugh, if it makes you cry, if it rips out your heart, that’s a good picture’ – Eddie Adams, Pulitzer prize-winning photojournalist

‘A picture has no meaning at all if it can’t tell a story’ Eetu Silanpaa - photojournalist