New & Digital Media: Week 12 / Week 7 IN&DM

http://www.ctvnews.ca/mobile/world/oscar-pistorius-vomits-in-court-during-graphic-testimony-1.1721682 - Pistorius vomits during autopsy report.

The high profile Oscar Pistorius trial has been one many have been keeping close attention to, Pistorius being one of South Africa's most decorated athletes and the only Paralympic to ever run in the Olympics, 2012 was a great year for Pistorius, winning gold in London but the worst came in the following year when Pistorius jailed for murdering his wife Reeva Steenkamp, and now we are witnessing South Africa's first ever broadcasted trial. We'd gotten to day 6 when state called upon Prof.Saayman for the autopsy report and for the first time all broadcast of the trial was halted, and the Judge ruled for the court order given by state to stop all recordings of the autopsy, to which we saw the media lawyers trying also in court to fight for this to be atleast recorded via audio but the judge remained to her word and demanded that nothing may be reported live, thus stopping people from posting live updates on twitter and blogs but they were allowed to summarise after Saayman had finished. In my opinion, in the era we are in where everything is broadcasted on any social networking site or any platform, I think it would have been interesting to hear the autopsy report giving audiences worldwide a wider verdict personally on Pistorius guilty or not.

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/technology-science/technology/apple-refuses-unlock-dead-womans-3214436

Apple refuses to unlock dead woman's iPad, despite grieving sons' pleas

The giant institution of Apple have come into some scrutiny due to not unlocking a dead woman's ipad. With the will of the woman being divided between her two sons, they decided to keep the ipad between each other and realised there mother hadn't given them the password, they then factory reseted it and after this didn't work, they went to Apple who said they need a letter from there Mother, they said she was dead so Apple said they needed to see the death certificate, when the two boys went with the death certificate, Apple then said they need a court order in favour of them to actually unlock the ipad, to which we saw comments about the young men being ridiculed for not just going to a normal phone unlocking shop. In my opinion, Apple should have unlocked the ipad after the death certificate and will was shown, surely it must have been awkward for the shop assistant to refuse to unlock a ipad even after seeing a death certificate.  

News Values

How has new and digital media technology changed Galtung and Ruge’s news values?

How would you update them for 2014?

Galtung and Ruge defined a set of values to explain how journalists & editors decide which certain stories and photographs were accepted as newsworthy. The original research was taken in 1965 but their work is still debated as newsworthy. 

Immediacy -  Has it happened recently ? Is it new ? 

New and digital media has changed immediacy vastly, before the rise of new and digital media, news was broken to audiences via Broadcast or those without a TV would usually have to wait till the following morning, where they would read the news in the papers, however since the rise of new and digital media, news apps, social networking sites and news sites on the internet have resulted into the public receiving their news much much 
faster, thus improving immediacy.  

Familiarity - Does it mean something to us where we live ? Can we relate to it ? 

New and Digital media has helped bring cultural news to audiences easier, even though much of this news may not relate to us, news apps such as Sky News & BBC News both give an area for World news, this news may not be in relation to us but it gives audiences cultural and world wide news, an example of this is the Oscar Pistorious murder trial, it has no relation to us and does not mean something to us where we live, but the South African blade runner is well known and with the trial being televised and us getting live updates on Twitter, we are able to get news like this much quicker. 

Amplitude - Is it a big event ? Does it involve many people ? 

The growth of new and digital media has helped us view major events much much easier, for example the Boston bombings and the Woolwich racist murder of soldier Lee Rigby, has shown how new and digital media has helped audiences view such tragic events, citizen journalism have let the audience see the full events rather than just seeing the impact. 

Frequency - Is it something that happened fairly quickly ?

In the same way Amplitude has been affected by the growth of new and digital media, frequency has too, citizen journalism provides photographs of events, and just putting in photographs with a caption portrays the event, and as seen by the Metro, pictures provide the story and it also saves time. 

Unambiguity -  Is it clear ? Are the results/effects obvious ? 

Newspapers usually ignore stories if they think they're boring, however the growth of new and digital media has shown that even these so called 'boring' stories do have a place on the internet, news websites or apps usually have categories that include 'boring' stories, the growth of new and digital media has helped some stories come out and even go viral. 

Predictability - Is it predictable ? Do we expect it to happen ?

If we know what is going to happen, we usually do not care, but Elections and cup finals or even football matches are seen as predictable yet interesting, and newspapers such as The Sun have used this to help promote there institution, The Sun used promotions in their newspaper for there new Goals App, this promoted there newspaper and the growth of New and Digital media was promoted through institutions such as The Sun.

Surprise - Is it rare or an unexpected event ? 

Audiences like surprises, even unpleasant ones. This is also something that has been affected by the growth of new and digital media and also citizen journalism, the murder of Lee Rigby was recorded on a phone and sent into ITV, this footage shocked the nation, no one expects such a thing to happen in there country, and especially one where the police force is so exuberant, this was a rare and unexpected event and with the video being sent in to ITV, we began to see shocks throughout the audience and the video beginning to go viral.  

Continuity - Has it already been defined as news ? Is it a running story ? 

Newspapers always try to look for new angles on ongoing news stories, these usually feature stories about a civil war in a country or some wrong doing in one country, this has been seen in Ukraine, the civil unrest regarding Ukraine and Crimea due to Russia has been an ongoing news story, one we have seen vastly on the news. Due to civil unrest in the country new and digital media has affected this news value due to the way videos have been sent in to news institutions such as BBC which allows newspapers and sites to find new angles regarding certain news stories. 

Elite nations or people - Has the event happened in a country that is important to the audience ? Does it concern well-known people ? 

The growth of new and digital media has been seen to affect elite nations or people, an example of this was seen at the previous Oscar's we just saw a few days ago, and presenter of The Elle Show, Elle tried breaking a record of the most retweeted picture and did so by taking a selfie with elite actors. The social networking site Twitter allowed people to retweet the picture and view the picture both nationally and worldwide. 

Personalisation - Is it a personal or human interest story ? 

Inspirational stories have been affected majorly by the growth of new and digital media, inspirational stories usually show personal and human interest, and we have seen many of these videos throughout new and digital apps such as YouTube and even social networking sites. YouTube allows people to see inspirational stories and even identify and be inspired by these stories. 

Negativity - Is it bad news ? 

Negativity is one that seen positively by news corporations. Negativity helps improve ratings and more people are interested in bad news than they are in good, it always seems to get more press and attention than good news does, and new and digital media does affect negativity, we usually see stuff about news trending on Twitter and this spreads news much much more vastly than word of mouth. It also shows different views of the story no matter how negative and these views are also shown on news channels and shows.

Exclusivity - Are we the only only newspaper that has this story ? 

The growth of new and digital media has gotten rid of  exclusivity, nowadays we hardly see exclusivity unless someone is reporting something through a newspaper, this used to happen quite a lot a few years ago and the biggest newspapers such as The Sun would usually be the first to get the dirt but since the growth of new and digital media, and since Tom Daley's confession of being bisexual via twitter and YouTube, breaking news is broken usually on social networking sites. 

Visual Impact - Is this a really strong image ? 

Visual impact has also been impacted majorly by social networking sites and citizen journalism. The photographs sent in usually are the ones newspapers lead with, when a story has strength via its images. However again new and digital media has impacted visual impact too. Images which are sent in are usually shown on news websites or social networking sites before a newspaper.

Balance - Is it being used to counterbalance other stories ? 

News stories can usually be placed in broadsheets to counterbalance a heavy weight of foreign news and happy human interest stories sometimes appear in tabloids to balance out the bad and good news. This may be one of the news values that hasn't changed much. Balance is used more for newspapers and broadcast, if we see a bad story that has been running for 2 days, corporations will usually find a happy news story to show that there is not all doom and gloom in the world and this will usually be an inspirational story found either on YouTube or sent in. 

New & Digital Media: Week 11 / Week 6 IN&DM

David Cameron gives Russa an ultimatum. UK prime minister, David Cameron used the social networking site of Twitter to tell the public of what would happen if Russia continues there stance in Crimea, he tagged in Barack Obama who like a normal country leader had a press conference to speak about his views of Russia's actions yet Cameron choose to hide behind a screen and abnormally tweet rather than use the normal way of a press conference, Cameron was then horrendously abused on Twitter, with one user saying; "We can't even run the jubliee line without delays, how the f*ck is Cameron going to deal with Russia"

#FreeSuarez - http://metro.co.uk/2014/03/03/arsenal-fan-sets-up-petition-to-demand-liverpool-release-luis-suarez-and-pay-gunners-4-5m-4394076/

Liverpool and Boston Red Sox owner, John Henry made clear recently that Liverpools controversial striker Luis Suarez did in fact have a £40M release clause and that they didn't sell because contracts don't mean much in the UK, Arsenal fans didn't take this lightly and decided to post up an e-petition, this petition stated that Liverpool must hand over Suarez for free, publicly apologise then pay £4.5M in compensation, otherwise they take Liverpool to court, disregarding the fact that only Suarez could take them to court for breach of contract, and if he'd have ever said he publicly  wants to join The Gunners, this petition also comes very soon after one about not allowing Tom Clevery to go to Brazil for the World Cup, getting almost 1M signatures 

New & Digital Media: Week 10 / Week 5 IN&DM

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/technology-science/technology/iphones-flappy-bird-sale-ebay-3131012 Flappy Bird on sale.

Creator Nyguen revealed a few days ago that he would be taking down Flappy Bird from the App Store, he believed that the simple game could ruin lives and he was true to his word and he removed it from the iTunes App Store however, people saw a gap in the market which led to users putting there phone on sale on ebay, saying that it had Flappy Bird installed and this led to one guy selling his iphone with Flappy Bird installed for $90,000. 

 http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-26124541 - Goverment blocking all online extremist videos. 

The government is attempting to block all online extremist videos that help to radicalise impressionable young men. This is due to the fear that they believe many returning from war could easily be turned due to years abroad and due to the amount of propaganda, they saw. The Goverment will hold talks with server holders to block any videos outside the hosters area meaning videos from the East could be ostracised from being seen by members of the public.  

Citizen Journalism - Media Magazine December 2009 Is Reality becoming more real ?

Examples: 

• Once, it was all quite simple…the big institutions created the news and broadcast it to a variously passive and receptive audience. Now new technologies mean that the audience are no longer passive receivers of news. The audience have become ‘users’ and the users have become publishers. Audiences now create their own content. We are in the era of user generated content (UGC) where the old divide between institution and audience is being eroded.
• Key to this change has been the development of new technologies such as video phones and the growth of the internet and user-dominated sites
• As technology improved over the years, incidents of this kind have become more and more common. Millions of people have constant access to filming capability through their mobiles, and footage can be uploaded and rapidly distributed on the internet.
• Gulf War, 9/11, Rodney King, Tsunami, 2005 London Bombings, Mumbai Bombings.

Theory:

• The theory involved in reality becoming more real is Baudrillaud's proposed theory of hyperreality. The theory is a term used in semiotics and post-modernism philosophy to describe an inability of consciousness to distinguish reality from a stimulation of reality, especially in technologically ordained post-modern society. 

Benefits to institutions:

• Institutions are able to get access to news via journalists easier, it detracts the risk involved in filming from journalists, it also saves institutions money due to the fact that they do not have to pay to send out news reporters in different countries as soon as something happens as now a days, a lot of video footage is sent in to the these news institutions. Events such as the Tsunami and bombings could be seen as a risk to news reporters, even though it is there job, there is still a high risk involved, but with footage of the Tsunami being sent in, it saved many journalists from filming on the scene as it happened.  With less journalists they also save money, vital benefit to the institution.

Benefits to audience:

• Audience members are now able to get 'real' news, the examples of major events such as the London, Mumbai bombings and also 9/11, how these were shown on the news was seen as an actual benefit to the audience, due to the fact that they got real news, by real news meaning that they got footage that was live from the scene and people saw what happened at the exact moment rather than seeing the aftermath of the event, so the benefits to the audience is that they get real news rather than the aftermath's first. 

Wider issues and debates: 

• Quality of footage will decrease, furthermore, due to the fact that the footage may not go through the gatekeeper, the footage could be imbalanced. This could potentially be bad for the media institutions due to the fact that the footage could be shown straight away rather than being checked due to the demand of the audience and the competition with other institutions.

SHEP:

• Social - Things such as the riots caused social unrest in society, the fact that the news reported that the riots are spreading resulted in the riots spreading. Thus causing social unrest in society.
• Historical - Rodney King, the attack on Rodney King was filmed causing the police officers to go into court, even though they were acquitted, it showed how new and digital media can have an impact of Law
• Economical - Benefits to institution, due to the fact that they are being sent in footage, they are able to get rid of normal journalists as they do not need most of them, they are sent in footage by citizen journalists instead. 

1) What is meant by the term ‘citizen journalist’?

The term 'citizen journalist' is given to members of the public who record an event or take pictures of an event and send it into the institutions, the only difference between a normal journalist and one given the term 'citizen journalist' is in the name itself, they are usually citizens. 

2) What was one of the first examples of news being generated by ‘ordinary people’?

One of the first examples of news being generated by 'ordinary people' was the video recorded of Rodney King being chased by the police and being beaten by police officers, since this we saw recordings of The Gulf War, 9/11 and other major events.

 
3) List some of the formats for participation that are now offered by news organisations.

Most news organisations include formats for participation: message boards, chat rooms, Q&A, polls, have your says, and blogs with comments enabled.

4) What is one of the main differences between professionally shot footage and that taken first-hand (UGC)?

One of the main differences between professionally shot footage and that taken first - hand is the quality of the footage, due to the fact that most people will be sending in videos recording via mobile phones, the footage will unlikely by full HD and as clear as it would had it been professionally shot. 

5) What is a gatekeeper?

Gatekeepers are usually known as editors who view the footage sent in and make sure that it is suitable to be shown on live television, they are also the ones who control what goes on broadcast for the institutions. 

6) How has the role of a gatekeeper changed?

The Role of the gatekeeper changed in the way that due to people sending in footage. the gatekeepers may have to put on footage without viewing it first. 

7) What is one of the primary concerns held by journalists over the rise of UGC?

The primary concern that could be held by journalists over the rise of UGC could be the fact that they could be without a job pretty soon, due to the fact that most user generated content would not be paid for and institutions would receive content for free. 

New & Digital Media: Week 9 / Week 4 IN&DM

'Nek Nominations' http://www.independent.ie/irish-news/what-is-neknomination-29973436.html

Nek Nominations have been in the news recently but have also been formed recently, the new drinking game which sees the drinker mix a pint full of drinks which are entirely his or her choice, it usually includes an egg, some beer, a mixer and something a bit stronger, the drinker then uploads the video of him/her making the drink then nominating 3 other people to do the same, the new and digital media aspect of this is the craze that started in Ireland has seen the videos go viral onto Facebook, users must upload the video then tag 3 others to upload a video of them drinking there idea of a death drink but to add to the misery of making a horrible drink in a pint glass, the name 'Nek' is given to this concept due to the fact that the drinker must down the drink in one go. It has also been in the news due to the fact that  it has killed two people and people are tryna get this craze banned before word spreads even more although we are beginning to see a craze here in England too.

My opinion of this is that it's all fun and games till it gets serious and putting it on Facebook does promote the concept to younger more influenced members of Facebook this some restrictions of age should be put in, the fact that two have also died will put a lot of negative impact regarding Facebook and if something isn't done quickly, the dying social network site may see some problems in the foreseeable future,

Bill Gates steps down as CEO of Mircosoft - http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/microsoft/10616998/Bill-Gates-quits-as-Microsoft-chairman-and-Satya-Nadella-is-named-chief-executive.html

Bill Gates has quit as Microsoft chairman to take up a new role as technology adviser in a management shake-up that will see Satya Nadella become chief executive. This is also only the third time Mircosoft has had a new chief executive. Gates' new role however will see him spending more time at Mircosoft and many say if he does his job well, this could be a good thing for Microsoft, Gates' was also advised by Nadella to step down which he happily did. Gates' has also focused more on the Gates' foundation since leaving Microsoft in 2008 thus this will see Gates back at Microsoft.

In my opinion I believe this may be a good thing for Microsoft, Gates' has focused more on his charity in the last few years thus coming back to Microsoft in a new role could see Gates change the game especially in his new role as a technology adviser

The sacking of Tony Gallagher

The Telegraph had been said to have taken a 'great leap into the digital unknown' by sacking editor Tony Gallagher purely to put the internet first. The reasoning behind this could only be described as absurd, Gallagher was apparently making 'exemplary profits' and performing solidly  against any competition, he also wasn't one who opposed digital media, so one may ask why he was sacked even after his speeches regarding the Telegraphs transformation. He was although sacked for the fact that the Telegraph wanted to reinvent the way they worked and they wanted to move beyond just putting news and information online as they believed that newspapers were not there only competition. 

Has the Telegraph made a good or bad decision in sacking editor Tony Gallagher ? 

In my opinion, sacking Gallagher was a bad decision, looking at the stats, you can see how Gallagher has changed the landscape of The Daily Telegraph, Gallagher was praised many times by Maclennan the successful chief executive of The Telegraph. They have also represented the best result for any full service paper in Fleet Street, digital monthly uniques were also up by 7% during the same period, proving to one that the sacking of Gallagher was absolutely absurd, they made a £60M profit between them the two telegraphs and the profits have been up not down. Gallagher was also not against digital media or putting it forward. The Telegraph media group however saw differently and got rid of Gallagher completely, for me Gallagher should have not been sacked instead another editor could have been appointed just for the online side and Gallagher could have stayed for the print side.