Cosmo UK

This article was just posted on the Perez Hilton blog site.

I’ve heard of magazines adding in information.. but never falsifying an entire article.  Especially the article that was the cover story.   She was on the cover of this issue and it makes me think.. did they steal this picture?  After this stunt, you can never know. At what lengths will a magazine go to sell an issue? And how on earth did they expect to get away with it.  According to Perezhilton.com, legal charges are being pressed.  There should certainly be a lot of jobs opening up at Cosmopolitan UK.  Perhaps I should apply there for an internship…

Updates in news

When Facebook informed me through the “News Feed” feature that a friend of a friend passed away, I immediately went searching for a news story on how he died.  First, I ran across this story which seemed like the most detailed and reliable source at the time.  However, when I went back the next day, the news story had changed. There were many comments stating that the reporter had the day wrong of the accident.  The date in the story was updated without a notice saying that it was changed.  When I thought about this today, I went back and again the story was changed.  All the comments pointing out the mistake were deleted.  The only way to tell that this story was changed is in small print below the title. It shows:

Last Edited: Wednesday, 26 Nov 2008, 9:31 AM EST
Created On: Tuesday, 25 Nov 2008, 10:15 AM EST

In class we pointed out this fault in online media.  It just makes me think how many stories I have read that had misinformation and I never knew were updated.  It should be required for online news sources to have “Update:” posted in the story and the story reposted to the main page.  Yes it is convenient to just retype the sentence within the story, but the reported still got a fact wrong and this shouldn’t go unrecognized.

Happy Holidays= politically correct

With the controversy between Happy Holidays vs. Merry Christmas in the media and in stores, i search this on the web and ran across a this story and this letter to the editor. The story supports the use of Happy Holidays, and the letter to the editor thinks its wrong to ban “Merry Christmas” from being used.   I worked in two retail stores last Christmas and despite all the christmas themed items we sold, we were required to wish people “Happy Holidays.”  We sold candles such as “christmas cookie” and “gingerbread man” and in the other store as we were handing out bags that had people sitting around a christmas tree, we still could not say Merry Christmas.  

I haven’t been watching much news this season, but last year I remember hearing news anchors and reporters saying “Merry Christmas” quite frequently.  In Blacksburg, the radio station 99.1 plays strictly christmas music now.  We have freedom of speech and freedom of religion in this country, so why should Merry Christmas be censored in the media?  They claim it would “offend” people, but I know I wouldn’t be offended if someone said “Happy Hanukah” to me.  The media should not have to cater to the easily offended people in this country.  This whole controversy most likely started just to start it.  Christmas is all around us this season with lights in shopping centers, the christmas trees in big cities, and the big after-Christmas sales.  In time will these things be censored as well? 

Merry Christmas to all.

Walking Mannequins

The Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show most likely caused a universal thought in all “average” girls around the United States… “I need to go do crunches.”

As someone who has always reassured her friends that the media is all about photoshop and digitally altering the female body, watching this even made me think twice about my flaws.  With the few exceptions of the J-Los and Beyonces of the world, it is a shame that the ideal female body is stick thin with plastic implants.  Images like these do nothing but give people ideas of what the ideal body type is and when in reality, only a very small percentage of women can actually obtain this body.  I am not saying these women aren’t absolutely stunning, it’s just that this image does nothing for the self esteem of the girls watching the show.  Not everyone can spend hundreds on trainers, have personal chefs to make healthy meals, and afford some of the surgeries necessary.  The media gives girls the idea that they should be silicon clones, and tells men that they should only be attracted to this kind of women.  

Victoria’s Secret claims to focus on their appeal to women, but with the models doing little kissy faces for the photos, it contradicts this a bit.  If they wanted to market to women, they would have their models project a little more class.  This year it seemed the show was all about showing T&A instead of unique fashion.  And this comes after VS claiming to want to lower the sex appeal of the lingerie and go back to the classier history of the company.  I think the show was advertised as very sexy just to draw in the male audience more, not to draw in their actual buyers. 

 

Poor Britney

After watching the film Britney Spears: for the record, I really saw how horrible the media can be to celebrities and the drastic measures they go through to get a story or picture.  The poor girl was trying to get out of her car to get in a store, and the paparazzi mobbed her and she wasn’t even able to step into the store.  I think this comes down to ethics of the paparazzi.  Is it worth it to hound a celebrity to get a picture? I think that it just results in false depictions of celebrities.  Celebrity gossip magazines post embarrassing pictures of celebrities to sell magazines, but people don’t think what the paparazzi did to get the picture.  

Photographers stand on top of cars and use ladders to peer over walls into private property to get a picture, but yet the picture is still published. Granted people want to see a celebrity looking their worst, picking a wedgie, or with out of shape midsections and thighs, but there has to be a better way to go about it.  This all comes down to respecting people’s privacy.  If it is unethical for a reporter to listen through a closed door at a meeting, it is just unethical for a photographer to scale a wall to take a private picture.  If an editor wouldn’t allow a reporter to use the information gained from listening in, why would they use the picture? 

 

Is bombarding someone really going to result in an ethical picture?

Influence of commercials

Sunday football.. the ideal opportunity for advertisers to reach their audience.  While watching the games with my neighbors, I saw just how easily people are influenced by commercials and they don’t even notice.  There were more Domino’s pizza commercials than any other pizza commercials, and when it came time to pick what to eat, almost everyone said they wanted Domino’s.  Noticing this, I asked them why they all wanted it and they said “Oh, I don’t know I’ve just been thinking about it.” After a Bud Light commercial, one of the guys who was drinking a Coors, reached behind all the Coors and grabbed a Bud Light.  It’s not even like everyone was paying attention to the commercials intently, but listening to it in the background and hearing the same commercials over and over, it gets into our brains.  No one wants to believe they are susceptible to the influences of media, and this plays into the third-person effects.

All my guy friends think that girls are more susceptible to the influences of ads such as in what to wear, where to shop, what makeup to get, and what shampoo to buy.  I am one to admit that I will buy a shampoo or mascara because I see it in the ads a lot, but I don’t think I do this anymore than anyone else.  I am just more willing to admit it.  At first I thought that advertisers tried to influence their male buyers in a more subliminal way, but I think beer and electronic commercials are just as loud and out there as make-up and home decor commercials. 

I think advertisers have gotten a lot better in imprinting a slogan or brand name into people’s minds.  Funny commercials, catchy slogans, and heart-wrenching stories catch our attention and we think about them almost daily.  I don’t think anyone is “above the influence” of commercials.

I think one of the only time people blatantly pay attention to commercials is during the Super Bowl, and this is why advertisers seem to pull out all the guns on this one.  Commercials will be rated and talked about for weeks after they originally air.  I couldn’t possibly count how many times I’ve heard people say “I only watch the Super Bowl for the commercials.”  The commercials are available for years after they are aired.

Will magazines fall victim to the web?

Magazines have changed drastically over the years.  There has been a theme in recent years that “print is dead” but I think that is far from true with magazines.  The appeal of magazines has been going to the grocery store and flipping through magazines while waiting in line.  Magazines have a way of drawing readers in with controversial headlines and eye catching covers.  This appeal could never transfer over the web.  Magazines have found a way to use the web to it’s advantage by including references to web pages and online shopping sites to generate advertising revenue, as well as mentioning featured videos on the magazine’s web-page that ties into articles.

When searching online to find popular online magazines, one I found was called Salon. It doesn’t even feel like a magazine at all.  It reads more like an online newspaper site.  Perhaps I am partial to print magazines because I want to be an editor of a magazine, but if magazines transfer to the internet I think they will go out of business.  

One criticism I do have of women’s magazines today is the lack of new content.  I am an avid collector of Cosmopolitan and lately all the articles I have seen are repeats of ones I read two years ago or so.  Instead of “10 Date Ideas He’ll Be Into” its now “15 ideas..”  I love the featured articles about brave women, role models, and crazy survival stories, but the advice on dating, sex, and health is old news. Glamour magazine just featured an article on “new” sex dos and don’ts, but last time I checked, filming the act and oral sex are not new concepts.  Perhaps this is because the magazines are entertaining the idea of attracting younger readers who haven’t read articles like this before.  I know when I was an early teenager, all these concepts were new.  Women’s magazines need to find new ways to deliver old ideas, and not just by splashing bright colors and graphics on the page. 

Internet Addicts

When the cable goes out, most of the time you shrug it off and go online. Most of the time prime time TV shows are available online after they are aired.

If you can’t pick up a paper that day, you go online and read the latest news.

However, when the internet goes out, you go into a panic. All of the sudden it feels like you are cut off from civilization. This is the first time I have been able to get online all day and I have been a nervous wreck.  I was on hold with the internet service for over an hour because it seemed like the rest of the area was in much of a panic as I was.  I remember the time when internet wasn’t available, but know that I have lived with it for years, I can hardly live without it for a few hours.

My apartment building was in just as much of a panic as me.  Phones were beeping constantly asking if anyone could get online or ahold of the internet company.  People couldn’t study for classes because study guides were only available online, online quizzes needed to be taken, mail couldn’t be checked, and the football game schedules couldn’t be found out.  

Have we become too dependent on the internet since it has converged with all other media outlets?  The internet has made TV easier because you can find out what is airing at the specific time and channel. Instead of driving to pick up a paper from the store in the morning or walking outside in the cold and rain to get the paper from the street, you can simply get on your computer.  With the internet, we have the feeling of control.  Everything we could want to know is within our reach.  We can read or watch what we want whenever we want.

politician’s kids are celebrities in the media world

Are politics just a fad? First the focus was on Obama, so everyone wanted to vote for him.  Now that the new controversy, Palin is in the mix, all the attention is on her.  This is a prime example of agenda setting.  The media can twist and turn what people think about, which right now, is the negative aspects of Palin.  At first the media went too far by dragging Palin’s young pregnant daughter into the line of fire.  The press just continues to get twisted around the axle of the Palin kids. The media seems to support Obama, but with every article, video, or radio talk show comment, they are letting a pregnant teenager sink the real campaign issues. They are helping dismantle what politics is all about.  Who cares about the politician’s children? Is it a huge factor in how they can contribute to the country? The media needs to stop worrying about the petty issues and focus on the big problems.  There are limits on how far the media should go, especially when it comes to the youth.  It has such a big impact on our lives, and seeing ourselves judged and criticized could have dire effects.

Celebrity gossip sites are now focusing more on politicians then tv, movie and music stars because politics is where all the drama and backstabbing is happening now.  One of the most popular celebrity blogs posted articles like this and this about Bristol Palin.  

Once the media found out about the pregnancy, the immediate response was to look for someone to blame.  Some blamed it on bad parenting, very few blamed it on just being a teenager, but the majority looked to fellow media outlets such as movies and shows.  Teens were getting pregnant long before Juno came out, which seems to be the primary target.

Factual Errors

This weekend made me realize just how much I depend on newspapers and reporters to find out information. The night of my birthday, my roommate and I were outside a house on Progress Street when a car sped by us.  Moments later we heard a loud crash and screams.  Running down the street while dialing 911, we came upon a devastating scene.  A car was stuck in a tree, one girl was laying on the curb while the other was in the yard.  I am going to spare the gruesome details, but ending the night by washing another person’s blood off your hands and clothes was not how I imagined my birthday. 

The next morning, my instant thought was to check newspaper websites to see if there was any information.  I wanted to find out the girls’ names and see if they were okay.  Reading the articles, I found out more information than I did just being at the scene. The second article I came across was from the Collegiate Times: http://www.collegiatetimes.com/stories/2008/09/06/progress_street__crash_sends_2_to_hospital.  Immediately found a factual error; the victim’s name that I helped out was spelled wrong.  Surprisingly it really upset me because I thought,  ”This girl was struggling for her life all night and the journalist couldn’t even take the time to find out how to correctly spell her name or just double check for spelling mistakes.”  (The girl’s name is Kellsye and it was written Kelsye)  This might seem like a small error to some, but being so involved in an incident, I realized just how influential things like this can be and how a journalist could be fired for a factual error.

Growing up, I have never had my name spelled correctly in a newspaper and it has always annoyed me to some degree.  No matter how big or small a story is, it is the journalist’s job to double check every little thing because it matters to a lot of people.

On a better note, I appreciated the timeliness of the articles posted about the accident because I was able to find out their conditions right away. Also, it is very interesting how quickly small town stories can be picked up so quickly by big time newspapers.  In the afternoon, I got a call from my mom in Northern Virginia who said the story was already in the Washington Post that day. 

 

Pray for a speedy recovery for Kellsye and Amanda.