Overview of The Courier Journal

The Courier-Journal, the only print news source that our class followed, seemed to have done the best job. But how did its print stories match up with its online stories?
The Courier-Journal had a total of 325 local stories with 114 of those stories in print and 211 being online. The fact that there was so much more online can be kind of concerning to a certain extent, but if you count the fact that the website has more room for stories and the majority of the stories were fluff (we'll get to that later) then the Courier-Journal didn't do too horrible on keeping things proportionate. The Courier-Journal had a total of 194 national stories with 107 being print and 87 being online. It had a total of 49 international stories with 31 being print and 18 being online. With most of the stories being local, the Courier-Journal did a pretty good job at staying true to its local relevance. 
Now on to the categories~

• Accidents, Disasters- 6 total, 5 in print, 1 online 
• Politics, Government- 76 total, 34 in print, 42 online 
• Crime- 47 total, 29 in print, 18 online
• War, Diplomacy- 8 total, 8 in print, 0 online
• Business, Economy- 119 total, 67 in print, 52 online 
• Social Issues, Human Interest, Education- 127 total, 60 in print, 67 online 
• Health, Consumer, Environment- 54 total, 21 in print, 33 online 
• Celebrity, Fluff, Other- 122 total, 20 in print, 102 online

All the categories, except Celebrity, Fluff, Other, seemed to have a somewhat balance between the number of online and print stories, which is good. These categories also had a reasonable number of stories relating to their topics, for example, it is good that there were a lot of stories pertaining to economy (something that could affect the people) while there weren't nearly as many crime stories (something that people want to hear about and usually should, but usually doesn't affect them in any way besides implanting fear in their brains).

And then there's the fluff. While the number of fluff in print wasn't horrendously high for the number of times we studied the Courier-Journal, the number online was absolutely outrageous. One hundred and two fluff stories online; that was more than any of the other categories number of online stories! The Courier-Journal really needs to experience a monumental decrease in its number of online fluff stories if it wants its website to be just as good as its actual print news. 

Link to one of the many fluff stories

"T.V. News Terminology- Wait, that's a thing?" -Mikayla Hinton; A Class Response

So it's kind of obvious to determine, distinguish and see different (but repetitive) parts of a news show when you're watching them, but who would've thought that they actually had names and terminology to indicate their meaning?
When I found out that there were names that went a long with certain parts of news shows I was fascinated in a sense to where I was like "Oh okay this is cool, I never knew that, but now it makes sense." but I also felt pretty silly for not realizing that until our lecture.
Things that I noticed, repeated patterns that I saw, they all had names to match them and learning that was really cool to me. For example, I always thought it was kind of funny when a news anchor would say something a long the lines of "And now back to Bob in the studio." I always thought "What's the point of saying that? Why do they say something like that after almost every story?" Then I learned what it was; a toss. Finally, I was given a name to match the thing that I often wondered about! When Mr. Miller explained the importance of the toss and how it is used to let the viewer know that they were moving on to the next story a sudden realization came over me and I finally understood it. When I imagined what a news show would be like without tosses, I understood why they were necessary; without them, viewers would be confused on where a story ends and where another one starts and everything would be out of order and chaotic.
As he explained the importance and introduced names to things that I previously had noticed, I began to appreciate the whole idea of a terminology system and why these things were necessary to make a news show flow successfully. And as silly as it sounds, that was a relief to me to finally understand some things that I'd always wondered about.

The Advertisement Games; Class Response

I love to review my notes, both new and old, to find relationships and patterns between things we recently and previously studied to see how they are all connected. It intrigues me how things that can be so different can have a minor detail in common. One thing I noticed as I was looking through my notes was something that nearly every medium of journalism has in common; advertisements.

• With newspapers, advertisements ultimately led to the newspapers' lower pricing because ads were a source of income for the newspaper industry. Since the prices were lowered, this led to more newspapers being sold; exactly what the industry needed.
• With magazines, the advertisements are centered around what kind of magazine they are in and the interests of that magazine's particular niche audience. Nonetheless, this also helps the magazine industry make money.
• With radios, advertisements played an important role in its money-making aspect. Radios promoted and played all kinds of advertisements, which of course provided them with money, but radios were also able to promote themselves through advertisements. For example, a radio advertisement could say something like- "Do you like what you're hearing? If so come on down to Radio World today and you can buy yourself your own super amazing radio! You just have to get one!" This kind of self-promoting through advertisements helped the industry grow even more popular than it was.
• With movies, the preview advertisements for new movies that are coming out in the future and are shown before the beginning of a movie help make the industry money and if you think about it, movies (that plan to lead into or are apart of a movies series) are advertisements themselves; they get a viewer hooked and wanting to see the next movie, leading to more money and more money and more... And another thing that I had never realized until Mr. Miller said it in class was that movies just set themselves up to make more money; it can all start from a book that was then made into a movie, and since movies tend to be more popular and get more publicity, they can create even more opportunities to make money, such as making action figures and toys to go along with the movie, making merchandise such as t-shirts, posters, etc., and even making the movie into DVDs to eventually sell.
• With T.V., advertisements/commercials help make so much money for stations and channels. After all, it's kind of a universal fact that, to the average person, T.V. commercials are definitely not cheap. The variety of advertisements is also very diverse; you can see advertisements for thing such as toys, food, jewelry, cleaning supplies, dog food, and basically anything you can possibly think of that people either want or need. A very popular type of advertisement is those promoting political campaigns. Now a days if you're running for a political position and you don't have television advertisements, chances are you won't win. It's kind of fascinating, in my opinion, to see how a piece of technology can play such an important, vital role in something like politics.

I think it's very interesting to see that even over time as forms of technology begin to demassify, most of them seem to still hold on and survive in today's world, and since they all have advertisements in common, it makes me think that maybe the advertisements are the reason they're still here, for they do bring a source of income to the industries/mediums.

Response to Madeline's "One last update from 10-30-14"

To answer your question Madeline, yes I did enjoy your blog entries about the type of news that the Courier-Journal had on a specific day. As a fellow member of the Courier-Journal group, I will miss the small little arguments we had over what category a story would go in. *Insert crying emoji.* On a more serious note, I, as a Courier-Journal member, approve of your posts concerning the news that it produced and can verify that what was said in those entries was correct. YAY GO MADELINE!
On a totally unbiased note, I also have to agree with what Madeline said about how I feel like the Courier-Journal produced the best news. Most of the time it was consistent with its number of stories and usually had an even or close to even amount of stories in each category. I have to disagree with Madeline's excuse for T.V. news stations, though; in fact, I disagree with the whole idea of T.V. news stations even having an excuse of why they didn't match up to/perform as well as the Courier-Journal print newspaper. Although T.V. news stations have a set time in the day when they broadcast news, they have the advantage of breaking news. When a new, important story comes out they can immediately inform the public, while the newspaper cannot, and therefore they have an advantage over the Courier-Journal, so the fact the Courier-Journal performed better puts a sort of shame on the T.V. news stations.
Also Madeline, I really like your post titles, such as 'Way Back Wednesday', but the constant use can be repetitive and confusing.

Link to Madeline's post: http://madeline5sos.blogspot.com/2014/11/one-last-update-from-10-30-14.html?m=0

Response to Sylvia's "Class Response: TV, Too Much Influence?"

While I was reading Sylvia's response about the immense influence that T.V. has over its audience, I couldn't help but agree with everything that she said. I especially agree/like the part where she said "The question is whether this influence is a good thing or a bad thing."
To build on what Sylvia explained, I feel as if there is typically a negative stereotype that is associated with the influence of T.V. when really its influence can be both harmful and beneficial. As Sylvia illustrated with her fashion influence example, some things that T.V. can influence aren't all that bad; if people want to model what they see on T.V. by wearing the same clothes, then there isn't really any harm in that, as long as they don't think it's okay to walk around half-naked. T.V. can be influential in good ways by airing shows that make people want to take action, make a change, or do something good for themselves or other people. An example of this is the show "Pitbulls and Parolees", a show on Animal Planet that I used to watch a lot when I was little. The show is about a bunch of parolees who are given a second chance through a job (taking care of the dogs) and rescue pitbulls (a breed of dog who most people wouldn't even give a second glance at) and help them to where they are able to get loving homes. A show like this can inspire people to give humankind and animals a second chance at life and want to do something to help them.
Also as Sylvia said, "It's all in the way T.V.s influence is used." Whether they choose to use this influence in a bad or good way is up to their network, and therefore not all T.V. influence should be viewed as something that is only trying to cause evil. 

Check out Sylvia's post here: http://sylviasjournalism.blogspot.com/2014/11/class-response-tv-too-much-influence.html

I'm still alive but I'm barely breathing -Newspapers, Radios, and Movies; A Response to Class Discussions

It seems that with every new form of technology, demassification is eventually inevitable. But one thing I've noticed from the lectures and from personal, real life experience is that even though they demassify, older forms of technology still manage to survive today in modern time.
So why do these forms of technology still exist today if most of their popularity seems to have disappeared? Because they all have unique aspects that people still tend to enjoy.

For newspapers it's because they are-

• Portable! People can carry them around and whip them out whenever they feel like getting their daily dosage of the news.
• Low-Tech! You don't have to be a rocket scientist to figure out how to read a newspaper.
• Cheap! They're only a few bucks and provide entertainment.
• Tradition! Chances are if your grandparents read the newspaper every morning it's because of tradition, and tradition is a repeated cycle.
• Physical objects! You can carry them with you and their stories aren't just fragments and pixel creations of the Internet.
•   Non-Linear! You can jump from story to story and don't have to follow a straight path like you would have to do on news website/app on your phone.

For radios it's because they are-

• Entertaining! When you're on a long car ride you can just turn on the radio and listen to music, a comedy talk show, a sports game, etc., and boom! Instant entertainment!
• Emotionally effective! Hearing someone's voice, whether it be the tragic tone or a jubilant, happy voice, can make you feel the same emotions.
• A group experience! People can gather around radios and witness/hear everything being said at the same time and together.

For movies it's because they provide-

• An overwhelming experience! This being self-explanatory, when you're at the movies you get an experience that is very different than watching something at home.
• Darkness! Being surrounded by darkness adds to the over-whelming, intense mood.
• 3-D! You get to witness movies in the third dimension, something most people can't do on their televisions at home.
• Surround-Sound! The rich, pure sound quality at movie theaters make it all the more enjoyable experience.
• Quiet surroundings with no distractions! This is how it goes most of the time, but these aspects make the experience more pleasant.
• Social experience! You can use going to the movies as an excuse to meet up with friends and have something to do.
• Cultural relevance! You obtain bragging rights for seeing the best movie of the year the first time it was publicly shown.

All these unique aspects are just a few examples of why these forms of technologies are still around. The fact that they all offer something different to their audience and continue to thrive on that measly little thread of hope is what I find to be really fascinating, and makes me wonder if something that demassifies can ever really disappear from existence. For example, look at MySpace; Facebook demassified MySpace, but MySpace is still brought up in conversations every now and then despite its substantial lack of popularity.

Television is Evil! A Response to Class Discussions

Recently in class we learned about the effects and impacts of many technological advancements from history. We learned about the impacts from radios, movies, and television. What I found to be the most interesting part of all of these lessons was seeing how these three things were all connected in a way.
I've always been aware of the fact that when a newer, bigger, better, etc product or technological advancement comes along that its popularity usually replaces that of an older invention's popularity, but I never knew the true depth at which these things could be connected until we had completed all the lectures.
One thing that I noticed is that T.V.s are extremely evil. Okay, I'm kidding, but when you look at what I said in a metaphorical sense, they kind of are, for one thing that I learned was that T.V.s, radios, and movies are all connected in which T.V.s demassified the other two and rid them of the immense popularity that they had at one time.
Television demassified radios in which all the talent that came from radios left and went to T.V.s; with television, celebrities could have an image to match their voice/talent, and this was more appealing to audiences and the celebrities themselves than only having a voice to match the talent on radios.
Television demassified movies in the same way as radios; all the talent that came from radios left and went to T.V.s. Television also demassified movies in which with television, all the entertainment and talent is easily accessible, in your home, and doesn't require any effort to physically go out and enjoy/view. On the other hand, movies required for people to get up, get ready, and have to find a way of transportation to go to/get to the movie theater. With this being said, the lazy aspect that came with having a television played another role in its demassification of movies.
This connection of the demassification and the power that television had over other forms of technology is just very intriguing to me, and though we have not had the lecture over the internet yet, I feel as if that we will learn that the internet might have had the same effect on television..