5 September - Lecture Week 7

See how motivated I am, I even write more than one post today hahahaha, anyway, in week 7 we learned about Commercial Media. Media is Based on their purpose, media is divided by two, commercial media and public media (will be covered in the next post). Commercial media is created for profit, it is not government funded and generate its profit from advertisement by guaranteeing audiences. The major players of commercial media are News Limited, Fairfax Media, Nine Entertainment Co., Win Corporation, Southern Cross Broadcasting, Seven West Media and Ten. Their production ranges from newspaper to digital media.

Commercial  media has commercial form, with 3 variants: subscription, sponsored and subsidised, and functions as commercial, propaganda and social. Based on Hutchins Comission 1947, there are 5 social responsibilities of media in a democracy:

1.a truthful, comprehensive, and intelligent account of the day’s events in a context which gives them meaning;
2.a forum for the exchange of comment and criticism;
3.the projection of a representative picture of the constituent groups in the society;
4.the presentation and clarification of the goals and values of the society;
5.full access to the day’s intelligence.

Commercial media, therefore, is expected to deliver commercial and social (public trust) functions. To achieve these, there are 5 things to keep commercial media under control:
1. Formal State Requirement
2. Legal prescription
3. State oversight
4. Statutory
5. Voluntary
Some new social controls include government agency that regulates content, state press subsidies and licensed journalism.

Style of commercial media has 3 keywords: corrupt, profit and low quality. Because of this style, the results of commercial media are dumbing-down its audiences, tabloidisation, the desire to please and 'Mickey Mouse' news. With the current challenges of commercial news such as less revenue from advertisements, there are four solutions: better quality, greater competition, move existing customer to digital and paywalls on internet sites.

29 August 2011 - Lecture Week 6

As I have been late for weeks, I have to start writing everything during the week. It is good because I have nothing to do, being stranded in Wagga Wagga, a country-town somewhere in the between Melbourne and Sydney. Rather than listening to my friend and his boyfriend enjoying their time in the next room, it is better to do my assignments and studies. In week 5, I learned about Web News.

Nowadays we divided media into two kinds, old media and new media. Old media is media that is created and developed during the 19th century and the first half of 20th century. This include print media, television, radio and Web 1.0. Web 1.0 or "brochure ware" is one way communication with content surrounded by ads. New media is Web 2.0 or "social web", the one we are using now. Examples of Web 2.0 is facebook and twitter, where the content is user generated. Web 2.0 generated the term "Prod-Users", where the users are producers. Web 3.0 or "the semantic web" introduces "meta-tagging". Web 3.0 is about hyperlocalisation and specific content delivery.

When news have been spread for free on the web, people believes that they are entitled to it and, therefore, web news are said to be the death of journalism. Now, Rupert Murdoch, founder and chairman of News Corporation is looking for a way so that people pay for news on the web. Online news that established subscription such as The Times try to give privileges on members and Courier Mail is about to do paywall. The question is what happens if people don't subscribe?

22 August 2011 - Lecture Week 5

Right now, I am not in a very good mood as my mouth tastes really salty. I was cooking by following a recipe and it calls for salt and pepper for seasoning. I forgot that I had to put soy sauce later and I put 3 pinches of salt. As I put the soy sauce I thought it would be fine because I will let the salt evaporate, later, I found out that salt do not evaporate. It is now incredible salty...and I still have to eat it because that is the last meat for the day... So, even if I have a very salty mouth right now, I have to write week 5 lecture because I am late for 2 weeks already...

Week 5 - Lecture

This week's lecture is about ethics. First let's look at grid below:

The grid above is used to measure value of public communication (i.e. advertisements, movies, books). The top left corner means the best and the bottom right one is the worst. The problem is how do we measure ethics?

There are 3 ethical theories:

1. Deontology --> includes rules, principles, and duties. All ethic codes are deontological.
2. Consequentialism (theology) --> relies on results. As long as the result is good, the process does not matter. 
3. Virtue --> relies on characters. Goodness come from virtues such as courage, justice, temperance and prudence which are mean of behaviour

In journalism, there are 4 codes:

1. MEAA code --> honesty, fairness, independence and respect for the rights of others
2. AFA code:
   1. Stand up for what you believe is right.
   2. Honour all agreements.
   3. Don't break the law. Don't bend the law.
   4. Respect all people.
   5. Strive for excellence in everything you do.
   6. Give clients your best efforts and advice, without fear or favour.
   7. Look after your colleagues.
   8. Compete fairly.
   9. Think before you act.
   10. Be honest.
3. AANA code --> treat sex and its references with care,  use appropriate language, avoid violence except when it is justifiable in the context, avoid discrimination in any forms.
4. PRIA code

Journalism codes, however, did not work effectively due to gaps in its jurisdictions. Ethics and values are choices. A good journalist, I believe, should follow this ethics from the heart and not by forces of others.