Showing posts with label Dan Burstein. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Dan Burstein. Show all posts

Wednesday, October 17, 2007

HW19: global influence

“Web Influence” pg 85-86

Blogs already have a big influence in United States politics and the top five political blogs together attract over half a million viewers per day. The big question is, can the blogosphere influence global politics as well? To answerer this question i would begin by stating that as of now blogs just do not have enough power to accomplish this. “According to the 2003 Pew Research Center for the People and the Press Internet Survey, only 4 percent of online Americans refer to blogs for information and opinions.” the majority of the people use blogs for social reasons. For example,”the typical blog is written by a teenage girl who uses it twice a month to update her friends and classmates on happenings in her life.” Essentially i am arguing that the answer to this question, according to the reading, would have to be no. But above all, international media coverage is a big reason that blogs have and are becoming more influential today.

Tuesday, October 9, 2007

HW17B: Cox and Zuniga

Influence of blogs on elections

Two blogs that may influence the way people vote in a coming election are “Wonkette” by Ana Marie Cox, and “Daily Kos” by Markos Moulitsas Zuniga. If i had to pick between these blogs i think i would have to say that the Daily Kos is more influential. Markos Moulitas Zuniga is a very intelligent man and puts a lot of effort into his blogs. The blog its self is well organized and more professional than that of Ana Marie Cox's. As soon as you open the site you will notice pictures of political issues which in a way let you know what the focus of the blog is about. Zuniga is very honest as well and even admits that traditional democratic consultants and media firms have influence of the party that can be negative. They are simply more interested in making money then winning the election. The Daily Kos also brings in more viewers than Wonkette. During the weeks before the election there were over 625,000 visitors per day. If that doesn't prove the the influence the Daily Kos can have then i don't know what will. 625,000 visits per day is just absolutely insane. Clearly the Daily Kos is kind of a big deal when election time comes around.

Monday, October 1, 2007

HW: 14 Aplying Graff to Nick Denton

Take and Obsession, Then Feed It!

In addition to the belief that blogs have been increasing significantly over the recent years, Nick Denton also spends a lot of time downplaying the hype of them. As a result, the article tended to be a little confusing because Denton struggled to stick to one side or aspect of his thoughts. For example, Denton made comments to the press stating that he is unsure if there is a real business in blogging when he is actually a blog entrepreneur. However, with this said there was also some convincing information given about blogs. As a result of the interview, I learned that the focus of Denton has been to build up the audience among eighteen to thirty four year old to attract large numbers of them through some of their sites to big media bloggers. In addition, web logs can be a good business that have been growing at about twenty percent a month and over the next five years are expected to aggregate larger audiences and have more of an impact on society, politics, culture, and businesses. In conclusion, blogs will increase within the next few years and may lessen the view of existing newspaper businesses.

Wednesday, September 26, 2007

HW:13 Bloggers in Business

Is business the main importance of blogging?

Blogging has been proven to have an impact on individuals for creative expression, social ideas and political ideas. Recently suggestions have been made for businesses to jump aboard and create blogs for customer feed back and questions that may be able to be answered. This is a good idea and if done correctly will be good towards satisfying the customer so they will continue to make purchases or whatever the case may be. Are blogs more important for companies or social and political ideas? I believe as of now the Political ideas are more important than business blogs. There are certainly a lot of them and its what many bloggers are interested in. in fact the book states, “Many of you don’t visit blogs--or haven’t since blogs became a sensation in last year’s Presidential race. According to a Pew Research Center Survey, only 27% of Internet users in America now bother to read them,“ Baker and Green, pg222). It’s clear that blogging increases around the time of campaigning and can have a big impact on the people. Yet it still is a good idea for businesses it will not have a huge importance and wont bring in the money they are looking for.

Monday, September 24, 2007

HW11: OhmyNews

http://english.ohmynews.com/

The blog I chose to view is technically not a blog. It is actually a kind of online newspaper called OhmyNews. It looks like any other newspaper webpage as it has headings of main issues that are going on and popular stories. However, according to Rebecca MacKinnion, the newspaper has professional editors who take in thousands of submissions everday from ordinary people. She also states that it was largely because of OhmyNews that president Rohm Moo-hymn of South Korea was elected. In my opinion, MacKinnon made the site sound as if it were strictly devoted to politics and when I looked at the site for myself there were a variety of topics just like any other newspaper. There was however a place to go and chat and tell your stories to the editiors but the stories still were not political. Someone who disagrees with me might say that there are plenty of politically based articles on the website and that Hominess is a newspaper that has a variety of stories simply because its what the people talk to them about and want to hear about.

Wednesday, September 19, 2007

HW:9 Huffington Interview

“Punching Holes in Faded Mirrors” Arianna Huffington

After reading the interview of Aranna Huffington, the creator of the Huffington Post, I realized there are some points made that I both agree and disagree with. I agree that blogs can make a difference when talking about political establishment in the United States because the amount of online political blogs confirms it. There are many blogs on politics where people can find answers to there questions about particular people or parties. On the other hand, Huffington states that today’s mainstream media suffers from attention deficit disorder and can only focus on one story at a time. She also claims that while mainstream media is covering a story its as though nothing else exists. I disagree with this because from my views of the mainstream media I believe they do cover a significant amount of material. They may, at times, favor a certain story or stories but that is only because they are the stories the public is the most interested in hearing about.

Monday, September 17, 2007

HW7: Should parents monitor

Emily Nussbaum’s “My so Called Blog”

In this chapter of Blog the question that comes up is, should parents monitor everything that their middle-school children write online? I believe it is a good learning experience for kids to write online. With today’s technology and the importance of computers, it will help them to become more familiar with ways to gain information and find helpful resources. Parents should acknowledge this and give the children space when concerning these areas of the internet. In the case of blogs, it will allow children to start a journal and express themselves in ways they hadn’t been able to before. However, there are different ways to one can view this. Expressing themselves can be good and bad depending on the situation. It can help them show there emotions and feelings in a healthy way or it could be in the form of argumentation and cause problems. Nussbaum’s article states, “ It’s a drama heightened by the fact that journals are linked to one another, creating a constant juxtaposition of posts among the students.” (Nussbaum, pg 355) If the children are going to use the blogs and cause arguments then yes parents should monitor their internet usage and make sure it is used correctly. Otherwise, the blogs are just creating drama and we all know how much drama already exists in the schools of today,

Wednesday, September 5, 2007

HW2: Posting to Your Reading Response Blog

“From Cave Painting to Wonkette” (Kline and Burstein xxi-xxvi)

My assignment was to connect one of Burstein’s 12 key ideas in “From Cave Painting to Wonkette” to an interest, issue, or commitment of my own. After reading over these key ideas to blogging, I decided to choose idea number nine. The idea states that, “The numbers of bloggers will continue to grow because the numbers of knowledge workers in our societies are continuing to grow.” I completely agree with this statement because I realize that new businesses are being born every day and blogs are a great way for these businesses to get in contact with others. The blogs may consist of employees or other businesses that can suggest ways to help each other out. Blogs can be great for any job. For an example, my dream job is to become a hunting guide for whitetail deer. If I owned a guiding business I would be able to keep track in my blog daily as to where I saw the deer, what the deer looked like, the time of day I saw it, and the temperature and weather conditions of that day. I would also have my employees do the same. This way we would be able to find out where the big deer are and when they will be there. It would improve my business a great deal just as it would for other businesses as well.