Responsive Web App Design

For some people who value the tradition of journalism, the idea of the internet taking over the classic media layout is a bit, well, sad. The classic layout of a newspaper allows the readers to sit and enjoy all the news stories instead of just clicking on which headline they want to read.

The New York Times has recently developed the Responsive Web App design for their paper, that is supposed to allow everyone to read the class layout on any device. Unfortunately, the NYT kinda missed the point of Responsive Web design… It actually doesn’t work on multiple devices.

Regardless of this problem, the new innovations allow the viewers to be exposed to new ways to view content. This further made me realize that the media is developing day by day and not just every so often. There is consistent competition and growing never really stops when it comes to the internet. I’m curious to see where it goes by this time next year, and where I’ll be to witness it or participate in furthering its development.

Journalism in the Age of Data

I stumbled upon this video one day, and I found it very interesting. I never considered the developing information world to cause journalists to be overwhelmed with information. It’s basically an overload. This video expands on what can be done to organize this data into a visual way. This way, people can receive this information in a different way that isn’t necessarily difficult to understand.

China blocks a news website, yet again

As a writer and a journalist, the future of print is intimidating. After gaining so much awareness to the future of the industry, I have gained a sense of peace. I know that I can still be a writer regardless of the physical print industry. Most news sources or magazines have moved to the internet in addition to their print copies. The internet is only growing, and its users are also growing as well as becoming more efficient. The internet also allows anyone to become a journalist. It opens all kind of doors with the freedoms to express and write what they feel. What happens when countries disagree with this? What happens when an entire country bans a news site?

Yesterday I was surprised to learn how this has happened many times in the past and is actually not that uncommon. Just the other day, China banned The Wall Street Journal. China. The country of China. The world’s most populous country with a population of roughly 1.354 billion people. That has to affect the number of readers just a little bit.

Are these content risks really worth taking if it potentially can destroy the print industry? Should it be the concern of the journalists and employees of a certain media? I’m curious as to what you think.

Miley Cyrus Skateboarding

Happy day after Halloween and happy November 1st. My favorite holiday was yesterday, but the weekend still welcomes costumes for those who still want to celebrate.

Recently in my journalism class we were discussing SEO, Search Engine Optimization, headlines and their tactic uses. SEO headlines draw people in by using the most commonly searched terms to get more hits when the content is being searched. One of the most famous examples is the classic, “What time is the Super Bowl?”. We had a lesson in class to use an SEO based headline on Twitter vs. a normal headline or the title of our actual blog post. I stumbled onto a great example while I was using my personal time on my Facebook. I came across a YouTube video titled “Miley Cyrus Skateboarding”. You know what I did? I clicked it. I wanted to see Miley Cyrus skateboarding. Guess what? It wasn’t Miley Cyrus skateboarding. In fact, it was a guy dressed as Miley Cyrus for halloween skateboarding with about 20 other people dressed up in various costumes. He was featured in the film the same amount of time as everyone else. I was curious as how this affected their views. The video was uploaded one day ago and is now up to 263,996 views. There are no other videos that come close to this many views except for one other. What is its title you ask? “Lil Wayne Skateboarding”.

And on that note, I give you Miley skateboarding. (S)he’s really good.

the rise of social media in 2014

After focusing heavily on social media in my classes, I’m also noticing how much I personally rely on it. It’s not something I do just for fun, but more so something I rely on for networking and keeping up with what’s currently happening in the world while I’m busy.

It’s important. There’s no denying that anymore. It used to be seen as a waste of time and a call for attention: taking profile pictures, talking about yourself, etc. Now, it only makes sense. If you don’t have one or a few social media sites, honestly, you probably won’t be as successful.

As 2014 is approaching, it has me wondering what kind of changes are going to be made to social media. To be successful, one has to think ahead and be able to appropriately predict what is going to happen. For people looking into making a career out of marketing and social media, this is very, very important.

Just as the print media is changing, technology is always evolving. We have to think more creatively as well as use the products in more creative ways. Trends can be seen from the data, and 2014 is sure to show some significant changes involving new social media outlets, and even old. It’s interesting to think about evolving the media. “How can facebook become more successful?” and other questions come to mind for me.

 

What do you personally think the changes will be? 

social media and online journalism’s role in the lifting of the Debt Ceiling

Yesterday was the first official day government employees could work after a 16 day “vacation”. Though I’m not a government employee, my father is. My mother has an independent business that has been making little to no money for the last few years, so my father is the only source of income. Since it personally affects me, I had been keeping close to my phone and computer for updates.

Wednesday night after I got off work, went to a yoga class and went grocery shopping. While I was on the go, I could still be plugged into what was going on in the Senate.

It has been a huge stress for the whole family, so yesterday and today have been rather relieving. So relieving that it made me step back and think about my behavior on Wednesday night. The constant checking of Twitter, the live streams, the news notifications on my phone- I didn’t have the inclination to pick up the morning newspaper to read the debt-ceiling story, because, well, I had listened to it while it was being decided, and I had read about it too. I even talked to my father on the phone shortly after I read tweets.

This reinforced to me that print media is surely on its way out. Our country has been withstanding deep stress the last couple weeks, and I wasn’t going to wait until the morning to hear about the relieving updates. I wanted them immediately. I’m pretty sure I wasn’t the only one thinking this way, and I’m pretty sure the majority of people considered the front page story about the Senate decision on Thursday morning as “old news”.

Social media and online media has continued to inform the public in a quicker and more efficient way. Not only were there multiple live streams from different news outlets, but also live Twitter updates from reliable sources.

Photo taken from blogworld.

Even more interesting, there has been discussion that social media actually aided in the deal made. President Obama actually began a Twitter tag named “Compromise”. This tag was  to be used to get congressmen’s attention from the public. Obama actually lost over 36,000 followers because of the campaign, but multiple states were very much in support and tweeted using the hashtag.

Twitter and other forms of online media have proven to take the cake in informing the public of timely news. In this case, it might have even helped the large issue seek #compromise. At least, for now.

defunct newspapers in California

While there have been thousands of print medias in decline over the last decade, my main, current interest is in California. In the future, I hope to work for a magazine in San Francisco, so it’s interesting to see how many defunct newspapers there are and in what locations. All of these newspapers were in business for 10 years or more.

advertising refresh

As I’ve talked about before, advertising is crucial in the journalism and media field. Advertising is shifting while journalism continues to evolve, but journalism and advertising go hand-in-hand. Simply, one can’t move forward without the others support. Journalism is evolving its mediums and accommodating to the current trend of the media: the internet. Advertising knows where it’s supposed to be, but advertisers don’t always know how to exactly do that. That’s why research is going into the most effective way to advertise in our current stance.

In a world where journalists are no longer gatekeepers, advertisers are not either.

In fact, some of the most affected ads by the decline of print media are business to business ads. These  ads have been on a steady decline, even just between 2012 and 2013.

 

This chart simply shows the consistency with the decline. It also shows how steady the decline is in regards to the whole year. This gives me the assumption that it can be easily predicted what 2014 will be like.

In short, advertising is crucial, but it also needs to recognize that print media ads are not the best bang for their buck. So advertisers, maybe think about joining us journalists in cyber-world a little more than putting all your ad-eggs in your one-magazine-basket.

Google Glass on your doctor’s face

Well, I’ve shared my opinions about the much-talked about Google Glass, but I’m starting to see the other side. Though I find it to be a bit pointless at this stage in the development for journalists, I did stumble on some interesting reads regarding the medical profession.

Some good points are made in this video that completely shook what I had formerly believed. Medical technology is so important and so, so advanced. This will only make hospitals or other offices more efficient and better managed.

Moreover, of course there are cons to the technology. The glasses themselves can cause discomfort and are limited in basic settings like brightness or colors. In my opinion, these flaws can easily be tolerated and do not stray away from the benefits of the product.

Regardless, I’m still having a hard time seeing the point for it for a journalism perspective. I just thought this bit of information in the medical world on Google Glass was very intriguing, especially when I wasn’t behind it at first.

Paint Yourself on a Billboard: How to advertise yourself

In my current and final journalism class of my undergraduate career, we focus heavily on blogging and the uses of social media. I also had a social media and marketing internship this past summer, and I feel like I’ve just begun to get the hang of the social media world. 

Through both the class and the internship, I learned how to market the business I was working for as well as myself. I’ve learned how to increase my readers and bring more attention to a business or organization. As I’m approaching graduation, I’m beginning to realize the difficulty the the job market and my ideal career goals. I’m used to applying to different restaurants or coffee shops and being content when I have any amount of income on the side of my education. 

So how can I market myself? Yesterday I decided to read about the benefits of using social media. I wanted to focus on getting the attention off of using it for an organization or using it to promote a blog. Though its all connected, I wanted to know how to market myself, my words, my personality and my strengths (and weaknesses) to potential employers. 

It turns out, social media is a tool in more ways than I expected. Social media not only links us to more people like us or in our situation, but it links us directly to the job market. It can link us directly to an employer. In fact, in some cases, it may link an employer directly to us. We are human, and we have different ways of thinking, interpreting and writing. We are not things, we are individuals. It’s what sets us apart that makes us desirable in any kind of relationship- even in the workplace. So, in order to establish ourselves, we must be ourselves. Who knew we could get a job for being ourselves? Of course this could deter employers away from someone. 

While reading about this topic, it simply just made sense. The trick is to apparently be professional and be a free thinker. Simple enough, right? Maybe. I haven’t exactly tried all of this yet, but I suspect it’s all about balance. A mix of genuine personality, voice, professionalism and proof of expertise is sure to attract an employer. All of these things plus a good use of social media and marketing, and you’re bound to be at least recognized. I’m anxious to try this and to communicate more over social media sites with amateur journalists in similar situations. 

Social media can also help predict the path of your potential career. One can follow other journalists that are in a line of work that’s desired. What better way to get a taste of the career than to observe something going through it and to see how that obtained the job. It’s all a support system. There’s actually a great Twitter that’s used to bring journalists, bloggers and more together to discuss certain topics in the industry one night a week. 

So what did I learn? I learned to not stress to apply to every job and to constantly tweak my resume. Instead, I’m going to use that time and energy to develop my online presence within my blog and also my social media outlets. What do you suggest to do to market yourself?