HW 13 : Blogging is Beneficial for Business

Blogging has turned into a universal trend. People write about their everyday lives, tell stories or criticize companies. In my opinion blogging has turned into a huge advantage for different companies. They can get their consumers' feedback on certain products or even establish their own blog and make their products noticed. I used to think that blogging was more like an online diary, but recently I've come to notice that it can also be used to help companies become more successful.

" Think of the implications for businesses of getting and up-to-the-minute read on what the world is thinking. Already, studios are using blogs to see which movies are generating buzz. Advertisers are tracking responses to their campaigns." "I'm amazed that people don't get it yet," says Jeff Weiner, Yahoo's senior vice president who heads up a search. "Never in the history of market research has there been a tool like this." (Kline&Burstein 229)

This quote shows how companies are able to look up reactions to different products, or like the example used here in this quote, movies. Companies can see what is going on in their consumers' minds. This is extremely helpful to them. They can use the criticism to make their products better or at least take it into consideration. Blogging has definitely become more helpful to businesses rather than individuals who use it for social expression.

HW: 11 "Making global voices heard"

The blog I chose to view was Jeff Ooi's blog. His blog is called screeenshots. The style of writing is directly towards people in Malaysia. He uses the same grammar as we would use in the United States also. Jeff's topics are about all different kinds of things going on in Malaysia. It is there way of communicated different news stories about their country. I noticed one of the blogs was written by a guest blogger, so he is not the only one that reports different stories on his blog.

MacKinnon describes Jeff's blog as being very critical of the government and using his blog as a way to speak out and inform other bloggers of news thats going around so they can get the word out. From what I can see, his blog fits this exact description. His latest blog is about dispelling a rumor that had be running through Malaysia about a man's death. He sent out a blog on behalf of this man and his daughter so the rumors would stop spreading.
On the one hand I agree with Jeff that is it always good to inform your country of what is going on if the government isn't giving them much. But on the other hand I insist that it sounds kind of like a gossip column at some points.

HW. 9 An interview with Ayelet Waldman

In the interview "A weblog saved my life last night", Waldman takes about the effects that her blog has had for her. Clearly the blog has had a huge impact on her life. You can tell just from reading the title. The entire interview talked about her life as a writer and as a mom and her psychological disorder. She starts talking about how in the blogosphere people have to be able to make their writing "pop". She says, "There is a tone that you have to adopt in order to make your voice heard amidst the general cacophony." (Kline 310) I completely agree with this statement because people who write blogs will not get any comments or feedback if they don't have this tone that she is talking about. Blogging does recquire you to have the ability to pull a reader in by using the right language.
At the end of the article Waldman was asked about her children and what she thought it would be like for htem to read her suicide note from the blog that she left. Waldman responded by saying, "They're subject of my column, too, but this is something and this is something that people give me a lot of grief about. But its what I do." (Kline 314) I think that Waldman is mistaken because she overlooks the fact that her children could be deeply effected by them being a subject of her writing. If they had found the suicide note that could have effected them for life.

HW: 7 Freedom from parents

Many children have found comfort in being able to write about their lives online. I think this is raelly good for them to have privacy from their parents. All kids have some things that they don't tell their parents because they don't feel comfortable. This allows them to open up to other people and have confidence that their parents can't just stumble across it in their room as if it were their diary or personal journal. All teenagers need a way to vent about things that they don't feel is apprpriate in school or to talk about with their parents. Parents may be disturbed if they ever saw some of the blogs or online journals, but kids need to have privacy and make their own mistakes while growing up. In Emily Nussbaum's article, "My So-Called Blog" she helps show how strongly kids feel about keeping blogs:
J. has his Blurty journal for about a year. He called it "better than therapy," a way to
get out his true feelings- all the emotions he thought might get him in trouble if he
expressed them in school or at home. (Kline and Burstein 352)
Most parents wouldn't like to hear about the things their kids do behind their backs or what they write about on their blogs. But this type of communication is clearly helpful and meaningful to kids.

hw 6: top interests

My three groups of interest for the semester long research project are overcoming sexism, overcoming religious intolerance, and the standards that are put out for women. Sexism is a topic that I would be interested in learning about because it is something I can relate too. Most women can relate to some sort of sexist encounter. I feel that learning about this will be empowering for me because I am a young woman. The topic of overcoming religious intolerance is a big deal for me. I am extremely religious myself and I do not know what I would do if my religion was not approved of or discriminated against in this society. I have seen people make discriminatory slurs towards other religions and I would never want to experience that myself. The last topic that I would like to learn about is a topic that I added. I feel that the standards for women these days are posted everywhere. The news, billboards, magazines, the workplace, and even online, set high expectations for how women should look and present themselves. In my opinion these things should be changed in many different ways. I would really enjoy learning more about each one of these topics.

hw 5b: Blogging is like an online diary

On page 248 of Kline and Burstein's Blog! How the Newest Media Revolution is Changing Politics, Business, and culture, Kline writes about the power of blogging for certain people. He states that blogging has helped people gain careers in writing books and becoming authors. Along with this he mentions that blogging can have a life-changing impact. Kline mentions how people are able the post blogs about their own experiences and get support for things such as terminal illnesses, being a new mother or entering into a new career. In my own life experiences these examples seem as something you would write in a personal diary. I feel as though blogging is just the same. In my opinion I would not want to write my personal things online for everybody to have accsess to them. My life stories and experiences are personal and not for the world, or bloggers to have accsess too. I wouldn't scrutinize these people for doing it, but I peronally do not agree with it. I tell my friends and/or family how I feel about my own life and I could not share them over the internet.

I looked at all of the items in my room and found pringles. I realized that the old slogan for pringles is "once you pop the fun don't stop". This saying is very satisfying. My roommate and I have about 10 cans of pringles and each and everyone lead us to fun. The flavor is fantastic which makes us very satisfied. When I went on the site for pringles the background was the map of the world in red and yellow, which is the pringles signature color. It had a list of all of the countries that pringles was sold in so I clicked on the U.S. This brought me to a page that said, "pleasure every single pringle". This catch phrase used ryhme to oull customers in. In my experience the company has stayed strong to all of their slogans because prigles are fun. And none the less, but pringles are the best chips I've tasted. Not only does the U.S page have a good slogan, but the opening page does too. The little man that represents pringles eats them and the crisp of pringles is shown. I have noticed that pringles are a very crispy chip and in every bite a customer cannot resist more. The pringles company does satisfy everything that they promise they would.

(this has a new date because I originally posted it in the wrong blog.)

HW 3: Toward a More Participatory Democracy

In Kline and Burstein's Blog! How the Newest Media Revolution is Changing Politics, Business, and Culture, they discuss 12 key points of blogging. The one key point that I was most effected by was the fact that blogging is considered a global way of communicating. Until I read this I did not realize how popular and important blogging has become. It's shocking to read about the fact that even in France people post blogs about things they are unhappy about within their government and politics. The involvement with politics in blogging is interesting. I was never aware of how much blogging effected certain aspects of society. Within the key point Kline and Burstein mention many countries that pop up on different blog sites which shows how global blogging really is getting. The fact that countries like Iraq and Iran have discovered ways of posting blogs is awesome to find out about. Blogs going global is a great way of communicating to people in other countries too.

hw 2: Suprised to find out how global blogging is

In Kline and Burstein's Blog! How the Newest Media Revolution is Changing Politics, Business, and Culture, they discuss 12 key points of blogging. The one key point that I was most effected by was the fact that blogging is considered a global way of communicating. Until I read this I did not realize how popular and important blogging has become. It's shocking to read about the fact that even in France people post blogs about things they are unhappy about within their government and politics. The involvement with politics in blogging is interesting. I was never aware of how much blogging effected certain aspects of society. Within the key point Kline and Burstein mention many countries that pop up on different blog sites which shows how global blogging really is getting. The fact that countries like Iraq and Iran have discovered ways of posting blogs is awesome to find out about. Blogs going global is a great way of communicating to people in other countries too.

hw 2: Never new blogging was going global