Magazine History, and Contributions

First off, magazines, no matter what you think about them, are important to journalism and the media. Unlike newspapers, they can last long with well made paper, and were the sort of connection between newspapers and books.
The inventor of magazines was one of the founding fathers, Ben Franklin. He created the General Magazine in 1741, with an amazingly, 'creative' title. One of the most important magazines was the Saturday Evening Post, created in 1821. The first magazine to try to reach a mass audience, having people from all over New England reading it. This magazine set up the many assorted types of content included in future ones, with such things as: fiction, jokes, news, interviews, and recipes.
Magazines came up with the concept of using advertisements to lower the price, and receive more readers. They eventually became the first national media, and helped create a national identity. The Postal Act of 1879 subsidized the magazine industry, reducing the cost to 1 cent. In the 19th century, magazines were the first to use long form journalism and personal profiles, and invented photo-journalism.
Nowadays, magazines are not really a national media. Because of radios, and television, which could accomplish more in certain areas, resulting in demassification of it. Now most magazines are aimed at niche audiences, and no longer attempt to reach the majority of people.

ISIS: An International Powerhouse of Terror, and how We've been Crying Wolf- A Media Critique

The recent Beheading of photojournalist James Foley, and murder of British aid worker David Haines, have shocked the American body. A terrible surprise, which has warranted greater acknowledgement of the terrorist group Islamic State (ISIS or ISIL.) It seems strange that western eyes have only now set on what Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel calls an "imminent threat to everything we have."

According to many news sources and media outlets, ISIS is insanely powerful. Meet The Press, CBS's Face the Nation, and ABC's This Week, have all had interviews with government officials of both parties assuring this, like: Sen Dianne Feinstein, and Rep Marco Rubio. Martha Raddats, global affairs correspondent of of ABC This Week said, that between leaving Bashar Al-Assed in power or the threat of ISIS, the white house was "clearly siding with the threat to the homeland." ABC World News reporter Terry Morgan said "A U.S. intelligence assessment says ISIS poses a threat to the American Homeland. So what happens in Iraq... matters back home." With so many sources crying out on impending doom, ISIS must already be planning an attack right now.

It seems that, in actuality, there isn't a real threat of ISIL attacking us anytime soon. In a Wednesday morning speech, Homeland Security Secretary Jeh C. Johnson said, "we know of no credible information that ISIL is planning to attack the homeland at present." American counter-terrorism officials looked over the United States major threats, and found that ISIS is not a top concern. Al Qaeda and affiliates remaining the highest priority. In Pentagon accounts of ISIS targets hit by air raids, 42% were "armed vehicles," civilian vehicles mounted with machine guns instead of tanks or personal carriers. Even President Obama earlier this year likened ISIS to a varsity basketball team, compared to Al Qaeda.

That isn't to say there is no threat posed by ISIS. By the CIA's assessment, ISIS has grown from 10,000 to 31,500 fighters over the summer. American intelligence agencies say that it's ability to gain and hold control over territory might become a major menace in the middle east. ISIS, though, is not nearly strong enough to attack America. Andrew Liepman, a former deputy director at National Counter-terrorism and Senior Policy Analyst at RAND Corporation said, "(ISIS) is different (from) many other situations we've been involved in because the ISIS narrative is so vicious and so brutal that it has virtually no external allies."

With all of this information that suggests against the news medias assertions, we would have seen more of it. These journalist's failed to present this information, and to verify their own. They have violated the second yardstick of The Seven Yardstick's of Journalistic Quality, context, and the third principle of The Nine Principles of Journalism, verification. These journalist's did not test their information against that of many independent experts, nor did they test on their own against the vague statements of politicians. This has resulted in sensationalism, blowing the story way out of proportion and breaking the eighth principle of journalism, inclusiveness.

The media could have easily avoided this, if they had taken the time to check their facts. The story still could have been interesting and important, if they hadn't went in the wrong direction. ISIS poses a bigger threat to the world at large in breaking the middle apart, and recruiting more people. If these journalists continue to have knee-jerk reactions such as this, they will be a disservice to the people. Misinforming people to the actual danger undermines the actual danger of ISIS, and journalism itself.

Sources:

• Mazzetti, Mark, and Cooper, Helene. The New York Times, New York Times Corporation, Aug. 22, 2014. U.S. Officials and Experts at Odds on Threat Posed by ISIS.                                <http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/23/us/politics/us-isnt-sure-just-how-much-to-fear-isis.html?_r=0>
• Thompson, Mark, Time Magazine, Time Warner Corporation, Sept. 14, 2014. Putting ISIS Threat in Perspective.                                                                                                                       <http://time.com/3373928/isis-threat-hagel-kerry-syria-iraq/>
• Mazzetti, Mark, Schmitt, Eric, and Landler, Mark. The New York Times, New York Times Corporation, Sept. 10, 2014. Struggling to Gauge ISIS Threat, Even as U.S. Prepares to Act.      <http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/11/world/middleeast/struggling-to-gauge-isis-threat-even-as-us-prepares-to-act.html?ref=todayspaper&_r=0>
• Fair, Fair.com, Sept. 12, 2014. Four Myths About Obama's War on ISIS.                                     <http://fair.org/take-action/media-advisories/four-myths-about-obamas-war-on-isis/>

Communication and Media

There are three types of communication:

1. Mass Communication: also known as media, it is the largest form of communication. It cannot filter it's audience, nor receive immediate feedback. Any communication has the potential to become mass media, just not always in it's original form.
2. Group Communication: communication with more then one person in a definable group, you know who your audience is. This type of communication can not have direct response, but allows the audience to express their general feelings or opinions.
3. Individual Communication: communication between two individuals, with understanding of each others intentions. Allows for the instant expression of either participant.

Communication is based around stimulus and internalization. One person comes with an idea, which is the stimulus, and tries to encode it in a symbolic fashion, transmit it to another person, allow them to decode the symbols, and hopefully internalize the idea or something similar. Media does this, but the transmission takes place across both space and time.

Certain things can corrupt this process, such as filters, which block internalization, and impediments which prevent encoding or transmission. Filters can be physical, where you can't internalize for a physical reason, such as being blind, psychological, you can't internalize because of your own biases, and informational, where you can't internalize because you lack comprehension. Impediments can be semantic noise, a mistake during encoding that prevents decoding, channel noise, information being corrupted, and environmental noise, where something can't be transmitted, thanks to external factors.

Dream Into Reality

I read a unique, and interesting interpretation of our class discussion about the importance of literacy, on my fellow student's blog:

http://dreaminreality14.blogspot.com/

It discusses that history of mass media, from the Mesopotamia's stamp seals, to Gutenberg's metal movable type press. Then, relays the importance of literacy, begetting the acquisition of information to the might of modern literary figures. Examples spanning from Superman, a symbol of the power and ideals of the american dream, to Katniss Everdeen, a challenge against financial segregation and a victim of unwanted fame and focus. Bringing up historical examples of the removal of literacy to confiscate power, in the beginning of dictatorship and fascism, and how this echoes in the villains of fiction.

She has a few more short post on our discussions, but this one stuck out to me, Literacy is Power,
which I might advise her to make into a well researched essay or book. If there is not already a book on this subject- perhaps with the name Superman's ABC's (or some dumb title like that)- I might just have to steal this idea, if you refuse to expand upon it.

The History of Journalism, and the Nature of Newspaper

Since language was invented, people would scream very loudly about what concerned them. This is the mostly American history of people deciding to write it down in, so more people could know, for a longer time.

59 B.C.E

Acta Diurna

Roman notices, carved onto slabs of metal, and carted all throughout the empire.

At the bottom, one phrase was always included:

"Publicare et Propagare"

publish and propagate

1689

Publick Occurrences

The first American newspaper, which only published one issue before being shut down.

John Peter Zenger

Criticized the governor of Rhode Island, for among many things, hiring his nephew.

In this time, criticizing an elected official of a king was seen as criticizing the king, so he was charged.

In court, the governor admitted to the allegations of Zenger to be true, and so the judge famously said:

"Truth is the ultimate defense against charge of libel"

Zenger's case allowed much more freedom to the press, even before the revolutionary war.

Up to Civil War

Era of Party Papers

Elitist, American papers convincing people to vote for their party.

Up to World War II

Yellow Journalism

Named after the popular cartoon The Yellow Kid.

Populist Journalism that focused on selling newspapers.

Started using advertising to decrease price.

Created Muckraking:

exposing the corruption of officials.

Modern Era

A mixture of Elitist Journalism and Muckraking Journalism.

Focuses on providing information to citizens.

Now, relating to this, we must ask:

Why Do Newspapers Continue to Exist?

You could be wondering this, as many young people do, because of the ease of the internet, but here a few reasons while they march on:

• Portable
• Cheap
• Great for older people lacking internet literacy
• Tradition
• A physical presence that provides an intimacy and ownership.
• They're a non-linear media

These reasons, and many more, keep print from dying, and make us remember the history of above. Even, if we massacre trees.

Silent Whispers

quietremains.blogspot.com 

I was looking about at my classmate's blogs, and I found one very interesting among the bunch.
Silent Whispers, a blog by a fellow writer, with an interesting post about Binary Models, that rambles a bit less. It also contains a good dose of memes, and cat pictures, which is expected of 9th graders, though, there is some very exemplary poetry, and intriguing quotes.
If you can stomach my writing, I'm sure you'll like hers.

Binary Models and Conglomeration: The Big, Smelly Mess of Modern Media

Binary, means two, not just the basest code language of this computer; binary models, in turn, means dividing a large concept into two important categories. There are many different binary models, but today we will discuss those related to media. These models include:

Hot/Cool-

Media which requires full attention, such as a book, is hot, while media which requires little attention, like a television show, is cool. To access how hot something is, I implore you to leave the room or skip ahead, and see how much you've missed.

Elitist/Popular-

Elite media has the ultimate purpose of you internalizing it, while popular media is primarily focused on entertainment. Think Citizen Kane Vs. Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen.

Content/Distribution-

Content providers are people who produce and publish media, like Warner Brothers, and Distributors are businesses which transmit these products to people, like Time Warner Cable. As you may have noticed, many companies are trying to become both, which we'll dive into later.

Information/Entertainment-

This was the only one I had to look up to remember, mostly because these two are merging, into infotainment. The line is becoming more and more blurred, and will probably be removed this from the list. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, as long as it's balanced, which it's not.

These are all important, and distinct parts of media, the problem is, there's been some conglomeration. Conglomeration is when one large concept starts to devour other concepts, with binary models it seems the right is usually the glutton. 

Now, thank you Mr.Miller, for all the information above and your opinions on what's below, and to those who might be using this as a study guide, just use the top.

Right now, in this era of time-space convergence and obsessive pop-culture, we need to realize how our habits are currently, and might be, used by businesses.

There's already the debate over net-neutrality with the quasi-monopolies of media, such as Time Warner or Disney. Which brings into question whether the internet is a utility or not, which it definitely is for a lot of people.

There's also the problem of how we consume media, which is based more on binge consumption, instead of infrequent consumption. This makes sense because we have more access to media, and can access it more easily. Of course, you can argue that it creates media similar to books, because you read in your free time, and most likely have all the content in front of you, but it also causes media to lean a bit more to the right. Since movies, music, and television generally require much less attention to books, and because television can create less content for individual episodes.

Coming back to the quasi-monopolies; it's one of the basest rules of economics that says: competition is one of the few things that can sustain a free market. All of these big businesses swallow up possible competitors and create their own bubble of protection from all but, really huge established corporations. One reason we don't allow monopolies, is because they can limit free expression, since smaller content providers can't compete, or rely on them if they disagree with the message; while these businesses might not decree all non-christian media, they focus more on creating entertainment, and cold media, to produce a larger audience.

So now media is changing and converging, which will happen when the world becomes drastically different in thirty years. Not everything is a bad thing, but most have a possibility to, and we need to make sure they don't. Journalism is about truth, and providing important news to the people; if we continue to resort to sneezing panda videos, just to entertain, journalism is dead and buried.