BCM

Hello! Bonjour! 你好! Guten Tag! नमस्ते! Ciao!

~ jakepascoe ~ Leave a comment

The chance to become an international student is one that I think many people love. Personally, many of my friends have talked about doing a semester in another country, and it’s something I’ve dreamed about since I was in High School. But international students are more important in our society than just for their own experiences. International students help to represent their country, allow us to understand global issues, and when in the workforce, they have a further understanding of cultural differences and negotiations.

There are many issues with international students however, and most of them originate from people in the countries they are studying in. People exploit students in housing and employment, and take advantage of their lower knowledge of the law to earn some more money. I think this is pretty disgusting, the lengths that some people will go, to earn and take advantage of some demographics, which are certainly not limited to international students.

One of the main issues however, is the crime and violence against certain international students because of their cultural background and ethnicity. In 2009, there were 152 attacks on Indian students alone, and many more racial abuses in the same year. Over 120,000 Indian’s enrolled into Australia’s education system in 2009, and it remains as one of Australia’s highest source of international students.

The Indian media reacted to this by saturating the media with out of proportion accounts of what is actually happening. There was even a report of an Indian journalist being attacked, which neglected to mention that the attacker was also Indian. I think this highlights not the Indian attitude on Australian’s, but rather the media’s perspective of them.

A journalist names Andrew Marantz wrote an article about how she was taught, while working at a phone company, about how ‘stupid’ Australia is, and that they over exaggerated into the Australian stereotype. He stated how shocked he was at “the extent Indian stereotyping of Australian’s”. I think this highlights that the small, but blown out of proportion, racism comes from both countries, and while they are both terrible, neither can be held more accountable than the other.

Sometimes it’s hard to beat the stereotype

Following these events, the amount of Indian international students in Australia dropped by as far as 46% each year, and it’s expected to drop even more. Racism is a large issue with any international student, and while certain countries and ethnicities are highlighted more than others, every country is guilty of it, and I personally don’t think we will see a decrease in racism until there is a lowered concept of nationalism and cultural ignorance. Australia is built on it’s cultural diversity, yet it’s seen, and arguably is, one of the most racist countries in the world.

Sources:

http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/society-and-culture/we-came-here-to-learn-but-we-live-in-fear-20120510-1yfhq.html

http://www.smh.com.au/national/chinese-students-at-risk-in-australia-20120426-1xn5v.html

http://listcrux.com/top-10-most-racist-countries-in-the-world/

Where is Home?

~ jakepascoe ~ Leave a comment

“Globalisation refers to an international community influenced by technological development and economic, political, and military interests. It is characterised by a worldwide increase in interdependence, interactivity, interconnectedness, and the virtually instantaneous exchange of information.”

The concept of globalisation has always intrigued me, nations coming together and working towards a goal and for a better life for everyone. There are so many concepts that closely relate to globalisation, a lot of which can allows us to understand how the world is working today, and how much globalisation has impacted the world today.

What I find even more interesting though, is the concept of ‘home’. Pico Iyer made a guest TED talk, and talked about this idea. He explained that he had live all over the world, was born in another, and so to explain where ‘home’ is for him, was very complicated. It’s definitely worth a watch if you havn’t already seen it.

Julie Beck wrote an article back in 2011, where she talks about where home is for her. She talks about where in the world she’s travelled and lived, and also talks about how hard it is to answer “Where is home for you?”. She points out that when she’s heading towards her old family home, she’ll say she’s going home, but when she’s going to her own house, she’ll say it too. The more I’ve read about it, I’ve realised the more in-depth, psychologically speaking, the question really is, because people will have their own definitions of home. So it’s very arbitrary.

It reminds me of the concept of ‘sonder’, which refers to the realisation that each person you see is living his or her own life, and it’s just as vivid and complex as your own, with their own collective group of friends and dreams. The reason it reminds me of this, is because you don’t really think about it, until it’s brought up. You don’t really think about how complicated the idea of where home is.

The well-known phrase “home is where the heart is”, I think is one of the better explanations to where home is. I think personally, to call somewhere a home; you have to have a deep psychological or emotional bond with the place. I don’t think you even have to be living there to be able to call somewhere home. You just know it, deep inside of you. Somewhere where you have a great feeling of bliss.

So where is home for me? Well, like I pointed out earlier, it’s hard to explain. The answer I would usually give people is my family house in The Shire. But personally, I think a better answer to that question would be an unusual one, my home is under the stars. No matter where I am, when I’m looking up at the stars at night and just laying on my back, no matter where I am, I always feel at home. Quite few people, when they look up at the stars, feel small, but I feel big. It’s hard to explain, and I don’t expect you to understand. Neil DeGrasse Tyson, who is probably the person I look up to the most (and arguably the most influential person for science of our time), made a beautiful speech about how he feels big when looking up at the stars.

I encourage you to try it next time you’re somewhere quiet. Just lay on your back, get really comfortable, and just look up at the stars and think about the universe. That’s when I feel at home.

Sources:

Julie Beck, JB 2011, ‘The Psychology of Home: Why Where You Live Means So Much’, The Atlantic, 30th December, Viewed 7th August, <http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2011/12/the-psychology-of-home-why-where-you-live-means-so-much/249800/2/&gt;

Women Online – “Tits or gtfo”

~ jakepascoe ~ 1 Comment

On most online forums where everyone has an account that gives them anonymity from themselves, they are mostly seen as genderless. And because of this, each gender will automatically associate a gender towards a people online. This will generally be because of a sexist view about whatever they have said, or maybe because you just associate an unknown gender of someone as similar to your own. I’m desperately at fault here, I do this all the time on forums online, mainly Reddit, where plenty of the users will also assume the profile is a male unless details specify otherwise.

Woman are not treated equally online. A lot of people have the stance of “tit’s of gtfo”, which is a famous slogan across the internet, mainly used sarcastically, but most certainly used seriously by some people. Some people online think that woman don’t have much to contribute online, which is a huge sexist issue right there, which is why they have this phrase, because they honestly think the only thing they can contribute is a picture of their breasts. Some 4chan user explains why they (or perhaps only himself/herself) use the phrase to eliminate gender all together, to create a true anonymous feeling.

For 4chan users, this phrase represents their philosophy of remaining anonymous if you actually think about the meaning of the phrase from their perspective. Another user talks about how this phrase is used to deter having a gender bias online. Everyone wants to remain anonymous, because they don’t, and no one should, care what gender they are. It’s a method of degrading woman for attempting to regain this gender bias online.

I’m expecting some comments about how this view might be sexist, or how the philosophy behind the phrase “tit’s or gtfo” is sexist itself. But once you understand that these people want a truely anonymous society, you can understand their reasoning. So is this a problem?

Well, on 4chan, in my opinion, it certainly isn’t. If you go into an anonymous environment where everything is gender-less and unbiased, and destroy your anonymity, you are destroying their philosophy, and deserve to be denounced because of it. You’re not denounced for being a woman, you’re denounced for breaking their philosophy. There is certainly sexist issues online that need to be addressed, and 4chan certainly can be sexist. There’s always going to be sexist demographic online, we just need a way to deal with it.

 

Media Ownership & Citizen Journalism Prezi

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Media Ownership & Citizen Journalism Prezi

Because of tools such as twitter and Facebook, we can receive an almost live stream of information about current events, whether it be the riots of Ukraine, or the process of your mum cooking dinner. Twitter is a tool that allows for citizen journalism, but, it can have positive and negative impacts towards the modern day journalism. Can it be considered as a primary source of information? Is everything we see on twitter actually true? Things need to be questioned. Question Citizen Journalism with the hashtag #BloodyCourseMaterial

ABC Video

Clicktivism.. Or Slacktivism?

~ jakepascoe ~ Leave a comment

Clicktivism is a principle where people can essentially become activists online, through ‘clicking’ petitions and sharing particular stories, hence the name clicktivism. Clicktivism is very popular in today’s society, because it’s easy, you don’t need to physically stand up and protest for fight for your beliefs, you can sit down and eat Cheetos and simply click the right stuff. Dwight Ozard calls this ‘slacktivism’. This is important because a lot of people in society are lazy, they’ll have beliefs, but when it comes to protesting for them, they “can’t be bothered”, so clicktivism shows a more accurate picture of who believes in what.

But it’s also easy to fall into an issue through clicktivism without even knowing all the facts. Take KONY 2012 for example. Almost instantly, everything became a human rights activist because they were so moved by the video from Invisible Children. It’s always good to stand up for human rights, but most people hadn’t researched the issue, and were believing almost anything they heard that was relevant to the issue.

I personally love clicktivism, because as I said earlier, it’s just so easy to broadcast your beliefs, all it takes is a click. I’ve participated in the KONY 2012 issues, SOPA/PIPA/ACTA, Anti-Liberal Marches and The Occupy Movement. It’s important to stand up for what you believe in, otherwise “the bad guys win”. It’s easy to join these clicktivism ‘trends’, they essentially are begging for your clicks.

Clicktivism has affected my offline activites, by physically going to marches and becoming more passionate about my beliefs, because I realise how many people think the same way as me. It helps me realise that i’m not alone with my beliefs, and there are thousands of similar people out there. Clicktivism can bring together people the same way religion does, through similar beliefs and values.

Social Media is a powerful tool for clicktivism, because it’s easy to share information, and broaden your audience to the issue. Everything is public, and by sharing clicktivism issues, you are broadcasting your beliefs. But anonymity is also important. We can hide behind our IP address and protest for less popular beliefs, or even share our not so popular opinion. We want to share our opinions, but people think of the consequences and the ‘damage control’, for broadcasting a particular message, and anonymity solves those issues. Which is why a lot of anonymous people are generally mean on the internet.

A current clicktivism event i’m currently participating in is the March in May, where people are protesting for a better government. People do this through the multiple March in May social media’s, but i’m planning on physically attending these marches and becoming an activist for this issue.

Re-re-remix!

~ jakepascoe ~ 2 Comments

Remixes! These days almost everything you hear is a remix, you just don’t realise it. So many popular songs are remix’s of old songs, or just current ones with a new twist. They’re all part of a remix culture. Bit’s and pieces of different material remixed together to create new content, creating a new perspective of the original content. But I want to touch one two main issues, how the internet has grown remix culture and how it affects it, as well as the nature of mashups in general.

Game Of Thrones meets GTA (Make’s for a great wallpaper)

The Internet and Remixing:

I don’t think remix’s would be as popular as they are today without the internet. Because of the internet, everyone get’s the chance to share their work. It’s up to the audience if they want to view it or not. And without the internet, most producers wouldn’t have the chance to share own work. There are so many aspects about the internet that have allowed remixing to become so popular. The accessibility and ease of use being one of the main characteristics. Anonymity I think is another key aspect. Without this anonymity, I don’t think as many people would or be able to download the original content, mainly because most people would download it illegally through a peer-to-peer torrenting website, or through a youtube downloader. Of course there’s always going to be the demographic that play’s it by the books, but that’s not interesting to talk about. Who buys music these days?

There’s also the issue of copyright and ownership. The internet makes it easier not only to share your work, but it makes it easier to illegally share your work. If you don’t own the rights to content that doesn’t allow you to edit it in any way, and then you go ahead and remix it, well i’m afraid that’s illegal. And the internet makes sharing illegal works easy, because it’s impossible to track down every source of infringement. I personally think that this is good for remix culture, because remix’s can make the original content more known, and it has more positive aspects then negative. For example, Gotye ‘steered into the skid’ that is remix culture, and created a remix of remix’s to create a mashup, and I wished more artists’ encouraged this rather than file for copyright.

Mashups:

Why mashups? Because mashups are awesome. Can you honestly tell me that there isn’t one mashup out there that you don’t like? Maybe it’s music, maybe it’s a mashup of tv shows, the possibilities are endless. Imagine mashing up two of your favourite shows, I think we all know you would watch it all at once. I’m still waiting for the Doctor Who and Sherlock mashup series, and I know i’m not alone. When people think of ‘mashups’ they generally associate that with music, but the mashup of ideas, shows, movies or concepts can be even better. It just takes one person to ask themselves what something would be like if they were mashed together, and they can create something amazing. The possibilities are endless.

Promotions that fans love.. Transmedia Stories

~ jakepascoe ~ Leave a comment

Transmedia is a principle involved with books and movies, basically anything that has a narrative. Henry Jenkins explains that “Transmedia storytelling represents a process where integral elements of a fiction get dispersed systematically across multiple delivery channels for the purpose of creating a unified and coordinated entertainment experience” Henry Jenkins (2007). Transmedia creates synergy across different platforms to work together and provide the audience with a good story, you can’t just “copy and paste” (Jezam Interactive) the content across platforms. But how does this concept work through The Pirate Bay?

Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the past few years, you’ll be aware that The Pirate Bay is a torrenting website, and it’s through this torrenting that transmedia takes place. People can upload and download whatever media they want, which can expand their potential audience, and it’s this factor that makes The Pirate Bay so amazing. If enough people seed a particular torrent, people will notice and think “What’s all this fuss about?” and they may or may not be urged by their curiosity to download and watch it. Seeding not only allows for it’s potential audience to grow, but it gives access to those that want it. It can also be seen as “…basically a new promotional strategy” (Jenkins Henry 2010) . If people want the media for a potential narrative, whether it be the original content, or fan-made content expanding on the particular show’s ‘universe’.

Jezam Interactive explains how transmedia creates synergy across platforms

The Pirate Bay’s search feature allows you to find more stories, some you may not even be aware of, and allow you to access and download it. Webisodes are a great example, they’re an extension of a tv show, usually about a topic that’s interesting to the big fans, but not as important or relevant enough to fit into a normal episode, or maybe they just explain a story behind a particular character. As a big fan of ‘The Office’ (US version, because let’s face it, the UK just doesn’t cut it), I was trying to download a copy of the latest episode, and found all these Webisodes! I could not be happier. Here’s my favourite Webisode from The Office, if you’re not a fan of the show, it probably won’t make much sense. All you need to know, is that Kevin has a relatively low IQ and likes to eat.

The Pirate Bay creates these databases for each story, and allows people to access whatever part of the story they desire, and they’ll always be there, unless of course the website eventually get’s taken down. This principle of accessibility is one of the many reasons why The Pirate Bay is so popular, you can get what you want, when you want. You can go on the website for one thing, and leave with something completely different. It creates fanbases for every type of media, and can be arguably one of the reasons why some tv shows have so many fans internationally.

Sources:

Jenkins Henry, 2011, Seven Myths About Transmedia Storytelling Debunked, Fast Company, Weblog, 8th April, Viewed 21/4/2014, <http://www.fastcompany.com/1745746/seven-myths-about-transmedia-storytelling-debunked >

Jenkins Henry, 2007, Transmedia Storytelling 101, The Confessions of an Aca-fan, Weblog,  22nd March, Viewed 20/4/2014, <http://henryjenkins.org/2007/03/transmedia_storytelling_101.html >

No Name, No Year, What is Transmedia?, Jezam Interactive, Weblog, No Date, Viewed 20/4/2014 <http://jezaminteractive.com/what-is-transmedia/ >

Prod-YOU-sage

~ jakepascoe ~ Leave a comment
By seeding, you are participating by uploading

When you think of torrenting and The Pirate Bay, most people wouldn’t really think of the term ‘Produsage’, but it’s a principle that we’re all currently doing. There would be no Pirate Bay without you and me. A simple way of summarising what i’m saying, is that the uploaders are downloaders. When you torrent anything from The Pirate Bay, you are giving back by seeding to others that are downloading the same torrent, which is how peer-to-peer file sharing works. And these users also make torrents available, they upload a magnet link to files they wish to share, and users can easily access these files to download. The Pirate Bay doesn’t actually host or create content themselves, the users do everything, so the term ‘produsage’ can be related to the Pirate Bay very easily.

Axel Bruns describes four key characteristics of produsage being permissive, unfinished, having fluid movement of roles and having an organisational shift (Bruns 2007, p.3). The Pirate bay shows all of these characteristics within itself. The Pirate bay is always unfinished. New torrents are always being uploaded, nearly 10,000 torrents are uploaded every day. In fact, they just hit their 10,000,000th uploaded torrent, and for those interested, it was in fact porn. I hear the storyline was great. And from a hardware perspective, it’s always changing to compete with the legal issues it’s facing.

To say that The Pirate Bay is permissive, in my opinion, is about as factual as North Korean propaganda. Both the founders and the users completely disregard any legal implications of their actions. They don’t have ‘freedom of behaviour’ to upload and share torrents, in fact for those that have been living under a rock, it’s illegal in Australia (except for shared legal software). But in terms of actually contributing towards The Pirate Bay, in the eyes of the moderators and founders, users are free to contribute whatever they want, and are encouraged to be as creative as they wish.

Realistic portrait of Kim Jong-Un

The concept of “uploaders are downloaders” includes the fluid movement between roles within The Pirate Bay. You don’t have to be Jack Sparrow to upload and download content. That concept could also be used to describe the organisational shift, you don’t have a team of moderators providing the content, the users create their own content and they simply allow you to access that content through magnet links.

The Pirate Bay is a collaboration and collection of participatory media, and without the user participation that they receive, it would be nothing. It’s a community built on freedom and creativity, and it’s based around the participatory nature of users.

Participating as a group makes The Pirate Bay what it is

References:

Bruns Axel, AB 2007, ‘Produsage: Towards a Broader Framework for User-Led Content Creation’, Proceedings of the 6th ACM SIGCHI conference on Creativity & cognition

Ernesto, 2014, Pirate Bay Hits Historic 10 Million Torrent Milestone, TorrentFreak, Weblog, April 21st, Viewed 25th April 2014, <http://torrentfreak.com/pirate-bay-hits-historic-10-million-torrent-milestone-140421/ >

Who Is Justice Beaver?

~ jakepascoe ~ 4 Comments

ImageAs i’m sure you’re all aware, Justice Beaver is a crime fighting beaver from Canada, and has managed to stop most crime in his country. In all seriousness, Justin Bieber is a 20 year old from Canada, and almost every week has an exclusive news piece about him. He’s a popular media figure to talk about, because of all the childish things he does, and how immature he still acts. He has millions of followers called ‘beliebers’ who treat him like some sort of gospel, so he’s constantly looked up to as a role model.

You can argue that having a popular figure in the media is both positive and negative. Popular figures can make good role models for young and impressionable kids, but it depends on the celebrities lifestyle. If they have a particular negative lifestyle, involving negative aspects such as drugs and violence, they’ll have an impact on the people that look up to them. And this can be seen as part of the reason of ‘What’s wrong with kids these days?’.

For my topic, i’ve chosen to talk about Justin Bieber, and the impacts he has in the media. We see every week how much mischief he’s been up to, whether it be spitting on fans, or getting arrested. One of the most famous examples of how Bieber has impacted people from the media is the ‘Cut For Bieber’ that a lot of teenagers participated in. While Bieber had no act in the trend, because of his popularity and drug smoking habits, it was thought that this was a protest towards his marijuana smoking. It needs to be said, self-harm shouldn’t be joked about, even Miley Cyrus tweeted in saying “#cut4bieber? Cutting is NOT something to joke about. There are people who are actually suffering from self-harm, this is so disrespectful“. But I think it’s important to highlight the stupidity of these people.

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This of course was started by some internet trolls from 4chan, and became very big, very quickly. People were uploading photos of themselves self-harming for their ‘idol’, thinking it will actually make in impact. I think this illustrates how much influence Justin Bieber has over his fans, even when he’s not making the influence personally. Things that happen to him in the media and online involving him can impact his fans in positive and negative ways. But I think this also illustrates how easily young people can be influenced by media itself. Even if it’s not real. Because of the relationship they have developed with this figure, they have automatically decided to do whatever is asked of them. It reminds me of the famous question, “Would you jump off a bridge if they told you to?”. And as we’ve seen from the #Cutting4Bieber trend, I think some people would. People are so influenced by what they see in the media, and how they’re represented that it’s almost tragic. People need to take more control over their own values, but it’s easier said then done.

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And now’s the time where we reflect on the past 6 weeks, and we talk about how awesome the course is, and how much we’re loving uni and blogging. And that’s the truth, I love blogging. So to blog for my assessment is just amazing. Over the past 6 weeks, researching for the various topics we have covered have helped me question the validity of everything, and to view everything from outside the box. To take a step back and think “How is this changing society?”. And that’s something I’ve never really done before. I didn’t look too much into what was happening into the media, and how it’s shaping our future morals and values. I’ve found everything we’ve covered very interesting so far, so i’ve enjoyed learning about it, while some things covered I’ve previously known, it’s interesting to learn more about. Blogging makes learning much more interesting, and makes it easier to show your learning. And as I pointed out in my introduction post, having an academic/profesisonal blog and an online presence always looks good on a resume and for potential employers.

References:

1. Watkins, J 2013, ‘Cutting is NOT something to joke about’: Miley Cyrus weighs in on sick ‘Cut for Bieber’ Twitter trend sparked by Justin’s controversial marijuana photos’, Daily Mail, 8th January, Viewed 14th April, <http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-2258778/Cut-Bieber-Miley-Cyrus-weighs-sick-Twitter-trend.html >

2. Stanley, T 2013, ‘Justin Bieber fans urged to cut themselves to stop him from smoking weed. This Belieber madness must cease’, The Telegraph, 8th January, Viewed 14th April, <http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/timstanley/100197042/justin-bieber-fans-urged-to-cut-themselves-to-stop-him-from-smoking-weed-this-belieber-madness-must-cease/ >

3. D’Addario Daniel 2014, Of Course the media should cover Bieber, Salon, Viewed 14th April 2014, <http://www.salon.com/2014/01/23/of_course_the_media_should_cover_justin_bieber/ >

The Chasers War On…. What exactly?

~ jakepascoe ~ 13 Comments

Millions of Australians will remember The Chasers, and their hilarious stunts and pranks they pulled. While it was on air as ‘The Chasers War On Everything’, they were a very popular show, averaging between 600,000 and 800,000 viewers each episode at it’s peak. They used comedy satire to relate the news to the public, which most notably was evident in their ‘What Have We Learnt From Current Affairs This Week?’. And personally, that was one of my favorite segments on the show.

“The Chaser is a satirical media empire which rivals Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation in all fields except power, influence, popularity and profitability.” (The Chasers)

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They’ve had to re-brand their show several times for various reasons, more recently their show was called ‘The Hamster Wheel’ which was more focused on the media, but it was announced that in late 2014, they would be airing a show called “We’ll have to leave it there”.

“This is a leaner and meaner Chaser, basing its attack less around public stunts and ambushes and more on substantial exposure of the absurdities and idiocies of the media.” (Ben Pobjie 2012)

But how did ‘The Chasers War On Everything’ actually contribute to debate in a mediated public sphere? Well, they brought the issues up, and weren’t afraid to embarrass themselves and get into trouble if it meant they got their message across. The Chasers aren’t what you call ‘Journalists’, they rather use the media’s and politicians own words against them in a hypocritical manner, but more importantly, in a humorous way. This allows the public viewers to understand and learn about what’s in the media, but more importantly, what seems like bullshit. The Chasers are great at nitpicking speeches and media reports, and finding inconsistencies.

They do of course, go ‘over the line’ often, whether it be a stunt, or a comment about an individual. This can cause controversy, and again cause people to question the validity of content in their show. It’s because of this, The Chasers War On Everything was pulled off the air. Their most famous ‘over the line’ stunt was when Australia hosted the APEC summit in 2007, where one of the Chasers dressed up as Osama Bin Laden, and managed to get inside APEC. The full video can be found here on Youtube.

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The show had/has a large social side to it as well, it brings together the people who watch the show to talk about the content online, and discuss what was over the line, and reach even more people to educate them about what’s happening. And of course, there is the direct conversation, “Hey did you watch The Chasers last night”, and without even knowing it, their actively participating in a public sphere. To finish, here’s a two hour collaboration of every segment of ‘What Have We Learnt From Current Affairs This Week?’ aired, but I suggest only watching it when you have no homework to be done, because once you start, you wont be able to stop.

References:

1. No Author No Date, About, The Chaser, Viewed 6th April 2014,  <http://www.chaser.com.au/about/ >

2. Pobjie, B 2012, ‘Biting Hamsters puts media in its place’, The Sunday Morning Herald, 18th October 2012, Viewed 6th April <http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/tv-and-radio/biting-hamster-puts-media-in-its-place-20121018-27smv.html >