Reflections

Through the creation of this blog and my posts, I have not only realized the different issues there are in the current media world of publishing and design but also acquired understanding and skills of a blogger.

For one, I was able to practise the use of multimodality and other theories of publication and design in creating and updating this blog. Writing texts and changing its typography, inserting the relevant images and creating proper subject titles for salience as according to Kress and van Leeuwen, the art of connection and disconnection with framing and several others.

In blogging my posts, I realized that as a blogger, though given the freedom, we also hold the power to use it wisely. Our content and images should be sensitive to other people's beliefs and thoughts. The way we put our words should also be tactful lest I create any copyright infringement or worse, get a defamation suit against me.

The world of publishing and design, as is the World Wide Web, is truly big and thus, sometimes the little things in them may not get noticed. From the discussions and review present here, I have realized how great and wide this world really is.

Facebook Facelift

Millions of people use Facebook, one of the increasingly popular social networking site, and were satisfied with it. Then in mid-2008, they started changing its design, creating massive disapproval and even had protest Facebook groups petitioning for it to be revert to its old look. Its makeover created headlines around and grew worse when the option of changing back to the old feature was removed and the makeover was there to stay. The users were unhappy about the way the design look and how the features had all change but most people were more furious over the fact that the social networking site did not review the opinions of its users before making changes (Ramadge 2008).

However, changes will still be made and users of Facebook will just have to accept it as Liedtke (2008) reported. It might take a while for it to get used to but sooner or later, it will be just as if it didn't change. According to Zuckerberg (Liedtke 2008), 30 million out of the 40 million who checked out the new look accepted the change without even using the option to revert back to its old look. Therefore, time is all it needs for changes to be accepted. It cannot be that bad if its old design was liked, it would only be a matter of time before the new one sinks in as well.

References:

Liedtke, M 2008, Facebook gets another facelift, viewed 12 November 2008, http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26639923/

Ramadge, A 2008, Facebook protest group hits a million users, viewed 12 November 2008, http://www.news.com.au/story/0,,24365075-2,00.html

Freedom of Speech Online

Freedom of expression is a right given to all and though it included in the Federal Constitution of Malaysia, there are still some repressive laws that restrict that.

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) implemented on the 10th of December 1948, states in Article 19 that‘Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers’ (Amnesty International Malaysia 2006).

Mainstream media itself is mostly owned by the government so there is no room for any critical opinions that would not be in the favour of the ruling coalition. Then, Internet changed it all. The power of political blogs and online news portals away from the reach of the government was realized by the public. But the more the government loses its grip over underestimating online media, the more they try to repress it such as the case of the 'controversial' Malaysia Today online news portal being blocked. However, the MSC Bill of Guarantees promised no Internet censorship, creating a loophole in this (Nurbaiti & Cheok 2008).

The Internet has proven to be a free and big place for freedom of expression. Despite political parties in power trying to restrict access to different opinions, there is no possibility they can repress all. One blog closed does not mean another one cannot be opened (Cheah, Lim & Sim 2008). Similarly, like the Malaysia Today case, though its ISP address was blocked, people were still able to access it.

References:

Amnesty International Malaysia 2006, ‘Universal Declaration of Human Rights’, Amnesty International Malaysia, viewed 5 November 2008, http://www.aimalaysia.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=25&Itemid=23.

Cheah, R, Lee, YP, Sim, LL 2008, ‘Malaysia Today Controversy gets hotter (Update 4), The Star Online 28 August, viewed 9 November 2008, http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2008/8/28/nation/20080828134908&sec=nation.

Nurbaiti, H & Cheok, LP 2008, ‘ISPs ordered to cut access to Malaysia Today website, The Star Online 28 August, viewed 9 November 2008, http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2008/8/28/nation/22187596&sec=nation.

Alternative media rules the politics

In the recent general elections on the 8th of March, for the first time since its independence, the Barisan Nasional did not manage to gain its usual two third majority. Instead, the Opposition gained much success as compared with their previous tries. Most people are crediting the use of online media for this success and it seems it could be quite possible. Most Malaysians are rather tech savvy and the convenience of the Internet and mobile phones becomes an added advantage (Ramachandran & Vijaindren 2008).

The freedom of expression made available for use by the Internet helped conform the success for political campaigns. The Opposition had limited use for mainstream media and so turned to online for help. And in doing so, it caused a much unprecedented change to the results for the elections.

Considering the popularity of the use of new media, it does not come as a surprise that campaigning through the Net was and will remain successful. About 60 per cent of Malaysians were known to use the Internet with an average of six hours spent logged on as reported by Wong (2008). There are various forms of online media that political parties could use to spread their messages such as online forums (LowYat.net), online news portals free from the stronghold of the government (MalaysiaKini) and of course political blogs (JeffOoi.com).

Alternative media has brought about a new change in the meaning of Malaysian democracy and seems most likely to remain. At the very least, this freedom is a right for all.

References:

Oon, Y. 2008, ‘An exciting time for the news media’, The Star Online 8 May, viewed 2 October 2008, http://www.thestar.my/columnists/story.asp?file=/2008/5/8/columnists/wikimedia/21173737&sec=Wikimedia.

Ramachandran, S. & Vijaindren, A. 2008, ‘CYBER clout’, NST Online 16 March, viewed 2 October 2008, http://www.nst.com.my/Current_News/NST/Sunday/Focus/20080316091740/Article/index_html.

Wong, KK 2008, ‘Media in Malaysia: The Peculiar Case of Mainstream Media Versus Alternative Media’, Ateneo Center for Asian Studies, viewed 11 November 2008, http://www.admu.edu.ph/offices/acas/.

Email etiquette

How do you communicate with your loved ones from a distance? It most likely would not be the old snail mail since the rise of the Internet. Emails these days have fast risen in their popularity whether it is for work or play. However, as convenient as it is, this form of communication still has its downsides. Like the old mail, emails lack the presence of non-verbal cues, giving the risk of being misunderstood. One sentence, read differently by the sender and the recipient, could mean different things. This however, can change with the use of the emoticon, a combination of 'a colon, a hyphen and then parenthesis' can help interpret emotions present in the mail (Davies 2007).

The problem with convenience is probably it being more likely to be misused. This is especially so when you are at your workplace and with the risk of losing your job (Osborne 2008). There are several ways for emailing to be considered bad. One of them would be the existence of 'office gossips'. One person having a bad opinion of Colleague A decides to send her thought through email to Colleage B at the other end of the office. Colleague B reads and sends her reply but the worst scenario here is that she hit 'Reply All'. Great, now the whole office knows.

Emoticons are nice and can help send out the emotions you would want to depict. For formal situations, however, Lynn (2008) recommends no use of the emoticon, or the smiley face, as an office etiquette. For communication with friends or basically in a casual setting, smiley faces are fine. In fact, that is not the only emoticon available for use.

As you can see, emoticons have since evolved since its original design but note to all, one should use it sparingly and be aware of the context. ":-)".

References:

Davies, A 2007, Emoticons & Email Etiquette, viewed 9 November 2008, http://www.abc.net.au/rn/mediareport/stories/2007/2064342.htm.

Lynn, J 2008, Misuse of Company Email Can Cost You A Job, BellaOnline, viewed 19 October 2008, http://www.bellaonline.com/articles/art31271.asp.

Osborne, D 2007, Email etiquette key to workplace harmony, News.com.au, Australia, viewed 19 October 2008,
http://www.news.com.au/business/story/0,27753,22756508-5012427,00.html5012427,00.html.

Evolution of Media Publishing

Blogs are not just forms of publishing or expressing thoughts that has changed. Media publishing has pretty much revolutionized with all kinds of mediums. Perhaps this form of media convergence helps to connect with the various groups of audience. Different people can be reached in different ways. In fact, new media was what brought about the recent success for the Opposition parties during the general elections this year (Ufen, 2008) .

Previously, videos can only be found playing on the Tube (that would be the traditional form, the television) but now technology has allowed a more convenient way of viewing through uploading videos on the Net. One popular example would be the YouTube! Your ideas, opinions and even recordings of yourself singing can be uploaded there.

[Source: http://www.youtube.com/]

Besides entertainment value, it was also a place to spread political campaign messages. YouTube being one of them could incorporate videos of their campaign, be it a song or a speech. For example, the Democratic Action Party (DAP) of Malaysia uploaded a music video with their 2008 election campaign song entitled "Just Change".

Newspapers, some of you might be wanting to read the latest news but forgot to buy the paper? Why bother going out when it's available right on your desktop (Internet connection required)? With the Internet, newspaper agencies need not worry about space and limitations. Videos of press conferences can also be found.

[Source: http://malaysiakini.com/]

On another note, the matter of freedom of expression and censorship can also be taken into consideration. The Internet is considered to be quite a free platform to speak your mind. Examples of alternative online newspaper such as Malaysiakini would depict the availability of censorship-free news.

References:

Ufen, A 2008, ‘The 2008 Elections in Malaysia’, Taiwan Journal of Democracy, vol 4, no. 1, pp. 155 – 169, viewed 11 November 2008, http://www.tfd.org.tw/docs/dj0401/155-170-Andreas%20Ufen.pdf.

Print vs Online: The Deal About Design

Online media can be noted to be of a higher advantage when it comes to the debate of which is the better publication. Of course, each has its own advantages (and disadvantages) but both practises the principle of multimodality.

Print material can have text accompanied with images - the text can vary in font and arrangement, and the image can be designed or even just a simple photograph. Web-based media, on the other hand, can incorporate moving images, sound, text - all in various forms. According to Walsh (2006), readers of the content on the Internet are more 'involved' and can choose their reading pathways with the different hyperlinks presented whereas the multimodality of print based is usually linear in its reading pathway.

Take the National Geographic in its print and online form as an example:

The Cover of the National Geographic Magazine

[Source:http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/]

Print design is much simpler with few images (or in this case, one image) and play with typography. Readers can read the information quite easily.

The National Geographic Website

[Source: http://www.nationalgeographic.com/]

Here there are several ways for the reader to engage with the information on site, not to mention the additional flash images for advertisement and links to topics in the website.

References:

Walsh, M 2006, The ‘textual shift’: Examining the reading process with print, visual and multimodal texts, Australian Journal of Language and Literacy, vol. 29, no. 1, pp. 24-35.

Classification of blogs

So we figured out the whole big issue with blogging. The Blogosphere is big, it reaches out to a lot of people and is made up of a lot of people. The amount there is, rest assured, do not express their thoughts over the same issue. In fact, blogs can consist of anything you desire, falling under several common categories.

In an ABC media program guested by author and media analyst Margaret Simons in September 2008, she listed down several different genres as such:

• Pamphleteering

This is similar to what we would casually know as 'political blogs'.

• Digest

A type of blog that summarises and collects material from elsewhere, usually known to be mainstream, and posts up links to it. A good example of this would be Metafilter, proclaimed the best media blog in 2003 by Forbes.com (Hesseldahl 2003).

• Advocacy

This genre is quite similar to 'Pamphleteering' but is usually published by an interest group or an advocay group.

• Popular Mechanics

An weblog version of how-to-do information varying in categories from photography to gardening to sewing. Basically, any sort of speciality.

• Exhibition

Like the title given, it is a blog that exhibits works done by the blogger. In simple terms, it can be a photoblog or even a blog with your own writing works, be it poetry or fiction writing.

• Gatewatcher

Interestingly, this is quite like a media-critique blog by small groups with such interest in observing the actions made by the media. One such example would be Australian blog, Possum Comitatus.

• Diary

The name says it all, it is basically an online journal that depicts about anything personal of the blogger's. Personal journals, as agreed by Simons, seem to be the most popular genre taking about 70 to 80 per cent of blogs (Rosen 2004). According to Technorati's 2008 report, this genre is less popular in Europe. However, though this is depicting one's personal life, some do become rather popular as in the case of local teenager Lim May Zhee.

• Advertisement

A commercial blog advertising its products or services.

• News

Blogs that break and report news, the new level of journalism.

Besides this, there are also various other mediums of blogging such as video blogging (vlog), audio (podcast), photo blogging as mentioned earlier (photoblog), and several others (Wikipedia 2008).

As it is, even from those categories, many other sub-categories can be formed based on topic. For some, it is quite hard to specifically classify a blog type. For example, how do you classify a video blog that uploads news programmes with a summary of it? Is it a vlog or a news blog?

This is how globalized and advance our technology has become. It is hard to generally categorize a blog with just one category. Perhaps that is how with various interests, blogging communities are formed to discuss and to share.

References:

Simons, M, Funnell, A & Davies, A 2008, A taxonomy of blogs, radio recording, ABC Radio National, viewed 6 November 2008, http://www.abc.net.au/rn/mediareport/stories/2008/2372882.htm#transcript

Hesseldahl, A 2003, Best Media Blog, Forbes.com, viewed 6 November 2008, http://www.forbes.com/2003/03/17/cx_ah_mediablogslide.html?thisSpeed=20000

Rosen, J 2004, Your Blog or Mine?, The New York Times, viewed 6 November 2008, http://www.nytimes.com/2004/12/19/magazine/19PHENOM.html

Technorati.com, State of the Blogosphere 2008 - Day 2, viewed 5 November 2008, http://www.technorati.com/blogging/state-of-the-blogosphere/the-what-and-why-of-blogging/

Wikipedia 2008, Blog, viewed 6 November 2008, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blogging

Blogging: The New Phenomenon

In the past, one could express themselves in a way that limited an audience size because of distance or timeliness. It's not easy publishing your comment in a newspaper or a magazine when there are thousand others for the editors to consider. Television? That five minutes of fame isn't that easy to come by either.

But weblogs - or more commonly known as just 'blogs' - gives a different scenario altogether. It gives you the freedom, the space or a global audience for your disposal to be heard. Of course, one should stick to the average code of ethics and not abuse that given freedom.

To answer the question of 'what is a blog', Blogger (2008) said 'Your blog is whatever you want it to be' and they could not have phrased it better.

The Blogosphere, as Wikipedia (2008) put it, is a colleective community where all blogs that are somehow interlinked together, almost making it similar to a social network. However, as the World Wide Web became increasingly popular as is the trend in blogging, the Blogosphere has changed tremendously in size and influence, making it truly a phenomenon.

The size of the Blogosphere 2008

[Source from: Technorati.com]

To top that off, the size of the Blogosphere is still growing. On average, Technorati Media (2008) receives data that 175, 000 new blogs are made every day. Not to mention, bloggers come various backgrounds and different places. Make that a global phenomenon.

Geographic Distribution of Bloggers 2008
[Source from: Technorati.com]

References:

Blogger 2008, What's a blog?, viewed 5 November 2008, http://www.blogger.com/tour_start.g

Technorati.com, State of the Blogosphere 2008, viewed 5 November 2008, http://www.technorati.com/blogging/state-of-the-blogosphere

Technorati Media 2008, About, viewed 5 November 2008, http://technoratimedia.com/about/

Wikipedia 2008, Blogosphere, viewed 5 November 2008, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blogspace

A Purpose In A Nutshell

Everyday, we are exposed to a book, a photo or even an email, but when do we actually think of the issues revolving around it? That is exactly what this blog has been created for - to discuss and review various issues relating to publication and design specifically targeting communication students who need to be observant of media issues. Of course, any other curious readers are welcome to gain extra knowledge from this.

Believe it or not, what may seem to be a small thing to you could very well mean something else in the eyes of another.

Welcome to In A Nutshell.