Moment of Zen 14.07.09

Today, we've been looking at our blogs in class. One thing we discussed was that it is actually a pity that our blogs don't get the attention they deserve. Hardly anybody has gotten any comments by others despite raising questions and addressing the "reader" (does he exist at all?) directly.
It's a lot of efford to keep your blog up-to-date and it takes a lot of time to do some research about the topic you want to write about (or the one you've been given).
Therefore, one might not have enough sparetime to read other blogs regularly, but I think a good idea would have been if everybody of us had been supposed to follow one classmate's blog and to leave comments - then none of us would have had the feeling of writing in vain!

Controversy in L'Aquila

Recently, discussions have arisen about the G8 summit in L'Aquila, Italy. The region has been

destroyed by a massive earthquake in April and many people still have to live in tents:



Originally, the summit was supposed to be held

on an italian island, but Berlusconi wanted

L'Aquila to host the summit in order to draw
everybody's attention to it and thus get more
people to donate more money and see the
necessity of help.

But not everybody is happy about this decision. Especially the people who have lost everything think that this is the wrong way. Doesn't the summit cost too much money that should rather be invested in the building of houses and infrastructure etc?
I understand this opinion and I also wouldn't want to have all these politicians and journalists wandering around and looking at my miserable living conditions...
So I think it it absolutely justified to be sceptical about the movement of the G8 venue to L'Aquila.

Forgotten Moment Of Zen 25.05.09

Ups, I realised that I hadn't posted a MOZ for that day. Unfortunately do I not know anymore what we were taling about then, so I will just quickly write about something else. On Twitter, Joe Trippe mentioned that NY Times might charge people for reading it online, like 5$ a month.
Mmh, I don't think that many people would pay that-at least I wouldn't. I mean, aren't there enough sources to get the information you want without paying for it? But on the other hand, the NY Times might be considered as one of the best sources for news etc and people might not want to miss it. But I don't think it would make sense in Germany-you either buy the magazine you want to read or you don't want to pay anything and get the information online-for free!

Trippi's Afterword...

Well, while reading the afterword several thoughts, comments and questions came to my mind. Since they are all pretty different I'm just going to put them here without including them in a text:

• I was impressed by the way Trippi talks about his illness-how honest he is

• things did change a lot between 2004 and 2008 - Trippi mentions that again and again although we all know it!

• I found the part where Trippi talks about all these people working in several campaigns/companies...

• will the Internet actually stay that popular or will it loose attraction?

• this chapter helped me to get a better insight in how politics/campaigns work (e.g. the meeting with Mr & Mrs Edwards)

• Mark Penn's quote really surprised me as well: "The Internet wouldn't have any impact in 2008 because it is composed of too small a group of Americans who are doing nothing but talking to each other" (from: Joe Trippi, "The Revolution Will Not Be Televised", Afterword)

• The hair thing is so confusing...Can't really imagine how it became that famous...
  

• I didn't like the comparisons between 2004 and 2008 coming up again and again

• I also think it's pathetic to draw attention to other people's mistakes (video about Hillary Clinton: http://www.trippimultimedia.com/clients/john_edwards ) Shouldn't you rather stress your own qualities?
  

• The idea of limiting contributions for campaigns is really cool-but would any candidate for presidency ever dare to do so?

• Would Hillary Clinton have won against Barack Obama if Joe Trippi had worked on her campaign?
  

Moment of Zen 07.07.09

How far do family circumstances really influence elections? Would a non-married man be able to become president of the US???

Moment of Zen 30.06.09

To be honest, today I havent't really found a moment of zen concerning our topic in class.
But what really kept me thinking recently is the video where iranian student Neda gets killed. Have you seen it? When I watched it for the first time, I thought that it is really disrespectful to show a girl's last minutes on earth and I wished I hadn't seen it myself.
But on the other hand this video might have helped to draw even more attention to the situation in Iran and get more people into it in order to stand up and support the people there-even if it's "only" in a protest vigil...And Neda has now become a "symbol" in the protest against the government:

What's your opinion?

A Media Mover

Ok, I did the test and it said that I am a media mover:

If you are a Media Mover, you have a wide range of online and mobile habits, and you are bound to find or create an information nugget, such as a digital photo, and pass it on. These social exchanges are central to your use of information and communication technology. Cyberspace, as a path to personal productivity or an outlet for creativity, is less important to you.

Mmh, I'm not sure how meaningful this test is. There were surely not enough questions to be able to find out what kind of Tech User I am. Of course, I use the internet quite often to get the information I need and I also use social webpages to stay in touch with friends and family-but aren't we all more or less the same?
As well as that, I don't think that my habits have significantly changed since taking our course. The only thing is that I try to look more specifically for the things I need or look for and not just vistit the first webpage that comes up when seraching something via google.

While doing this test I was thinking about my dependence from the internet and my mobile phone. It would be very hard for me to give up either and that is something that I don't actually like. Isn't it horrible to be that dependent from technical stuff? I wonder what would happen if I gave up using the internet for a few days or a week....Well, it's basically impossible, isn't it? University alone forces me to go online reguarly to do the taks I am supposed to do...

Moment of Zen 23.06.09

We are completely dependent from our alarm clocks. Have you ever thought about this? It rings, and we have to get up. But what if we don't get up...? We could miss our job interview or other important appointments. It has happened to me several times before and it's just so annoying cause you can't do anything about it. While still half-sleeping you press the wrong button and, yeah, good night again!
But there is something that might help you:






It appears absolutely horrible to me but I think these alarm clocks fulfill their tasks =)

Iowa Caucuses

I had never heard of these caucuses before and I am still not entirely sure why they are doing that. Why don't they just go a certain place and hand in their ballot? I guess the most important argument is that people come out, are motivated to discuss politically and try to convince others of their opinions.
Watch this video in order to get an impression of the caucuses:




But on the other hand, doesn't public voting easily lead to peer pressure and the fact that neighbours or friends basically fight against each other? They try to convince each other and I can imagine some friendships being broken by unprofessionally led conversations?
As well as that, people who haven't got that much free time might not want to spend their time discussing politics. Many people will not go to the caucuses and that then is not really democratic, is it?
But to stay fair, if you really want to vote you will be able to sacrifice some time!

Well, I guess the Americans know why they have installed such thing like the caucuses and will have their reasons for that. You always have pros and cons and the pros probably couunt more in this case. I myself find it a very interesting way of voting and would actually love to be part of a caucus if we had one in Germany!

Moment of Zen 16.06.09

I have recently been wondering why no other party has a serious chance to get nearly as many votes as the Democrates or the Republicans. Isn't that a shame and don't get many ideas or new points of view get lost through this "the-winner-takes-it-all-principle", namely that just the candidates who got most of the votes move on to the next step whereas all the votes for other canditates are just deleted? On the other hand you just argue that other parties won't have a chance anyway since the Republicans and the Democrates have by now completely established themselves...
Found this:

My political influence-does it exist at all?

I too attended last week's guest lecture by Mitchel Cohen and was surprised by it's structure. Mr Cohen didn't actually teach us something but rather encouraged us think about our personal political influence. He mentioned all these little actions where a few people went out and drew attention to their interests by doing crazy things. To be honest, I used to think that these actions wouldn't change anything. But I do get the point of trying to get attention by doing many things that don't seem to have a huge impact on anything-if you do that regularly or with many people politicians have to react to it.
So Mr Cohen got me think about all this again and made clear, how important it is to go out and express your feelings and opinions.
"Resitance is not only positive, but it's necessary" I like this sentence because it shows the importance of going out and expressing yourself. In order to try to be more politically active and fight for my interest I will go on strike next wednesday:

http://www.asta.uni-dortmund.de/2009/05/28/bildungsstreik-in-dortmund/

My weak point though is that I still don't think that I should attend every election that comes up. I didn't vote last sunday because I wasn't in Dortmund and, sorry, was too lazy to vote via postal vote. If I knew that my single voice can really be important and change something I would go and vote. But at the moment, I just don't see the utter necessity...

Oh dear, I do have the impression of having written in a very unstructured way-sorry for that, but there were so many thoughts in my mind that I tried to tie together.

But back to the lecture again: I was shocked by this situation in New York in 1999 where pesticides were set free in order to fight against mosquitos. That was just ridiculous: 7 people got sick through these mosquitos whereas 1000 got sick due to pesticides-this is unbelievable!

To sum this all up a little: I liked the guest lecture as it gave me many thought-provoking impulses. I also thought it was very good to have the audience participating in the lecture by asking questions or express their thoughts.

"Please don't raise your hands-just shout" -> That's what we are ought to do!!!

Moment of Zen 09.06.09

Last Tuesday we read the Introduction of Joe Trippi's The Revolution Will Not Be Televised and that made me thinking about money-yeah =) No, seriously, I was wondering whether people who run campaigns for politicians or develop other advertising strategies do actually think about what ideas their bosses stand for. Or do they just choose their jobs by figuring out where they can make the most money of it. I mean, isn't our world all about money? But then it is rather strange for someone running campaigns for a politician whose ideas he doesn't support himself. Well, I guess we rarely get to know it anyway and won't even realize it because these people work so professionally and can make a difference between their jobs and their private matter...

Moment of Zen 02.06.09

When we were talking about social networks today I started to think about a possible addiction to these internet-networks. I mean I do use e.g. studivz a lot and it really helps me to stay in touch with 'real' friends I don't see that often or quickly communicate with my uni-friends...But what if I deleted my account? What do you think? How would you feel? I think I would easily get the impression of missing something important. But I've got a friend who hasn't registered at any internet-network and studies well and has friends...Well, it got me thinking and I shall consider communicating more via 'old-fashioned' ways like talking, phoning or writing letters ;-)

Old Media vs New Media

Since we've been discussing both New and Old Media I started to think about the advantages and disadvantages and the impact they have on people.

Examples for Old Media are cable television, radio, books and newspapers. Do we still need and use them??? I think, due to the internet could we easily give up on these media. We read the news there, probably much quicker than in newspapers, are able to listen to the radio and can even watch tv. So why would one want to keep up using old media? I guess, some people prefer holding a newspaper in their hand and being able to read it whenever and wherever they want to. Same thing with books: it's much nicer to buy books and have them stand in your shelf than to read them online-your eyes may also prefer that =)

New Media are mainly digital, and often deal with social networking sites. Personally, I am glad that there are such things as New Media Tools because it's a nice way to stay in touch with yout friends and also to get informed about tha daily news very quickly.

But my problem is, that there is such a massive range of New Media Tools that I find it hard to select the best and important ones.

But many people seem to need these tools, as this table shows:

http://images.google.de/imgres?imgurl=http://www.enthusiastgroup.com/files/enthusiastgroup/images/timechoice2.jpg&imgrefurl=http://steveouting.com/2007/05/02/what-would-you-do-with-15-minutes-of-spare-time/&usg=__M2PuNWNC9cvio-OM7UFDe6uh5d8=&h=325&w=400&sz=70&hl=de&start=12&um=1&tbnid=ReuUX-9bROZ7CM:&tbnh=101&tbnw=124&prev=/images%3Fq%3D15%2Bminutes%2Bspare%2Btime%26hl%3Dde%26rlz%3D1T4GGLR_deDE212DE212%26um%3D1

Howard Bragmann, an American public relations practitioner, writer and lecturer says

and I would agree with him in the fact, that New Media may have less quality in their journalisic work, but are still a good way to read news
My conclusion is that there are pros and cons for both Old and New Media and I myself hope that Old Media will not disappear but stay in our minds and be used by us!!!

Faith in schools?

First of all, have a look at what faith schools are:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2001/nov/14/schools.uk2

I think this is an interesting topic and worth discussing it. Obviously, there are arguments for and against faith schools, which you can finde here:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/6986398.stm

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/minette_marrin/article609028.ece

Personally, I think faith schools should not be forbidden-they just need to be observed and stay in contact with the government concerning their curriculum, especially in order to avoid the teaching of unacceptable faith theories. Faith schools can have a positive influence on children by teaching great values-and they can also help them to understand the countries' culture better. In general, I would say that it is not wrong to teach children a certain faith, because to most of the children it's the faith they have grown up with and it might also be the dominant faith in their communities/cities/countries...
But then foreign children and children without any faith at all might be disadvantaged because their will of freedom of religion is pretty much limited. To avoid this one could install different schools with different faiths, but that would then lead to a separation of cultures. It seems to be a vicious circle.
My solution is to have faith schools, yes, but they should not only teach their own faith but also discuss other ways of faith and therefore give all the children the feeling of being welcomed in that country - no matter what their belief is like!

Thinking about handicapped people...

I found it very interesting when we talked about handicapped people being sexy and attractive and I looked for some photos that have been taken in order to draw more attention to the Paralympics 2008:


Arent't these beautiful???

Moment of Zen 12.05.09

It was mentioned last Tuesday that Google actually signed a 900 Million Dollar Deal with MySpace (advertising). Well, that really doesn't go into my mind. I just can't imagine that being worth it. Google is already pretty famous, isn't it? ;-) Can somebody explain me the point of such an enormous deal and how they are gonna get their money back?

Amazon Kindle

It was pretty funny this week: As soon as I had finish my presentation on books I watched a couple of TV-reports about "Kindle", which enables people to read books without having to buy them but rather download them. You then can save them on your digital reader. Have a look:

http://www.amazon.com/Kindle-Amazons-Wireless-Reading-Device/dp/B000FI73MA

Actually, I'm not sure whether I like this form of New Media...Ronald J Zboray wrote in my chapter that the book will certainly have a future and resist all these new inventions, but, as we know, the book was publishes 15 years ago and time changes. Now might come the end of the printed books. I think that is really a bit of a shame since books have had such an important role in history and I just like the look of books standing in shelves-although my shelf is pretty empty ;-)
But I guess on of the biggest advantages is that you don't have to carry your heavy books around anymore. Or if you are on holidays, you can just grab your Kindle, download several books and that's it! Well, that is actually interesting for my Mum, whose suitcase is always pretty full of books =) Never mind...
I found a video from the Daily Show, that might convince you of that invention:
http://www.thedailyshow.com/video/index.jhtml?videoId=218392&title=Jeff-Bezos

Remember, most importantly: it can be read with only one hand =)

Moment of Zen 05.05.09

While listening to the presentation on films I was wondering who is in charge for the PG-guidelines. I mean, who decides that films are only suitable for a certain agegroup (if it is not that obvious, e.g. the use of violence) and what do they base their argumentation on? Do they have a valuesystem? What is it like?

Socially dependent???

When I read the text "It's the conversation, Stupid!" by Valid Krebs I was surprised by the fact that voters are that influenced by the people around them and I asked myself whether I would make my vote dependent from a friends' social activities or votings. I wouldn't have thought so, but the more I think about it the more do I believe that I might actually get influenced by these people-even it that only happened subconsciously.
Assume I had a good friend who belonged to a certain party and told me all the good things they fought for I'd probably believe it and support this friend by voting for that party.
But then I (or we) have to aks ourselves whether we oughtn't to be more scrutinizing and independent in order to vote for the parties that support our own ideas and interests.
So this comment leads automatically to the idea og going out and voting, and I found an interesting article by New York Times

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/06/magazine/06freak.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1

(I'm interested in what you think about the Swiss system! Did you know that before?)

as well as a video explaining the voting system in the US



What do you think?

I'm looking forward to reading your comments =)

1st try =)

I'm gonna put my Moment of Zen concerning the interview with Herbert Gans first:
If our news were more multiperspective, as Gans suggests, would people actually still watch the news? Would they be interested in "small" news, that don't seem that important? Or would nobody watch the news anymore so that they would have to be changed back again?