Reflections

After completing all my posts for this blog, I completely learnt many new things regarding the power of new new media also better understanding about responsibility and ethics are crucial for the modern blogger.

Such as the current phenomenon and benefits of blogging to the community, different types of blogs, principles and techniques for good document design as well as media issues relating to blogging.

Throughout the assignment progress, I have personally familiar and understood with are Kress and van Leeuwen's theory of the meanings of composition, multimodal texts and semiotic landscape. There are also several theories relating to publication and design which helping me to understand the concepts and principles to be a good document designer.

Reep (2006) states that design for print should follow some principles, but online media, together with various multimodal interactions between different media needs special principles as underlined by Walsh and Nielsen.

Some important notes that really attract me is that what Putnis & Petelin (1994,p.241) outlined visuals are very important for a good document designer or web user. Delivering good content to audience and also respect other bloggers or web users.

On a final note, the blogging activity was an interesting experience and I will continue blogging with more important facts relating to media studies.

*Hugs*

References

Nielsen, J 1999, Differences Between Print Design and Web Design, Alertbox, viewed 14 June 2010,
http://www.useit.com/alertbox/990124.html

Putnis, P. & Petelin, R. 1996, 'Writing to communicate', in Professional communication:principles and applications, Prentice Hall, Sydney, pp.223-263.

Reep, DC 2006, Technical writing: Principles, Strategies, and Readings, 6th edn, Pearson Education,USA.

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.24-37.

Between Books and Kindle

Early October 2009 brought along some news for enthusiastic readers. Amazon.com the popular online bookselling site released an international version of its popular Kindle e-book to be functional in 100 countries and will use high-speed mobile telephone networks to download books, magazines, newspapers or personal documents (Harvey 2009).

(Source: inewscatcher.com)

Kindle is an electronic book reader, which allows its user to download and start reading a book on the device through a digital screen instead of physical printed pages ( Kindle Port 2009). It is also offers a chance to readers to download the first chapter of a book for free and also read it first, before making a decision on whether to purchase the book or not. Recently, Amazon is building a kindle application for the iPod and the other tablets that are about to enter the market in 2010. As for the features, Amazon promises that applications will be upgraded to the size and look with customizable background, brightness and font in order to attract reader's attention ( Schroeder 2010). Here is some screenshots:

(Source: cdn.marshable.com)

" E-books, differ from traditional book in that a range of costs is eliminated........and they are often priced lower than their printed equivalent" (The Joint Information Systems Committe-JISC 2003).

Conventionally speaking, there are two types of e-book: the electronic version of a whole text ( a book that already exists in print), or a database of linked materials which not all already exist in a print version, for example encyclopaedias ( Lardinois 2010). Ultimately, e-books also can be a resource for modern teaching, learning and research materials. It is because e-books can always be obtained and they are never out on loan. Online journals are very useful because they are available to more than one user at a time (JISC 2003).

No matter how modern technology today, the question that always publisher wonder about is that would the growth of e-books threated print media?. However some media experts predict that old media would still alive as different audiences have different likings on how they get their information ( Paterson 2008).

( Source: theunquietlibrary.com)

However reading from a digital screen is not as pleasant and comfortable as reading from a printed document. It causes eye strain and eventually affects the reader's sight. The resolution from a digital screen is considerably less than a book page's print quality (Disadvantages of E-books 2009). However reading e-books is eco-friendly and save trees as they head towards a paper-less environment future.

Factually, technology advancements, the rising cost of traditional text books and the fastest of searching and getting excess also play in favour of e-books. But although the kindle is a well-received device, book are still undeniably in popular demand. Referring to Penman (1998), older people would prefer reading from printed books rather than spending a few hours in front of the computer.

Schriver (1997) also concurs that 'better technology does not equal better communication'.Therefore Naughton (2006) predicts that people have bigger response on the new media such as e-book version but would prefer to get back to old nature of the old media (printed book).

Ultimately, copyright issue is practically raised on online reading version or web materials. Google Book Search controversy, for instance raised several questions regarding the different laws and their interpretations regards copyright and ownership.Google is based its policy on a U.S Law, but the materials that they scan cross other countries and cultural boundaries.

I personally feel, publisher, corporations, or authors of the materials must conduct research regarding copyright issue widely. Better technologies to regulate the information on the web to protect the rights of the writers and to authorize and controlled the use of information. Reep (2006) also agrees, copyright is the legal protection for the creators of original work.

References

Disadvantages of E-books 2009, Article base.com, viewed 13 June 2010,

http://www.articlesbase.com/ebooks-articles/disadvantages-of-ebooks-549820.html

Harvey, M 2009, International version of Kindle out for Christmas, The Australian, viewed 13 June 2010,
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/news/international-version-of-kindle-out-for-christmas/story-e6frg90o-1225784098422

Lardinois, F 2010, E-books on the iPad:IBooks vs. Kindle for iPad, readwriteweb.com, viewed 13 June 2010,

http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/ipad_ebooks_kindle_for_ipad_ibooks.php

Naughton, J.2006, ' Blogging and the emerging media ecosystem', University of Oxford, viewed 13 June 2010,
http://reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk/fileadmin/documents/discussion/blogging.pdf

Paterson, R. 2008, 'Getting from here to There-How Torey Malatia is solving the Innovator's Dilemma', Fastforwordblog.com, viewed 13 June 2010,
http://www.fastforwardblog.com/category/torey-malatia/

Penman, R. 1998, 'Document structures and reader's habits', Communication news, vol.11, no.2, pp. 1 & 10-11.

Promoting the Uptake of E-books in Higher and Further Education 2003, The Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC), viewed 13 June 2010, http://www.jisc.au.uk/uploaded_documents/Promotingebooksreportb.pdf

Reep, DC 2006, Technical Writing: Principles, Strategies and Readings, 6th edn, Pearson Education, USA

Schriver, KA.1997, 'Chapter 6: The interplay of words and pictures' in Dynamics in document design: Creating texts for readers. pp.361-441, Wiley Computer Publishing, New York

Schroeder, S 2010, Here's what the Kindle app for iPad looks like, Mashable.com, viewed 13 June 2010, http://mashable.com/2010/03/22/kindle-app-ipad/

What is Kindle? 2009, Kindle Port, viewed 13 June 2010,
http://kindleport.com/What-is-Kindle-.html

Blogging and Freedom of Speech

Blog as a web-based application build on user-generated content bypasses conventional gatekeepers such as editors, advertisers and official authorities (Lim, 2009). Kahn and Kellner argues that this feature enables blogs, and other internet activities to form part of new development in order to promote the consumer society, individualism and competition.

Blogs also serve another crucial function in order to shape a healthy democratic country. They enable ordinary people with an avenue for expression. They could debate and publish what they want to say especially about terrorism, war or political issues without having to deal with company policies or law constraints.

In the wake of the 11 September terror attacks and resulting terror war on a global degree, many of political activism has risen, with the internet such as blogs, wikis, online news or any alternative media playing an increasingly central role ( Kahn & Kellner 2004). Suddenly, anyone could blog on any subject, also a medium that people could debates and involved with real-time discussion with other bloggers.

Journalistic blogs such as Glenn Reynold's Indaspundit aggregates information from a network of site to give solid voices to people. Credible sources and professional shown in their blog as they actually from traditional media organisations (Wikipedia).

Glenn Reynold
(Source:themachoresponse.blogspot)

Why are these blogs successful?

Factually, online sites are freer from government ownerships or interference. Blogs and other online sites are not restricted to any law constraints. Therefore the information given are detailed as compared to print newspapers. Also, materials providing context to events happening. For instance, the Asian Tsunami tragedy allow sharing of information on blogs about those missing, found of deal total and appeals for aid is much faster than traditional media..International News like Global Voices project which initiated by Harvard Law School's Berkman Center for internet and society to aggregate and drawing focus on marginalised people and areas overlooked by the mainstream media (Global Voices).

Online newspaper such as OhmyNews influenced the outcome of the South Korean presidential elections in December 2002 with the election of Roh Moo Hyun (Joyce, 2007). Journalist and author Antony Loewenstein discusses in the Blogging Revolution book review interview the issue of the freedom of speech in relation to blogging, especially in countries of a repressive regime like Iraq, China, Saudi Arabia and Egypt. However with modern technology and the development of the blogging movement, those citizens are able to express their freedom of speech.

In China, web courses are also held to encourage people to express forbidden subject like corruption or government propaganda. Also, Iraq and Egypt, their government allows the Internet to exist even in the poorest community as to boost living standards ( Loewenstein,2007). Recently, South Australia Attorney, General Michael Atkinson repealed a law that anyone posting comments or blogs during election period would have to give their real name and postcode. It is because, bloggers demand the right to publish their stories or opinions during election anonymously( abc.net.au, 2010)

Blogging is certainly making waves in several controversial issues. In 2007, Raja Petra Kamaruddin was interrogated by police for allegedly insulting the King, degrading Islam and inciting ethnic hatred and violence on alternative media site Malaysia Today (Reporters Without Borders, 2008). Here i include an additonal source from Aljazeeras Riz Khan with Raja Petra Kamaruddin(Part 1) and other guests discussed about the censorship of media in Malaysia:

To view another part of this video, please click this link:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dbd9qetPLDc

References

ABC News, 2010, SA backs down on internet comment curb, viewed 11 June 2010,
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/02/03/2808495.htm

Global Voices, About Us, viewed 11 June 2010,
http://globalvoicesonline.org/about/

Joyce, M 2007, The citizen journalism website " OhmyNews" and the 2002 South Korean Presidential Election, The Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard University, viewed 11 June 2010,
http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/sites/cyber.law.harvard.edu/files/Joyce_South_Korea_2007.pdf

Kahn, R, Kellner, D 2004, ' New Media and Internet Activism: From the 'Battle of Seattle' to blogging', New Media and Society, vol.6, no.1, pp.87-95.

Loewenstein,A.2007, The Blogging Revolution, Media Report, viewed 11 June 2010,
http://www.abc.net.au/rn/mediareport/stories/2008/2351985.htm

Lim, MK 2009, 'The Function of Blogs in Democratic Discourse', Journal of Global Communications, vol.2, no.1,pp.313-326.

Reporters Without Borders 2008, Leading blogger Raja Petra Kamararuddin released, viewed 11 June 2010,
http://www.ifex.org/malaysia/2008/11/07/leading_blogger_raja_petra_kamaruddin/

Wikipedia 2010, Glenn Reynolds, viewed 11 June 2010, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glenn_Reynolds

Go Print!

(Source: 'Practicum Pioneers')

Print newspaper readerships slowly declining. The analysis of newspaper audiences reveals that young people are not using newspaper as their main news source. Young people have grown up with their computers, iPods, cell phones, the Internet, user created media and participatory media (Foley, 2007).

However, this does not mean that print newspapers are going ruined completely, rather the statistics show that print newspaper are adapting. However not enough are utilizing social media online to interact with their readers.

Yes, I agree that our society today becomes more intellectual in selecting their own stories.Therefore they tend to shift into alternative media like blogs, Twitter, Facebook, or online newspaper.However, according to Dasselaar (2006) journalism in mainstream media still has an important to play in society.

Mc Nair states that journalists, journalism and traditional media will not experienced any form of death, because they are needed on so many social, political and cultural levels worldwide ( Mc Nair, 2009). In recognition of this, I feel that traditional media has transformed and improved under the pressures of the new media.

Ultimately, Malaysians relied on the mainstream media for information on corruption but they were concerned with biased reporting on the issue
( Center for Independent Journalism). Online news portal such as Malaysiakini and Malaysian Insider are popular as alternative news sources, especially on politics (The Malaysian Insider, 2009).

The Malaysian Insider

(Source: The Malaysian Insider)

The advantages of online newspapers is that they provide information that is updated constantly, as opposed to print newspapers which have only limited number of additions per day. Alternative media promotes open space for readers to create open discussion about anything especially on political issue. Although journalist in alternative media or bloggers are not graduate journalist from major journalism studies, but still the readers believe what they are reported, just because they are close to people's interest (Bentley et al.,2006).

There is also the interactive element where the readers can leave their comments on the website. It is also much cheaper to host on web servers than publish on print. Online newspapers can aggregate together a large number of related articles from many sites.

However, the disadvantages of alternative media are the danger of altering or manipulation by hackers or provocative remarks posted in the comments section. Also, the strong element in newspaper is the format of the professional journalist in mainstream media which still impact reader to believe in newspaper as a primary source ( Foley,2007). The accountability and and accuracy of newspaper's content is no questioned.

News organisations such as MSNBC, The Providence Journal and The Dallas Morning News are now leading with blogs run by their editors information gatekeepers by spending up their news publishing cycle, while still maintaining the objectivity and accuracy of traditional journalism
( Lasica, 2003). Readers will always turn to traditional media as trusted sources of premier information and that will never change.


References

Bentley,C.H,Hamman,B,Ibold,H,Littau,J,Meyer,H 2006,Sense of Community as a Driver for Citizen Journalism,University of Missouri,Columbia,viewed 9 June 2010.

Centre for Independent Journalism 2009, Public want media to be more effective in reporting on corruption, cijmalaysia.org, viewed 9 June 2010,
http://www.cijmalaysia.org/content/view/513/6/

Dasselaar,A 2006, On the Journalistic Aspects of Dutch Blogsphere, Journalism and New Media Leiden University, viewed 8 June 2010,
http://www.arjandasselaar.nl/thefifthestate.pdf

Foley,FC 2007,Why Must Citizen Journalist Fill the Information Gaps Left by Mainstream Media?,Quinnipiac University, viewed 9 June 2010,
http://www.noisemakersproductions.com/pdf/CJ-v-mainmedia.pdf

Lasica, J.D. 2003,'Blogs and Journalism Need Each Other', Nieman Reports,vol.57,no.3,pp.70-74, viewed 9 June 2010,
http://socialmediaclub.pbworks.com/f/blog%20and%20journalism.pdf

McNair, B 2009,'Journalism in the 21st century:evolution,not extinction', Journalism, vol.10,no.3,pp.347-349, viewed 9 June 2010,
http://jou.sagepub.com.ezlibproxy.unisa.edu.au/cgi/reprint/10/3/347.pdf

The Malaysian Insider 2010, About Us, viewed 9 June 2010,
http://www.themalaysianinsider.com/index.php/about-us

Is Facebook Against Privacy?

A social networking site(SNs) has strongly established itself as one of the most recognized online activities. Internet users are rapidly boosting the integration of social networking into their daily web activities. In a study performed by PEW Internet Project and American Life Project, they found that 87 percent of teenagers aged twelve to seventeen have some level of Internet access (Lenhart, Madden, Hitlin, 2005).

(Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg)
Source: robertbykowski.com)

Today, the trend is changing. parents are becoming increasingly worried about their daughters being addicted to social networking sites, most notably Facebook. In this sense, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg told the media recently that the world has changed that its become more public and less private,and that the new controversial of new default and permanent settings indicate how the site today violated people's privacy
( Kirkpatrick,2010).

Privacy setting has switched their function to make those updates publicly visible to everyone. That become the new default. Does it against people privacy by forcing them to make public some of their information all the time?

In November 2009, an activists group called Control Your Info (CYI) claimed credit for taking control of 289 Facebook group to expose how vulnerable shows the vulnerabilities of social media, especially identity tampering ('Control Your Info activists hijack Facebook group, 2009). In recognition, this could lead to spammers using a Facebook account and identity to express ideas and opinions that are not the users. This is such of identity theft and violation of privacy.

Nissenbaum (1998) describes privacy as contextual integrity. Contextual integrity is sustained when norms of appropriateness and norms of distribution are respected. Privacy is a basic human right and should be respected no matter what which it seems less on Facebook.

In my opinion, Facebook is seems like a feature, not a virus. The truth is that Facebook benefits when it conducts the privacy practices of its users. It needs to set a strong privacy architecture to survive as one of most notable social networking sites.

In a large group, even a small percentage affected could mean thousands of people.Millions of people are exploited monthly, thanks to criminals turning a trusted source against them (Ragan, 2009).

I agree that social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter were designed to keep people in touch and build a huge network relationship, but sometimes people claim that their details are become more public and their privacy has been violated. For instance, a teacher feel uncomfortable when she found out that her student was spending hours everyday looking at her profile photos (Peterson, 2009).

Key Google researchers in a recent paper (Davis, 2009) have warned of privacy issues on social networks. These include unwelcome linkage, less control of activity, streams and making a profile of a person by comparing his activity on all his friend network pages.

I believe that social networking groups are crucial medium that people use, but they are not aware of their right of privacy and security. Therefore I agree with google researchers in their suggestion that users should be allowed to remove events and activity streams, and that application creators must also be held responsible to inform the user of the details of any program which is being run on their pages and also always protect user's privacy.


References

Adelaide Now,2009, 'Control Your Info' activists hijack Facebook groups, adelaidenow.com, viewed 7 June 2010,
< http://www.news.com.au/adelaidenow/story/0,22606,26335072-5005962,00.html>

Davis,L 2009, Google Warns of Privacy Issues on the Social Web, readwriteweb.com, viewed 7 June 2010, <http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/google_warns_of_privacy_issues.php>

Kirkpatrick, M 2010, Why Facebook is Wrong: Privacy is Still Important, readwriteweb.com,
viewed 7 June 2010, < http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/why_is_wrong_about_privacy.php>

Lenhart,A.,Madden,M. & Hitlin,P 2005, Teens and Technology: Youth Are Leading the Transition to a Fully Wired and Mobile Nation, PEW Internet and American Life Project, viewed 7 June 2010, <http://www.center-school.org/pko/documents/PIP_Teens_Tech_July2005web.pdf>

Nissenbaum, H 1998, "Protecting Privacy in an Information Age: The Problem of Privacy in Public", Law and Philosphy, vol.17,pp.559-596, viewed 7 June 2010,
< abstract="139144">

Peterson, C 2009, Saving Face: The Privacy Architecture of Facebook, University of Massachusetts, Amberst, Spring, viewed 7 June 2010,
< http://etc.cpeterson.org/documents/2009/savingface.pdf>

Ragan, S 2009, FUD:Facebook groups were not hacked and no one is at risk, The Tech Herald,
viewed 7 June 2010, < http://www.thetechherald.com/article.php/200946/4766/FUD-Facebook-groups-were-not-hacked-and-no-one-is-at-risk#ixzz0XN2CUBMv>

Document Design: Principles and Techniques

Every people has their own experienced surfing various types of document design where is from dull and ill document design to an attractive and good designs. After I have done my readings regarding document design and the principles and techniques, I can conclude that, several elements are significant in designing a good document design. I believed that, using high standard of writing, proper sub-headings as well as adding suitable images will help to hold the reader's attention while reading.

Walsh (2006, p.26) says that, written text is only one part of the message and no longer the dominant part. This means, besides written text as a vital factor of good design, images is gaining importance over written text.

According to Schriver, the first principles need to consider before beginning a document is to identify the possible target audience for the text. Document design is meant to 'help people to achieve their specific goals for using texts at home, school or work ( Schriver, 1997). This means, as a document designers, they have to be responsible in order to ensure their readers keep reading until the end and will get proper and crystal clear of information or instructions.

In addition, document designers are advised to apply multiple of diversity of elements when producing a document. They have to know that not everything can be realized in language, but can also be realized by means of images (Kress & van Leeuwen, 2006,pg 19).

My group presentation's slides are applied the recommendations as suggested in the readings concerning a good document design. For instance, take a look at this slide:

In this slide, we created proper document design elements such as the used of proper font types and size as well as colours. For this introduction slide, we choose black and bolded, different font types for the main title and sub-title in order to capture reader's understanding. According to MacKenzie as quoted in Putnis& Petelin (1996,pg241), optimum legibility is fundamental for designing a good document. It involves elements such as the type and size of the font used.

Reep (2006) states that headings call the reader's attention to the specific topics, and divide the major points to achieve better understanding in one document.

In this slide, our group used appropriate headings to highlight the important points as well as to capture reader's interest to read more about the topic. The title is bolded and place on top of the page and the font is in larger size than the bullet points under the heading.


Moreover, Reep also argues that the use of same kind of font and avoid using all capitals are elements of good design. Reep and Nielsen agree that listing out factors and sub-topics is to underline information and simplify the complex facts for the readers.

Nielsen (1997) says that bulleted lists and separate idea for each paragrapgh would help the readers along the reading journey. For instance, take a look at this slide,

References

Kress, G. & van Leeuwen, T.2006, Reading images, Chapter 1: The semiotic landscape: language and visual communication.

Nielsen, J.1997, How Users Read on the Web, viewed 4 April 2010, www.useit.com/alertbox/9710a.html

Putnis, P,Petelin, R 1996, 'Writing to communicate' in Professional Communication: Principles and Applications, Prentice Hall, Sydney.

Reep, D.C 2006, 'Chp 4: Principles of Document Design', in Technical Writing,6th ed, PearsonEdu,Inc.,New York, p.173-190.

Schriver, K.A. 1997, Chapter 6: Dynamics in document design: creating texts for readers, Wiley Computer Pub., New York.

Walsh, M.2006, " 'Textual Shift': Examining the reading process with print, visual and multimodal texts", Australian Journal of Language and Literacy, vol.29, no.1, p.24-37.

New Forms of Media Publishing

Traditional and new forms of media is the hot topic today, but there remains a degree of ambiguity about its definition, meaning and function to our society. The growing of web 2.0 sites is making people question about the role of journalism in mainstream media.

Young people have grown up with their computers, cell phones and through the Internet, users created media and participatory media (Foley,2007). Therefore, a new forms of media like blogs, online newspapers, YouTube and Twitter have brought online communication and information sharing as well as hard news to a new level of getting information.

Twitter

(Source: leeds.ac.uk)

Twitter is a real-time information network controlled by people all around the world which allows them to share and discover what is happening now within seconds. Users can write a few lines about anything on their minds. For instance, the cases of the part time model in Singapore, Kartika Sari Dewi Shukarno who has been sentenced to six lashes of the cane for drinking beer in a Kuantan Hotel has garnered a lot of International and local media attention.After that news appeared in the local media, every seconds users were spreading the news and their comments. . Therefore, twitters has a significant impact of sharing information by breaking news updates even faster than traditional media channels.

Online Newspapers

(Source: Malaysiakini.com)

Malaysiakini, and The Malaysian Insider are the example of online newspapers as well as alternative media in Malaysia. Believing that political control had corrupted the values of journalism in the mainstream media, Malaysiakini concept was to bring independent news, investigate reporting and in-depth analysis which are longer than mainstream media articles. For instance, the 2008 General Election in Malaysia has made Malaysiakini as a vital contributor to the shift of people to alternative media. Malaysiakini was posting live updates and many of them sent in by recently trained volunteer (Steele, 2009). They provided more commentary and links to give more varried perpspectives about the 2008 General Election.

Facebook

(Source: Facebook Logo)

Facebook a popular social networking sites which had proposed a sweeping 'news feed' program and allow users to post their personal information on profiles. For instance the caning cases of Kartika Sari has made a lots of changes in society. In this sense, there is Facebook tiltled 'HELP Kartika Sari Dewi Shukarno' which supporting her. Thus, this page has four hundred and ninety-five fans all over the world. Most of them post provoked by the generalistic arguments of noted about the caning of Kartika's case.

Here, I include an additonal information of Kartika Sari Dewi's case in the Bloomberg live news.

References

Adiwira, 2009, Kartika Sari Dewi Shukarno, Warkah.com, viewed 2 April 2010,
http://warkah.com/kartika-sari-dewi-shukarno/

Facebook: HELP Kartika Sari Dewi Shukarno, Facebook.com, viewed 2 April 2010,
http://www.facebook.com/pages/HELP-Kartika-Sari-Dewi-Shukarno/116947506453

Foley, FC 2007, Why Must Citizen Journalist Fill the Information Gaps Left by Mainstream Media?, Quinnipiac University, viewed 3 April 2010,
http://www.noisemakersproductions.com/pdf/CJ-v-mainmedia.pdf

Steele, J 2009, 'Professionalism Online, How Malaysiakini Challenges Authoritarianism', International Journal of Press/Politics, vol.14, no.1, pp.91-111

Weblog Malaysiakini, Malaysiakini, viewed 3 April 2010,
http://weblog.malaysiakini.com/?page id=2