I have been spending a lot of time with my family in quarantine. when i told my brother I had to record a podcast he got excited and asked if he could be in it. My brother and I both really enjoy music, especially rap. But we decided to switch it up and review the top 5. We could have went on and on and I had to do a lot of editing to cut it from 10 minutes to 5.
All posts by brianag113
Politics 2.0
During this time many people are looking to politics for help. In America, almost every channel is focused on politics and what the president is going to do about the coronavirus. Because everyone had this access to the internet, it is only logical from a political standpoint to share their thoughts and ideas through the media. Obama used this during his campaign in 2008 and progressed his campaign dramatically. Other politicians, such as Trump, use social media to state his many opinions. Twitter has become an extremely political app since Trump’s campaign because of the strategized audience that he wants to draw in. Politicians use the media to advance their campaign, get the word out, and to project global news.
Since the realization of how important media and social media is, it has been taken advantage of in many cases. One in particular is politics and campaign extension. In 2008, the internet had an important role in the campaign. Over half of the adult population were following online politics, which is extreme considering it is more available and mobile. This is where Barack Obama took advantage of his campaign opportunity and said let’s use the internet. Around 70% of the population was on the internet looking for facts and news about the 2008 election. From looking up the campaign to talking about the campaign, the internet was a key factor in the election that showed the power of social media.
Due to this pandemic going on around the world, it is extremely important to get the information that we need from the most trusted people. Some may say this is doctors and others might say that it is our president, Donald Trump. Now, all jokes aside he has an important role in what is going on, which is why it is so crucial that the information that he has as a politician is spread to the masses. The best way to do that is obviously the media. From CNN to my local Connecticut channels, Trump’s word is getting out. Despite whether you want to hear it or not, it is vital to know what is going on and what you should be doing during this time of the coronavirus outbreak.
Politics is not something I am very fond of. I hate the ritualistic aspect of it where you have to sit down and watch the debates every four years, and who’s on whose side; I honestly think it’s a waste of time. But seeing it on my phone is a different story. Through apps and social media it is so much more convenient and time efficient. I think that is a huge strategy used in politics today too because it lost so much attention from the younger audience. When Obama used the media it brought the politics to them.
MOJO Project: The Picasso Museum
This is my MOJO project on the Picasso Museum. I visited for my art class and loved learning about Picasso’s life and his art. Hope you enjoy the video!
Marketing 2.0
Marketing is a series of activities to promote a product or company. Companies use data and research to attract customers or clients to bring attention to a product or even more importantly to sell the product. The goal of marketing is to promote a good product which concludes in a happy customer in terms of sales and promotion. The user experience is the most important focus in marketing because it is all about the people. The people, viewers, or customers are the ones that are going to be using or talking about the product. It is so easy to get the word around about a product or company with the help of social media.
While researching marketing I came across five concepts of marketing that made me further understand the process. The five concepts are…
- Production concept
- Product concept
- Selling concept
- Marketing concept
- Societal marketing concept
These concepts are used to carry out and organize the strategies of marketing to get the best outcome possible. As social media becomes more easily accessible, yes, more people will be exposed, but it can also be easily taken away, hidden, or ignored. To explain these in short, the production concept focuses on making the product available and easily affordable. This is important because like anyone we want something fast and cheap. Product concept is the idea that a customer will favor a product based on the quality of the product. Selling concept is the theory that people will not buy the product if it does not have a good selling and promotion rate. Many people base their purchases and experience on other people that they can relate to by using ratings and apps such as Yelp!. Marketing concept is achieving organizational goals that depend on the needs and wants of the customer and considering the competition. This is relevant to the companies that are close in selling rates such Apple and Android. Lastly societal marketing concept refers to how the product is satisfying the customer’s short-term and long-term needs and if it is going to be passed onto friends or coworkers. I think these concepts back up the fundamentals of marketing 2.0 because it is all about the people and how they react to the product.
These concepts go for viral marketing, visual advertising, and even Google recommendations. Based on evangelist customers and our contribution and feedback to marketing, there is no easy way to a perfect company. Even if a company brainstorms the perfect concepts to a product, there will always be a customer that gives negative feedback and positive feedback. Specifically in the larger companies there will always be people that are unhappy with the product, but it can be easily ignored. But, in a smaller company like a small clothing store or small restaurant, they can be easily affected by these comments and feedback.
Marketing is majorly affected by the customers that are exposed to the product. This is why all customers should be considered. From a marketing perspective there should not be anyone excluded from wanting the product, which is why I think a lot has changed in the advertising world. There was a lot of feedback to Victoria’s Secret, for example, because there were only white female models. In recent years, there was a growth in black and asian models in advertisements and also the Victoria’s Secret fashion show. This goes to show that feedback and negative comments are important in the marketing of companies and how they relay their product.
Marketing vs. PR
People are like magazines. Some are intellectual, some are informational, some are ignorant, and some are creative. Magazines are sold based on their content. Just like people are sold or persuaded based on their opinions or values. That is why it takes people of different professions to capture the attention from a variety of audience members. No matter how you get these people to consider the product, the company wants to be seen. This is where the difference in public relations and marketing are relevant.
Public Relations is the profession of planned release of information based on an individual or an organization. Even though the goal is still to persuade a client, it is through trusted and information based tendencies. PR is set in place to notify customers in a truthful setting based on the key factor that it is earned media. When a company is mentioned in a third party organization, such as the news, it is not because they paid to be mentioned but because they gained an importance to be mentioned. For example, an article was posted by UN News due to the recent outbreak of covid-19 and UNICEF’s contribution to helping the people of Afghanistan, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Somalia, the Philippines, Syria and South Sudan. UNICEF paid nothing but their efforts to help the less fortunate to get this article published. PR is solely based on the relevant news to attract clients, which is why it is free. The well informed and intellectual people that I mentioned would most likely be the key clients in this PR case.
Marketing and advertising on the other hand are based on persuasion through paid and visual based media. Although advertising is a step in the process of marketing, their goal is the same. They both want to gain publicity of a product and company by data and research to communicate why the audience should show interest in this product. We can use UNICEF as an example of marketing too by looking at these advertising photos. Just by this series of photos there is very little information given about the company. These advertisers use emotion and visuals for a gain of customer support. But by looking at these photos, does the viewer trust this organization? In marketing there is skepticism in the ads exposed to the public because many people see it as a scam. But, there are people that can be considered “suckers” because they are easily persuaded by these ads. The Audience members that are more influenced by a visual or emotion could be the people I mentioned before that are more uneducated or creative.
The reason for me comparing people to a magazine is to capture the idea of someone being sold on an idea. I find myself uninterested in magazines that are intellectually based, such as Harper’s Magazine but more interested in fashion based magazines such as Vogue. Which is why I would be easily persuaded by an advertisement rather than a PR article. There is a difference in information that is put out because there are people that are easily persuaded and people that need factual evidence to contribute to a company. The difference is so relevant because of the audience or customer. There would be no company without this customer, which is why there is relevance to making your product or company seen.
Valenti Sanjuan
Valenti Sanjaun is an influencer that started by sharing his struggle story and how he changed his lifestyle because he knew he wasn’t living a healthy life. After his successes in changing his daily routine, he started to feel selfish because he was sharing all of his success stories and they started to seem redundant to him. Valenti started sharing other people’s stories from all over the world. One of the main messages he tried to convey to his overall audience is what is your excuse? This theme carries on into his documentary called Cape Epic.
Alex Libre’s story was one that Valenti shared in his documentary. Alex passed away from a motorcycle accident and had a list of 101 things that we wanted to go before he died. When his friends found this list, they wanted to do the top thing on his list, Cape Epic, in honor of him. Alex’s friends and family started a foundation called ALL1 for Alex’s loved ones that wanted to conquer what was on his list. One of his friends said that he can imagine Alex looking down at them cheering them on and saying, “Keep pedaling!” He made note to thank Valenti for all he does. He shared the inspiration that he spreads to this large group of people is important to spread their story about Alex.
Valenti takes these stories and connects them to his real life issues. He related Alex’s story to his mother’s passing. He said, “One of the first things that I learned when my mother died of cancer is that, as it is not certain that there is life beyond death, it is important that we at least make sure that there is life before death.” Although Valenti does not have the same story as Alex, there is this underlying meaning of living that he wants to emphasise. He uses relation to connect with the other stories as they may also connect with the other audience.
I think another major idea that Valenti uses as an influencer is metaphors. This is relevant to an influencers content because they want to make sure that they relate to their audience not only to keep them interested but also to keep them inspired. As he is tying all of these stories together about his mother’s passing and Alex’s, he adds in a scene from the Dead Poet’s Society that has a metaphorical approach to the situation. In the movie, the boys are looking at pictures of alumni in a trophy case. They realize that they are just like them except the people in the picture already lived their lives. The teacher proceeds to tell the boys to seize the day and make your lives extraordinary.
Valenti relates reminds me of Jonathan Van Ness from the Netflix show Queer Eye. Although they are completely different in a number of ways, they both stand out to me as an inspirational person in a media crazed world. Jonathan is gay and has struggled growing up all of his life. Although he was openly gay all of his life, he still experienced bullying along with death threats and hatred from his peers for being feminine and flamboyant. Jonathan went down a rough path when he started college, involving drugs and sex addiction. His grades dropped and he lost his cheerleading scholarship and ended up having to drop out of college. He later also found out that he was HIV positive. He realized that that wasn’t the path that he wanted to follow in life so he got into hairdressing. He worked in many different salons and also started his own podcast called Getting Curious with Jonathan Van Ness. Soon after his two passions combined in the making of Queer Eye. This show is one of the most inspirational shows I have seen. These five gay men go to people that need fixing and encourage them to make their lives extraordinary. They fix up their style, hair, house, and their thoughts with a therapist.
Even though these two men are completely different, they still have this story of a second life while living. They both had an epiphany where they find hope and carry on their lives in a positive way and to help others. Many people go through something traumatic in their lives that they think they aren’t going to get through but there are people like Valenti and Jonathan that chose to share their stories so that they reach an audience that can relate to them. All of these stories pose as one another in the sense that they all recover for a good purpose.
5 best characteristics of mojo
MoJo, short for mobile journalism, is a strategy used to tell stories through technology. Using a phone rather than a camera man can have many pros and cons. On the plus side, you get a lot more freedom, it’s way cheaper, it’s easier to travel with and it’s fast to report news and information. On the other hand, the quality could be iffy, along with the lighting, audio, and stability. Most of these mojos are freelance journalists that use a variety of technologies to share new media.
There are two aspects to mojo; the first being mobile. Mobile can mean two things, being able to move freely and technology. In this case I’d say both can fall under the mobile category of mojo. There is an importance to both of these definitions because of how flexible mojo has to be. Technology has grown exceptionally in the journalism department. Smartphones are one of the most popular technologies of mobile journalism. Because of the recurring updates it makes for better quality videos and edits that work in favor of mobile journalism. Journalism is the second aspect of mojo that relates to the person on camera doing the storytelling.
- More freedom.
When using technology to report news, you have so much more freedom than using a ginormous camera. If there is something newsworthy that needs to be recorded as soon as possible, it is a set back to carry around the big camera. You also get the opportunity to work alone and put your own twist on things. Because mobile journalism is all about storytelling it is important to make it unique to draw in an audience, which is where mojo comes in. It doesn’t have to all be in a news theme. It can be used to make a documentary sequence showing information about a person or place.
- Way cheaper.
An average news camera costs around 5,000 dollars or more. While an iPhone and equipment costs way less and is easy to replace. The products needed for mobile journalism such as a tripod are important for the quality of the video along with the mics and flash lights needed for quality of lighting and sound. Those three things alone are around 200 dollars plus your iPhone and you’re good to go!
It is also cheaper to hire freelance journalists who are familiar with mojo and have been using it for a while. They are also most likely going to be a younger generation that are more comfortable with a phone rather than someone who has been behind a news camera for most of their career.
- It’s easy to travel with.
Because the phone is so small it is easier to travel. If there are freelance journalists in New York who have a story in California that they think would make a good story, they can’t lug around a huge camera and expect it to be easy. But, if they were to carry their iPhone it would be much more convenient to get from place to place.
It is also easy to move around with a cell phone instead of a camera because what if there are areas for shooting that are in small spaces, you simply just can’t fit a news camera. It is also easy to move around when people don’t want to be recorded. There are many people that do not like to be recorded and the iPhone is the best way to hide that someone is taking a video for a larger purpose.
- It is comfortable.
When people do see you recording, they aren’t as afraid. Most people are so comfortable with the iPhone that they are more likely to be themselves while behind the camera. There are many areas where this is seen such as in YouTube videos, TikToks, and even photos.
- It’s fast.
If the news isn’t timely, then people most likely already heard it or don’t care anymore. There are so many reasons why the iPhone is so much faster than even television. People are on their phones all the time that means that there are more people that will see the post or video sooner than they will on the news. Apps like Snapchat, Twitter and Facebook provide this information before most news channels do.
Mobile Journalism is everywhere but the audience doesn’t even notice. There are so many reasons why mojo is way more convenient than carrying around a dinosaur news camera. Because the audience is the most important part to storytelling, I think that keeping it quick and easy is the best way to keep the audience hooked. News readers want their information from one sentence in an article they don’t want to have read through the whole thing. But, watching a video is a different story. Most people would rather watch a video online or on tv rather than read about it in a newspaper or article. This represents the development of technology over the years and how important it is to keep up with our audience to keep them hooked.
What not to do in Geneva, Switzerland
Me and my friend Theresa are probably one of the worst duos that can ever exist. Basically everything we do is a mistake, whether it’s a simple task of doing laundry or doing something major like traveling the world. Hopefully this blog will teach you something about my mistakes so you don’t have to go through what I went through.
Theresa and I went with our two guy friends and met up with two other girl friends, Maddie and Emily, who are studying abroad in Florence. It was overall a pretty fun trip but there were a number of things that went terribly wrong, making it a trip to remember for sure. Just a little introduction for you guys, Theresa completely forgot her passport and realized as soon as we got to the airport. We spent over 90 euros in cab fares just to get to the airport.
First of all, Geneva was not a place for college kids. If you consider yourself boujee, maybe go for it but I don’t recommend. The main reason for choosing Geneva was because it was the cheapest flight into Switzerland (chosen by me of course). It is also known to be more of a beach town, not really for winter. Geneva is where most people fly into for connecting flights to ski resorts in Zurich or Interlaken. When we get to Geneva, we get into a taxi and automatically start speaking spanish to taxi driver, naturally, who spoke perfect English, French and Italian. As we’re talking to him I realize that I actually have no idea what language they speak in Geneva so I ask, it’s French. The three borders of Switzerland coincide with the language that they speak, so the border of France is French, the border of Germany is German, and the same with Italy.
Switzerland in general is not in the college budget. One of my other friends that came with us picked the hotel. She assumed that if it was a little more expensive then it would be a lot nicer. But of course, we were wrong. The location of the hotel was not ideal. It was in a more unsafe area of Geneva where there was a lot of sex shops and public drinking areas. The hotel we stayed at had a very outer space-like theme. It reminded me of the Boomerang show, The Jetson’s, which had a very futuristic vibe. As weird as it was, it was still a place to sleep (and it was clean). Our other friends were staying in an ibis, which was perfectly fine to stay in and a lot cheaper. On the topic of money, food and drinks were also very expensive. When me and Theresa saw the Starbucks next door to our hotel we ran. We assume that the Starbucks was a safe bet because it’s pretty much the coffee version of McDonald’s right? No we were wrong yet again. My venti vanilla latte was almost 9 francs (the currency in Switzerland is francs which was something else I didn’t know arriving there).
To continue about the food and drinks, and the ridiculous pricing, we figured out some hacks to save a couple francs. First, we used the instant coffee and tea in the hotel so we wouldn’t have to go back to a Switzerland Starbucks ever again. For food, we pretty much shared everything. For lunch the first day we went to The Little Kitchen which was a burger place right on the river. Theresa and I shared a salad and their potatoes and got our own drinks. For dinner we got fondue, which Switzerland is supposedly known for. We went to Auberge de Saviese, it had a selection of fondue for individuals or groups. By the end of the dinner we finished about 5 lbs of cheese and 5 loaves of bread, but completely worth it. One of our most successful outings was at Arthur’s. Arthur’s is an upscale restaurant with outdoor seating, but not just any outdoor seating. They had big plastic igloo looking tents with seating inside, so we just had to go. But here’s the thing, the drinks were all 10 francs and up. This was just not going to cut it, so we had an idea. We told the boys to go to the liquor store and get multiple bottles of wine. We order the cheapest glass on the menu (when I say cheap I mean like 12 francs) and pretend we are drinking the same glass for about 2 to 3 hours. We really pulled it off. So we really saved a lot of money drink wise. Five Guys was also a go to. It’s this great to-go burger place and even has vegetarian options. Have you heard of it? Highly recommend; we spent most of our time there.
Even though Geneva was a little more upscale than we expected, there was still a decent amount to do. We were staying right next to Lake Geneva that separated the sketchy area from the nicer area. We were on the sketchy side, but it was a close walk to get to the nice area which was Old Town Geneva. In the old town there is the St. Pierre Cathedral and you can walk all the way up to the top for a panoramic view of Geneva. In this part of Geneva there was also shopping and chocolate shops, which is a must. The chocolate was really as good as people say.
To top it all off, we planned to go out on our last night there. Multiple bottles of wine later we head to a bar called Black Sheep. It was a really cool bar in a good area. This is probably the last place my good old friend Theresa remembers. As we are all heading to the club we realize that Theresa and her boyfriend are no longer behind us. We try to get a hold of them, which was a struggle because none of us had service. Because Switzerland isn’t considered part of the European Union it has a lot of differences from the neighboring countries such as currency and cell phone service. So of course we can’t get a hold of them. One of my friends starts to freak out and starts running the Switzerland streets screaming “THERESA” dramatically. After we had a good laugh at the fact that we lost them, we realized that this was just a shit show. We walk back to the hotel to get a hold of them and Theresa calls us crying. She and her boyfriend fell asleep at a table in a hotel… A hotel. So after security escorts them out they get a cab and go back to Theresa’s boyfriend’s hotel. So as I’m sitting in our hotel room by myself I get a Facebook dm from her boyfriend saying that she left her phone in the cab. Poor Theresa. As the story comes to an end, my incompetent self makes it to the airport safe and on time.
Theresa is currently using an iPhone 5s in hopes to get her iPhone 11 back. We look back at Geneva as a mistake as a whole but loaded with memories. So here is a little recap…
- Don’t go to Geneva. But if you do follow these steps…
- Stay south of Lake Geneva in Old Town Geneva
- Share your food even if you think it’s going to be the death of you, you’ll thank me later
- Bring drinks instead of paying for them
- Get chocolate
- Don’t get lost
- Don’t leave your phone in a cab
- Don’t forget your passport
- Don’t fall asleep in a hotel lobby
- Last but not least, no matter how often you mess up, always make the most of it.
I hope you enjoyed this blog and learned a little but about Geneva and what not to do. As obvious as some of these tips may seem, it could be you one day.
-Briana
Social Networks
Where would we be without social networks? We depend on these apps, websites and technologies pretty much do everything. There are different characteristics to these social networks that make them different from the rest. Although they may have the same goals, people prefer specific apps or websites for different reasons. For example, when looking at news social networks we have Facebook and Snapchat. Facebook has been, and still is, the most popular social networks an expected number of 1.69 billion users in 2020. One of the main reasons that it is one of the most popular social networking apps is because it reaches out to many different generations like grandparents, parents and even younger siblings. But, when we compare the users of Facebook to the users of Snapchat, we can see a difference in the age of the users. Snapchat has a smaller amount of users of 210 million in 2019, but keeping in mind that 90% of users are from ages 13 to 24. Because of these apps we have access to news, communication with friends, and sharing content.
I downloaded Facebook specifically for college. I had no desire to have the app entertainment reasons but rather for social reasons to find a roommate for school. On the other hand, Snapchat is one of the more important apps that I use on a day to day basis. I have been using Snapchat since my freshman year of high school along with all of my friends. Since we started using the app at such a young age, we became dependent on it.
Snapchat, in short, is for communicating with friends, sharing content, and discovering news. There are a lot of details that go into these characteristics in the app. When communicating with friends there are “streaks”, which is a numerical count of the amount of days that you and your friend in a row. In my opinion, this is one of the smartest ways to keep users attached to the app. My friend and I have a streak of 1,714 days meaning we have had this streak for more than 4.5 years. This small tweak in the update made this one of our most important communication sources along with a number of other loyal snapchat users.
Not only is Snapchat for communicating but it also provides information. The discover page provides many news sources that so many people use on a daily basis. This news ranges from entertainment to politics to animal planet.
Overall, Snapchat provides the necessities for social media app. Even with just WiFi, you can still direct message, send pictures, and look up news. Because of the fact that Snapchat is so accessible, it’s most likely going to be around for a long time. My friends and I always say, “Are we going to be snapchatting each other about how annoying our kids are when we’re 40?” Even though we joke about it there is still a possibility that we will be using Snapchat to keep in touch with our grandkids.
My First Blog Post
Geneva, Switzerland. January, 2020
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https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.jsReggie Jackson hit the "Shmoney Dance" after fans started chanting "Bobby Shmurda" at him 😂💰 pic.twitter.com/MZ9pPSDNLD
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