Media exam

 Introduction

defintion 

argument 

context

''I shall argue"

"I shall come to the conclusion"

Content

point 

evidence 

argument 

Tide advert is sexist 

Cultivation theory 

Hegemonic norms are reinforced 

David Hesmondhalgh has argued that while the internet initially had radical and transformative potential, this has largely been squandered by the involvement of vast corporations motivated by power and profit. Critically evaluate this theory related to the cultural industries. Make reference to Zoella/Zoe Sugg and Attitude Online to back up your argument

Yes David Hesmondhalgh's argument that online media's potential hasn't been realised due to large corporations favouring power and profit over art and culture. The products we have studied are solely motivated by power and profit 

• all human knowledge is stored on the internet 
• create a new persona and identity 
• novel ways of making money and distributing products in an ethical and environmentally responsible way 
• news and information can be instantly shared 
• Revolution and social change can be promoted 
• a completely inclusive and universal structure 

Plan:

• Influencer who promotes beauty products 
• Attitude is a British gay magazine 
• Zoella targets women 
• Attitude targets gay men 
• Both websites have a ton of ads
• Attitude has a separate physical magazine as well 
• Attitude website targets working class 
• Attitude magazine targets middle class 
• Diversification of audience ^
• Horizontal integration 
• Vertical integration 
• Conglomerate companies 
• Ideologies 
• Hyper-reality 
• Niche audience 
• Regulation 
• Digital convergence 
• Advertising 
• Brand identity 
• Profit orientated 
• Rebranding 
• (Representation)
• Stream (horizontal integration)
• Monopoly 
• Sponsors 
• Clickbait 
• Curran Seaton - power and profit
• pick and mix 

Introduction

The internet refers to a large connection  of interlinked servers which allow audiences to freely access and share information. There are many platforms that can be linked and driven by digitally convergent technologies, and potentially they can present a unified and exciting set of opportunities. However, these potential advantages have been squandered by vast corporations through mass advertising, clickbait and exploitive tactics. In this exam, I shall argue that vast corporations have corrupted the creativity of the internet and the people who use it, and now most of the internet is solely motivated by profit over art. In order to explore this idea, I shall be looking at the example of Zoella, an online blogger and influencer who is particularly appealing to teenage female audiences and more recently more older female audiences, and Attitude online, a gay men's online magazine which is a supplementary products to the print version of Attitude. 

Content

Attitude

Engages their audience with a variety of news articles, but solely driven by profit and greed. The overwhelming presence of advertising, including banner adverts, wrapper advert, scrolling adverts and clickbait 

Hypersexualistion of gay men constructs a stereotypical representation which cynically targets a gay audience 

Zoella

Includes a range of hyperlinks to her own online shop and the products it features, including shoes, clothing, books and makeup 

Hypermodality in zoella's website, linking to a variety of social media platforms, and more opportunities to advertise to her target audience. 

Zoella's rebranding to Zoey Sugg is a cynical move to appeal to and manipulate older fans 

Attitude Online - British gay lifestyle magazine

 2.7% - 10% of people could be gay in the UK 

Sexuality is a spectrum 

• Gay men are seen as vulnerable 
• Ant and Dec, two straight men, are coded as being queer
• Ant and Dec are represented as fierce and powerful 
• Some articles get close to erotica
• Attitude challenges hegemonic norms 
• The erotica is homoerotic 
• Gay men are represented as hyper-sexualised
• Camp is an overtop, deliberately trashy aesthetic 
• On average, gay men have a more expendable income meaning they'll have more money to spend on holidays, clothes and theatre 
• Targeting cisgendered, homosexual, British men 
• Has a gossipy mode of address 
• Focuses on stories about celeb gossip and tv giving it a more working class audience feel 
• Lots of advertising - related to gambling and promotions 
• Informal lexis 
• The site targets working class audience 
• The physical print magazine targets middle class instead of working in order to diversify its audience 

1st question is on music videos - 30 mins - One that has been studied - media language

2nd question is on wateraid - audience question - 15 mins - how it appeals to audiences 

3rd question is on les revenants - representation question - 25 mins long 

4th question - 50 mins - on online media - zoella and attitude - industry

Attitude site:

• Attitude is published by Stream media, a horizontally integrated company which specialises in publishing magazines. We are studying attitude online which should be seen as an online supplementary component to the Attitude brand
• Infrequently updated by the publisher which suggests that they aren't nearly as important to the brand its success
• Attitude online and Attitude magazine differ significantly when it comes to target audience. The magazine clearly targets a middle class audience. It has less of a focus on gossip, and more of a focus on a sophisticated, high end design with a big focus on high end production values. Attitude magazine often interviews and shoots celebrities, including heterosexual celebrities, such as Prince William, olympic athletes like Tom Daly, and female musicians such as Lady Gaga 
• Attitude online however clearly targets a working class audience. It utilises an informal lexis, there is a big emphasis on images over text, masses of adverts like Etoro, Nike, Batman. The website often promotes low production values, and the number of adverts can make it confusing to read. In short, attitude only mainly exists to make money 

How could Attitude harm audiences 

• Many stereotypical assumptions are made about gay men, including that they have an interest in drag, camp culture, theatre and young buff men 
• Manipulative clickbait adverts can potentially be scams which can destroy the lives of vulnerable people 
• Articles that deal with mental health, bullying and suicide 
• The nudity in certain articles. Highly sexualised images may make certain audiences uncomfortable 
• Not many ways to engage with Attitude Online 
• You can engage through contests to win certain rewards 
• You can subscribe to Attitude magazine and the newsletter suggesting they have an older audience 
• They have hyperlinks to their social media
• You cannot comment on Attitude online due to possible trolls and would be too difficult to moderate

TERF - trans-exclusionary radical feminist

Hyper-modality - A term used to describe the way in which the linkages in online media products such as webpages ' go beyond the default conventions of traditional multimodal genres

Online Media Regulation

Problems with Regulation - Case Study 

• Blocking access to mainstream sites could lead to users trying to access sketicher sites 
• Mainstream sites are worried that they'd implement the age verification whilst smaller sites get away with not implementing it due to poor enforcement of the regulation
• It costs around 20p per user to verify their age which could have a negative effect on smaller sites
• Many users don't want to have their personal details shared to the website they're trying to access upon doing the age verification
• The regulation could promote the use of VPNs to bypass the UK verification system with ease

"The internet is largely regulated in a “patchwork of regulation and voluntary initiatives”. This means that, in the UK, the internet is regulated in radically different ways depending on the site, but ultimately, it is up to the distributor of content to voluntarily regulate themselves. Therefore the internet is largely self-regulated. There are a number of reasons for this approach, including the rapid advancement of technology, and the simple fact that much of the internet is hosted in completely different countries with completely different laws and restrictions. You must communicate in the exam about the potential harms and problems the internet may present its users.

"

Potential Harms to users of online media:

• Cyberbullying/trolling on many different platforms from other users as there is no real consequence for them as a result of this 
• Could be exposed to harmful material being posted on social media or on gore websites 
• Scam and viruses being located on fake download links and pop up ads attempting to install some sort of malware onto your system 
• DDos and IP tracking from potential hackers especially on dodgy sites 
• Having your personal details on public display affecting the users personal security and privacy 

The Zoella Site potential harms:

• The terms and conditions states that the information they publish on the site isn't mean to be "relied on" and instead there just for "general information". However, this isn't stated on any of the articles meaning some users could end up being misinformed 
• The terms and conditions also include a statement about how they may but are not obligated to removing potential harmful content meaning the audience could be potentially left vulnerable to material which may offend them
• There's a few articles mentioning things such as "audio porn you should listen to" and "getting in touch with your erotic self" which could potentially lead to audiences coming across offensive material whilst reading or doing more research upon the topic 

Zoella Controversies:

• Old tweets were found of Zoella using offensive language including the use of words such as skank, fat chav and tramp. She has been accused of making homophobic comments as well as fat shaming
• Zoella was under fire for an advent calendar she released which only had 12 doors yet still costed £50 (which was later reduced to £25 by Boots). People complained that she overpriced the calendar which was of poor quality due to only containing "packet of confetti, seven stickers and cookies" and was exploiting her fan base which consisted of kids in order for them to beg their parents to get it for them 
• Zoella has also been in trouble with Instagram for not disclosing a promotion she did for a dress she posted on her story. This resulted in her getting a warning from UK ad regulators for not making it clear that her story was promotional material 
• Zoella has also been caught "driving and volgging" on camera where it's shown that she takes both hands of the steering wheel at one point. A police spokesman says "she could've killed someone" 
• Her book "Girl Online" has been said to be ghost written which Zoella has received massive backlash over when it first came out 
• Due to Zoella advertising sex toys for her mature audience, she was taken off the AQA GCSE Media curriculum as her content was seen as too inappropriate to teach to GCSE students 

Hyper-real - is more real than the thing its representing 

Online Media

• constantly changing
• broad range of interests and personalities are catered for. Hyper-specific targeting/narrowcasting
• Legal and ethical issues with sharing data (Data mining, Doxxing) 
• a lot of illegal stuff 
• Issues with vast conglomerates and monopolies
• Ethical issue with removing competition
• Violation of privacy within the educational sphere
•  digital convergent 
• if something online is free than you are the product 
• questioning reality 
• advantages that come with it comes with massive drawback

Zoella - Youtuber, vlogger, influencer

online media - technology that functions using the internet 

WWW - World wide web 

Internet - interconnected network of computers and servers sharing data 

Vlogging - video blogging - the activity of posting short videos or maintaining a vlog

Blog - web log, online journal, online diary

Vlogging has become one of the biggest and influential forms of media. Research shows 42% of internet users said they watched a vlog withn last month 50 %. 

• Vlog has a structure 
• Usually hosted on a streaming site
• Caters to extremely specific interest 
• Low production value to relate to the audience 
• Generally short form 5-20 mins
• Direct address
• Sense of involvement 
• Provides audiences with escapism 
• Voyeurism 
• Conform para-social relationships
• Authenticity 
• Changed her audience
•