Category: students

The following is an example of my typical media use in a 24 hour period, which is mostly spent as a consumer in the digital world.

The first thing I check in the morning is my phone to make sure I have no missed messages, phone calls, or voicemails. Then, I usually send a, “good morning,” text to my girlfriend and our conversation will be consistent throughout the day.

After checking my phone messages, I head downstairs to hop on to http://my.asu.edu to see what work I must get done for the day. This particular day I checked the blogging assignment due for the week, and then continued to read each of my professors’, Dan Gillmor and Kristy Kroschke, blog examples of their daily media use.

An hour or so later, I checked my Twitter app from my phone and read some comedic tweets, favoriting a few that I thought were especially hilarious. These tweets usually come from comedians or YouTubers that I follow, rather than retweets from other people.

After I checked Twitter, I decided to relax and watch some television. Once again, I was watching shows that involved comedy and not as much news or drama.

During the time I spent watching T.V. I also posted a video to my Instagram story of one of my close friends that happened to come over a few minutes prior. Some of my followers replied to the video saying it was funny, and I replied back to a few saying something like, “I know right,” or double tapping on their comment to, “like,” it.

Once I finished up replying to some people, I decided to head onto the YouTube app via my Playstation 4. I watched a few more funny videos with my friend, before we decided to just put some regular television on.

My friend had to leave shortly after, so I was left watching Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift. I’ve never actually seen that movie, so I decided to finish watching it.

While the movie was on, I opened the Twitter app again to see if there was any interesting news.

A few seconds of scrolling led me to a retweet of an LA Times article about Liz Warren denying Bernie a handshake. I decided to give the article a read, as well as the replies to the tweet itself. In all honesty, the article seemed a little pointless in my opinion, and could be causing a commotion over nothing, but everyone has there own views and I suggest you read the article I linked above and form your own thoughts rather than taking my word for it.

After reading that article, I stumbled across another tweet that linked a video showing a massive rainfall in Australia. The person who had tweeted the video had added a no source quote stating how much rain Australia has received in the last few hours. I was a bit skeptical about the accuracy or where that quote was even coming from, so I clicked on the tweet to see were the original video was posted, and was eventually led here.  As you can see the original video was posted by a verified news presenter for 9 News Australia. I decided to retweet the Australian news presenter’s tweet about how much rainfall Melbourne had received, since it seemed to be straight from the source.

Once I finished up on Twitter, I decided to hop back on YouTube to see if there was anything entertaining to watch. When I hopped on the app,  the politics section showed breaking news footage of the senate passing the USMCA deal. It was only a short 40 second video, but it was enough to spark my curiosity into understanding further what the USMCA deal was exactly.

I conducted a quick Google search on the term USMCA, and decided to further research the bill on congress.gov. It actually allowed me to view the bill and I was able to learn more about it. Once I had figured out more detail on the USMCA, I decided to try and figure out what results will come from it. I found an article on politifact.com that explained why democrats have been supporting the bill, and gave me better reasoning on why it so easily passed by the senate.

Later in the day, like most days, I finish up my media use by watching some T.V. on one of my many streaming services(Netflix, Hulu, Playstation Vue, YouTube TV). Usually it will be live T.V. via Playstation 4. Finally when I get sleepy enough,  I hop into bed and usually fall asleep to whatever show I’m watching, which is cartoons most of the time.

I’ve noticed that I am a complete consumer of digital media, and less of a curator. I want to change that this year, and become a user who tries to share as much as they consume.

 

Media Source Rankings 

Here are the media sources I viewed, how I rank them in credibility and why:

1. My.asu.edu: (10)This is the student home page for Arizona State University, so this is one of my most trusted places to find sources for information. This is usually a spot where links and stories posted here have been verified and not spread misinformation.
2. Twitter: (6) Twitter is an interesting place for information because it can be useful due to its instantaneous spread of information and also the ability to give voices to people from all over the world. You can learn about real time incidents happening across the world and hear from people involved in it, rather than a news curator. The downside, which is why I rated it a 6, is that people can post whatever they want on Twitter, and it’s up to the other users to fact-check or verify what this person is sharing is true. If done correctly it can be used to acquire a lot of interesting information, but if not misinformation can spread like wildfire.
3. Television: (5) Television is a great way to find information since you can tune into a news channel reporting on events of the day and hear opinions from people directly involved. The issue I have with T.V. is that each news channel is usually biased towards a certain viewpoint. Also, Television involves visual communication more than anything else, so sometimes News channels will report on a more visually pleasing event, such as a car chase, rather than something that is not as entertaining to the eye.
4. Instagram: (4) I never get any of my information from Instagram. Instagram, in my opinion, has no checks and balances when it comes to information that people share. As long as the image is not offensive, it usually doesn’t get taken down. Instagram is completely visual, so I feel that important information isn’t shared there too often. It’s really hard to have a back and forth conversation with one person on that platform, so sharing information on politics or anything else that would spark conversation through multiple users would be difficult as well.
5. Congress.gov: (10) This website is published by the Library of Congress, so this is a pretty credible source when reading anything that has to do with legislation. If someone wanted to know more information, I would highly suggest this.
6. Politifact.com: (10): This website is now owned by The Poynter Institute, a nonprofit for Journalists. I believe the move to Poynter institute has now given this site more credibility since a nonprofit is not influenced by a political party, they can report truthfully and without  biased. This is a great place to check during debates to see what statements made might be true or false.

This is my first blog post as I am learning the options and features of WordPress.

I tend to start my days early since I usually need to be up by 4 or 5 am for work.      You would think I’m a morning person after 2 years of doing this, but I still struggle to get out of my cozy bed. What does help my morning not be completely dreadful is Spotify. Depending on how I feel I’ll either listen to a podcast, either  My Favorite Murder (a true crime podcast) or The Big Picture (a movie podcast) or if I really need to wake up I’ll put on some tunes.

Friday morning I felt like listening to The Big Picture. I have been tuning into them more since it is award season and I am a huge film nerd. Today, they covered the movie 1917. I really enjoyed this film so I have been looking forward to this episode.

On my way to work I usually listen to music but I was really into the episode so I continued to listen to that. I had yet to check in on any social media accounts. I think I’ve been doing a great job with my 2020 resolution of not being on social media so much. I told myself I will only check them while on my breaks and a maximum of 3 times when I am home.

When I have an 8-hour shift, I get two 10-minute breaks and one 30-minute lunch where I let myself check Instagram, Facebook, Snapchat, and sometimes Pinterest if I have time. I rarely ever post anything which -I told myself I would try to do more of. Friday was no different, I just scrolled around and took in content.

My first 10 minute break always consist of me watching NBC News “Stay Tuned” Snapchat stories. I get most of my world news here and it is broadcasted by young journalists, which I think is a great way of getting the youth involved in more credible news.

They answered viewers questions about the Australia wildfires on their “Stay Tuned Answers” segment. This is always interesting to watch because they have super young kids asking them serious questions and they provide them with lots of reliable information.

After Stay Tuned, I went on Facebook where I usually find articles, click on them and put them to the side to read later.  Once I get home I will usually read through them while I’m eating an after work snack. That day, I saved one by Variety about an interview with Parasite director Bong Joon Ho. Then I listened to a NPR news podcast, Up First where I get the rest of my world news. Friday they covered, the Puerto Rican earthquakes, and Trumps impeachment process.

Once I was done relaxing from a long day at work, I got back to business and started on some homework. Not too long ago, I made the New York Times my opening page for my  lap top. I did this because I wanted to challenge myself to read directly from newspaper organizations instead of social media. I won’t lie and tell you I actually read through it because I don’t.

The truth is, I still get all of my news and information through social media. Although, I give myself some points for keeping up with the Up first podcast!

Since it was a Friday, I found myself jumping around social media more, but it ended with me watching Ramy on Hulu. It started snowing in Chicago, so I stayed in and sketched some ideas for a project. I plan on making an Instagram account where I post all my work, but for now its just an idea.

After checking how much sketching I’ve done, I realized being less on my phone has really helped with getting side projects done and I hope I continue to do that throughout the year.

When ranking these media sources I’d like to think “Up first” and NBC’s Stay Tuned are my most trusted, as well as the New York Times. Although, like I learned in the lecture, the New York Times has had some slip ups so I have learned to be more skeptical when it comes to reading some articles. Overall, I think these sources are good with transparency and letting viewers know how they are getting their information/research. Most of these sources also come from reputable news organizations.

My least trusted is definitely Facebook, since I always see questionable articles. The other day I scrolled past one with a headline saying Selma Hayek and Sofia Vergara were hosting the Golden Globes -which I did believe until I watched them and Ricky Gervais was hosting them.

 

 

 

I’m going to be honest. Going to school as an online student has really given me the perfect excuse to be on the internet A LOT. Not only am I an online student, but I’m an online student studying media and mass communications.

Media and plenty of communication… Facebook is basically studying. Right?

Maybe wrong.

My mornings start early, and I am definitely not an early person. Media isn’t a part of my morning routine while I am trying to get out the door to work, but it definitely is once I get in the car and start my commute. I’ve recently discovered a love for podcasts, so my morning drives for the past few months have all been started by listening to Crime Junkies  on Spotify.  Maybe an odd choice for starting your morning, but I really love listening to something that catches my attention and keeps me awake.

I’m currently working as a nanny for a 20-month old little girl, so often the second piece of media I consume every single day is what we refer to as, “The B-word”. The B-word stands for our beloved childhood classic, Barney and Friends. My charge is obsessed with him, so he often keeps the peace for me while I prepare our breakfasts. Thanks B-word.

After making breakfast for baby and coffee for me, I usually get some downtime to browse my social media accounts – Specifically, Facebook and Instagram. This browsing is usually done on my phone and pretty surface level, I don’t really click on any news stories or links to outside sources. I use this time to catch up on friends, families, and groups that I am a part of before I go on to consume any news bigger than my personal bubble. I do often see some local news headlines, and many of them on this day were centered around a pretty big snowfall we were projected to get later that evening.

Around noon is usually nap time, so this is where a lot of my media consumption takes place. I check my emails for anything that may pertain to work, school, finances, or orders I have placed, and then I browse emails from stores whose email list I subscribe to. On this day, I clicked on an email I received from Groupon and dream vacationed through some getaway deals  for awhile. From there I spent about an hour on Facebook, doing a lot of browsing but also interacting with several articles posted by friends and in groups that I am apart of.

In particular, an article that was posted on Medium regarding the ethics behind the thrift retailer Goodwill was being deeply discussed in a Facebook group I follow about sustainability. After reading the article regarding goodwill, I went on to read two articles also on Medium regarding someone’s experience with one year of microdosing and then an article about the possibility of Trump resigning in 2020. The last thing I did before nap time was up was check Hobby Lobby’s online advertisement to see if there were any good deals on crafts or activities to keep us busy for the week.

Throughout the rest of my workday I casually browse Facebook or Instagram once or twice, but mostly the only media I consume is Jack Johnson through the Alexa or Mickey and the Roadster Racers on Hulu. I also read a few Frozen books and a book about a school bus, but after that I go back to listening to Crime Junkies on my drive back home.

While cleaning up around the house and cooking dinner, I watch Dr. Phil, 20/20, and Super Nanny on Youtube. When we eat we watch a documentary on Netflix, and then I went on to play Luidgi’s Mansion on our Nintendo Switch for a bit after that. I checked our weather a few times that night on AccuWeather to keep up with the snow, but aside from that I didn’t consume any more news for the night.

I ended my night by reading a couple chapters from my textbook Race, Gender, Class, and Media : Studying Mass Communications and finishing up the Netflix documentary my boyfriend and I had started earlier in the evening. Although I often feel like media fills a lot of the empty space in my days, I realized that my day really doesn’t center around it. I also realized that I choose to avoid a lot of the more serious and hard hitting news articles and aim more to consume things that interest me.

If I were to rank the credibility of my media sources (1 being least trusted and 10 being most trusted), I would rank them as follows :

Facebook – 3

Local News Source (The Journal Times) – 8

Medium – 5

Youtube – 5

AccuWeather – 9

Facebook is low on the list in terms of credibility because while I do find a good portion of my news via Facebook, more often than not I see far more fake news than I do credible news. Being a student studying media I usually can brush past it quite easily, but I think that if I did not have the experience I do that it would be much more difficult for me to decipher which news is fact based and which is opinion based. Many of the titles on Facebook articles are extreme and “clickbaity”, focused much more on getting you to share the link due to it’s shock factor than it’s credible information.

Youtube and Medium are higher in terms of credibility but not by much, as still much of the information presented is opinion based rather than face based. I put my local news source at an 8 because they have been criticized before for having obvious bias in their articles, and they are not a place I look to if I am searching for completely fact based, true news articles. AccuWeather scored highest because it is the site I rely on the most for weather forecasts, and although they aren’t always completely right they are a pretty trustworthy source for your weather watching needs.

Overall, I think that I know where to find credible sources of information when I am in need of them, I just do not choose to consume a lot of news in my daily life. I found that consuming too much news brought me down, so I aim to consume media that I find enriching and informative in other ways, even if that is more so the opinions of others than it is statistics and research and scientific evidence.

 

 

As it all too often does, my day started with Twitter.

Scrolling through my Twitter timeline is not the best way to kick off the morning. I know this. But it is a great way to stall for ten minutes while I fantasize about cancelling everything on my schedule and never leaving my warm, comfortable bed.

For a long time, I used Twitter, in part, as a news aggregator. In 2020, for my own sanity, I’ve decided to try and separate the fun that can be had on social media from the anger and frustration often brought on by the news. As an experiment, I unfollowed or muted dozens of accounts a few weeks ago. While I still see some news or commentary on current events, my timeline is now mostly full of silly comments from friends, sports/entertainment content, great dogs, and a whole lot of Baby Yoda. It is bliss.

This is OJ. After safely evacuating, him and his family returned to their home in Wairewa, Australia yesterday to find it entirely destroyed by the fires. But amongst the rubble, OJ found his favorite toy had survived. 14/10 never letting it go again pic.twitter.com/gx3d0P5349

— WeRateDogs (@dog_rates) January 15, 2020

When I’m ready to know what’s going on in the world, I visit news sites directly. Over breakfast, I caught up on the previous day’s impeachment news and read brief profiles of the impeachment managers from NPR. I also enjoyed their list (and playlist) of 41 women who should be in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. From Wired, I learned that feral cats are making things worse in Australia. Linked in that article was an interesting video from CBS News about attempts to save endangered wallabies by airdropping food. I finished with a few stories about the Astros’ cheating scandal from The Athletic.

I didn’t interact with media again until lunchtime when I ate a salad with a side of Bon Appétit’s YouTube channel. I also checked Twitter again later in the afternoon.

Once I was free to unwind for the evening, I read a few more articles about impeachment, one about the potential illegality of withholding aid to Ukraine, and one explaining how we need to fix our recycling programs all from the New York Times. I also watched two episodes of Dollface on Hulu and listened to Apple Music.

My day ended like it started–with Twitter. I went to bed laughing at this attempt to explain the day’s baseball news via a clip from Mean Girls.

Of the news media I used, I consider NPR the most trustworthy. I am a longtime reader/listener who finds their content credible and informative. On a scale of 1 (least trusted) to 10 (most trusted), I give NPR a 10. Next up, both the New York Times and CBS News are a 9. These outlets have strong track records, though the Times has made some choices recently that I find frustrating. I give Wired and The Athletic an 8. Both do good work, but I only started subscribing within the past year and thus haven’t reached the same level of trust I have in other outlets. Lastly, I’d rank Twitter a 5. While there are plenty of credible people and organizations that share content on Twitter, there is also a lot of bad information to wade through.

First blogpost

Hello!

This is my first post.

I think I’ve got everything set up correctly and I’m ready to start blogging!

Hi, this is my first blog post.

When tracking my media use for a full day, I was surprised to realize just how much content I consume on a regular Friday. To give an overview of my daily routine, I typically work from 9-5, come home, do homework, and then around 9:00 I’ll make dinner with my boyfriend and we’ll watch a movie or tv show as we eat before going to bed a few hours later. It sounds simple, but throughout the day, even when working for eight hours, I still consumed a lot of media. 

The first thing I noticed was that I am someone who goes on my phone every chance I get. I started off my morning at 7:30 and promptly looked through my instagram feed. I don’t follow a lot of dedicated news accounts on there, but I do follow a lot of magazines that occasionally post journalistic content such as Dazed and Paper. Right now, a lot of this revolves around the happenings of Paris Fashion Week. I typically don’t have the time to read articles from these magazines in the morning, but on this day, one about the designer brand Comme Des Garcon models of all colors sporting cornrows on the runway stood out to me, so I gave the entire article a read. This was the only full news article I read for the day. As I got ready for work, I watched a couple of YouTube videos related to veganism and cooking, checked Instagram one last time, and then headed out. While at work our phones have to be put away. I did scroll through my twitter feed for about 15 minutes on my lunch break. On Twitter I follow more news accounts like CNN, The New York Times and The Washington Post, among others. This is typically where I get my news content. Every couple of days I will go to the actual websites and catch up on things I may have missed just from social media, but on this day I did not. While I may be following more news accounts on Twitter, I noticed that I still pay more attention to posts made by my friends and tend to skim over news posts unless they are important, breaking stories. 

When I got home from work I watched one more YouTube video relating to fashion before starting on homework. This day I mainly just had to read and take notes for an upcoming quiz. The textbook is titled Pastimes: The Context of Contemporary Leisure, 6th Edition, by Ruth V. Russell. I checked my Instagram feed a few times while working, but wasn’t really consuming any news content, just posts from friends and influencers that I follow. 

  I ended the night by watching the movie Reservoir Dogs followed by a YouTube video titled “27 Things You Didn’t Know About Reservoir Dogs”. 

As for the credibility of the media sources I visited I have ranked them as the following below:

 

Paper Magazine- 6

Dazed and Confused Magazine- 6

Insider Magazine- 7.5

New York Times- 10

CNN- 10

Washington Post- 10 

NPR- 10

Complex- 5 

Vogue Runway- 9 

 

I ranked both Paper and Dazed Magazine as a 6 because both of them tend to be pretty biased. They have a lot of opinion writing style content and tend to have clear viewpoints in their articles that are news related. I believe to be a credible news source, the content should be neutral toned, free of bias, and focus on the facts. 

Insider I ranked a 7.5. I don’t read a lot of articles from this platform, so I feel like I need to engage with it more to give it a proper rating. From what I can tell, Insider seems to be doing good journalistic work. They’re unbiased and and are transparent about sources, however I am always skeptical of news platforms that are new to me.

Complex, which is an online fashion news blog, I ranked as a 5. I put them below Paper and Dazed because they don’t have as wide of a range of content they create, and they as well tend to be biased. I know their have also been multiple instances in the past of them not doing thorough reporting jobs and facing backlash for this. While their articles and posts are entertaining, I take them with a grain of salt. 

The New York Times, CNN, Washington Post, and NPR I all ranked as a 10 because I know that they are well trusted news media outlets that value credibility. For the most part their articles are free of a biased tone and present the reader with important information that has been fact checked. I know that when I read articles from these outlets that I will be able to understand the situation being discussed and form my own opinions about it. 

Lastly, I ranked Vogue Runway as a 9. Vogue Runway is  Twitter/Instagram fashion news platform that focuses on just that; news. I think they are credible because they are simply reporting the happenings of the fashion world and not really making any commentary on them like many other fashion outlets do.

Recording my media usage means holding myself accountable for the amount of time I spend, face glued to a screen. A scary thought. Tucked in my notes app is a page to record it all, titled “Media Use: 1/16/2020” – I am assigned to keep track of the media I read, listen to, post, interact with for 24 hours.

“Okay, so this might be perfect timing. One of my new years resolutions is to spend less time wrapped up in social media and screen use.  I’ve probably already cut down significantly anyway. So my professor and classmates won’t think I’m obsessively pouring over my phone” I explain to my friend over text – which now looking back, I realize is… laughable.

So here goes nothing. The tell-all of my 24-hour media use.

2AM, I lay on the couch, blue-light blocking glasses resting on the bridge of my nose. Attached to my nose is the rest of my face pointing towards my tv screen which blares the show Community, streaming through the Hulu app. I scroll through Instagram aimlessly.

8 hours later, I wake up and instinctively reach for my phone. To my dismay, nothing riveting. I read texts and Instagram messages to which I promise myself I’ll answer later. Open my email and stalk the shipment of my latest Amazon purchase. The tip-tapping on the roof reminds me to open the weather app… as if I didn’t already know it was raining.

While making breakfast, I throw on the NPR – Up First podcast. They continue onto the news, discussing whether or not Trump was “in the know” about the happenings in Ukraine. They include a sound byte from an MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow, a news program host, interviewing Lev Parnas – claiming that President Trump VERY WELL KNEW what was going on. Full disclosure, I have the attention span of a dog in a room full of tennis balls an frisbee’s, so I didn’t watch the entire additional MSNBC interview. 12 minutes and 28 seconds later, they promote the NPR One app, and the podcast comes to an end.

I notice that I’ve already absorbed copious amounts of media in the short time I’ve been awake. However, I need to eat breakfast, so I guess the only thing to do is consume more media while doing so. I flip on the Hulu app and select the tab “My Stuff”, where all the TV shows I saved appear. Today’s choice is the anime “My Hero Academia” – the dubbed version.

I finish my breakfast before my episode is done, so I peruse my phone a little more. Up pops an email from a website I subscribe to, “Word Genius”, which sends you a new word of the day. Today’s word is: Funambulist.

Did this significantly add any value to my life? No. But it’s going to be a thrilling ride attempting to use this word in conversation this week.

Facebook is an app I use less regularly. Don’t get me wrong, it’s still opened daily, but only 2 or 3 times per day. My friend found an article through Apple News, published by wired.com, claiming that “Cat’s Are Making Australia’s Bushfire Tragedy Even Worse“. Apparently the cats are preying on the weakened and injured animals, which is putting that ecosystem at risk (wired.com). Me-Ow…

It’s my day off and I decide I should leave the house. So, you guessed it, I pick up my phone! I search yelp for a good boba spot. I read reviews, look at photos, and finally decide on Asha Tea House in Berkeley.  This particular spot boasts 4 stars, 1,379 reviews, and 1,938 photos on Yelp. In fact, later in the evening, I end up leaving my own 5-star review solely based on their out-of-this-world grass jelly. If you haven’t tried grass jelly in your milk tea already, do yourself a favor and try it ASAP.

Nothing gets me back home quicker than the return of rain… which, of course, I need to post to my Instagram story (shameless handle drop: @natalieelyn) for all my friends to witness synchronously. Note the red light – I promise I do not post and drive.

 

 

A nod to my New Years resolution, I open the book I bought while I was out, How To Walk Away by Katherine Center. In an effort to be 100% transparent with you, class mates, I DID judge this book by it’s cover. It’s bright red and it has flowers on it. Because of this, I conduct a quick google search and land on goodreads.com – sifting through reviews, I find they are almost nothing but glowing. 4.07 stars based on 35,122 ratings and 5,327 written reviews. On this page, I also run into ads for Audible (of which I already subscribe), Amazon publishing, and the New York Times. However, no specific news stories.

And there it is. My extensive intake and output of media in a period I’ve claimed to be mildly abstaining. I think it’s safe to say that the first takeaway from this experiment is that my New Years resolution is null. 

To recap the new sources, I encountered NPR, MSNBC, Apple News, and wired.com. All these news sources are known to be 10 out of 10 credible. I am particularly loyal to the NPR podcast and have come to trust them as my daily dose of news. The guests that they interview are always extremely relevant to the topic and they have news correspondents who reside in the area of the current news.

In a past life (2019 lol), I was in tech sales, so I had to stay up to date with technological advances. My managers referred me to wired.com when they found an interesting article. While I personally do not follow this news source, it is trusted by people who I trust.

Apple news is a source I use often. Mostly because it’s right on my iPhone. It’s quick, convenient, and I’m able to single out the articles with sources of whom I’m familiar. If I swipe over to my news stories, we can see CNN politics, NPR, Fox News, BuzzFeed, and the same wired.com article that showed up on Facebook. The only source I might seriously question is BuzzFeed, because their focus is not on hard-hitting news as it is on general entertainment.  I mean for heaven’s sake, BuzzFeed’s article here reads “27 Products So effective Amazon Reviewers Have Literally Called Them ‘Unbelieveable'”, so “entertaining” might even be a stretch.

I could claim that this will be the year I’m setting down my phone, turning off the tv, and focusing on the right now. I could also claim that I have Gigi Hadid legs and Billie Eillish style. In all cases, I’d be a big fat liar. Maybe writing this blog post has helped me realize that media is a part of my life. As long as I’m sifting out the trash (BuzzFeed) from the treasure (NPR), I think I’ll live a long hearty life.