The Mobile World

It's pretty obvious that Mobile devices are taking over the world. Statistics have shown that out of the world’s estimated 7 billion people, 6 billion have access to mobile phones. Far less than the number of people who have access to a working toilet which is only 4.5 billion people. Joseph Bower and Clayton Christensen explain their theory of disruptive innovation describes a process by which "a product or service takes root initially in simple applications at the bottom of a market and then relentlessly moves up market, eventually displacing established competitors." Examples of these include the Ipad, disrupting the the PC computer, and challenging the idea of a portable computer; the google apps, like google docs and such that challenge the conventional word processing and spreadsheets. But the biggest one yet, has been the dramatic increase of mobile phones that have disrupted the any form of pc's, desktops, and tablets. Mobile phones these days come as a portable mini pocket computer given anyone and every access to the world-wide web. So what does that mean for the word of media and advertising. It means that according to the disruptive theory that "Managers much beware of ignoring new technologies that don't initially meet the needs of their mainstream consumers." That means that advertising companies need to be aware of the opportunity and take advantage of the mobile world of advertising. 

And from what I can see they have taken full advantage of this. 

This article bellow talks about mobile marketing trends to look out for in 2016!

http://mobilemarketingwatch.com/top-5-mobile-ad-trends-for-2016-52942/

Tablets for Education?

Recently, I have become very aware of the the social injustices in the education system. Everyone has an absolute right to learn, but today, the education that each person receives is heavily influenced by where you live, what your parents do, and the color of your skin. 

An advocate for Teach for America came and visited my student org I am a part of a couple weeks back, and she shared her experience with teaching an AP US History class in a urban school in Atlanta. She said that she was thrown into an 11th grade classroom with 50 kids and the goal was to get every kid to pass the AP US History Exam. The only catch was that only 10 text books were available to the 50 kids in the class. I remember my AP US History class, Every student had a textbook under their desk at school, as well as, another text book that each student got to take home to study with. That is serious social injustice. 

I have to agree completely with Rotella when she says 

"Still, if everyone agrees that good teachers make all the difference, wouldn’t it make more sense to devote our resources to strengthening the teaching profession with better recruitment, training, support and pay? It seems misguided to try to improve the process of learning by putting an expensive tool in the hands of teachers we otherwise treat like the poor relations of the high-tech whiz kids who design the tool."

YES. Of course. Tablets for middle school and highschoolers? It's like we're asking for the future generations to have no correct social ability to interact or learn from other humans. Also, has anyone hung out with a 12-year-old lately? Their attention span is pretty much non-existent, and I know this because I lead a group of 7th grade girls each week and its incredibly difficult to get them to focus on anything. And to expect that they will enrich or fulfill their educational potential through a electronic tablet... that's unrealistic. The 30 million dollars are being wasted if they are being spent on tablets. If "falling behind" educationally behind other countries is a concern then the government should invest in equal education to all public school, as well as, efficiently training the educators to become better educators. 

EBOOK vs. REALBOOK

"The problem with e-books are that they are e-books" was probably my favorite quote from the article. Just thinking of the pros and cons of E-books I found this buzzfeed article that shares a lot of opinions about the pros and cons of e-books. 

Ebooks vs Realbooks
Here are a couple of quotes from random people who are sharing their opinion about books and my responses to them.

Alanna Okun: I’m pretty platform agnostic, as it were, but I do feel like that kind of thinking is pretty reductive and head-in-the-sand — it’s almost like saying the internet is a fad. Like, “I don’t understand this so it probably doesn’t matter.”

I don't think Ebooks can be compared to the internet. Firstly, because Ebooks would be replacing something we already have, books; while the internet was a new invention. Could Ebooks be a fad? Maybe? but maybe not. I think that its really up to personally preference than fad. Although, if I were to guess, I think majority of the people right now would choose to read a real book over an Ebook. But maybe not in a couple of years, when the kindle/ebook continue to advance and imitate a paper book feel. I have no idea how a kindle would imitate a book feel, but then again I wouldn't of guess the functions of an iphone 10 years back. 

But if I had to imagine something, it probably would be somewhat like this product?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KHSdObeUdxI

Krystie: When I turned 21, my aunt and godmother gave me an old, tattered copy of a green hardcover book from 1921. The content of the book wasn’t all that interesting to me — it was about how to grow wildflowers or something like that, and I don’t even garden — but there was a handwritten note on the front page. It was a note from an aunt to her niece on her birthday, and it was just by chance that my aunt found the old used book on a cart at her local library. It was really special to me and has such a huge sentimental value that no e-reader could * ever * give me or recycle for someone else. #BooksForPresents

Krystie makes a great point. Do you think that passing down an old kindle will ever become sentimental? My guess probably not, because imagining myself passing down my first itouch from 2007 probably doesn't hold any meaning now or in 10 years. Its just an old piece of metal shaped together. 

Isaac: I feel like words on paper is one of our most simple and basic technologies. Nothing beats the written word for getting your point across. And while e-readers are convenient, books are each their own thing, with their own specific story and soul. So while there is definitely room on your bookshelf for an e-reader, there will always be books too. Think of them as portals. Is it cool to have device that can hold 1,000 portals? Of course. But when you hold one specific portal, it feels more important. More special. More a part of you.

Isaac pretty much sums up my feelings for ebooks and real books in this quote. Both are pretty cool, but paper books will always be more special. 

We'll be back

When I was growing up, my youth pastor would ask for book reports and if they were up to par he would give us a dollar coin. So, being so drawn to the rare dollar coin (its actually not that rare), I've read probably over 100 different books between 1st grade to 5th grade. While I was writing countless book reports on what each story was about and what its symbolized, I recognized how much I enjoyed reading and falling mindlessly into a paper book. Now as I college student, I can honestly say I prefer reading print. Even for my classes, if I could print every article and read it, I would. Sadly, ink is expensive and too many trees would be wasted. But my reasoning is that I would rather be able to highlight and write my thoughts on the paper as I read. Right now, my sister is 8 years old. She is growing up in a world where iphones have always been a thing and instant access to technology and web media never ceased to exist. Just now, I called my sister and asked her if she would rather read from an actually book or a kindle. She told me a kindle because she wouldn't have to put away her books in her bookshelf.

Regarding Professor Chyi's research and theory, I do agree with her in the fact that print newspaper will probably not go away, at least for another couple of decades. So even for me and my generation, the millennials, may prefer print over a web document because we remember the age before the instant web access. But what happens when my sister grows up? Will she buy books for her children or kindles? And then what about her kids' kids? and then their kids? I think it is completely possible the print media/newspaper could one day disappear.

BUT.

Let's talk about content for a minute. I think that what people find amusing and important have degraded in a sense. Flash back to the 1940s, World War II has happened and commercial television has just emerged. Newspapers back then were huge in the sense of knowing what is going on in the world, politically and economically. There were tons of crucial things going on in the US and the US people wanted to know about it. They wanted to know how the the NATO alliance was being formed, what the Holocaust was about etc. because as a country we were being directly impacted and being transformed into a different nation. I'm not saying that things going on in the world right now aren't as important. But the priorities that people put on what's important has definetly changed. If you put an article of the elections and then a BuzzFeed article on print or online. In my opinion, majority of people are probably more drawn to the trending cat video or Adele's performance at the Grammy article, than the 411 on current elections.

Another Point I wanted to bring up in convenience. That's a huge factor that should be accounted for in print and online media. People are not going to go out of their way to look up news, so I think that is a big reason why print newspapers could still be so prevalent. There is something about picking something up right in front of you or being given something to read, than going out of your way to find something interesting online. 

I feel like its too early to predict if print newspaper will become distinct. There are still generations living who have become accustomed to print media, and habits are hard to break. So my conclusion is lets wait a couple decades and try this again later. 

Thanks Long Tail

The Long Tail theory is quite interesting. It's interesting because we see it going on all around us everyday. We, as millennials, have grown up witnessing this economic shift in the digital industry. Yet, as a 21-year-old speech-pathology student, I've never even thought twice of the economic shift that was happening right before my eyes. 

As a CSD student, knowing nothing about journalism or the economic side of digital media, what I want to know is how this effects my day to day life. Because the idea of me as a consumer having access to unlimited choices and paying one simple reasonable price seems pretty great. I love that Amazon and Spotify recommend things that I would be interested in or things that relate to my interest or wants. But what about the cons of this Long Tail theory? I guess we could talk about how it effect smaller start-up businesses that are striving to be known. But then again, how does it effect me? Why is this of use to me and why should I care? 
There is no debate that this economic shift of the Long Tail has overtaken the digital industry. It's extremely rare to find anyone who doesn't have a Netflix account, or has yet to order something off of Amazon. I have to say I agree with the three rules to the "new entertainment economy." The three rules faciillate the economy in a way that it meets the wide variety of demands of individual consumers while allowing the consumer to feel that they are unique, known and in control. One thing that I found interesting in this article is this idea that you can now compete with free. I'm sure this concept isn't as new as this article makes it out to be, because this "ah ha! it's not worth it" moment has been here before the millennial age. But, what's interesting to me is how now, new media and old media have to strategize to compete with the free. 

I guess if I tried answering my question "why should I care?" I could sum it up to the benefits of Long Tail. I love Spotify in the sense that sometimes I get sick of all the same music that I listen to. So Spotify offers this thing called "Browse," where I'll get tons of new suggestions based on the music genre that I like. I've discovered a couple of my favorite bands through this feature. So I guess I should care cause the Long Tail is pretty awesome at making me feel like I have choices and control over what I want, and now I know why I feel unique in my music choices. So there we go, Thanks Long Tail.