IN MY HUMBLE OPINION #2

FACEBOOK IS COMING UP IN THE WORLD

I recently read an article about how smartphones now top computers for Facebook time in the US. According to comScore, they calculated that the average time spent on Facebook in the US via smartphone was 441 minutes in March, compared to 391 minutes via computers. Facebook emphasized that it does not make any revenue off the mobile user, yet they do recognize the importance of mobile. Analyst say that this is why in April Facebook bought $1 billion to buy a photo sharing mobile application, Instagram, to maintain Facebook’s mobile strategy. In March, comScore measured mobile usage for Apple iPhones, Google’s Android, and Blackberry on the Facebook site. The data also showed the next most popular services are Twitter, with 114 minutes and Foursquare, with 146 minutes. The articles states more mintues were spent on facebook because people like to stay on to update their statuses, read friends’ statuses and updates, and respond. On Twitter it does not take as long to tweet a status. Facebook is determined and dependant on its ability to increase levels of user engagement in current and new markets.

After reading the article I felt like Facebook is beginning to take over the world. As an avid Facebook user I could not deny the facts of data. I do use my phone more for Facebook because I carry my phone on me everywhere I go, I can’t take a laptop with me everywhere. By looking at the data it seems like a lot of other people are doing the same thing. But what does this say about society as a whole? In my humble opinion I believe that society is too reliant on social media, in order to impress themselves or others. People have begun to be so engaged in social networks that they often become anti-social. For example, even around campus you see students looking with their heads down on their cellphones, I predict they are either texting or on Facebook or some other social site. One can be whoever they like on Facebook and live out their fantasies, which are forms of deception and lies. And even though society is aware of that and its addictive nature, it does nothing to ease the “Facebook era”. There should also be no competition between cellphones and computers. Why? Are we going to recycle computers for smartphones now? It amazes me that society always gravitates towards the better version of things and over looks other more important issues that are going on in the world. Sometimes I nfeel like Facebook is blocking us from the real issues of the world, while feeding us with more and more entertainment crud.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/05/07/smartphones-facebook-march-2012_n_1498279.html

http://www.theindiansabroad.com/2010/09/ten-anti-social-effects-of-facebook/

Word Count: 445

Letter to the Editor

Title: Florida A&M University Drum Majors Hazing Death

Dear Editor,

It deeply saddens me that some organizations continue to haze individuals. The worst part is that the hazing gets so extreme that it can lead to death, which happened to a drum major at Florida A&M University. In these types of situations I don’t even know who I am more angry with, the band members who beat the drum major or the drum major for allowing them to beat him without standing up for himself.

This is a major issue among college students everywhere that want to fit in and are willing to do anything to fit in with these types of organizations. Its up to the colleges and leaders within these organizations to heavily enforce the anti-hazing rules and laws. Yet what does this say about our future leaders? That we are willing to do anything and let anyone abuse us in order to be suspected? And if we are already apart of some prestigious organization we have the right to abuse potential members to see if they are good enough to join? Parents, students, and school officials need to do a better job of being aware these issues and of telling their students their worth. No one deserves hazing in any shape or form.

Martina Long

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/05/02/famu-drum-majors-hazing-death_n_1470280.html?ref=college

COPY EDIT THE WORLD

1. Phi Kappa Phi was charted in 1954 with three hundred sixty-five chapters…

-Correction: 365

-Spartan Daily

2. Less than half of the room in Engineering building was occupied.

-Correction: forgot the word the between in and Engineering.

-Spartan Daily

3. His attack brought about 2 financially crippling wars that cost thousands of American and coalition force lives

-Correction: change 2 to two

-Correction: Americans

-Spartan Daily

4. Now, only 2 percent of Chinese Americans

-2%

-HuffingtonPost Article

Targeting Ananlysis

http://stylefrizz.com/img/chanel-iman-dkny-be-delicious-2011-ad-campaign.jpg

The magazine I got this advertisement from was Cosmopolitan. The intended  target market for the magazine and advertisement is for women between to the ages of 18 and 24. It ranges between teenage girls, who are in high school and college, to young adults who are just starting their careers  and live in metropolitan areas or big cities . They are either single or in relationships, but not yet married and are on a fixed income between low and medium. The women who read this magazines are into fashion, celebrity entertainment, relationships, and women issues. Based on the DKNK fragrance ad, the target audiences lifestyle is probably based around beauty and always wanting to look good and smell good. Also, DKNY is a high-end brand so if one can afford it, means they are making/or have a substantial amount of money. The audience most likely values how they look and appear to people, along with valuing materialist items.

The message the advertisement is portraying is towards young adult women and mature women. The information given on the ad “Be Delicious” is vague, but bold and stands out. That caption is eye-catching and instantly relatble  because  women love to smell good not only for themselves, but for other people, like men. The ad and message is using the appeal to vanity scheme to target the audience. The source pictured on the ad is of a beautiful, exotic, ethnic model to engage women of ethnicities to be aware of the product. This appeal will help the product get a more diverse range of customers.

Blog #8 The Japanese Internment Memorial

The fieldtrip to the Japanese Internment Memorial was very eye-opening and fascinating. The Japanese Internment happened in 1942 when the United States government issued the relocation and internment of about 110,000 Japanese Americans who lived along the Pacific coast to “War Internment Camps.” This happened because of Japans attack on Pearl Harbor.

 
Ruth Asawa is a Japanese American sculptor. She was born in Norwalk, California and one of seven children. Her farther worked as a truck operator during World war II, until the Japanese American internment. Asawa graduated from the internment centers high school and then attended Milwaukee State Teachers College to become an art teacher. Her noted work includes the 1994 Japanese American Internment Memorial Sculpture in San Jose and the origami-inspired fountain on the San Fransciso waterfront in 1986 called Aurora.

 
After the bombing of Pearl Harbor about 3,000 of Santa Jose’s Japanese residents were interned. Around 50 Japanese owned businesses closed down and the residents stored their belongings in the Buddhist and Methodist churches. Yet in December of 1944 the Japanese internment policy was revoked and by 1947 many businesses and families re-established themselves in San Jose area. San Jose State University was apart of the internment process. In 1942, the old gym, now named Yoshihiro Uchida Hall, was used to register and collect Japanese Americans before shipping them off to internment camps. Uchida’s family were processed in the building.

 
The memorial sculptures are so vivid with life it makes it easy to picture what was going n during that period. I also like how your able to touch and feel on the sculpture so you can get both mental and physical aspect of the art work. The touch adds feeling for onlookers to engage in the experience that the Japanese had to endure at the camps. One of the vignettes that caught my attention show the camps guards, holding guns, looking down on the Japanese who were working and slaving away at their task. This is a haunting image because there are also barbed wires drawn on it showing how trapped the people were. It gave off a feeling of being a refugee and being stuck in prison. Another vignette that was compelling to me showed the living arrangement and conditions for families in the camp. It showed multiple families living under one roof with little kids running around outside. The families are standing around with their heads down and one displays a cloth, I’m guessing for cleaning. By the looks of things the lack of privacy and space were still being monitored by guards. When I was looking at this I felt sad and kind of angry that the Japanese had to live like this. Its even worst that the children had to go through this without proper education and activities. I couldn’t even imagine how my family and I would survive, let alone adapt to that type of situation. Living in this country during harsh time and looking back through history I could see the government implying some sort of internment based on how extreme the terrorism is. I know it is sad to say and I hope to the heavens above nothing like that will ever happen again, but the realities of the world have proven differently.

Word Count: 537

Blog #10 Fish Out Of Water

The Dance Around The World event was a fun and interesting experience that I’d like to attend again. The event was put on by the Indian Student Organzation, along with Well University and The Human Resource Diversity Program. It was a dance workshop that incorporated the moves and basic steps of Bhangra. The Bhangra is a folk dance that emerged from the Punjabis.  The event was taught by female students, who wore traditional Punjabi dresses. They told us about the culture and nature of the dance, then displayed a performance of the traditional dance moves. The ladies used some of their native language to refer to the different moves we were being taught. For example the words “jhoomer” and “mirza” were used to refer to arm and leg movements. I attended this event because I love to dance and have always been a fan of the “Bollywood” dance movement. Plus I enjoy exercise and heard it would be a great workout.

 As soon as I walked into the event I automatically felt like a fish out of the water. Being the only person of my race out of around 20 people I began to feel awkward. The class was full of people I did not know or even seen before.  I stood towards the back, trying to be incognito. I began looking around the room and started passing judgement on others in the class, thinking they probably would have a hard time learning the dance while it would a piece of cake for me. I also felt that people were looking at me wondering why I was there, but I stayed to myself and didn’t speak or smile at anyone. But as soon as the workshop started and the ladies began explaining their culture of the dance I began to feel comfortable and settled.  The ladies who taught the class were energetic, nice, and relatable.  I could feel the passion as they spoke taught us the moves. The moves were difficult to comprehend at first, not only for me but everyone. So everyone started looking silly and awkward, which made it fun to learn. I began to smile and laugh as we went through the routine, letting my guard down. Towards the end I started incorporating my swagger and their dance moves together, which made it more enjoyable and appreciative of others people cultures, movements, and way of life.  

Blog #9 In My Own Humble Opinion

It really irks my nerves to hear that The American Legislative Exchange Council, whose push for the “stand your ground” gun laws is now retreating from the social policy field to focus on more economic issues. Just recently in Florida that gun law was said to be reason to the deadly shooting of unarmed 17 year old Trayvon Martin by neighborhood watch volunteer George Zimmerman. This incident became a national tragedy that sparred anger and sorrow throughout the communities everywhere. How is it ever okay to shoot and kill an unarmed boy, who was on the phone with his girlfriend, wearing a hoodie, with ice tea and skittles in hand? Because of this law, Zimmerman claimed he had the right to follow Martin because he “suspicious looking” was not arrested or charged until 48 days later.

It saddens me to know to that these corporate sponsored lobbying groups only remove themselves when tragedy hits their surface. The council who pushed for the “stand your ground” laws should have really been scrutinized the law to its fullest potential in order to only to help the innocent. Now that they are under the heat with the Trayvon Martin Case, that along deals with social problems such as racial profiling, they want to remove themselves from the situation. Yet if the law was not enacted or provided better guidelines on who could carry a gun, an innocent young black teenage boy would be alive right now. The “stand your ground law” has been used as an excuse or justified mean for murder in multiple cases in Florida. The law needs reform.

I would feel much better if the council announced that they would look into the law for change, rather than just try to keep themselves away from the situation because of the pressure they are under. It would have been nice for the council to put out a statement of condolences to the Martin family. Although I am relived to hear that other big businesses like Coca-Cola and McDonalds, have enough compassion in their hearts to cut ties with the council after the incident took place. Personally, I’m sick and tired of all these weak-minded and weak-willed corporations that give out these controversial laws and then bail when someone misuses the law for their own selfish ways, because the law is not proper within their means.

Word Count: 394

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/04/17/alec-retreats-stand-your-ground-laws-voter-id_n_1431531.html?ref=trayvon-martin

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/03/16/trayvon-martin-george-zimmerman_n_1352874.html#56_reports-zimmerman-to-be-charged-in-trayvon-martins-death

Word #10

1. Looming

2. Charges looming in Trayvon Martin case.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/04/11/george-zimmerman-charged-trayvon-martin_n_1418351.html

3. Verb: (of an event regarded as ominous or threatening) Seem about to happen

4. There is a crisis looming in the Middle East that has been lurking around for years.

Blog #7: Drinking Coffee Elsewhere

I enjoyed reading the stories in Drinking Coffee Elsewhere by ZZ Parker. The story I read was about the formation of 2 unlikely friends, Dina and Heidi. They both attend Yale University and work together as dishwashers for a nice hotel restaurant. Dina is described as being an African American who is in psychiatric counseling for stating that “if she could be any object she would be a revolver, so she could wipeout mankind”. Heidi is described as a blonde, tomboy-like Caucasian girl who is known as a promiscuous girl. Parker uses raw language for the characters dialogue, mentioning few derogatory and curse words. The way that Dina and Heidi communicate is in a very witty, dry, humor manner. They are very intellectual and have a more complex vocabulary. Some of the words I had to look up in a dictionary to understand. It was somewhat difficult reading the flow of the story because it was unlike any stories I’ve read before. One has to be educated and knowledgeable to understand some of their conversations. The characters used creative language when referring to their personality and scene settings. For example similes were used to describe Heidi as “dressing like a plumber”. Dina described the way Heidi’s stories were told were in “hiccup-like burst”. Metaphors were also used when Dina compared the way Yale University’s architecture to the look of the time when the students owned slaves. The style the story was told in done in a way in which I have not read before. It was straight-forward and engaging the way the stories flowed.

Word Count: 264

Word #9

1.Irreparably 

2.” Facebook said it has been “irreparably harmed” by Yahoo’s infringement. “

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/04/03/facebook-yahoo-pantent-counterclaim_n_1400477.html

3. Adverb: Not reparable                  

4. The oil spill irreparably damaged the facility.