Tuesday, February 23, 2010

Persuaders

What in "The Persuaders" surprised you (or not)? Name one new thing you learned about marketing or politics from watching the film. Name one new thing you learned about yourself from watching the film, or one thing that the film reiterated about yourself.
In my Marketing class last semester, I read a lot of books and spent the majority of the semester learning about the topics discussed in this video. The film has put a greater emphasis on how much actually goes into creating advertisements and ensuring that they reach their respective target audiences. The video has also made me realize about myself that I do tend to tune out when it comes to advertisements. There are so many around us that its hard to focus in on one commercial or one billboard out of the hundreds in places like New York City.

Where are things headed in the future? What are some possible scenarios that could play out as far as the direction that future persuaders may take their marketing techniques.
New technologies are bringing more means of advertising. One of the advertising techniques that is becoming increasingly popular comes from the growth in sales of smartphones. Marketers and advertisers are now working with cell service providers to provide consumers with free cell phone service if they agree to receive a certain number of advertisements daily on their cell phones. This is a unique way of providing consumers with a benefit while at the same time making them more aware of other advertisements and new products.

Frontline Part 2

After watching the Frontline video, I think that it is very important to note that the role of technology in our lives grows each day. Even though technology is intended to make things easier on us, we need to also realize the consequences that come along with using its different forms. One example is in the school that was shown in the video. Although the number of graduates and the rate of productivity had increased since laptops were a requirement in classes, many students also found themselves distracted by the technology. It was impressive to see that the school had its own monitoring method, but still it seems impossible to know what every student is doing on his or her computer at every minute of the school day.

I also believe that this video showed how technology slows the human race down. The World of Warcraft segment showed video gamers who quit their jobs in order to play the game throughout the day. While the gamers backed up their stories by stating that they had made lifelong connections with people they never would have met, I believe they could be doing something much more productive with their time and make those connections through their jobs or community service activities.

I am a user of technology at mostly every moment of the day. While technology sometimes makes things easier, I also wish that I wasn't so dependent on it. This video made me realize just how much people are becoming dependent on technology and that people would be much more productive without all of the distractions that it brings.

Tuesday, February 9, 2010

Digital Nation

I found the video, "Digital Nation", to be very interesting. While I knew that technology and the internet were taking over a majority of our everyday lives, I didn't realize the extent to which it was doing so. The most shocking part of the film so far was the footage of the children in the school in Korea. The fact that the children were singing songs about the internet with words like "netiquitte" and the internet as a "friendly neighborhood", made me realize just how much of our lives are consumed with interacting over the internet.

I was also shocked by the studies of ivy league college students and their inability to multitask as well as they had originally believed. I know that I, and many of my peers at Marist, believe we can multitask by studying, checking e-mail, and chatting all at the same time without it having much of an effect on the outcome of our work. Seeing that the study results proved quite the opposite made me realize that students can be doing much better in school and can produce higher quality work if the technological distractions are either minimized or eliminated.

Sunday, February 7, 2010

Web 2.0 Definitions

User-generated Content- refers to the different forms of media content that are produced by users and can be publicly viewed.

Long tail- a strategy of selling a large number of unique items in relatively small quantities. Users tell manufacturers exactly what they want and need, and in turn, companies add options on their websites where the customers can customize the products to fit those wants and needs.

Network as platform- a way of delivering a customized experience to consumers. As businesses are become more concerned with how they can increase value rather than simply increasing the number of sales, exectutives are realizing that they have to deliver products the way the customers want it. The online user-interfaces allow these consumers to communicate with the businesses so they can generate valuable products and experiences to them.

Folksonomy- a way of allowing users to classify and characterize information on the web. An example is photo tagging on social networking sites.

Syndication- website material is made available to multiple other sites. This allows for the increased immediacy of information provided on the web.

Mass Collaboration- occurs when a large number of people are working on a single project at the same time. New web technologies, such as Google Docs and Spreadsheets and Google Wave, allow users to upload project information and edit and share each others work in real time. This allows for a quicker and easier way of updating information and keeping communcations flowing throughout a work group.

Computer Supported Collaboration- similar to mass collaboration in which technology and the internet are used in work groups to increase the steady flow of information from user to user.

Hosted Services- a type of internet hosting service that allows individuals and organizations to make their own website accessible via the internet. An example of this can include blogs.

Web Application- an application that is accessed via a web browser over the internet. It allows for the updating and maintaining web applications without disturbing the software of the million other users and computers. These web applications are highly compatible with other softwares and application.

Social Software- allows users to interactand share data. This can include softwares used my Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, Amazon.com, and Ebay. They can also come in forms of blogs and wikis.

Video-sharing sites- sites that permit users to upload videos they have created. YouTube is an example of a video-sharing site. Users can upload videos and then also comment through video on other users' videos. This new technology allows for the increased customization and personalization of information sharing.

Wikis- a website that allows the easy creation and editing of any number of interlinked web pages via a web browser using a simplified markup language or text editor. They are used for collaborative websites and many professors use them to allow the uploading of student assignments.

Blogs- a website that is usually maintained by an individual who continually updates the site with commentary and personal opinions about information, news or anything else that the user is concerned about sharing with the public.

Mashups- a web page that combines data from two or more sources and puts it into one. It provides fast and easy integration to allow for the faster sharing and spreading of information over the web to users.