As a blogger cum document designer, it’s essential to understand the different types of affordance in different modes of media in order to reach the target audience more effectively as the functionality of a document is depends on its structure to match the reader’s habits, expectations and context of use (Penmen, 1998).
In my 10 postings in the weblog, I understand that it’s essential to be sensitive to the cultures to avoid boycott from the public. This is because that the meaning of the document is being translated based on different cultures in terms of belief, attitudes and values (Scriver, 1997).
Besides that, I also learn that the design of the blog plays an important role in attracting readers’ reading interest such as the choice of colour. Nevertheless, a blogger should effectively using the multimodal ways such as provide hyperlinks to allow user to obtain more information from the weblog.
Reference
Penman, R 1998, ‘Document structures and readers’ habits’, Communication News, vol.11, no.2, pp.10-11.
Schriver, K.A., 1997, “Dynamics in document design: creating texts for readers,”
Apple enjoyed the sales of 7.26 million devices for iPad 2 since its release in April 2010 which allows iPad to become the top selling and most popular tablet in the world. Hence, there are many news corporation are seeking a chance to enter the market by coming out with newspaper mobile apps (Trotter, 2011).
It shows that iPad tends to take place in the future media trend by taking over newspaper whereby people can easily read the news by using the apps. In this case, according to NYT USA, NPR for iPad were among the top 10 most-downloadable iPad apps where it shows that people todays are engaging themselves into the world of internet (Conde, 2011). In Malaysia, The Star newspaper is offering free apps for users to download at the iTunes by allowing people to enjoy reading newspaper for free.
However, the public opinion varies when comes to the newspaper and the iPad. Some people finds that the iPad newspaper is a cheaper and convenient ways to obtain the latest news where some people tends to reject the thought of reading from a tablet as they thinks that ‘there’s something special about the newspaper’ (Trotter, 2011)..
The iPad newspaper are using a multimodal way to deliver the message where the meaning of the text is communicate through a synchronization of modes such as moving images and videos (Walsh, 2006). However a printed newspaper can do things that the iPad newspaper can’t do such as using the double pages and the page design to attract the readers’ reading interest. People might feel annoyed with the multimodal ways when there are too many hyperlinks and it is tiring by facing the screen for a long time.
I believe that iPad newspaper and the printed newspaper have their advantages and drawbacks as Bezener & Kress (2005) says that there are different types of affordance in meaning making for each mode as it communicates in its own meaning. The demand for printed newspaper might decrease but due to the differences between both modes, there are still people who prefer reading the printed newspaper instead of iPad newspaper.
Walsh, M 2006, 'The 'textual shift': Examining the reading process with print, visual and multimodal texts', Australian Journal of Language and Literacy.
Bezemer, J & Kress, G 2008, ‘Writing in multimodal texts’, Written Communication, vol.25, no.2, pp.166-195.
Media Prima raises the racist issue in Malaysia by airing a controversial series of Ramadan commercials on its 8TV channel which results them to receive heavy public criticism. The Media Prima Berhad CEO Ahmad Izham Omar apologized for any ‘inconvenience or uneasiness’ causes at the internet by asking the public to “chill” and not to “overanalyze” the commercial (Yow, 2011).
In the advertisement, it showed an ethnic Chinese girl acting in a rude manner towards Muslims and followed by a message saying “Do not be loud or obnoxious” (BBC, 2011). Because of that, it tends to shows that the Chinese races in Malaysia are rude and not educated as they did not understand the gestures and the culture of the Muslim. Besides that the advertisement also shows that the Muslims are trying to avoid the Chinese girl when she tends to socialize with them. Hence, it creates offensive meaning for the non-Muslim races in Malaysia especially the Chinese as the Chinese girl is being used in the advertisement (Bedi, 2011).
This phenomena also shows that the importance of understanding the situational context whereby this advertisement might be acceptable in the western country but not in the eastern country. Hence, it requires advertiser to understand the culture at the country before they publish their advertisement. Besides that, it also rise the advertising ethics issue of the 8TV as they are previously fined by the Malaysia Communications and Multimedia Commissions (MCMC) for airing an advertisement by Danish beer maker Carlsberg during the Euro 2004 championships. Hence, the public tends to criticize 8TV for their unethically advertising ways to ‘educate’ people about the things that should be followed during the Ramadan (Asiaone, 2011).
In this case, Kress & Vann (2002) mentioned that other cultures may contrast value the more general, abstract and theoretical. Viewers with those values will read the pages in the light of their habitual valuations. In this case, it clearly shows that the 8TV did not understand the culture context in Malaysia by airing the controversial advertisement as the religion and language are sensitive issues in Malaysia after the deadly race riots in 1969 (Asiaone, 2011).
According to the survey done by D S Simon, 85% of the online media websites are using online video to cover the news. It’s found out that radio stations, magazines and newspapers are leading the pack when it comes to using externally produced video whereby there are traditionally printed and audio mediums. Hence, this phenomenon indicates that almost all forms of media have transformed themselves into online television networks as media websites are becoming more interested in monetizing their sites (Neill, 2011).
There is a big difference between the audiences’ process when come to interpreting readings or visuals and reading of words (Walsh, 2006). A video provides a different affordance to their audiences when comes to the background music and become emotional attached to their audience as it can provides more cues in guiding people’s perceptions towards a production. In this case, using a video can easily help people to learn things faster and enhance problem-based learning by projecting real life example to the people.
The video above are the introduction of the Apple new launch product iPhone 4S. Unlike the descriptions at the Apple websites, the video seems to be more effective in attracting viewers’ attention and it provides a projection of the way to use it in reality. Therefore, it’s easier for the audience to understand the features of this phone compare to reading the features at the websites which it may cause confusion of the buyer in terms of using it in the reality.
Reep (2006) suggest that the written text and visual presentation work jointly to present readers with information they need. Media should achieve the balance between the video and text mode as both of the approaches have advantages and drawbacks. It’s impossible for the audience to absorb all the information from the video and audience might need something they can refer to it and this is when the text comes in. Next, I think that using online media to cover news might rise up some advertising ethical issues such as copyright. Nevertheless, online media is a new media that benefits the audiences.
Walsh, M, 2006, “The textual shift: examining the reading process with print, visual and multimodal texts”, Australian Journal of Language and Literacy.
“A lot of journalism materials should be put online, but there needs to be a much higher level of quality control from the publisher because the students will not tolerate junk” Says Mindy McAdams (Capeloto, 2011).
In today’s world where most people are engaging themselves into the world of internet, reading books in the tablet or computers provide readers a different reading experience due to its multimodality nature. Besides reading the text, readers can easily access to the given hyperlink and search for information faster by using another tab. In this case, most of the university encourages student to find materials online by using their database at their online library.
According to CourseSmart, students are able to save 60% by subscribing to a text for a semester versus buying a new book. In this case, students will prefer online books and journal as they did not have enough spending power to spend on buying textbook. Besides that, by downloading books online, students are able to obtain information in a more convenient way. Despite adding features to allowing students to take notes and highlights, CourseSmart admit that the e-books are still faithful replicas of their print counterparts as they still updated at the same slow pace (Capeloto, 2011).
There are many students are still prefer print textbooks as they believes that there are something different when comes to reading a printed text book. The things that make the difference between the printed material and material in the screen are, by reading the printed material; readers are able to enjoy the pleasure from “flipping” pages to pages. Besides that, the quality of the printed material plays an important role to attract the reader’s reading interest. Next, the quality of pictures in the printed material is always better than the images that are projected in the screen (Coeus, 2011).
Overall, e-textbooks and online module allows student to obtain information in a more convenient way but the printed textbooks are still needed as both of them provides a different kind of affordance to their target audience.
Newspaper and magazines has a huge canvas for designers to play with, such as double page spreading, colours, size and quality of the paper to attract reader’s attention. Besides that, high quality printed images can be different from screen images in terms of the resolution as the colours that be shown in the webpage are not as sharp compared to the printed images and it requires more time for the internet user to download a high resolution picture by using internet (Nielsen J, 1999).
Larger size design such as billboard and posters can attract reader’s attention by using the size advantages.
Apart from that, printed design can be 2-dimensional layout with much attention paid to layout and it’s possible to allow readers to turn the page to find out the story behind (Nielsen J, 1999).
Screen Design
Screen design is simultaneously 1-dimensional and N-dimensional design. However it’s possible for a screen design to come out with small amount of 2-dimensional layout by using the reader’s scrolling experience to oppose to a canvas experience (Nielsen J, 1999).
Besides that, screen design will allow users to locate more information by using features such as hyperlinks to direct readers to another website for more information. Next, with the “print screen” features in computers, it will also allow users to save the image they want without taking any physical space (Nielsen J, 1999).
In conclusion, both printed and screen designs have advantages and drawbacks both of the design can catch reader’s attention based on different situations.
According to the research done by IDC, people now spend twice as much time surfing the Web as they do watching TV. It shows that internet is the medium on which users spend the most time which are 32.7 hours per week, as compare to magazines which is 3.9 hours (Lewin J, 2008). In this case, it shows that people today are engaging themselves with high technology to obtain their information.
Firstly, YouTube had become a powerful tool for media publishing where allows user to upload video clips of TV shows, films and music videos. However there it might rise up the copyright issue between the publishing companies. In the year 2007, a group of music publishers had joined a class action lawsuit filed against YouTube on the video sharing issues (Sandoval G, 2011).
Besides that, the explosion in social media over the past couple years resulted many of the international brands are getting attention of their core demographics on social networks such as Facebook and Twitter. According to Philip Keightley, traditional publishing world has suffered audience decline through the increased competition offered by a fragmenting media market (Keightley P, 2010). Hence, it results that the new forms of media publishing has altered the communication in a new media ecosystem.
Next, iPad had made a change in the new media ecosystem by making entries for magazine and newspaper to enter the new ecosystem with their applications which differs to the traditional media that are created by hierarchical organizations that are built for commerce. A new media ecosystem refers to online communities that discuss and extend the stories created by mainstream media (Lasica, 2003). Besides that, it allows publisher to save their distribution cost by engaging themselves in the world of internet (Alveras, 2010).
There are 3 types of blogging community according to Nancy White (2006) which are:
Blogger Centric Community
Blog that are owned by 1 organization but there are many authors in writing the blog. Hence, there is little opportunity for members to change and adapt to the environment.
Topic Centric Community
Blogging community that bloggers discuss on a specific niche topic. However it is difficult to search for people that had the same specific niche of interest and this will results in the slow growth of the community.
Boundaried Community
Community sites such as Myspace and Yahoo 360 where blogs are connected with social networks sites or forums. In this case, it allows bloggers to obtain easier accessibility to other blogger’s blog.
There are 8 tips to build up a blog community according to Darren (2009):
1)Starting with using comments- Interact with other bloggers.
2)Reader center post- Answering and inviting relevant questions to other bloggers
3)Interactive tools and projects- Use quiz or competition to attract other readers.
4)Invite reader generated content– Make sure the content attracts reader’s attention.
5)Become a cheer leader– Identify opportunities to cheer the community along.
6)Give readers jobs– Moderate comments and judging the competition.
7)Set readers homework– Encourages reader to report what they’ve done.
8)Give multiple avenues to ‘join’ or be a ‘member’– Use hyperlinks at other social networks, forums to attract readers to join.
According to Martha (2011), blogs can be classified into 5 categories which are corporate blog, niche blog, personal blog, forum blogging and review blog.
Firstly, corporate blog are blogs that are used officially with organization purpose. In a corporate blog, company’s information and latest update are easily being found and most of the corporate blogs will provide a space for their customers to leave their comments about the goods and services that are provided by the organization.
Niche blog refers to blogs that related to specific niche such as gaming, technology and music where bloggers only provide information on a particular topic.
Besides that, personal blog are usually used by blogger to keep track of their life and also a place to express themselves. Therefore, personal blogs are commonly written in personal language and also includes the emotional attachment of the blogger in the blog. Some of the blogger choose to privatize their personal blog.
However, Chang & Yeh (2008) proposed a different ways to classifications different blogs in 2 approach, which are the motive-based classifications which refers to the bloggers motive to create a blog such as idea exchange and emotional expression. The second approach is content-based approach which classifies blogs according to subject matter such as online diary or life experience.
I agree more on Chang & Yeh's perspective as it provides a wider ways to classify blogs.
According to Dave Sifry, the CEO of Technorati mentioned that the blogosphere continues to grow at a quickening pace (.
In the year 1999, Cartmeton Barret had published a list of 23 Blogs that are exist at the time and it's being projected that the number will increase to 126 million 10 years later.(Extraincomesimplified, 2011) This phenomenon also indicates that the emergence of the internet in today's world whereby people today's are engaging themselves into the world of internet which also resulted the emergence of new media..
By creating a weblog, users are able to share their information such as Food, Travel and even doing some business such as Clothes and Digital Devices.
In Malaysia, blogging has the potential to serve as a democratizing force in the country with the little freedom of expression in the blog. Apart from that, despite the fact that the government has promised not to censor the Internet and allowing bloggers to operate without a publishing license, bloggers are will subject to a wide range of laws such as Part 5, Section 3.5 of the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Content Code states: “The Online environment is not a legal vacuum. In general, if something is illegal ‘off-line’, it will also be illegal ‘on-line’. In this matter, the relevant existing laws apply”. (Sandra CS, 2011)
Blog places an impact in the education today as Williams and Jacobs found out that students were highly positively of the use of blogs as a learning tools and it also increases interactively and reflective activities. Besides that, using blog as a learning tool will tend to increase the student-relationships in this conversational atmosphere. Hence, it provides an active learning environment and also encourages critical thinking in the discussion (Helena SYS & Chan YM, 2008).
Coming out with a weblog will allow me to share my opinion on topics that I wish to discuss about. I can achieve it by using features such as hyperlinks, discussion box and comment boxes. In this case, my target audiences will be people that are interested in Issues and Publications and Design.
