TEEN VOGUE (which we covered in the AS course – link here)

Teen Vogue is a former US print magazine and current online publication launched in 2003 as a sister publication to Vogue, targeted at teenage girls. Like Vogue, it included stories about fashion and celebrities. The main categories are: Identity, beauty, style, lifestyle and politics. The target audience would be teens and young adults because the celebrities featured on the front are teenagers. Cross media titles: print and digital. Teen vogue is worth 5 million dollars.

https://www.teenvogue.com/story/women-in-music-2019

This post by teen vogue is about woman in music and how they are reshaping the industry. The article features new upcoming female artists talking about how they entered the music business and their current life in music and performing is treating them. This article mixes the popular music industry with feminism and women empowerment. It promotes and praises a feminist ideology and the fact that the music business is typically male dominated. It is a reactionary article for teen vogue to write as it deals with common themes they talk about such as women, pop music, fashion and feminism.

Tweets every hour to appeal to a young, active target audience.

• Stuart hall’s theory applies to this article as young girls will react dominantly to the text.
• They will listen to what their idols have to say.

TOMB RAIDER (which we covered in the AS course – link here)

Lara Croft of TOMB RAIDER fame is a video game icon. She was one of the first female protagonists in a gaming industry filled with women in supporting roles. And she has come a long way.

A media franchise that originated with an action-adventure video game series created by British gaming company Core Design.

One view:

• RADICAL as there is a female protagonist
• challenges dominant ideologies in action games
• female empowerment

Another view:

• sexualised to appeal to a stereotypical audience of straight males (male gaze)
• theory of preferred reading (Stuart Hall)

THE VOICE WEBSITE (link here)

The Voice, founded in 1982, is the only British national Afro-Caribbean weekly newspaper operating in the United Kingdom. The paper is based in London and is published every Thursday.

The newspaper is representative of black british experiences.

The editorial tone and content of The Voice has often come under criticism. At the launch of the New Nation newspaper, the paper’s editor, Richard Adeshiyan referred to The Voice as a “doom-and-gloom sheet” which prints damaging news and images of blacks as victims.

SIMS FREEPLAY (the game, Facebook page, twitter feed)

• Recieved mainly positive reviews but was banned in China, saudi arabia, United Arab States etc… for portraying homosexual couples
• Real time game simulation
• Created by EA
• Released for iphone for free and different devices

METROID: PRIME 2 ECHOES (game cover,

• Gaming magazine targeted for people aged 12+
• Released in November 2002
• Developed by Retro Studios and published by Nintendo for the GameCube.
• Cover:

Life hacks

Described as:

“Life Hacks is an example of a transitional media product which reflects changes in the contemporary media landscape (it is the replacement for a previous, similar programme, The Surgery). Life Hacks is both a traditional radio programme with a regular, scheduled broadcast time, but is also available online after broadcast for streaming and downloading. The broadcast itself and the accompanying website provides opportunities for audience interaction, which is central to the programme’s address to its audience. Life Hacks also exemplifies the challenges facing the institution as a public service broadcaster that needs to appeal to a youth audience within a competitive media landscape.”

Media Industries:

• Life Hacks is a Radio 1 product and therefore has a public service status as part of the BBC.
• Identification of funding for Radio 1 through the license fee, concept of a hypothecated tax.
• Issues around the role of a public service broadcaster – how does Life Hacks reflect the need to represent the nation. 
• Arguments over the need for addressing a youth audience already catered for commercially.
• Consider the programme as distinctive in its public service remit.
• The influence of new technology on media industries – Life Hacks as multi – platform media product.

Media Audiences:

• Life Hacks is reflective of the way the industry targets niche audiences and provides an opportunity to consider industry regulation and the availability of new technology shapes audience targeting and response.
• What techniques does the broadcast use to target a youth audience? – ‘expressing yourself and lockdown hair disasters’
• Consider the way that external factors – such as demographics and psychographics – are likely to also affect audience response and produce differing interpretations
• opportunities for audience interaction and self-representation –  life hacks is involved in audience interaction through texts and calls.
• cultivation theory including Gerbner
• reception theory including Hall

Social and cultural contexts:

• Life Hacks reflects an acceptance of diversity and a degree of openness in contemporary culture around personal, social and identity issues.

War of the worlds

• Andrew Crissel wrote a book about radio language and understanding radio. He said “Radio is a blind medium” meaning you can’t see it.
• War of the worlds has an important historic context – the alien invasion could represent something else going on in the 1930’s such as Stalin, Hitler or the beginning of world war 2.
• McDougall says in his book that hard times are a breeding ground for misinformation/fake news.
• It was first broadcast on October 30th 1938
• Performed and directed on radio by Orson Wells
• War of the Worlds was broadcast by Columbia Broadcasting Company (CBS) – an institution still in existence today.
• It is a hybrid genre
• Suspending disbelief
• People were panicking as they believed aliens were coming. Or were their reactions fake?
• Regulation – radio broadcasting was regulated by the Federal Communications Commission and it investigated the broadcast to see if it had broken any laws.
• war between online news and newspapers – Radio broadcasting was seen as direct competition to newspapers which had previously been the only way of receiving news.
• Every time something bad happens it is because of the media. – (Stanley Cohen) said this is and example of moral panic.

• Chicken received positive reviews and holds a 100% “Certified Fresh” rating on Rotten Tomatoes based on 12 critic reviews. The Guardian gave the film 3/5 stars and said “first-time director Joe Stephenson elicits lively, empathic performances from his small cast.”
• No guaranteed previous audience as it is the debut film for the director/producer Joe Stephenson.
• Production company: B Good Picture Company
• BFI film fund uses the money paid for lottery tickets to provide financial aid and support to young filmmakers. It contributes to the British Film industry by giving these young filmmakers the platform to be able to produce films that otherwise would not be created or recognised. These films often target a niche audience.
• Was premiered and played at multiple film festivals.
• The British Board of Film Classification is a non-governmental organisation founded by the film industry in 1912 and responsible for the national classification and censorship of films exhibited at cinemas and video works released on physical media within the United Kingdom.
• Marketed through a facebook page, twitter and youtube.

What is the difference between a consumer based media regulation system and a citizen based regulation system?

Consumer based regulation system

• what people want
• consumer chooses what they want to watch by giving producers freedom to create those products.
• media makers are given as much freedom as possible to make the media that audiences want to consume.

Citizen based regulation system

• what government want
• argues that media has a role in shaping society and it’s citizens
• provides rules

What impact did the 2003 Communications Act have on media regulation?

• The act was designed by the labour government in 2003
• The act promoted independent tv production by requiring the BBC and Channel 4 to commission more content from smaller production companies
• Livingstone and Lunt think it’s bad as it is too free regarding citizens interests.

What is the drawback of a self-regulated system?

• Media producers self regulate themselves
• Regulation in place for the media is not rigorous enough.
• Can mess with people’s lifes if consumers want to buy the media products.
• No-consequences for horrible articles
• This led to the leveson inquiry which was a judicial public inquiry into the culture, practices and ethics of the British press following the News International phone hacking scandal. A series of public hearings were held throughout 2011 and 2012.

How do you regulate media content and organisations on a global scale?

• very hard to regulate but it is needed
• who will regulate who
• not everyone will agree

Hesmondhalgh: ‘The media is a risky buisiness

How do media companies maximise profit and minimise risk.

Hesmondhalgh	Case studies
Star formatting – Using a star to gain an audience.	The Killing (Sarah Lund)
Genre based formatting – This provides familiarity for audiences	The killing and no offence: Crime/police drama
Remakes – reduces risk by recycling old successful material. Provides an element of nostalgia.	Using a female detective.
Independant stylising – does the product invoke a non-mainstream aestethic?	No offence: Using people with downsyndrome is representation of a disabled cast.
Serialisation – Includes a prequel or sequel which maximises audience investment.	No Offense: 3 series The Killing: 3 series
Multi-sector integration – Vertical and horizontal integration are used.	The killing: Originally broadcast on Danish DR1. Then on amazon prime, BBC and was on netflix.

• How the media landscape has fallen under the control of a handful of global media conglomerates.
• costs and risks associated with the production of media products has resulted in the organisation of media companies into vertically and horizontally aligned conglomerates.
• Mass market news: news designed to appeal to huge readership
• Commercial media: an organisation that makes products for profit
• Horizontal integration: Ownership os subsidiaries that produce similar types of products.
• Vertical integration: Ownership os subsidiaries that enable a media producer to produce, promote and distribute products.

The two i’ve picked: No offence and The Killing

The Killing

A Danish tv programme that’s synopsis is ‘a crime series that follows the police investigation of the murder of a young girl. It interlocks three different stories.’ There is 44 episodes and was produced in Vancouver by Veena Sud it can fit into these genres: Serial, Drama, Mystery, Thriller, Crime film, Adventure, Crime Fiction, Action/Adventure and Police procedural. Stream on amazon prime or BBC but original broadcast was DR1. Denmark’s first television station.

Original UK air date	UK ratings (BBC Four)
1	“Episode 1”	7 January 2007	1,550,000	22 January 2011	472,000

CATEGORY	FAMILIARITIES	DIFFERENCES	THEORY
CHARACTERS	the detective who has a ‘natural’ instinct for law and order	The Killing, The mising has the main detective as female	PROPP
NARRATIVE	the first episode often introduces a lot of different characters	The missing girl was found dead in the first episode.	TODOROV
THEMES	the use of binary oppositions around familiar themes: family, community, law and order, justice.	identity. a female is the main hero.	LEVI-STRAUSS
REPRESENTATION	reactionary representations of police, family, law and order, urban/rural	Radical gender roles and having a male sidekick	SEMIOTICS
TECHNICAL CODES / LANGUAGE OF MOVING IMAGE (music, setting, props, lighting, use of camera, editing etc)	opening montage sequence that often gives clues as to the whole series – themes, locations, characters, events etc.		
			

• Who is the primary, secondary and tertiary audience for this product?

The primary audience is people who speak Swedish or are Sweden because it is a language they would understand. Secondary could be Netflix watchers.

the character of Sarah Lund is a familiar detective stereotype and conforms to the concept of the celebrity detective

No Offence

No Offence is a British television police procedural drama on Channel 4, created by Paul Abbott. It follows a team of detectives from Friday Street police station, a division of the Manchester Metropolitan Police (a fictional version of the Greater Manchester Police). Channel 4

• No Offence was broadcast on France2 the public service broadcaster, to very high viewing figures; the perceived weakness of French broadcast TV provides opportunities for export.
  • the series’ focus on the detective narrative and crime drama is familiar and understood globally, the representation of the independent, female detective has proven popularity.

I am doing the NEA 2 which is the games magazines and adverts. I will do this by creating a radical product using a man as the dominant signifier in a war themed video game. This is radical as it is stereotypical having a man character being represented as the protagonist in an action genre game. I will use a Fuse man gamer on the front page as it conveys the message that it is for a specific target audience, the person will be wearing a headset and holding a controller with stereotypically big arms. My contents, I will then include pictures of animated characters to advertise a new game and screenshots from this game. For the double page spread I will use one image of a fuse character that will take up a lot of space on the left side, this corresponds with Judith Butler’s theory of gender as performative. As the game is a cross between skating and war which are both typically male dominated. The style model I have used for this is:

For the three advert prints I will be advertising an online football event. To communicate this I will use a background of a football stadium with bold writing to show the date and time of the event. This could appeal to a niche audience that enjoys football games as well as action. This is playing on the assumption of what men in this target audience would enjoy and what else would appeal to them. My next print will be an advert for a new games controller with voice recognition, the colours are blue and white which mocks the stereotypical colours associated with the male gender. This would appeal to a gaming audience as it is a new technology that is easier than using headphones with a microphone. My 3rd advert is for a new game called ‘Action Adam’ which is a game that features a typical action figurine-looking solider, who is based in a city doing different tasks. This game/advert would appeal to the audience as it fits within the action genre and in terms of representation, the target audience could identify as ‘Adam’ and give a sense of secured masculinity. The background will show a landscape of buildings to give an understanding of the setting within the game and have the avatar ‘Adam’ as the dominant signifier.

Behavioural/operant conditioning – B.F. Skinner (pigeon experiment)

Propaganda is the expression of opinions or actions carried out by a group or individual to manipulate and influence the actions and beliefs of other individuals and groups.

Audience Theories

1920-30: Lasswell – Hypodermic model (passive consumption):

• Wrote about propaganda for mass groups
•  Lasswell, as a behavioural scientist researching areas connected with political communication and propaganda, believed each government had ‘manipulated the mass media in order to justify its actions’ in World War 1.
• For example spoon feeding people and they will believe you
• Linear model of communication:

• Eg: WHO: Caroline Jones, SAYS WHAT (message): ‘Boris Johnson has dandruff’, CHANNEL: Daily Mail, TO WHOM: Middle aged women, WITH WHAT AFFECT: Embarrassing and suggesting Boris Johnson has dandruff caused by the stress of covid.

1940’s: Shannon and weaver:

• Shannon and weaver developed this as they suggest that the linear model of communications is not complex enough as people may read things in a different way or not understanding or decoding the message that is being sended out.

1950’s: Laserfeld 2 step flow:

• Two step flow of communication:

• What is significant here is that this theory suggests that the audience are ACTIVE NOT PASSIVE, in that audience consumption is based on consideration of what others think not a PASSIVE process of unthinking consumption.
• Depending on where you get your information from can influence your opinions, and they can differentiate from others opinions.

1960’s: Uses and gratifications:

• Idea that audiences actively choose the media they consume ie newspapers and media they watch and read.

• In essence, they put forward research to show that individual audience members are more active than had previously been thought and were actually key to the processes of selection, interpretation and feedback. In essence, individuals sought particular pleasures, uses and gratifications from individual media texts, which can be categorised as:

• information / education
• empathy and identity
• social interaction
• entertainment
• escapism
• For example, a cartoon in a newspaper could be enjoyment and escapism but if it is about world hunger it is also knowledge about the world.

1970’s: Gerbner – Cultivation Theory:

• Looking primarily at the relationship between violence on television and violence in society. They developed what is known as cultivation theory, noting the distinct characteristics of television in relation to other media forms, they suggest that ‘television cultivates from infancy the very predispositions and preferences that used to be acquired from other primary sources‘ (Gerbner et al 1986).
• In other words, television shapes the way individuals within society think and relate to each other
• Althuserr and Chomsky were also in the 1970’s

1980’s: Stuart Hall – The theory of preferred reading:

• Stuart hall is a black academic that said ‘The world is looking very white’
• For example you can present something that people will receive in a different way
• For example tv used to be mostly white which black people would reject because they’re not represented.
• He says there are 3 ways of receiving a message:

• A dominant position accepts the dominant message
• A negotiated position both accepts and rejects the dominant reading
• An oppositional position rejects the dominant reading

2000’s: Clay Shirky – End of audience:

• There isn’t a collective mass audience but a mass audience of individuals.

2019: Zuboff – surveillance capitalism:

• Theory that we are all complete individuals but we are individually profiled and targeted. ie, manipulated.