Monday, January 23, 2012

Here ...You throw this away.

So far the idea is vague, broad, and general. And it’s the third in series of vague, broad, general ideas for a Capstone project, but I’ll leave those others aside for now. Suffice it to say that, as a student whose emphases are communications and English, I want to research mass communications media, specifically (possibly) advertising, internet marketing, social media, as platforms for new rhetoric—that is, according to some—or perhaps platforms for the exchange of value through storytelling, if nothing else. For now I’ll refrain from either criticizing or endorsing any conclusion because I’ve only just started to ask the question. It seems a complicated enough topic without me trying to confine it to the conclusion I hope to find. I’ll obviously need to draw some focus.

A few years back I thought I was ready to tackle this. Capsone 1 I mean. Turned out I was mostly just ready to be showered with praise from my support system for having graduated. Neither one happened because I was taking it all way too seriously. I had a slightly different idea then—the first in the series of three I mentioned earlier. And it was even more broad, vague, and general. It turned out, as I learned in the course of reading, to be one of those cliché attempts to answer some universal question that undergrads are so well known for. Still, my Integrated Studies advisor at the time saw some promise in it—I think. But she told me I needed more critical theory. She was right, and I have since acquired a great deal more experience with critical, theoretical discourses. So the only relative certainty I have at this point is that I’ll be treating the subjects of my proposed inquiry as discourses, and criticize or endorse them as such, relying heavily on my experience with English literature, journalism, free speech theory, Postmodern and Post-Structuralist Criticism, and Media Criticism.

I would like to become even more expert in all of these, including the topics in question. My hope is that, in the end I will have done it in some way that lends itself to both the job market, and grad school prospects.

My initial question is derived from, what I am told, are current market trends in advertising and what I had previously understood to be the origin of news media—the way the two have always been necessarily linked. Newspapers began as handbills, advertisements for goods and services from merchants who included news to give the public a reason to read them that served public interests up front. And by this I mean interests that exist apart from the pre-supposed premise of service implied by the advertising function of handbills. News reporting, as I understand it became the service that gave advertising its merit and kept the public from automatically discarding handbills on contact. One of my favorite comedians, Mitch Hedberg, had a joke on this topic that comes to mind. He said every time someone gave him a handbill it was as if they were saying, “Here, you throw this away.”

According to Internet marketing professionals, the industry has come full circle. Advertising in and of itself no longer holds an audience captive. There’s just too much of it. Is this new? I don’t know yet. In either case, once again, or as usual, advertising and marketing messages need to compete for public attention by serving public interest up front. I find this claim interesting, but I don’t know that it’s true in the sense that it has been explained to me. If it is, I wonder if it’s true in the same sense as it was centuries ago.
Now to focus the question…

4 comments:

  1. The marketing and project on media sounds unique. It will be interesting to see how this goes.

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  2. Jared, You're right you are kind of all over the map here, and we do want to "focus the question" (as you put it).

    The most specific idea that I see being developed here is the history of the news media and the idea that it was really just a tool for getting people to read ads. I think this is a fascinating idea, and it will be interesting to see if research into the history of newspapers bears this out.

    It will also be interesting to see how that interplay has evolved through the years. So good start, and let's narrow it down!

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  3. Jared,

    Would you care to tackle the critical comparison of early newsprint (and/as advertising schemes) vs. the latest social networking (and/as advertising schemes)?

    I ask this in part because, like the early printed forms of news, the social networking tools are both massive new ways of moving merchandise and, somewhat unexpectedly, tools for revolutionaries.

    Consider, for instance, the role of Twitter alone in last year's so-called "Arab Spring" uprisings. How does this relate to the role of Twitter (or Facebook or Google) as new and more effective ways of getting ads to consumers?

    You write that, "the only relative certainty I have at this point is that I’ll be treating the subjects of my proposed inquiry as discourses, and criticize or endorse them as such, relying heavily on my experience with English literature, journalism, free speech theory, Postmodern and Post-Structuralist Criticism, and Media Criticism." This seems to set you up perfectly for a historical, critical comparison of the wild and crazy early days of the printed press with the (still) wild and crazy early days of the new social networking media. What do you think?

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  4. Thanks for the feed back all.

    And to answer your question Professor Jeffreys, yes. Yes I would care to tackle the critical comparison of what you call "the wild and crazy early days of the printed press with the (still) wild and crazy early days of the new social network media."

    I really appreciate the insight.

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