Assignment 4 - The Day I Was Born

September 13, 1983

I was born on Tuesday in Pennsylvania. The weather where I was born was beautiful. Harrisburg, PA had a high of 66 degrees and zero precipitation. However, the weather wasn’t perfect everywhere. On the day I was born it rained in New York City and Dallas had temperatures north of a scorching 96 degrees. On the day I was born many events transpired that molded the way we now think and live. But what is equally intriguing are the events that have stayed relatively the same. After three decades we are not so far removed from many of the same issues, media and culture that was created on September 13^th, 1983. The common thread is Darwin’s Law: survival of the fittest. What ideas evolved and survived on this planet for the past 30 years and avoided extinction?

The Olympic Eagle gold coin. 

Extinction equals irrelevance. For example, the US Mint struck its first gold coin in 50 years on September 13^th, 1983. They called it the Olympic Eagle. It was a gorgeous looking coin. Who cares? We’ve been subtly shifting away from tangible money since the early 1900s. There is not Olympic Eagles in heavy circulation around this country now nor have there ever been. Gold coins are merely a hobby at present day, making the entire endeavor seem futile. This is a currently extinct idea born alongside me. Yet, there are many ideas that have survived alongside me as well. 

          

Time cover, Sept. 1983

Some headlines in the news on the day I was born seem dated which only makes sense. It is odd that the biggest headlines are only a few nouns away from being ripped from a newspaper yesterday. Moscow vetoed a UN Security Council resolution on this day. It stemmed from a civilian Korean 747 that Russia shot down because of airspace infringement much like Russia vetoing UN resolutions currently in regards to their aggressive defiance of Ukraine’s independence. Russian rebels also shot down a Malaysian flight earlier this year.  

Downed Malaysian plane by Russians in 2014.

On this day Chrysler agreed to pay$311.1 million to the Government to buy back their stock as reward for helping bail Chrysler out in 1980. This sounds eerily similar to bailing out the auto industry in 2009. In fact, Chrysler, along with Ford and GM, participated in that one as well. Finally, Pres. Regan asked Congress to use more aggressivetactics in Lebanon on Sept. 13^th, 1983 by implementing a continuing military presence. Not coincidentally, ISIS is currently eyeing Northern Lebanon in a major offensive that Pres. Obama must now act upon politically and militarily. Different decades, same Russia, same auto bailouts, and same military conflicts.

The Osborne 1 portable computing device. 

There was a major death on the day I was born. A death that impacts us all to this day. Adam Osborne killed his company. The pioneering done by Osborne heavily influenced Apple and Compaq in the early stages of portable computers. However, Osborne Computer Corporation, maker of the first portable computer with a bundled software suite, declared bankruptcy on September 13^th, 1983 due to the notorious “The Osborne Effect”: 

The unintended consequences of a company pre-announcement made when the timing is misjudged, which ends up having a negative impact on the sales of the current product.

Now, in 2014, all tech companies are extra savvy when it comes to upcoming product announcements as to not jeopardize current merchandise.  

     

But the correlations don’t stop there.  The reigning box office champion for 8 weeks in a row on the day I was born was a film called “Mr. Mom”, a Michael Keaton comedy classic that solidified him as a movie star for the next fifteen years. 

Last week “Birdman” was released in theaters. It stars Michael Keaton as a washed up famous actor and is critically hailed as his best work to date, which should revitalize his career. The musical charts were dominated on the day I was born by the Eurhythmics’ classic “Sweet Dreams (Were Made of This)”. 

Annie Lennox

The lead singer of the Eurhythmics is Annie Lennox. Guess who is number ten on the Billboard Top 200 this week? Yep, it’s Annie Lennox with her new album Nostalgia.

While many magazines could be purchased on the day I was born only one had a multimillionaire who was only 15 years old. 

Right side, second from the bottom is a future superstar. 

Thrasher Magazine featured relatively unknown skateboarder Tony Hawk describing his up and coming sport. Now he is kind of a big deal.

If you wanted to watch TV on the day I was born you were probably watching Tuesday night’s highest rated show: The A-Team on NBC. Perhaps cartoons are more your speed. The second ever official episode of G.I.Joe: A Real American Hero debuted on the day I was born. If you missed it, don’t fret, because both properties have been reimagined as big budget movies in the past four years, further solidifying the lack of extinction. 

Of course things change with time and remaining constant is rarely a good trait in evolution. On the day I was born, a Jeep costs $7600 on The Price Is Right.(Jump to 5:15)

In 2014, the price of the Jeep has gone up, but you can still buy a Jeep. You can even still watch The Price Is Right! The culture created and appreciated on the day I was created is very much sewn into the fabric of today. Some ideas like auto bailouts have survived despite their contempt, while others, like “The Osborne Effect” have served as valuable reminders and will continue to do so. The day I was born is not a day that will live in infamy, but it appears to be a day that will live forever. 

Assignment 3 - Google News Vs. Huffington Post

In the not so distant past, one newspaper would be easily compared to another. Taking the Pepsi challenge with the Dallas Morning News and The Chicago Tribune would yield predicable results because the structure of both is very similar. Headlines, front pages, subject sections, etc. The same could be said for two news magazines. Remember those?  Newsweek and Time both had, at the core, a wide array of comparable sections and designs from the table of contents to the last page editorial. It is the merger of these formats, magazines and newspapers, where I believe Google News surpasses Huffington Post in the realm of news aggregate. In its design, the tone they elicit, the choice of news providers and the ability to stay relatively centrist in a polarizing media environment makes Google News the superior ‘product’ because, dare I say, they are more trustworthy.

A few weeks ago, one of my classmates asked the room to evaluate two websites for his job, JCPenny and Macy’s. Overwhelmingly, the class chose the aesthetics of the Macy’s site, rather than a JCPenny site that applied a large, red and black advertisement taking up more than half the screen. This is how The Huffington Post formats their page design. It’s audacious to the point of over exaggeration. It doesn't maintain a sense of dignity with this design. It models itself on a hybrid faux newspaper title/navigation banner, but delves into shopping market tabloid territory with its first half page of ‘attention getting’. This is in direct contrast in Google News, which opts for consistency down the page.

The pic to the left is front page of the

Huffington Post while the one above

depicts the exact same time of day on

Google News. It seems very clear the

tactic being used to entice your eyes. 

HuffPo only further devolves into a Slate.com twin that has larger than required photos and weak headlines. While helpful on mobile devices, the desktop version looks like a Reader’s Digest designed for seniors with massive font and titles void of any defining content.  

Google News drop down for multiple links. 

In the minimalist way that Google normally is, News provides more relevant content in a clean and structured manner that is not overdeveloped and exhaustively depending on a flashy magazine design that feels more like cerebral People magazine than news aggregate. It relies on the consumer to scroll down easily and has a lack of major advertising on the bulk of it’s page.

Google News is far more digestible due to drop down arrows that give multiple links to the same story topic. These links have the name of the source, which can allow me decipher which side of the aisle I would like to journalistic slant to be on, if any.

It is no secret that the Huffington Post is liberal in its point of view as a whole. Arianna Huffington makes the rounds pretty consistently on talk shows spouting her political attitudes. Her news site doesn’t so much as break stories as they give their spin on the interpretation of events that unfold and direct you to links toward the like minded. I am much more centrist at heart, so it was difficult to compartmentalize the biased leanings of the website. I attempted to make a clear distinction not to compare it to The Drudge Report, a very pedestrian conservative version of this site that I also do not particularly care for. One that uses scare tactics constantly in an effort to undercut the left.

Drudge Report's front page at same time as Google & HuffPo.

I am a staunch believer that all sites claiming to give factual news should declare up front what editorial bent is being reported. This can be compared to native advertising in that at the top of all sponsored articles it clearly notifies its true nature. It could be implemented as a standard journalistic practice throughout the country and would revolutionize media relations, but I digress.

At the end of the day, a cleaner designed news aggregator that stays relatively independent and trusts its user to elaborate further into topics and news analysis/ interpretations of their own free will can be trusted more. Critically, the bottom line when it comes to news should be trust. Factual information is the crux of why someone is on a news aggregator to begin with. Google uses multiple links to establish trust by providing all sides of an issue staying transparent in all aspects. A democratic population must trust the news in order to make informed decisions based on reality rather than perception. Google seems to be the clear conduit for disseminating all information, trustworthy or otherwise.

Assignment 2 - 'Like' Everything On Facebook

So, not unlike many people in latter part of 2014, I no longer utilize Facebook at a high level – if at all. My attentions have shifted to other social media or in some areas I've gone off grid completely, therefore making the control of this experiment, at least in my case, a bit slanted. That preface is only stated to lay the foundation for what was concluded by “Liking” everything on Facebook for a few days.

The other options available (hiding and not liking) I essentially already do on a daily basis by ignoring my Facebook page. I have to assume that my experience is similar to most people who try to perform the high wire act of clicking ‘Like’ on everything. My news feed became saturated with crap that totally drowned out any personal connections, content mills dominated my feed, and I had a bit of awkwardness due to liking some pics that a very distant acquaintance decided to share with the planet of his new wife in a bikini. However, I anticipated the weirdness of liking everyone’s photos and posts about how Obama is cause of and solution to all of life’s problems. I also projected the polarizing views that would populate my page that find me algorithmically by feigning passion about everything regardless of consequence.  However, there were some things I did not anticipate.

• While nobody hit me up to ask if I was hacked, I did get a surprising amount of friends and family ask if I changed political parties –although none were specific about who I was changing to or from. As someone who has never been a staunch advocate of either side of the aisle, that was perplexing.

• The difference in mobile feeds and desktop feeds was significant. It’s as if Facebook assumes you think more critically at your computer than on your phone so they try to “pull a fast one on ya” much less frequently with desktop content.

• Interact or die! Once something is ‘Liked’ and triggers a call to action or related post or an associated advertisement which is then ‘Liked’ or ignored, then the real assault begins as Facebook will continue a relentless campaign to get interaction predicated on that ‘Like’. There was no way to call of the dogs of follow-up posts as they continued to pile up, ambivalent to falling on deaf ears.    

Assignment 1 - 3 Retweets

I found three tweets that were very difficult to not want to know more information about. That is the key for me, more than a clever one liner by a comedian.  I want to treat a tweet like a long headline that either makes me invest in further research or realize that it is inconsequential to my life and interests. 

A tweet from the Libertarian Republic stated: Parents Convicted Of The Same Crime - Male Gets Jail, Female Gets Off. This was worth looking deeper into because injustice fascinates me and I love to get stories that would usually be buried by some political minded media outlet. Reverse gender inequality is pretty rare so it was worth checking out.

A tweet from The Onion's sports blog was a bit more meta and clever than normal, so I felt the need to retweet it. It said that the Baltimore Ravens' Biggest Strength: The NFL’s outlook on domestic violence prior to August 28, 2014. This is a tongue in cheek reference to a Ray Rice incident that happened in the off season with his wife that the NFL handled poorly. I found the headline and the article to be very poignant so long as you're in on the joke.

And finally a tweet from i09 stated that the first successful demonstration of brain to brain communication in humans has been achieved. This is massive for many reasons ranging from ESP human evolution to the very cool idea of telepathy becoming science reality rather than science fiction. A groundbreaking concept that was worth sharing, I felt.