#3

Morgan Russell
Media Literacy and the Environment
Assignment #3
February 8th 2010


1. Our minds have been fundamentally altered by our constant use of the internet, making both “concentration and contemplation” far more difficult.

2. I agree with the idea that the way we browse the internet may be having a large effect on our reading. When I am online I find myself reading only the headings and first few paragraphs of a news story, and skipping from page to page. I often find that I will read an article as quickly as possible, simply because there are often bad articles online. Rather than spend my time looking at every one we must skim until we find a valid source. However once my brain has been set in this skimming mode it is always difficult to focus once I finally find a useful site.

I also agree that the Internet plays the largest role a communications system ever has and because of this has enormous influence on our thoughts. Internet has been able to absorb almost every medium and has recreated it to fit the World Wide Web. The Internet is not a place for a single medium or topic, when using the Internet we are constantly bombarded with more than just the information in a particular article or email. We have gotten so used to the Internet that it is changing and replacing the original mediums. For example the recent addition of “article abstracts” and “shortcuts” to The New York Times.

I disagree with the statement made by Taylor, “In the past the man has been first, in the future the system must be first.” The system seeks maximum speed, efficiency and output. Taylor’s goal was to reshape both industry and society to be as efficient as possible. I believe if this “system” were to take over society we would see a complete loss of creativity and individuality.

I was unable to find a place where I disagreed with the author. The most shocking information in the article was the goals and quotes from Sergey Brin and Larry Page, the creators of google. “Certainly if you had all the world’s information directly attached to your brain, or an artificial brain that was smarter than your brain, you’d be better off” says Page. I was absolutely horrified to hear this statement, I believe if this ever were to happen it would be the end of society the way we know it.


ADNAUSEAM:

I found the movie consuming kids to be very disturbing. Clearly kids are a large target audience since they have so much influence over parental decisions. Another reason children are so easy to convince through advertising is because they do not yet understand the concept. On page 51 Mclaren and Torchinsky explain that we do not learn to disregard advertisements until the third grade. By the third grade we have essentially trained children to tune out, ignore their surroundings, and act mindlessly out of necessity.

In “Your Ad Here” the authors discuss the enormous number of advertisements that constantly invade our lives. “Perhaps the only real challenge would be to find spaces without advertising” p. 43.This reminded me of the feed. In the feed they literally had advertisements running through their heads at all times. Not only did they see advertisements everywhere (including their own heads) they also spoke them. For example when they could win Coca-Cola if they said it enough times, or when on character would say Nike in every sentence he spoke.