For Monday, November 3

1. Type up your analysis of whether you think patriotism works in election advertising.

2. Find another ad for your theme and post it on your blog.

3. Read and watch this slideshow essay from Slate. After you click on the link, click "here" on the page that opens.

4. Post a comment on Atara's blog or Salisha's blog. If you are Atara or Salisha, write a post that analyzes your ad in 300 words.

5. If you're not Atara or Salisha, write a post that analyzes your ad in 150 words.

Note: On Wednesday, October 29 I will have individual meetings with students instead of a regular class session.

Ad Savvy: Analyzing Ads

This site has useful analyzing techniques and information: http://www.adsavvy.org/

Questions to Consider When Analyzing Your Ads

Who is the audience for your ad? How do you know this?
What is being marketed? How can you tell?
Are there people in your ad? How would you describe them? Are they old, young, male, female, white, black, Asian-American, Latino? Why were these people chosen?
What color schemes are used in the ad? What effect does this produce?
Are there any props? How are they used?
Where is the ad taking place? Why was this location(s) chosen?
What kind of music is used? Are there any other sound effects? What kind of tone do they produce?
Is there a voice over in your ad? What kind of voice is used? Why effect does it produce?
Is there any text in your ad? What does the text do?
What kind of emotion does your ad want you to feel? How can you tell this?
Does your ad make any promises? How does it convey these promises?
Are there characters in the ad the audience is meant to identify with? How can you tell this?

Patriotic Ads: What do they do?

McCain's Patriotism





Obama's Patriotism

Assignments for Monday, October 27

1. Type up your analysis of whether you think fear is a legitimate tactic in advertising campaigns, particularly election ads.

2. Find another ad for your theme and post it on your blog.

3. Read this article from the LA Times blog and read the first page of comments that follow.

4. Post a comment on Jonathan's blog or Neal's blog. If you are Jonathan or Neal, write a post that analyzes your ad in 300 words.

5. If you're not Jonathan or Neal, write a post that analyzes your ad in 150 words.

Election Ads that Invoke Fear

Click here for an ad in Spanish that is trying to make viewers scared.

More Fear Ads from the Left and Right: Click here.

Two Links That We'll Be Looking At in Class on Wednesday

The Living Room Candidate has Election Ads from the start of television advertisements. Find it here. We'll especially be looking at the "Fear" Ads under "Type of Commercials."

Also this feature from the NY Times called "The Ad Wars" has interesting statistics and information

See you tomorrow!

Assignments for Wednesday, Oct. 20

1. Type up your summary of "The Early Word: The Cost of Going Negative" and post it on your blog.

2. Find another ad that exemplifies the theme you're investigating in advertising. Post the ad on your blog.

3. Read this article from Newsweek.

4. Post a comment on Stephanie's blog or Jiarui's blog. If you are Stephanie or Jiarui, write a post that analyzes your ad in 300 words.

5. If you're not Stephanie or Jiarui, write a post that analyzes your ad in 150 words.

What's the Role of Politics in the Classroom?

We'll discuss this in class today. You can read Stanley Fish on this issue here. Reading this article is optional; I'll be bringing up some of the points he makes in our discussion.

Advertising Techniques

Here are some techniques that ads use: http://www.foothilltech.org/rgeib/english/media_literacy/advertising_techniques.htm

Identifying them might help you analyze how an ad aims to convince people of its message.

Attack Ads

"Do you Know Enough to Elect Barack Obama?"


"KEATING ECONOMICS: John McCain & The Making of a Financial Crisis"

Assignments for Monday, October 20

1. Please set up your own blog through blogger.com. Give it a descriptive name, and then send me an email with the URL of the blog by Sunday at noon.

2. Begin thinking about what component of advertising you might like to research. Find an example of this issue in advertising and post it on your blog. It can either be an image or a video.

3. Read this article. Make sure to read some of the comments at the bottom as well. We'll have a discussion about it in class and perhaps a quiz.

Reminders for Paper #1

Deadline: The final draft must be emailed to me before class on Wednesday, October 22.

Length: Your paper should be 4-5 pages in 12-point Times New Roman font or equivalent. Please double space.

Requirements: Your paper must have a thesis statement with supporting evidence. You should have at least two outside research sources to support your argument, and you should integrate at two to three quotations from those sources to support your argument.

Citations: A works cited page is not needed for this assignment. However, for every source you site include a footnote that either links to the online article you're referring to or gives the author, title, and date of publication.

Mabinogi Summary

Mabinogi, The Fantasy Life, is a free to play online game, developed by a Korean company called Nexon. This company is known by the development of several most played MMOGs in Asia. Mabinogi is a virtual world based on the Celtic culture, very similar to the settings of the movie "Lord of the Rings". The game has its own market system and currency where you can buy and sell items and even exchange for real money. Asides from the usual combat system and killing monsters, this game have a life system where you can farm, tailor clothes, cook foods, build houses, write music, make potions and even make poisons by mixing two different potions. As we discussed in class, this type of online games can make people antisocial because of they are really time consuming and addictive. Three of the thirty six players that i have interviewed have the game open the whole day so they can access the game whenever they look at the computer. However, the game has its good sides like any social network, you can meet new people and make new friends, it may also helps people relieve daily stress and depression.

Summary of Tencent QQ

Tencent is one of the biggest network companies in China. The QQ is the most popular computer IM software which belongs to Tencent Company. In its first quarter results of May 14, 2008, there are over 700 million registered QQ users. QQ is a very large network platform. It is not only has the QQ Instant Messenger; it also include Q-zone (blog), QQGroup (chat room), Paipai (online shop), QQAlum, QQBook (online to read book), QQDoctor (anti-virus to check QQ IM), QQLive (like Youtube), QQGame, SoSo (website searcher like Google) and so on. It almost includes everything that we will use in the Internet. It makes easier and faster when we use the Internet. But on the other hand, it also brings some disadvantage in the same time. Those companies will through the QQ to get our information. It makes them to violate our privacy easily. Only one website can cover the whole cyber community that sounds boring and limitable, even the Tencent tries to make it more enormous, but a huge cyber community is what we want.

For Tuesday, Oct. 14

1. Yan and Jiarui will post the last in the series of posts on cyber communities. Please make sure you comment before class.

2. Bring in 12 copies of the introduction to your paper. We will peer review it in class. Also, include 2-3 examples in outline form describing how you plan to support your argument.

Summary of Centsports

Centsports may not be an extremely popular website in comparison to sites like facebook and myspace. However it offers its own unique form of a cyber comunity. Since it was founded its user base has been steadily growing without much advertisement for the site. Like any cyber community it has its faults which will be questioned. As we discused in class there is no age limit for centsports and thus it could potentially lead young children to gamble. However I believe this risk is minimal because since the site doesnt advertise the number of young children who even know about the site is extremely low. Besides the majority of young children are not going to be interested in the site if they were to come across it. I also believe that the site does more good than bad because it allows people who would be gambling for large money to get there fix at no risk. This is why I believe centsports is an all around good site that is both fun and safe.