"And Now a Word from their Cool College Sponser" Response

Creating an advertising stunt that feature teenagers is a very good approach to getting a company publicity and more business. If someone were to tell me that they would pay for me to go to college if I spoke for their company and advertised for their business, I would be totally on board because today, college is expensive. By doing a business a favor and in return getting free tuition, I believe more and more companies could get better business. After all, it is our generation that is going to run the country, and what better way to start out early and get the youth of the nation involved. Not only does this help a company, but it helps the teen sponsers as well. It is a great resume builder for getting into a successful job, and allows the teens to do something productive with their time, while also getting experience into a field that could be a potential career. I wish more companies would advertise for this type of business and actually do this because it can help both the company and the teens involved.

"Meet my 5,000 New Best Pals" Response

After reading Janet Kornblum's article about how people on Myspace add a million friends to their friends list, I think about how many friends I actually do have. Why add people who I have no idea who they are? They wouldn't be called "friends" then, in the real world. They would just be other people I am adding to a friends list who are total strangers, which really defeats the purpose of a Myspace or Facebook. Of course, I have people added to my Facebook who I do not talk to at all and wouldn't consider my "friend"; however, I add these people because I knew them at some point in my life and feel as though they should be added. I do not just randomly add people who I've never spoken two words in real life before though. That would just be ridiculous. The social networking sites like Facebook and Myspace can actually hurt someone's social skills by adding random people, but I think they can also help as well. Getting to know friends of friends can help finding jobs, or meeting that special someone. But I wouldn't just add Joe Smith because he looks gorgeous in his picture; he's still someone I have never seen or spoke to before.

Leading a Double Life

In response to Irene Sege's "Leading a Double Life", I think it is abosolutely bizarre that people like to think they are something else on a digital aspect. Even though they put their interests and everything that relates to them into these people, I feel that it is just a "safety" blanket for living in the real world. There was an episode of True Life on MTV about how people that are uncomfortable with themsevles use these sites to portray themselves as something else. I think that instead of hours on end on the computer pretending to be someone, people should use their social skills and own selves in the real world to meet people physically, not digitally. It helps them in the long run, and this goes to show that technology is changing teens and the way they interact and socialize with the rest of the world.

Advertising

In the article, "Salespeak" by Roy Fox, advertising is in the future classrooms as well as the entirety of the world. Although this article was a bit ridiculous with its naming children after certain product brands, it did give a good message. I can see in the future that there will be more advertising and in many more ways, even though I do not believe it will consume our lives entirely that we are paid to name our kids after the next cereal brand. I also do not think that the curriculum will be that surrounded by advertising. Yes, there are some things in our classes that advertise certain products in our textbooks, but I don't think it will go as far as children's whole curriculum based off of advertising. Being that I want to pursue a career in marketing and wanting to do something creative in the advertising field, I do feel that advertising is a big part of our culture and we need it to flourish. For example, how are we going to persuade consumers to buy products in order for the economy to grow? Advertsing is the answer. Although it is a big part of life, hopefully advertising won't be as bad as Pepsi's generation with parents naming their children after Red Bull.

Nothing is Wrong with Cinderella!

Peggy Orenstein's article focuses a major part on how girls get the wrong message at a young age when they idolize Disney's princesses and "play princess". At a young age, I believe it is perfectly normal for girls to buy princess items and want to "be" princesses because what else are they going to do for fun? Sure, there are sports that they can play at a young age and there are other toys that they can play with, but most of the toys targeted for little girls are "girly" things. I'm not saying that girls should only play with girl toys; I believe that children at a young age should play with whatever makes them feel happy. I do believe however that because we live in a society that shows girls that playing dress up and pretending to be princess is accepted, then they should be allowed to go with their imaginations and do so. After all, it will just be a phase. How many teen girls now believe that they are princesses and play with barbies? The answer would be almost none. Children go through phases in their lives. One minute Sally is a princess and then the next minute she is teaching her stuffed animals the ABC's. The days when I thought I was princess hasn't had an effect on me growing up and the way I perceive women today; it was assumed after the age of ten or so that girls don't grow up to become perfect princesses because that is what we are taught even before the princess phase is over.

"The Rules of Attribution" Response

In the first years of highschool, I was taught not to take someone else's ideas and put my name on them to hand them in for credit. Plagiarism was taught in every classroom and in the same way; a handout and maybe even a packet in which we as the students were asked to read when we got home. In the essay, "The Rules of Attribution", I strongly agree with Gerhardt in that sometimes teachers do not fully teach the rules effectively so that students can fully understand what Plagiarism is. My teachers assumed that we already knew what it was because every teacher for every subject was supposed to touch on it. Because of this assumption, my teachers rarely discussed it at all, and if they did, they would just whip out the handout and tell us to read it on our own. Yes, people could easily have asked questions the next day, but who really reads a one to two page paper on plagiarism when we think we know what it is in the first place? I believe that teachers and professors shouldn't lecture what Plagiarism is, but give examples of different writings that include plagiarism and show us how to replace "stealing" with creating our own ideas based off of others.

"Culture Renaissance or Culture Divide?"

While reading "Culture Renaissance or Culture Divide?" by Bill Ivey and Steven Tepper, I gained a lot of knowledge that while in a growing technological world, we still experience a "culture divide". Although more and more people are experiencing the arts through their own creations, whether building their own recording studios, or filming their own "professional" movies and posting them over the Internet, those with less technological resources and time and money cannot experience other people's creations or their own. This does not allow those who have less time and less money to broaden their horizons, which forces them to "jump on the bandwagon" and listen to the same songs on the radio according to what is "popular". I think that this is why people need to not wait around until the next big thing is broadcasted on the televisions or the radios, but to find the next big thing by experiencing it themselves. To do this, it does also require people to use the latest technology and to keep updated in a world of endless technological advances.

I think it is great that "pro-ams" are experiencing art hands on and this is what we all should do. It only takes one person with one new idea to help America's culture broaden. With more and more ideas and new skills, the world can be more culturally diverse and more people will be forced to experience an array of things and become more culturally diverse themselves.