Stop the MERGER!!

Getting straight to the point I feel that the plans to merge Alcoren State and Mississippi Valley with Jackson State is totally unfair. I do not think that Haley Barbour thought this plan out clearly. It has been said that the idea has been brought up in order to save money but in actuality money will not be saved but instead more money will be needed to make the change happen and to keep it up. I feel that by doing this merge it takes away from the history of each school. It defeats the purpose of all the hard work it took for us to get where we are now. Why can't ways be thought of to make more money to separately add to each school to make it better individually?

If we merge then it truly takes away from the college experience, the rival games and most importantly the history behind each college. I love my school--Jackson State University and I am pretty sure all the students that attend Alcorn and Valley love their schools as well. When I first heard about it I could tell that many people for against this and some were even highly upset about the idea. Once again I agree that it is time to have an honest discussion about our HBCU's. The idea has been thrown around that some of the community colleges should be closed down or merged. On that thought I do not feel that is necessary. Although, they are community colleges they too have history. But the idea to close down a few branches of the same community college would not be such a bad decision.

My mother is an alumni of Jackson State University. She was a senior at JSU when they had the Gibbs-Green shooting on the campus so she was apart of history. When I asked her about her views on the idea she said, "I feel that it shouldn't happen." She is totally against this. She then went on to tell why she felt that way, "because Jackson State is a historically black college and if he [Barbour] wants to merge something...why not Ole Miss and Mississippi State." Even my aunt who did not attend JSU is against the idea and I totally agree with them as well.

Television & The Holidays!

Every morning around 2 A.M. me and my aunt sit in the chair to watch Cold Case. I love Cold Case, CSI: Miami and Without a Trace. Basically any kind of show like those. Is television still the center of family activities? I would say yes. If we go buy a new movie we will all get around the living room and watch it. Or if one of our favorite shows are on we'll all watch it. Right now, as I write this we are sitting in the living room watching The Closer on TNT. My family just likes to watch television shows about mystery and solving cases. We're not really a sports family so at this time we're not watching the football game but maybe later on tonight.

On Monday, in no particular order, we watched the News, then it was a TV show named The World's Strictest Parents, Click and then I got on the computer to do some work and network. Later on I came back for the early morning routine of watching Cold Case. After their two shows I went to bed. I guess I like those shows so much because of how they go by finding the killer. Its always a joy in trying to figure out who did it and why. If I wasn't going into Mass Communication Forsenic Science would have been my next choice. On Tuesday, beside watching my routine episode of Monica: Still Standing on BET it was about the same as Monday and Wednesday as well. My brother came over and we watched some basketball game on television. On Thanksgiving day we ended up not watching the game. After we ate we sat around and talked and watched whatever was on the television that caught our attention.


My folks are some what just like me. We like to watch the same things maybe except for reality shows. The only time they watch those are when I am around. On Friday morning I got up early enough to watch Bringing Home Baby on TLC. Its another one of my favorite shows beside A Baby Story or the documentaries they show on that channel. Today is Saturday and I have watched several different shows. I think I woke up and started watching Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Throughout the evening my family and I flipped back and forth through the channels until I came across my favorite show The Game. It was the last episode of season 3 where Melanie (Tia Mowry) was getting married to Derwin (Pooch Hall). After that, Diary of a Mad Black Woman came on but I did not want to see that so I changed the television to watch Click again.


As I conclude this blog, nothing seems to be catching me and my aunt's attention so I think we're just going to watch The Incredibles, the cartoon movie about the family of crimefighting superhero's.

MC Practical: Family & Communication!

As I have spent quality time with my family over the Thanksgiving holiday I have paid close attention to how they communicate and the new media that they use. Over the break I was around my aunt and my parents the most. Each person has their own cell phone but the house phone is used more than anything. My aunt only uses her phone when she is out of the house but she stays on the house phone quite a lot. She doesn't have texting on her phone so she talks more. My dad does not too much use his cell phone nor does he use the house phone. He is more of a interpersonal communicator. When it comes to communication he doesn't too much use phones. My mom on the other hand has learn to text. So she uses the cell phone every now and then to talk and text but is mostly on the house phone as well. When someone texts her phone she'll text back. So talking and texting is equal with her.


No one in my immediate family is on Twitter or Facebook. You could say that they are technologically declined. No social networking for them. One day this week though my father attempted to search the net to look for some information on something. My mom is a little more computer illiterate then my dad and aunt but they have not yet to make their way to social networking. There are no computers in house besides my laptop when I come home. On Thanksgiving day my aunts son came over to eat. He is 49 years old and he frequents the social networks from time to time and uses his phone to talk, text and download ringtones. He has a Myspace and Facebook page. He doesn't too much change his status or update his page too often though.


Everybody in my house reads the newspaper regular. Especially my auntie and my mom. My dad doesn't read the newspaper that often but you can mostly find him with his reading glasses on and his face in a Tradewind magazine. We use to get the local paper sent to our house but it only comes out on Monday and Wednesday so they stopped getting it sent to the house. My cousin on the other hand, my aunt's son, stays in Alabama and he reads the newspaper everyday. My parents get their intake on whats going on from the news on TV. Over the break my mother listened to the radio. It was a gospel station that had a preacher doing a sermon. But they are always listening to the radio. In my family on my mother and I have iPods. She hardly uses hers though. The last time she did it was over the summer when she went on her daily walks. I use mines more than her though. When it comes to listening to music in my immediate family it is in the car with the cd player or on the music channel on TV.


All in all, the members in my family that I am mostly around the most when I am home are 50 and above. So, they are not really too equipped with the new media. They have cell phones but are not fully using it to it full advantages. My mom and dad know how to text better than my aunt does but my mom knows how to text better than my dad. Like I stated earlier they kind of know how to use the computer but are not internet smart. The only media that is used around this house with them are the TV, the radio, and cell phones.

MC Practical: Chris Brown's Upcoming Concert Tour!

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:


Jamilah Vaughn

Royal Phoenix PR Firm

662.888.0990

jamilah8828@yahoo.com

Chris Brown's Upcoming Concert Tour

R&B Sensation is Back At it Again

(MARKS, MS) -- November 26, 2009 --America's number one hearthrob, singer, actor and award winning Chris Brown is back at it again with his upcoming concert.The natural born entertainer is putting together The Fan Appreciation Tour-a 19-date trek that takes the "Forever" singer to intimate venues and clubs "conceptualized for and with 'fans only' in mind," starting in Houston on November 14th 2009 till December 15th 2009 at The Nokia's Theater in New York. Tickets will go on sale immediately.

Chris is no stranger to sold-out concerts and he is back to regain his title as arena's number one headliner. Chris wants to put on the tour for all his loving and supportive fans that stood by him during his time of absence due to the incident between him and his former girlfriend, Rihanna. A portion of the proceeds from the tour will be donated to Best Buddies International, a non-profit organization devoted to providing friendships, jobs and leadership opportunities for people with intellectual and developmental disabilities. A portion of the proceeds from the ticket sales will also go to The Jenesse Center, another not-for-profit organization.

Besides rewarding his fans by playing intimate venues, Chris Brown plans to meet his fans by offering special meet and greet opportunities. His junior album is set to be release sometime this year towards the end of the month. Dates will be posted later on for that and tour dates will as well. For more information you can go check out Chris's official website, chrisbrownworld.com or mechanicaldummy.com. #####

Sarah Palin's New Book

Alaska Politician Releases a Book

(MARKS, MISS)--November 10, 2009--Alaskan Governor who was Republican candidate for Vice President of the United States in 2008, Sarah Palin is releasing her first highly anticipated book titled, "Going Rogue: An American Life." It will be released on Tuesday, November 17th 2009. It will outline her path to presidency.

There will be interviews held. In a world exclusive, Oprah Winfrey will interview Sarah Palin for an episode on the Oprah Winfrey Show that is schedule to show Monday, November 16th 2009, a day before her book releases. This will their first time meeting and doing an interview. More information can be found on the oprah.com. ####

*Sending out press releases are one way to get information out about a celebrity or anybody who is trying to get promoted. Although this is one way there are other avenues to give your client the best possible media attention. A press kit is done, the publicist will book interviews for their client whether it is for a television show, for a magazine, or at a radio station. Clients can do public appearances such as book signings or meet and greets. Mostly anything that helps get the client none to the public. I am majoring in Mass Communication with a concentration in public relations so this is some of the things I will be doing for my clients. In this field I want to become a publicist who will work for a record label helping to perfect and promote the image's of artist (my clients). This is my dream job that I am so passionate about.

*Later on in life I want to be a public relations specialist and open up my own PR Firm. This is my dream job. Writing these press releases were kind of hard because I did not know what was actually suppose to go in them and what I was allowed to say or what was too much information. It was easier talking about Chris Brown because I am a fan and I know more information on hm than Sarah Palin. Hopefully as time passes and I get into my higher courses I will learn. It was interesting doing this assignment though.

MC Practical: Advertisement!

All day I have watched and paid attention to the advertisements on television. Lately all have seen were commercials on the upcoming sales different stores will be having on Black Friday. For example, everyday throughout the week each channel was showing Black Friday sales. Those stores include Best Buy, Circuit City, Walmart and even car dealerships. The one I saw the most of was the one for a shoe and clothing store named Okuns. Their sale was buy one, get one half off for everything.

The only newspaper I was able to read while over the break was Monday and Friday--The Panolian, a local newspaper for the Panola County area. There was an advertisement for Treasurer Loans which is a loan company. Another was for Caldwell Insurance, Johnson's Furniture and The Dickins Funeral Home in the Monday paper. There were a lot of diverse ads and markets in the newspaper. From Serta Mattresses to Insurance and Furniture store ads in the Friday paper. Although there was a wide range of ads both newspapers had the same ones. Since I could not come across any other newspapers I went through some magazines like Seventeen and the Cosmopolitan. In the back of the magazines there were a whole two pages of different ads, from Shampoo that will grow your hair longer and thicker in thirty days to stores that sold lingerie.

As for Television commercials and advertisements there was one on the Downy product. Another was Cash4Gold which was offering 25% more cash if you sent in your old jewelry. All this was VH1 while watching Trading Spouses on Monday night. As I was watching Forrest Gump on Spike TV there were commercials advertising JC Penny's and Payless. Majority of the advertisements were for upcoming movies like Precious and Armour which I hear are two great and highly anticipated movies.

I feel that in order to understand and scrutinize media advertising you do not need to be a critical consumer. But I would not like to go into this area in Mass Communication. For the most part as I watched all the advertisements they begin to repeat themselves. Even when I changed the channels.

Does The Media Act Responsibly? Ethically? Define Defamation.

Does the media act responsibly or ethically? Tough question. In order to answer this one must first know what rules the media follow or should follow to act resonsibly or ethically. I would say that the media does not act responsibly all the time. In some ways the media acts responsibly but that is rarely. Sometimes the media promotes what is called the "American Dream." They give people the false perceptions of how it is said people should look, live, act and what they should wear. For example, the media portrays the images of being skinny and having a model type body. People who are not skinny and unhappy with their weight look at those model images and look for ways to become that. For some people, they end up having a low-self esteem, being unhappy and even committing suicide. When in all honesty being skinny or big-boned is not bad as long as both types are healthy. When it comes to information like news and things that go on that may or can harm people then the media acts responsibly. An example of this would be for instance if something happened in your state or area that the police did not want the general public to know at the time, often to protect the integrity of an investigation or even to avoid embarrassment to their department. However, media representatives act under responsibility to present certain information regardless of the desires of the law officials. Here is an article talkin about the media not being ethical.

Does the media act ethically? Ethically is defined as being in accordance with the accepted principles of right and wrong that govern the conduct of a profession. Honestly, taking a wild guess I would say yes. The media does act ethically according to the definition. The media does have ethical obligations to present only the information they believe to be factual. In law, defamation is the communication of a statement that makes a claim expressly stated or implied to be factual. It is usually, but not always, a requirement that this claim be false and that the publication to communicated to someone other than the person defamed. It is also known as slander(for spoken words) and libel(for written or otherwise published words)

Edward Bernays?? ...& PR today!

The question this week is who Edward Bernays? Has todays PR changed or is it the same template? How did Tylenol use PR to save the company? Before I proceed to answer the blog topic I would like to say that I am excited that we are on Public Relations now because that is my field of study.

Edward Bernays was known as the father of Public Relations and an American pioneer in the field of Public Relation. Bernay was the first to attempt to manipulate public opinion using the subconscious. He felt this manipulation was necessary in society, which he regarded as irrational and dangerous as a result of the 'herd instinct'. Bernays was named one of the 100 most influential Americans of the 20th century by Life Magazine.

Has PR changed or is it the same? For the most part Public Relations is the same with more modern ways added to it. Public Relations is the practice of managing the communication between an organization and its publics. Public relations gains an organization or individual exposure to their audience using topic of public interest and news items that do not require direct payment. Traditional media publications are laying off journalist, consolidating beat reporters, shrinking their print editions, and many publications are shutting down entirely. It has been said that blogs are increasingly sprouting to replace traditional media with a more sustainable low-cost business model and are gaining more of a following. Blogs have a lower over-head costs than traditional media and are often said to provide better news coverage and analysis. The article link will provide those who do not know what PR is with more information.

"The Tylenol Crisis" is when Tylenol had several cases of people dying after they took Tylenol. Each Extra-Strength Tylenol capsule in question were each found to contain 65 milligrams of cyanide. The publicity about the capsules immediately caused a nationwide panic. After this crisis, Johnson & Johnson was faced with quite a dilemma. They needed to find the best way to deal with the tamperings, without destroying the reputation of their company and their most profitable product, Tylenol. Many marketing experts thought that Tylenol was doomed by doubts that the public may have had to whether or not the product was safe. "I don't think they can ever sell another product under that name," advertising genius Jerry Della Femina told the New York Times in the first days following the crisis. "There may be an advertising person who thinks he can solve this and if they find him, I want to hire him, because then I want him to turn our water cooler into a wine cooler'' said Knight. The public relations decisions made as a result of the Tylenol crisis, arrived in two phases. The first phase was the actual handling of the crisis. The comeback of both Johnson & Johnson and Tylenol, was the second phase in the public relations plan. The planning for phase two began almost as soon as phase one was being implemented. The company immediately alerted consumers across the nation, via the media, not to consume any type of Tylenol product. They told consumers not to resume using the product until the extent of the tampering could be determined. Johnson & Johnson, along with stopping the production and advertising of Tylenol, recalled all Tylenol capsules from the market. The recall included approximately 31 million bottles of Tylenol, with a retail value of more than 100 million dollars. The rest of the information can be found in this link: "The Tylenol Crisis".

New tools in the news!

What is news? Deciding what is newsworthy is not an exact science. News values are formed by tradition, organizational policy, and economics, and, more recently, by the digital revolution. Nonetheless, news is said to have five core elements that characterize new that is worthy. First it is timely. Yesterday's news is old news. No one really wants to hear about what happen yesterday but what happened earlier that same day. Secondly, its proximate, readers and viewers want to learn about their neighborhood, town, or country. Thirdly, news is prominent, the more important a person, the more valuable he or she is as a news source. Next, news is consequent, events that affect a great number or people have built-in news value. And lastly, it holds humans interest, those are stories that arouse some emotion in the audience--stories that are ironic, bizarre, uplifting, or dramatic.

The way news works in today's age is different from the past. As pointed out by Randy Reddick and Elliot King in The Online Journalist, in the past elite media organizations would send reporters to power centers and other locations where news usually happened to cover events. Today's reporters can sit at his or her desk and instantly access documents, databases, government records, and expert sources. There is really no more going out to look for news when they can just receive it at their desks. New skills are needed in order to make the most efficient use of the new tools. For example, the 21st century journalist must be able to perform Web searches, download data files and analyze them with spreadsheets, set up listservs, and use geographic mapping software. Those skills are generally lumped under the term computer-assisted reporting. Although the changes brought by the move to digital media are extensive, there are still some constants.

In my mass communications class we went to interview someone at a news station. Our interviewee gave us a tour around the place. In the production area we saw all the buttons on the production board. Tools that use to be used in the production room have changed or improved compared to what is used today. News stations now use the internet more than it use to be used. Most of all news stations have an online website. As for the news channel that I watched it did not seem biased or stereotypical. Now what news stations can do is report more news that people need or want to hear. Here's and research article on the topic: New news, old news.