Last Blog! News in The Daily Show

The Daily Show is a satirical news show and markets itself thus. Obviously, as a brand cobranded with the Comedy Central network, it knows its place in the media world, and does not pretend to be a serious news source. However, the Daily Show does have a niche in the news media culture that contributes to the serious news community because it so effectively uses sarcasm and wit to point out different angles in the news. Comedy is a technique that appeals greatly to me as a consumer, and if someone can make a rational point using comedy, I am often more likely to listen to that point than if that person presented the point with a straight laced approach.
      Recently, I have heard many comparisons between the union protests in Wisconsin and the protests in Egypt. While they both fall under the category of "political protests," the Wisconsin and Egypt situations could not be more different in scope or in practice. Here is a clip from the Daily Show a couple of nights ago critiquing this comparison:
http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/tue-february-22-2011/wisconsin-budget-protests
This is pretty hilarious and quite clever. John Oliver (the "Daily Show correspondent" covering the story) uses sarcasm to force the protestors creating the link between Egypt and Wisconsin to deflate their own comparison. Now, I would have seen rationally that these two events are not nearly as linked as they are made out to be if an anchor on national television had pointed out the divide. However, watching someone unveil the irony in the way that Oliver was able to do was, to me, significantly more effective than the previous method. I feel that often, the Daily Show makes a mockery of the images and comparisons produced by the mainstream media. However, they do not receive the same flak for challenging that media status quo because they are billed as a comedy show. Thus they are at liberty to point out the ridiculousness  of any language suggested to the mainstream media or to politicians by consultants like Frank Luntz without worrying about their image being tarnished. In a comedic news show, the whole point IS to challenge the status quo. In this particular example, John Oliver points out the ridiculousness of the comparisons between the Wisconsin situation and the Egypt situation. Through the eyes of all those who watch the Daily Show, this destroys the credibility of media outlets using this comparison. In this sense, the Daily Show serves an important purpose in elucidating manipulative or false language in the media. And while the show markets itself comedically, it often has something powerful to say about the hard hitting stories important to the mainstream media.

New York Times Depiction of Lybia

The Arab world is in turmoil. Over the past few weeks, the media has made something of a bonanza of the increasing belligerence in Tunisia, Lybia, Bahrain, Yemen, and Egypt. As these crises have developed, the American media has promoted different images and themes to portray the events in different countries. While the success of uprisings in Egypt and Tunisia successfully overthrew dictatorial regimes, similar efforts in Lybia and Bahrain have not yet produced the same triumph. In fact, Lybian protestors have been brutally quelled by the Qaddafi and his hired mercenaries. From what I have seen, the American media has been quite up front in portraying the despair of this movement, despair that contrasts sharply with the celebrations in Egypt and Tunisia.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/27/world/africa/27libya.html?ref=world

This is an article I read in the New York Times today. While the article itself is interesting, I thought the picture was of special note in seeing the New York Times's presentation of the situation in Lybia. This man is solitary. He is separated from the group behind him, struggling alone in his quest to find food (his age makes me think that he is probably trying to provide for a family). Secondly, he is carrying food, a life necessity, and given the title of the article which references "Long Bread Lines," he most likely invested serious effort to obtain the food he carries. The people crowd behind him probably waits in the same line he did to get their bread. The sweat on his furrowed brow glistens in the sunlight, and he looks defeated, his eyes downcast, his eyebrows angled down in seriousness, and his mouth drooping slightly trying to gain air. Rubble litters the ground around him, and physical obstacles in the form of makeshift barricades obstruct his path back to home. He carries the loaves of bread he holds as if they were an infant, as if losing his grasp would result in death or serious injury. If I trust the headline, this might be the only food this man will receive on this day or maybe even for a few days. One word comes to mind when I see this picture: struggle. The effort in Lybia is a struggle, both physically and mentally. Even men like this, with enough time to shape impeccably trimmed mustaches, have difficulty finding the means to provide for themselves and their families. This is far from the jubilant portrayal of the Egyptian gallantry during the fall of Mubarak. If this photo accurately describes Lybia, protestors against Qaddafi are in trouble. 

The Local Business

In this course we have discussed advertising by enormous corporations that have a high stake in the media Americans consume on a daily basis. However, I want to focus this post on commercials on a more local, insulated level. Ultimately commercials all have the same goal: to cause consumers to buy their products. In all scales of advertising, companies want to create brand loyalty for their consumers. In the 21st century, advertising giants tend to pursue this by promoting a lifestyle or a set of emotions rather than a product. As a result of huge advertising budgets and extensive market reach, these companies have the ability to target particular subsets of the population and create ads that will jive mesh with the lifestyle that demographic idealizes. Thus, these ads do not necessarily have to be as informative as they need to be clever or carefully planned. What, then, about local companies, whose markets reach a small, geographically predetermined section of the population? Because of their limited advertising budget and their limited audience, these companies often focus more on down to earth, informative presentations of their businesses. The small size of the companies also means they are more concerned about spreading information about their companies, rather than spreading feelings like already established corporate giants try to do. However, this informational style utilized out of necessity by many small businesses also promotes a way of life: simple, homey, old-fashioned, small-town American. 

     One of my favorite youtube channels is the Rhett and Link channel. Rhett and Link are two comedians from North Carolina who began on youtube by making commercials for local businesses recommended to them by people across the country. While Rhett and Link intentionally make the commercials ridiculous, the youtube community has greeted them with almost unanimous praise. Here are a couple of their commercials: 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vnOyMSEWNTs

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J3v4nC3iuMo&feature=relmfu

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K3HnFfS9iSI&feature=relmfu

These commercials were clearly very low budget. They are all shot on facility at the stores. They are all rather quirky and unorthodox. Yet they all have more than 100,000 views on youtube, and the Red House commercial has over 2.5 millions views. All of these stores are now internet celebrities and have benefited greatly from the publicity (here is an article talking about the sudden celebrity status of the Red House after the commercial was released: http://www.furnituretoday.com/article/529177-Red_House_Furniture_goes_viral.php). Personally, I find all of them really entertaining, and they all make me want to go to those stores. Why are they so successful as local commercials? First and foremost, Rhett and Link give all these businesses identities. The Red House is the place where people of all races get along. The Discount Seafood Warehouse is where you can find clean, fresh, cheap seafood variety. Bobby Denning furniture is where you can say goodbye to high prices. These commercials are also funny. They do a really effective job at keeping the watcher entertained, and however much their intention is to poke fun at the traditional local commercial and to poke fun at the businesses themselves, these commercials generate immense amounts of (good) publicity for the target businesses. And while they fall into the more "informative" category versus the more "thematic"category often used by bigger businesses, they still manage to produce a brand identity. If I were a local businesses, I would pray Rhett and Link chose me for my next local commercial. 

Albert Pujols: Super Brand

Come on. Really Albert? You are asking for thirty million dollars a year for ten years. Thirty million dollars every year. For a decade. Are you insane? Today, you reached your announced deadline for the negotiations with the Cardinals, your team, surrounding your contract extension, and of course, they did not agree to your ludicrous demands. Do you know the talent they could acquire for your proposed three hundred MILLION dollar contract? Until now I have, with a few exceptions, accepted the ridiculous salaries in baseball. You, however have crossed the line. Do you really think you are a 300 million dollar baseball player?

The simple answer to the question above: no. No baseball player, even one who bats .330 with forty home runs and 120 RBI's per year like Albert, is worth paying thirty million dollars per year to hit the ball and run around the bases. Albert Pujols the player is not worth anywhere near what the Cardinals pay him. Albert Pujols the brand is. Specifically, his brand name is worth that money to the Cardinals baseball organization. Over the past ten years, Pujols has become the face of the St. Louis franchise. He has appeared on the cover of Sports Illustrated, has starred in many advertisements for his endorsers (Nike, ESPN, Wheaties, etc.) Here is one of them: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5m5-M2YE3os. With this commercial, not only does Albert Pujols generate a huge amount of publicity for himself, he also promotes the team whose logo appears on his chest. To be honest, I watch the Cardinals because they have Albert Pujols. Sales of his jersey alone must generate literally millions of dollars a year for the Cardinals organization. I would say his presence alone causes more people worldwide to watch Cardinals baseball than any other part of the Cardinals team. As a baseball fan, I expect to see Albert in a Cardinals uniform. He would look totally out of place in a Cardinals uniform, and the Cardinals would look totally out of place without him in their uniform. This symbiosis means that, while any team would pay millions of dollars to have Pujols the player and the brand, the Cardinals have an extra incentive. He is a great player. I am by no means dissing the abilities of perhaps the greatest hitter since Ted Williams. However, the 300 million dollar contract he requests could easily pay for equal or greater talent. However, the Cardinals certainly cannot replace Pujols's identity as an icon and a brand, a brand that will  (in my opinion) soon guarantee that it is cobranded with the Cardinals for the next decade at a price of 300 million dollars. 

Doritos: Chips that Provide Life

I like laughing. Laughing is relaxing, enjoyable, and usually done with other people. Because of laughing's good effects on people, humor is an incredibly successful marketing technique when used correctly. A funny commercial, although still nothing more than a commercial, is much more watchable than a standard humorless one. Somehow, however, only a few companies manage to effectively use humor in their advertisements. In the super bowl, I thought Doritos, the Darth Vader commercial, and beer commercials were the funniest ads of the program. My personal favorite: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tSTEFK-LoVo. I laughed pretty hard at this the first time I saw it. To be honest, it made me want to buy Doritos. It WORKED. Doritos uses its humor really cleverly here. First of all, the whole premise of the commercial is that the friend watching his buddy's house for him is too lazy to stop eating Doritos and get off the couch to do the tiny number of menial tasks his friend asks him to carry out while he is away. This appeals to the (masculine) desire to bum around and do nothing on the couch, and then get caught in a tight spot right before the friend (or, in other terms, the wife) gets home. The commercial uses builds and releases of comedic tension. Just as you think that Doritos has saved the day with the fish and the flowers, the klutzy friend knocks over grandpa's ashes, which spill all over the floor. Of course, again, Doritos swoops in and ameliorates this sticky wicket. The cut to the grandpa on the couch without showing the friend sprinkling the Doritos on the ashes adds more to the comic suspense the commercial creates. 

     Why is this commercial so effective? What does the Doritos brand have to say about itself in this commercial? Well first and foremost, it sells itself to young men. The commercial features two young men as the main protagonists. It appeals to the laziness of young men. It also uses conspicuous consumption to its advantage (did you notice how nice and put together the apartment or house looks for a 20 some year old guy?). Doritos brands itself as a fixer. If you have a problem, just relax and have some Doritos and your problems will all go away. Not only that, you might even discover that the Doritos fix something else (grandpa) that you were not expecting. Doritos also markets itself as a product associated with leisure and couch-potato behavior. What could be better than popping a squat on your couch with a back full of cheesy Doritos, and letting the Doritos take care of your problems? On top of all this, the commercial makes Doritos feel hip and cool because it effectively appeals to our humor. If you eat Doritos, you will be a young guy who sits on his couch and doesn't have problems that Doritos can't solve. Who knows, maybe even they will even raise you from the dead like grandpa. 

Case Study: Why We Forgive

Mark Wahlberg has become one of the most celebrated actors of the 20th and 21st centuries. Whether starring alongside Leonardo DiCaprio in The Departed or Will Ferrell in The Other Guys, Wahlberg has proved that he has the appeal and the versatility to play many different roles on set. He is in every sense a celebrity icon. Like many celebrities of his stature, Wahlberg has a devoted following. In my own group of friends, he is universally liked and respected. Yet violence and anger stain Wahlberg's past. As a teenager growing up in Dorcester, Wahlberg beat a middle aged Vietnamese man unconscious in an unprovoked outburst of racial hatred, permanently blinding the man in one eye. During Wahlberg's teenage and young adult years, the Boston police reportedly arrested him between 20 and 25 times for crimes that ranged from cocaine possession to assault to attempted murder. Wahlberg frequently ridiculed racial minority groups, and reportedly used racist language during many of his assaults. In his early 20's, however, Wahlberg abruptly changed his lifestyle, relinquishing his violent past and focussing his energy on his acting and producing career. He has since established himself as one of the most successful and prolific actors in America.
     While Mark Wahlberg has accomplished a great deal in his acting career, I wonder why I and the rest of society choose to forgive him for his past grievances. After all, his transgressions in youth match or even transcend those of Joseph Rakes, the supposedly soft-spoken subject of Stanley Forman's pulitzer prize winning photograph, do they not? Why, then, does Joseph Rakes still live under the shadow of his youthful anger, and Wahlburg has been able to transcend his violent and racist behavior? The answer lies in two of the concepts we have discussed this term: branding and worthiness. Mark Wahlburg is an important man. He endorses products (Calvin Klein, for example). He stars in movies, and produces ENORMOUS revenues for movie companies. The media (by means of the advertising filter) has every incentive to market Mark Wahlburg as a person worth emulating, as a good image of Wahlburg benefits the goals of advertisers who use him as a marketing tool. The movie industry also wants to keep Wahlburg's image in a good light for financial reasons because they need to promote his brand for their brands. As for the people who already know about Wahlburg's past, we tend to overlook many of his wrongdoings because we like his movie characters and his close-up shots at the Academy Awards, in which he appears elegantly dressed and smiling. We assume that, because he is a person respected by the movie industry and the mainstream media, he deserves our respect as well. Also, we find it easy to ignore Wahlberg's past because of his efforts to change his old ways (the fairy tale story of converting from the dark side and thus gaining the ability to ignore past evils is such an American, Starwars image, ingrained into our heads from such a young age that it is immensely difficult to question). In contrast, Joseph Rakes, who grew up in the same racially charged time period as Wahlberg, cannot overcome the demons of his past because he does not provide the people in power with an incentive to vindicate him. To twist Chomsky's definition of "unworthy victim," Rakes is a victim unworthy of absolution because his absolution provides no benefit to the one responsible for his acquittal. Rakes has one claim to fame: his portrait in Forman's photograph, and that he has been branded with that identity. Wahlberg can escape this image because others have had a desire to brand him differently.

Save the Planet

I think George Carlin is an existential genius of comedy. While I try not to adopt his cynical, jaded perspective on the world, I often find myself agreeing with his message. This is a video of one of Carlin's unmistakable diatribes regarding climate change and "saving the planet:"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eScDfYzMEEw
Of course Carlin's argument is riddled with logical fallacies. People do not actually worry every minute of the day about the earth's air quality. Pollution does cause significant suffering for animal species other than homo sapiens. Yet Carlin brings up a number of points that do legitimately force me to examine the stigma around pollution and climate change. Ultimately, what DOES it matter if the climate changes? As Carlin points out, nature has no planned course. Nature does not have disdain for plastic, or any other pollutant. What if our purpose on this planet WAS to invent plastic? For two billion years, earth had no mechanism for breaking down wood. Ultimately, however, nature found a way for wood to decompose. Who is to say that in a few million years, plastic-eating bacteria will not evolve and support more life on earth than wood does now?
         Amid his twisted logic, I completely agree that the whole "save-the-planet" movement is based not around regard for the planet itself, but for the people living on the planet at this moment. We have evolved to be a self-centered species. After all, does the natural process of evolution not denote that in order for a species to survive they must be willing and able to work in their own self-interest? Let me give an example. Suppose you consider yourself an environmentally aware individual. You are faced with two options: you continue having access to your car or you have your car taken away for so called "environmental reasons." Of course, you would choose to keep your car. While this might seem like an absurd example, it illustrates how fundamentally dependent we are on industry that cannot help but pollute the planet. Even hybrid cars rely on batteries powered by electricity, the majority of which, at its origin, is generated by coal or oil based power plants. With our increasing expectation of standard of living increases (as well as the effects of such economic forces as the Jevons paradox, which I outlined in a blog a few weeks ago), I feel completely hopeless in this campaign to lower carbon emissions. I will do it for economic reasons (i.e. lower my payments or those of PA), but I find it hard to convince myself that turning off my computer speakers when I leave my room will make any difference to the state of the environment. And as Carlin points out, who gives a shit? The planet will recover. Even if our carbon emissions raise the temperature of the atmosphere, life will adjust. It might take thousands or millions of years, during which time humanity dies out. But Carlin points out rightly that we are by no means the worst disaster earth has witnessed in 4.5 billion years. I know this post has little to do with a specific news story in the news this week, but I feel it addresses a prevailing attitude in modern society that I, like Carlin, believe is arrogant and misleading. I would greatly prefer "Preserve the Planet" or "Save the Human Way of Life."

Beer Commercial: Get the Girl or Get the Beer

Beer commercials often take the prize as the most entertaining of all advertisements. The beer companies compete heavily among one another to run the funniest ads. One of my personal favorites is this Miller Light ad
 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zil1j9S0Oe8
In my humble opinion, advertisers inundate viewers with irritating commercials for corny dating sites on television, and I thought the initially mundane appearance of the commercial was hilarious in contrast with the surprise ending, which reveals Miller Light as the product being advertised. What is this commercial really saying though? It used to be that a typical beer commercial followed a plot-line along these lines: Guy sees babe, guy has beer, guy performs ridiculous stunt to give beer to babe, babe likes beer, guy gets babe. Here is an example of a commercial from the mid 2000's that follows this rubric:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YUjGayIkI6g
The Miller Light commercial, however, changes the structure of the old-school beer commercial. Here is the progression of the new wave of beer commercials: guy has babe, guy has beer, guy has choice between beer and babe, guy ALWAYS chooses beer. Beer advertisers have always directed their commercials at a  masculine audience. However, it used to be that men drank the beer in the commercials in order to get the woman. Now the man drinks the bear INSTEAD of getting the woman. What kind of message does that send to a viewer? It seems that beer companies are trying to tell me it is perfectly acceptable to completely ignore a woman (even my girlfriend) in favor of my beer. What's more, is alcohol not supposed to be a social drug? If beer companies are telling me I am supposed to drink my beer and ignore the social aspect, what is the point of having a beer unless I intend to drink 5 more by myself to get drunk? I would be a fantastic source of revenue for the beer company if I acted that way, would I not? Of course, beer companies also appeal to the male desire to do manly things like lie on a couch and watch football with other male friends. Here is a famous Budweiser commercial that ran during the Super Bowl a few years back:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mO1NyXlnL84
In one commercial, Budweiser constructs an all male, football-watching, couch-lounging, "bro-chilling," inside-joking environment. As a guy, I must admit that this is a tremendously appealing image. There are few things I enjoy more than hanging out on my couch watching football with a few friends (minus the beer of course). However, when this masculine image enters and reenters the media feedback loop to the point that the beer transcends the significance of a girl or even a girlfriend (not to mention the jaw-dropping looks of the girls in the advertisements), I question the motives and the morality of the beer company. While the masculinized environment the beer advertisements put forth appeal to my sense of manhood, I still think that Miller Light commercials, while they do provide me with thirty seconds of quality mid-program entertainment, need to be more aware of the message they are sending people.

Explosion in Davos: Media Study of Fox vs. NY Times Vs. Washington Post

    Earlier today, a small boiler room explosion shattered a number of windows at a hotel in Davos, the site of the World Economic Forum's annual meeting. While no one was hurt, this event drew attention from virtually every major media source I checked as part of my daily perusal of the news. First of all, I found it interesting that an event that elicited not "so much as a jostle or a wince" according to one eyewitness. Considering the importance of corporate sponsorship (especially advertising) in news broadcasting, the only explanation I can conjure for such intent coverage on such an insignificant event would be that the news corporations want to increase their demonstrated level of concern for corporations so as to gain the approval of the high powered executives at the Davos conference. Secondly, I found decidedly different accounts of the story as I switched between news sources. For example, both the New York Times reported that the police recieved a message from an "Italian activist" website claiming responsibility for the explosion, but had yet to verify the integrity of the source. The Washington post neglected to report any claim of responsibility, insisting that "police said it was caused by fireworks."
     Fox News differed dramatically from the Times and the Post in reporting its story. In the subheading of the article as it appeared on the website, Fox alleged that "Left-wing activists claimed responsibility for a minor explosion on Thursday at a hotel in Davos, close to where top executives and world leaders were meeting, but nobody was hurt." This claim, which appeared as the first sentence in the article, not only verifies the source that the Times said Swiss police had not yet validated, but it also introduces political dichotomization into the issue with the use of the phrase "left-wing." As we discussed in class today, this rhetoric is so deeply ingrained into American media consumers that the readers of this article instinctively identify the perpetrators of this explosion with a Democratic agenda. Of course, Fox news is known as having a fairly strong conservative bias, just as the Post and the Times are known for having more liberal biases (although not nearly as pronounced as Fox's conservative slant). The use of this language in Fox's material helps to forward its own political agenda set forth by the ownership, whereas the liberally leaning Post and Times have no incentive to use such language because of the ownership's traditionally liberal bias.
     Fox news also had a short video segment they ran with the story on their website. In the segment, a business reporter in Davos elaborates on the event, and gives a report of an eye-witness account. While an eyewitness account seems like a perfectly reliable source in a story like this, I found it interesting that the reporter asserted the source's American nationality quite adamantly (she states this Americanness three times in a video that runs for less than two minutes). I found it curious that the source might be viewed as more reliable simply because of its American affiliation (after all, every person at the forum is high level or CEO level and probably a reliable source of such information). The Davos explosion blatantly advertises the variously skewed reporting supplied by the Times, the Post, and Fox news.

Fox Article: http://www.foxbusiness.com/markets/2011/01/27/minor-explosion-davos-hotel-injuries-reported/ (video is a link)
NYTimes: http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2011/01/27/small-blast-at-davos-hotel-shatters-glass-and-calm/?scp=12&sq=davos&st=cse
Post: http://voices.washingtonpost.com/davos-diary/2011/01/me_and_the_bomb.html

Husain Haqqani

     I sometimes surprise myself at how small a percentage of interesting opportunities I pursue at Andover. While I am often busy, to this point I have surprisingly rarely taken the initiative to attend lectures and events featuring distinguished outside speakers. Tonight, by chance, I attended the commons dinner with Husain Haqqani, the Pakistani ambassador to the United States. While I hadn't originally intended to go, I somewhat accidentally RSVPed yes when one of my friends posted the event on his Facebook status. After attending, I could not be more grateful that I mistakenly signed up. Ambassador Haqqani spoke engagingly and articulately, answering our questions with ingenuousness and clarity rarely see in politicians. Through his thick Pakistani accent, I perceived a man simply oozing with knowledge and intelligence, eager to contribute towards social and political progress in Pakistan and in the world. The Ambassador provided a fresh perspective on Pakistan and the rest of Asia and the Middle East with rhetoric untarnished by any of the five filters of media with which we have grown so accustomed. The degree to which I enjoyed my dinner with Mr. Haqqani, a dinner I shared with about thirty other PA students, compels me to wonder why I do not take advantage of more opportunities like this one.
      During dinner, I had the opportunity to ask Mr. Haqqani how the political and social environments in Pakistan changed after the assassination of former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto in 2008. I distinctly remember the American media's portrayal of the event as a woeful tragedy that sent "shockwaves" all throughout the Asia and the world. I remember the media talking about Bhutto's bravery and goodness as if she were infallible, almost goddess-like, and how the assassination was a major setback in the "War on Terror" in Pakistan. Yet while it is true that Bhutto was a vital part of the Pakistani fight against the Taliban and al-Qaeda, the Ambassador gave a slightly different story of Pakistan's reaction to Bhutto's assassination. He first pointed out that Bhutto's status as a symbol of change in Pakistan transcended politics, meaning that while she was not always a perfect politician with perfect policy beliefs, her status as the first female prime minister in Pakistan meant that she would automatically garner a great deal of Pakistani support regardless of her flaws as a person or a politician. Mr. Haqqani went on to say that Ms. Bhutto's death dramatically increased support for her political party (of which Mr. Haqqani is a member), and actually allowed her party to gain significant seats in the next parliamentary election. I remember little or no talk of these beneficial repercussions of Bhutto's death in the media. Mr. Haqqani's sincere and frank response to my question somewhat took me by surprise. I hardly expected a proponent of political change and progress in Pakistan to highlight the good aspects of the death of such an important icon.
      As a final note, I thought it was interesting to see how readily Mr. Haqqani challenged U.S. policy in Pakistan. He blatantly criticized the U.S. for over-investing in the Pakistani military and not encouraging Pakistan to increase infrastructure, which he proclaimed is the real agent of security in Pakistan. The governmental/informational dependency filter in Chomsky prevents the U.S. media from such forthcoming reproach of U.S. foreign policy. Overall, I found Mr. Haqqani's visit to Andover thought provoking and intriguing, and it makes me question why I don't more consistently take advantage of the resources available for me to increase my own education here at Andover.

The Jevons Paradox

On today's New York Times website, I found a business article entitled, "In New N.Y.U. Plant, a Collateral Carbon Benefit," which discusses a recently opened New York City power plant that "it gets almost three times as much useful energy out of a unit of fuel as a typical utility power plant does" (http://green.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/01/21/in-new-n-y-u-plant-a-collaterial-carbon-benefit/?ref=energy-environment). The article goes on to discuss that this new technology is beneficial for earths atmosphere, and may be essential to cutting carbon emissions and slowing global warming. After all, fuel efficiency does mean fewer emissions, right? A month ago I would have most likely adamantly agreed with this assertion and condoned the use of the new technology in all power plants across the nation. However, a subject of discussion in a recent economics class has caused me to be more reserved in seeing absolute benefits in the application of this new technology. This economic concept is called the Jevons Paradox, and, while unproven, it provides an interesting lens through which to look at the concept of fuel efficency.

       The Jevons Paradox stipulates that an increase in efficiency does not necessarily result in a decrease in the negative external consequences of a certain industry. Pretend someone invents a machine that makes the process of extracting energy from burning coal twice as efficient, meaning that the people dependent on coal based energy get twice as many kilowatt hours per lump of coal than they did previously. Now of course, if people's habits and consumption stayed constant, this new coal-burning machine would mean emissions from coal burning, one of the chief sources of pollution and greenhouse gas, would be cut by 50 percent. However, other forces play into this scenario. This new efficiency would significantly increase the supply of coal-based energy. This increase in supply would induce a lowered price of coal-based energy. This drop in price, in turn, would dramatically increase the quantity of coal based energy demanded, both by corporations and by personal residencies. Also, the lower price of energy for corporations would enable companies to produce goods at a lower price, which would increase the quantity of these products demanded by consumers. This new demand would inspire companies to consume even more energy to produce more goods so they satisfy the market. The Jevons paradox states that this coal required to meet this increase in consumption, both of coal itself and of the merchandise produced by coal-based energy, can be enough to completely cancel out the gains in efficiency made by the new machinery. In other words, the lower price of the more efficient energy causes people to use SO much more of the more efficient energy that emissions stay the same or even rise. After hearing the implications put forth by the Jevons Paradox, I find it difficult to believe any news source that says an increase in efficiency leads to an indisputable lowering of emissions, whether the article addresses an increase in the efficiency of coal or of any other energy resource. I cannot deny that economics class has turned me into a significantly more cynical person when it comes to the issue of climate change because of the intricate balance that holds our economic world together. While I would love to believe that the New York Times is a perfectly authoritative source on the issue of energy and climate change, the Jevons Paradox compels me to question the accuracy and the truth of articles triumphantly proclaiming new innovative methods for energy efficiency as agents for lowering climate change. 

Music and Manipulation

As I have watched the news over the past few weeks, I have begun to notice more and more the effect that music has on me as a viewer. Nearly every news show or network has an overly dramatic, quasi-epic theme song that provides me with a subconscious mindset as I watch the news. For example, here is the CNN theme song that they play during promotional advertisements for their network, and for introductions to their nightly news program:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nwasO3udSqQ
This next clip is a clip of the theme song to the 1996 action film, "The Rock," featuring Sean Connery and Nicholas Cage (two of the most prolific action stars of the modern movie era).
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FPrHH3DOaSE
In my humble opinion, the CNN theme has an even more cinematically epic feel to it than the theme for the action film. The inflated spectacle of the music before these news programs compels me to imagine action in the newscast similar to that in an action movie with a similar musical score. The tone this music sets for the newscast means that CNN must maintain a similar level of energy in their newscast as they maintain in the theme music or run the risk of boring their viewing constituency. CNN must, to some degree, keep their stories sensationally and emotionally stimulating if they wish to preserve this intensity. In contrast, NPR, a public radio station, has a much lower key attitude with regards to its theme music. Here is a collection of NPR themes:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0MU6K8MBr78
While these theme songs are by no means completely mundane, they produce a much less adrenaline-ized buildup and thus influence me to hear their news broadcasts with a much less dramatic expectations. Of course, I understand that CNN has corporate and monetary motives while NPR has much less emphasis on these thing, but that does little to change my view that the music skews my perception of the news.
        As I have contemplated the topic of music in media, I have realized more and more how profoundly music affects my day to day perception. A walk from the Sam Phil steps back to Pease House listening to this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4P9mmZyGb4s makes for a dramatically different experience than the same walk listening to this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G3DJhwAhrjY. As I look back on many of my most memorable experiences, I realize that music has skewed my perception of a great number. For example, my most vivid memory of last spring occurred as I sat on the great lawn playing the acoustic song in the link above on my guitar, watching the sun set. I have seen many sunsets and I have spent countless hours playing guitar outside, but that particular moment stands out in my mind because the music I was hearing affected my ability to glean beauty from my surroundings. Music has a subtle and undeniable affect on memory and on my view of life and the news.

Which Side is the Dark Side?

On Wednesday, Hezbollah, a Shiite Muslim militant group and political party based in Lebanon, effectively dismantled the Lebanese government by resigning from the Lebanese Cabinet of which it composed a significant portion. Hezbollah, considered a largely hostile force by the United States (namely the military), has come under fire from many different publications as "paralyzers" (New York Times) and "Iranian-backed" (Fox News), both images that hold negative connotations in our society. Yet as I have seen this topic, which is of significant global importance, discussed in the media over the last couple of days, the issue of perspective has been prominent in my mind. In Borges's Everything and Nothing, Shakespeare appears a vulnerable and identity-less character, far from the grandiose image his name generally conjures. As Borges's account proves, one's interpretation of Shakespeare depends greatly on the criteria for judging his character. Rather than interpreting him through his work and mental genius, Borges looks at Shakespeare the man through his human quest for self-understanding. In many of the articles I have read on the Lebanon crisis, journalists have chosen to look at Hezbollah's actions through the lens of the United States, and the interests of the U.S. and its allies. The Fox News's website's most prominently displayed article on this matter, entitled "Israel troops on alert after Lebanon government fails," shifts the focus from the actual events in Lebanon to their effects on the U.S. interests in the Middle East. Few, however, take the Borges approach and analyze the reasons behind Hezbollah's actions and their stance.
      I read a book a few years ago called "Dreams and Shadows" by Robin Wright, an eminent journalist who has written for many publications including The New Yorker and Time magazine. In her book, Wright talks about Hezbollah's rise to power in Lebanon. According to her, while Hezbollah began as a radical militant group, it emerged in the mid 2000's as a legitimate grassroots political and social organization. Hezbollah provided healthcare, education, employment, and opportunity for many in Lebanon who otherwise would not have had access to these resources. From the angle of many Lebanese, Hezbollah has been a savior and a foundation in unstable times. Yet most U.S. newspapers choose to focus on the negative and terroristic acts of Hezbollah rather than the good they have done for the country, and while its contribution to the collapse of the Lebanese government over the past few days has significantly decreased Hezbollah's legitimacy, U.S. publications still take an entirely negative perspective on the organization. One of the New York Times's articles is entitled "Hezbollah's Latest Suicide Mission," language charged to invoke the image of an evil terrorist organization in the reader. This kind of charged language, while it is certainly justifiable from the U.S. perspective, takes into account none of the good that Hezbollah has provided for the Lebanese. The article only briefly discusses the reasons for Hezbollahs' withdrawal (objection to U.N. indictments of several members over the murder of prime minister Rafik Hariri in 2005), while harping on the militancy and power-hungry nature of the organization, using words like "power-drunk," "militant," and "destabilizing." While Hezbollah has committed its fair share of heinous crimes and contributed to the violence in the Middle-East, these articles present the story as a too one-dimensional occurrence by a too one-dimensional organization. So far, I have seen little evidence that anyone has made any effort to follow in Borges's footsteps and challenge the decidedly wicked presentation of Hezbollah in this story.
      

A Photographer's Pencil: The Tucson Shootings

In On Photography, Susan Sontag quotes Fox Talbot, a photographic innovator in the 19th century, with the assertion that photography is a "natural image...without any aid whatsoever from the artist's pencil" (88). While Sontag goes on to recognize and explain the artistic qualities of photographs and how perspective and context contribute to the weight of a photograph, her book's publishing date limits her ability to recognize the degree of irrelevance of Talbot's claim with regards to 21st century photography. Sontag's inclusion of this quote by Talbot without direct contradiction is misleading when looking at photography of the last decade. Before I lived in a dorm with Yuto Watanabe, the head of photography for the Phillipian and an active freelance photographer, I might have believed Talbot's assertion to be perfectly applicable to the modern times. However, after watching Yuto process photos for the Phillipian and for his personal and modeling photoshoots, I have grown skeptical that any photo in the news is free of Photoshop's mark.

        Yuto tells me that nearly every photo in fashion magazines, catalogues, and the news is photoshopped to express the message the publisher intends. These edits range from subtle or almost unnoticeable to blatant, egregious shifts in the subject matter. For example, here is the photo that the New York Times ran of Arizona killer Jared Loughner:

 http://www.nytimes.com/imagepages/2011/01/11/us/11loughner_75.html

In contrast, here is the photo run by ABC news:

http://abcnews.go.com/US/jared-loughner-alleged-tucson-shooting-gunman-appears-court/story?id=12580344

Looked at seperately, these photos appear almost identical. Despite different cropping, one could mistake them for exactly the same unaltered photo. However, if one looks at the photos side by side, the New York Times photo (which I gather from its widespread appearance in other news sources is the original mugshot of the suspect) has a more wan, yellowed tint, and looks slightly out of focus, as if an amateur mugshot photographer took the picture. The ABC photo, however, has some Photoshopped post processing that turns down the yellow and brings out the more natural color  in Loughner's face. Why would ABC choose to spend time editing a mugshot photo? ABC's photo looks more adroitly crafted, and appears sharper and more crafted than the New York Times photo, so perhaps ABC wanted to put forth a more polished image to subtly draw in news watchers. However, this slight alteration in the photo significantly skews interpretation in that the yellowed, sickly, out-of-focus look of the Times picture gives the reader a less human sense of the suspect, whereas the focussed, sharp construction of ABC's picture adds a tad of dignity to the suspect's maniacal grin. This slight difference has a subtle effect on the reader, and might be completely dismissed or ignored if the reader did not have external knowledge on modern photography outside of that with which Sontag provides us about Talbot's quote. In this subtle way, I felt that Sontag (through Talbot) somewhat misleeds her reader. 

Photos

Like many kids, I used to believe that the world before 1950 or so was a black and white world, as evidenced by the grayscale photographs I routinely saw from that time period. Things looked drab in this "Pleasantville" or "Giver" world without color, and in my little boy way, I rejoiced in the fact that people discovered color before my lifetime began. As I have grown older, I have of course shed my amusingly naive beliefs. Yet I am often surprised at how my interpretation of pre-color photograph life remains the same. While intellectually I understand that the world of that time mirrors the world of today in a multitude of ways, my view of life and culture is skewed by the colorlessness of the photographs through which I connect to that previous time period. Adding to my interpretation is the rigidity of many photographs from the early 20th century. People look serious, almost somber, even in family portraits and summer camp staff photos. I find it difficult to imagine that people sent pictures of their unsmiling families to each other as christmas cards. I still find it awkward to picture that time period in color, as I have attained my entire perspective from a colorless collage.
         While photography has been an essential piece of the media and of my exposure to the unknown, I find that it somewhat bounds my ability to imagine. I have seen photographs of awe inspiring mountain landscapes, and beautiful sunsets over snow speckled conifers in the upper reaches of Canada's Rocky Mountains. Amid all this access to nature, can anything remain untouched by the human eye? I sometimes wonder if it would be possible for me to travel to a place on earth that no person could just as easily travel to on google images. Of course, I appreciate the ability to so easily stand a few hundred yards from the summit of the Matterhorn without leaving the safety of my desk chair. However, this ease of access to such stunning photographs is a double edged sword, as experience in the flesh becomes a comparison to the impressiveness of the photographs I have witnessed. I hope that photographs do not have this same effect on all people, but I fear that they do.