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Let me introduce myself…

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Hello class,

My name is Ben Fast and I think I’m posting this in the correct place.  I’m a fifth year honours history student taking the Professional Writing minor and wrapping it all up this semester.  After 17 years of constant school I think I need a break, but I also need a solid base in the real world so studying technology and society seems like a great idea.

As this is my fifth or sixth WordPress-based blog, I think I’ve got the hang of how it all comes together, but I am interested to see how this OAC thing works.  I really like networking and social media, but I’d say I’m somewhere between a Jenny Aitken and a Katie Rosenburg on the scale of social media familiarity scale.  My interests in the more physical machine side of technology draws me towards airplane design and digital cameras.  I have a great passion for airplanes and studying how designs have changed over the first century of flight, and I am an avid amateur photographer who uses both film and digital cameras regularly.

I would love to see this class explore media integration into learning, but not specifically classroom learning.  As Jenny and I so aptly put, the university is both like a womb and a prison, but what about how we learn outside of school?  I’ve studied the idea of public history (non-academic-centred history like in museums, movies, walking tours, historical fiction, etc.) and I am heading towards a career in museums, so I would love to see how media and social media has integrated into those areas, and how that affects alternative learning experiences.  If none of this paragraph makes sense to you, take a look at the Royal BC Museum’s Twitter account and tell me how it changes your view of the museum and their programming.

Well, I think that’s it for me.  Nice meeting you, see you tomorrow,

Ben

PS: This is one of my favourite YouTube videos recently.  Michael McIntyre on the Invention of the Kilt.  Enjoy!

(I’ve done the classic embed YouTube to WordPress trick, but we’ll see if it works on the OAC servers…  If not, watch it here.)

Introduction

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Hey guys,

My name is Kaitlyn Rosenburg and I’m a fourth year creative writing major, journalism minor. (This is my last semester, OMG!) I can’t even begin to imagine my life without the Internet and my biggest fear is dropping my iPhone down a street drain.

I’ve taken TS 200 and 300 in previous years and loved every class. Over the past three years, technology has slowly become my writing niche, both in topic and form. I truly believe technology is a universal theme, whether you dream in 140 characters or can barely operate an iPad.

I wasn’t in class on Wednesday because I was attending the Canadian University Press’ national annual conference with The Martlet. I spent five days with a bunch of young people who all own smartphones and all maintain active Twitter accounts. The number one takeaway from every session I attended was how traditional media like newspapers need to starting marketing themselves as media organizations that just happen to publish a daily paper.

I also talked with other student writers and designers about content. Specifically, understanding what readers want. One paper admitted their student body was not interested in news stories, so this year, they’ve redesigned themselves as a magazine with a focus on fashion.

This idea of tailoring content to a clearly defined demographic really interests me. As a writing student, I spend a lot of time coming up with stories and characters that will appeal to readers. My main genre is screenwriting, so the Netflix model really excites me. If you haven’t read this recent Atlantic article on their in-house analytics, I would highly recommend it. (House of Cards won a Golden Globe this Sunday!)

I’m not really sure how in-depth our pitch should be, but I would love to explore how analytics are changing the way media creates content. Does it only work for television and films? Journalists often scoff at sites like Buzzfeed, but perhaps we can learn something from their click-driven editorial approach. This topic could also touch on Internet privacy. Does it bother you how much Netflix knows about your viewing habits?