Multi-Media - hyperlocal news & podcasts 17/12/09

Well, at last. There are two podcasts, by me, on the website. After going through several pod hosting sites. I found podbean.com. They allow a larger file to be published AND supply an embed code which works with weebly.com. The link comes up with a 'Listen to podcast here' statement. I have to say I prefer the one Rich found, which is houndbite, looks more professional and 'funky'. So, to be able to use houndbite I've decided to keep all my podcasts to six minutes maximum so they fit in the same format. 

It does mean that some sessions will miss out on some of the information, but as long as the main points are there I feel it's fair to people who require an audio format. 

I looked on the Express & Echo website, which is a news/lifestyle website. http://www.thisisexeter.co.uk and noticed that they only have an abridged version of their stories, don't include all their stories and are mostly in text or video based formats. 

One element I was also interested to note was 'Anna's Campaign' - it has a picture, a link to a page on facebook and a video of her Mum talking about how she lost Anna, her 21 year old daughter. Anna was the passenger in a car involved in a drink driving accident. It's actually quite an emotionally horrific video, with photo's of Anna as a child, as an adult included. The point being that the campaign has brought together an annual campaign (drink driving) with a local human interest story (Anna's death) and combined it in a multi-media format on the local papers website. 

I've included a photo of the banner. I've included it here as an example of the hyper-local trend which is appearing on websites at the moment. Newspapers are hitting a bad time, as we all hear and many of the podcasts I see on Mediashift by Gorkana talk about the concept of hyperlocal that newspapers and news in general will obviously have a national context, but that it will also become more and more localised to smaller communities. For example in Exeter, that may mean areas like Exwick, Countess Wear, Pinhoe, Middlemoor, Heavitree would have their own news/websites etc. 

The local government has already started this trend by setting up PACT and My Neighbourhood groups which meet in the schools of the localised areas to discuss the problems in a relatively small area. The meetings attract members from the Council, Education, Police and local residents. 

Multi-Media Did it work on the website?? 2

Aargh, I've now recorded the 8 CV Must Have's Audio three times. First it was 22 minutes long, so then remembered it should be no more than 15 minutes long. I then recorded it and it's 9mins 48 seconds. I thought plenty of time spare. HOWEVER, after trying to load it three times. I looked at the site help and realised the file cannot be bigger than 8mb. Mine is 9mb. So, I'll have to re-record it and try to cut it down to 6minutes and see if that is less. The reason I can't just cut it up as I would normally, is that I'm not at college and I don't have the software to be able to do so. *Sigh* Take three!

Multi-Media Did it work on the website??

Hurray, houndbite works perfectly on the weebly website, as it has for Rich. So it is just that houndbite is not compatible with blogger. 

For now, I'm not worried. I'm just happy I can upload the audio's for the CV Tips etc. 

Multi-Media Did it work?? NO

A big fat NO. It closed down all of my 'safari' windows on the mac and chucked me out of blogger, houndbite and everything else I had open. Great. Oh well, I'm going to move on, come back to it later and see if it works on the website. :(

Here we go again, will it work this time.

This time, I've highlighted the text and linked it to the URL of the houndbite podcast. Will it work, will it work? 

Podcast for houndbite Test

No that didn't work either, as you can see. argghhh. This is what takes up all the time on this course. I know that's half the point of doing the course, but the advertising for the course gave me the impression I would be taught some of this type of stuff. Apart from in-design there hasn't been one taught package on this course and the college doesn't run courses to back it up. Bit pointless telling us to go away and produce multi-media products, websites, etc. without the giving us the tools to do so in the first place. In the workplace, if a new piece of software/technology was to be used under Management of Health and Safety at Work legislation from Europe we would have to be taught it before having to use it. Why is it that just because this 'education' that the leaves the college free from this legislation. I'm not saying that all new media should be taught, but at least the basics. We have to use final cut studio, photoshop, dreamweaver, indesign and various other packages, yet receive no training. Even though the college provided specific training for tutors. Why couldn't it be run in an evening or lunchtime and staff paid to teach these lectures. Instead we're left to find training in these packages on you tube or from a book. We just don't have the time with studying as well to do the background research and training that we need to do the course. I also rang at the beginning of the course to say what could I do to prepare myself for the course - NOTHING was said about needing to have prior knowledge of these packages. To me, it's just common sense and I guess that's why I'm so frustrated. If I was attending a proper university I'm sure I would be able to access a course at the university which I'd need for my course. 

Anyway, frustrated, whinge over. My moto - winning, not whining. Back to how do I load an audio podcast to my blog and to the Work Rest and Play website :D 

I might have found how to post it. Had to change the settings in blogger under the formatting tab to show links. Now when I'm posting a new box comes up which lets me put in the URL from houndbite. Let's see if it works lol. 

Enclosed: TEST podcast. 

Multimedia - Houndbite didn't work

For some reason I cannot copy and paste into the blogging post, so that won't work. I'll see if there's a way round it. It seems I'm able to upload video's, but not audio's. So I'll see if it works with this. 

No, tried to upload it as a video, as it is an mp3 file and the site says it will accept these files. It's not worked. This is what happens when I copy and paste. 

file:///Users/juliaoshaughnessy/Downloads/Julia-upload-5duxhf4rz6vd.mp3

that hasn't worked either. So now, I'm not so excited. The compatability of all these things should be considered. I'll try to put it into the website and see if it's just me or blogger that's the problem. 

Multi-media Group Project 10/12/09

Yeay, I've discovered how to embed an audio file into a website/blog using houndbite. Feeling really happy because I would like to do some of my evaluative log in audio. It adds to a multimedia feel and gives it more personality, but more importantly means we are able to comply with legislation such as DDA The Disability Discrimination Act and with W3C the World-Wide-Web Consortium WAI Guidelines. The Disability Discrimination Act is a piece of legislation that promotes civil rights for disabled people and protects disabled people from discrimination. However, it does not mention specifically websites. 

Most lifestyle/news websites such as ...... have podcasts and the audio files ensure the site is accessible to people: 

• with visual impairment 
• with low literacy and reading skills
• who's first language is not English
• Users who are dyslexic

I've also included a written version of the training session which allows people with a hearing disability to access the information. 

We've put the text directly into the website rather than downloadable PDF's because a lot of PDF's do not have a semantic structure. This means a screen reader cannot differentiate between text, headings, lists and therefore the user cannot get a feel for the structure of the document. It also does not pick up on tables or pictures within the document. If the document is inputted into the website screen readers and assisted technologies, such as Browsealoud, will pick up on the information. Browsealoud is a free plug-in download - see the following website for further information www.opsi.gov.uk/about/accessibility.htm . 

Here is the test houndbite audio I did initially to see if the process would work on the mac computer. I recorded this file with H4 Zoom digital recorder, downloaded the file to my mac. Then went to the houndbite site, uploaded the file and used the embedding code to input it to my blog. Which is what I will do with the training session audio's. 

http://www.houndbite.com/?houndbite=21685

FOJ 13/12/09

Interesting to read an article by Will Bunch about the death of Editor and Publisher. An opinion I hear repeated and repeated. Journalism isn't dead, just the print industry. Although having seen The Sun's advert today on the TV before X-Factor I don't think they're going to go down without a fight. Editor and Publisher were a company who based their principles on good old fashioned great journalism - asking difficult questions and not just accepting the official line. The finale to his article says: 

"It's a sad day, but in a strange way the death of Editor & Publisher gives me hope for the future of journalism. Because they showed us a blueprint, that size or technology is overrated, that a half-dozen people can make a difference just by asking the right questions and by not backing down. And if Greg Mitchell and the others could accomplish this at a small, shrinking trade publication, then I know that it can happen again and will happen again, somewhere else and in some other format -- that no-holds-barred journalism is possible even on these weird little newfangled tablets or whatever.

Because in the remarkable way that they died, Editor & Publisher showed the rest of journalism how to live."

Magazine Production 031209

I'm so pleased, I saw some photo's on a photoshop site, tracked the photographer to the Deviantart site and left him a comment to ask if he would allow me to use his photo in my magazine. He's emailed back. He's called Jesus Martin Miguel Constantine (how apt for a spiritual magazine). He's sent me 8 photo's that he's happy to use. He's sent them in a resolution suitable for web though 72 dpi and I really need them for cmyk 360 dpi if I want to get the magazine printed. 

I've emailed him back, of course thanked him, even if he can't then I could use the photo's for an online version of the magazine - which I'm now also thinking. I've done the usual thing - which could be all or bust, but I want a printed copy of the magazine, an ebook email version and a free meditation CD on the front. The ebook would have downloadable files attached for the CD. Reason behind this is that although print is in decline, the actual concept is not. People will always need information - information is power - whether that be for leisure, work or learning. The format in which this information is obtained is changing, yes. But, I feel if the print industry got on board with the mobile/kindle etc technology, they could save themselves a lot of money. OK, to date papers are finding it difficult to find a decent way to obtain payment from online content, BUT, I don't feel that'll go on forever. I feel the key is to provide content which people want to read - now which form of news values is that again, must look up my notes. Anyway, I digress. 

As I say, I want to provide the magazine/book in a 'pick up and read way' - whether people pick up their mobiles and read it on the train, download it to their computer or have a physical copy of the magazine - I want it to be accessible. This also is why I've been tossing over in my mind whether to have the magazine in A4 size or A5. I've noticed the women's magazines such as Cosmopolitan and Glamour now have the option of either size on the shelf. The A5 is perfect handbag size, A4 as opposed to the slightly larger magazine sizes is perfect for fitting into folders, rucksacks, any magazine rack, etc. The A4 is winning at the moment as part of the way I want the magazine to look is full of stunning photo's. So that reading through the magazine/book is a visual experience. 

The reason I'm calling it a magazine/book/e-mag is because I've noticed that some magazines eg: Photoshop Advanced are charging £5.99 for their monthly magazines. Reason being is that they include tutorials/training. The charge for online/self taught psychic development courses aren't in the same ballpark as photoshop courses, however the interest in the actual product 'spiritual learning/psychic development' is probably much larger.  To make a monthly spiritual 'how to' magazine is a niche in the market that I don't feel is filled. Frequently, I find the 'spiritual' magazines Kindred Spirit, Chat Fate & Fortune, Psychic Times etc are filled with experiential interviews or advertorials for courses. EG. Mr/s X Reporter goes to a course and gives a description of how it felt, who taught it, perhaps a bit about the background, quotes from attendees and her opinion of, usually, how much s/he enjoyed themselves.  Personally, and it's only an opinion, I think this is lazy reporting. It's all very nice, but how useful is it, except for advertisement purposes? 

Anyway, back to Mr Constantine. He made me think today about the concept of the photography side of the magazine today. I like people who make me think. I'm being a bit harsh on myself, but I wonder if I had perhaps an image in my head of a lot of beautiful photo's of perhaps fairy-esque women, whether it be photographed or drawn to go alongside the writing. 

The photo's he sent are mostly of 'poor' people. There's a photo of an old woman standing in a que, with such character in her face and an internal verbal battle started.  'Great face .v. shame she's looking down' 'Want to include real photo's .v. made up shots are more pleasing to a commercial eye' etc etc. The main conclusion being is that I want the magazine to be real, whether reality is ugly or not, 'surely that's the whole concept of the magazine' - that there is beauty everywhere, that you don't have to go to Church or follow religious 'rules' to be a strong spiritual woman. So the magazine has taken a bit of a turn today. I had, without realising, started to get together what I consider 'fake' images of women, because I felt that's what the reader would expect and enjoy.  This is my one chance to put together something different from the norm as if it were being 'sold' in a commercial world.  I don't know if I'm doing myself justice either way. Commercial high gloss, 'pretty' - or a different look at what beauty is and take the chance to do something more organic, but less mainstream market? Hmmm? I don't have the answer right now and would find the images easier if I had more content, but these are just a few of my thought processes and an uncredited thankyou to Mr Constantine for making me think. 

I'm chuffed I've also found a site www. lulu.com which allows people to publish their ebooks/CDs for free and then publishing is only pay per order.  So the e-mag concept is looking possible for this project - yeay! This is the link to how to publish on Lulu and what it's all about. I also noticed that if people buy multiple copies they get a discount eg. 3 copies gives 3% discount, so small spiritual booksellers may be interested in stocking the e-mag. Also, this site has already a large stock of books for the spiritual industry, so it must already have a similar customer base. 

http://www.lulu.com/uk/publish/index.php?cid=en_tab_publish 

Magazine Production 17/11/09 P2

OMG I'm just loving photoshop. It's an absolute answer to anyone like me who has creative ideas, but just can't draw. 

I've been playing with brushes again today. I want to create a corporate logo/image throughout the magazine, but something like a drop of water. I've been looking through some photoshop trouble shooting books. The first one by Peter Beid Cui is all about creating the wonderful flows. I've managed to create a green blob. I lovely blue and cyan feather swirl and a white like frosty wind image. You open a new doc, put all these blobs and lines on the page, then add motion blur of 430, then put in a transform grid, manipulate the grid and hey presto - your image. Loving it! 

I want my magazine to have this additional texture, like 70's but with a etheric flow to it and the 'blow images' are perfect. The brushes element in photoshop seems to be the answer to my prayers. Although the programme takes a lot of playing with, it really is worth it. As I say I can't draw for toffee, but know what I like and what I want. I think photoshop combined with Indesign is the answer. 

Mag Production 27/11/09

Some advice I picked up off of a photoshop website. I thought very useful when considering my magazine. : D

1. Use the acronym of A.I.D.A, to check if a poster (or advert) works. 

A = Does it get my Attention? No! The name of the company very rarely will get anyone's attention. Whereas, FREE PATIO SLABS! Will most certainly stop anyone who is the market for a Patio.

I = INTEREST. Once you have the readers attention now is the time to get their interest in the product. 

D = DESIRE. Once you have created an Interest in the product you must now create a desire, tell them how they will benefit from owning this fantastic patio! 

A= ACTION. Once all the above have been addressed, tell the reader what to do! Tell them to take action. PHONE NOW! I said by one yer get one free... phone NOW! (Example?) 

2. Be careful with the fonts you use, I'm sure you well understand the power of the typeface and what it can covey to the reader. Be sure that the font provides the reader (potential customer) with the correct perception of the product or company. The correct perception is that which the vendor wishes it to be. 

3. On a poster I wouldn't consider using more than two different typefaces. And, I wouldn't be tempted to use a hand-written script type font, mainly as on a poster at a distance it could be difficult to read. 

4. Finally, if poster is in Landscape, consider Portrait before committing, on a poster the upright view usually works better. (depending on what the product is and what use the poster is to be put to. 

WRP paragraph about self

The paragraph hasn't been agreed by David, so I'm assuming there's something wrong with it?? Will email him to see what the problem is. He's obviously working on the site as I notice his paragraph has changed. There's little communication in this group at the moment. Maybe that's just my perception/opinion. Hopefully will see the other two guys and Mary Monday and find out. I've asked twice for a catch up meeting, but this isn't happening. I've a feeling I'll have to plow on with the work element of the site and just accept that Jaime's hate campaign has so far worked. 

NEWS: Notes: Media Revolution

Notes from BBC The Media Revolution programme: presenter Janet Street Porter. started as a Fashion Writer in the 1970s

PART ONE: Newspapers

Property and Recruitment advertising going elsewhere. - Online websites. 

Print: 2.25m loss of readers last year. 

750,000 readers lost The Mirror

400,000 readers lost The Sun

10% Guardian lost

500,000 readers stopped buying a sunday paper. 

Sir Martin Sorrell WPP, buys advertising round the world. 

Advertising FB, MSN, MySpace are taking lots of advertising from the papers. 

Classified ad's a previous income for newspapers have gone down by 30-35% eg.property in the last year. Moved to online websites. 

NUJ reports 500 print journalists in a week lost jobs. 

Derek Jameson started with Reuters as a runner. Newspapers have survived Radio/TV, why won't they survive the internet? 

10/12/85 Murdoch moved offices to Wapping. 

25/01/86 Strikes and riots between proprietor Rupert Murdoch and workers. HQ in NY. Controls Sun/The Times/ Wall Street Journal. 

London Sun's circulation gone up in the last year, but less than it was ten years ago. NEWSCORPS. 

Graham Dudman, MD. Sun, Says great journalism is still selling the paper. Has cut it's cover price against the Mirror. RM has increased investment in Editorial and production. Printing has moved from Wapping to London. Prints all his papers faster 30,000 p/h before. 86,000 copies an hour in full colour. They print £23m newspapers a week. Printing more economical and delivers newspapers so quickly and in full colour. 

Media Analyst, Paul Gooden. Prices going up, but can keep loyalty by giving away a book or CD, DVD's. 

McFly set up own record company and instead of releasing it they gave it away free with a newspaper. It boosted their sales and the band £2.4 had the album, and extra 300,000 more readers/listeners. 

Offsetting advertising losses with new giveaways. 

Free papers are also picking up the advertising. Targetted young people with disposable income, good for advertisers. 

Freesheets are accused of dumbing down news. Supposed to be 55% news, but in an onstreet survey people still wouldn't pay for it. One person said 20p. Junk newspaper. Freesheets cannot deliver news indepth. 

RM Chairman and CEO - young people are living on their computers. RM totally neutral about where the news is read, tv,web,print. 

Alan Rusbridger Guardian, says the print presses they have are probably the last presses they will ever buy. 

People want to see news as it happens, pictures, audio, opinion all at once. 

Daily Telegraph, Britains biggest selling daily. Has overhauled it's offices. Images projected across the wall and also a realtime number of how many people are reading articles online. 

Edward Roussel, Telegraph. They are making more video than they used to. EG financial programmes. Feel they have a younger audience metropolitan audience on the web. You find they're not so different after all (young and old news readers)

New Media distinctly unprofitable - no-one wants to pay to read news online. 

Tim Bowdler - If it's online we should have it for free. 

20m unique users 2m abroad - Guardian. £7m p/month log on from USA. to Guardian newspaper. British news is popular. 

Cameron Yuille, Agent 007, need to change the way the newspaper thinks about their audience. They got to figure out how to sell to the global audience. Reader specific advertising. 

Guardian going for US, and India. 

Amazon - the kindle, can have books, newspaper subscription, whole paper. 

Newspapers have to find the funds to weather the recession and invest in digital technology. 

Newspapers will not die, because it's a good way of reaching large sections of the population, like TV. Our appetite for news is not diminishing. 

PART TWO: Books. The Fight, Libby Potter. 

Who's profiting from the boom in celebrity books?

Books have been cheap, delivered to your house next day - what's not to like, Will Self

Booksellers are telling publishers what they will sell and what they won't. 

£1,500 - £100,000 being paid to booksellers to highlight their book. 

£200m books bought last year in the UK. 

Rise of celebrity books, 5 of last years top 10 books were written by celebrity's. 

Patrick Janson Smith, Publisher. gave Dawn French (for her book) - £2m advance, but how many books need to be sold to recoup that? 

Fiction and Celebrity are popular books. Paul O'Grady was paid 'seven figures' for his book. Larry Finlay MD. If you have the books that are generating the money then you have money to help new authors. 

Carole Blake, Literary Agent, 'celebrity take up a lot of bookshelf space, marketing, and smoothing ego's'. But only one out of ten of these books will make it. 

Fay Weldon, Author, feels the Celebrity books are affecting what is being published. The quality, history and standards are going downhill. 

Stephen Page, Faber and Faber. Says other books are being overpriced to fund the celebrity books. 

Neill Denny, Editor in Chief, says celebrity books is helping other books by using profit from their books. 

Book world, price wars, competitive wars. Gerry Johnson, MD Waterstones. People have to feel confident that our prices are as good as they can get anywhere else. 

PD James are not selling as much now. Used to be £15 is now £10 for a hardback. 

A £20 book is now selling at around £8. Publishers are losing out. 

Newsnight, WHSMith 26/9/95. 'Net Book price' collapses. Now a free for all on what the market can charge. 

Asda etc introduced their discounting skills to books. Will your author take a minimal price, but higher quantity. 

Booksellers dictate to publishers what will be sold and how much of. 

Amazone and rise of books on internet has had a massive impact on the bookselling world, competing with price and availability. 

Christopher North VP of Media, Amazon. Basic idea was to be able to offer the entire selection of books which wouldn't be offered on the high street. 

Has discounting gone too far? Amazon's discounting is same as other retailers large. 

Haschette has recently refused to sell their books at the discounted price Amazon requires. 

Aggressive discounting has left smaller independent booksellers unable to compete and have had to specialise or close. Nearly 100 independents have closed in the last year. Independent bookshops can't compete on price as can't hold the same amount of stock. 

Will Self, Author, says the customers are starting to wag the dog. Buyers reverting to independent bookshops. Although, TV daytime programmes such as R&Judy bookclub has had a phenomenal impact on the book industry. Will's been asked to butter up Amanda Ross to help the trade! 

Amanda Ross - MD. Cactus TV. idea to set up a bookclub on daytime TV. She chooses the book by what she likes. Oprah Winfrey also did on her show. 

Daytime TV has got the right demographic, Richard & Judy recommendation. 

22/1/04 Star of the Sea, Joseph O'Connor. - started climbing after the show and went to number one after the show. Bob Geldof's recommendation sent it sky high too. 

Must secure foreign sales too. Bookfairs in Frankfurt, Brit titles in big demand there. Booksellers and buyers across the world meet to April/Oct. All manuscripts delivered month before bookfair. 

Carole Blake, she has back to back meetings all week selling foreign rights to her authors books. Independent publishers don't have marketing budgets like the 

Tindal Streeet Press, Luke Brown, - small publisher. Have to be more inventive and more passionate. Go for books that the larger publishers miss. EG Catherine O'Flyn What Was Lost sold 7m copies. She was told that the book lacked commercial appeal by the bigger publishers. As it didn't fit in the pigeon holes they felt were selling. 

Conscious of the market you're selling to. Agents aren't looking for: completely mad letters suggest completely mad people and Carole Blake isn't interested. 

Cost of a title can dictate where the book is sold. EG 3for2 deal tables hold a small marketing fee and will make the book sell thousands more than it would on shelf. 

Transworld Publishers. Larry. pay £1,500-100,000 to get their book in prime slots in booksellers. 

Pressures of market, industry is now mass market and mass market ideals. Therefore, a lot of books have been pushed down this format. Profit from publishing is being concentrated to big commercial houses/multi-national conglomerates. The big book selling chains are winners. 

Losers are the independent booksellers, small publishers and authors who couldn't get their work out there.  Serious literature is supposedly being printed less. 

The consumer is winning, not just the educated elite buying books, wide variety, cheaply. 

PART THREE: TV Analogue to Digital as prfound as moving from b&w to colour. 

Britain invented it. 

Hells Kitchen, UK Idol, 

Still funding TV as if it were 50 years ago. 

Who wants to be a millionaire started from a home quiz show. biggest profit. 

What will keep TV alive? 

Rod Taylor, Head of International TV, 2waytv, Executive Producer, Who Wants to be a Millionaire. Being made for Cosovan and Albanian TV. 

Needs to consider viewers and advertisers. Young male presenters attracts women. 

Max Flint - reporter. 

TV competing 

25% share of advertising held by internet. 

Google will be as big as ITV. 

Reaching £4.50 p/adult - used to be £7 from advertising. 

Has to find new sources of funding to meet new landscape. 

Wayne Garvie, must have an international strategy and can you access international funding. 

Britains done well with it's format. EG Freemantle Media. Tony Cohen. Format has tears, laughter and a resolution. A format can be repeated. 50% of formats across the world are from the UK. Because UK commissions original ideas and can then export them. 

EG: Strictly has been screened across 40 countries. Each country has own judges and contestents so it is adapted to each culture. 

Similar to way films are funded. Patchwork of various funders and participants/companies. 

hit film Slumdog Millionaire has shown how ingrained one of our shows has become. 

London's Capital Radio started Who wants to be a Millionaire. David Briggs worked to turn show to a TV show. Prizes got from premium rate numbers. Once international companies heard they wanted to buy, never got any answers, so prices kept going up. 

WWTBM has been broadcast in 107 countries. 

2waytraffic was bought by Sony for £7m 

Peter Bazalgette, after WWTBM US were knocking down his door for next new format. 

UK US, Russian and Eastern European Companies take it on. 

When they sell a programme it includes a bible to producing the show. 

In a lot of countries it isn't £1m. In Cosovo it's 50.000 Euro's as this is 2o times someones annual wage and will therefore change their life. 

Albanian and Cosovan's are bused to the gameshow. 

Lee Bartlett, ABC 92-99, says they can film in London and still fill the audience with whatever language they want. If you go to the country and produce the show yourself then you get to keep the production fees. In US the production fees are very lucrative. 

$100m a year Granada TV US. 

The BBC have offices in US and own American Idol show. Fox screens the show. American Idol has been number 1 for last five years. (FremantleTV). 

Simon is part of the british original . - A nasty britishman seems to increase ratings (Gordon Ramsey). 

Wife Swap, What not to Wear, Antiques Roadshow, Top Gear have all been taken to the US. 

The Office, NBC Universal, Ben Silverman - says Britain invades US with Shakespeare, music-the Beetles. 

Product Placement is being campaigned for as imported programmes are allowed to. John McVay says domestic programming can't use this. 

Merchandising - v.comp in kids programmes - NEVER! - Tele Tubbies going on tour, in China huge themed kindergartens are being opened. Anne Wood co-creator of Teletubbies. Lucky if you get quarter of funding, have to go out and get 75% yourself. It's made more diff by counterfeit merchandise. 

Piracy of digital content. Video sharing on the internet - this threatens the corp from exploiting the show across different platform. Therefore, jeopardising the production of this type of show again. 

Director of Content and Production Worldwide. Wayne ... & Ben Silverman say if other people are counterfeiting the programme, work out a way of doing the same thing, so they can't. 

Bebo experimenting by having TV. Joanna Shields Ch Exec. Bebo. Drama Kate Modern, 67million views worldwide. Advertisers were brought into the show, ie Cadbury's Cream Egg suit worn. 

Future, may be able to choose what adverts they will see. Can sell their time of watching an advert for 20sec's then they get certain amount of time to watch free content. 

Millionaire into Afghanistan 2009? 

30-40 yrs TV has shown itself adaptable to new technology and new viewers. 

Transmedia - content available in lots of areas. 

Movies didn't disappear when TV came in. 

Work Experience Express & Echo/Features

My second Women in Business Feature went in today. It was a column the Echo have been running for a little while and Gordon asked me to have a go at. I wrote the piece in the first person after interviewing Celina West. I'd interviewed Liz Hodges the week before and done the same thing. 

Liz Hodges article was harder to interview easier to write. Celina was easy to interview, but harder to write as she had so much more riding on the published article. I was pleased to see they published my article on their website too. www.sarahwestrecruit.co.uk

Gordon had changed the order around. This is something I keep coming up against. The paragraphs seem to be fine, but they're in the wrong order, ie. the priority of which to put first, second etc isn't always right. I was glad to see he hadn't really changed the wording, just the order. 

Strange to see something in print you've written. If it gets changed it takes away that delight for me. I wrote an obituary, and it was changed around slightly and they spelt my name wrong. After that it didn't give me the same pleasure as reading a very short article I'd written which had been put in word for word. Something about pride and the fact that it's printed word for word being equivalent to a 'tick' on a marked piece of work. 

Anyway, the article has gone in, it was a professional which I recommended us to interview and I was pleased it hadn't been pulled. :D

Mag Production 17/11/09

Today for the first time in a while I felt like a 'real' student. 

I saw Russ this morning for a tutorial and was pleased to see I wasn't as behind as I thought I was. I then went to both of the learning resources centres to try and register for the library. Forty minutes later I was 'in'. I'm official, it's real and I'd better get on with it now. 

We'd been talking about the magazine this morning and I want to do a women's spiritual magazine. I was so pleased to see at the library a book by Anna Gough-Yates, 'Understanding Women's Magazines'.  How 'meant to be' was that! NB: Do you put a ? after a retorical question, or a full-stop? 

Anyway, moving on. I'm sat in my bed, alone with the pc/a book and some chocolate biscuits- I'm officially a student ha. 

From the small amount I've read so far I can feel the neuron's start to flick and ignite already. Gough-Yates talks about the fact that she feels the magazines have been putting out an image of a 'new woman' since the 70's, but more so in the 80's and 90's. An almost superwoman, who runs the home, but is mostly a middle-class young, professional woman. She talks about how some magazines are now (2005) trying to target women they had previously targeted as younger women, but who are now in their mid thirties. 

It got me thinking, firstly how if the market is moving their content to fit with a certain set of aging women, that obviously there were some ingredients (culture,class,opportunities etc) that made them predisposed to purchase magazines or a certain type of magazine. The eighties and nineties, as I remember were growth periods for my career and during this period I was very much career and lifestyle orientated. It becomes a chicken and egg question, what came first the type of woman or the magazine which promoted 'being' a certain type of woman? I do remember seeing my Mother with her copy of Woman's Own and from a young age being quite repulsed by it and it's articles. Especially, anything which seemed to want to teach me to be a better 'housewife' - YUK. Although now I'm a parent, I do sometimes think it would be quite useful to know how to make clothes out of old curtains, like The Sound of Music's, Maria. 

Initially, I looked on the County Council website at the local demographics and found out 18-29 yr olds were prevalent in this area of the country. So I had thought I would aim a magazine at that age group. However, because the magazine is a spiritual/women's magazine it occurred to me that most women interested were not 18 year olds. Although there are younger people interested, mostly people come to looking at their spirituality after a variation of experiences. When I say spirituality, I don't mean religion. This magazine is not about following certain rules or ways of life. I've always said the 'simplest person can still hold the strongest truth'. In a nutshell, spirituality, to me, is about helping people while finding and spreading happiness in everyday situations. 

This led me on, today I had been plotting out some ideas for articles, to make it easier to plan the number of pages for the magazine, what artwork, photographs and graphics I might need. The ideas I'd come up with were, in no particular order, an interview with Nicki Ravenscroft about what it's like to be the woman behind the musician, an article on depression - a life coaches perspective/answer. Parenting - teenagers and 'crystal/rainbow' children, how to develop psychically, mah-jong horoscopes, Interviews with Reiki/Homeopathy teachers locally, etc etc. BUT, tonight, I realise that Gough-Yates is trying to say that people buy images/icon's and read magazines about things/people/etc they want to be like or are like. So, I realised it was a tougher job than I thought. Although I had decided the concept of the magazine I haven't fully considered the image that the reader is buying into. At the same time, I don't really like the idea of an image. Maybe I can have a non-image as this would fit better with the magazine. IE. Here are a series of articles which you may or may not feel an affinity with or find useful. The main aim is to boost confidence, self-esteem and start opening the reader to possibly new concepts and ideas. Like a catalyst for change. MMmmm 'Catalyst' is that a good name for the magazine??? 

There are a few on the shish kebab of names at the moment, 'Shhh', 'Power of She', 'Shine', 'Independent', TRY (The Real You), but I'm not 'feeling' it. I thought about Ohana - it's a Hawian name meaning 'family', but again, parenting is only a subsection of what the magazine is about, so I don't want to give the wrong impression.  To me the mag's which make it, have one word catchy names, Elle, Red, Hello, Psychologies, Cosmopolitan, Glamour etc. In some ways I like catalyst better, it has scientific connotations as well as other more general associations. Catalyst, is something which happens that CAUSES something else to happen. I like the thought of the magazine giving someone/a woman a spark of inspiration to make a change. I am passionate about living a motivated purposeful life. Through these two things I've achieved and got through things I never thought I would. I like the idea of the magazine being a bit of on-hand motivation. It's not the run of the mill Closer/Hello type magazines, but it is better to die standing than to live bending (an albanian proverb).

WRP paragraph about self

Hi, I'm Julia, the Editor responsible for the Work element of the WRP website. 

Providing bread and butter on the table ie: our working life takes up such a large part of our time that I feel it should have an element of fun to it. If you're looking for a job, looking for some guidance as to what to do next this is the area for you. 

There are links to other sites as we couldn't squeeze it all in here and I'm not pretending to know it all just provide a structure around which you can start to think about short and long-term career goals, or consider other available options.  The journey's important, so I'm not going to do all the work for you, make sure you have something to take notes with and remember to send in more specific questions to the work Q&A area :D 

My sins also include studying for the Fda in Journalism and Practical Media, I'm a freelance journalist and a loan parent of a five year old son.  My career in short has given me experience of training, recruitment, health & safety, security, employment skills, sales and management. If you'd really want to know more about my career to date I've included a brief history in the work section. 

I have 12 years experience of managing and facilitating and in short as long as fun is included on the work schedule a lot more gets done. I hope my section is a lighter way to help you through the career maze whilst still holding on to what else is important to you. 

'The best things in life, aren't things'. Art Buchwald

BRIEF CAREER HISTORY: 

My career has been varied starting when I finished a B-Tec National Diploma in Sports and Leisure Management. I taught myself to touch-type during the two years and temped for a while when I left College. 

TIP: Having office skills of some description will always keep you in work, even if it's only a temporary gig. 

I then worked for both the Police Studies Centre within Exeter University, progressing to Office Manager and took high ranking Police Officers around Europe to study European Policing. Eventually a mortgage and an increased sense of social responsibility attracted me to a management position within a Drugs Project. 

It was an 'interesting' time and within five years I was part of the management team that grew the project from eight people working within Exeter to seventy people working all over Devon and Dorset. Responsible for staff, security, health & safety administration and finance the post was varied and pretty stressful. I frequently worked seventy hour weeks. When I left, I was proud to be informed they had to replace me with three people. I had been offered a commission with the RAF, however a horse riding accident put an end to my 25 mile a week running and fitness regime. Changed my destiny in a split second. 

I was then offered a promoted position with Avon Health Authority as Facilities Manager, responsible for a £2m budget, 11 team leaders and 70 staff.  This was great, but although I was good at my job I realised my heart wasn't in it anymore and the work was no longer challenging. 

I went to a local recruitment company TACT Personnel to find alternative work. Surprisingly, impressing the manager so much she offered me the Account Manager's job at Howmet recruiting and managing temporary staff.  We quickly changed the recruiting processes and went from one to one interviewing to group interviews of up to 40 people a session, three sessions a week. It was so successful I was quickly earning £30k a year. Little ole me, in little ole Exeter - anything can happen. I can honestly say, I've never enjoyed a job so much, the buzzy atmosphere and the social life I had working in recruitment was phenomenal. 

Nothing lasts forever, 9/11 put paid to the American owned company Howmet's growth and 212 temporary staff were whittled down to 30.  I love a challenge and responsibility for thirty staff was not. I moved from recruitment to self employment and took up a contract with a local training agency, whilst also working as a door supervisor and running a small door security company. 

Becoming a mother put work on hold temporarily and when I returned I craved some stability, so took up a position as Advertising Account Manager for the Sidmouth Herald.  Here, again, I was successful and within three months offered promotion to a larger paper, but working for Archant I realised I wanted to be a journalist and an old dream resurfaced. 

The rest of my career is, 'in progress' so to speak. I've returned to University, proving the key to success is to never stop learning and it's never too late to start again. :D 

Whether you're hunting or gathering stay happy. Julia :D 

How NOT to: :D NB:

NB: Don't put what I wrote in my 'witty writers' application - It didn't work - no response lol. :D

You may wonder why I'm laughing and just think 'silly woman, of course she wasn't going to get a response'. I don't think life's all about getting it right every time. If we really think about it, we all know what's 'right', but if you don't make a few harmless mistakes how can you ever find new solutions or new ways to do things at all. 

I feel that we should never be afraid to lose. Obvious reasons are that we don't get/have the things we want, but also because there's a lot of learning in the losing. Mainly, staying positive and knowing it wasn't meant to be. 

Random Poetry for the Magazine 16/11/09

Just some random poetry: 

Here we are, monitors of the outcome. 

Weighing the difference between chaos and calm. 

If it were said that chaos was ahead, 

would you smile and forgive? will you make sure you live? 

'Love makes the world go round', 

hate drives love into the ground. 

You decide, LOVE? ... or hide?

Work Experience Express & Echo Concluded

I'm such an all levels person that working with the E&E on the lead up to Armistice Day was quite emotional. For some reason this year seems to be more prominent to people. It was reported that more people turned out to the various memorials and much younger people. It doesn't feel too many years ago the media reported people fearing the loss of interest in marking Armistice Day. 

The people I worked with were all lovely. Hannah Hope (Features), 'Fletch' John Fletcher (Court Reporter), Tom Bevan (Reporter), Gordon Richmondson (Business Section). They all really helped and were so friendly. Watching Fletch, Tom and Gordon doing telephone interviews with forces and ex-forces service personnel was quite touching. They've all got great technique and seem to know just when to ask questions, how to get people talking and able to show the right levels of respect. It was one of those moments when although I know I have a little bit of talent, I realised I'm still leagues away from being a professional. I never felt like I was treated me like a work experience bod, more like part of the team, which I liked. 

I had done various articles and was feeling a little bit more confident. However, I was given a small article to write about the timings of the parades etc and asked to include all the various contingents in the article. There was a list of twenty or so different regiments, charities, community forces and companies. I couldn't tell which one's would be more important to mention and which ones to leave out. It was obvious in the case of Royal British Legion versus St. John Ambulance, but I have to say I made a right hash of it. I seem to be more comfortable writing in a feature style. 

The editor Patrick was also great in loads of ways, encouraging, supportive, helpful. He gave me a story about a local man to who has terminal cancer. His friends and family raised £5,500 for the family. I spoke to Paul from Bridge, I spoke to Andy from the Kings Pub in Cowick street and asked Paul to contact the family to pass our number on so we could speak to them. I wrote the story and the editor was very happy, said I could have a byline on it. The photo's we'd got from Rob, someone at the fundraiser, were too poor a quality to print in the paper. So Paul was finding us some better photo's. All of a sudden he seemed to have cold feet and when I rang him, kept going on about how the family didn't know about the story. I asked him again to pass our number on. I spoke to Patrick and told him about Paul's (cold feet) issues. 

Patrick was quite clever and said that if the man's wife contacted us and said specifically she didn't want it in the paper then we wouldn't print it, but we wouldn't retract the article just because Paul had cold feet. I rang Paul and asked him to get Janice to ring us by 8pm that Friday night. We heard nothing, but then Saturday I got a phonecall on my mobile of Janice having small fits about the story being in the paper. I got the message at 9pm, so rang my parents to see if the article had already gone in - it hadn't. Then I rang her back and said I couldn't guarantee it wouldn't be in Monday's paper already, but that I had spoken to the Editor and he had asked for the family to ring us. She said Paul had only just given them the message, then she proceeded to rant about Rob and how he shouldn't have given us photo's etc. I told her he'd given us the bare minimum and that most of the information we had included the amount of money raised had come from Paul himself. She seemed to calm down then and wanted to know more about what we'd written. I talked to her for a bit and said that we didn't want to upset the family, the E&E weren't about that, we had just wanted to print the story as it was about the fact that one man had made such a difference/impact on so many peoples lives that such a fundraiser had even been possible. 

I dealt with her with kid gloves, thought about how I would feel about it and thought there was probably a few reasons why she wouldn't want it printed: 

1. Once something's in print it becomes 'real' maybe the family felt there was hope and did not want to tempt fate? 

2. Death of a loved one is a very personal experience and something you may want to go through without everyone stopping you in the street saying 'I read about it in the paper'. 

3. Cynically, perhaps they're on benefits now, as she had to give up work, and did not want the benefits system to know how much they'd got as it would effect them. 

4. They didn't want to feel like a charity case - pride. 

Either way, it definitely wasn't worth pushing the story into the media just for my own ego to have a byline in the paper, at the expense of someone's feelings. If it had involved crime, dishonesty, fraud etc - I'd have been right there and not caring about their feelings, but not this one. It was good to discover an experience to prove my ethical boundaries, something which writing for College doesn't provide without real work experience - real self knowledge. 

As I say, everything comes to those who wait and by the end of the week, possibly because of the way I dealt with the other scenario, I was given an obituary to do and to contact people who knew Major General Marston Tickell, another sensitive situation. I got my byline. tbc. 

Work Experience Express & Echo Day 1 and 2

I've completed a couple of days at the Express and Echo now, and I'm glad to say - I love it! 

My son was ill Monday and Tuesday, so I couldn't start till Wednesday, but I can go in Monday and Tuesday next week to make up the time. I've been put in the news team with Hannah Hope, John 'Fletch' Fletcher, Tom Bevan and Gordon (who I only met today so don't know his surname). I started off being given some press releases to turn into fillers between 150 and 300 words. They ranged from being about 8 yr old Brownies looking for ex-members to Skate Parks in Teignmouth, to talking to someone who had put together a fundraiser for his friend who has just been diagnosed with terminal cancer. 

It's interesting to see the varying responses to the press. Some people like agents for the Hotel Barcelona in Exeter are VERY cagey and won't give away anything. Even when I said we were wanting to do a positive article. Contacting people about news is very much like sales, you have to ring them and ring them, never leave a message unless you absolutely have to. Once you've left a message you take away your right to keep ringing back lol. 

This afternoon I went into Exeter for Hannah's 'What we're wearing' feature which appears in the E&E on Saturday's. She asked me to take four photo's of 'fashionable' people walking around Exeter High Street and get details of their name, age, occupation, where they bought all their clothes, their favourite shops and any style icon's. Initially I was a bit nervous, mainly as I don't have much of an idea about 'fashion'. Funnily enough, the people I thought really were 'cutting edge fashionable' wouldn't speak to me lol. I ended up interviewing people who mostly shopped in Primark, New Look, River Island and Topshop. They all seemed quite chuffed to appear in the paper. I was getting a bit desperate to find some people who would take what I thought Hannah might think were 'good' photo's. So after I'd taken photo's and got details of six of the general public I accosted two Sales Assistants and asked them if I could take photo's of them. The first a guy from Moss Brothers, the second a woman from Jane Norman. 

I was quite disappointed with the quality of my photo's. After looking at the photo's I noticed most of them weren't smiling warmly. Most looked terrified in their first photo lol, so much for me putting them at ease. All those seasons watching America's Next Top Model - wasted! :D Apart from all that I did actually enjoy doing that 'assignment'. So I HOPE Hannah Hope likes my photo's. 

Anyway, it has made me think if I want to be a journalist I really need to address the poor quality of my photo's. Unsure exactly how to do this outside of reading books and getting photographic magazines. I can't afford another course and don't have the time. 

We're HERE! WRP Multimedia

'Ey up, we're here! 

Eleven luggage bagts, seven adults, four kids, three cars and a dog! The journey took a mere two hours, through the rain, but that's what camping's all about. The main aim of the blog this week is to give you a few highlights and ideas of what to avoid when taking budget holidays in the UK. 

I say camping, but I mean caravaning, there's probably a severe distinction between the two and I don't want to insult a windbreaker full of people. The main similarity to me seems to be the fact both groups drive hours away from their warm and secure homes to battle with not much between them and the elements. Bracing! I love that word, it conjures up images of war time hero's, cold winds and some courageous pursuit of some description. 

Anywho, moving on, the weather is actually quite beautiful for the time of year and I'd like to say a quick thanks to India for sending us some of their summer. We're actually staying at Twichen holiday camp in Woolacombe, North Devon. My first tip would be - don't tell them you have a dog. We've booked two caravans and at the last minute half of us got moved to the other end of the campsite in the 'BUDGET' caravans. Not good. Rust, dust and the smell of damp dog welcomed us, right after the grumpy Receptionist Lynne did not. 

After a cold night - no radiators in the BUDGET caravans - a glorious 5;30am morning had me up showered and read for action. 

Half of us, the younger have gone to the beach, the other half have gone shopping, and one of us has found a wifi site two miles away and is blogging - guess who got the best deal, lol :D 

The papers are full of photos of fields full of snow last year and the russet reds and golden oranges of the leaves this year, the views here are no different and it is stunning. So, grumpy receptionists aside the place is a haven for mending the soul, as far as caravaning can. 

Got to make this a short blog as I've had to pay a pound to use the internet for an hour, the Waves Studio is filling up with kids who want to paint pottery - the other usage for the cafe - and I've got to walk the dog. Lovely. 

How NOT to: :D

I noticed an advert asking for 'Witty Writers' to send a pitch to obtain 'top notch' professional freelance work. Feeling in a particularly cheeky mood I emailed this: 

Well, what DOES one put in pitch? It could be likened to an ad in the personals, but I hear now it's all in the translation. Initially I thought I would put: 'Beautiful, voluptuous, free spirited woman, approaching her 40s', but according to the unofficial 'Dictionary for Decoding Women's Personal Ad's*' this would be read as: A 49 year old pathological liar who is very fat and possibly a junkie. Not nice, not accurate. So, I reconsidered .. keep it simple: 'Adventurous, open minded professional'. I popped through the internet looking glass to translate, 'Desperate, bitch who has slept with everyone'! 'Survey says 'Uh OH'. This just isn't working, so I've decided to go for honesty: 'Busty brunette writer, GSOH, NFOFD'. :D I hope that helps..! JULIA

* Link: http://www.craigslist.org/about/best/lvg/440674102.html

mag production social media feature

Check this out, intro to social media conference. lol. :D 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZKCdexz5RQ8

NEWS: Alike Minds Conference 16/10/09

SOCIAL MEDIA CONFERENCE ‘HITS’ EXETER

A coffee in Starbucks, Exeter last August sparked two friends to hold the first social media conference in the South West.  The conference was advertised using social media sites such as Twitter, Facebook and email only. The cost of the advertising and marketing was nil and attracted 180 delegates from all over the UK, with a ticket price of between £5 and £35 each.

The main theme was based on the ability to make an investment into social media and gain a return. Local businesses and charities sent representatives. Public relations officer, Sarah Parkhouse from the Red Cross said, “We are using twitter already to communicate between offices, but I’m hoping to pick up tips to utilise it further”.  

The event, streamed live around the world via Ustream.com, also allowed delegates from the internet community to participate and started with a controversial video from Scott Gould, who introduced himself as ‘nobody’. He prepared participants for some straight talking from speakers and panellists who included a local solicitor James Barisic and Carl Haggerty from Devon County Council.

Trey Pennington, author and Social Media Manager for the Jones Group, informed everyone, hits on social media sites have taken over the number of visits to pornographic sites. James Barisic, from Every’s Solicitors in Exeter spoke candidly about his experiences as co-founder of their PhotoLegal podcast. 

Olivier Alain Blanchard, manager of thebrandbuilder.com, gave a demonstration regarding ‘Social Media: Return on Investment’ and was met with mixed reactions. Some felt the social media concept was not a new idea and others spoke out to say they did not feel they, “Had learnt anything new’, but only one person has requested a refund. These questions pre-empted outrage from the internet community following the conference and comments such as, “Without social media you people wouldn’t even be there!” and “How do you think this conference was organised?” were two comments projected regularly onto the large screen behind the panellists.

Most delegates showed more enthusiasm in almost revolutionary tone, one predicting, “National newspapers will disintegrate and we are not going to be led by the nose, by the media anymore”.

Rich Waghorn, creator of twitter-based ‘OutWithABang’, was asked whether he felt social media was partially responsible for the deterioration of the print industry. He replied, “Businesses wishing to thrive in the future can not stop this phenomenon”, then reiterated a recent comment by The Guardian’s Emily Bell, “We are entering the age of participation and journalists must engage”.

Apart from the controversial questions all seemed glued to their seats until realising the Guildhall car park shut at 6pm. The conference finished at 6:30pm, but through the power of new media all were able to recap the nuggets from Sky’s, Maz Nadjm’s final spot on Ustream.com.

LINKS:

http://alikeminds.org/

http://www.exeterconferencecentre.co.uk/

PHOTO'S TO FOLLOW FACEBOOK IS BUSY CENSORING ME AT THE MOMENT. THEY SIGN THE OPEN INTERNET POLICY, YET FREEZE MY ACCOUNT FOR THREE DAYS FOR NOTHING. GRRR

Random Poetry for the Magazine 15/10/09

Do you feel sad? 

Look through MY eyes. 

Through MY eyes the world is beautiful and every day there is something new. 

Everyday there is a miracle. 

Come skip and play. 

Come to the field today. 

I ... am never far away. 

I am the child. 

The child within YOU. 

Look through MY eyes.... 

Mag Production/Independent Study 14/10/09

Mag Production 

Today we worked on our magazines 

Independent Study

Having spoke to my Tutor Russ and realised that the project making a DVD might not take off in the way I was hoping it to, and this year I don't want to leave anything to risk. I needed to rethink what I would do for my independent study. Although there are many things I would love to do in a journalism career I have to be realistic about my own situation. I'm a loan parent who has CFS and the reason I started this course initially was to be able to work freelance writing for various magazines/papers on a flexible part-time basis. The other people on the course have all been in very different situations, mostly being younger and at the start of their careers, being able to put energy, freedom and youth behind their ambitions. I'm starting a new career at a time in my life where my mind isn't as viperesque as it once might have been. Basically, I'm not there anymore and have many restrictions on my time. 

So, to cut a long story short, it's time to revise my expectations and go back to what I started with, working/writing freelance, part-time and flexible. In order to do so, I have to return to the areas I know best. 1)new age information 2)being an independent self-sufficient woman. 

By going back to these basics I can tackle two parts of the course at once. I can use these industries to form my magazine from. I've already looked through a few women's magazines such as Marie Claire, Glamour, Cosmo, Psychologies, and new age magazines such as Re-connect, Kindred Spirit, Spirit & Destiny, Pentacle, Psychic News, Prediction, (all the p's lol) The Source, but also through various magazine sites on the web, Dennis Publishing,IPC Publishing. The site www.issuu.com is great, lots of ideas and has helped me to think about making my magazine pages look like posters with some text opposed to standard magazine lay outs. It's also helped me to think of a design theme - I call it 'pastal retro' lol. Pastel colours, but the images are quite 70's, with lots of flower symbols. 

I set up a poll and have been asking people to vote on various names for the magazine, 'power of she', 'shhh', Chic Geek, Beg Me. I've also thought of Ohana which means family in Hiawian. Other ideas people have put forward are 'penny', 'independence', 'goddess', 'independent goddess'. I've offered a free reading for the winner. 

Had to have a little laugh and try the virtual makeover on the Marie Claire site.  http://www.marieclaire.co.uk/beauty/virtualmakeover.html

I looked terrible lol. 

Managed to put a mock up page together in Magazine Production today and that was a useful start to both magazine production and the independent study. 

We also went through Richard and David's rewrites of each other's articles. They were both brilliant and are very talented. I know I could never write in their witty and individual style. The standard of their work is very high and at the moment I'm feeling very down about my own abilities. Not because theirs are brilliant, it's nice to hear their take on the same work. I just feel quite lost in general with the course, mainly because of what happened last year. My confidence in my ability to write/put together articles is VERY low and probably lower than when I started the course. I feel like my abilities have gone severely backwards. Having confidence in yourself is important as sometimes it is the glue between a lack of ability and with hard work producing something spectacular. 

At the moment I'm a fraud, I'm winging it and not very successfully. 

Mag Production 07/10/09

Design Thoughts

I've been looking through the internet for some ideas for my magazine. This year I would like to do something that is within a mainstream industry. The two areas which are obvious are women's magazines and parenting being as I'm female and a Mum :D 

I've never been keen on parenting magazines they're all a bit 'toddler group' for me, some of them seem like they seem to be as if they're written for their five year old rather than the parents. Massively colourful, cluttered and crammed full of information and adverts for summer camps and childminders. Exceptionally useful, please don't get me wrong, but I don't buy them or even look at them as the whole look of it puts me off.  Also, sometimes the parenting mags I've seen seem to have an underlying message - 'Be a Hockey Mom'. This catchphrase was used continually to describe Sarah Palin during the US elections. What I mean when I say this is some Mother's seem driven to be like PR agents for their kids. They (and the kids) are dressed in the best clothes, full face of make-up no matter what time of day it is, great bodies, great nails, great teeth, the kids go to Ballet, Football, Piano Lessons, Scouts. They have a full-time job, their houses are immaculate and in the latest house magazine fashion, they drive 4x4's, they throw parties for their husbands boss and clients, they holiday in Mexico and have the best ever grandparents lol. They are phenomenal women, but I don't feel they're a good role models for the modern day woman. If they are truly happy on the inside - fantastic, I'm not judging - I wish I had that kind of energy, but not that kind of life. To me it's almost a modern day version of the 50's housewife. 

Looking at what type of magazine I would like to do I can feel an idea forming in my head. It's something combining, women, parenting, power, self-esteem, reality, beautiful design (if I can lol). Looking through some of the magazines on www.issuu.com (what a fab website) I want something simple, clean colours, either b/w and yellow highlights or pastels with an organic feel to it (not greens and browns) but hand sketches, lines and doodles through it. 

I've started to learn photoshop, as I want to create my pages in indesign, but I want the double spreads to look almost like posters, complete pictures in their own right. I'm torn between striking and smooth, or pastel and calming. 

Nothing Moves People like People Moving Together

At the moment I feel a bit lost with the course. Like I'm going through the motions, but I can't find my heart in it. The last two years I was motivated, but this year I feel like I'm dragging my feet a bit. Once bitten twice shy kind of thing, but I have to get past it and find my motivation again else there is just no point. 

The group project, Multi-Media, got me down last year and it's doing the same this year. I feel we've wasted two weeks of our ten weeks already. I still haven't got any real way of communicating with the group apart from Rich. Jaime's influence to stop people working with me seems to still be around the others. Tomorrow I am going to be more insistent that we agree roles or at least tasks to get on with. I'm hoping the poster has been done to advertise for people to contribute to the site. If not I'll do it myself. I'd really like to get involved with co-ordinating 'consumer content' - content sent in from site users. 

I am going to try and talk to Jaime tomorrow, nothing heavy just try to get some communication going between us. If she wants to be involved with this group project I am going to make it loud and clear that this year she isn't getting rid of me. 

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us; it's in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.”

by Marianne Williamsonfrom A Return To Love: Reflections on the Principles of A Course in Miracles

Mag Production Pastiche 05/10/09

Evaluation for Pastiche: 

The idea of this piece of work is to hype up our own style. I picked this article because I actually liked the style, it wasn’t as dry as the usual articles in the Economist, plus I am intrigued by Obama and haven’t quite made my mind up about him yet. Politics is one of my weak areas, mainly as I believe that fundamentally they’re all the same and therefore have to make an effort to be interested. There’s another one of my sweeping, inaccurate, offending statements!

After reading through this and considering how I tend to work in general I recognised some key points. My work , left unchecked, is often:

v Grammatically incorrect.

v Badly researched. There are few solid statistics although the original article is full of statistics and quotes.

v I often include something of my own experience and use this to back up my point. I know little about the health system in the US or the proposed reforms, but aged 18 I was working in America teaching outdoor pursuits. I broke my toe in what I would like to say was a heroic adventure, but I was only playing volleyball. I was taken to hospital and luckily had health insurance. I wasn’t in very much pain at all, but a black pregnant woman near me was in agony. They were trying to find ‘someone’ to pay for her care as she had no insurance. They treated me first. I left after having X-Ray’s and perfect treatment about two hours later. As I passed through the waiting area I noticed the black woman was still there, still in agony. I don’t even know the whole story, she could have been an addict who regularly came in cold turkey, but I have still used this experience in my article. It is wrong to do so, for several reasons, but mainly personal opinion in an article disrupts the balance of the article and one incident proves little. If the article is not perceived to be balanced then the writers credibility could be doubted and therefore the ‘facts’ not taken as true. 

v Full of strange humour, which is too subtle, and not many people ‘get’. For example I mention the ‘right-wing bangs’, this is to replace ‘right-wing fringe’ in the original article. ‘Bangs’ being a word used for a straight fringe. The article makes no other mention of hair, so it would be difficult to pick up. I sound sarcastic. This will put the reader off, especially if my articles aren’t known for style.

v Has two or more crossed themes, here I’ve crossed references to Jesus Christ with Obama. This is something I love to do, take two different concepts and mix them up and make new metaphors. I could have mixed Obama with references from the movie Grease, but I’ve chosen Jesus to mix with Obama for several reasons.

o   I often offend people with non-pc writing

o   The new messiah is often said to be black. There are also references to the original Jesus being black and not of Jewish origin.

o   Obama came from ‘small’ beginnings, like Jesus. He speaks passionately and is able to motivate and attract huge crowds of people. His story isn’t yet told and I think that he has stirred up such a hornet’s nest within the US and will they ‘kill him if they think he’s lied’. (Jesus Christ Superstar the musical).

o   Gallup and the ‘respected analyst’ are like the Apostles and Gospels of today and it made me smile.  I used the word prophet for Charlie Cook as Obama claims to have lived as a Muslim. So again badly researched references to major religions, neither of which I am involved in or know very much about.

Again this isn’t a good idea if I don’t want to alienate or confuse the reader.

v I often sound ambiguous about what my opinions are. Here I start as if I disapprove of Obama, then appear to defend him half way through. Finally to discard him altogether. In my attempts to be balanced I often swing from one extreme to another rather than walk a middle line throughout the text. 

Ind Study & Work Experience Diary/Tasks 02/10/09

Raf was in London today and Nicki had a lunch meet, so I worked from home today from 10:00am - 2:45pm. I rang Raf and he was with Paul Haplin at Music Sales Ltd. He needed a list of publishers for a new project, so I started researching publishers who have previously published similar projects. I found several sites, but the most helpful was Amazon. I found similar titles and then clicked down to see the similar books, then clicked on each of them to find their publisher. 

There were several repeated regularly, Music Sales, Wise Publications, Schott, AMSCO, Hal Leaonard, Boosey & Hawkes, Mel Bay Publishing, OUP, and Faber to name a few. I text and emailed the list as it I found the details. Raf rang a couple of times, to keep me updated. It's a work in progress. 

Nicki also wants me to work on some photo's in photoshop, so I've bought 'An Idiots Guide to Photoshop' and the magazine 'Photoshop Creative', published by Image Publishing (est. 1983). 

Publishers & Addresses

** = A publisher listed on Amazon which publishes Saxophone related products.

Publisher/Publication	Address & Email	Contact No’s
A&C Black Publishers **
Adams Media Corporation **
Backbeat Books **
Beckman Visual Publishing DVDs **
Berklee Press Publications **
Cherry Lane Music Co. US. **
Wise Publications Absolute Beginners Alto Sax **	N/A
Music Sales Ltd **	N/A
Shott Music GmbH&Co KG Weihergarten 5, D55116, Mainz **	info@schott-music.com 48 Great Marlborough St. London, W1F 7BB	Tel:+49 6131 246-0 Fax: +49 6131 246-211 MPA. 02075340700
Stainer & Bell’s	www.stainer.co.uk PO Box 110, Victoria House, 23 Gruneisen Rd, Lon, N3 1DZ post@stainer.co.uk	+44 020 8343 3303 Sales&   Copyright. +44 020 8343 2535 Promotion, library etc.
AMSCO Music Pub.Co	All contact info seems to be protected! Can’t find anywhere
Alfred Publishing (Warner Bro’s Publishing)	www.alfred.com
Boston Music Publisher **
C.L. Barnhouse Company	editorial@barnhouse.com Send cover letter, contacts, music title. Full score file in Finale or Sibelius. A ‘live’ performance in MP3 format pref. 205 Cowan Avenue West PO Box 680, Oskaloosa, Iowa, 52577	(641) 673-8397 questions@barnhouse.com
Carl Fisher Music (Theodore Presser) Dealers:B&H	cf-info@carlfischer.com 65 Bleecker St, NY 100012	Tel: 212-777-0900
David E.Smith Publications	www.despub.com 4826 Shabbona Rd, Deckerville, MI 48427.	PH: 810/376-9055
Dover Publications Inc **
Flame Tree Publishing Co Ltd **
Words & Music **
Hal Leonard Publishing **	7777 West Bluemound Rd, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, 53213	414 774 3630 Fax: 414 774 3259
Jamey Aebersold Jazz	Assume publish only ‘Jameys’ work. PO Box 1244 New Albanny, IN 47151-1244 USA	Tel: 1-812-945-4281
John Wiley & Sons **
Kjos Music Company	http://www.kjos.com/index.php Neil A Kjos Music Co., Attn: Submissions, PO Box 178270, San Diego, CA92177-8270	Music for schools, Churches and private music studios.
Konemann UK Ltd **
Lorenz Publishing Company	www.lorenz.com 501 East third Street, PO Box 802, Dayton OH 45401-0802	(800) 444-1144 x 1
LTP Publishers Ltd **
Boosey & Hawkes **	Aldwych House, 71-91 Aldwych, Lon, WC2B 4HN OR: 295 Regent St, W1B 2JH. www.boosey/shop.com	020 7054 7200   OR: +44 020 7291 7255
Foils ?
Now Publishers Inc **
Mel Bay Publishing **	salesUK@melbay.com Office 512 Fortis House, 160 London Road, Barking, Essex, IG11 8BB. email@melbay.com Submissions: Attn:William A. Bay No.4 Industrial Drive, Pacific, MO 63069.	UK:020 8124 1222
Music Minus One Accompaniment Music
Prentice Hall & IBD **
Southern Music Company
The FJH Music Company	custserv@fjhmusic.com Westport Business Park, 2525 Davie Rd, Suite 360, Fort Lauderdale, Fl 33317-7424 (Frank J Hackinson) sales@fjhmusic.com	800-262-8744
Sheet Music Publishers
Harmony & Melody Studio
Too Smart Publications
Oxford University Press **	custserv.us@oup.com Oxford University Press, Great Clarendon Street Oxford, OX2 6DP	(44 1865) 556-767
United Music Publishers	www.umusicpub.com 2440 Speulveda Blvd, Suite 220, Los Angeles, CA 90064	310-235-4700
Universal Music Publishing Group UK	ukpublishing@music.com www.universalmusicpublishing.com 20 Fulham Broadway, Lon, SW6 1AH	020 7835 5200 Fax: 020 8752 2601
Chester Music
Trevor James & Co
Universal Edition
CPP/Belwin	www.alfred.com
Sanctuary Publishing Ltd **
ABRSM Publishing (part of Musicsales group) Examining Board	Musicroom. info@musicroom.com	+44 01284 725725
Camden Music	info@camdenmusic.com 85 Waldegrave Park, Twickenham, TW1 4TJ, UK	UK: 020 8744 9005 Fax: 020 8607 9536
Studio Music London	sales@studio-music.co.uk www.studio-music.co.uk Cadence House, Eaton Green Road, Luton, Bedfordshire, LU2 9LD	+44 01582 432139 0800 389 2484
Chappell Music	www.alfred.com
Novello
Scarecrow Press
Summy Birchard Inc **
Faber Music Ltd **
Wadsworth Publishing Co **
Registry Publications Ltd **