website analysis- introduction

Introduction

For my analysis I am going to look at Alluc.org, I have frequently used this website for films and television programs, so I am vaguely familiar with the layout etc, though I have never used the forum or any of the other new interactive features. This website is a website in which u can access links to thousands upon thousands of music videos, films and television shows. Many of the links lead you to illegal pirate films that have been filmed in the cinema and are very bad quality, but there are also many links that take you to high quality rips of the films. Although streaming films is not illegal, many of the films that are on the website were filmed illegally in cinemas. The UK Film council recon that they loose £800 million a year due to film piracy. (http://technology.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/tech_and_web/article3097544.ece)

This website is very of the time in todays news, because it is also one of the reasons why the writers strike in America occurred in the first place. The WGA wanted compensation for there programs going out on to websites like this in the first place. As I use this website frequently for television programs especially, it could be said that I was not helping the situation in America, because I was backing a website which was not giving any money to the original creators of the content, but because American shows take longer to come over to the UK, it is a quick and easy way to access them and as I said before it is not actually illegal, because all the content is streamed.

This is an issue raised by Lawrence Lessig who says that he is against the idea that producers have the right to prevent other users from modifying and reusing the content, and so he may think that this website is perfectly acceptable and should not really cause any controversy, but when there is so much money involved, especially in the film and television industry should it still be the case that any one should be free to reproduce and modify content? I believe that this may be a little drastic and that maybe something should be done in order for the industries to get money out of it, but I would still like the content to be free, I suppose we can not have it both ways.

website analysis- interactivity

Interactivity

This site is also very convenient if you miss a show, you can just simply go on the internet and watch anything you have missed. The same with films, with being a student and having very limited funding, going to the cinema is a lot of money, so viewing them on the internet is quick easy and cheap. This website has gradually become more and more interactive and grown in content and size. It used to just be a list of television shows and films, but now there are applications such as “watchlist” which is for registered users, you can put “w”s next to programs that you want to watch and once you have watched them you can delete them from the list. You can now also search other members and maybe get in contact with them to ask them if they have certain films or just to generally chat to them about films you have both watched. Another interactive feature is the forum, this is where to talk about your favourite TV programs with other members, but also to request anything that you think is missing form the site. For instance one of the threads is called “Family guy?” and a member is asking whether anymore episodes of family guy are going to be uploaded because he hasn’t seen any in a while.

website analysis- Hyper text

Hypertext

The layout of this website is as follows, two navigation bars, one down the side one across the top, the homepage also has the top shows for each category that is available, for instance cartoons, movies music sport, this makes it easier to get to your link especially if it is popular. Hypertext is the way in which we navigate around a page, we no longer go about it in a linear fashion, it encourages active engagement, the user is encouraged to contribute and to become produsers, which we will talk about a bit later. Every reader who looks at this page will navigate around it in very different ways, as there are so many different ways of accessing the different pages, not one person will do it in a linear fashion, as this is not an option. Also because there are often more that one link to a show, people have the option to choose a link that suits them the best, which backs up the idea of active engagement. The design of the homepage is al light blue colour, the connotations of this light blue could be that it is neutral, this could be due to the fact that this website could appeal to anybody of any ages, due to the age of links that it has available and therefore it would not want to be to garish so that older readers get put off because it would like it was appealing to a younger audience. The picture on the top left has the website address in an orange type colour with bold writing, the picture on top of that is a television which has the same colour antennae as the writing below which anchors the text to the picture. The picture also acts as a hyperlink to bring you back to the homepage, which I believe is a good technique to use because it an easy symbol to associate with and is big enough and noticeable enough for people to realize that this is its function.

website analysis- virtual community

Virtual Community

The forum that is available has defiantly created a community between the users, there are people who are more knowledgeable about films, television programs and just alluc.org in general and so they are teaching other users the best way to navigate around the site and the best links etc to use. Within the forum there is a section called “Thread Graveyard” in which it says it contains “dead/closed/shitty threads” you can tell that this is not a corporately owned website, because of the diversity of ages that this website appeals to this type of language may not always be appropriate, but because of the sort of people that do own it, I will not be a big deal to them. I believe that the community that is created on this website is very different to the traditional sense of community, because it can appeal to any ages, any body could be on the forums, people from all ages from anywhere around the world. People that you talk to might not even have the same tastes as you, but you are connected by the fact that you are trying to find films or television shows, but maybe not the same shows or films as the people that you are talking to. Howard Rheingold suggested that communities online were very similar to communities that were face to face they were just broadened out by the use of technology, but the forum that he was talking about “The Well” requires people to use there real identities, it would not matter if on alluc.org you called yourself “ Hero Fan 4 EVA” or whether you used your real name as it is less about the people you meet and more about the information that you can get off them. So maybe here I have contradicted myself, and its not a real community?

Website analysis- produsers

Produsers and Technological Determinism

Alex Bruns coined the word produser, which is “the collaborative and continuous building and extending of existing content in pursuit of further improvement.” (Bruns, 2005 a) This is exactly what is happening on alluc.org, people can post on the forum links they have uploaded on to other online video hosting sites such as youtube.com and dailymotion.com, there links that they have produced and then other people can click on the links and become the consumers, but the people who post links can also access other peoples links and therefore become consumers. This is a good feature alluc is just simply the host and then it is the members that upload the links and generally create the content.

This leads us on to technological determinism as, is what is being produced advancing society, is technology changing the way we live. As far as I can tell this site would say that it is. A new age of technology is around that has never been developed before- even though films are released weekly and TV shows and music videos are broadcast frequently on television, people are becoming impatient. Especially when it comes to the fact that people are waiting for American shows to come over to England and the fact that the cinema is becoming more and more expensive. People like the way this site makes it easy to access these films and TV programs without having to wait, or even leave there rooms. This shows that this sort of technology has changed society because people are getting different attitudes towards what is right and what is wrong and what is convenient for them. It could be said that technological determinism has lead to laziness and it could also pose the question, are film and television going to die out completely?

Task 2 week 4

To begin with i believe that filesharing, online downloading of new material has meant that music is more liekly to be consumed through computers and MP3 players than through cd players, etc. I know for sure that whenever i listen to music i listen to it throught the computer, iot is very rare i put a cd in a cd player adn listen to it that way. I would also say that more music is being consumed and more varieties of music, people ar able to branch out more from just the basic chart music that they here on the radio, becaue through word of mouth people say "you should really listen to this song" and you dont have to actually physically buy it in ordeer to listen to it, you can just download and if you dont like it you can just delete it and if you do you casn keep it and dowload more.

A band might make it through a social networking site etc, because of what i talked about in the prevsious post, bands can just add as many people as they like and just spread the word about there band with out spending any money or physically moving from there seat. Also as said above through word of mouth, people can send you url's to myspace pages on bands that are up and coming, again with out paying for it or the hassel of actually having to physically move. Bands like Artic Monkeys, do not like to say that this is how they made it, for reasons i am unsure of, but it is certain that Myspace has definatly helped there cause and spread there muscic even further sround britain and even furtehr than that. This is also a good way for bands becasue they do not have to pay to set up these myspace pages, but they can still be designed in a way that suits the band and a way that suits there personality.

I think that this has already changed the face of popular music. Id say that popular music is alot more diverse these days, the stuff that you here on radio 1 and see on music channels, covers alot more genres, stuff such as indie that would probably not have been classed as mainstream in the past has become alot mroe forefront and i belive this is due to the internet and the way that it does promote new bands and new sounds, to people that may not have even thought about listening to that sort of music before.

i think that we will still need media companies in the future, but they may not come in the same form as they do today, maybe they will go completely online as well, and find way of benefiting from produsers in different ways, so that music still reaches the masses and they still make a profit from them. I think there will always be a place for them but maybe just not in the same way that they are needed to day.

Task 1 week 4

My experience with user generated content websits would be web sites such as wiki's, youtube and i think that websites such as alluc.org and veoh.com. I find wiki's reeally useful, if you need a quick fix to find out information, because they are usually straight to the point and are usually in simple language that is easy and quick to understand. for instance this is a wiki on user generated content. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User-generated_content. Even though there are issues surrounding whether the content is real or not, if i found out an interesting fact, i would always go look it up further on another website or in a book, so wiki's is a good source of finding initial information to then go on to do further research. Another user generated website that i often use is IMBD.com, this is always useful if i am doing a bibliography and i need to dinf out the director or publisher of a certain film or televsion program. For instance i am currently doing some research on childrens media and i had to find some information out on a program called "Shoe box Zoo", the information i needed to find out included, directors, channels, company actors, all this information i was able to find on this web site, http://imdb.com/title/tt0406468/. I have used youtube to both post and look at videos, although they are trying to cut down and often take off content that isnt entirely legal to post like full tv series or new videos released, they are often useful to me to watch videos of cheerleading and dance, to help me with ideas and to see what other team are l;ike and what standard they are at. Also if i dont have a song on my computer i often listen to it on youtube, instead of paying for it or downloading it.
Alot of the idssues surrounding the WGA strike are due to the fact that people like me use sites such as alluc and veoh, but the reason i use them is because of impatience and money. One of the main series that iw atch on the internet is HEroes, this took a very long time to come to british television and even when it did it was just on the sci fi channel, it took at least another 6 months to come to terrestrial and so when the second series came around i didnt want to have to wait another year for it to come to terrestrail television. Also with the price of cinemas and ebing a poor student i can not afford to go to the cinema to see all the films that i want to see and so when they are as easy accessible as they are, i just cant resist the temptations that surround them.
I spend alot of my time on social networking sites, before i came to uni i lived on myspace, but since being at uni i have been converted facebook and ahve never look back, i love the fact that you can post pictures and look at everybody elses pictures from nights out. and they are always there never to be lost. you can always post on someones wall and message them and keep in contact with people that maybe you wouldnt always talk to text or on the phone or over msn. Often on myspace and facebook you get security issues, i have often had eople hacking into my facebook and sending out messages about ringtones and other random stuff with out me even realising as soon as this happens i change my password. It does annoy me that it is this easy to hack into my facebook, but i do not know what else to do, the good thing about it now is when you are choosing a password it does tell you how safe it is, for instance if there is a red signal next to it its not very self and the greener it gets the safer it is.
Another issue with facebook is it annoys me when people send you lots of applications, or add you when they dont know you, if i do not know who a person is i do not add them, because i think it is kind of strange if they do add you! This happened with alot of bands on myspace i used to get alot of adds from random local or amateur bands, but i didnt tend to add them because there music didnt usually interst me and i didnt understand how they got my url to add me.

week 3 task 2 part 1

Second life is a digital version of the world, that is created entirealy by its users. You create your own character, both physically and mentally and then send them places to meet new people, the people that you are talking to are actually characters, with real humans attatched to computers on the other side. it is free to sign up and the virtual world that you seem if graphically very similar to "The Sims".
I would say that the biggest thing that it is used for is escapeism, within this world you can be anything you want to be and create a life that you want to lead, without maybe the normal issues of everyday communities and normal life. For instance if you have isses with your appearance, like you are overweight, your avatar can look slim and you could make your weight so it was no longer an issue.
I saw a television programme on this the other day, and to me the man thing that appealed to e was the novelty value, i used to love to play on sims for ours and this would be similar, only " real" people to talk to, me and my friend said it was like sims but with msn.
On the documentary that i saw, the characters that people created often looked completely different to how they actually looked, they usually made them selves look more eccentric, for instance one couple that met on second life were two middle class white people, but the woman made her self have sort of a lara croft outfit with long dark hair and the man made himself black and have big muscles, with lots and lots of peircings and tatooed, which is not what they looked like in real life at all. Although there physical appearance was exaggerated, it could be said that there personalities were real, and therefore it could be a projection of real life, but when it came down to it this coupld had no chemistry in real life and they found it difficult to talk to each other, but online there relatioship was great.

week 3 task 1

i think there is a difference between not putting your full name and with holding your identity, not putting your full name could be for your own safety, hiding your identity for instance pretending to be a 15 year old boy when you are a 50 year old man is wrong. if you are on a forum, or a website in which there are people who have the same beliefs, you do feel that you are able to express yourselves in ways that maybe you can not amongst your friends and colleagues, this doesnt mean that u shouldnt with hold your identity, it just means that in some situations you can feel more at ease with you veiws and personality. The risks that are involved with online self experssion are that when people read your point a veiws, especially if they are offensive, you could be subject to bashing and flaming, but also if you express yourself on a social networking forum, future employers read these sites and can decide whether you are right for the job just by what you have written, so maybe not in every situation, is self expression the best idea.

Alot of what i have talked about in my blogs with the dangers of relatioships online, is to do with people not being who they say they are and grooming. But there are other issues surrounding, relationshipd, for instance the person that you are talking to may find it easier to speak on the internet and therefore the personal that they are portraying, is someone that you get along with and can talk to easily, but if you ever met them face to face, you may find that you actually done have anything in common with them. Also i did find the poin intereting that dave made in the lecture about relationships that are formed online are disposable, unlike that of real life. I have made a few online friends through forums etc, and i dont think thatt in a real situation that we would necessairly get on the way that we did online, also the fact that i suddenly stopped talking to some of them, didnt really have an effect on me, it was just simply because we had nothing left to say to each other, it unlikely that as "face tyo face friend" would be this easy to faze out and just stop talkijng to.

Though this is the case alot of my real friends i would also call online friends especialy when i am away from home at uni, or back at home, i speak to my friends via the internet, so i through many points in the year i have just purely online and maybe the odd texst or phone call realtionships with friends from back home.

Week 2 Task 2

The closest thing that i can realate the blogs to, that is offline, is writing letters, because it can take a few days for any one to reply, face to face conversation is instant. Maybe text could be similar because if you do not have your phone on you at the time, the reply is not going to be instance, same as if you are not signed o to the internet at the same time as someone posts on your blog, the reply is not going to be instant either. I think that there is definatly a moe relaxed way of writing when blogging, you do not feel under as much pressure to write grammatically sound sentances, and it would not be frowned upon to write "u" instead of "you". I think the relationships that are formed on our blogs are slightly different to those that are formed on blogs that are out there on the web, because for one on ours we know alot of the people who re posting on them personally, where as if you had one that wasnt for you uni course, you may not know the people that are posting on them, therefore false relatioships can be formed, and people can claime to be somebody there not. Where as on our blogs, we have at least had a few face to face conversations with everyone that is posting on your blog. When i am blogging i know that my audience consists of lecturers as well as students, therefore i believe i am writing in away that is appropriate for both, in that it is not to formal, so students dont get bored of reading what you are writing, and so that lecturers think that what i am writing is relevant. I'd say that the image i am portraying of myself on this blog, is not really who i am, but i feel that it is appropriate for the setting that this blog is in. Alot of the people who will read thsi blog will no what i am really like and know that this is maybe not how i would speak to them, over face book or msn. I hink that after a few weeks, of getting into the swing of things, i probablyk will feel part of the bloggers community, but as it stands at the moment i dont!

Task 1 week 2

To begin with, i do belive that learning on these blogs is very different to being in a seminar, for one, you have to state your opinion when using these blogs, you can not just get away with saying nothing! Where as in face to face seminars, there is always the odd person that sits there very quite and doesnt really express there opinions on what is being said. Also there is the opportunity for more people to express what they have to say in as much detail as they like, because people can not interrupt them and change the subject and also there are no time restrictions on how long you can spend on the blogs, where as you usually only have an hour to an hour and a half in a seminar. I would say that that it is not a conversation, more like a statement with the opportunity to reply and express yoru oppinion as well. The problem is because there is no "authority figure" as such, leading teh discussions, it may be easier to go off topic, or to maybe talk about the wrong thing. The fact that there is the ability for question and answer situations between two or more people, is a feature of speech, but because of the time delay involved and the non immeadiacy of the replies, it makes the "conversation" that is going on less like face to face speech. I personally have used qutie a lot of forums, but not for this tyope of work before, so even though the concept is quite familiar to me, it is strange when you have to read a blog with such a lenthy amount of writing in it, i am used to short snappy sentances, it can be quite difficult to read long paragraphs on a screen.

task 3

it could be said that technology is the prim mover in society, it is the one thing that determins how society is going to change. On the one hand i do agree with this because, with the development of new technologies, everyday activites are changing and sometimes made easier the more technology develps, A simple example of this is the fact that you can take a mobile phone almost anywhere, therefore you can get in contact with people more easily. This has changed the way society has lived, people have come to rely on there mobile phones, i know for one if i loose my mobile phone i feel lost and freak out cos it feels like i cant get in contact with any one. Al though this is the case i do not believe that tachnology can be the one thing that completely determins how our society is going to be shaped im sure there are other factors that fall into this. Technology just happens to be a very key factor in this i dont believe it to be the only one though!