International IT College of Sweden

INIT at Hagaparken

noreply@blogger.com (INIT College_Kyle) — Thu, 27 May 2010 12:18:00 +0000

INIT College went to Haga Park for a day of football, food and fun!

Here are some pictures from the trip...

The Importance of Advertising

noreply@blogger.com (INIT College_Kyle) — Thu, 25 Mar 2010 11:31:00 +0000

Today in Text Communication C, we discussed how messages presented in advertising campaigns relate to the beliefs and values of their targeted audience. We also looked some interesting examples of advertisements and messages embedded in social spaces and urban environments, and how this placement relates to the product/message being sold or presented.

Lots of examples can be found here: The 19 Best Ads I Have Ever Seen.

This DeBeers commercial is a great example of how meaning is attached to products through advertising.

Wikipedia Article Translation

noreply@blogger.com (INIT College_Kyle) — Wed, 24 Mar 2010 09:32:00 +0000

This week your assignment is to translate a Wikipedia article.

Wikipedia, as you may know, is a free, online encyclopedia that everyone has the right to edit. Wikipedia has 2,798, 226 articles in English and 309, 919 in Swedish (and counting). Even though it should not be relied on as a definite reference for every subject, in the professional or academic arena, Wikipedia is one of the best starting places to get a general idea about your topic. It usually provides many important details and can help to direct you in your search for information. Also, referring to the references section of an entry will direct you to other great sites and more information.

This week, I am expecting you to find a Swedish or an English article on Wikipedia (300-500 words) and translate it from Swedish into English or from English into Swedish.

My suggestion for finding such an article would be to open the Wikipedia homepage, or use the search box to find a topic that interests you, and check to see if it has a translation into English (if the entry is in Swedish) or into Swedish (if the entry is in English). If it already does, look throughout the article for links to a more obscure topic that may not have the supplementary translation. When you have found an appropriate article, post the URL onto the comments section of this blog post. You can start working on your translation after I approve your article.

Here is a link that shows you how to translate an article on Wikipedia. If you can't find an article to translate, here is a list of articles needing translation from Swedish to English.

I would recommend you to do a bit of research about the translation process before you start your assignment for better results. Keep in mind that another Wikipedia user can use your article for his/her research.

Some tips: Avoid translating word by word and try to reflect the meaning and most important points of the article. Also, be sure to re-read your translation before publishing.

Good luck.

Falcon James feat. Ola - If you know what I mean

noreply@blogger.com (INIT College_Kyle) — Tue, 02 Mar 2010 12:10:00 +0000

Check out the music video for Falcon James' new song "If you know what I mean."
Directed and edited by INIT College's own Ross Macpherson!

Pew Millennial Quiz

noreply@blogger.com (INIT College_Kyle) — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 13:09:00 +0000

Take the How Millennial Are You? quiz and post the result on your blog, with a reference to the Pew Research website.

With the ubiquity of Internet access and usage, an important question to ask is Does Google Make Us Stupid?

INIT Winter Sports Day

noreply@blogger.com (INIT College_Kyle) — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 13:14:00 +0000

On the crisp and chilly morning of February 18, INIT College students and staff met at Hellasgarden for a day of winter sports.

Students and teachers set out on a winter hike through the snow-covered forest.

Teachers Simon and Jonas lead the group during the snow hike.

Bringing a soccer ball along for the journey, Mahdi and his students make their way through the snowy ski-trails.

After the long hike, everyone enjoyed eating hot dogs and warming up around the campfire.

Teachers Sandra and Jonas weren't going to be caught unprepared in the event of a snowball fight!

Authors@Google

noreply@blogger.com (INIT College_Kyle) — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 13:27:00 +0000

This is a great discussion of the "Read Only" versus "Read Write" cultures and economies of the Internet, along with various problems facing current copyright legislation in the United States.

The speaker is Lawrence Lessig, Harvard Law School professor and author of Free Culture, on a visit to Google's New York office on October 3, 2006 as part of the Authors@Google series. He's got his own unique style of presenting Power Point slides (known as the "Lessig Method" or "Lessig Technique") which makes the presentation quite interesting and easy to follow and understand. Here's another example of this style.

A Fair(y) Use Tale

noreply@blogger.com (INIT College_Kyle) — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 12:22:00 +0000

This video produced by the Media Education Foundation uses excerpts from various Disney cartoons and digitally animated films to explain important aspects of copyright, including Free Use, the public domain, and the duration of copyright protection. The form of the video itself challenges the notion of what differentiates creative production from infringement. Do you think this is a legitimate use of copyrighted material or an infrigement of Disney's ownership rights? Does copyright law impose limits on freedom of speech?

The Corporate ABC Quiz 2

noreply@blogger.com (INIT College_Kyle) — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 10:18:00 +0000

Test your knowledge of letters and numbers used in the logos of various brands. My Text Communication class was able to identify almost all of them (anyone who knows the answers to v, w, or x please post it here). This definitely helps to highlight some of the challenges inherent to the protection of copyright, since the use any of these "letters" or "numbers" could be an infringement of these companies' intellectual property.

Here's the quiz: The Corporate ABC Quiz

Happy Pill Commercial

noreply@blogger.com (INIT College_Kyle) — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 13:19:00 +0000

Are you feeling a bit down and in the dumps? Has the icy and dim Swedish winter really been getting to you lately? Well, here is the solution you've been waiting and praying for! The Happy Pill™ is a super pill that makes you super happy, and it's here to wash away all of your worries and woes! It's the proven way to improve happiness. Forget things like gratitude, personal fulfillment, a sense of belonging, service to one's community, honesty, a strong moral character, success, achievement, a tight-knit group of friends and family, and an all-around meaning-filled and purposeful life...this pill is all you need to be happy.

The pill is produced by Awesome Corp, which is an awesome corporation. Production is currently underway on Awesome Corp's newest creation, the Awesome Pill™.

The Initiative - Halloween

noreply@blogger.com (INIT College_Kyle) — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 16:20:00 +0000

The Initiative - Halloween

The Initiative - 2

noreply@blogger.com (INIT College_Kyle) — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 16:19:00 +0000

The Initiative - 2

Parody Ads

noreply@blogger.com (INIT College_Kyle) — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 13:26:00 +0000

Humor can be an effective way to get a point across. Compare the following parody advertisements with real ads and answer the following questions about them:

1.) What was the first thing you noticed about the ad?
2.) What is being made fun of in the ad?
3.) What is different or the same compared to the real ad?
4.) How did it make you feel?
5.) Did the parody ad change how you look at the original advertisers?

See the Adbusters Culturejammers Headquarters for more spoof ads. The lesson plan and discussion questions were taken from the Media Awareness Network website.

Media Observation

noreply@blogger.com (INIT College_Kyle) — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 13:23:00 +0000

Directions:

1.) Choose a drama or sitcom that centers on teen characters.
2.) Complete all the documentation information on the program.
3.) Answer all the questions carefully in complete sentences and/or paragraphs. Your answer should be in the form of a coherent essay, rather than individual numbered answers.

Be sure to specify:

The name of the TV program
The channel or network
The time the show starts and ends

Questions:

1.) Describe a major problem or conflict that the teens face on this show.
2.) How is the problem or conflict resolved?
3.) Do you think this is the real way teens deal with this kind of problem or conflict? Why or why not?
4.) Describe the main character(s) in the show.
5.) Are the teen characters exaggerated or stereotyped in the show? In what way?
6.) Are there characters portrayed positively?
7.) Are there characters portrayed negatively?
8.) Would you want to be like any of the characters portrayed on the show? Why or why not?

Sex in Advertising

noreply@blogger.com (INIT College_Kyle) — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 12:40:00 +0000

Last week, we discussed the topic of sex in advertising. Refer to this page for the material and samples we went over in class concerning various ways in which men and women can be portrayed in advertising.

After that, I want you to find three such advertisements depicting a man or a woman (or both) and how they relate to the product.

Answer the following questions for the advertisements you have chosen:

1.) What is the product being sold by the ad?
2.) Who is the target audience for this ad?
3.) What underlying message or value is being sold by the ad? Is it obvious or subliminal?
4.) Do you agree/disagree with this message?
5.) In this a positive or negative portrayal of the man or woman in the ad?

These may also be relevant questions for the ads you've chosen:

1.) What is the women doing?
2.) What is the man doing?
3.) Who is in the foreground?
4.) Who is in the background?
5.) How is juxtaposition used to convey meaning?
6.) Is the woman or man placed beside objects that send out specific messages?
7.) Who is active?
8.) Who is not?
9.) What is the message you receive about this relationship?
10.) Who has the power in this relationship?

Media Awareness Network

noreply@blogger.com (INIT College_Kyle) — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 12:22:00 +0000

Answer the following questions based on the article "A Different World: Childrens's Perceptions of Race and Class in Media."

1.) How many children participated in the survey?
2.) What four races were included in the survey?
3.) What would the "perfect" TV show have in it?
4.) What type of program do Latinos most frequently watch?
5.) What two people were listed as favorites by all four races?
6.) What two races are shown the least on television?
7.) Characters from what race are most likely to be portrayed in a negative manner?
8.) Characters from what race are most likely to be portrayed in a positive manner?
9.) Describe the stereotypical qualities of white characters on television.
10.) Describe the stereotypical qualities of minority characters on television.
11.) What two races are portrayed negatively through the news?
12.) Explain the results of the survey regarding newscasters and race.

Newspapers and the Internet

noreply@blogger.com (INIT College_Kyle) — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 12:52:00 +0000

In The Great Unbundling: Newspapers & the Net, Nicholas Carr discusses the tensions the proliferation of the Internet has brought to the media world. He provides a healthy dose of statistics concerning worrying trends in the newspaper industry. Here are some examples:

In 1964, 81 percent of American adults read a daily newspaper. In 2006, only 50 percent did.
Just 36 percent of 18-to-24-year-olds reported reading a daily newspaper in 2006, down from 73 percent in 1970.
After peaking in 1984, at 63 million copies, the daily circulation of American papers fell steadily at a rate of about 1 percent a year until 2004 when it hit 55 million, by more than 2 percent in 2005 and by about 3 percent in 2006.

These statistics seem to suggest that less and less people are getting their daily news nowadays. One should also consider, however, that the availability of online news has led more people to turn to the Internet rather than the newsstand to catch up on the headlines. For example:

According to the Pew Internet & American Life Project, the number of American adults who get news online every day jumped from 19 million in March 2000 to 44 million in December 2005.
By the end of 2005, the Web had become a daily source of news for 46 percent of adults under 36 years of age who had broadband connections, while only 28 percent of that group reported reading a local newspaper.

Questions to consider:

1.) What are the economic implications of this decline in newspaper readership? How have newspapers been affected by the creation of an online advertising industry?

2.) What effect has this had on the structure of newspapers? (hint: there are several answers to this question)

3.) How are online newspapers adapting to the rules of online marketing? What type of news stories generate the most/least amount of revenue?

Social Media Revolution

noreply@blogger.com (INIT College_Kyle) — Sat, 05 Sep 2009 13:42:00 +0000

I just ran across this video posted on the blog of Ohio State University history professor Mark Grimsley. Check out his award-winning blog on war, history and politics entitled "Blog Them Out of the Stone Age."

INIT on Twitter

noreply@blogger.com (INIT College_Kyle) — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 19:39:00 +0000

Follow INIT on Twitter...

http://twitter.com/initcollege

The 1981 Hunger Strike in Northern Ireland

noreply@blogger.com (INIT College_Kyle) — Tue, 19 May 2009 21:47:00 +0000

Last week we watched Some Mother's Son, a movie about the 1981 Irish Hunger Strike. Read a bit more about Northern Ireland, Sinn Féin, and the Provisional Irish Republican Army. You can find lots of real footage of the events on YouTube, as well.

I then want you to write a blog post about the historical background of the hunger strike, the relationship between Northern Ireland, Ireland and the UK, and the motivations of the hunger strikers. Although it should inform your opinion, try not to base your whole analysis on the movie.

The Daily Show goes to Sweden

noreply@blogger.com (INIT College_Kyle) — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 11:35:00 +0000

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart

M - Th 11p / 10c

The Stockholm Syndrome

thedailyshow.com

Daily Show
Full Episodes

Economic Crisis

Political Humor

Funny story...

noreply@blogger.com (INIT College_Kyle) — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 05:53:00 +0000

I would like you all to browse what you can find about funny stories and then concoct one of your own. There are many things you can do to improve a story and make it more interesting for your readers/listeners. There is also a site called Humor Blogging devoted solely to comedy writing online you can also check out.

Have you heard the one about the guy who goes to Ethiopia, or the one about the weight loss plan?

Good luck!

Blog Tips and Revision

noreply@blogger.com (INIT College_Kyle) — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 10:16:00 +0000

Scan through this page about Weblog Usability: The Top Ten Design Mistakes. It has a lot of great advice on common mistakes to avoid in order to make your blog more useful and enjoyable to read.

The site Coding Horror: Thirteen Blog Cliches also contains some useful tips you should take into account when blogging.

Notice that both of these sites contain numerous outbound links spread throughout their posts. This is useful to connect readers to other sites, rather than keeping them contained within yours. This helps connect your blog to other bloggers and is valuable for search engine optimization.

Then check out what Google has to say.

This http://www.problogger.com/ page also has Blogging Tips for Beginners and a wealth of relevant information.

Constantly editing and revising previous work is an important part of the writing process. You can often discover spelling, grammar, stylistic or structural mistakes in your work when you glance over it a second time. Even if there is nothing technically "wrong" with what you wrote, looking over it again will allow you to gain a different perspective on it, and perhaps find valuable ways to add to it. Also, don't be afraid to delete some words or sentences if they don't strengthen your arguments or contribute to the overall piece. Something that seemed to fit in while you were writing may seem out of place or innacurate upon review.

Go back through some of your old post and try to make some improvements.

Web 2.0 - Introduction to Social Media in the Classroom

noreply@blogger.com (INIT College_Kyle) — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 10:15:00 +0000

Check out this SlideShare Presentation:

Web 2.0 - Introduction to Social Media in the Classroom

View more presentations from Kyle Heatherly.

The Machine is Us/ing Us

noreply@blogger.com (INIT College_Kyle) — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 19:25:00 +0000

Check out this awesome video...