Vanity? Think Again

COLLEGE NEVER LOOKED THIS GOOD. YOU—ONLY BETTER. A MUST-HAVE FOR EVERY GIRL. YOUR BEST-EST FRIEND EVER!

These are the taglines of some of the country’s popular teen-based magazines. Catchy, isn’t it? Appealing mostly to the girls. Skinny models, new make-up, stunning dresses, interesting and intriguing articles. A whole lot of fun!

(From a girl’s point of view. Haha.)

Magazines are a fad nowadays. I, for one, collect them. Why? Because I love the idea that they know every girl’s problems and they have the solutions to all of them! They come up with different gimmicks every issue—like how to get over from a break-up, how to know if your friends are not the fake ones, how to prepare for college entrance exams, how to make yummy muffins, and the list goes on. Magazines display an image they want you to imitate—classy, smart, independent, confident. Some might think that this is all for vanity’s sake, but I suggest those people to give it a second look.

For the past two weeks our class was really busy. We were engaged in a class project—producing our very own magazine. It was a tough job, really. The class was divided into different departments and we are free to choose wherever we think we will fit it and be able to contribute. The department heads were really strict; we had to follow a timeline to keep everything under control. The Editorial Board wrote articles concerning relationships, new gadgets, movie reviews, and especially about our main topic—youth pop culture. The Marketing team took care of the sponsorship and promotions, and we in the Circulation group were tasked to sell the magazine.

Through the course of this project, I learned that people in the magazine industry really plan ahead. They do research early and scour different stores and boutiques to know the latest fashion trends, movies on DVD, and the latest from film /movie artists. They also do surveys to know if it will click with the people or not. They prospective models/endorsers/starrers of the magazine articles or the magazine itself. They go to different spots specially those for vacation and state their experiences and show photos of the wonderful places they’ve been to. Plus, they get a load of major labels as sponsors! Imagine how much effort is exerted on that! That’s why I think in this job, team work really makes the dream work.

Back to our project.

It was tiring but it was all worth it. When we saw the actual copy of the magazine, all of my blockmates were awed by what we’ve accomplished. Ours may not be the grandest, but just the thought of everyone’s exerted efforts to make the magazine better signifies the unity of the class and the extreme bond that we have. Plus, we’ve got the best models in town! Hahaha! Hopefully this experience may help us if ever we get in this line of work in the future. I know it will. Ü

Idiot Box

I love watching TV programs! It’s my favorite hobby, my stress reliever after a long day at school. I love foreign shows-especially the ones aired at ETC and Star World. They are almost real and they depict true to life problems people specially the youth are experiencing nowadays. I like One Tree Hill, and I’m a sucker for The OC! I also watch investigative shows like CSI and Bones; and comedy ones like Scrubs and How I Met Your Mother. Fictional ones are also abound, like Smallville and The Ghost Whisperer. There’s so much more—talk shows, reality shows, news and current affairs, cartoons, movie channels. All of these genres give us audience a wider variety to choose from.

Television means “seeing at a distance.” You don’t have to be in direct contact with what you’re watching; hence, it is broadcasted. You could know things without having a teacher or being in school, and you can explain why something came to existence even if you haven’t seen that particular thing with your very eyes. This is how television works—it has gone further in affecting how we spend our hours and our money, how we relate to others, what we talk about and think about.

Here in the Philippines, television had come a long way. Before, foreign shows dominated the Filipinos’ TV sets; the earliest were even in black and white. The TV industry had its share of struggles before it flourished. Over the years, we came to develop a number of programs appealing to the Filipino audience—some of them were sitcoms and dance shows. Actors and actresses alike were noted for their superb performances in drama. Little by little, the Filipino audience believed in those programs and thus hastened the airing of foreign shows to give airtime to the rising local ones. This gave birth to new ideas for programs that will cater to the masses. Among these newly-introduced programs were gameshows and late-night variety/musical shows. Other types of programs filled the air, from Sunday morning church services to political interviews to sports like basketball and soccer. Moreover, competition between TV giants ABS-CBN 2 and GMA 7 sparked the audience’s interest to which channel to tune in and what programs to watch.

Today, we are bombarded with different programs having different themes, objective and market. Some are suited for elders, some are done for kids. Some are informative, others only pure entertainment. It’s like everything has its own place, its own audience. Some say it distorts our perceptions of reality and illusion, and that it erodes our regional distinction in speech and clothing. But everyone goes to television for all these and more, which is why television resonates so powerfully throughout the culture.

Sitting on the couch and watching TV programs for so long will reduce the time that we should be able to spend with our family members talking to them, but on the brighter side, television has its positive effects—like it aids in correct pronunciation especially foreign words, and the illiterates finding a new world opened to them—because television is cheap and readily available. It requires little energy, intelligence or education to enjoy it.

Maybe that was why it was called the idiot box—because it makes you passive to almost everything you see. Everytime you open it, that’s the time you are least productive and lazy. That’s why we should take control or our TVs—not the other way around. Let us all be responsible enough to know if we’re watching too much. Remember, too much of anything is bad. =)

Movies Galore!

Who doesn’t love to watch movies? Whether it be a suspense-filled horror film or something that will tickle your funny bone, watching a movie helps us relax and forget all our other preoccupations even for a while. It is something that could help us ease our tension and divert our attention to what we are viewing. We could relate to the actors, and sometimes, we even derive our decisions and actions based from what we see or hear from them.

Motion pictures are by far the most used, most convenient form of mass media. Through movies, people can see others’ way of life and can relate to them. They could transmit messages through the actors’ portrayal of roles. It is universal because people from different countries from different walks of life could watch it and have their own say to what they saw. Language is also not a hindrance—because the mere fact that that the audience sees action, I think they could comprehend to what they are watching. This proved to be true because the earliest films didn’t have the actors talking. Movies have the power to tell people what and what not to do. Through their storylines, they could greatly influence the way of thinking of its viewers, even without being in direct contact with them. It’s like a storytelling process that never ends, because different movies convey different messages, and the audience may come up with different meanings or translations. Movies adapted from books are also a fad nowadays. Some people can better understand what they are reading when they see it on film. Visual understanding, so to speak. This also signifies that movies contain information necessary for us to understand certain things happening around us, whether fact or fiction.

The making of movies also serves as our expedient to freely express ourselves and let others see what these films are made for. There are patriotic films, science films, fiction films—the list goes on. The diversity of the topics or subjects used by the filmmakers is of incalculable value, because these are what bring life to the movies made.

Then came entertainment. Movies, I agree, are one of the best forms of entertainment. It amuses the audience with whatever story it presents, and its use may vary. Before, people have Nickelodeons. These are small theaters that when you drop a nickel, you could view a short film. During that time, most of the people were contented with that kind of set-up. Many patronized the Nickelodeon. Cinema had a particular appeal, and people of different classes wanted to go to movie theaters. This also provides social meetings for men and women alike. Blacks were then barred from the Nickel theaters. Then came movies with sound. People can now hear actors talk, and also with the coming of color, movies are now vibrant and more interesting to watch. Over the years, with technology as its aid, the movie industry flourished. Nowadays, whether of what race or country you are from, we can watch movies anytime we want to. Movies of different genres are readily available today. And we can see films not only in the theaters, but also in drive-ins and in our very own TV sets at home. As the years pass, more and more people are making movies. This further implies that our movie industry is in the rise. We should capitalize in our resources so that we may continue to improve and be known as good and responsible filmmakers and movie-goers. See you at the movies! ;-)

Spooky Night!

What comes to your mind when you hear the word Halloween? For me, I imagine toddlers clad in their costumes, lining up in the ever popular Trick or Treat; street/house parties decorated with lots of cobwebs and gooey sticky stuff, posters and masks of monsters worn by people who try to scare others. This is the typical Halloween setting—dark, eerie, vague—but fun.

On October 30, 1938, an episode of the American radio drama anthology series Mercury Theater in the Air aired War of the Worlds, an adaptation of HG Wells’ novel of the same title. I listened to the broadcast and found its script for back-up. It was so long, it would have bored me had I not found the script and then figured that it was so action-packed!

During those times, the radio was the most convenient form of mass communication. It’s like everyone can hear what radio commentators say, and many believed it to be true. Well, the story was about Martians attacking the earth, and studies made by unnamed historians conclude that six million people heard the Columbia Broadcasting Systems (CBS) broadcast; 1.7 million believed tit to be true, and 1.2 million were extremely frightened of what they thought of as breaking news. People were astounded; they panicked and thought that might be the end. In the garden of a certain Mr. Wilmuth in Grover’s Mill in New Jersey was where the cylindrical metal disk landed. It contained Martians—green with tentacles, ready to attack and conquer the earth. It was also said that many “were killed by putrefactive and disease bacteria against which their systems were unprepared,” and that martial law was even declared throughout New Jersey and eastern Pennsylvania. Police and authority tried to shoot the Martians, but they failed. In the end, men were defeated. The Martians prevailed and inhabited our planet. Only Prof. Richard Pierson remained alive. He was an astronomer, and he was also the one who documented the Martian invasion.

At the end of the broadcast, I could say that Carl Phillips was an effective commentator. Not only did he spoke well, he also helped the other characters give justice to their roles. Plus points for delivering the lines meticulously that they seemed almost real. Maybe this was why the people listening got totally hooked—that they forgot they were supposed to hear a drama. If I were part of the audience that time, I swear I would have also believed. Of course, that topic is something new to my ears, something I would be fascinated about, and at the same time will make me wonder if there was really extraterrestrial life. I would have been in hiding to save my precious life for fear to be killed! No kidding! Probably, the serious tone of the actors is what made the broadcast convincing enough. Also, a bit of exaggeration like many civilians who died because of the metal disk that landed and was first thought of as a meteorite, for example, greatly stole the audience’s attention. Greatly affected were the people that they forgot its Halloween. Actually, War of the Worlds was a Halloween presentation. I give director Orson Welles two thumbs up for a job well done. It’s like April Fools’ Day set in Halloween. A good scare, isn’t it? ;-)

Communicating

Communication is part of our lives, something that we cannot take away. It is necessary because it is how we express ourselves and make other people understand what we want to tell them. The things we say may affect other people's actions, decisions, and/or points of view. In a way, the messages we convey, though written or not, influences the way of thinking of the audience we speak with.

That's why our subject CA201 interests me. It helps me define different ways to communicate, that there has to be a medium to do so. Information will only be significant if your receiver can comprehend with what you're saying. For example, primetime news programs TV Patrol (ABS-CBN) and 24 Oras (GMA 7) use the Filipino language to cater to the mass. It will be easier for the common people to understand and give their comments about the current affairs. Information is easily spread throughout the country, even overseas.

Through the information we send, we get feedback from others. Whether good or bad, it is important because it is through feedback that we learn if people believe us, and we will know how to improve our ways of speaking out and relating to others. Our personal experiences may be the same with that of other people, and this may lead us to new friends.

These are only some of the things I have learned about communication. I know it has more complex sides that I should discover, so that I may use it as effectively as I could. I know i can improve myself and also influence others to make more meaning in their lives through communicating with them. :-)