The Caffeinated Carbivore

This new term has been flying across the internet, from creative to advertising mediums. So what exactly is a TransMedia project? A TransMedia project places content on multiple stages, such as Facebook or Twitter, and uses each medium to tell a part of the story. This type of storytelling offers a deeper appreciation for projects because of the varying strengths of these mediums. In this way, viewers often become more engrossed in stories or characters because they can interact with them on Facebook, get live and instant updates via Twitter, and watch new episodes on YouTube. This type of advertising offers strength in its variety; the message is sent to multiple audiences simultaneously and can be altered accordingly. One new TransMedia project is highly anticipated in the comedy world: I Made America . Particularly timely in light of the upcoming election, I Made America is a comedy sketch about a few founding fathers stuck in the mire that is our current campaign trail. The father...

The French have quite a few odd rules, as Matthew Fraser points out, but this one strikes us Social Media bandits to the core: Not being able to say Facebook or Twitter on air?! The social media hold a great deal of power in today's society: 1. Political power, as evidenced by the Obama campaign and the rallies in Egypt 2. Social power (how many couples meet or maintain relationships online?!) 3. Educational power (interactive lessons, teacher immediacy...studies show that students may even learn better with social media. How many times has Google gotten you over that brainfart, "Who was the director of that movie...gosh I can't remember...this is going to keep me up tonight...better just Google it."). The evidence is in our culture. Language serves those who use it, and social media have certaintly taken the driver's seat in creating new turns of phrase like "I'd "Like" that","Tweet this" or "Facebook me". An even stron...

Everyone loves a good story. In fact, we love good characters so much that they often re-appear. The step parent was evil in Cinderella, and that hasn't changed much in the new blockbuster Step Father . The media has always been a vehicle to tell a large story to a large audience. Now with the dawn of the digital age, we too can become story tellers. We share our personal narratives with our Tweets and add our voice to movements on Facebook and newstories on CNN. But who's story is NOT being told? Those without access to technology, either because of their membership in a lower economic group or a higher age group. Aka, those without the skills or the money cannot be cultural storytellers. This was not the case in Egypt, however. While the inernet was shut down, only outsiders could tell the Egyptians' story. BBC and American news networks innitially told the tale of the Egyptians without adding individual narratives. Instead, blanket statements about the protestes (not as ...

What place do politicians have on Twitter? The primary one (pun intended haha). We've heard a lot of complaints about the costs of campaigns, specifically where the politicians are getting their money from. A politician likes social media for two reasons: 1. It's cheap 2. With the help of your Facebook fan list, Facebook offers a highly targeted ad to a highly targeted audience. Recent research shows that Facebook users may become resentful of the presence of big business on Facebook. The degree to which a politician is considered a big business or a representative thereof has yet to be seen. However, the study did find that young users in particular were open to brands which they felt represented themselves. The takeaway? A politician's ad on Facebook is more likely to be accepted by young users if they seem to be "one of the in crowd"...aka youthful, earthy, and not corporately oriented. A great example of politics, via social media is Comedy Central...

I've often written here about how media has become increasingly plastic-we shape and reshape our social networks via social media, and vise versa. Even a teachers' pedagogical standpoint influences her social media choice...and the social mediums of her PLN influence her pedagogy! I do not believe this is due to our increased dependency on social media-I believe the plasticity of social media is due to the fact that it was born from a cyclical and self-motivated American capitalist media. Our society is smothered by a few voices repeating and rehashing status quo for the sake of feeding the media machine. The result? No fresh, new perspectives or ideas, and certainly no new voices. Our media is built upon money-making, and thus entertainment; even objective or factual news stories are scrapped if they are not entertaining. This has led to a degradation of traditional fact: even the most horrifying or logical of events is reduced to an ordinary and entertaining standpoint ...

Do you know this man? This is Steven Slater , the man who has 28,000 fans on facebook for...quitting his job. Though his flight exit was a bit theatrical, his plight was far from abnormal. Contrary to popular belief, Steven is not suffering from a breakdown-he's dealing with a part of his industry that many fellow airline employees are familiar with: Emotional Labor . As teachers, we have equal amounts of academic and emotional labor. We have to physically and mentally instruct through our personalities-but which personalities? We are familiar with our many faces (the "parent" the "co-worker" and yes, the "teacher"). It's tough to always be friendly and attentive when our students are being anything but. So should we pull the emergency hatch? No way. Be aware of the tasks you're performing-grading papers can be easier than keeping a smile on your face sometimes.

We've received our rosters-we're learning their faces. But who are these new students? If asked, many of them might not be able to say. In a digital age, we have many mailable identities. On Twitter I'm OceanEyes729 and I tweet and follow those who write about technology for teachers. My Twitter identity is made up of my tweets and those I follow. On Facebook, I'm a fan of a lot of things-Despicable Me, etc. So according to the internet I'm a techie teacher who likes children's movies. But wait. I can get on my Facebook and fan a lot of things that don't really describe me. This way, I can create a false identity. For incoming college students, Facebook is a great way to make new friends. Find people who like the same artists as you! But does that mean that they'll make good friends in real life? I show this clip to my students on identity day-who are your friends, and does the concept of friendship change on the internet? Another pa...

The population of Facebook is larger than the total inhabitants of the United States , and has been for a while now. What does that mean for teachers? Facebook has become a large part of our students (and our own) lives. This means, if we friend our students or have a public profile, we should keep our page professional. In addition, it is important to remind our students that "public speaking" doesn't just happen in face-to-face communication . Encourage your students to consider what creates their "self"-both online and in person. 1. Ask them to check their sense of self comes from- how much comes from the media ? 2. Talk to them about who their friends are in person, versus their Facebook friends .