Shane Tilton earned his Ph.D. from Ohio University's Individual Interdisciplinary Program (I.I.P.) in 2012. His main research interest deals with new media and computer-mediated communication within the framework of sociological theory. His dissertation research is dealing with how social networks aid in coping/adjustment of the incoming students to universities. Shane was an instructor of Instructional Communication at the University of Kentucky. He had taught Communication for the last 14 years. Supervisors: Eric Rothenbuhler and Mia Consalvo
First Year Students in a Foreign Fabric: A Triangulation Study on Facebook as a Method of Coping/Adjustment, Oct 31, 2012
As American high school seniors graduate and prepare to attend college, these students must chang... more As American high school seniors graduate and prepare to attend college, these students must change in order to adapt to the new rituals that higher education presents. Teens, for the most part, leave their family structure and their normal everyday routines to pursue a degree and a chance for a good paying job.
However, these students can be unsure about their new collegiate environment. They can feel scared about moving away from their family, friends and their local community. More teens are looking at online social networks, primarily Facebook, to gain awareness of the surroundings that they are moving into. Since the advent of online social networks, there has been little research regarding how students are using this new channel of communication to adapt to the collegiate culture. This dissertation will document my triangulation study of American first-year college students’ use of Facebook as a mode of adapting to college life and how their participation on Facebook relates to their “real world” interactions.
The focus of this research will explain three of the core functions of Facebook as they relate to the development of a first year college student; (1) Facebook as a “stream of awareness” for the student, (2) Facebook as a point of engagement between the student and the collegiate environment and (3) Facebook as a “real world” community builder. These functions will be explored through the use of three methods: a survey exploring how Facebook is helping first year college students adapt and cope to their new lives on campus; a series of interviews addressing the issues that first year students are facing on campus, and the relationship between those issues and the students’ online presentation, and a virtual ethnography study of students’ Facebook profiles with a focus on how students’ online presentation impacts their everyday lives on campus.
The Journalism Breakdown: Writing Multimedia Journalism Content in an Era of Changing Media Systems & Economic Models, 2020
One of the issues facing journalists is a lack of training that focuses on creating editorial con... more One of the issues facing journalists is a lack of training that focuses on creating editorial content with the changes to media platforms, economic models, and the mode of communicating with their audience. There is a lack of guidance on how to apply their storytelling style and lessons from college with newer content management systems and fragmented journalism workflows. There is a need for journalists to gain mastery in performing the "series of non-routine tasks" that will face them in the future. Journalists entering the job market must have a level of social intelligence to understand the changing nature of audiences and their news consumption habits. New journalists must also apply critical thinking practices and creative problem-solving skills toward the complex news-gathering process.
The Journalism Breakdown integrates praxis and research from journalism, social psychology, computer science, and visual communication along with the best practices from media organizations to provide skills and techniques to apply essential journalism practices to the dynamic and often chaotic world of the newsroom. Parts of the lessons from this book will teach the reader how to use flexible thinking, a growth mindset, solution-focused thinking, audience awareness, and community engagement to craft stories worth reading now and the future.
Meme Life: The Social, Cultural, and Psychological Aspects of Memetic Communication, 2022
Memes have been part of computer-assisted communication almost since the development of the first... more Memes have been part of computer-assisted communication almost since the development of the first consumer browser (the "World Wide Web") in 1990. The internet's ability to provide a public sphere for people to discuss the issues of the day and other topics of interest means that people can use the language of the internet to express themselves in ways that would not be feasible in the real world.
Those bits of content are so native to the internet that it feels obvious to want to understand why they are so compelling to tens of millions of people who use smartphones, tablets, computers, and other smart devices. This book seeks to explain how memes influence societies and cultures beyond the confines of social networking services. It will begin by reviewing the fundamental definitions that frame discussions about memes in popular culture and academic research. There will be a connection between theoretical concepts about memes and the memetic content itself. Each chapter will be using one theorist's work to dig a little deeper into what makes memes effective modes of engagement between people online.
On October 3, 2008, a post on CNN’s iReport, a citizen journalism social network website, reporte... more On October 3, 2008, a post on CNN’s iReport, a citizen journalism social network website, reported that Steve Jobs suffered a massive heart attack, spurring a decline in Apple’s stock. The story’s falsehood was quickly discovered, and the credibility of CNN and citizen journalism was thus called into question. The purpose of this article is to analyze those ethical questions and the relationship of citizen journalism to traditional media outlets.
Specifically, I investigate how the ethics of citizen journalism have changed since the Steve Jobs incident. I consider the improvement of the tools of production and their impact on workflow within a digital newsroom as they relate to the decision-making processes of the leadership within a journalistic organization. I examine key ethical decisions from the viewpoint of multiple actors within the organization, as those actors influence the speed of production within the network and what content is released to the general public.
The chapter begins with historical and theoretical analyses of the iReport event and its ethical aspects. The historical analysis derives from a study of the articles published during the time of the misreported story (i.e. October 2008 to January 2009). Beyond the initial analysis of the iReport event, the case study is centered on the context of other issues relating to citizen journalism since October 2008. In particular, the case study examines the internal and external code of ethics followed by news organizations that partner with citizen journalists. By doing so, I hope to ascertain a lineage of ethical evolution.
The case study concludes by discussing the current state of citizen journalism and its future within traditional journalistic organizations. The conclusion presents takeaways that future scholars may reference when studying the connection between ethical codes and citizen journalism.
The Psychology of Zelda: Linking Our World to the Legend of Zelda Series, 2019
The general public’s first exposure to the Legend of Zelda series came from the original Legend o... more The general public’s first exposure to the Legend of Zelda series came from the original Legend of Zelda (1987)—specifically, its opening credits. Before a video gamer even started playing, the Title Screen music set the tone of the game. The driving rhythms and grandioso melodies allow the player know they’re about to be thrown into an epic journey. The Legend of Zelda series set the tempo in the series with the music from the original game. To this day, the music from the original game is still special. Players hear the songs from the original game and feel those original emotions they had during their first plays of the games. This emotional draw comes from a place bigger than the game itself. As this original Zelda game was the first to introduce the game-playing world to the kingdom and mythology of Hyrule, its music played a crucial role in engaging a player enough to press “start” (Consalvo, 2003).
The music that a player hears during the first exposure of the Legend of Series aids a player in making the decision if they would like to start playing. Every note, beat, and rest weaves together a musical narrative that expands the audience’s understanding of what their expectation should be playing that game. This initial interaction is vital. A player will only spend a limited amount of time determining if a game is worth their time and most of it is spent in the beginning stages including the title screen. The music the player hears during the Title Screen helps the player maintain their interest in the game and communicate to the player what to expect when playing the Legend of Zelda (Livingstone & Brown, 2005).
Music affects and sticks with us for many reasons, but there are several psychological theories that best explain why the Legend of Zelda’s music does so in particular: the mere-exposure effect, the lizard (lizalfos) brain, and aesthetics of music. To fully understand the impact of the music in The Legend of Zelda and the reason it remains an iconic part of the game—and, in turn, our popular culture—it is crucial to contemplate and examine the psychological components that provide the music with so much meaning.
This chapter explores the importance of navigating the terrain of social interactions, being open... more This chapter explores the importance of navigating the terrain of social interactions, being open to new experiences, and avoiding the traps of going through the linear motions of the well-worn pathways of life. The rewards for choosing to explore the boundaries of the territory will also be discussed as well as how to minimize interpersonal risk by being able to recognize potential the dangers are and how to react to them. Examples from various games, along with Face-Work and Affect Theory, will be creating an understanding that being open to new experiences means viewing emotion as the pallet that influences a person’s views of the world and creates a roadmap of how to be a more open person.
The Psychology of Final Fantasy: Surpassing the Limit Break, 2020
Square Enix created a series of worlds designed to push the player’s understanding of how social ... more Square Enix created a series of worlds designed to push the player’s understanding of how social development and interactions could be crafted within the Japanese Role Playing Game genre of video games. The three continents of World A from Final Fantasy I (FF I) to the lonely star known as Eos in Final Fantasy XV (FF XV) provide the backdrop for all of the action that takes place within the game. Players enter a rich cultural experience throughout the series and, in turn, players care about the lives that the different player characters (PCs) and non-player characters (NPCs) go through during the game. These environments and personas represent an almost “mirror world” as it reflects the different eras found on Earth with all of the various forms of strife that existed in our world.
Final Fantasy, as a study in social psychology, represents a complex challenge as the game designers essentially create a new world and society for every version of the game. Few narrative threads connect the overall series. The more significant connections come from the traditional good versus evil battles that are found in Japanese mythological storytelling (along with some references to Judeo-Christian and Islamic religion in character creation). Also, the symbolic components of crystals, life force, and the apocalypse are embedded in the overall storyline. These narrative supports described above built the spiritual overtones that most players of the series would recognize as core to the gaming experience. A broader story arc, which will be the arc examined by this chapter, is the influence of technology within the cultures and societies of these games. The rationale for this analysis is that as the series progressed from FF I to FF XV along an almost similar technological development curve to Earth with the exception that Earth-based technologies were not built upon the foundations of magic or spiritual influences.
The later versions of the game series invoke Arthur C. Clarke’s Third Law of Technology, which states “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.” The “uninitiated” outsider that the player represents would look at a society like the Garleans from Final Fantasy XIV that has the capability to grab a moon for the sole purpose of weaponizing it to destroy the other “primitive” nations and control all of the world of Hydaelyn as a magical place that should be fear. This fear is in contrast to the world of Earth were nations have the capability of destroying and controlling merely through the weaponization of the atom.
This broader discussion of technology is not merely to look at how technologies drive the various nations from the Final Fantasy universe. After all, the PCs and NPCs are motivated more by the game designers’ algorithms and narratives than the more baser psychological drives of man. This writing instead will use a few of the critical worlds from the series as a model to explain how technology influences human behavior in the real world. Final Fantasy as a series raises the problems people experience with technology on a day-to-day basis. Technologies in their most basic form represent a power structure and cultural mindset that people have accepted as part of the norms of society. These power structures and cultural mindsets are made explicit when the players play these games.
This critical discussion of technology will need to be framed by the right set of theories. It seems that these worlds could use the work of philosophers to examine vital socio-technical concerns. One philosopher in particular, Martin Heidegger, would provide a good grounding for this discussion because of his work on technology and modern society.
A standard part of journalism scholarship is considering the relationships between the journalist... more A standard part of journalism scholarship is considering the relationships between the journalist/journalistic organization, the community covered by the journalist, and the audience that reads/listens/watches the journalist's work. Those who have the privilege of teaching journalism at any level would naturally develop their students entering the workforce to deal with the ever-changing media industry by thinking critically about those relationships. I needed to adjust this developmental training practice due to COVID-19. During the summer break, I reflected on the journalists that would cover these gut-wrenching stories when I was a child.
Social deception games are games that involve players adopting roles and teams that are not known... more Social deception games are games that involve players adopting roles and teams that are not known to all players of the game. One of the components of these types of games is deceiving other players for the purpose of completing goals and tasks. The focus of this case study is to show how social deception games were used to teach aspects of small group communication (specifically the development of roles with small groups and power structures that emerge within small groups) to multiple groups of students taking a basic communication course at a large university in the United States. The framework of this case study will begin with an explanation of two social deception games (“Are You a Werewolf?” and “The Resistance”) and the previous literature related to small group communication, game-based learning, and other pedagogical frameworks. This review of literature is followed by a description of the lesson plan and course objectives that were used to frame the class time. An analysis of the reflective assignments will help describe the benefits of approaching small group communication with a ludological technique. Finally, discussion of the effectiveness of games like those in the category of social deception within the college communication curriculum is provided.
eTools: Using Technology in the Classroom, Mar 15, 2016
A need exists for students and communication educators to go beyond the traditional concepts of l... more A need exists for students and communication educators to go beyond the traditional concepts of literacy. Students enrolled in our communication courses are expected to be proficient in verbal communication through traditional face-to-face forms of engagement and more mediated/electronic modes of interaction. Practitioners of communication must be able to archive their speeches and other relevant oral presentations for future consumption. This skill set will be equivalent to mastering word processing and information gathering as a measure of being a successful graduate in the field of communication.
Tablet computers (or just tablets) are often discussed in context with their relationship with bo... more Tablet computers (or just tablets) are often discussed in context with their relationship with books as an informational portal. For the most part, the analysis of tablets has dealt with frequent tablet activities, locations of use and contextual factors. It is fair also to note how the tablet has become a central nexus of production tools for the content creator. Tablets represent a platform both for distributing content to multiple audiences and providing the tools necessary to produce content on the fly. Tablets allow the user to capture thoughts on a screen that is slightly smaller than that of a traditional laptop (10 vs. 13 inches), while maintaining a level of portability and usability beyond what a traditional laptop can provide. This ability to quickly capture thoughts and ideas is extremely handy to academics in the field, specifically researchers, as they conduct research or present knowledge to the larger population. This study will look at how researchers are using tablets to replace older techniques for gathering data and publishing their work. The analysis of publishing will look at the differences between writing on a tablet and writing on an office computer or laptop. For example, the advantages and disadvantages of a touch screen device versus traditional user interfaces (keyboard and mouse) will be discussed by the researchers and shown via the everyday use of the tablet/office computer.
International Journal of Communication, May 15, 2015
In March 2014, a viral campaign spread across social media using the tag #nomakeupselfie. This ca... more In March 2014, a viral campaign spread across social media using the tag #nomakeupselfie. This campaign involved women posting selfies without wearing makeup and (in later iterations of the trend) donating money to cancer charities. It was credited with raising £8 million for the charity Cancer Research UK (CRUK) and received a wealth of coverage in mainstream news media as well as across a range of blogs and news sites. The starting point for the #nomakeupselfie has been attributed by its lead campaigner to a single picture Laura Lippman posted on Twitter after Kim Novak’s appearance at the Oscars on 2nd March 2014 (Ciambriello, 2014; London, 2014).1 Novak’s appearance was marred by criticism about her look. Some people on Twitter commented on how her face was not beautiful and that it was disfigured from plastic surgery. Lippman’s tweet of “No makeup, kind lighting. #itsokkimnovak” (Figure 1) was noted as the starting point to the prosocial focus of this hashtag.
The meme initially saw female users of multiple social media sites post selfies sans makeup with comments along the lines of “here’s my makeup-free selfie for breast cancer.” Before long, the posts mutated to being about cancer more generally, and they acquired messages with more specific actions, such as “Text BEAT to 70099 to donate £3.” More people started to share these photos, sometimes accompanied by a screenshot of their mobile phone to prove they had donated. And people began to nominate others to be the next one to dare to bare. It was around this time that the trend reached enough critical mass for it to be picked up on by other media outlets, and over the following week it mutated several times more, developing spin-off male-oriented memes, including #manupandmakeup (men wearing makeup) and #cockinasock (men naked except for socks covering their penises), as well as gaining traction internationally—generating thousands of words of commentary across news media and blog sites.
This article explores how the selfie became used as a charitable meme in this campaign and how the meme mutated from a (possibly naïve) notion of raising awareness to becoming a multimillion-pound fund-raiser. We consider the way the campaign was discussed and problematized within other media and how this contrasted with the coverage of cancer patient Stephen Sutton’s social media fund-raising events during the same time period and the campaign for Britons to post selfies using the #thumbsupforstephen hashtag following his death. Finally, we consider how these cases reflect wider discourses within British culture about charity, performativity, and national identity as well as how and why wider media responses to these two campaigns differed.
This article will look at the impact that mobile technologies have had on the ability of people t... more This article will look at the impact that mobile technologies have had on the ability of people to document their everyday lives. What is important to note about this documentation is that it has become a public display of events and experiences via mediated content. This documentation becomes more interesting to observe when it is put in context of how people can now record their travels. This “public memory” of private travel is assisted via mobile technologies with applications designed to record locations through Global Positioning System data and mediated content. After the documentation, the consumption of this content is conducted through social media services and other public outlets as opposed to the traditional means of showing where people have traveled via postcards, slides, and souvenirs. Through a mixed-method study, this process of documentation is analyzed via the thematic dichotomies that emerged throughout the course of surveys and interviews. This article will explore this contrast between the digital and physical through an analysis of the “traditional tourist” versus the “archiver of experiences.” Finally, the impact of this documentation will be framed in the context of mobile communication.
As people adjust to mobile technologies as part of the normal flow of society, those same people find new and innovative methods of applying these technologies beyond mere one-to-one communication or even one-to-many communication (Ling & Campbell, 2011). Some people are applying the channels of communication to become more of a self-documenting mode. This self-documenting mode is comprised of writing posts and comments and recording mediated content for the purpose of recording the experiences and mundane actions of everyday in a way that can be recalled or searched via a public social feed. This feed of information represents a kind of “public memory” for the individual who posted the content.
For the purpose of this analysis, the term public memory is simply shorthand for posting content onto a mediated platform where one of the purposes of posting is to journal or note information that has a personal significance. For example, one could take pictures of their meals not because they are showing the dinner to their friends but rather keeping a recorded journal of their favorite meals to remember them later. In this way, there is not necessarily an imagined audience that the individual is focusing their content toward, but rather it is designed to be an online scrapbook.
The purpose of this work is to look at how mobile media is changing the nature of the collection of memory via digital artifacts created by the hybrid of services that represent the social and hyper-local interactions. These interactions are best exemplified through the use of the SoLoMo (social, local, mobile) category of applications for mobile devices, especially services such as FourSquare and Instagram (Nelson, 2013). These services will be discussed within the context of their impact on public memory, specifically how they bridge the gap between the digital and the physical, the gap between an artifact and a souvenir, and its ability to combine the role of the tourist and the archiver. The remaining parts of this article will define these terms and describe the impact that the mobile media space has had on these concepts.
Twitter, and other forms of microblogging, represent a recent occurrence on the Internet. Microbl... more Twitter, and other forms of microblogging, represent a recent occurrence on the Internet. Microblogging allows an individual to express themselves 140 characters at a time through a website, through a program designed to access the individual's account, like Tweetdeck, or even through a mobile device, like a Blackberry. This channel also presents an opportunity to broadcast an individual's thoughts across the Internet to a group of followers.
This paper will look at the ability of online social networks to predict election outcomes of a c... more This paper will look at the ability of online social networks to predict election outcomes of a connected society, in this case a university. Facebook represents a new phenomenon in networking within a university. These network constructs allow for communication to occur rapidly and can influence the opinion of the student body. It is the conglomeration of previous information and communication technologies (ICTs) wrapped up under a simple graphical user interface (GUI) that allows the student body to communicate quickly and has allowed online social networks to dominate collegiate culture. Collegiate culture exists in a duality of the real world and this new online social network. Student governance is reflected in both of these realms. Student governance is as close to political power as most students get within the confines of the university and just as complex as the network structure present in Facebook. Like Facebook, the students within the collegiate experience must successfully navigate within the internal network to survive and become leaders in the community. With these similarities, the research question that will framed the rest of the paper will be "could Facebook be used to estimate the results of a student election?" The research used a hierarchical linear matrix, which was developed for the work of Raudenbush & Bryk, to develop a model that could answer this question. The final analysis of the matrix showed it was able to predict what place the candidates came in 21 out of 27 times for all of the candidates in a given election. In terms of predicting the candidate's final percentage of votes received (within half the standard deviation of the Estimated Polling Percentage, which was .072722) during the election 12 out of 27 times for all of the candidates in a given election.
This case study examines how social media accounts use memes and on- the-ground content to create... more This case study examines how social media accounts use memes and on- the-ground content to create a “real-time” and historical record of the events hap-pening in Ukraine during the 2022 invasion of their country by Russian forces and their allies. Artifacts from the Ukrainian Memes Forces’ Twitter account (among others) provides the memetic artifacts of examination. The grounding of this case study is based on Stuart Hall’s “Readings” to assess how audiences would interpret these messages the memetic artifacts via Twitter and TikTok and using an analysis of the layers within the memes that pro-Russian and pro-Ukrainian content creators are producing. The general theme is that pro-Russian content creators are focusing their content on an internal audience under a theme of nationalistic pride, while pro-Ukraine content creators are focusing their content on external audiences under the themes of satire of Russian propaganda and global awareness of the war.
The Praxis of Play: Exploring Freedom In/Through Games, 2023
Tabletop role-playing games (TTRPGs) are those activities in which players craft representations ... more Tabletop role-playing games (TTRPGs) are those activities in which players craft representations of themselves by creating player characters (PCs) and their various skills, abilities, and traits that the player adds to their PCs. Those PCs will interact with a fictional environment in some meaningful way determined by pre-described and understood rules and restrictions that the players acknowledge. Players then have face-to-face interactions connected to those mechanisms and mechanics, and those actions facilitate play among the players. This paper will look at the communication benefits of participating in such activities.
A comprehensive survey was created through a composite of eight established research instruments and given to ten traditional-aged college students from the southern part of the United States before and after they played in a multi-session campaign. This comprehensive survey was part of a pilot study that found that taking part in a face-to-face campaign could reduce certain aspects of the player's sadness, shame, and worthlessness. However, further research is required to determine the overall effectiveness of such gameplay, as the research needs to be more extensive in scope.
First Year Students in a Foreign Fabric: A Triangulation Study on Facebook as a Method of Coping/Adjustment, Oct 31, 2012
As American high school seniors graduate and prepare to attend college, these students must chang... more As American high school seniors graduate and prepare to attend college, these students must change in order to adapt to the new rituals that higher education presents. Teens, for the most part, leave their family structure and their normal everyday routines to pursue a degree and a chance for a good paying job.
However, these students can be unsure about their new collegiate environment. They can feel scared about moving away from their family, friends and their local community. More teens are looking at online social networks, primarily Facebook, to gain awareness of the surroundings that they are moving into. Since the advent of online social networks, there has been little research regarding how students are using this new channel of communication to adapt to the collegiate culture. This dissertation will document my triangulation study of American first-year college students’ use of Facebook as a mode of adapting to college life and how their participation on Facebook relates to their “real world” interactions.
The focus of this research will explain three of the core functions of Facebook as they relate to the development of a first year college student; (1) Facebook as a “stream of awareness” for the student, (2) Facebook as a point of engagement between the student and the collegiate environment and (3) Facebook as a “real world” community builder. These functions will be explored through the use of three methods: a survey exploring how Facebook is helping first year college students adapt and cope to their new lives on campus; a series of interviews addressing the issues that first year students are facing on campus, and the relationship between those issues and the students’ online presentation, and a virtual ethnography study of students’ Facebook profiles with a focus on how students’ online presentation impacts their everyday lives on campus.
The Journalism Breakdown: Writing Multimedia Journalism Content in an Era of Changing Media Systems & Economic Models, 2020
One of the issues facing journalists is a lack of training that focuses on creating editorial con... more One of the issues facing journalists is a lack of training that focuses on creating editorial content with the changes to media platforms, economic models, and the mode of communicating with their audience. There is a lack of guidance on how to apply their storytelling style and lessons from college with newer content management systems and fragmented journalism workflows. There is a need for journalists to gain mastery in performing the "series of non-routine tasks" that will face them in the future. Journalists entering the job market must have a level of social intelligence to understand the changing nature of audiences and their news consumption habits. New journalists must also apply critical thinking practices and creative problem-solving skills toward the complex news-gathering process.
The Journalism Breakdown integrates praxis and research from journalism, social psychology, computer science, and visual communication along with the best practices from media organizations to provide skills and techniques to apply essential journalism practices to the dynamic and often chaotic world of the newsroom. Parts of the lessons from this book will teach the reader how to use flexible thinking, a growth mindset, solution-focused thinking, audience awareness, and community engagement to craft stories worth reading now and the future.
Meme Life: The Social, Cultural, and Psychological Aspects of Memetic Communication, 2022
Memes have been part of computer-assisted communication almost since the development of the first... more Memes have been part of computer-assisted communication almost since the development of the first consumer browser (the "World Wide Web") in 1990. The internet's ability to provide a public sphere for people to discuss the issues of the day and other topics of interest means that people can use the language of the internet to express themselves in ways that would not be feasible in the real world.
Those bits of content are so native to the internet that it feels obvious to want to understand why they are so compelling to tens of millions of people who use smartphones, tablets, computers, and other smart devices. This book seeks to explain how memes influence societies and cultures beyond the confines of social networking services. It will begin by reviewing the fundamental definitions that frame discussions about memes in popular culture and academic research. There will be a connection between theoretical concepts about memes and the memetic content itself. Each chapter will be using one theorist's work to dig a little deeper into what makes memes effective modes of engagement between people online.
On October 3, 2008, a post on CNN’s iReport, a citizen journalism social network website, reporte... more On October 3, 2008, a post on CNN’s iReport, a citizen journalism social network website, reported that Steve Jobs suffered a massive heart attack, spurring a decline in Apple’s stock. The story’s falsehood was quickly discovered, and the credibility of CNN and citizen journalism was thus called into question. The purpose of this article is to analyze those ethical questions and the relationship of citizen journalism to traditional media outlets.
Specifically, I investigate how the ethics of citizen journalism have changed since the Steve Jobs incident. I consider the improvement of the tools of production and their impact on workflow within a digital newsroom as they relate to the decision-making processes of the leadership within a journalistic organization. I examine key ethical decisions from the viewpoint of multiple actors within the organization, as those actors influence the speed of production within the network and what content is released to the general public.
The chapter begins with historical and theoretical analyses of the iReport event and its ethical aspects. The historical analysis derives from a study of the articles published during the time of the misreported story (i.e. October 2008 to January 2009). Beyond the initial analysis of the iReport event, the case study is centered on the context of other issues relating to citizen journalism since October 2008. In particular, the case study examines the internal and external code of ethics followed by news organizations that partner with citizen journalists. By doing so, I hope to ascertain a lineage of ethical evolution.
The case study concludes by discussing the current state of citizen journalism and its future within traditional journalistic organizations. The conclusion presents takeaways that future scholars may reference when studying the connection between ethical codes and citizen journalism.
The Psychology of Zelda: Linking Our World to the Legend of Zelda Series, 2019
The general public’s first exposure to the Legend of Zelda series came from the original Legend o... more The general public’s first exposure to the Legend of Zelda series came from the original Legend of Zelda (1987)—specifically, its opening credits. Before a video gamer even started playing, the Title Screen music set the tone of the game. The driving rhythms and grandioso melodies allow the player know they’re about to be thrown into an epic journey. The Legend of Zelda series set the tempo in the series with the music from the original game. To this day, the music from the original game is still special. Players hear the songs from the original game and feel those original emotions they had during their first plays of the games. This emotional draw comes from a place bigger than the game itself. As this original Zelda game was the first to introduce the game-playing world to the kingdom and mythology of Hyrule, its music played a crucial role in engaging a player enough to press “start” (Consalvo, 2003).
The music that a player hears during the first exposure of the Legend of Series aids a player in making the decision if they would like to start playing. Every note, beat, and rest weaves together a musical narrative that expands the audience’s understanding of what their expectation should be playing that game. This initial interaction is vital. A player will only spend a limited amount of time determining if a game is worth their time and most of it is spent in the beginning stages including the title screen. The music the player hears during the Title Screen helps the player maintain their interest in the game and communicate to the player what to expect when playing the Legend of Zelda (Livingstone & Brown, 2005).
Music affects and sticks with us for many reasons, but there are several psychological theories that best explain why the Legend of Zelda’s music does so in particular: the mere-exposure effect, the lizard (lizalfos) brain, and aesthetics of music. To fully understand the impact of the music in The Legend of Zelda and the reason it remains an iconic part of the game—and, in turn, our popular culture—it is crucial to contemplate and examine the psychological components that provide the music with so much meaning.
This chapter explores the importance of navigating the terrain of social interactions, being open... more This chapter explores the importance of navigating the terrain of social interactions, being open to new experiences, and avoiding the traps of going through the linear motions of the well-worn pathways of life. The rewards for choosing to explore the boundaries of the territory will also be discussed as well as how to minimize interpersonal risk by being able to recognize potential the dangers are and how to react to them. Examples from various games, along with Face-Work and Affect Theory, will be creating an understanding that being open to new experiences means viewing emotion as the pallet that influences a person’s views of the world and creates a roadmap of how to be a more open person.
The Psychology of Final Fantasy: Surpassing the Limit Break, 2020
Square Enix created a series of worlds designed to push the player’s understanding of how social ... more Square Enix created a series of worlds designed to push the player’s understanding of how social development and interactions could be crafted within the Japanese Role Playing Game genre of video games. The three continents of World A from Final Fantasy I (FF I) to the lonely star known as Eos in Final Fantasy XV (FF XV) provide the backdrop for all of the action that takes place within the game. Players enter a rich cultural experience throughout the series and, in turn, players care about the lives that the different player characters (PCs) and non-player characters (NPCs) go through during the game. These environments and personas represent an almost “mirror world” as it reflects the different eras found on Earth with all of the various forms of strife that existed in our world.
Final Fantasy, as a study in social psychology, represents a complex challenge as the game designers essentially create a new world and society for every version of the game. Few narrative threads connect the overall series. The more significant connections come from the traditional good versus evil battles that are found in Japanese mythological storytelling (along with some references to Judeo-Christian and Islamic religion in character creation). Also, the symbolic components of crystals, life force, and the apocalypse are embedded in the overall storyline. These narrative supports described above built the spiritual overtones that most players of the series would recognize as core to the gaming experience. A broader story arc, which will be the arc examined by this chapter, is the influence of technology within the cultures and societies of these games. The rationale for this analysis is that as the series progressed from FF I to FF XV along an almost similar technological development curve to Earth with the exception that Earth-based technologies were not built upon the foundations of magic or spiritual influences.
The later versions of the game series invoke Arthur C. Clarke’s Third Law of Technology, which states “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.” The “uninitiated” outsider that the player represents would look at a society like the Garleans from Final Fantasy XIV that has the capability to grab a moon for the sole purpose of weaponizing it to destroy the other “primitive” nations and control all of the world of Hydaelyn as a magical place that should be fear. This fear is in contrast to the world of Earth were nations have the capability of destroying and controlling merely through the weaponization of the atom.
This broader discussion of technology is not merely to look at how technologies drive the various nations from the Final Fantasy universe. After all, the PCs and NPCs are motivated more by the game designers’ algorithms and narratives than the more baser psychological drives of man. This writing instead will use a few of the critical worlds from the series as a model to explain how technology influences human behavior in the real world. Final Fantasy as a series raises the problems people experience with technology on a day-to-day basis. Technologies in their most basic form represent a power structure and cultural mindset that people have accepted as part of the norms of society. These power structures and cultural mindsets are made explicit when the players play these games.
This critical discussion of technology will need to be framed by the right set of theories. It seems that these worlds could use the work of philosophers to examine vital socio-technical concerns. One philosopher in particular, Martin Heidegger, would provide a good grounding for this discussion because of his work on technology and modern society.
A standard part of journalism scholarship is considering the relationships between the journalist... more A standard part of journalism scholarship is considering the relationships between the journalist/journalistic organization, the community covered by the journalist, and the audience that reads/listens/watches the journalist's work. Those who have the privilege of teaching journalism at any level would naturally develop their students entering the workforce to deal with the ever-changing media industry by thinking critically about those relationships. I needed to adjust this developmental training practice due to COVID-19. During the summer break, I reflected on the journalists that would cover these gut-wrenching stories when I was a child.
Social deception games are games that involve players adopting roles and teams that are not known... more Social deception games are games that involve players adopting roles and teams that are not known to all players of the game. One of the components of these types of games is deceiving other players for the purpose of completing goals and tasks. The focus of this case study is to show how social deception games were used to teach aspects of small group communication (specifically the development of roles with small groups and power structures that emerge within small groups) to multiple groups of students taking a basic communication course at a large university in the United States. The framework of this case study will begin with an explanation of two social deception games (“Are You a Werewolf?” and “The Resistance”) and the previous literature related to small group communication, game-based learning, and other pedagogical frameworks. This review of literature is followed by a description of the lesson plan and course objectives that were used to frame the class time. An analysis of the reflective assignments will help describe the benefits of approaching small group communication with a ludological technique. Finally, discussion of the effectiveness of games like those in the category of social deception within the college communication curriculum is provided.
eTools: Using Technology in the Classroom, Mar 15, 2016
A need exists for students and communication educators to go beyond the traditional concepts of l... more A need exists for students and communication educators to go beyond the traditional concepts of literacy. Students enrolled in our communication courses are expected to be proficient in verbal communication through traditional face-to-face forms of engagement and more mediated/electronic modes of interaction. Practitioners of communication must be able to archive their speeches and other relevant oral presentations for future consumption. This skill set will be equivalent to mastering word processing and information gathering as a measure of being a successful graduate in the field of communication.
Tablet computers (or just tablets) are often discussed in context with their relationship with bo... more Tablet computers (or just tablets) are often discussed in context with their relationship with books as an informational portal. For the most part, the analysis of tablets has dealt with frequent tablet activities, locations of use and contextual factors. It is fair also to note how the tablet has become a central nexus of production tools for the content creator. Tablets represent a platform both for distributing content to multiple audiences and providing the tools necessary to produce content on the fly. Tablets allow the user to capture thoughts on a screen that is slightly smaller than that of a traditional laptop (10 vs. 13 inches), while maintaining a level of portability and usability beyond what a traditional laptop can provide. This ability to quickly capture thoughts and ideas is extremely handy to academics in the field, specifically researchers, as they conduct research or present knowledge to the larger population. This study will look at how researchers are using tablets to replace older techniques for gathering data and publishing their work. The analysis of publishing will look at the differences between writing on a tablet and writing on an office computer or laptop. For example, the advantages and disadvantages of a touch screen device versus traditional user interfaces (keyboard and mouse) will be discussed by the researchers and shown via the everyday use of the tablet/office computer.
International Journal of Communication, May 15, 2015
In March 2014, a viral campaign spread across social media using the tag #nomakeupselfie. This ca... more In March 2014, a viral campaign spread across social media using the tag #nomakeupselfie. This campaign involved women posting selfies without wearing makeup and (in later iterations of the trend) donating money to cancer charities. It was credited with raising £8 million for the charity Cancer Research UK (CRUK) and received a wealth of coverage in mainstream news media as well as across a range of blogs and news sites. The starting point for the #nomakeupselfie has been attributed by its lead campaigner to a single picture Laura Lippman posted on Twitter after Kim Novak’s appearance at the Oscars on 2nd March 2014 (Ciambriello, 2014; London, 2014).1 Novak’s appearance was marred by criticism about her look. Some people on Twitter commented on how her face was not beautiful and that it was disfigured from plastic surgery. Lippman’s tweet of “No makeup, kind lighting. #itsokkimnovak” (Figure 1) was noted as the starting point to the prosocial focus of this hashtag.
The meme initially saw female users of multiple social media sites post selfies sans makeup with comments along the lines of “here’s my makeup-free selfie for breast cancer.” Before long, the posts mutated to being about cancer more generally, and they acquired messages with more specific actions, such as “Text BEAT to 70099 to donate £3.” More people started to share these photos, sometimes accompanied by a screenshot of their mobile phone to prove they had donated. And people began to nominate others to be the next one to dare to bare. It was around this time that the trend reached enough critical mass for it to be picked up on by other media outlets, and over the following week it mutated several times more, developing spin-off male-oriented memes, including #manupandmakeup (men wearing makeup) and #cockinasock (men naked except for socks covering their penises), as well as gaining traction internationally—generating thousands of words of commentary across news media and blog sites.
This article explores how the selfie became used as a charitable meme in this campaign and how the meme mutated from a (possibly naïve) notion of raising awareness to becoming a multimillion-pound fund-raiser. We consider the way the campaign was discussed and problematized within other media and how this contrasted with the coverage of cancer patient Stephen Sutton’s social media fund-raising events during the same time period and the campaign for Britons to post selfies using the #thumbsupforstephen hashtag following his death. Finally, we consider how these cases reflect wider discourses within British culture about charity, performativity, and national identity as well as how and why wider media responses to these two campaigns differed.
This article will look at the impact that mobile technologies have had on the ability of people t... more This article will look at the impact that mobile technologies have had on the ability of people to document their everyday lives. What is important to note about this documentation is that it has become a public display of events and experiences via mediated content. This documentation becomes more interesting to observe when it is put in context of how people can now record their travels. This “public memory” of private travel is assisted via mobile technologies with applications designed to record locations through Global Positioning System data and mediated content. After the documentation, the consumption of this content is conducted through social media services and other public outlets as opposed to the traditional means of showing where people have traveled via postcards, slides, and souvenirs. Through a mixed-method study, this process of documentation is analyzed via the thematic dichotomies that emerged throughout the course of surveys and interviews. This article will explore this contrast between the digital and physical through an analysis of the “traditional tourist” versus the “archiver of experiences.” Finally, the impact of this documentation will be framed in the context of mobile communication.
As people adjust to mobile technologies as part of the normal flow of society, those same people find new and innovative methods of applying these technologies beyond mere one-to-one communication or even one-to-many communication (Ling & Campbell, 2011). Some people are applying the channels of communication to become more of a self-documenting mode. This self-documenting mode is comprised of writing posts and comments and recording mediated content for the purpose of recording the experiences and mundane actions of everyday in a way that can be recalled or searched via a public social feed. This feed of information represents a kind of “public memory” for the individual who posted the content.
For the purpose of this analysis, the term public memory is simply shorthand for posting content onto a mediated platform where one of the purposes of posting is to journal or note information that has a personal significance. For example, one could take pictures of their meals not because they are showing the dinner to their friends but rather keeping a recorded journal of their favorite meals to remember them later. In this way, there is not necessarily an imagined audience that the individual is focusing their content toward, but rather it is designed to be an online scrapbook.
The purpose of this work is to look at how mobile media is changing the nature of the collection of memory via digital artifacts created by the hybrid of services that represent the social and hyper-local interactions. These interactions are best exemplified through the use of the SoLoMo (social, local, mobile) category of applications for mobile devices, especially services such as FourSquare and Instagram (Nelson, 2013). These services will be discussed within the context of their impact on public memory, specifically how they bridge the gap between the digital and the physical, the gap between an artifact and a souvenir, and its ability to combine the role of the tourist and the archiver. The remaining parts of this article will define these terms and describe the impact that the mobile media space has had on these concepts.
Twitter, and other forms of microblogging, represent a recent occurrence on the Internet. Microbl... more Twitter, and other forms of microblogging, represent a recent occurrence on the Internet. Microblogging allows an individual to express themselves 140 characters at a time through a website, through a program designed to access the individual's account, like Tweetdeck, or even through a mobile device, like a Blackberry. This channel also presents an opportunity to broadcast an individual's thoughts across the Internet to a group of followers.
This paper will look at the ability of online social networks to predict election outcomes of a c... more This paper will look at the ability of online social networks to predict election outcomes of a connected society, in this case a university. Facebook represents a new phenomenon in networking within a university. These network constructs allow for communication to occur rapidly and can influence the opinion of the student body. It is the conglomeration of previous information and communication technologies (ICTs) wrapped up under a simple graphical user interface (GUI) that allows the student body to communicate quickly and has allowed online social networks to dominate collegiate culture. Collegiate culture exists in a duality of the real world and this new online social network. Student governance is reflected in both of these realms. Student governance is as close to political power as most students get within the confines of the university and just as complex as the network structure present in Facebook. Like Facebook, the students within the collegiate experience must successfully navigate within the internal network to survive and become leaders in the community. With these similarities, the research question that will framed the rest of the paper will be "could Facebook be used to estimate the results of a student election?" The research used a hierarchical linear matrix, which was developed for the work of Raudenbush & Bryk, to develop a model that could answer this question. The final analysis of the matrix showed it was able to predict what place the candidates came in 21 out of 27 times for all of the candidates in a given election. In terms of predicting the candidate's final percentage of votes received (within half the standard deviation of the Estimated Polling Percentage, which was .072722) during the election 12 out of 27 times for all of the candidates in a given election.
This case study examines how social media accounts use memes and on- the-ground content to create... more This case study examines how social media accounts use memes and on- the-ground content to create a “real-time” and historical record of the events hap-pening in Ukraine during the 2022 invasion of their country by Russian forces and their allies. Artifacts from the Ukrainian Memes Forces’ Twitter account (among others) provides the memetic artifacts of examination. The grounding of this case study is based on Stuart Hall’s “Readings” to assess how audiences would interpret these messages the memetic artifacts via Twitter and TikTok and using an analysis of the layers within the memes that pro-Russian and pro-Ukrainian content creators are producing. The general theme is that pro-Russian content creators are focusing their content on an internal audience under a theme of nationalistic pride, while pro-Ukraine content creators are focusing their content on external audiences under the themes of satire of Russian propaganda and global awareness of the war.
The Praxis of Play: Exploring Freedom In/Through Games, 2023
Tabletop role-playing games (TTRPGs) are those activities in which players craft representations ... more Tabletop role-playing games (TTRPGs) are those activities in which players craft representations of themselves by creating player characters (PCs) and their various skills, abilities, and traits that the player adds to their PCs. Those PCs will interact with a fictional environment in some meaningful way determined by pre-described and understood rules and restrictions that the players acknowledge. Players then have face-to-face interactions connected to those mechanisms and mechanics, and those actions facilitate play among the players. This paper will look at the communication benefits of participating in such activities.
A comprehensive survey was created through a composite of eight established research instruments and given to ten traditional-aged college students from the southern part of the United States before and after they played in a multi-session campaign. This comprehensive survey was part of a pilot study that found that taking part in a face-to-face campaign could reduce certain aspects of the player's sadness, shame, and worthlessness. However, further research is required to determine the overall effectiveness of such gameplay, as the research needs to be more extensive in scope.
We hear the term “nostalgia” and “remakes” quite a bit in gaming and the entertainment industry. ... more We hear the term “nostalgia” and “remakes” quite a bit in gaming and the entertainment industry. But why are we so attached to the psychology of past positive emotions? And why do remakes tend to violate our expectations of those previous memories? Our panel and panelists will discuss the importance of nostalgia, how it can be used negatively and positively, and how we can use nostalgia and push games forward.
Anyone who has played Final Fantasy understands that the plots are full of twists and turns. The... more Anyone who has played Final Fantasy understands that the plots are full of twists and turns. The complex characters, gut-wrenching narrative, and the personal struggle of the characters make it a game to relate to. This panel will focus on unpacking these concepts and why this series continues to draw so many people to playing its immersive experiences. Topics include mental health representation, theoretical concepts, and why we love this game so much.
South-by-Southwest Gaming (SxSW Gaming), Mar 17, 2019
The Legend of Zelda franchise has immersed players in a courageous struggle against the forces of... more The Legend of Zelda franchise has immersed players in a courageous struggle against the forces of evil for three whole decades and across 30 different games. Surprisingly, throughout all these years, the powerful psychology of this game continues to allow players to assess many varying mental health conditions and to overcome emotional trauma. From Dark Link to being an orphan, panelists discuss the varying psychological importance of why this game series Links up so well with our psyches.
Carolinas Communication Association Annual Conference, 2018
Instagram represents a new platform for photojournalists and journalistic organizations to delive... more Instagram represents a new platform for photojournalists and journalistic organizations to deliver news and information to audiences and build community. Photographers can frame a developing event through their unique lens and instantly publish it garnering audience reaction from the universe of the platforms 150 million users. This social platform allows organizations to connect populaces, branding, modes of authentication, and resources (both in the form of production and support for the photographer). Both photojournalists and news organizations are adapting to this crowdsourced feed of content (Aitamurto, 2015), the issues related to the perceived validity of photos (Brandtzaeg et al., 2015), and the changing tempos related to the production and consumption of journalistic content (Garcia, 2014).
The focus of previous research on Instagram’s impact on journalism has focused on the impact to individual photojournalists either covering crisis zones throughout the world (Alper, 2014), the authenticity & hyperreality of the images (Borges-Rey, 2015), or the connection to citizen journalism and other forms of amateur reporting (Mortensen & Keshelashvili, 2013). Little work has been done to determine how journalists and news organizations are presenting news on Instagram. A content analysis of 18 of the top 25 “Most Popular and Active News Brands on Instagram” (Sherk, 2013) was conducted using the last 50 posts at the time of coding. This analysis will look at the work produced on Instagram by the various categories of journalistic organizations (e.g. print, broadcast, & multimedia) and analyze how these organizations and photojournalists present narratives within the framework of the Instagram platform in regards to assisting with the branding and promotion of those journalistic organizations.
Link is thrust into his destiny of having to defeat evil by collecting items and tools throughout... more Link is thrust into his destiny of having to defeat evil by collecting items and tools throughout Hyrule, proving himself a hero and eventually leading to a showdown with a villain. However, his journey is not as simple as defeating evil and saving the princess. There are multiple and significant psychological concepts at play throughout the different games in this series. This panel will link the psychological concepts found in each game for discussion and questions from the audience.
This panel will cover how to effectively create assessment narratives and plans for media and jou... more This panel will cover how to effectively create assessment narratives and plans for media and journalism programs when dealing with lay audiences. The focus of this panel will include yearly assessments, seven-year reviews, advisory boards, and general fiscal planning initiatives by colleges and universities. This presentation was given October 26, 2018 during ACP/CMA/SCJ Fall National College Media Convention in Louisville, KY.
This presentation was part of the "Shrinking Enrollments & the Impact on Media Programs" panel at... more This presentation was part of the "Shrinking Enrollments & the Impact on Media Programs" panel at the 2018 Broadcast Education Association annual conference. The focus of the presentation was how to incorporate media production trends into two-year/small college media programs.
It is an honor to be given an opportunity to respond to these series of papers that strikes at th... more It is an honor to be given an opportunity to respond to these series of papers that strikes at the core of what our discipline and division studies; the role that newer communication technologies play in the interactions between different communities that forms the mass audience of the modern society. As respondent to this panel, it is my job to follow the guidelines set by Raymond Puchot in fulfilling this role, which is being able to praise the work of the scholars, providing a clear summary of the individual papers & the connective elements between the various presentations, focusing on the questions left unanswered by the research, and challenging the scholars to go beyond what was stated in the written and spoken word related to their given research. It is a charge that I attend to fulfill given the nature of this work and the scholars that are before you today.
The presentation was given during the 2017 Broadcast Education Association annual conference duri... more The presentation was given during the 2017 Broadcast Education Association annual conference during the "Where do you see yourself in 3 to 5 years?" session of the conference. The focus of the presentation was to help novice media educators with the advising and planning of students' futures.
This research was presented at Theorizing the Web 2017 in Brooklyn, NY on the 8th of April. The f... more This research was presented at Theorizing the Web 2017 in Brooklyn, NY on the 8th of April. The focus of the presentation was to examine the narratives from Appalachian regional media sources and national media sources that describe the Appalachia region and people & their views of the national election. This mixed-method study used a quantitative content analysis to examine the article and sort them based on the thematic and regional focus. The rhetorical case study examined the theme and discourse that emerged from the stories from the Appalachian region and the United States.
It is always an honor to be given an opportunity to respond to the top papers of the Communicatio... more It is always an honor to be given an opportunity to respond to the top papers of the Communication and the Future interest division. This year is no expectation. I try to follow the wisdom that Raymond Puchot set regarding the role of the respondent, which is being able to praise the work of the scholars, providing a clear summary of the individual papers & the connective elements between the various presentations, focusing on the questions left unanswered by the research, and challenging the scholars to go beyond what was stated in the written and spoken word related to their given research. It is a charge that I attend to fulfill given the nature of this work and the scholars that are before you today. The level of scholarship, analysis, and academic rigor shown by the scholars is a tribute to work that was put in developing the particular problematics worthy of this division. The research questions and hypotheses addressed by the scholars pushed the division further as those questions and hypotheses used innovative applications of research instruments, quality meta-analyses of the problematics, and solid conceptualization of the realm of the known and the problematics of study. We should praise these scholars for the work they have done for this conference.
Nerd, geek, dweeb, and dork were the four terms used often in the late part of the 20th century a... more Nerd, geek, dweeb, and dork were the four terms used often in the late part of the 20th century as a means to create a barrier and separate those whose quirks were considered outside the mainstream sense of normal. Nowadays, the "otaku" nature of popular culture has removed some of the negative connotations related to those terms. Those four terms are included as modifiers to aspects of culture that involve a "deep dive" by a selected niche of the populace. This essay will act as an etymologocial analysis within the structure of a popular culture case study on the use of these terms and a more realistic construction of the various terms as they relate to fan culture and fandom. The hope is that the reader of this work understands the connection between popular culture intelligential properties, fan culture, and the temperament of a given fan as a result of this analysis.
As Ohio Northern University moved from Journalism to Multimedia Journalism, one of the areas that... more As Ohio Northern University moved from Journalism to Multimedia Journalism, one of the areas that a point of discussion was how to help students tell stories that had the media "amplify" the narrative (as opposed to being redundant). This presentation will discuss the Media Hub model and how this model helps students create works that use the platform effectively. Dreyfus' Model is also used as a way of explaining the level of proficiency needed in today's media landscape. The presentation will end with a discussion of the five-year plan associated with the transition to a media hub.
This was my response to the papers and presentations delivered by those students that won the "To... more This was my response to the papers and presentations delivered by those students that won the "Top Student Honors" from Communication and the Future.
My report in front of the Mass Communication interest division at NCA 2015 reviewing the actions ... more My report in front of the Mass Communication interest division at NCA 2015 reviewing the actions from the Legislative Assembly meeting held on November 18.
“Are You a Werewolf?” (AYAW?) is a deception based party game that forces a group of villagers to... more “Are You a Werewolf?” (AYAW?) is a deception based party game that forces a group of villagers to pick out a pair of werewolves from the group and eliminate them before the werewolves destroy the village. Andrew Plotkin created this game as a derivative of Dmitry Davidoff’s “Mafia” and is a favorite of gamers as a representation of a “social game” (Chittaranjan & Hung, 2010). The game is often played late at night with many of the popular gaming conventions in the United States (Origins, GenCon, San Diego Comic Con, Dragon Con, etc.) as a way for gamers to socialize, to “decompress” from the convention experience, and as a means to participate in the act of gaming in a more “adult” manner (language, alcohol consumption, and other adult behaviors that normally frown upon at a family-friendly event).
Along the same style of game, “The Resistance” was inspired by AYAW? with only 5 to 10 players needed to make the game work, as opposed to the 15 to 21 players needed for AYAW? This change in the player structure allows for, according to the manufacturer of the game, “increase the resources for informed decisions, intensify player interaction, and eliminate player elimination.” Both “The Resistance” & AYAW? fit the classic definition of a social deception game (SDG)
One of the strengths of SDG is the primary interactions are communication-based. It is not a traditional role playing game (RPG) that uses dice rolls and generated player stats as the primary mode of interaction, nor is it a traditional card/board game where the main mode of interactions being the elements present on a tabletop. Bluffing and perception are the tools that players use within a typical game of AYAW? It is these two elements that make a great platform to teach about small group communication, specifically the power roles within small groups and the structures within a small group (Verderber, Verderber, & Sellnow, 2013).
Many of the academic studies of SDGs either relates to the mathematical probabilities connected to the various structural co-constructions based on role configurations and village engagements (Midgal, 2010) or as a proxy for analysis of deception (Chittaranjan & Hung, 2010). As communication scholars, it is important to look at the communication interactions themselves, rather than a proxied representation of social interactions present in the previous research.
The focus of this case study is to show how SDGs were used to teach aspects of small group communication (specifically the developments of roles with small groups & power structures that emerge with small group structures (Harris & Sherblom, 2011)) to multiple groups of students taking the basic communication course at a large university in the United States. The framework of the case study will begin with an explanation of the game. The next element will be a brief discussion of the previous literature related to SDGs are the ludological aspects of small group communication. This will be followed be a description of the lesson plan/course objectives that were used to frame the class time. An analysis of the reflective assignments will help describe the benefits of approaching small group communication with a ludological technique. There will also be artifacts from interviews with other werewolf players from popular gaming conventions to show how the students’ impressions of the game match “the reality” of playing the game with others (as opposed to playing the game in the academic realm). Finally, there will be a discussion of the effectiveness of SDGs within the college communication curriculum.
Two of the major themes that were present in the reflective analyses conducted by the students were the understanding of “task-based” communication patterns and the impact of power roles and leadership within SGC. Artifacts will be presented in this case study to provide context behind these two themes.
Tablet computers (or just tablets) are often discussed in context with their relationship with bo... more Tablet computers (or just tablets) are often discussed in context with their relationship with books as an informational portal. For the most part, the analysis of the tablets has dealt with frequent tablet activities, locations of use and contextual factors (Muller, Gove & Webb, 2012). It is fair also to note how the tablet has become a central nexus of production tools for the content creator. Tablets represent not only a platform for distributing content to multiple audiences but also a content creator can use the production tools of the tablet to produce content on the fly (Hendricks, 2010). Tablets allow the user to capture their thoughts on a screen that is slightly smaller than a traditional laptop screen (10 inches versus 13 inches) while maintaining a level of portability and usability beyond what a traditional laptop can provide. The ability to collect and express thoughts on the go is an amazing expression of freedom. Also, the camera and microphone on most tablets are “good enough” to replace the need for carrying a digital camera on a daily basis. This ability to quickly capture thoughts and ideas is extremely handy to academics in the field, specifically researchers, as they conduct research or present knowledge to the larger population.
The purpose of this work will be to examine how researchers use tablets. The focus of this research will look at how researchers are using tablets to replace older techniques for gathering data and publishing their work. The analysis of publishing will look at the differences between writing on a tablet and writing on an office computer or laptop. For example, the advantages and disadvantages of a touch screen device versus traditional user interfaces (keyboard and mouse) will be discussed by the researchers and shown via the everyday use of the tablet/office computer. Gathering data through the tablet will be analyzed through the traditional ethnographic methods of qualitative research and the scientific instruments of quantitative inquiry. The purpose will be to look at how these instruments and methods are conducted via the tablet. Both data collection and the presentation of knowledge are key elements for the dissemination of information by the researcher to the larger whole. This research will look at how the tablet changes the way both of these functions are done.
Presented 2014 November 21 at “The History of the Future of Communication: The "Communication and... more Presented 2014 November 21 at “The History of the Future of Communication: The "Communication and the Future" Chair's Panel” during the 100th National Communication Association Annual Conference in Chicago, IL.
The purpose of this work will be to examine the role of new media sources, especially social medi... more The purpose of this work will be to examine the role of new media sources, especially social media hubs and mobile media platforms and those sources’ ability to help cope and adjust to the changes in society and the speed of information. These sources represent the communication technology structure of today’s society. The research for this work was built on a year-long triangulation study that focused on the use of Facebook as it relates to helping people with a move to a new city, which led to the development of three thematics explaining how new media sources help with the coping/adjustment process. The thematics presented within the paper will be a hybrid between the artifacts of the previous research and a modified review of the literature on the elements of modernity. These thematics will also be explained through theory related to modernity & post-modernity. Finally, the work will look at a model of how new media sources help with the modern condition & the future of mediated communication. This model, the liquid mob academy, bridges the gaps between social network theory and psychology of transition.
Dr. Shane Tilton, assistant professor of multimedia journalism, will present a discussion on the ... more Dr. Shane Tilton, assistant professor of multimedia journalism, will present a discussion on the role of a decentralized citizen journalism movement, focusing on the last decade and the role of social media.
The following slides were used as part of a copyright talk to a graduate student colloquium in Wa... more The following slides were used as part of a copyright talk to a graduate student colloquium in Washington D.C. July 23, 2016. The focus of the talk was the connection between copyright law and augmented reality. Specifically, the focus was on the questions surrounding the academic and legal issues around copyright law in augmented reality platforms and environments,
This lecture was designed to discuss the foundations of understanding communication research base... more This lecture was designed to discuss the foundations of understanding communication research based on the traditions of research.
This was present as a symposium speech during Mia Consalvo's "Digital Games" class. This was look... more This was present as a symposium speech during Mia Consalvo's "Digital Games" class. This was looking at the social constructions around the concept of the term of gamers.
One of my lectures when I taught "Critical Thinking and Information Studies" at the University of... more One of my lectures when I taught "Critical Thinking and Information Studies" at the University of Kentucky.
Abstract gaming is the idea that the game isn’t defined by the pieces, board and, to a small exte... more Abstract gaming is the idea that the game isn’t defined by the pieces, board and, to a small extent, the rules. The gaming experience is defined by the player’s and designer’s creativity. This was a guest lecture I gave for Mia Consalvo's "Digital Games" at Ohio University during Spring 2004 quarter.
Wednesday is a date that has been part of Facebook hoaxes for nearly two years. October 21, 2015 ... more Wednesday is a date that has been part of Facebook hoaxes for nearly two years. October 21, 2015 at 1:21 am represents the time that Marty McFly enters the “future” from “Back to the Future 2.” One of the common jokes/meme/criticisms can be found on the “Back to the Future Future Date Guardians” Facebook page. “ This is simply a group to remind everyone that the REAL Future Date is October 21, 2015 at 1:21 am, so no need to stress about hoverboards or zero-calorie pizza until then.” Flying cars, garbage as energy, and especially those hoverboards have been part of our concept of the future since the movie came out in 1989. The design of the hoverboard has been discussed since it floated out onto the screen and into our imaginations. With this important date in mind, it’s important to discuss why we shouldn’t be disappointed that Mr. Fusion is not attached to every car. Matthew Rosza from Salon wrote a great article highlighting a few of the reasons why the writers missed the mark on the future. However, I think there are more basic reasons for this miss.
Nerd, and nerd culture, has been a popular fixture in the media and popular culture. Dr. Shane Ti... more Nerd, and nerd culture, has been a popular fixture in the media and popular culture. Dr. Shane Tilton looks at how the term has changed in recent times.
In a previous article, I referred to Jon Stewart as a “News Nerd.” It may be a good point to expl... more In a previous article, I referred to Jon Stewart as a “News Nerd.” It may be a good point to explain why nerd was appropriate, and not the term du jour of geek. The purpose of this article is to try to look at the terms we seem to use to describe our community and the way we represent ourselves to the general public. Also, I want to try to explain how these terms have moved away from the negative pejoratives towards a more normalized view by members of society.
As we wish #JonVoyage, Dr. Shane Tilton attempts to argue that Jon Stewart is a big "news nerd" t... more As we wish #JonVoyage, Dr. Shane Tilton attempts to argue that Jon Stewart is a big "news nerd" that knows how to mimic a journalist.
Richard Prince is known for his reappropriation of popular works into new pieces that could be in... more Richard Prince is known for his reappropriation of popular works into new pieces that could be interpretted as providing a critical eye of American culture and commericalism. His exhibit “New Portraits” shown at the Gagosian is not a criticism or a creative endeavor but it does represent the lengths some would go to in order to falsify the works of others. Primarily, I would (as a few others have) argue that the works are nothing more than the intellectual theft of others’ work for the sole purpose of profit.
With fewer and fewer of the "original" Daily Show correspondents left to take over for Jon Stewar... more With fewer and fewer of the "original" Daily Show correspondents left to take over for Jon Stewart, Shane Tilton looks at The Daily Show with Jon Stewart's legacy and what a new host would mean for the show.
To say the last six hours in the media has been a surreal experience would be an understatement. ... more To say the last six hours in the media has been a surreal experience would be an understatement. Brian Williams being suspended from NBC News on the same night that Jon Stewart decides to end his nearly two-decade run on the Daily Show made for an interesting night of media self-reflection. We look at one institution with a de-facto credibility in terms of journalism and another institution that is trying to rebuild its credibility after one if its managing editors inflated his importance.
A standard part of journalism scholarship is considering the relationships between the journalist... more A standard part of journalism scholarship is considering the relationships between the journalist/journalistic organization, the community covered by the journalist, and the audience that reads/listens/watches the journalist’s work. Those who have the privilege of teaching journalism at any level would naturally develop their students entering the workforce to deal with the ever-changing media industry by thinking critically about those relationships. I needed to adjust this developmental training practice due to COVID19. During the summer break, I reflected on the journalists that would cover these gutwrenching stories when I was a child.
This article will look at the impact that mobile technologies have had on the ability of people t... more This article will look at the impact that mobile technologies have had on the ability of people to document their everyday lives. What is important to note about this documentation is that it has become a public display of events and experiences via mediated content. This documentation becomes more interesting to observe when it is put in context of how people can now record their travels. This “public memory” of private travel is assisted via mobile technologies with applications designed to record locations through Global Positioning System data and mediated content. After the documentation, the consumption of this content is conducted through social media services and other public outlets as opposed to the traditional means of showing where people have traveled via postcards, slides, and souvenirs. Through a mixed-method study, this process of documentation is analyzed via the thematic dichotomies that emerged throughout the course of surveys and interviews. This article will explore this contrast between the digital and physical through an analysis of the “traditional tourist” versus the “archiver of experiences.” Finally, the impact of this documentation will be framed in the context of mobile communication.
This chapter explores the importance of navigating the terrain of social interactions, being open... more This chapter explores the importance of navigating the terrain of social interactions, being open to new experiences, and avoiding the traps of going through the linear motions of the well-worn pathways of life. The rewards for choosing to explore the boundaries of the territory will also be discussed as well as how to minimize interpersonal risk by being able to recognize potential the dangers are and how to react to them. Examples from various games, along with Face-Work and Affect Theory, will be creating an understanding that being open to new experiences means viewing emotion as the pallet that influences a person’s views of the world and creates a roadmap of how to be a more open person.
This case study examines how social media accounts use memes and on- the-ground content to create... more This case study examines how social media accounts use memes and on- the-ground content to create a “real-time” and historical record of the events hap-pening in Ukraine during the 2022 invasion of their country by Russian forces and their allies. Artifacts from the Ukrainian Memes Forces’ Twitter account (among others) provides the memetic artifacts of examination. The grounding of this case study is based on Stuart Hall’s “Readings” to assess how audiences would interpret these messages the memetic artifacts via Twitter and TikTok and using an analysis of the layers within the memes that pro-Russian and pro-Ukrainian content creators are producing. The general theme is that pro-Russian content creators are focusing their content on an internal audience under a theme of nationalistic pride, while pro-Ukraine content creators are focusing their content on external audiences under the themes of satire of Russian propaganda and global awareness of the war.
The discipline of information studies is one of those areas that I enjoy teaching. I had the plea... more The discipline of information studies is one of those areas that I enjoy teaching. I had the pleasure of teaching "IS 200 Information Literacy and Critical Thinking" during my post-doc at the University of Kentucky. One of the areas that I wish I could have done early in the development of this course was craft a primer on information studies terminology that helped establish what some of the baseline terms were given in the context of this course. This primer would have assisted discussions, since the primer laid out the groundwork for the direction of future readings the students would have needed to complete. The article (though almost a decade late) would have served this purpose.
This was my response to the papers and presentations delivered by those students that won the &am... more This was my response to the papers and presentations delivered by those students that won the "Top Student Honors" from Communication and the Future.
This chapter explores the importance of navigating the terrain of social interactions, being open... more This chapter explores the importance of navigating the terrain of social interactions, being open to new experiences, and avoiding the traps of going through the linear motions of the well-worn pathways of life. The rewards for choosing to explore the boundaries of the territory will also be discussed as well as how to minimize interpersonal risk by being able to recognize potential the dangers are and how to react to them. Examples from various games, along with Face-Work and Affect Theory, will be creating an understanding that being open to new experiences means viewing emotion as the pallet that influences a person’s views of the world and creates a roadmap of how to be a more open person.
Social deception games are games that involve players adopting roles and teams that are not known... more Social deception games are games that involve players adopting roles and teams that are not known to all players of the game. One of the components of these types of games is deceiving other players for the purpose of completing goals and tasks. The focus of this case study is to show how social deception games were used to teach aspects of small group communication (specifically the development of roles with small groups and power structures that emerge within small groups) to multiple groups of students taking a basic communication course at a large university in the United States. The framework of this case study will begin with an explanation of two social deception games (“Are You a Werewolf?” and “The Resistance”) and the previous literature related to small group communication, game-based learning, and other pedagogical frameworks. This review of literature is followed by a description of the lesson plan and course objectives that were used to frame the class time. An analysi...
This article will look at the impact that mobile technologies have had on the ability of people t... more This article will look at the impact that mobile technologies have had on the ability of people to document their everyday lives. What is important to note about this documentation is that it has become a public display of events and experiences via mediated content. This documentation becomes more interesting to observe when it is put in context of how people can now record their travels. This “public memory” of private travel is assisted via mobile technologies with applications designed to record locations through Global Positioning System data and mediated content. After the documentation, the consumption of this content is conducted through social media services and other public outlets as opposed to the traditional means of showing where people have traveled via postcards, slides, and souvenirs. Through a mixed-method study, this process of documentation is analyzed via the thematic dichotomies that emerged throughout the course of surveys and interviews. This article will explore this contrast between the digital and physical through an analysis of the “traditional tourist” versus the “archiver of experiences.” Finally, the impact of this documentation will be framed in the context of mobile communication.
Instagram represents a new platform for photojournalists and journalistic organizations to delive... more Instagram represents a new platform for photojournalists and journalistic organizations to deliver news and information to audiences and build community. Photographers can frame a developing event through their unique lens and instantly publish it garnering audience reaction from the universe of the platforms 150 million users. This social platform allows organizations to connect populaces, branding, modes of authentication, and resources (both in the form of production and support for the photographer). Both photojournalists and news organizations are adapting to this crowdsourced feed of content (Aitamurto, 2015), the issues related to the perceived validity of photos (Brandtzaeg et al., 2015), and the changing tempos related to the production and consumption of journalistic content (Garcia, 2014).
The focus of previous research on Instagram’s impact on journalism has focused on the impact to individual photojournalists either covering crisis zones throughout the world (Alper, 2014), the authenticity & hyperreality of the images (Borges-Rey, 2015), or the connection to citizen journalism and other forms of amateur reporting (Mortensen & Keshelashvili, 2013). Little work has been done to determine how journalists and news organizations are presenting news on Instagram. A content analysis of 18 of the top 25 “Most Popular and Active News Brands on Instagram” (Sherk, 2013) was conducted using the last 100 posts at the time of coding. This analysis will look at the work produced on Instagram by the various categories of journalistic organization (e.g. print, broadcast, & multimedia) and analyze how these organizations and photojournalists present narratives within the framework of the Instagram platform.
The purpose of this paper is to discuss to discuss how the work of Kant can be applied to the fut... more The purpose of this paper is to discuss to discuss how the work of Kant can be applied to the future of communication scholarship. Kant’s analysis of knowledge and scholarship was framed on his Doctrine of Methods. This doctrine described the key praxeological and axiological issues that should define all scholarship; cognition, definition & ethical discourse. Kant’s conception of Erkenntniß or cognition represented a real possibility constraint and a determinate content constraint within the course of knowledge of the world (Schafer, 2013). Definition in Kant viewpoints focus on the contrast between the analytic (things are true by virtue of their meaning) & synthetic propositions (things are true by how their meaning relates to the world). Finally, the ethical discourse looked at the ground rules of communication in order to establish the standards of discussing knowledge.
This course will focus on culture as communication via the smallest unit of expression, the meme.... more This course will focus on culture as communication via the smallest unit of expression, the meme. The term itself comes from Richard Dawkins in 1976 to describe some of the most basic constructions of culture within society, like stereotypes within television shows, wallpaper patterns, and even the form factors of kitchen appliances.
The structure of the course will be in the form of the analysis of memetic communication (using the more modern definition of the term) using visual communication theory, mass communication theory, and interdisciplinary approaches to attempt to deconstruct memes and understand how to effectively communicate in the often noisy arena of communication known as the Internet.
My syllabus for the UKC/IS 200 class I taught in the Spring 2014 semester at the University of Ke... more My syllabus for the UKC/IS 200 class I taught in the Spring 2014 semester at the University of Kentucky.
Introduction to the techniques and practices of media analysis. Designed to provide critical skil... more Introduction to the techniques and practices of media analysis. Designed to provide critical skills to understand media products for the messages embedded within them, the different interpretations that various audience mem- bers or users take away from them, and how those products can change or not in a global culture. This course is an advanced undergraduate examination of mass communication theory and criticism, with the primary goal of showing how theory drives research, and how research helps us understand mass media. We’ll be learning through lectures, classroom discussions and readings, as well as your own explorations as you work on assign- ments. The primary objective is to give you the knowledge and problem-solving skills to understand and critique the patterns and processes that underlie modern media institutions, their productions and practices; and the con- sequences of those patterns and processes on the way media audiences understand and interpret the world. The ultimate objective is to place media institutions, texts, and practices within an understanding of the power struc- tures that shape our cultural life, politics and economics.
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However, these students can be unsure about their new collegiate environment. They can feel scared about moving away from their family, friends and their local community. More teens are looking at online social networks, primarily Facebook, to gain awareness of the surroundings that they are moving into. Since the advent of online social networks, there has been little research regarding how students are using this new channel of communication to adapt to the collegiate culture. This dissertation will document my triangulation study of American first-year college students’ use of Facebook as a mode of adapting to college life and how their participation on Facebook relates to their “real world” interactions.
The focus of this research will explain three of the core functions of Facebook as they relate to the development of a first year college student; (1) Facebook as a “stream of awareness” for the student, (2) Facebook as a point of engagement between the student and the collegiate environment and (3) Facebook as a “real world” community builder. These functions will be explored through the use of three methods: a survey exploring how Facebook is helping first year college students adapt and cope to their new lives on campus; a series of interviews addressing the issues that first year students are facing on campus, and the relationship between those issues and the students’ online presentation, and a virtual ethnography study of students’ Facebook profiles with a focus on how students’ online presentation impacts their everyday lives on campus.
The Journalism Breakdown integrates praxis and research from journalism, social psychology, computer science, and visual communication along with the best practices from media organizations to provide skills and techniques to apply essential journalism practices to the dynamic and often chaotic world of the newsroom. Parts of the lessons from this book will teach the reader how to use flexible thinking, a growth mindset, solution-focused thinking, audience awareness, and community engagement to craft stories worth reading now and the future.
Those bits of content are so native to the internet that it feels obvious to want to understand why they are so compelling to tens of millions of people who use smartphones, tablets, computers, and other smart devices. This book seeks to explain how memes influence societies and cultures beyond the confines of social networking services. It will begin by reviewing the fundamental definitions that frame discussions about memes in popular culture and academic research. There will be a connection between theoretical concepts about memes and the memetic content itself. Each chapter will be using one theorist's work to dig a little deeper into what makes memes effective modes of engagement between people online.
Specifically, I investigate how the ethics of citizen journalism have changed since the Steve Jobs incident. I consider the improvement of the tools of production and their impact on workflow within a digital newsroom as they relate to the decision-making processes of the leadership within a journalistic organization. I examine key ethical decisions from the viewpoint of multiple actors within the organization, as those actors influence the speed of production within the network and what content is released to the general public.
The chapter begins with historical and theoretical analyses of the iReport event and its ethical aspects. The historical analysis derives from a study of the articles published during the time of the misreported story (i.e. October 2008 to January 2009). Beyond the initial analysis of the iReport event, the case study is centered on the context of other issues relating to citizen journalism since October 2008. In particular, the case study examines the internal and external code of ethics followed by news organizations that partner with citizen journalists. By doing so, I hope to ascertain a lineage of ethical evolution.
The case study concludes by discussing the current state of citizen journalism and its future within traditional journalistic organizations. The conclusion presents takeaways that future scholars may reference when studying the connection between ethical codes and citizen journalism.
The music that a player hears during the first exposure of the Legend of Series aids a player in making the decision if they would like to start playing. Every note, beat, and rest weaves together a musical narrative that expands the audience’s understanding of what their expectation should be playing that game. This initial interaction is vital. A player will only spend a limited amount of time determining if a game is worth their time and most of it is spent in the beginning stages including the title screen. The music the player hears during the Title Screen helps the player maintain their interest in the game and communicate to the player what to expect when playing the Legend of Zelda (Livingstone & Brown, 2005).
Music affects and sticks with us for many reasons, but there are several psychological theories that best explain why the Legend of Zelda’s music does so in particular: the mere-exposure effect, the lizard (lizalfos) brain, and aesthetics of music. To fully understand the impact of the music in The Legend of Zelda and the reason it remains an iconic part of the game—and, in turn, our popular culture—it is crucial to contemplate and examine the psychological components that provide the music with so much meaning.
Final Fantasy, as a study in social psychology, represents a complex challenge as the game designers essentially create a new world and society for every version of the game. Few narrative threads connect the overall series. The more significant connections come from the traditional good versus evil battles that are found in Japanese mythological storytelling (along with some references to Judeo-Christian and Islamic religion in character creation). Also, the symbolic components of crystals, life force, and the apocalypse are embedded in the overall storyline. These narrative supports described above built the spiritual overtones that most players of the series would recognize as core to the gaming experience. A broader story arc, which will be the arc examined by this chapter, is the influence of technology within the cultures and societies of these games. The rationale for this analysis is that as the series progressed from FF I to FF XV along an almost similar technological development curve to Earth with the exception that Earth-based technologies were not built upon the foundations of magic or spiritual influences.
The later versions of the game series invoke Arthur C. Clarke’s Third Law of Technology, which states “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.” The “uninitiated” outsider that the player represents would look at a society like the Garleans from Final Fantasy XIV that has the capability to grab a moon for the sole purpose of weaponizing it to destroy the other “primitive” nations and control all of the world of Hydaelyn as a magical place that should be fear. This fear is in contrast to the world of Earth were nations have the capability of destroying and controlling merely through the weaponization of the atom.
This broader discussion of technology is not merely to look at how technologies drive the various nations from the Final Fantasy universe. After all, the PCs and NPCs are motivated more by the game designers’ algorithms and narratives than the more baser psychological drives of man. This writing instead will use a few of the critical worlds from the series as a model to explain how technology influences human behavior in the real world. Final Fantasy as a series raises the problems people experience with technology on a day-to-day basis. Technologies in their most basic form represent a power structure and cultural mindset that people have accepted as part of the norms of society. These power structures and cultural mindsets are made explicit when the players play these games.
This critical discussion of technology will need to be framed by the right set of theories. It seems that these worlds could use the work of philosophers to examine vital socio-technical concerns. One philosopher in particular, Martin Heidegger, would provide a good grounding for this discussion because of his work on technology and modern society.
The meme initially saw female users of multiple social media sites post selfies sans makeup with comments along the lines of “here’s my makeup-free selfie for breast cancer.” Before long, the posts mutated to being about cancer more generally, and they acquired messages with more specific actions, such as “Text BEAT to 70099 to donate £3.” More people started to share these photos, sometimes accompanied by a screenshot of their mobile phone to prove they had donated. And people began to nominate others to be the next one to dare to bare. It was around this time that the trend reached enough critical mass for it to be picked up on by other media outlets, and over the following week it mutated several times more, developing spin-off male-oriented memes, including #manupandmakeup (men wearing makeup) and #cockinasock (men naked except for socks covering their penises), as well as gaining traction internationally—generating thousands of words of commentary across news media and blog sites.
This article explores how the selfie became used as a charitable meme in this campaign and how the meme mutated from a (possibly naïve) notion of raising awareness to becoming a multimillion-pound fund-raiser. We consider the way the campaign was discussed and problematized within other media and how this contrasted with the coverage of cancer patient Stephen Sutton’s social media fund-raising events during the same time period and the campaign for Britons to post selfies using the #thumbsupforstephen hashtag following his death. Finally, we consider how these cases reflect wider discourses within British culture about charity, performativity, and national identity as well as how and why wider media responses to these two campaigns differed.
As people adjust to mobile technologies as part of the normal flow of society, those same people find new and innovative methods of applying these technologies beyond mere one-to-one communication or even one-to-many communication (Ling & Campbell, 2011). Some people are applying the channels of communication to become more of a self-documenting mode. This self-documenting mode is comprised of writing posts and comments and recording mediated content for the purpose of recording the experiences and mundane actions of everyday in a way that can be recalled or searched via a public social feed. This feed of information represents a kind of “public memory” for the individual who posted the content.
For the purpose of this analysis, the term public memory is simply shorthand for posting content onto a mediated platform where one of the purposes of posting is to journal or note information that has a personal significance. For example, one could take pictures of their meals not because they are showing the dinner to their friends but rather keeping a recorded journal of their favorite meals to remember them later. In this way, there is not necessarily an imagined audience that the individual is focusing their content toward, but rather it is designed to be an online scrapbook.
The purpose of this work is to look at how mobile media is changing the nature of the collection of memory via digital artifacts created by the hybrid of services that represent the social and hyper-local interactions. These interactions are best exemplified through the use of the SoLoMo (social, local, mobile) category of applications for mobile devices, especially services such as FourSquare and Instagram (Nelson, 2013). These services will be discussed within the context of their impact on public memory, specifically how they bridge the gap between the digital and the physical, the gap between an artifact and a souvenir, and its ability to combine the role of the tourist and the archiver. The remaining parts of this article will define these terms and describe the impact that the mobile media space has had on these concepts.
A comprehensive survey was created through a composite of eight established research instruments and given to ten traditional-aged college students from the southern part of the United States before and after they played in a multi-session campaign. This comprehensive survey was part of a pilot study that found that taking part in a face-to-face campaign could reduce certain aspects of the player's sadness, shame, and worthlessness. However, further research is required to determine the overall effectiveness of such gameplay, as the research needs to be more extensive in scope.
However, these students can be unsure about their new collegiate environment. They can feel scared about moving away from their family, friends and their local community. More teens are looking at online social networks, primarily Facebook, to gain awareness of the surroundings that they are moving into. Since the advent of online social networks, there has been little research regarding how students are using this new channel of communication to adapt to the collegiate culture. This dissertation will document my triangulation study of American first-year college students’ use of Facebook as a mode of adapting to college life and how their participation on Facebook relates to their “real world” interactions.
The focus of this research will explain three of the core functions of Facebook as they relate to the development of a first year college student; (1) Facebook as a “stream of awareness” for the student, (2) Facebook as a point of engagement between the student and the collegiate environment and (3) Facebook as a “real world” community builder. These functions will be explored through the use of three methods: a survey exploring how Facebook is helping first year college students adapt and cope to their new lives on campus; a series of interviews addressing the issues that first year students are facing on campus, and the relationship between those issues and the students’ online presentation, and a virtual ethnography study of students’ Facebook profiles with a focus on how students’ online presentation impacts their everyday lives on campus.
The Journalism Breakdown integrates praxis and research from journalism, social psychology, computer science, and visual communication along with the best practices from media organizations to provide skills and techniques to apply essential journalism practices to the dynamic and often chaotic world of the newsroom. Parts of the lessons from this book will teach the reader how to use flexible thinking, a growth mindset, solution-focused thinking, audience awareness, and community engagement to craft stories worth reading now and the future.
Those bits of content are so native to the internet that it feels obvious to want to understand why they are so compelling to tens of millions of people who use smartphones, tablets, computers, and other smart devices. This book seeks to explain how memes influence societies and cultures beyond the confines of social networking services. It will begin by reviewing the fundamental definitions that frame discussions about memes in popular culture and academic research. There will be a connection between theoretical concepts about memes and the memetic content itself. Each chapter will be using one theorist's work to dig a little deeper into what makes memes effective modes of engagement between people online.
Specifically, I investigate how the ethics of citizen journalism have changed since the Steve Jobs incident. I consider the improvement of the tools of production and their impact on workflow within a digital newsroom as they relate to the decision-making processes of the leadership within a journalistic organization. I examine key ethical decisions from the viewpoint of multiple actors within the organization, as those actors influence the speed of production within the network and what content is released to the general public.
The chapter begins with historical and theoretical analyses of the iReport event and its ethical aspects. The historical analysis derives from a study of the articles published during the time of the misreported story (i.e. October 2008 to January 2009). Beyond the initial analysis of the iReport event, the case study is centered on the context of other issues relating to citizen journalism since October 2008. In particular, the case study examines the internal and external code of ethics followed by news organizations that partner with citizen journalists. By doing so, I hope to ascertain a lineage of ethical evolution.
The case study concludes by discussing the current state of citizen journalism and its future within traditional journalistic organizations. The conclusion presents takeaways that future scholars may reference when studying the connection between ethical codes and citizen journalism.
The music that a player hears during the first exposure of the Legend of Series aids a player in making the decision if they would like to start playing. Every note, beat, and rest weaves together a musical narrative that expands the audience’s understanding of what their expectation should be playing that game. This initial interaction is vital. A player will only spend a limited amount of time determining if a game is worth their time and most of it is spent in the beginning stages including the title screen. The music the player hears during the Title Screen helps the player maintain their interest in the game and communicate to the player what to expect when playing the Legend of Zelda (Livingstone & Brown, 2005).
Music affects and sticks with us for many reasons, but there are several psychological theories that best explain why the Legend of Zelda’s music does so in particular: the mere-exposure effect, the lizard (lizalfos) brain, and aesthetics of music. To fully understand the impact of the music in The Legend of Zelda and the reason it remains an iconic part of the game—and, in turn, our popular culture—it is crucial to contemplate and examine the psychological components that provide the music with so much meaning.
Final Fantasy, as a study in social psychology, represents a complex challenge as the game designers essentially create a new world and society for every version of the game. Few narrative threads connect the overall series. The more significant connections come from the traditional good versus evil battles that are found in Japanese mythological storytelling (along with some references to Judeo-Christian and Islamic religion in character creation). Also, the symbolic components of crystals, life force, and the apocalypse are embedded in the overall storyline. These narrative supports described above built the spiritual overtones that most players of the series would recognize as core to the gaming experience. A broader story arc, which will be the arc examined by this chapter, is the influence of technology within the cultures and societies of these games. The rationale for this analysis is that as the series progressed from FF I to FF XV along an almost similar technological development curve to Earth with the exception that Earth-based technologies were not built upon the foundations of magic or spiritual influences.
The later versions of the game series invoke Arthur C. Clarke’s Third Law of Technology, which states “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.” The “uninitiated” outsider that the player represents would look at a society like the Garleans from Final Fantasy XIV that has the capability to grab a moon for the sole purpose of weaponizing it to destroy the other “primitive” nations and control all of the world of Hydaelyn as a magical place that should be fear. This fear is in contrast to the world of Earth were nations have the capability of destroying and controlling merely through the weaponization of the atom.
This broader discussion of technology is not merely to look at how technologies drive the various nations from the Final Fantasy universe. After all, the PCs and NPCs are motivated more by the game designers’ algorithms and narratives than the more baser psychological drives of man. This writing instead will use a few of the critical worlds from the series as a model to explain how technology influences human behavior in the real world. Final Fantasy as a series raises the problems people experience with technology on a day-to-day basis. Technologies in their most basic form represent a power structure and cultural mindset that people have accepted as part of the norms of society. These power structures and cultural mindsets are made explicit when the players play these games.
This critical discussion of technology will need to be framed by the right set of theories. It seems that these worlds could use the work of philosophers to examine vital socio-technical concerns. One philosopher in particular, Martin Heidegger, would provide a good grounding for this discussion because of his work on technology and modern society.
The meme initially saw female users of multiple social media sites post selfies sans makeup with comments along the lines of “here’s my makeup-free selfie for breast cancer.” Before long, the posts mutated to being about cancer more generally, and they acquired messages with more specific actions, such as “Text BEAT to 70099 to donate £3.” More people started to share these photos, sometimes accompanied by a screenshot of their mobile phone to prove they had donated. And people began to nominate others to be the next one to dare to bare. It was around this time that the trend reached enough critical mass for it to be picked up on by other media outlets, and over the following week it mutated several times more, developing spin-off male-oriented memes, including #manupandmakeup (men wearing makeup) and #cockinasock (men naked except for socks covering their penises), as well as gaining traction internationally—generating thousands of words of commentary across news media and blog sites.
This article explores how the selfie became used as a charitable meme in this campaign and how the meme mutated from a (possibly naïve) notion of raising awareness to becoming a multimillion-pound fund-raiser. We consider the way the campaign was discussed and problematized within other media and how this contrasted with the coverage of cancer patient Stephen Sutton’s social media fund-raising events during the same time period and the campaign for Britons to post selfies using the #thumbsupforstephen hashtag following his death. Finally, we consider how these cases reflect wider discourses within British culture about charity, performativity, and national identity as well as how and why wider media responses to these two campaigns differed.
As people adjust to mobile technologies as part of the normal flow of society, those same people find new and innovative methods of applying these technologies beyond mere one-to-one communication or even one-to-many communication (Ling & Campbell, 2011). Some people are applying the channels of communication to become more of a self-documenting mode. This self-documenting mode is comprised of writing posts and comments and recording mediated content for the purpose of recording the experiences and mundane actions of everyday in a way that can be recalled or searched via a public social feed. This feed of information represents a kind of “public memory” for the individual who posted the content.
For the purpose of this analysis, the term public memory is simply shorthand for posting content onto a mediated platform where one of the purposes of posting is to journal or note information that has a personal significance. For example, one could take pictures of their meals not because they are showing the dinner to their friends but rather keeping a recorded journal of their favorite meals to remember them later. In this way, there is not necessarily an imagined audience that the individual is focusing their content toward, but rather it is designed to be an online scrapbook.
The purpose of this work is to look at how mobile media is changing the nature of the collection of memory via digital artifacts created by the hybrid of services that represent the social and hyper-local interactions. These interactions are best exemplified through the use of the SoLoMo (social, local, mobile) category of applications for mobile devices, especially services such as FourSquare and Instagram (Nelson, 2013). These services will be discussed within the context of their impact on public memory, specifically how they bridge the gap between the digital and the physical, the gap between an artifact and a souvenir, and its ability to combine the role of the tourist and the archiver. The remaining parts of this article will define these terms and describe the impact that the mobile media space has had on these concepts.
A comprehensive survey was created through a composite of eight established research instruments and given to ten traditional-aged college students from the southern part of the United States before and after they played in a multi-session campaign. This comprehensive survey was part of a pilot study that found that taking part in a face-to-face campaign could reduce certain aspects of the player's sadness, shame, and worthlessness. However, further research is required to determine the overall effectiveness of such gameplay, as the research needs to be more extensive in scope.
The focus of previous research on Instagram’s impact on journalism has focused on the impact to individual photojournalists either covering crisis zones throughout the world (Alper, 2014), the authenticity & hyperreality of the images (Borges-Rey, 2015), or the connection to citizen journalism and other forms of amateur reporting (Mortensen & Keshelashvili, 2013). Little work has been done to determine how journalists and news organizations are presenting news on Instagram. A content analysis of 18 of the top 25 “Most Popular and Active News Brands on Instagram” (Sherk, 2013) was conducted using the last 50 posts at the time of coding. This analysis will look at the work produced on Instagram by the various categories of journalistic organizations (e.g. print, broadcast, & multimedia) and analyze how these organizations and photojournalists present narratives within the framework of the Instagram platform in regards to assisting with the branding and promotion of those journalistic organizations.
Along the same style of game, “The Resistance” was inspired by AYAW? with only 5 to 10 players needed to make the game work, as opposed to the 15 to 21 players needed for AYAW? This change in the player structure allows for, according to the manufacturer of the game, “increase the resources for informed decisions, intensify player interaction, and eliminate player elimination.” Both “The Resistance” & AYAW? fit the classic definition of a social deception game (SDG)
One of the strengths of SDG is the primary interactions are communication-based. It is not a traditional role playing game (RPG) that uses dice rolls and generated player stats as the primary mode of interaction, nor is it a traditional card/board game where the main mode of interactions being the elements present on a tabletop. Bluffing and perception are the tools that players use within a typical game of AYAW? It is these two elements that make a great platform to teach about small group communication, specifically the power roles within small groups and the structures within a small group (Verderber, Verderber, & Sellnow, 2013).
Many of the academic studies of SDGs either relates to the mathematical probabilities connected to the various structural co-constructions based on role configurations and village engagements (Midgal, 2010) or as a proxy for analysis of deception (Chittaranjan & Hung, 2010). As communication scholars, it is important to look at the communication interactions themselves, rather than a proxied representation of social interactions present in the previous research.
The focus of this case study is to show how SDGs were used to teach aspects of small group communication (specifically the developments of roles with small groups & power structures that emerge with small group structures (Harris & Sherblom, 2011)) to multiple groups of students taking the basic communication course at a large university in the United States. The framework of the case study will begin with an explanation of the game. The next element will be a brief discussion of the previous literature related to SDGs are the ludological aspects of small group communication. This will be followed be a description of the lesson plan/course objectives that were used to frame the class time. An analysis of the reflective assignments will help describe the benefits of approaching small group communication with a ludological technique. There will also be artifacts from interviews with other werewolf players from popular gaming conventions to show how the students’ impressions of the game match “the reality” of playing the game with others (as opposed to playing the game in the academic realm). Finally, there will be a discussion of the effectiveness of SDGs within the college communication curriculum.
Two of the major themes that were present in the reflective analyses conducted by the students were the understanding of “task-based” communication patterns and the impact of power roles and leadership within SGC. Artifacts will be presented in this case study to provide context behind these two themes.
The purpose of this work will be to examine how researchers use tablets. The focus of this research will look at how researchers are using tablets to replace older techniques for gathering data and publishing their work. The analysis of publishing will look at the differences between writing on a tablet and writing on an office computer or laptop. For example, the advantages and disadvantages of a touch screen device versus traditional user interfaces (keyboard and mouse) will be discussed by the researchers and shown via the everyday use of the tablet/office computer. Gathering data through the tablet will be analyzed through the traditional ethnographic methods of qualitative research and the scientific instruments of quantitative inquiry. The purpose will be to look at how these instruments and methods are conducted via the tablet. Both data collection and the presentation of knowledge are key elements for the dissemination of information by the researcher to the larger whole. This research will look at how the tablet changes the way both of these functions are done.
The focus of previous research on Instagram’s impact on journalism has focused on the impact to individual photojournalists either covering crisis zones throughout the world (Alper, 2014), the authenticity & hyperreality of the images (Borges-Rey, 2015), or the connection to citizen journalism and other forms of amateur reporting (Mortensen & Keshelashvili, 2013). Little work has been done to determine how journalists and news organizations are presenting news on Instagram. A content analysis of 18 of the top 25 “Most Popular and Active News Brands on Instagram” (Sherk, 2013) was conducted using the last 100 posts at the time of coding. This analysis will look at the work produced on Instagram by the various categories of journalistic organization (e.g. print, broadcast, & multimedia) and analyze how these organizations and photojournalists present narratives within the framework of the Instagram platform.
The structure of the course will be in the form of the analysis of memetic communication (using the more modern definition of the term) using visual communication theory, mass communication theory, and interdisciplinary approaches to attempt to deconstruct memes and understand how to effectively communicate in the often noisy arena of communication known as the Internet.