Saturday 28 November 2009

3. What kind of media institution might distribute you media product and why?

The kind of media institution and the only institution that would distribute my site would be an ISP (Internet Service Provider). Examples of ISP's would be AOL, Madasafish, OneTel, TalkTalk etc. These companies are also dependent on another two main companies (British Telecom and Virgin Media) which are responsible for allowing people to access them through their cables. These are the main sources of direct distribution. The main reason why these media institutions choose to distribute media products is for money. If i want to have my media product distributed i would have to pay an annual fee, which in return they make sure my site and everything on it runs smoothy and works properly.

A screenshot of British Telecom's media distribution.

All other forms of distribution are indirect. For example Google are indirect because although they may find the website you are looking for they still have to go to the ISP to retrieve the product for your viewing. Although you have to pay to be listed on Google, the listing will be pointless if you are not being hosting by an ISP. Google simply makes your site available for people to search for, thus making it instantly more available for distribution.

This is very difficult to justify as distributing would be a lot easier if my media product was a film or radio programme rather than a web design. This is because distributing through a media institution like BBC is a lot more simple. To receive a TV program or film all you need is an aerial that can receive signals from the media institution which plays directly through a TV.

Just making sure that your site is being hosted on the internet by an ISP is distributing but also adding it to an indirect distributor like Google, Yahoo, Ask and Bing just increase the chances of your product being seen and therefore increasing the rate of distribution.



Wednesday 25 November 2009

2. How does your media product represent particular social groups?

The social groups i am hoping to represent in my media product are Age and Gender.
As i have already explained i have tried to keep my website conventional so it appeals to all ages from ten and onwards. We do this by keeping the language i write in simple and easy to understand, and by keeping the text clear to read, i use Franklin Gothic Book, Size 12 to do this.. The pictures vary throughout the site, while keeping the same characteristics,which are making sure they are not to extreme, good quality, beautiful to look at and trying to use them in a special and slightly unconventional way. The colours on the site are basic and mostly primary colours to make the site look fun and bright to appeal to the younger audience but sophisticated to appeal to everyone else at the same time.
The other social group this website represents is Gender. To make sure we represent gender effectively, we have made sure there is no differentiation between the two. By making sure we use a variety of simple colours and structuring the text so it is directed at everyone. Doing this we make sure we appeal to both genders, this in turn again secures the maximum amount of donations from the audience.
The main point of our website is to secure the the maximum number of hits, by doing this it is more than likely that we receive the most donations possible.

Monday 23 November 2009

1. In what way does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

The media product that i will be evaluating is my charity website called Thinking Green. It is calling upon people to donate money in order to save the environment.

USE
My website uses conventions from the WWF website. Although it is not an environmental website the layout looks very smart and it is easy to use and read. Firstly i tried to imitate the header titles they used which was ' What we do' and 'How you can help':

MY WEBSITE




WWF HOMEPAGE







This is a good thing to use as it shows that their website is to the point and not full of unuseful things. I used this on my site but added one more title and worded it differently; Who? What? How?. I did this with emphasis on the question mark as it will be used thorughout the site, it will almost be used as a logo as it will be unique to our charity.

Also on WWF's homepage they have a picture with a topic that they are concerned about over the picture, i have put this on my homepage, but will also continue to put it throughout all of the pages,but instead of having notes for concerns it has a picture of nature and over them qoutes and question to get the audience thinking about why they are donating, while they are browsing the site.
I have also tried to keep this site as conventional as possible while still trying to make it my own. The reason why it has to be conventional is because it has to cater for all age and types of people. Doing this will help increase the amount of money donated as it will be targeted to an audience on a large scale.

DEVELOP
I liked this site at first but after looking at other websites and decided that it was conventional but just to busy to really get my point across, it has almost take the from of an internet shopping site. This is not ideal as i aiming for it to be short, sweet and to the point.



CHALLENGE
The way i have challenged the forms of convention, is the way that i have used picture to try and secure the donations. Every page the viewer will be greeted with a picturesque view as this is an environmental site it should have pictures of the things we loike and want to keep . The picture will be of a beautiful natural environment to make sure they know what they are trying to save. This will also be the emphasis of Thinking Green?, the pictures will get them thinking about times where they have seen something natural and beautiful (Green) or maybe even get them considering to go and visit somewhere where they can.


Thursday 5 November 2009