Impact Of Media Essay, Research Paper

Impact of Media

A good indicator of human advancement is their ability to communicate. Thanks to technology, each year it gets easier to convey a message to another person. With this convenience comes not just communication of basic needs but more and more advertising for everything else. Needless to say, media is everywhere. It influences people in nearly every decision they make. Some say that this isn=t true and that people decide for themselves. It may all depend on the point of view.

First of all, let it be said that media is everywhere. Newspapers, magazines, television, billboards, telemarketing, and the Internet. Example: John Doe leads a fairly normal life. Each morning he reads the paper to begin the day. The newspaper is filled with ads and also opinions. Each article may seem to be from an objective point of view but some personal views may come through. John Doe may or may not choose to be affected by it. Either way, it is still there and Mr. Doe may be subconsciously influenced. There is no way to avoid it. Even in TV programs or movies there is Ahidden@ advertising. A carefully angled shot shows the hero is drinking Coke and has been planned to catch the consumer=s eye.

1993

By the start of the year, 98% of U.S. households own at least one

TV set, 64% have two or more sets.

Companies will use innumerous ways to coerce the customer to consume their product. Association is a major one. Matching a song with a product can influence a consumer after the commercial is long over. Every time they hear the song, they will think of that product. Even colors in decorating can be planned to produce a response. Fast food places such as Burger King use warm colors like orange and brown. Coincidently, looking at those colors tends to increase appetite.

People are influenced. In 1990, the Children=s Television Act took effect Alimiting the amount of commercialization in children’s TV programming (including cable) and requiring operators to carry at least some programming designed to meet children’s educational and informational needs.@ http://www.adage.com/news_and_features/special_reports/tv/1990s.html.

This Act was put into effect because children were being influenced.

In October of 1993, the deliberately tasteless “Beavis and

Butt-head” MTV animated series, the top-rated show on the

music network, is attacked for allegedly inspiring a 5-year-old to

start a fatal fire. In response, MTV agrees to run the show in a

later time spot and the writers agree not to use references to fires

in the future.

Now there are others who argue that people can use the information they receive to make educated decisions. The purpose of advertising is to convince people that a particular company’s product is better than their competitor’s product. People are bombarded with this every day from different companies, brands and products. It=s hard to say if Nike would do so well without using sports celebrities to help them make it so that consumers of sports equipment will think of anything but Nike. It may be said however that whoever has the most money can have the most speech. In the beginning of the United States birth, opposing forces stood on a box and each said what they wanted to say. Nowadays, money can purchase a loud speaker so that the other cannot even be heard. But, then more people can hear. So if the consumer takes time to hear both, then yes, they can make educated decisions. However, it may not be their choice if they don=t want to hear it all either. ADefenders of advertising say that it is meant to sell products, not create values, and that it furthers product improvement through competition, while critics contend that it creates false values and impels people to buy things they neither need nor want.@

It=s all about results. At Babcock & Jenkins Direct they say Awe’re in the business of solving problems for our clients with highly-targeted direct mail campaigns and cutting-edge technologies that meet sales and marketing objectives, and get results. Because when all is said and done, that’s what really matters@.

In conclusion, it can be said that people want to make their own decisions or at least feel like they do. But the fact is that media influences surround every person in America that owns a TV, reads a paper or talks to a neighbor that does. Some people are passive to these pressures and others can make educated decisions if they know the game.

http://www.media-inc.com/cgi-bin/virtuflex/virtuflex?FeaturedWebsites/index.html

http://aj.encyclopedia.com/home.html

http://www.adage.com/news_and_features/special_reports/tv/1990s.html.