SM2007 Culture, Society & New Technologies

Celia’s MEDIA DIARY

DATE TIME MEDIUM MEDIA COMMENTS

TEXT USED
18/10 10:00am- iPod Facebook – Watch friends’ blogs
10:20am social network
18/10 10:20am- iPod Twitter See all kinds of news and
10:30am personal opinions from the
website Twitter
18/10 11:00am- Email Gmail & Reading & replying to
11:20am Hotmail messages--information,
social interaction
18/10 11:20am- Internet Sina, Mtime, Read new while eating
12:00pm websites Douban and so breakfast; Sometimes have
on discussion with my
roommate.
18/10 12:00pm- Online Youku Video Watch TV series – Big
12:20pm Video bang theory online.
18/10 3:30pm- Movie 400 blows Watch the film 400 blows
5:20pm on computer
18/10 5:20pm- Cell phone SMS Send a SMS to a friend to
5:30pm invite her for dinner
18/10 6:30pm- Internet douban,renren, Web Surfing – watch
9:00pm websites Twitter, Mtime blogs, news and movie
and so on trailers.
18/10 9:20pm- Sony Play Call Of Duty – Play the FPS game with
11:30pm Station 3 Modern War online players through PS3
32
18/10 – 12:00pm- iPod Tianya, Watch news and reply
19/10 1:30am Facebook and messages to friends on
soon Facebook
19/10 10:30am- iPod iTunes Listen to music whiling
11:00am sleeping
19/10 11:00am- Internet Renren, Web Surfing – watching
1:00pm Websites Sina,Yahoo news and reply messages
and so on to friends online
19/10 1:30pm- Magazine Timeout HK, Read magazines while
3:00pm PCW having lunch
19/10 3:00pm- Online Tudou Video Watch the film Ghost in
5:00pm Video Shell online
19/10 5:00pm- Email Gmail & City Check emails and reply
5:30pm Webmail 2.0 them online
19/10 5:30pm- Sony Play Red Dead Play game with friends
8:00pm Station 3 Redemption together at home
19/10 8:00pm- Internet Douban,taobao Watch blogs and shop
9:00pm Websites and so on online
19/10 9:00pm- Online Tudou Video Watch the film Ghost in
11:00pm Video Shell2 online
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20/10 1:00am- iPod Tianya & other Watch news and blogs
2:30am applications with iPod before sleep
20/10 11:00am- e-newspaper NY Times & Watch news online before
12:00pm on iPod CNN get up
20/10 12:30pm- Online Youku Video Watch TV series while
2:00pm Video having lunch
20/10 2:00pm- Internet Google, Search information about
5:00pm websites Wikipedia the film GIS online
20/10 5:00pm- Social Massager Discuss the film with
6:00pm Network partners through MSN
20/10 6:00pm- Movie Asian Short Watch lasted short films in
9:00pm Theatre films a movie theatre
20/10 9:00pm- Email Gmail & Arrange emails and delete
10:00pm Hotmail the old and useless emails
20/10 – 10:00pm- iPod facebook, Watch blogs and reply
21/10 01:00am twitter, renren messages online
21/10 10:30am- iPod iTunes Listen to music while
11:00am having body exercises
21/10 11:00am- TV TVB Watch TV news when
12:00pm having breakfast
21/10 4:00pm- Internet Douban, Sina, Watch blogs and news and
6:00pm websites Tianya, twitter share some to friends
through MSN and twitter
21/10 6:00pm- magazine& Times, South Read them when having
8:00pm newspaper China Post dinner alone
21/10 9:00pm- iPod GPS Map Find a friend’s house
9:30pm application through iPod applications
21/10 10:00pm- TV MTR Watch news on MTR
11:40pm Commercial tv
22/10 1:00am- iPod Facebook, Watch blogs and reply
2:30am Twitter messages online
22/10 6:30am- iPod Twitter, Post photos on twitter
7:00am Xiaonei when waiting for the plane
22/10 7:00am- Email Gmail & City Check emails and reply
8:00am Webmail 2.0 through iPod
22/10 11:00am- Cell Phone SMS Send SMS to friends and
11:30am ask them to pick me from
the airport
22/10 1:00pm- TV Local news Watch TV on car with
2:00pm friends
22/10 4:00pm- iPod Facebook, Watch blogs and news on
6:00pm Twitter, renren my iPod
22/10 10:00pm- TV Lust Caution Watch the film Lust
11:30pm Caution on the motel’s TV
23/10 9:00am- iPod Email Check email and reply
10:00am messages
23/10 10:00am- TV Local news Watch news on TV when
12:00pm having breakfast
23/10 1:30pm- Movie Confession Watch the lasted Japanese
 SM2007 Culture, Society & New Technologies

3:20pm Theatre film in movie theatre

23/10 3:30pm- iPod Douban, See some features and
4:00pm Twitter critics of the movie
Confession
23/10 4:00pm- TV MTR TV Watch news and TVCs on
5:00pm MTR
23/10 8:00pm- Internet Facebook, Watch blogs and reply
10:00pm websites renren, mtime messages online
23/10 10:00pm- Sony Play Call of Duty – Play online game with
11:30pm Station 3 Modern War II other players through
network
23/10 – 11:50pm- iPod Tianya and Watch Ebooks and play
24/10 3:00am other games with iPod
applications
24/10 12:30pm - iPod Skype Make a phone call to my
1:40pm parents using the online
application – Skype
24/10 1:40pm - Internet Sina, renren, Web Surfing – watch news
2:30pm mtimes and movie trailers
24/10 2:30pm - TV MTR TV Watch local news and
3:30pm TVC on MTR
24/10 4:00pm - iPod Twitter & Post photos on twitter and
5:30pm MSN chat with friend on MSN
when waiting for plane
24/10 5:50pm - Magazines Sanlian & Read news on the plane
7:30pm Vogue
24/10 9:00pm- Email Gmail Check email and reply
9:30pm messages
24/10 9:30pm- Internet Facebook, Web Surfing – Watch
11:00pm renren, twitter blogs and news online
24/10 11:00pm- DVD Last Year at Watch the French movie
1:00am Marienbend on PS3
 SM2007 Culture, Society & New Technologies

Analysis of my Media Diary

Written by WONG SIU TAN 51241944

Based on my media diary, I could say that I mainly receive information from the

internet websites instead of traditional paper media like newspapers. It is also obvious

that the iPod plays an important role in my life as a “mobile information station”. In

next paragraphs I will deeply analyze my media diary and talk about the reasons why

iPod becomes so important to me.

Firstly, I want to summary the different kinds of media that I used in the last week.

They can be divided into two groups: the pure information provider and the

information exchange center. The provider includes such media like newspaper,

magazine, sina, yahoo, google and so on. While the exchange center includes Blog,

Twitter, and those social network websites like Facebook. The diary shows that I

spend more time on exchanging information with people online than just receiving

messages passivity. It is because the Web 2.0 has provided us an open space to leave

and receive messages freely. Comparing to three years ago when I was a middle

school student, the internet has changed a lot. In the past, computers are mainly used

as a searching tool by me since it is easy to get worldwide information from the

internet. However, most computer users at that time were not familiar with blog and

twitter. And audience did not have much chance to share their opinions after receiving

information from the internet. But since the social network became more popular,

most of us have changed the habits of web surfing and got used to receive opinions

from different people and angles. Also, instead of watching others’ work, we

gradually learned how to post and share our own things on the websites. For example,
 SM2007 Culture, Society & New Technologies

we may use blogs to replace the paper diaries. On one hand, computer users nowadays

have less privacy than before, but on the other hand, we are closer to the public than

the past. One of the advantages of sharing information with people online is that we

learn to observe and comment things in multiple ways and different angles of view.

But of course it is time-consuming and more complex.

Besides, the mediums of media that I used are basically electronics which relying on

the internet. For me, the paper media (newspapers and magazines) nowadays could be

replaced by computers and Televisions. The main reason is due to the efficiency of

network. For an instance, when the earthquake in May 12th 2008 happened, some

people described the situations on their twitters in time and the news was sonly

received by thousands of users online. However, it took at least half a day for

newspapers and magazines to publish the news to the public. Therefore the

information on those paper media became less useful for people like me who wanted

to know the latest news about the huge disaster. Another good quality of internet is

that it is cheaper than the traditional media because most information online is free.

Therefore I do not need to waste money on buying newspapers and magazines.

However, the online information is usually less reliable than the paper media since the

law of these areas has not been wholly set up. These may sometimes mislead us and

cause serious problem. For example, after a short period of the 5.12, a young hacker

in Xi’an attacked the local Earthquake Administration and wrote an announcement

which said that there would be a serious of earthquakes in Xi’an in a few days. This

wrong information caused panic and chaos to the society. Large number of schools

and companies were affected by the message. And after two days, a local newspaper

reported the facts and relieved people’s worries.

 SM2007 Culture, Society & New Technologies

Secondly, I’d like to talk about the environmental factors that may affect the ways in

which I use the media. As I am a university student, I have to get used of using the

school’s website and the student online systems (City Webmail & AIMS). It trains me

to use computers in different ways, such like submit essay, download course notes or

communicate with teaching staff. These skills may help me to change my old habits

of using media. For an instance, I used to make appointments with teachers face to

face or by phone while now I could just send an email to do so. Besides, the social

policy is also a factor that affects the way people use the media. It usually has related

to the freedom of speech. And one classic example is the GFW in mainland China.

GFW is the short term of Great Firewall. The purpose of this firewall is to block some

websites in one or more regions of People’s Republic of China under the country’s

policy of Internet censorship1. And it blocks some famous websites like New York

Times, Facebook, Twitter, Youtube and so on. This will definitely affect the way

people use the internet since it limits their freedom of reading and sharing information

online. And once the government controls the internet, the audience may not be able

to receive much information other than the mainstream one. And it again might have

chance to mislead people by blocking true facts that are not beneficial to the

government.

Last but not the least, I will talk about the importance of iPod Touch plays in my

media life. iPod Touch is a MP4 designed by the Apple Store. But in my point of

view it is far more than just a MP4. It combines the functions of music players and

palm computers which known as PDAs. And because of its well developed software

markets, the users could download more than 100,000 softwares from the App Store.

1
Wikipedia. Date Access: 28/10/2010
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_websites_blocked_in_the_People%27s_Republic_of_China
 SM2007 Culture, Society & New Technologies

This provides lots of convenience to iPod users and even changes their ways of using

media. The several of news applications start to replace the newspapers provided in

MTR stations. We see people in MTR read news and browse websites with their

iPods or iPhones. For students like me, iPod is a portable and useful tool to listen to

music, check email, read news and social with friends. According to the Apple Store’s

research, iPod Touch has replaced iPod and becomes the most popular MP4 in the

world.

In a word, I’m a “typical” person who could not live without computers. And the way

I use media is mainly through Internet. The factors that affect my use of media

include the geographic location, age, my occupation in the society and so on.

Total Words: 1080