Final Reaction Paper due 4-29 (midnight)

Worth up to 20 points..

When a lawyer presents a case to the court, one way of creating a strong argument is citing precedent: past court cases that are similar to yours, where the outcome is in your favor.
Use your best skills of argument and finding past precedent in this paper:

A nuclear power plant located in Colorado Springs, CO. provides power to a 400-mile radius.

The plant is notable for being tied to the Defense Department's local network of "in-case-of-disaster" installations (the North American Aerospace Defense Command is located in Colorado Springs).

A journalist receives a tip from a source whose name they know but wishes to remain anonymous in print (or they won't give the journalist information). The tip concerns the lack of security at the plant, including sleeping guards and visibly broken security cameras.

The plant offers a tour to the public once a month. Of course, no cameras are allowed. The journalist goes undercover, posing as a regular citizen, and takes the tour. Once inside the journalist uses a special hidden camera to take still photographs.

The tipster was right. The journalist discovers many faults in the security at the plant.

The newspaper decides to go with it as a multi-part story, spanning five days. Different pictures and detailed notes from inside will be published.

After the first edition is released, the government immediately springs to action. The Defense Department launches an injunction against the paper, trying to stop further pictures and details from being published whatsoever -- with concerns about security and the information getting into the wrong hands -- and also to reveal the identity of the anonymous source. They also want to charge the journalist with trespassing.

The court will hear the opening arguments to decide if the paper has a right to publish this information and whether the journalist must reveal their source.

Take one side or the other. The side of the newspaper, arguing for the right to print it (and no trespassing), or the side of the Defense Department, arguing that it should not be allowed to go to print (and the journalist should be charged with trespassing).

**** Your best bet to win is to cite prior court cases that show that you are right. **** You can use court cases from your book (Chapter 14) or from the Internet (one idea, try Googling: reporter trespassing).

Final Study Guide

It's a lot of stuff! We'll do a review on the last day of class -- either Wednesday or Friday next week. If we get ahead of schedule we can review Wednesday and have Friday as a day off to finish the last reaction paper and study for the test.

If you don't recognize a term from your notes, lecture, or the book, you can search Google or ask me!

Chapter 13 & lecture
Qualitative vs Quantitative research
Magic bullet theory
Minimalist effects theory (with two-step flow)
Media Research - survey's, experiments, panel studies - pro's and con's of each
Socialization
Narcotizing theory
Spiral of Silence
Third person effect
Cultivation/Gerbner
Stereotypes (with cultivation theory)
How has the Internet changed politics?
Bandura and Bobo doll research
Different approaches to violence in the mass media
Violence: Catharsis/Stimulation/Catalytic theories
Social effects of the Internet?
Agenda setting
Mainstreaming, resonance
Children and Advertising

Chapter 14 & lecture
First Amendment.. what are the five freedoms
What is Prior Restraint
Near vs. Minnesota case.. what did it conclude
Pentagon Papers and prior restraint
Shield laws protect reporters in cases of…?
Freedom of Information Act
Libel, slander, actual malice, NY Times v. Sullivan
Copyright & fair use
Food Lion case.. what was the ruling
Equal Time Rule
The FCC and its evolution
Fairness Doctrine
Does the FCC govern cable and broadcast TV the same way?
Telecommunications Act of 1996
Children's Television Act
Obscenity
Deceptive Advertising is monitored by whom?

Ethics lecture
How journalists make their decisions: Ethical Principles (know basic differences)

Chapter 15 & Global village lecture
Theories of the press (authoritarian, libertarian, social responsibility, developmental, communist) -- which is the U.S.?
Pros and Cons of Outsourcing
Digital divide - 4 main areas (economic equality, social mobility, democracy, economic growth)
What is Al Jazeera?
Role of media in elections
Polling, advertising, debates
Roll of Internet in politics
Push Poll


3 possible essays (I'll give all 3 as an option) -- remember, when you write your essay, err on the site of presenting more information than you think you might need -- show me that you know what you are talking about, not just simply answering the basic premise of the question. This could come down to giving examples, defining terms, or giving historical context.
1. What is the difference between indecent speech and obscenity, and how does the FCC regulate each?

2. Please describe how a media researcher would describe violence in the media and its effect on viewers according to these theories: socialization theory, catharsis theory, stimulation theory, and agenda setting theory.

3. Discuss the role of the mass media in our democracy. What are some of its positive and negative effects on the process, and how is the Internet changing things?

It's Friday, Friday

Couple notes... no class Friday but we do have Reaction paper #9 due.

Hopefully you're also working on your research paper. If you're having trouble finding good sources, let me know.

But for our online exercise (instead of class) I thought it might be fun to play with YouTube Time Machine.

Click on the link and watch some videos from your birth year. Link to a good one (or a couple) in the comments. Does it seem... "old"? What surprises you about it? How does it differ (if at all) from what we see on TV now?

Effects lecture slides.

Reaction Paper #9 due 4/15

(2nd to last!)

For this paper, I'd like you to come up with a hypothesis or theory about how we interact with the mass media or how the mass media affects us and how you would test it (experiment, survey, focus group, case study, etc.)

For example:

My hypothesis is that students who use Facebook for more than 2 hours a day will have lower grades than those who don't use Facbeook.

In my paper I would explain why I think this is so, then I would explain how I would use a survey to measure this. Go into as much detail as you can when you talk about your study.

Also explain any other factors that might affect the outcome (for example, those without access to a computer wouldn't use Facebook at all, but their grades might be lower because of less computer access, etc). There might be quite a few.

That said, please don't use Facebook in your experiment. :-)

Use these sites to help you decide on a qualitative study (case study, ethnography, etc.) or a quantitative study (survey, experiment, etc).

Qualitative vs Quantitative

Quantitative methods

Qualitative research

Types of Research Designs

Write a couple paragraphs explaining (based on the above links) why the study approach you picked is appropriate and why others might not be.

Remember, you don't have to do the experiment/case study/etc. only explain how you would do it.

Here's the Shigeru Miyamoto profile I was talking about. Good read even if the writer doesn't seem to have a great knowledge of video games.