As more people are taking the covid vaccines, the rates of people catching covid are going low we went from 10000 people dying a day to 50 people dying a day in Minnesota which is very good to hear. Just yesterday CDC came out with new guidelines on when to wear your mask now. The “CDC Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky said. “Over the past year, we have spent a lot of time telling Americans what you can’t do. Today, I am going to tell you some of the things you can do, if you are fully vaccinated.” The new rules are if you have been vaccinated with two of the shots then More than half of all adults in the United States, or around 140 million people, have received at least one dose of vaccine, and more than a third have received all three doses. that being said you do not need to wear a mask if you’ve been vaccinated two times. only if you have completed your doses you can take off your mask in an outdoor setting. but that rule does not go for unvaccinated people. the rule for unvaccainted people is Unvaccinated people, on the other hand, should wear masks at small outdoor events with some other unvaccinated people, according to the CDC. Unvaccinated people are defined as those who have not yet received both doses of the Pfizer or Moderna vaccine or the one-shot Johnson & Johnson formula. They should also cover their faces while dining with friends from different households at outdoor restaurants. i think there doing this so people who are worried of taking it, can take it. Everyone truly understand that masks are not in favor meaning it gets annoying to wear it constantly everywhere but if you want to take off your mask, then take the vaccine. I really hope this influences people to take the vaccine so we can have a fourth of July that’s spent with our family as well as a outdoor, vacationing summer.
Thanks to social media and the internet, the Deaf community has been able to share more of their culture and language. From YouTube to TikTok, videos in ASL have been increasing in volume. While this is a pro, there also lies another problem – hearing people can also upload their American Sign Language (ASL) videos.
Enter TikTok.
@kaytlynasl is a self-proclaimed hearing ASL student of 7 years. She posts TikToks of herself signing and interpreting songs and her follower count, comprised of mostly hearing people with little to no knowledge of ASL, sits around 300k. Her stated goal is that she creates videos for accessibility and wants to uplift the Deaf community. She has a sizeable following and many of her followers comment that they are learning ASL from watching her videos. Katlyn’s song interpretation videos even landed her a gig interpreting at a concert.
The problem?
Katlyn, in hearing people’s eyes, is amazing at what she does. Her signing is cool and beautiful – but to those in the Deaf community and fluent in ASL? Her signing is a little less than subpar. Her ASL is full of inaccuracies and structural issues; she is very clearly not ready to be out in the field at all. As a matter of fact, she’s just a student and isn’t certified – and her ASL teachers and mentors have discouraged her from uploading. This poses an issue with her hearing audience learning from her – they’re learning butchered ASL that can’t be used in the real world. Those in the Deaf community have requested that she take her videos down because she is spreading misinformation.
Katlyn has ignored all concerns from those in the Deaf community and continued uploading. March 2021, she posted a TikTok namedropping a Deaf creator who reached out to her. She then explained the situation and asked if she should stop uploading, emphasizing her 300k following count. This set off a chain of events as she sent her hearing audience to attack the Deaf creator for giving her feedback and those in the Deaf community felt frustrated at her lack of accountability. The fact that she cared more about the opinions of her hearing audience versus those in the Deaf community that contacted her, emphasized even more that her content was not in the best interest of the Deaf community.
Katlyn has since deleted all videos on her account due to the backlash.
This is not an isolated incident. Hearing people who believe that ASL is trendy tend to use the language in order to gain clout and a following on social media. Why? Because other hearing people put them on a pedestal for knowing even the tiniest bit of ASL.
@rosaliee_ospina is another creator on TikTok that has been criticized for using inaccurate ASL in order to gain a following. In comparison to Katlyn, Rosaliee doesn’t really sign much of anything. In fact, Deaf individuals have pointed out that she’s signing gibberish. If you look closely, you can catch an actual sign or two. There isn’t a semblance of sentence structure or anything – she just slaps the words “ASL” on her videos and hearing people flock to it. She is notorious for blocking any Deaf creator that has reached out to help her learn ASL and openly mocks Deaf people who are concerned about her misrepresentation of ASL.
Katlyn’s comments section on her goodbye video signify what the problem is – hearing people don’t care that ASL is a language and they don’t care about the accuracy.
“Imagine gatekeeping accessibility then non stop complaining about how there isn’t enough inclusion. This a big easy for lack of accessibility GATEKEEPING”
“This is so sad, you guys ruin and cancel everyone for everything. She made such wonderful and accessible content.”
“I’m hearing and I loved your content mainly cuz I’m a beginner at ASL.”
Never mind that it was pointed out that her ASL was inaccurate. Never mind that even her own teachers told her to stop. Never mind that those in the Deaf community said she was spreading misinformation and actually not making accessible content at all. (Also never mind that she isn’t certified and has never graduated from an interpreting program so it’s actually illegal for her to interpret at concerts.)
What they don’t understand is that they’re fetishizing the language and othering it. When hearing people exotify ASL, they then ignore that it’s a language used for communication. By using ASL for entertainment, it causes people to take it less seriously and mock it. ASL isn’t meant to be gawked at and it doesn’t exist for the purpose of entertaining hearing communities. The only people that benefit from using ASL for clout are hearing people – Deaf people suffer the consequences.
Now, to clarify: there isn’t anything inherently wrong with a hearing person learning ASL.
Most people in the Deaf community encourage it and you will find that many are happy to support and educate a student. I have been learning ASL and engaged with the Deaf community for almost a decade – and I have never once been mocked for my learning by anyone in the Deaf community. Every day I learn a new sign because language is always evolving. I have learned signs from professionals, random people I encounter in the street, and even junior high students – learning another language is all about gaining the ability to communicate with more people.
But honestly, learning ASL is the bare minimum. Just because you can sign doesn’t mean you understand Deaf culture or Deaf signs. Do you regularly interact with the Deaf community? Do you understand that ASL and English are two separate languages and have completely different structure and rules? Do you know the history and struggles that Deaf people have faced under the oppression of hearing people?
Learning ASL is a somewhat different experience than learning other languages – learning ASL means learning Deaf culture because ASL is steeped in the community’s history. When you chose to ignore the Deaf community’s input on your ASL journey, it signifies that you do not respect Deaf culture.
And quite frankly – the Deaf community is better off without hearing TikTok’ers who make music covers but can’t even manage to correctly sign the ASL for “music” anyway.
Protestors spent most of the summer 35 feet in the air in
sky pods tied to cypress trees. The goal was to block the Bayou Bridge Pipeline
from running through Louisiana. Energy Transfer Partners was building the
pipeline to move oil between Texas and St. James Parish in Louisiana. Even
though the protestors were on private land with the landowner’s permission,
some were eventually arrested. The pipeline was still completed.
Louisiana’s Governor, John Bel Edwards, signed HB 727 into
law making trespassing on “critical infrastructure” a felony—something that was
once a misdemeanor. The protestors who were arrested were jailed with bonds as
high as $20,000. Four other states including Oklahoma, North Dakota, South
Dakota and Iowa, have enacted similar laws after the national attention of the
Dakota Access Pipeline. The 2017 protest at Standing Rock included months of
clashing with law enforcement. In Texas, a bill was passed that makes
interfering with some oil and gas operations a third-degree felony—the same
amount one would get with indecent exposure to a child. Lawmakers in seven
other states, including Minnesota, are considering similar legislation. Some of
the punishments could be up to 10 years in prison and $100,000 in fines.
In my last blog, I talked about the current state of social media, while referencing recent events such as the Parkland mass shootings, as well as our class reading, “Social Media is Bullshit?” I came to the conclusion that social media isn’t “bullshit”, and that it’s simply a tool. And as with all tools, it can be used for good or bad.
Lately, there’s been a lot of talk about social media being used…again as a bad tool. #deletefacebook is a current campaign to, as the hashtag states, delete the Facebook application from our lives. The reason for this action against Facebook is because the company shared peoples info with other entities, some harmless and some harmful.
Personally, I find it ironic and humorous that people are punishing a company for sharing info that individuals are freely sharing. We are at a crossroads as a society, and at some point we’ll have to make a decision whether or not to exist in complete transparent lives.
Do you remember the George Orwell novel, “1984”? The book is set in a fictional province of the superstate Oceania, whose citizens are victims of ongoing war, omnipresent government surveillance, and public manipulation. Even though it was published in 1949, the troubling societal themes reverberate today. This novel seems to be a prescient reflection of the current and future state of social interaction.
So what is the end game? There’s so much access to people, their information…almost everything with the right resources. I think we need to look to the mechanisms that are ultimately behind all of this.
Stay tuned for the next blog where I discuss the future of social media and humanity’s downfall.
(Audience: MDST485 – Goal: get their wheels turning)
Let me ask you a question. What do you think is one of the top things that make successful people, well, successful? I have one word for you. Preparation. I’ve read countless self-developement books, listened to many speeches, to many sermons, and they consistently and repeatedly talk about preparation. If there is no preparation, the probability of success is rare. Ask anyone. David Meerman Scott also talks about preparation in chapter 17 of ‘The New Rules of Marketing & PR.’ He talks about the preparation of podcasting. In this chapter, he quotes the producer of ‘Marketing Over Coffee,’ who was asked how one gets started with a podcast. His response; “I’ve found the most important thing is show preparation.”
Please tell me you all have listened to a podcast… at least one episode, even though I don’t know how you could stop at just one! If you have AND have an iPhone, the below icon should look very familiar to you. For me, it’s the most used app on my phone. And now one of my dreams is to host my own podcast someday. David Meerman Scott, I’m holding on to every word you write about podcasting. (Fingers crossed!)
I encourage two things out of you in the coming weeks. The first thing is to start preparing for your future, in whatever way that looks like. Write down your goals for the next year, three years, five years. Start a new hobby by jotting down all that interests you. Summer is coming, what are some things you want to be sure you do? Prepare for what’s to come. Prepare for YOUR successful future.
Secondly, start listening to podcasts, or if you already do, try a new one that could better your life, bring a smile to your face, push you to see a different perspective, hear stories on those who have it much, much worse than you, or literally countless more.
Stay tuned for my future blogs. I’ll give you some intriguing recommendations. You can count on it.
My goal for my second blog post is to switch gears from the dark side of social media in my last post to the light side. The second topic I would like to discuss is the benefits of social media. My audience for this posting would be anyone who uses social media, students and teachers in this class and companies or people who market or campaign through social media.
Whether we like to admit it ‘our’ generation eats, sleeps and breathes social media. It’s reach and popularity is without doubt. According to www.quantumrun.com, “It’s estimated that by 2018, 2.44 billion people will be using social networks.” Yes, this might not be the healthiest trend for us to participate in however, there can be benefits from this. As we rely more on technology the need for social media platforms increases. Platforms such as Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and Podcasts allow for instantaneous news coverage, access to limitless information and connects us with the world all within the click of the button.
The opportunities that social media can create are endless. With recent social and political issues being brought to the surface Twitter and Instagram can be used to create awareness by trending hashtags. They can also provide information and rally people for a cause such as creating a buzz agent for the Women’s Rights Marches, Black Lives Matter protests and Most recently the March For Your Lives. If you click on the hashtag or a tagged photos it will literally connect you with millions of other people who are supporting the same cause. What method of getting information out can literally beat that?
Chapter 17 in this weeks Scott reading discusses a newer tool in social media which is Podcasting. This is something I never used to care to listen to until I found an interesting Podcast that caught my attention. I see this platform continues to take off and joining the more well known ones.
Whatever social media platform you follow, the limitless benefits are undeniable.
The audience is anyone who is new to podcasting like myself and the goal is to show how great podcasting can be.
I’m new to podcast. Shameful, right? I knew they were around but never really listened until two years ago when I was introduced to Roughing the Podcast via Twitter. The host, Di Murphy and Ted Glover go back and forth about all things related to the Minnesota Vikings. It was great to listen to them and the knowledge they had about the Vikings and football in general.
After I listened to a few shows I feel down a rabbit hole of podcast. Not just about sports though. I was listening to radio podcast, political podcast- I tend to listen few and far between to them, and comedy podcast just to name a few. What is great about them is that they provide great content without reading. I do love to read, but when I’m in the car or at work I can’t whip out a book or a magazine, and I can get the same content while driving or at my desk.
While I have a new found appreciation for podcast, I have found some that just aren’t good. In The New Rules of Marketing & PR on page 312 they talk about “show preparation.” I have heard podcast were the host weren’t prepared and it within the first five minutes the show is ruined because the host have no idea what they are talking about.
But overall, podcast have been a great discovery for me and I feel that if you are new them like I was, I suggest picking your favorite topic and start from there. Happy listening.
It is obvious by now that social media has taken over the way that people and companies advertise and communicate, but how? The changes are significant and have their benefits. In this three-part blog series, I will be explaining the benefits of social media’s influence on three major subjects: visual media, music artists, and businesses. These posts will hopefully be informative to those who don’t know about the benefits in relation to these topics, as well as entertain those who do know the benefits, and hopefully teach them something they don’t know.
Welcome!
In the last post I talked about the benefits of social media on visual media. This time, I will explain how social media benefits aspiring musicians and musician’s fanbases.
Musicians of the past few decades found fame through touring extensively and getting their music on the radio. Their goal was also to get signed to a record label and create music videos that would hopefully be featured on T.V. With the advancement of technology and social media presence in the daily lives of people, appealing to a wider audience is now easier than ever. Musicians are now able to spread the word of a band or single artists through platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, Spotify, Bandcamp, Soundcloud, and more. Most of these platforms allow you to upload your own content without the help of anyone else and allow anyone to consume your content (either for free or for a fee). This was not always true seeing as how, in the past, an artist would have to have to work through someone (typically a label) to promote their music and make it available for the masses. This makes it easier for independent artists to really make a name for themselves and for more people to even create and promote their own record labels.
Another marketing benefit of social media for musicians is more personally oriented. From a relational standpoint, musicians can now show much more of their personality and share their experiences with their fans than before. This can lead to more involvement, higher outreach, and better sales for their music. Brandon Seymour of indieonthemove.com makes a good point about this, saying “As a band, you have the unique opportunity to be the “tastemaker” for your audience. Step outside the box and incorporate some non-band-related content that you find interesting and chances are your followers will find it interesting too” (Seymour 2013). Being able to appeal to people even when it isn’t about music, can make the community support stronger. This improved involvement of fans can also lead to higher satisfaction as a result of feedback.
Social media can also lead to the spreading of knowledge as well as the expansion of networks. The tradition of spreading fliers for an upcoming show is not dead, but it is seriously overshadowed by the implementation of social media posts and event pages. Facebook specifically, has an event page system that engages people who are planning on attending and provides all the information they need about said event. These event pages can be shared between friends and grow in attendance. When a band posts that they are having an event, friends can ‘tag’ each other in the comments to get their attention. As said simply by David Meerman Scott in The New Rules of Marketing and PR, “When you tag people, they get notifications that point them to the tagged content. Isn’t that great? When you create something interesting, your friends can spread it for you!” (Scott 2017). These tags can allow for people to see new bands they have never heard about including aspiring new bands.
There are so many positive uses of social media for musical artists including, product/music promotion, personal artist-fan interaction, spreading of knowledge and networks, and more. I did not touch on everything but hopefully this will get you thinking about how much social media can help aspiring artists.
Next blog, I will talk about the impact of social media on businesses.
The audience is those interesting in new media and podcasting. The goal is to show the rise of podcast.
Podcast are amazing! I love podcast. I love love love podcast. So many diffrent podcast with different topics. As we continue with new media, podcast are a growing medium from the individual to the people. It helps with car rides, waiting for the bus, waiting for class to start and so on. It’s a way for information or entertainment, probably both.
The rise of podcast is real. Mark Trainer stats in a recent study that 40 percent of Americans have listened to a podcast and 24 percent have listened to one within the past month of the Survey.
Podcast are great. It is an amazing way to get information and be entertained. It’s also relatively easy to start one. David Meerman Scott list some fundamentals of starting a podcast in The New Rules of Marketing & PR: show preparation, record when near computer, mobile recording gear, phone interviews, editing your audio files, postproduction editing, tagging audio, hosting and distribution, promotion, and companion blog.
The audience for this blog post is social media users as well as students in this course. The goal of this post is to inform readers about the platforms that social media has been used to form.
Social media is a powerful tool for anyone and everyone to use. In my last blog, I discussed the importance of DACA and how social media has impacted DREAMERS as well as how they communicate and educate one another (as well as others) about DACA. Social media can be used to not only CREATE a movement but to also FURTHER a cause. For example, the #MeToo movement started with one woman, Tarana Burke. “Ms. Burke created Just Be Inc., a nonprofit organization that helps victims of sexual harassment and assault. She sought out the resources that she had not found readily available to her 10 years before and committed herself to being there for people who had been abused. And she gave her movement a name: Me Too” (1). And the rest is history. Although it did take Tarana’s Me Too movement to gain a lot of speed, it has helped millions of women not only share their stories comfortably but, unfortunately, find common ground with others as well. Black Lives Matter has also used countless hashtags to get their point across whether it be simply, #BlackLivesMatter or #HandsUpDontShoot or even just tweeting out the names of innocent people of color being killed in horrific ways by our police force to make sure that their names are remembered. The most recent hashtag that is being used is #NeverAgain and #EnoughIsEnough which started after the Parkland shooting to call for gun control. These are just a few social movements that I personally can think of that have made impacts maybe not the way that they intended but raised awareness and educated some people as well which is what Castells mentioned in his Networks of Outrage Prelude to Revolution. “Mobile phones and social networks on the Internet played a major role in spreading images and messages that mobilized people in providing a platform for debate, in calling for action, in coordinating and organizing the protests, and in relaying information and debate to the population at large” (p. 46).
Overall, if it’s important to you, speak out, or at least just listen and acknowledge others’ strides to speak out and make a change. It never hurts to listen.
My goal for my second blog post is to switch gears from the dark side of social media in my last post to the light side. The second topic I would like to discuss is the benefits of social media. My audience for this posting would be anyone who uses social media, students and teachers in this class and companies or people who market or campaign through social media.
MDST 485 Class Blog 