This document contains summaries of multiple articles about mass media and technology: 1) The first article discusses college students' views on illegally downloading music online, with many feeling it is not truly immoral though illegal, while the music industry sees it as rampant piracy. 2) The second article examines the effects of television on children, with some arguing it can stunt development, though others note parental influence is more important. 3) The third story describes a father creating a virtual world for his disabled daughter using multimedia, allowing her to experience things she cannot in real life. 4) The final poem envisions a future where nature and technology coexist harmoniously, with machines taking over human labor.

1. MASS MEDIA AND
TECHNOLOGY
ADDITIONAL READING 3

2. GROUP MEMBERS
 Jashmina Pradhananga
 Kriti Manandhar
 Priya Singh
 Rupesh Shah
 Sristi Siddhi Bajracharya
 Vineet Goel

3. CONTENTS
 Students Shall Not Download. Yeah, Sure
−Kate Zernike
 Don’t Touch That Dial
−Madeline Drexler
 Conceptual Fruit
−Thaisa Frank
 All Watched Over by Machines of Loving Grace
−Richard Brautigan
 Humor

4. STUDENT SHALL NOT
DOWNLOAD. YEAH, SURE.
-KATE ZERNIKE

5. CONTENTS
 About the author
 Students’ point of view on downloading music
 College plans on the issue
 Views about downloading music
 Music industry point of view

6. ABOUT THE AUTHOR
 Kate Zernike
 Correspondent for the New York Times
 Previously a reporter for The Boston Globe

7. STUDENTS’ POINT OF VIEW ON
DOWNLOADING MUSIC
 Illegal but not immoral
 Taken internet for granted
 Broadband encourage downloading
 Blurred lines between right and wrong
 Lot worse issues to focus on
 Cool to have them
 A dollar a song not worth it
 Form of advertising

8. COLLEGE PLANS ON THE ISSUE:
 Online tutorial to students
 A new program to pay for the rights to music
 Educate students on what is ok

9. VIEWS ABOUT DOWNLOADING MUSIC
Agree
(Percentages)
Disagree
(Percentages)
Not sure
(Percentages)
Downloading and then selling music is
piracy and should be prohibited;
downloading for personal use is an
innocent act and should not be
prohibited
75 14 11
If the price of CDs were a lot lower, there
would be a lot less downloading off
music of the internet
70 21 9
Musicians and the recording companies
should get the full financial benefit of
their work
64 17 19
Downloading music off the internet is no
different from buying a used CD or
recording music borrowed from a friend.
54 31 15

10. MUSIC INDUSTRY POINT OF VIEW
 Steady rise in internet plagiarism from 1993 to 2003
 Common analogy unable to sway students
 College students biggest downloaders of internet
music
 Music record industry mainly after sharers not
downloaders

12. DON’T TOUCH THAT DIAL
-MADELINE DREXLER

13. CONTENTS
 Author introduction
 Significance of the title
 Right or wrong???
 General assumptions
 Research on television
 Violence on television
 Daniel Anderson’s viewpoint
 Advice to parents
 Conclusion

14. AUTHOR INTRODUCTION
 Madeline Drexler
 Science and Medical journalist
 Worked in many national publications in the United
States
 Article appeared in the Boston Globe, a large daily
newspaper in 1991

15. SIGNIFICANCE OF THE TITLE
 Dial refers the control on a radio or television set
used for tuning
 Simply means don’t touch the remote

16. RIGHT OR WRONG???
 Television acts as a narcotic on children
 Mesmerize them
 Stunt their ability to think
 Displace wholesome activities as book reading and
family discussion

17. GENERAL ASSUMPTIONS
 Tend to blame TV
 TV impairs a child’s ability to think and to interpret
the world
 Displaces reading as a form of entertainment
 Watching TV lowers IQ scores and hinders school
performance

18. RESEARCH ON TELEVISION
 Dangerous to children
 Hypnotizes them
 Curbs intellectual development
 Takes place of loftier pastimes

19. VIOLENCE ON TELEVISION In %
Programs with Violence 61
Violent Programs
Long term negative consequences of violence 16
Perpetrators as bad characters who go unpunished 45
Perpetrators as attractive characters 40
Violent Scenes
No remorse, criticisms, or penalty for violence 71
Blood and gore 14
Humor 42
Violent Interactions
No physical harm or pain to victim 51
Unrealistically low levels of harm 34
Lethal violence 54

20. DANIEL ANDERSON’S VIEWPOINT
 A psychologist at the University of Massachusetts
at Amherst
 Important to distinguish television’s impact on
children from family and cultural influence
 Overlook own roles in shaping children’s minds
 Muse upon the meaning of what they see
 Time spent on watching TV not related to reading
ability

21. CONTINUED…
 Influence of family on children’s reading ability
 No link between television exposure and lower IQ
 People of lower IQ tend to be lifelong television
devotees
 Appreciates high school courses on how to
“decode” TV
 Social impact rather than cognitive impact

22. ADVICE TO PARENTS
 Children are not just passively mesmerized by TV
 Think of alternatives to television
 Find why they watch too much TV

23. CONCLUSION
 Source of enlightenment or a descent into
mindlessness
 Depends on the choices of lucre-driven executives

25. CONCEPTUAL FRUIT
-THAISA FRANK

26. CONTENT
 Author introduction
 Significance of the title
 Characters of the story
 Greta’s character
 The story
 Conclusion

27. AUTHOR INTRODUCTION
 Thaisa Frank
 Teaches at University of San Francisco
 Practices psychotherapy
 Extracted from story collection Sleeping in Velvet
(1997)

28. SIGNIFICANCE OF THE TITLE
 Fruit refers to the multimedia
 Concept of virtual world

29. CHARACTERS IN THE STORY
Four characters
– Greta (Daughter)
– Father
– Mother
– Joel (Son)

30. GRETA’S CHARACTER
 Girl of 16
 Couldn’t perform activities as normally as others
 Often repeated whatever she heard
 Went to special school

31. THE STORY
 Father wanted to share about a new site
 Only Greta showed interest
 Took her to show where she could make up streets
and bowls of fruit
 Asked what she wanted
 Created a street called “Greta’s Street”, a house
called “Greta’s House”

32. CONTINUED…
 Placed bowls in every room
 Peaches everywhere
 Eleven windows covered with white curtains
 Clicked bowls – word peaches appeared
 Greta expected real peaches to appear
 Father said - the words remind what they stand for

33. CONTINUED…
 Didn’t cry but closed her eyes
 Created a kitchen, a dining room, a living room, a
bedroom, a room for cat
 But no bathroom – not a real house
 Smiled the next time when the word peaches
appeared
 The house could have anything

34. CONTINUED…
 But Greta will never have a house of her own
 Would live in a group house with people like her
 Father hopes the house to be large and as Greta
wanted

35. CONCLUSION
 Multimedia and internet helps to create a virtual
world
 Helps people to get satisfaction to some extent

37. ALL WATCHED OVER BY
MACHINES OF LOVING GRACE
-RICHARD BRAUTIGAN

38. CONTENTS
 Author’s introduction
 About the poem
 The poem
 Conclusion

39. AUTHOR’S INTRODUCTION
 Richard Brautigan (1933-1984)
 Popular U.S. poet and novelist
 Extracted from The Pill Versus the Springhill Mine
Disaster (1968)

40. ABOUT THE POEM
 Deals with computers
 Written at the time when electronic technology was
in its early stages
 Use of refrain

41. THE POEM
I like to think (and
the sooner the better)
of a cybernetic meadow
where mammals and computers
live together in mutually
programming harmony
like pure water
touching clear sky

42. CONTINUED…
I like to think
(right now, please!)
of a cybernetic forest
filled with pines and electronics
where deer stroll peacefully
past computers
as if they were flowers
with spinning blossoms.

43. CONTINUED…
I like to think
(it has to be!)
of a cybernetic ecology
where we are free of our labors
and joined back to nature,
returned to our mammal
brothers and sisters,
and all watched over
by machines of loving grace.

44. CONCLUSION
 Balance between technology and nature
 Dream of a paradise free of labor
 Machines can take place of man in future

46. HUMOUR