Reminicences... (4.5)

...Personal Media Use Dossier...
(26/08/10)
For this part of our assessment last year we were asked to record all our media use (both consumption and production) and make some observations upon our findings. These 4 graphs depict my personal media use, within certain boundaries. All times were recorded within 5 minute increments, therefore if my usage was less than that it was not noted. Therefore results on things such as "Facebook" or email production may not be as accurate as desirable. Also, whilst some books were recorded ("World War Z", and "The Zombie Survival Guide" Max Brooks), any text books for study purposes were omitted.

Fig. 1 Media Use Per Day

Fig. 2 Total Media Use By Time Slot

Fig. 3 Media Use As %age Of Total Time

Fig. 4 %age Of Media Types

Figure 1 reveals some trends. I never consume over 7 hours of media per day (roughly 1/3rd of the day), but as a bare minimum would consume more than 20 minutes. "Consume" is probably a debatable point as it cannot be measured how much attention i was paying at that particular day. For instance, i might read an online article for 20 mins and critically absorb each word, and i might leave a radio on while my attention is completely elsewhere for 5 hours. There seems to be no identifiable pattern as to what days are peak periods as my highest consumption falls on Saturday the 13th, Sunday the 14th, Wednesday the 17th, and Friday the 19th. The reason it is higher these days is because i drove on these days, and therefore had the radio on. My peak consumption points fail to discriminate between weekends or weekdays. Likewise my lull periods also fail to follow any pattern, except both Thursdays within this period, which is because i did not drive on those days. The 15th and 16th ( Monday and Tuesday) are low because on that week i was too broke to pay for petrol and therefore caught the train. This is highly reminiscent of ABC's Steve Austin's belief that pre apocalypse Australian society was "time poor", and needed to consume radio as a multi tasking exercise while doing something else (in my case driving).
Figure 2 illuminates what time my media use tends to occur. My peak periods tend to be around mid-day, and 21.00 to 23.00. I often used to surf the internet aimlessly just before bed, and drove most days of the week after 9pm. From 00.00 until 10.00 i was usually asleep and therefore not consuming media. The lowest point (other than sleeping) is around 20.00 when i used to train for judo. Again, with reference to Steve Austin, my peak uses of media occur at times where i was either doing something else (work, study) or returning home in my vehicle.

Figure 3 I put in merely for perspective, to point out that within the 336 hours in a fortnight, i was consuming media around 10% of that time ( roughly 44hours).

Figure 4 is a cross-section of that approx. 44 hours, and what media use went into constituting it. The largest segment is devoted to 4ZZZ, which i had on in my car whenever i drove. B105 is the next contender, which i (was forced to) listen to at work (Subway). Everything else on the left of the chart are all internet borne media (including the books and movie) except for one negligible reference to MX (the pre-revolution railway newspaper). Of these "Blogger" the google derivative took the largest amount of my attention, with roughly 8 hours. There was a complete absence of any media that wasn't electronic, and there was no TV usage recorded either.

Discussion

To first analyse my media use and how it is relevant to journalism/communication, you must first ask, what does J/C mean? Without descending into semantics i will simply argue that journalism/communication is/are much like any other product manufactured by humans; in that it/they is/are a industrially produced commodity that is designed to generate capital. All of these mediums listed had advertising, whether it was for a specific physical product (radio ads , B105 is saturated with them) or an ideological concept (such as peace in "Apocalypse Now", or safety in "The Zombie Survival Guide). Journalism specifically is used as a lure to draw the audience into buying these products.  "Objectivity" is mythic, as this self sustaining capital is critical for the media to exist. Logically no one would offer their informational/entertainment expertise to a faceless public for free.  This is debatable as 4ZZZ is not commercially driven per se, but rather funded by donation. Yet it asks the listener to pay to fund the station. Therefore it must be understood that as a product, it must appeal to the consumer to generate this revenue. "The consumer" is diverse and much effort is extended in order to understand demographics in order to better market to them. As i was often listening around the 21.00 point on, advertisers would therefore target my age group (or at least not an age group that would be absent at that point). There is a bit of freedom for obscenities and ect for marketers when generational censorship is taken out of the equation. People seeking such titillation on audio broadcasts would tune into radio at these times and be marketed to accordingly by professional communicators. The key point is that all media must draw attention of consumers, and make them fund their existence.

I as a member of the "young student driver" demographic would be targeted during my radio use, and would be offered concepts and products that i would desire; so long as i could be identified as a member of that group. On the internet time slots aren't a consideration per se, but URL still is, as well as networking sites which can log what media you access. (Youtube, Facebook, etc.). If i am to assume that i am like others my age and class there is a limited amount of time (10% of the day) in which marketers can appeal to my group to buy things i might be interested in. They must therefore edit their journalistic authors to attract me to their medium, and make me internalise their advertisements and fund their existence. My attention span, my interests, my occupation, my subjective life experience (to list a few) must be taken into consideration when communicating with me. Therefore it is the job of people like Public Relations employees to study me and my peers and our collective wills and opinions. Assuming you have a large potential client base driving around the 21/22.00 time slot you can attract the audience you want by offering them their interests (interview with certain niche celebrities), and then market to them accordingly.

toad.