Blumler & Katz

Uses and Gratification Theory

• (Katz, E. Blumler, J.G & Gurevitch M. 1974) The uses and gratification Theory is a popular approach to understanding mass communication
• The theory focuses more on the consumer or the audience more than the actual message
• Theory states that audiences are responsible for choosing media to their own needs

Model

The theory suggested that the uses and gratifications theory has to fulfil one of the following when we choose a form of media:

Identify: Able to recognize a product/person, role models that reflect similar beliefs and values to yours.

Educate: Acquiring information, knowledge and understanding

Entertain: Consumption of media should provide enjoyment and a form of escapism allowing the audience to forget about their life temporarily

Social Interaction: Media products to produce a topic of conversation between other people

Cover work 26/11/14

Playing video games for just 20 minutes a day can encourage violent behaviour.

This would link to the hypodermic needle theory because the students that were asked to play the more violent games such as Call of Duty reacted more aggressively where as the students that were asked to play the less violent game (Dirt 2) reacted more calmly. This shows that there is a direct correlation between what you see and what you do which then supports the hypodermic needle theory.

http://metro.co.uk/2013/08/28/playing-violent-video-games-not-harmful-to-children-3940335/

This is another article that proves that playing violent games affects what you do later on. Based on this article an eight-year old had killed his grandmother after playing Grand Theft Auto which clearly supports the hypodermic needle theory again.

In my opinion I would agree with this debate because from my own experience I have seen young boys get violent after playing a video game for example GTA V and later on think its legal to do what they do with in the game. 

Jamal Edwards: Amateur film-maker turned multimillionaire

I can link this to the two step flow model by making Jamal the 'opinion leader' in this case because he makes the videos and compares different rappers to see who is better and promotes different rappers that he comes across.

There are more you-tubers similar to Jamal himself, for example 'Cynical Brit' who reviews new video games on PC's and game consoles. Also there is TheDevilsJoker, ShintaiReviews, Standurbman and there is also a website where people compare hundreds of different and new video games called IGN.com.

Premlinary Excercise

Young & Rubicam's 4C's

This test gave me a result of my main value to be Control and my secondary value to be Status. 

The Wolf of Wall Street Official Trailer

The Wolf of Wall Street

This movie has a linear prospective where there is an equilibrium at the beginning, a disruption of it in the middle and a creation of the new equilibrium at the very end. the action codes in this trailer are things such as the appearance of money and the use of women to show the wild lifestyles of these men. As an audience we would like to find out how they have these lifestyles and creates interest in the narrative. 

There are also many enigma codes used in this trailer where we see Leonardo DiCaprio throwing money at the police men walking from his boat. This creates suspense for the audience and holds our interest. The use of sound is gives the narrative more suspense and as we see the montage in this trailer the sound builds up and stops at the very end where one of the actors starts to 'hum'. The use of different wide shots in this trailer show the variety of adventures Leonardo DiCaprio take through his time at Wall Street. 

The variety of shots show that he goes through a lot of different roles in this movie and also gets himself into much trouble where we see a detective come onto his boat and that scene skips to another scene where we see DiCaprio throwing money at the police officers which connotes that he's disrespecting them. The camera movement is quiet fast in this trailer due to the different shots being used to intimidate the audience. DiCaprio is shown to be the hero where as Jonah Hill is the helper. DiCaprio's father would be the donor and the princess/heroine would be Margret Robbie (Naomi). This movie is shown to be like a story due to the the narrative flow DiCaprio gives in the beginning where he starts to tell the story of Wall Street which is basically his life. 

During the slow motion phase of the frames, Di Caprio's voice over describes to the audience what quaaludes are and their effect on a person's body, this is parallel to what we see on screen when all the beer and pills are flying around in slow motion while Jonah Hill is screaming 'Steve Madden' like a mad man as the effects that are described in the voice over are being presented on screen. The voiceover almost promotes the use of quaaludes and at a point in the speech he says 'you people are sh*t out of luck' suggesting the endorsement of drugs and presenting it in a way that shows all rich and successful stock brokers did these while they were available to 'stimulate their free flow of ideas'.

The clothes the actors are wearing are also very upmarket and prestigious presenting them as successful and wealthy individuals. Also all the chaos happening around his mansion doesn't seem to bother him, for example when the glasses start falling off the edge he doesn't even pay attention to it and carries on talking about his new business opportunity. Also the scene where Jonah Hill starts hitting the pool table with his expensive leather loafer further shows emphasis on how wealthy they are, making it very desirable to the viewers as everyone would love to be rich and live life carelessly like them. This fits into the rich and luxurious lifestyle enigma code that's desirable to many people. 

After the Steve Madden sequence the classical music stops along with the slow motion frames and the diegetic sound of a typical 80/90's song is heard in the background suggesting a resolution to the problem. As he's speaking the protagonist is playing with his hair and massaging his face as everyone laughs showing the audience a contrast as successful and rich people seem very professional and strict when it comes to work, on the other hand in this scene we're shown a group of business men behaving worse than children.