omg-my-jacobs-epic-blog

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Exploring Genre in Young Thugs “Homie”

The video also portrays the display of wealth in a alternative way rather than the typical brick of cash or cocaine. Thug is instead shown dining at a table with decadent assortments of foods before him, and an entire waiting staff despite only having one guest. The walls in the video are also adorned with tens of portraits painted of him, this is another way Thug displays his wealth in an unconventional way. “Homie” is song written and performed by Atlanta rapper Young Thug, featuring Meek Mill. The video displays most of the traditional aspects of a rap video including the displays of wealth such as jewelry and designer clothes like the pair of Adidas coveted Yeezy 350 boosts. Also the classic expressive hand gestures directed at the camera, but this is where the cliches stop.

Thug presents an alternative androgynous persona that is uncharacteristic to the genre of rap music. Thug’s music videos are no different, this particular video fringes on the verge of horror. The video unlike most music videos goes beyond the flexing of money, drugs, and guns by following a narrative, in this case being the demise of Thuggers dinner guest. The actors in the background of the video are two little girls and the waiters - they create a very ominous tone with the sharpening of their knife's and the demented drawing done by the children.

The video also portrays the display of wealth in a alternative way rather than the typical brick of cash or cocaine. Thug is instead shown dining at a table with decadent assortments of foods before him, and an entire waiting staff despite only having one guest. The walls in the video are also adorned with tens of portraits painted of him, this is another way Thug displays his wealth in an unconventional way.

#Youngthug #thugger #ysl #youngslimelife #youngstonerlife

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What Do You Meme?

This genre of meme falls under throwing shade or roasting. This type of meme involves making fun of another organization or region in this case Ottawa. This memes target audience is people in Ontario. 6ixbuzz a Toronto Instagram page is constantly creating these memes that target cities around and make fun the stereotypes that are applied to the people that live there. In the case of this meme targeting residence of Oshawa the stereotype being people riding around on dirt bikes and drinking too much Monster energy.

         The Origins of this type of meme is derived from people on the outskirts of Toronto claiming that they are from Toronto but really they live in places like Brampton, Oshawa, and Oakville. Pages from Toronto like 6ixbuzz choose to represent places like Oshawa in an overly negative light to create humour from these stereotypes.

#6ixbuzz #Toronto #oshawa

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Working in New Media

The medium of Tumblr compared to the old school pen and paper has several sizable advantages in its capability to spread information in today's world. One especially useful application of Tumblr is the ability to embed links to videos and articles right in the text.

 The reason this is such a great tool is that it allows people to access resources quickly rather then people having to search through your bibliography. This kind of convenience is something that really appeals to the younger generation because of their lack of attention span compared to older generations. I think a disadvantage of using this kind of platform is that your content will be taken less seriously in an academic setting because of how uncommon it would be for someone to present their ideas via a Tumblr blog. 

I don’t believe that this exercise has changed the content or meaning of my work because I have grown up in an age where I have almost always been aware of this type of approach to content. This being said I this use of medium definitely influenced the way I work. 

#newmedia #content

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Lean in Hip-Hop Culture

        In recent years the rise in opioid abuse has risen creating a crisis surrounding overdoses. The use of these drugs has been glorified my artist in the trap music scene specificity lean also known as codeine cough syrup with promethazine. The reason this promotion of this drug is so troubling is the primary audience for these rappers is teens and people in their early twenties. Because lean is most commonly consumed by mixing with soda and jolly ranchers to make an intoxicating surgery cocktail it easily appeals to young people. Also because it is an over the counter medication and because of this many people from the misconception that it is safer than street drugs. My goal for this campaign would be to urge people of all ages to stop consuming opioids.                  

   The target audience for this campaign would be the people 16-25 because of the twisted fancy view that this drug portrayed in pop culture. An analysis done by a company named Genius found that lean was mentioned in “30 percent of rap songs that reached the top ten of Billboard’s Hot 100 in 2017”.  

The digital platforms I would you to reach my target audience would be Instagram, Youtube, and Snapchat ads. The reason I choose these social media platforms is that I believe these are the most popular among people 16-25. Any other social media platforms such as Facebook would be a waste of time in recent years.

For the campaigns, I would plan to reach out to celebrities and musicians that have previously endured the use of lean and have recently said that they have quit. The ads would be a variety of short pieces of dialogue urging users to stop and stating that it is not just a trend but a deadly epidemic facing young people. This campaign would feature artists such as Lil Uzi Vert and Freddo Santana. I think an advantage of using popular rap artists is that their faces grab the attention of users so teens would be less likely to skip over the advertisements without a second glance. A problem that I might face with this sort of campaign is there is still such a big promotion of lean within rap music. This constant reference of the drug might be too overwhelming for people to open their minds to an alternative point of view.  

#lean

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Censoring the Internet?

The British government has recently launched a proposal to start regulating what the public has access to on the internet. This plan has been unpopular among western cultures and is being used to discourage online users from accessing material “supporting terrorism, inciting violence, encouraging suicide, disinformation, cyberbullying and inappropriate material accessible to children.”. The question has been asked if a similar ban should be implemented in Canada to urge company executives to be more aggressive with the censoring of harmful material on their sites.  

My concern with this proposal is its potential for the government to abuse its ability to censor content to the point where it infringes on the right of freedom of speech. I think that it should remain the responsibility of the administrator of the site to decide what is appropriate content for their website.

Even if the government attempted to regulate the internet, I don’t think it would be possible for them to purge every trace for harmful content from the internet to a point where they could guarantee that the internet is a safe space.  In my opinion I believe it is important that people be aware of the harmful content that is able to help themselves avoid it. I don’t believe being ignorant to it all together is the answer. I think a good compromise would be to have this content more heavily monitored so that people can be aware of people such as  the gunman who distributed a racist manifesto online before the massacre in New Zealand to help stop things like this before they happen.

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Hegemony in Engagement ring Ads

Jewellers every since the first ad for an engagement ring ad in 1477 have used engagement rings to market a happy relationship, this marketing promotes the idea that spending money on your partner will make your relationship better and more romantic. Jewellery ads specifically for engagement rings are marketed using prodominany white hetrosexual couples such as seen in most advertisements. This stereotype has been perpetuated and the legalization of gay marriage has done almost nothing to change this closed idea of of marriage.

https://www.cosmopolitan.com/style-beauty/fashion/news/a35153/tiffanys-new-engagement-ring-ad-gay-couple/

Tiffany Diamonds has recently gone against the gain and realised a new advertisement campaign that shows a real life gay couple from New York. Although Tiffany is a company that is guilty of perpetuating the white hetrosexual sterotype that is commonly scene in engagement ads, this campaign is a great step in the right direction from such a prominent jewelry company. I think this change in trend will open up more room for other jewelry companies to create more ads that are inclusive for all sexualities in years to come.

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“All media exists to invent our lives with artificial perceptions and arbitrary values.” - Marshall McLuhan

One of Marshall McLuhan's famous aphorisms that comment on old media is “All media exists to invent our lives with artificial perceptions and arbitrary values.” Although McLuhan was writing these aphorisms far before the age of social media that we live in today his ideas are still valid when applied to a new form of media.

This aphorism can be applied to the validation that we receive from the new forms of social media. An example of this kind of arbitrary value that we assign this media is the likes, comments, and follows on instagram. Now because of the way these apps have shaped us have lead use to assess a persons importance and relevance based on the number of instagram follower they have and if they don’t have over one thousand they are probably not worth your time. This follower count is also comes with countless other arbitrary values such as your follower to following ratio where as a rule a person should have more followers then they are following or their follower count means nothing.  These made up rules are guidelines to your online life that have almost no relevance outside the social media. Another example of this is the absurd amount of validation a person craves from likes and comments on instagram. Form these likes and comments people derive their social status online, and sometimes a person will delete a post and repost it at a different time of day to attempt to get more likes because the likes make people receive the better they feel about themselves. People with post their own post on their story and tag all of their their friends in the post to try and get more publicity and likes and comments and if you are tagged in a photo then it is your personal obligation to your friend to now comment on that photo to affirm your friendship.

These types of interactions carry no weight outside of the online community, these medias invent new lives with our online personas and the amount of likes and followers we get create artificial perceptions of people self worth.

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