Advertising throughout history has become a task which marketers and companies had to perfect in order to catch the advantage over other competitors. Many companies use ideas such as product comparison, band wagoning, and even catchy gingles that get caught up in the consumers heads. However one of the most poplular methods used by companies is celebrity approval. This use of advertisement is very blatant in the world of sports and can be seen in every aspect of sports. According to the website www.sportsjournal.org, sports icons are among the most influential people in the American society and the use of athletes has steadily increased to gain sales of products in recent years. Many companies try and increae the sales of their product by exploiting popular superstars to gain the attention of the consumers. Companies such as Nike or Adidas will compete to gain the rights of athletes to be a spokesperson for their product. Companies will often pay outlandish amounts of money to gain these rights, in fact frequetly pay more than their salary for the spor that they play. By winning the rights of the athlete to be a spokeperson for a company, often sales increase as well for the company. By winning the bidding process and by the athlete signing a contract that particular athlete is at liberty to only use their product. By using this method fans of hte particular athlete will often follow along with the athlete and buy what he uses. For instance, Tiger Woods, arguably the greatest golfer in the world is one of Nike’s greatest icons. When people see Tiger using golf clubs or equipment made by Nike and see him dominate the competition, people will often think that is the best equipment to use. Because Tiger is one of the best golfers in the world, people usually associate that th product he is using is the best in the world as well. As a result if they use the product, their skills will also increase and make them better and give them the edge on the competition. This method has been used throughout time and has never stopped working, unless the spokesperson creates contradiction, in which case the sponsor usually drops the contract. A resent case of this was the Michael Vick case earlier this year. Nike had a huge contract with Vick and when he was convicted of criminal action, Nike dropped his contract to avoid any loss in sales. Athletes are very influential figures in society all around the world because of their spectacular abilities in their respective sports. Athletes gain our respect from their talents and skills rivaled by only few. The search for the best equipment or product is often sought after by people across the globe, and when someone see their idol using a particular product often the consumer will be attracted to it because it is what their hero uses. Sports are so influential and I am guilty of being coaxed into the explotation athletes for partcular products. It is so tempting and luring American and is a strong influence to Americans of all ages.

Nate Jenkins

Advertising throughout history has become a task which marketers and companies had to perfect in order to catch the advantage over other competitors. Many companies use ideas such as product comparison, band wagoning, and even catchy gingles that get caught up in the consumers heads. However one of the most poplular methods used by companies is celebrity approval. This use of advertisement is very blatant in the world of sports and can be seen in every aspect of sports. According to the website www.sportsjournal.org, sports icons are among the most influential people in the American society and the use of athletes has steadily increased to gain sales of products in recent years. Many companies try and increae the sales of their product by exploiting popular superstars to gain the attention of the consumers. Companies such as Nike or Adidas will compete to gain the rights of athletes to be a spokesperson for their product. Companies will often pay outlandish amounts of money to gain these rights, in fact frequetly pay more than their salary for the spor that they play. By winning the rights of the athlete to be a spokeperson for a company, often sales increase as well for the company. By winning the bidding process and by the athlete signing a contract that particular athlete is at liberty to only use their product. By using this method fans of hte particular athlete will often follow along with the athlete and buy what he uses. For instance, Tiger Woods, arguably the greatest golfer in the world is one of Nike’s greatest icons. When people see Tiger using golf clubs or equipment made by Nike and see him dominate the competition, people will often think that is the best equipment to use. Because Tiger is one of the best golfers in the world, people usually associate that th product he is using is the best in the world as well. As a result if they use the product, their skills will also increase and make them better and give them the edge on the competition. This method has been used throughout time and has never stopped working, unless the spokesperson creates contradiction, in which case the sponsor usually drops the contract. A resent case of this was the Michael Vick case earlier this year. Nike had a huge contract with Vick and when he was convicted of criminal action, Nike dropped his contract to avoid any loss in sales. Athletes are very influential figures in society all around the world because of their spectacular abilities in their respective sports. Athletes gain our respect from their talents and skills rivaled by only few. The search for the best equipment or product is often sought after by people across the globe, and when someone see their idol using a particular product often the consumer will be attracted to it because it is what their hero uses.

Nate Jenkins

When trying to think of a topic that I should write about for a blog, I could only think of a rubik cube. The idea came to me because of my new profound interest in the cube that has stumped millions since it was invented in 1974. The rubik cube, invented by a Hugarian Sculptor named Erno Rubik is a mechanical puzzle that without intentions by Rubik became the most popular toy ever invented in the world. The inegma shaped in a simple cube has sold over 900,000,000 since 1980 when it was released for sale to the public. The popularity of the toy gained it the prestigious award “Game of the Year” in 1980 and in 1981 in addition to the BATR Toy of the Year Award in both 1980 and 1981. However, the popularity of the puzzle was an added bonus for Rubik. The cube was looked at as a challenge in itself to Rubik and he was merely looking for a way to make the cube work. Starting in 1970, a protype for the Rubik Cube had been created by a Canadian named Harry Nichols. The difference between the two were Nichols idea was a 7×7x7 puzzle and was rotational, very similar to the ideas of Rubik. In addition, the puzzle was held together by magnets resulting in being clomsy and very costly to produce. Also in 1970, a man named Frank Fox, invented a 3×3x3 toy but was spherical. He received a patent much earlier than Rubik but failed to gain popularity. When Rubik created his version of the puzzle, he used the idea of interlocking pieces inside of the cube, allowing every piece to swivel in every direction except diagonally. The only pieces that didnt’t move were the center pieces, which were held firmly in place because they are bonded together. The use of interlocking pieces was much more efficient, durable, and cheaper than the other models created. After testing out his invention and dispersing it to toy shops to test out for themselves resulting in popularity. As the popularity began to grow, he original name for the cubic puzzle, the magic cube, was changed when it went on sale in 1980 by the company Ideal Toys. However, because of similar ideas, Nichols sued Ideal Toys and lost the suit that the 2×2 cube was an infringement on his patent but the 3×3x3 cube did not do so. After all of the legal settlements were resided, production of the product started up again, and by 1982 over one hundred million cubes had been sold. When the toy reached its peak of popularity, stickers of the cubes were actually sold because people became so frustrated in trying to solve the cube. For the majority of the population the original cube is a challenge in itself, but for some the cube was to simple nd did not give them a worthy challenge. As a result for the demand for a greater challenge, cubes of 4, 5, 6 and all the way up to eleven cubes were invented. In addition to the gifted who are able to solve the complex puzzle with relative ease, competitions around the world are held throughout the world for who can solve it in the least amount of time. Today the record is set at 9.55 seconds and is .22 seconds faster than any other competitor. One of the reasons that the puzzle has gained such popularity and interest to the American public is because of its intense and rigorous challenges to solve. The cube is made up of 26 individual cubes resulting in over 3,252,003,274,489,856,000 different positions. This results in a almost insurmountable challenge to anyone who tries. However, no matter how many different ways that the cube can be positioned, it can be solved in less than 40 moves no matter what. The solution to the Rubik Cube must be solved using algorithms which is a series of moves that result in not moving any pieces except for the single intended cube. This task to solve the cube has stumped almost a billion people since its invention and has only been solved by less than 10 percent of the people who have ever picked the cube up. It is a goal of mine to one day be a part of that ten percent.

Nate Jenkins
http://www.rubiks.com/
http://www.worldcubeassociation.org/
http://www.hungarianbookstore.com/rubik.htm

Day in and day out, it seems that kids are getting dummer and dummer. When I entered High School I was amazed at the number of people who didn’t know simple geography, math, and science. Then the show “are you smarter than a fifth grader” came out, and the proceptions how smart a fifth grader can be changed drastically. Harvard graduates couldn’t even win. This confused me, why are the smart gifted fifth graders being potrayed as average, and the less intellectual gifted students being neglected? This is a problem that I do not think will be solved anytime soon, however, I beilieve that both the home and the governent is to blame for this problem. The home is being changed forever, instead of family values being taught at home, children are forced to learn from teachers and counselors what they should do instead of asking their parents for help. This not only seperates the parent/child connection, but prohibits the child from wanting to ask questions from adults. They can’t ask their parents for help, and who wants to ask questions from strangers? So the child consequently remains ignorant of the solution. This habit continues into the classroom, the child begins to beilieve that they must rely on themselves to find the answers, and what they must learn, they already know or understand. The confortation occurs when Parents blame the school, and the school blames the parents. The percentage of parents that show up to PTA meetings is not nearly as staggering as the number of parents who do not show up. When the child remains ignorant, they become a problem, and which teacher wants to deal with problems. My mother is a teacher and gossips frequently about teachers who ignore disruptive childeren and only focus on the students who want to learn. According to the National Education Association the average teachers’ salary barely skims 40,000 dollars a year.  This hardly seems enough to fund the people who are responsible for the future of America.  This, to me seems to be the main problem. The childeren who are ignorant want attention, become disruptive, and the teachers simply ignore them. The parents tend make matters worse when they have to come in and talk to teachers “shocked” to hear their sweet little angel is a disruption. So, everybody is taking a blind eye to these neglected childeren. Very few teachers truly care about their students enough to confront the troublemakers to a point where they want to learn from a teacher who has guts enough to care about a student like them. Parents need to take more initionative with their children’s education and not simply rely on the public education system to solely teach their system. To me, that is just stupid, if you want to believe that the government who is filled with people who went to prep shcools, and private education centers will send the tax money to public shcools, your dead wrong. This is where the government takes blame, because they rely too much upon the home to teach childeren, they are totally neglecting a majority of students who are just passing through the public school system and not truly learning enough to impact, (not function) but impact society. If this tradition continues, what will our country become, a small pool of private schoolers who learn, and kids are continued to bbe neglected, because “they don’t care about learning” Bull sh**, they don’t care because they haven’t learned to learn. Their parents have placed the blame on the government, and the government has placed a blame on the home, so while your finger pointing contest is going on, you childeren, our future is going down the tubes. So its all of our faults, but until the government puts more money into it, and the parents at least care enough to show up to PTA meetings, education will not be a priority.

James Butters

The movies “Crash” and “Do the right thing” show the complexities of racism in our society. The differences in these movies is very distinct, yet essentially tell the same story. The Movie Crash follows several characters over the course of several days througout the city of Los Angeles. The movie’s setting has a historic backround that shows, that the melting of america has not quite made its dinner. The several races represented in this movie include, korean, black, white, hispanic, etc. This is very similar to the races represented in the film “Do the Right Thing.” However ” Do the Right Thing” only follows the events of one day rather than several. What makes these films so similar is that they aritistically show the problems with racism in our society. The movie Crash uses common day themes that even the less interested mind can see, for , when the cop shoots the hitchhiker, it shows that the good samaritan cop thought Black man had a gun, yet he simply showed the saint of travel, showing how the two men were similar. These simple symbols were very powerful, yet clearly illustrated through dialouge and settings. However in the movie “Do the right thing” Spike Lee used several subtle symbols to convey his movie’s message. For example, he used camera angles, volume of sound, even the temperature to show the multitude of levels that is involved with racism. In this way, “Do the right thing” is very different from “Crash” because it tells a story without strictly outlinig it for the audience to recognize. In Spike’s Lee’s movie, the audience has to look, watch, and listen to what the movie is trying to articulate. In the movie Crash, the audience simply has to watch the movie to realize what the movie’s message is. The result of this is drastic. Even though the two movies have the same message, “Do the Right Thing” accomplishes something out of Crash’s reach. The complexity of Spike’s Lee’s movie not only gives the audience an entertaining movie, but he forces the audience to reflect upon their own views aobut other races. When one wathces Crash, you aren’t necessarily compelled to look in a mirror and ask ” I am racist?” When you watch Spike Lee’s movie, you realize, “wow, this is alot to take in”. He shows nearly all aspects of racism from all sides that one can imagine, on top of this he adds character names that coincide with his message, adding further to what the audience must compare to receive the complete vision of Spike Lee’s joint. All in all the several symbols intertwined with Spike Lee’s picture is what makes it so thought provoking. You are compelled to watch the movie with four of your senses, You must see, listen, feel, and hear every little bit to truly understand that racism is a screwed up thing, and that everyone of us apply to it in some way. However when watching Crash, I cried, but it didn’t issue me a message that I should change my ways, it only showed me that racism effects all people, only effect. Crash ended on a relatively good ending and later swithched to comical car crash, ” Do the right Thing” left you on the note of Death, the N-word, minority bonidng(in a strange way) and destruction. So the movies provide the same message, but I beilieve that ” Do the right thing” provides the audience with far more intricate movie filled with something for everybody. According to the members of my survey, they said they enjoyed ” Do the right Thing” more than “Crash” because it made them pay close, close,close attention. I whole heartedly agree that “Do the Right Thing” is a much better film.

James Butters

What to believe, the picture of the gorgeous blond model who is
selling you long lasting mascara or the image of the scrony boy who is
attracting those gorgeous blond models with his Axe Body Spray? The
more one observes advertisments, the more one can conclude that the
degree of ridiculousness has greatly augmented over the past
years.When watching television, we are exposed to many outrageous
commercials that we are supposed to believe.

How about the advertisement for Rimmel's Anti Age Defying Foundation.
Model Kate Moss is standing next to a bus, with a knee long skirt and
long shiny blond hair. Right after the commercial's narrator
describes that the foundation will make you feel and look years
younger, so why not show off that skin, we see Kate Moss who stops
leaning on the bus, rip her skirt to be just long enough to cover her
butt cheeks, and touch her cheeks. Now she really is looking
great....Hmmm. So she has showed us her legs, oh and yes of course,
the camera man decided to show us her face that has the foundation on
it. Or maybe they were instigating that our legs could look younger,
if only we had read through the lines and put that Anti-Age Defying
Foundation on our legs too! Common ladies, apply that foundation on
those thighs!
 

Now looking at several beer commercials, we see the young guy, who
probably just became the legal age to drink alcohol, who decides that
he will own the world of broads once he holds that Budweiser--King of
Beers, in hand. Being that the majority of the commercials are
cliché, the girls do come after the guy who drinking that beer.
Truly, there is nothing greater than a guy holding a beer bottle.
Woman, you are set. Go get that man and make him yours. RIGHT! Hint
the sarcasm. Are these commercials depicting that because guys can
buy beer at a bar -- which are always a riduculous amount more
expensive -- are wealthy and therefore girls should mooch of the guy until they can
get every penny. Maybe they should hint that the guy is starting to
drink at such a young age, by the time it's time to settle down, you
will have his lovely beer belly between you and him everytime you lean in
for a kiss, or more like lean in to his back pocket for that wallet!
 

Although a great deal of the commercials that we see these days are
considered to be ridiculous, there are a few that still maintain their
essence.
There is a particular commercial in mind when "good commercial" comes
up. Mercedes Benz made a general commercial describing their
vehicles. The commercial begins with a black Mercedes driving on a
winding road, with only the sound of the car. Then a man appears
asking questions that all begin with "Why?", for example "Why have the
highest standard in safety?". After several questions pass along and
we still see the car being driven to its limits, the last words of the
man are "Because we promised you a Mercedes Benz, that's why". He
shuts the door of the car and it's over. The message of the
commercial is clear, there is no reason to read between the lines, and
most importantly you do not feel like you have wasted a minute of
your life watching this commercial, regardless if you like the vehicle
or not.
Another commercial that simply tops all commercial is yet to be
simplest, and another from Mercedes Benz. The commercial begins with
a blond woman entering a library, speaking with a loud voice. She
walks up to the librarian and makes an order for food. The librarian
looks are her as if she were crazy, and tells her that it is a
library. The blond waits a few seconds, looks around and reorders in
a lower voice, just whispering. Right after there is a simple message
: "Beauty is nothing without brains", meaning a beautiful car with no power underneath the hood is useless.
http://youtube.com/watch?v=EZScx-NFhTA
 

If there is one thing to retain from this blog is to BE MEDIA LITTERATE!

Magalie Amine

For years now, the USA has been sending over its own soldiers over to
Iraq, in order to help the political conflicts which are occuring over
there. President Bush seems to find that sending over our troups is a
rational and patriotic thing, because he has not withdrawn the troups
from Iraq. The emotions of many civilians vary, depending on which
political party they support and if they are in aggreance with Bush’s
ideas. In actuality, many Americans seem to be disapproving of
President Bush’s methods
(http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/06/07/AR2005060700296.html).
 There are also some eople believe that Iraquians to do not support
the idea that American soldiers are in their country. They regard it
as an imposition from the Americans.

Magalie Amine

Before I get into the analysis of the film Do the Right Thing, I must admit that this film really got to me, and I’m not sure in which way. I can’t seem to decide whether or not I liked the film, though I am sure it was an excellent example of prime film making. I’ve been thinking about a lot of aspects of it since we finished it and I can’t seem to come to a conclusion about what I saw and felt and heard. Does anyone know what I mean?

I took a hint from Justin and decided to do some research, not on the movie but on Spike Lee himself. I have a little prior knowledge on him, from a person who has worked with him first hand. My highschool drama teacher was an actress and casting director in Chicago and had the opportunity to work with Spike Lee and she shared her experience with us during class one day. She said that he was very professional in his work but had a hostle tone with every white person he came in contact with. She told us that he was slightly standoffish with any white person he didn’t know but he treated his white employees with slight attitude and rudeness. My own personal research lead me to the name of his production company. Fourty Acres and a Mule (promised to every free slave at the end of slavery by the US government) was established by Spike Lee to make movies about race and racial tensions. Every film he has made to date has had a message relating to racial tensions and things of that nature. For a complete list of his works, go to this link.http://www.inmotionmagazine.com/slee2.html

There were many things I noticed about the film that stood out to me in a way that enhanced my perceptions and reactons to the film. The first thing I noticed was that the bright, exaggeratet colors of the film made the color black stand out. Many things in the movie had patterns and colors and shapes but anything that was black (signs, radios, skin, clothes) had no distinct markings or alterations. I thought that was an interesting choice made by Spike Lee. It also pertained to the discussion of love and hate. When Vito and Pino were fighting in the back room Vito was wearing black and Pino white. Pino (to me) represented hate and all the secondary emotions that go along with it, and Vito represented love or acceptance or understanding. I think this scene exemplifies the battle of love vs. hate particularly well. The small location of the battle (the back room) adds a bit of tension or uneasiness to the scene; it’s almost like the viewer feels like their personal space has been diminished. I felt like I was there.

I think there is a lot to be said for this film, not so much for the point it presented but how these points were expressed. It was almost like we were being taught without really knowing it, it would take me a while to realize the poignancy of what I was seeing untill I actually thought about it, which I believe is the real genius behind this film.

One thought to leave you with…While there exists in the world select individuals who satisfy unfair stereotypes set on them by society, people will always judge those groups as a whole. Lets try and challenge that.

As I sat in class to watch Spike Lee’s “Do the Right Thing”, I couldn’t help but notice that a 20 year old movie could carry such overwhelmingly true, contemporary social aspects. Many of the themes in the movie which lead up to the inevitable chaos of the movie are problems which we face today.

The first example I would like to give is the first scene of the actual movie, Mookie(Spike Lee) counting his money. Bearing in mind, this is one of the happiest time’s where we see Mookie, when he is counting his money. This comes up time and time again, when he is working, he insists that Sal pays him his money early, because he “Gots ta get paid”, he also uses it as an excuse to neglect his responsibilities (i.e. his girlfriend, and his son), and justifies this negligence because he is making money. Sal, on the other hand, believe he can make all of his problems disappear by throwing money at them, like what he does with Da Mayor, and Smiley, he hands them a couple of bucks to make them go away. Many people today are driven by the almighty dollar, it drives people to commit crime, and ultimately destroy themselves. Sal’s character represents to me the notion that simply throwing money at a problem will make it go away; a modern day example of this can be seen with the public school system and things like the No Child Left Behind act.

Another interesting point which I noted was the incessant batte between Love and Hate. Radio Raheem narrates this when he explains his knuckle “love and hate” rings. We see a squabble between the two brothers of Sal’s pizza (one wearing black and one wearing white, fitting) about trusting black people. Pino, the biggot wearing white, tells his brother Vito that they aren’t to be trusted, and attempts to make his brother, who is wearing black, to submit to his beliefs, but the battle continues. During the riot sequence of the movie, when Mookie tosses a trash can through Sal’s window, he yells “hate”, and at that point, hatred has ultimately won. At this point the title of the movie comes to mind, and I ask myself, in the movie, is anyone really doing the right thing?

There are many injustices in our society that outrage, and could even justify violence, but is it really the right thing to do? The beginning credits start with a song by Public Enemy “Fight the Power”, with people dancing and mimicing a fight sequence, this shows the rage that many people have, but the closing sequence, the quotes from Malcom X and MLK Jr. lead one to ask themselves is rage really the right path, and will it help solve the problem at all. This is the question that I asked myself, and I believe that Spike Lee’s movie did achieved this wonderfully.

One last bit of irony that I noticed, is that when I was researching the movie, I learned that the characer that played Buggin’ Out, that person that led the campaign to get Sal to put black people on his Wall of Fame, is himself part black, part Italian. Just something to think about.

–Justin Zajdel

The movie Do the Right Thing is one of those movies that needs to be watched closely and for several times in order to understand the full aspect of the movie. In every single scene of the movie there is always a subtle and hidden message that if not looked at closely would be missed. Throughout the movie the heat of the day increased greatly parallel with the hate and anger of the characters in the movie. It seemed that the hotter the temperature got during the movie the tension between people rose, especially between the African Americans and Sal. Many examples of hate that built up through out the movie were obvious and corresponded to the movie. One of the examples of hate was between the two brother that were sons of Sal’s. As the movie passed they fought more and more. Another example of hate was between the old African American men that sat on the street and the Korean shop owner. It seemed that the anger increased but for some reason after the fire and riot all of the tension was let go. The most prevolent example of hate building up was between Radio Raheem and and buggy and Sal. As the movie passed the anger built up until the end and the most angry scene of the movie occurred when the fight happened and the building burnt dwn and was looted. This was the most tension that occurred and after the fire all the hate seemed to be washed away. Mother Sister forgave the Mayor and seemed to respect him, the African Americans respected the Korean, Sal seemed to forgive Mooky, and Mooky’s girlfriend seemed to settle a little but was still pissed because she hates the world so it didn’t matter. A final example of how the temperature seemed to relate to the anger of the people was when Mooky took ice and rubbed it on his girlfriend. When he did it she settled down and was not angery anymore at anyone and settled but before that she was a bitch and was always swearing. The constant rising in heat corresponded directly with the build up of anger. I really think that the movie was to a point saterical because I just can’t see people getting so angry as to boycott a place because they can’t blare music in a pizza store that there is no pictures of black people on a wall of an Italian man’s. It is so dumb, I really couldn’t see someone get so upset about that and call them racist and start a fight. I bet if that Buggy guy had his own store, there would not be any white people on the wall. In addition, Sal didn’t even have a picture of a non-Italian person. So what, if a non-Italian white person walks in there and sees the wall are they supposed to get pissed and tell the owner how to run things. That is obserd, if you don’t like how the business is run don’t go back to it. Don’t boycott and start a revolution. IOverall the movie was ok and was confusing to me, however it was a good experience and a good movie to analyze and ponder about. I do not understand the complete concept and believe I will watch it again in the future to better understand it.