Friday, November 16, 2007
Flash Animation & Scriptwriting workshops 11/8 and 11/9
I don't really have any information from these workshops to blog about, but I do have some handouts from the classes which are now in my desk drawer. These were pretty cool because they not only applied to what I'm doing at the TV station, but the Flash workshop also applies directly to my ART232 class this semester. It's really sweet when school and work stuff tie so nicely together, which is the point I wanted to make with this post. Real world application of things you do in school is really a nice experience, because it makes the long educational process seem worthwhile.
11/9 Keynote Luncheon and Public Policy Update Seminar
Gloria Tristani was the keynote speaker for our lunch and the conference in general. She was very knowledgeable although not very warm and social. However, I don't really think she was there to make friends so that's alright I guess. She used to be a commissioner at the FCC and has made a lot of speeches about the FCC, violence in media and other related topics. These are the highlights of what she spoke about in her luncheon speech and the public policy workshop.
1. The FCC is less involved in net neutrality issues than in video franchising issues (I know I've defined the franchising thing in here before). However, net neutrality laws and rules actually need to be in place a lot more than they currently are to protect user rights- this is kind of the principle of consumer rights, but currently the FCC is reluctant to address the issue of net neutrality and instead focuses more on video franchising which directly affects public access media.
2. The FCC has scheudled a public vote in December to further deregulate the video franchising industry, which pretty much means that they're encouraging a monopoly of communications between a few large corporations (the big 6). Essentially, this will effect the ownership of tv/radio/newspapers and the rest of media ownership rules so that one owner can have multiple venues of communication within the same geographic areas hence creating a disturbing monopoly of information distribution. Apparently this bill is to be decided by the FCC by December 18th and does not even attempt to address the issue of minority ownership.
3. Polls suggest that the public prefers local news, which is threatened by multinational conglomerates. The meeting to address this issue by the FCC is to be in Seattle, and has been said that it "smells like mean spirit" by the public access people. This is a nice twist of Nirvana lyrics (smells like teen spirit) appropriate for Seattle as the home of grunge music. Just a cool little aside there that I picked up on right away when it was quoted from the page Ms. Tristani was reading.
4. Another issue that the FCC is not addressing but should be is the issue that broadcasters should provide material that actually serves the community it is being distributed to, and that there should be more broadcaster accountability. Currently, there really isn't any, which is a big issue because it means that all this one-sided fake news can be distributed with absolutely no reason why the broadcasters should stick to more truthful stories.
5. Ms. Tristani also says that the upcoming presidential election "change may bode well for people" because if we get someone in office who cares more about the public then the FCC may be more concerned with doing right instead of just doing for money and big business.
6. PEG broadcasting (public, educational & government) provides for the people diversity, coverage of local information, and it fills the void of public interest. However, we really need to make an improvement to keep PEG surviving and also strengthening because at the current rate there's a concern that it will end up disappearing all together.
Public Policy:
"There is nothing wrong with your television set. Do not attempt to adjust the picture. We are now controlling transmission. If we wish to make it louder, we will bring up the volume. If we wish to make it softer, we will tune it to a whisper. We will control the horizontal. We will control the vertical. We can roll the image, make it flutter. We can change the focus to a soft blur, or sharpen it to crystal clarity. For the next hour, sit quietly and we will control all that you see and hear. You are about to participate in a great adventure. You are about to experience the awe and mystery which reaches from the inner mind to... The Outer Limits." — Opening narration – The Control Voice – 1960s
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Outer_Limits
7. This Outer Limits quote was read at the beginning of the meeting and it's surprisingly scary how much of it has turned to reality with the media these days. With the big six controlling the media ( http://www.commondreams.org/views/042700-104.htm) the public really has no say anymore in what's included as news, or any other anything that has to do with media. As the ACM sees it, we need to get these issues out of the boardroom and into the public eye. This is both in the sense of the big six boardrooms and also the FCC boardroom. One suggested way to call attention back to the public eye: outside protests. Outside of the FCC meetings. Anywhere really that the public is being oppressed by the media. It's kind of ironic watching all these media people protest the media, but I'm intrigued and want to learn more.
8. A lot of the issue discussed here was about content battles- the internet, programs, papers, who's controlling the information and who should be able to control the information.
9. Back to the net neutrality issue: if we want to broadcast public access on the internet, that'd be cool. Except that a lot of IP providers are blocking types of filesharing, and if we can't network then we can't go nationwide with our programs. Kind of a big issue here.
10. In order to change the issues that are going on, we have to change the politicians who are supporting it. The two things that move politics: people and money. Since we don't have a lot of money, we're going to have to go the route of people. Gather up email lists and and mailing lists, and have those people all contact their local politicians.
11. Politicians that were named as possible people to contact: Dorgan, Olympia Snow, Obama.
12. Random fact: FCC COMMISIONERS ARE SUBJECT TO IMPEACHMENT. That's rather interesting.
The future:
2/17/2007 the TV stations will cease to use analog signal and will only be using digital technology. Without digital technology, the old television sets will only see black. The issue here:
21 MILLION AMERICAN HOUSEHOLDS USE RABBIT EARS ONLY (NO DIGITAL).
Talk about the digital divide. When the analog signal goes out, the divide will darken even more than it is currently. And while there will be converter boxes for sale that will switch old tv's to digital technology, millions of Americans will not be able to afford to buy the converters. What to do about this? The state and national governments talk about giving away coupons that will assist in the purchase of the converter boxes. The issue here:
THE COUPONS WILL BE GIVEN OUT IN JANUARY AND HAVE AN EXPIRATION DATE THAT EXPIRES BEFORE THE BOXES ARE MADE AVAILABLE, or will only apply to one brand that will be in low supply
-or-
THE COUPONS WILL BE GIVEN NOT TO THOSE WHO FINANCIALLY NEED THEM THE MOST, BUT ON A FIRST-COME FIRST-SERVE BASIS, which means that the people who most need the coupons may never get one and will be totally in the dark.
The future is kind of a gloomy picture.
1. The FCC is less involved in net neutrality issues than in video franchising issues (I know I've defined the franchising thing in here before). However, net neutrality laws and rules actually need to be in place a lot more than they currently are to protect user rights- this is kind of the principle of consumer rights, but currently the FCC is reluctant to address the issue of net neutrality and instead focuses more on video franchising which directly affects public access media.
2. The FCC has scheudled a public vote in December to further deregulate the video franchising industry, which pretty much means that they're encouraging a monopoly of communications between a few large corporations (the big 6). Essentially, this will effect the ownership of tv/radio/newspapers and the rest of media ownership rules so that one owner can have multiple venues of communication within the same geographic areas hence creating a disturbing monopoly of information distribution. Apparently this bill is to be decided by the FCC by December 18th and does not even attempt to address the issue of minority ownership.
3. Polls suggest that the public prefers local news, which is threatened by multinational conglomerates. The meeting to address this issue by the FCC is to be in Seattle, and has been said that it "smells like mean spirit" by the public access people. This is a nice twist of Nirvana lyrics (smells like teen spirit) appropriate for Seattle as the home of grunge music. Just a cool little aside there that I picked up on right away when it was quoted from the page Ms. Tristani was reading.
4. Another issue that the FCC is not addressing but should be is the issue that broadcasters should provide material that actually serves the community it is being distributed to, and that there should be more broadcaster accountability. Currently, there really isn't any, which is a big issue because it means that all this one-sided fake news can be distributed with absolutely no reason why the broadcasters should stick to more truthful stories.
5. Ms. Tristani also says that the upcoming presidential election "change may bode well for people" because if we get someone in office who cares more about the public then the FCC may be more concerned with doing right instead of just doing for money and big business.
6. PEG broadcasting (public, educational & government) provides for the people diversity, coverage of local information, and it fills the void of public interest. However, we really need to make an improvement to keep PEG surviving and also strengthening because at the current rate there's a concern that it will end up disappearing all together.
Public Policy:
"There is nothing wrong with your television set. Do not attempt to adjust the picture. We are now controlling transmission. If we wish to make it louder, we will bring up the volume. If we wish to make it softer, we will tune it to a whisper. We will control the horizontal. We will control the vertical. We can roll the image, make it flutter. We can change the focus to a soft blur, or sharpen it to crystal clarity. For the next hour, sit quietly and we will control all that you see and hear. You are about to participate in a great adventure. You are about to experience the awe and mystery which reaches from the inner mind to... The Outer Limits." — Opening narration – The Control Voice – 1960s
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Outer_Limits
7. This Outer Limits quote was read at the beginning of the meeting and it's surprisingly scary how much of it has turned to reality with the media these days. With the big six controlling the media ( http://www.commondreams.org/views/042700-104.htm) the public really has no say anymore in what's included as news, or any other anything that has to do with media. As the ACM sees it, we need to get these issues out of the boardroom and into the public eye. This is both in the sense of the big six boardrooms and also the FCC boardroom. One suggested way to call attention back to the public eye: outside protests. Outside of the FCC meetings. Anywhere really that the public is being oppressed by the media. It's kind of ironic watching all these media people protest the media, but I'm intrigued and want to learn more.
8. A lot of the issue discussed here was about content battles- the internet, programs, papers, who's controlling the information and who should be able to control the information.
9. Back to the net neutrality issue: if we want to broadcast public access on the internet, that'd be cool. Except that a lot of IP providers are blocking types of filesharing, and if we can't network then we can't go nationwide with our programs. Kind of a big issue here.
10. In order to change the issues that are going on, we have to change the politicians who are supporting it. The two things that move politics: people and money. Since we don't have a lot of money, we're going to have to go the route of people. Gather up email lists and and mailing lists, and have those people all contact their local politicians.
11. Politicians that were named as possible people to contact: Dorgan, Olympia Snow, Obama.
12. Random fact: FCC COMMISIONERS ARE SUBJECT TO IMPEACHMENT. That's rather interesting.
The future:
2/17/2007 the TV stations will cease to use analog signal and will only be using digital technology. Without digital technology, the old television sets will only see black. The issue here:
21 MILLION AMERICAN HOUSEHOLDS USE RABBIT EARS ONLY (NO DIGITAL).
Talk about the digital divide. When the analog signal goes out, the divide will darken even more than it is currently. And while there will be converter boxes for sale that will switch old tv's to digital technology, millions of Americans will not be able to afford to buy the converters. What to do about this? The state and national governments talk about giving away coupons that will assist in the purchase of the converter boxes. The issue here:
THE COUPONS WILL BE GIVEN OUT IN JANUARY AND HAVE AN EXPIRATION DATE THAT EXPIRES BEFORE THE BOXES ARE MADE AVAILABLE, or will only apply to one brand that will be in low supply
-or-
THE COUPONS WILL BE GIVEN NOT TO THOSE WHO FINANCIALLY NEED THEM THE MOST, BUT ON A FIRST-COME FIRST-SERVE BASIS, which means that the people who most need the coupons may never get one and will be totally in the dark.
The future is kind of a gloomy picture.
Wednesday, 11/7
I have business cards for the TV station! With my own email: candi@mac3tv.com However, I'm not sure yet how to access it, so if I'm getting any emails there I'm totally clueless. But I have business cards like a real employee! And Jan said that not only can I stay next semester, but if I want to keep working here through grad school (if I go to CMU) we'll work out a permanent position. How cool is that?!?!
Friday, November 9, 2007
Changes in the Public Sphere, 11/8
Thursday, 11/8 (8 hours): This was the first session of the regional conference that we attended, and I ended up taking 4 pages of notes because it was really interesting. Most of this is directly from my notes/the forum conversation but some of it is what I've added as my own personal view/interpretation on the subject as well. Here's a related link that relates to the conversation and also provides more information on the topic:
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/habermas/
What is the "Public Sphere"?
1. Historically, information and content was controlled by either the government (king, dictator, etc) or the church and there really was no sense of "public" in the fact that the public had no real influence on anything that was happening. However, in the 17th/18th century, somewhat of a revolution started to change the way the "public" was thought of, as the common people started getting more access to money and money is power. Suddenly, even though the printing press had been around for years, the people started printing newspapers and making information more readily available. One of the longest running papers: The Spectator, London.
2. The "Public Sphere" really started with the newspapers, the coffee shops and the salons where people sat around and talked about issues that were affecting them or present in society. The public sphere evolved from this PUBLIC DISCUSSION and actually involved more of the public and less of the government/church. However, today the public sphere arena is domnated more by corporate interests- much like before but replacing the church/state. Thus, hte public isn't actually controlling the sphere.
3. People used to actuall sit down and discuss ideas- a public dialogue- but now it's all a monologue where people are screaming their ideas AT he public instead of sharing and discussing ideas. They TELL us what's important versus asking what's important- there's a real lack of actual discussion/communication in general as communication is a two-way street and needs input, output and feedback to be successful.
4. We're not creating citizens in our country anymore, we're creating consumers- we're being lazy and accepting what's being thrown at us instead of trying to change and improve things. Even though we complain a lot, we don't actually do anything about the issues. Overall, as a society we aren't hungry enough to make the change.
5. The true meaning of public sphere seems to be citizenry- not the church, state or corporations (corportate interests/media) but the people.
Improving Public Access Media
6. As public access media, we currently have an opn door policy but really we should be moving in the direction of not only an open door policy, but also an active effort in going out and getting people to come in and get involved. To get people to actually communicate their ideas we will have to first teach people how to have effective communication. Sure, we provide the equipment and the technological requirements, much like the education system these days, but we aren't teaching people HOW TO EXPRESS THEMSELVES- how to get their ideas across and get the message to reflect what they actually mean to say.
7. Our society needs to be more focused on education based in media literacy instead of just the technology-use education. As in: How can we express what we really mean by using this technology? What is the message behind what we're watching/reading/hearing etc.
8. Instead of us just showing the town hall meetings on our channels, we should also have shows that reflect the commentary of viewers in regard to the material that we're seeing. If we can get people to actually respond to what they're seeing and get them involved in such a way that we have shows going back and forth in a sort of discussion format, THEN we'll have more of what we see as the public sphere. The people would be again voicing their opinions instead of just accepting the opinions they're shown.
9. Can public access tv somehow join together and consolidate like the FCC is doing to laarge-scale media efforts? If we are able to unite on more of a national level we would have more unity, support and overall strength. We currently have a national chapter of the Alliance for Community Media, but it's really a very small group of people and therefore not as effective as it could/should be.
10. One of the downfalls though is that the ACM is looked at like a bunch of "old fogeys" as said in the meeting, because of the platform we're using. Instead of doing the internet thing we're still on TV, which some groups are looking down on. However, radio has been around even longer and it's still going strong.
11. The game plan: where is the next public sphere going to emerge? Internet videos? Blogs? Can we get in on the underground/what the kids are doing these days and integrate ourselves in there so the kids think that this is just the way things are and accept us? Kind of a sneaky plan, but it might work.
12. THE LARGER ISSUE AT HAND: has nothing to do with technology or the platform we're using. How do we get more people involved in the conversation, to participate and help revive the public sphere?
13. many local newspapers and large scale newspapers say things like "come to us with your opinions and information and we'll be the center of the community" but then they take control of the material and skew the message which is bad fo rthe public sphere.
14. However, when you think about it we really are corporate media in our own way because even though our intentions are good, by telling the public what they should put on air (non commercial, preferable personal opinion dialogue) we ARE THE MAN and are controlling what they're able to say. Just like back in the day when Swift and DeFoe and whoever else were talking and creating the public sphere it still wasn't open to everyone, it was expanding but not open to everyone. As in, not everyone was able to sit around and think these big thoughts.
15. We can't just go out and yell at students to say "you're being duped by the media" because then we come off as the next group sharpening the axe- our education tactics need to change or else the kinds are being trained to come off as the next "monolith yelling" because they don't know how to express their ideas without screaming them at the audience.
16. Within public access employees, people need to think of this as a calling, not just their job. It was compared to Paul Revere making a conduit available to the people, one day it'll be the only way for people to get their voice/ideas out.
17. Random fact about consumers vs. citizens- the Cope hearing referenced the American public as consumers 62 times and citizens 4 times. Kind of a big issue huh?
18. The biggest thing we need to work on teaching is "what do you want to say?" before teaching "how do you say it (medium)? We need to focus on the message and how we can improve communications. Thus, we need more education in terms of HOW, not theory and not technology but how do you actually express the messagge? MEDIA LITERACY PROGRAM both here at the station, and spanning the educational system from preschool to college.
19. Essentially, public access media is serving as a bridge to the digital divide and we need to make sure we're living up to that responsibility.
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/habermas/
What is the "Public Sphere"?
1. Historically, information and content was controlled by either the government (king, dictator, etc) or the church and there really was no sense of "public" in the fact that the public had no real influence on anything that was happening. However, in the 17th/18th century, somewhat of a revolution started to change the way the "public" was thought of, as the common people started getting more access to money and money is power. Suddenly, even though the printing press had been around for years, the people started printing newspapers and making information more readily available. One of the longest running papers: The Spectator, London.
2. The "Public Sphere" really started with the newspapers, the coffee shops and the salons where people sat around and talked about issues that were affecting them or present in society. The public sphere evolved from this PUBLIC DISCUSSION and actually involved more of the public and less of the government/church. However, today the public sphere arena is domnated more by corporate interests- much like before but replacing the church/state. Thus, hte public isn't actually controlling the sphere.
3. People used to actuall sit down and discuss ideas- a public dialogue- but now it's all a monologue where people are screaming their ideas AT he public instead of sharing and discussing ideas. They TELL us what's important versus asking what's important- there's a real lack of actual discussion/communication in general as communication is a two-way street and needs input, output and feedback to be successful.
4. We're not creating citizens in our country anymore, we're creating consumers- we're being lazy and accepting what's being thrown at us instead of trying to change and improve things. Even though we complain a lot, we don't actually do anything about the issues. Overall, as a society we aren't hungry enough to make the change.
5. The true meaning of public sphere seems to be citizenry- not the church, state or corporations (corportate interests/media) but the people.
Improving Public Access Media
6. As public access media, we currently have an opn door policy but really we should be moving in the direction of not only an open door policy, but also an active effort in going out and getting people to come in and get involved. To get people to actually communicate their ideas we will have to first teach people how to have effective communication. Sure, we provide the equipment and the technological requirements, much like the education system these days, but we aren't teaching people HOW TO EXPRESS THEMSELVES- how to get their ideas across and get the message to reflect what they actually mean to say.
7. Our society needs to be more focused on education based in media literacy instead of just the technology-use education. As in: How can we express what we really mean by using this technology? What is the message behind what we're watching/reading/hearing etc.
8. Instead of us just showing the town hall meetings on our channels, we should also have shows that reflect the commentary of viewers in regard to the material that we're seeing. If we can get people to actually respond to what they're seeing and get them involved in such a way that we have shows going back and forth in a sort of discussion format, THEN we'll have more of what we see as the public sphere. The people would be again voicing their opinions instead of just accepting the opinions they're shown.
9. Can public access tv somehow join together and consolidate like the FCC is doing to laarge-scale media efforts? If we are able to unite on more of a national level we would have more unity, support and overall strength. We currently have a national chapter of the Alliance for Community Media, but it's really a very small group of people and therefore not as effective as it could/should be.
10. One of the downfalls though is that the ACM is looked at like a bunch of "old fogeys" as said in the meeting, because of the platform we're using. Instead of doing the internet thing we're still on TV, which some groups are looking down on. However, radio has been around even longer and it's still going strong.
11. The game plan: where is the next public sphere going to emerge? Internet videos? Blogs? Can we get in on the underground/what the kids are doing these days and integrate ourselves in there so the kids think that this is just the way things are and accept us? Kind of a sneaky plan, but it might work.
12. THE LARGER ISSUE AT HAND: has nothing to do with technology or the platform we're using. How do we get more people involved in the conversation, to participate and help revive the public sphere?
13. many local newspapers and large scale newspapers say things like "come to us with your opinions and information and we'll be the center of the community" but then they take control of the material and skew the message which is bad fo rthe public sphere.
14. However, when you think about it we really are corporate media in our own way because even though our intentions are good, by telling the public what they should put on air (non commercial, preferable personal opinion dialogue) we ARE THE MAN and are controlling what they're able to say. Just like back in the day when Swift and DeFoe and whoever else were talking and creating the public sphere it still wasn't open to everyone, it was expanding but not open to everyone. As in, not everyone was able to sit around and think these big thoughts.
15. We can't just go out and yell at students to say "you're being duped by the media" because then we come off as the next group sharpening the axe- our education tactics need to change or else the kinds are being trained to come off as the next "monolith yelling" because they don't know how to express their ideas without screaming them at the audience.
16. Within public access employees, people need to think of this as a calling, not just their job. It was compared to Paul Revere making a conduit available to the people, one day it'll be the only way for people to get their voice/ideas out.
17. Random fact about consumers vs. citizens- the Cope hearing referenced the American public as consumers 62 times and citizens 4 times. Kind of a big issue huh?
18. The biggest thing we need to work on teaching is "what do you want to say?" before teaching "how do you say it (medium)? We need to focus on the message and how we can improve communications. Thus, we need more education in terms of HOW, not theory and not technology but how do you actually express the messagge? MEDIA LITERACY PROGRAM both here at the station, and spanning the educational system from preschool to college.
19. Essentially, public access media is serving as a bridge to the digital divide and we need to make sure we're living up to that responsibility.
Friday, November 2, 2007
2 Fridays, and not much in between.
Friday, October 26 (6 hours): TJ and I went to the Alma studio today, because Jan had a meeting but John from one of the church groups had a program that he had wanted to edit, we had to take a DVD of an elementary school musical to an access user, and another woman had to drop off a program for us. John ended up staying the whole time because he always does, which is good because at least someone is using the Gratiot access center. As it turned out, we didn't have the right DVD for the woman, so we have to search through the archives to find the right one. However, this may prove to be a difficult task because a lot of tapes keep going missing from the Gratiot studio, and so if it was there in the first place it may not be there now, and that will be unfortunate.
Friday, November 2 (7 hours): Preparing for conference next week, things are getting really chaotic around the station. First, we have to make sure we've got everything set around here so that we can leave for a few days. This is kind of a big issue, because lately our Nexus (the big computer that pretty much runs everything that you see on TV- the slides, the shows, everything) has been randomly blacking out. This turns out to be an issue with producers leaving blank spots on the beginning of the dvd's, which the nexus picks up as having no content because it does this smart scan thing and if there's nothing at the beginning of the program it thinks there's an error and stops playing. However, sometimes it stops playing just for the time allotted for that program, and sometimes it's been stopping all night until we get in and fix it. Kind of a weird situation, so we must talk to the Leightronix (our electronic provider people) guy to see why it's doing it.
Second, we have an official list of things that I need to be working on, including 1) the brochure, 2) making an instructional sheet for the new Panasonic cameras, 3) I still need to make a show 4) we need to start calling the NPO's that we sent surveys to, as most have not responded to our mailing (not that it's really a surprise because mailings aren't that effective).
Third: today I did my first official camera check-out. As in, I gathered the equipment and filled out the check-out sheet for the user, and then he took the equipment for the weekend. This was pretty cool, because it shows that I'm becoming more familiar with the equipment and am able to actually function in the role of a "real" employee. Woo hoo!
Total of 102.5 hours so far.
Friday, November 2 (7 hours): Preparing for conference next week, things are getting really chaotic around the station. First, we have to make sure we've got everything set around here so that we can leave for a few days. This is kind of a big issue, because lately our Nexus (the big computer that pretty much runs everything that you see on TV- the slides, the shows, everything) has been randomly blacking out. This turns out to be an issue with producers leaving blank spots on the beginning of the dvd's, which the nexus picks up as having no content because it does this smart scan thing and if there's nothing at the beginning of the program it thinks there's an error and stops playing. However, sometimes it stops playing just for the time allotted for that program, and sometimes it's been stopping all night until we get in and fix it. Kind of a weird situation, so we must talk to the Leightronix (our electronic provider people) guy to see why it's doing it.
Second, we have an official list of things that I need to be working on, including 1) the brochure, 2) making an instructional sheet for the new Panasonic cameras, 3) I still need to make a show 4) we need to start calling the NPO's that we sent surveys to, as most have not responded to our mailing (not that it's really a surprise because mailings aren't that effective).
Third: today I did my first official camera check-out. As in, I gathered the equipment and filled out the check-out sheet for the user, and then he took the equipment for the weekend. This was pretty cool, because it shows that I'm becoming more familiar with the equipment and am able to actually function in the role of a "real" employee. Woo hoo!
Total of 102.5 hours so far.
Starting to think about the paper.
Monday, October 22 (2 hours)and Wednesday, October 24 (2 hours): A lot of the time here was spent discussing how the Friday shoot went, which we think was good. We've got 4 tapes worth of material, and so when it comes time to edit that we should have a lot going for us. We're now in the process of trying to make a date with Dr. Gilbert to do the editing, but fitting that in sometime when everyone is available is going to be quite tricky because we've got 2 weeks left until we leave for the conference and arrangements need to be made for that. I was also left in charge of calling Dr. Gilbert to make arrangements to get back the jacket that TJ had left in the theater on Friday night. It wasn't a bad task by any means, but it was a tad intimidating for me to just phone my professor at home and be like "so did you happen to find a jacket at the theater? Oh, you did... can we get that from you sometime?" It's not that I didn't want to talk to Dr. Gilbert, but I've never actually called a professor at home and so it seemed more like some kind of violation of the standard communication paths or something. But I survived, and we had a nice discussion about how things are coming along here. It kind of seems like even though I'm learning a lot of things, they're hard to put into a journal because about half of the things tend to be the real-life experiences that don't really seem impressive on their own until I reflect on the fact that I've grown as a person because of them.
On another note though, a few of the people who had originally scheduled to go with us to the conference have found out that they can't go, and so that's kind of a loss because the more the merrier, and if we have more people we could potentially gather more information because there will be multiple sessions going on at the same time at this conference. I'm going to take a notebook and just scribble furiously in hopes of catching the important stuff. I've been thinking about the paper that I have to write at the end of the year- not a lot, but a little bit at least, and I have been keeping up on the "outside readings" that are part of the internship requirement... actually I think I'm a bit ahead of the requirement because I've got more than 1 per week, but I've been trying to learn as much as I can about public access TV and the related fields. I guess I should make a list of these; a lot of them are scholarly journals and books on the media use (photoshop, dreamweaver, iMovie, etc). I'm not totally sure how I'm going to tie these in together, unless I do something like an overview of my internship from the broad to the narrow- explaining public access television and all of the drama/excitement surrounding it, and narrowing down to the actual creation of material for P.A. TV. I'll need to work on the idea, but I do have some materials.
On another note though, a few of the people who had originally scheduled to go with us to the conference have found out that they can't go, and so that's kind of a loss because the more the merrier, and if we have more people we could potentially gather more information because there will be multiple sessions going on at the same time at this conference. I'm going to take a notebook and just scribble furiously in hopes of catching the important stuff. I've been thinking about the paper that I have to write at the end of the year- not a lot, but a little bit at least, and I have been keeping up on the "outside readings" that are part of the internship requirement... actually I think I'm a bit ahead of the requirement because I've got more than 1 per week, but I've been trying to learn as much as I can about public access TV and the related fields. I guess I should make a list of these; a lot of them are scholarly journals and books on the media use (photoshop, dreamweaver, iMovie, etc). I'm not totally sure how I'm going to tie these in together, unless I do something like an overview of my internship from the broad to the narrow- explaining public access television and all of the drama/excitement surrounding it, and narrowing down to the actual creation of material for P.A. TV. I'll need to work on the idea, but I do have some materials.
Friday, October 26, 2007
THE EMPERORS NEW CLOTHES!
Friday 10/19 (9 hours): I took the GRE this morning, and it wasn't that fun but I did survive so it could have been worse.
In the afternoon I hung out at the station for a while, and then we all headed down to Alma for the big show. It was fun because we had dinner at the Main Cafe downtown, and with all 5 of us (Jan, TJ, myself, Will (a volunteer who rocks) and Tim (my boyfriend who is now volunteering as well) dressed up in our MAC3TV shirts we looked real slick. The show itself went really good as well, I had my first experience duct-taping the cables to the floor (so no one trips or knocks the camera over), setting up the tripod and camera, and actually doing some taping aside from the caterpillar. I was in charge of one of the wide-angle cameras up in the projection booth, which was good because a) there were 2 of us, so if I messed mine up there was a backup, and b) it was easier to follow the action from a distance than it is to follow it up close. When we actually watch these tapes and start editing them I think there will be some commentary on what I did well/could have improved on while taping, but overall it went pretty good. I'm really excited that I actually got to tape something, because I'm getting more responsibilities around the station and a lot of hands-on experience. Sometime in the next few weeks Dr. Gilbert is going to come up to the station and help with the editing process so she can have a copy of the show for herself, and make sure that we're getting the important parts in the final copy. It's going to be a good time, and when it's finished I'm going to include a copy in my final portfolio as an example of my work.
In the afternoon I hung out at the station for a while, and then we all headed down to Alma for the big show. It was fun because we had dinner at the Main Cafe downtown, and with all 5 of us (Jan, TJ, myself, Will (a volunteer who rocks) and Tim (my boyfriend who is now volunteering as well) dressed up in our MAC3TV shirts we looked real slick. The show itself went really good as well, I had my first experience duct-taping the cables to the floor (so no one trips or knocks the camera over), setting up the tripod and camera, and actually doing some taping aside from the caterpillar. I was in charge of one of the wide-angle cameras up in the projection booth, which was good because a) there were 2 of us, so if I messed mine up there was a backup, and b) it was easier to follow the action from a distance than it is to follow it up close. When we actually watch these tapes and start editing them I think there will be some commentary on what I did well/could have improved on while taping, but overall it went pretty good. I'm really excited that I actually got to tape something, because I'm getting more responsibilities around the station and a lot of hands-on experience. Sometime in the next few weeks Dr. Gilbert is going to come up to the station and help with the editing process so she can have a copy of the show for herself, and make sure that we're getting the important parts in the final copy. It's going to be a good time, and when it's finished I'm going to include a copy in my final portfolio as an example of my work.
10/12 through the first half of Access Training
Friday 10/12 (8 hours): We spent a while going over the tape from the dress rehersal and figuring out whether or not we should use 2 or 3 cameras for the actual shoot- we decided on 4 as it turns out. If we put two cameras up in the projection booth as wide-angle shots, we can be sure to get a wide span of all of the action going on onstage. We will also have 2 cameras on the floor, one on each end of the stage, which will give us some nice close-up shots of the action and different angles that will make the finished, edited project really nice with some smooth transitions. We also spent some time in the Gratiot studio today, working down there with the people who use the facility and still working on straightening the place up down there.
Monday 10/15 (2 hours): We had some interviews for the Gratiot position today. We're still going through the process of finding someone, because as before, Lori is still out with the eye thing and also the job had to be posted and interviewed for anyway, even if we do think she's the best for the position. We've gotten about 8 applications, even though some aren't qualified, it's nice to see some response to the posting. TJ and I made arrangements for Wednesday morning to work on getting me trained to actually use the cameras. The "official" training class is tonight (my boyfriend Tim is attending), but I have to work and so I need to get other training scheduled in to be ready for Friday!
Wednesday 10/17 (3.5 hours): At the station super early to do the first half of the camera training. Actually, it's all the training for the cameras, and then the second half of the training is the computer editing part of the program. However, we only have time for the first half, which is all I really need for this week anyway. And this really was an exciting training session, because when I went outside to do the "practice filming" I was going to tape the construction workers across the road because it's fun to make them feel nervous about why we'd be taping. However, after a few minutes of that I looked down and saw the strangest caterpillar ever, and so I started taping that instead (really, it wasn't moving a whole lot so it's just me zooming in and out a lot). Extreme home makeover turned into discovery channel. I'm the best videographer ever!
Monday 10/15 (2 hours): We had some interviews for the Gratiot position today. We're still going through the process of finding someone, because as before, Lori is still out with the eye thing and also the job had to be posted and interviewed for anyway, even if we do think she's the best for the position. We've gotten about 8 applications, even though some aren't qualified, it's nice to see some response to the posting. TJ and I made arrangements for Wednesday morning to work on getting me trained to actually use the cameras. The "official" training class is tonight (my boyfriend Tim is attending), but I have to work and so I need to get other training scheduled in to be ready for Friday!
Wednesday 10/17 (3.5 hours): At the station super early to do the first half of the camera training. Actually, it's all the training for the cameras, and then the second half of the training is the computer editing part of the program. However, we only have time for the first half, which is all I really need for this week anyway. And this really was an exciting training session, because when I went outside to do the "practice filming" I was going to tape the construction workers across the road because it's fun to make them feel nervous about why we'd be taping. However, after a few minutes of that I looked down and saw the strangest caterpillar ever, and so I started taping that instead (really, it wasn't moving a whole lot so it's just me zooming in and out a lot). Extreme home makeover turned into discovery channel. I'm the best videographer ever!
Dress Rehersal for the Emperors New Clothes, 10/11
Thursday, 10/11 (2 hours): The dress rehersal for Dr. Gilberts "Emperors New Clothes" was really cool because I was able to see both the precess of preparing for a muscial production and the preparations for videotaping such a production. This was the first day that I actually got to (kind of) use one of the cameras (even though I'm not a certified access user yet) and I learned a lot about where the cameras should be placed, how to measure for cable needed, microphone needs and also the issue between backdrops and camera ligth levels. For example, the backdrop on the stage was lit well enough for the audience to see it, but not well enough for the camera to be able to pick up all of the details. Lighting was also an issue with the mirror that the emperor was holding, because it had a lot of sparkly "gems" on the back side- the side facing the audience- which is a nice effect except for the fact that all the light reflected from the sparkles would really mess with the camera pickup and display. We spent a few hours here getting things organized for the shoot on the 19th, and I think it's going to turn out very good, which will be nice to have some evidence that a) I'm learning things, and b) Dr. Gilbert is a witness to this as well. On a related note, the sound guy at the theater complimented my handshake- BIG BONUS! because self presentation was one of the topics that I had put in the objectives to work on, and here was the first criticism that Jan had given me, and it was turned into a compliment within a few months. Just thought I'd note that, because it seems like a pretty big improvement from where I was in the beginning of the semester.
Wednesday, October 10, 2007
The new news.
I haven't posted anything in the last two weeks, I guess because there hasn't really been much going on that is very noteworthy. However, I'll update with what I've got, because I have been going to the TV station as scheduled. With the posts up until 9/24 I had 37.5 hours, just for the record. Since then I've been in:
Wed. 9/26 2 hours (I've started going in between 9 and 10 on Mondays and Wednesdays)
Fri. 9/28 8.5 hours
Mon. 10/1 2 hours
Wed. 10/3 2 hours
Fri. 10/5 7 hours
Mon. 10/8 2 hours
Wed. 10/10 2 hours......... thus bringing the total up to 63. About half way to the required hours, although I'm not worried about that since we have so many extra outings to count.
Now, past the bookkeeping stuff...
We have officially posted the position to hire someone to run the Gratiot studio, because Lori (the interim) had surgery for her detached retina and hasn't been in. Even though we would like for her to apply for the job, this is proving more difficult than we first expected because she isn't sure if she's up to it. This is too bad, because she has a doctorate in broadcasting and is a retired CMU professor and would have been absolutely perfect for the position. Hopefully she'll get to apply, because while we have some other applicants I think she would probably work out the best for our purposes. In the meantime, TJ and Jan have been taking turns at the Gratiot studio- I've been going with Jan on Fridays for a while, but since I'm not yet ready to run the place by myself I can't go alone.
The other major thing that's been going on at the station is the survey to the NPO's of Gratiot county. I think we've been through at least 7 drafts of the letter and the survey questions, and today was finally the day that we sent them out. The reason these took so long was that a) we were working on these at the same time we were working on everyday tasks that need to be done around the station, so they didn't have the full attention that they deserved each time they were looked at, and b) every draft we'd make we would take some time to let it sit so we could look at it fresh later on. This turned out for the best I think, because we went from a 1-page piece that had the introduction and the survey questions on it to a 4 page mailing. The first page was a letter introducing MAC 3 TV, for those who are not familiar with how public access works. Then it explained all of the free services we offer, and mentioned the attached interest survey. The last thing it did was mention the Gratiot access center (which is the target area for these NPO's to use) and explain that we are remodeling and will soon have a Grand Re-Opening that they will receive an invitation to when the time gets closer so they can come take a tour of the center. The second page had the questions, which were pretty simple: do you ever use the Gratiot access center? Would you be interested in using it? Do you have any special/yearly events that you would like taped and on public access TV? Would you be interested in having some of your volunteers attend the free training to be certified to use our equipment and tape your event? Questions of this sort. And then the last 2 pages were part of our rules and regulations that explained about what kinds of things can be put on public access TV and such. Overall, I think it was a very simple mailing in the sense that the way we set it up will be easy for the recipients to understand what we've sent. We put the fax number on the first 2 pages, the front page is on our letterhead, and the second page it is listed at the bottom of the survey so they can return their answers without the hassle of envelopes and postage.
Another cool thing that's been going on is we've been preparing for Dr. Gilbert's performance of "The Emperor's New Clothes." We'll be taping the show on 10/19, also the same day that I take the GRE (wish me luck!). I'm excited to go and tape a live event, which is good because I'm kind of learning to use the cameras. I still need to take the official training courses, but so far they've all been on Monday nights and I work on Mondays so that hasn't worked out. However, I think we're doing a 1-day session of it before the 19th so I'll be useful during the shoot for Dr. Gilbert. Jan and I are going tomorrow night to the dress rehersal to spec out the area and see what equipment we're going to need, where to position things, how many people we'll need, etc etc. This should be good fun.
Wed. 9/26 2 hours (I've started going in between 9 and 10 on Mondays and Wednesdays)
Fri. 9/28 8.5 hours
Mon. 10/1 2 hours
Wed. 10/3 2 hours
Fri. 10/5 7 hours
Mon. 10/8 2 hours
Wed. 10/10 2 hours......... thus bringing the total up to 63. About half way to the required hours, although I'm not worried about that since we have so many extra outings to count.
Now, past the bookkeeping stuff...
We have officially posted the position to hire someone to run the Gratiot studio, because Lori (the interim) had surgery for her detached retina and hasn't been in. Even though we would like for her to apply for the job, this is proving more difficult than we first expected because she isn't sure if she's up to it. This is too bad, because she has a doctorate in broadcasting and is a retired CMU professor and would have been absolutely perfect for the position. Hopefully she'll get to apply, because while we have some other applicants I think she would probably work out the best for our purposes. In the meantime, TJ and Jan have been taking turns at the Gratiot studio- I've been going with Jan on Fridays for a while, but since I'm not yet ready to run the place by myself I can't go alone.
The other major thing that's been going on at the station is the survey to the NPO's of Gratiot county. I think we've been through at least 7 drafts of the letter and the survey questions, and today was finally the day that we sent them out. The reason these took so long was that a) we were working on these at the same time we were working on everyday tasks that need to be done around the station, so they didn't have the full attention that they deserved each time they were looked at, and b) every draft we'd make we would take some time to let it sit so we could look at it fresh later on. This turned out for the best I think, because we went from a 1-page piece that had the introduction and the survey questions on it to a 4 page mailing. The first page was a letter introducing MAC 3 TV, for those who are not familiar with how public access works. Then it explained all of the free services we offer, and mentioned the attached interest survey. The last thing it did was mention the Gratiot access center (which is the target area for these NPO's to use) and explain that we are remodeling and will soon have a Grand Re-Opening that they will receive an invitation to when the time gets closer so they can come take a tour of the center. The second page had the questions, which were pretty simple: do you ever use the Gratiot access center? Would you be interested in using it? Do you have any special/yearly events that you would like taped and on public access TV? Would you be interested in having some of your volunteers attend the free training to be certified to use our equipment and tape your event? Questions of this sort. And then the last 2 pages were part of our rules and regulations that explained about what kinds of things can be put on public access TV and such. Overall, I think it was a very simple mailing in the sense that the way we set it up will be easy for the recipients to understand what we've sent. We put the fax number on the first 2 pages, the front page is on our letterhead, and the second page it is listed at the bottom of the survey so they can return their answers without the hassle of envelopes and postage.
Another cool thing that's been going on is we've been preparing for Dr. Gilbert's performance of "The Emperor's New Clothes." We'll be taping the show on 10/19, also the same day that I take the GRE (wish me luck!). I'm excited to go and tape a live event, which is good because I'm kind of learning to use the cameras. I still need to take the official training courses, but so far they've all been on Monday nights and I work on Mondays so that hasn't worked out. However, I think we're doing a 1-day session of it before the 19th so I'll be useful during the shoot for Dr. Gilbert. Jan and I are going tomorrow night to the dress rehersal to spec out the area and see what equipment we're going to need, where to position things, how many people we'll need, etc etc. This should be good fun.
Wednesday, September 26, 2007
Can I ask you a question? 9/24
I spent the time in the studio today creating a survey for the NPO's (non profit organizations) that I had gotten the list for from the Gratiot Chamber of Commerce last week. Pretty much, what we want to do is find out how much they use the Gratiot studio (if at all) and also find out if they're interested in using our services. Though it was a rather small questionnaire, we ar ehoping to find out how much the studio really is used (as there are no accurate logs of usage from the past, as the woman who was there before did not follow the same procedures as we do in Mt. Pleasant), and also find out how much the studio could possibly be used if people knew about the availability. This also will help us decide what hours/how many to have the Gratiot studio open, which is important to make sure that resources are not being under-used or wasted. we did get some bad news over the weekend though- Lori somehow got a detached retina, and had to have some emergency surgery, and so she will be out for at least 2 weeks. Hopefully after that time, she will be able to return and take over with running the Gratiot studio, because that would be a really cool arrangement if we can get it to work out.
9/21/2007
The first hour and a half, TJ and I worked on editing the video for the Pere Marquette District Library Grand Opening in Clare. Let me tell you, not only am I learning how to do the editing, we made it hilarious. Actually, we made two different versions of the video, because one was the promo-use version and the other was the humor version. We had the "ceremonial bearded lady" and the "attack of the birds" all included with some fancy text. Work isn't all fun and games here, but sometimes we get a kick of out what we're doing, which is excellent because it makes coming to work so much more fun than any other job I've had. Learning doesn't seem like such work. Jan liked both versions of the video, and although we can't play the humor version on TV, just out of respect for the nature of the ceremony, we are keeping it around the studio. Maybe I'll save the file(s) somewhere as proof that I'm actually able to learn and work the program.
Lori came to the station today and to celebrate the official addition to our group, we went out to get pizza for lunch. I love lunch, especially pizza, and so we got to walk down the street a little ways to one of the downtown pizza places. We're excited aout having Lori here to work with us, because I guess she has a PhD in broadcast arts. This means that she will be able to take interns herself, which is an exciting improvement to our Gratiot situation. With the ability to have interns at the Gratiot studio- in downtown Alma- this will open up a lot of opportunities to Alma students who may not have the means to travel to Mt. Pleasant frequently for an internship. This is very lucky for everyone really. After lunch we went to the Gratiot studio for a few hours to do some more cleaning and refurbishing of the studio. It's really makng progress down there- last time I went, TJ and I set up the lighting system. This time we were starting to set up the master control station for the video shoots, but we found that most of the equipment is really old and bad, and so we will be ordering more for that. We got about half of the equipment set up though, and so that's good progress considering the situation it was in before.
Also very lucky- I was given a key to the station today! I'm very excited about this, because it means that I've been given responsibility and I'm valued enough to have access to the station even when others may not be here yet! WOO HOO! And, this way when my parents come up to visit on Saturday I'll be able to give them a tour of the studio even though we're not open on the weekends...!
Lori came to the station today and to celebrate the official addition to our group, we went out to get pizza for lunch. I love lunch, especially pizza, and so we got to walk down the street a little ways to one of the downtown pizza places. We're excited aout having Lori here to work with us, because I guess she has a PhD in broadcast arts. This means that she will be able to take interns herself, which is an exciting improvement to our Gratiot situation. With the ability to have interns at the Gratiot studio- in downtown Alma- this will open up a lot of opportunities to Alma students who may not have the means to travel to Mt. Pleasant frequently for an internship. This is very lucky for everyone really. After lunch we went to the Gratiot studio for a few hours to do some more cleaning and refurbishing of the studio. It's really makng progress down there- last time I went, TJ and I set up the lighting system. This time we were starting to set up the master control station for the video shoots, but we found that most of the equipment is really old and bad, and so we will be ordering more for that. We got about half of the equipment set up though, and so that's good progress considering the situation it was in before.
Also very lucky- I was given a key to the station today! I'm very excited about this, because it means that I've been given responsibility and I'm valued enough to have access to the station even when others may not be here yet! WOO HOO! And, this way when my parents come up to visit on Saturday I'll be able to give them a tour of the studio even though we're not open on the weekends...!
9/17 & 9/19
These few days are kind of a planning period where we're trying to get all of our upcoming projects in order. TJ (the official tech guy here) and I played around with some Final Cut Pro editing stuff just to get me familiarized with the program. I've also been watching some videos on lynda.com to get a better idea on how to run the programs we've got- I had to get the subscription for ART232 and found that it's turning out to be helpful in the rest of my life as well- I think I'm really making progress with the program. Granted, I haven't made anything yet but at least I'm feeling comfortable editing other random videos.
I've also been put in charge of gathering all the little supplies and literature to put together the promo to get people more involved. We've been slowly finding and compiling the materials- we've got a red file folder and some good ideas anyway. There's just so much to do all at once so it seems like it's taking forever to get anything done. We did, however, find a woman to run the Gratiot access center- Jan did some calling around and we found Lori. This is a good thing, because we sure did need someone to run the place down there a few days a week.
I've also been put in charge of gathering all the little supplies and literature to put together the promo to get people more involved. We've been slowly finding and compiling the materials- we've got a red file folder and some good ideas anyway. There's just so much to do all at once so it seems like it's taking forever to get anything done. We did, however, find a woman to run the Gratiot access center- Jan did some calling around and we found Lori. This is a good thing, because we sure did need someone to run the place down there a few days a week.
Tuesday, September 18, 2007
The dates of Sept. 10, 12, 14:
Monday, 9/10: Pretty much we did a recap of the alliance meeting from Friday and made some decisions about the big regional meeting in November. Ft Wayne Indiana is the location, and I will be attending from Nov 8-10. This is pretty sweet, because a) I will only be missing classes 1 day of the trip, which is really good considering how hard it is to schedule a trip during the school year. I officially have a Mac3TV shirt, a desk (kind of, it's half a desk in the reception area) and we're going to get a Mac laptop set up for me to travel about with. I did get to spend about a half hour of the 3 hours I worked this morning on the phone, which doesn't sound exciting but it was all about networking for the station and just improving my phone skills. I felt rather accomplished.Homework: find a list of the nonprofit organizations (NPOs) operating within Gratiot county.
Wednesday, 9/12: Characterized by Chai tea and collecting materials to work on the new promotional campaign. This is planned to be consortium-wide and should span to include the government councils as well as NPOs and individual citizens. There's now a folder with a nice stack of information, which is good because having a stack of papers usually means progress. Still no progress on my homework wtih that list though, because between classes and Bob Evans I didn't really know where to start my search. I've got a few ideas though, and Thursday is the day set aside to really start making some progress with this matter, because this seems like it could be either really easy or really hard.
Friday, 9/14: Turns out the list of NPOs was really easy to obtain. I had asked Tracy in the mail room at Alma where she thought I could get a list, and she said maybe try the County Clerk's office. So I called down to Ithaca where the Clerk's office is, and they directed me to the Chamber of Commerce. Sure enough, I called there and asked where I could get a list, and the lady was like "well I can fax it to you if you want." However, since I don't have a fax machine on campus here I instead went downtown to pick up the list, which was 6 pages or so. I sure did feel accomplished. I gave the list to Jan when we met at the Alma studio Friday afternoon. I got to help TJ hang some lights for the studio "stage" and clean the place up a bit. It's in some serious need of renovation, even though they just recently put a lot of money into it. The place is kind of scary, with spiders and other gross things everywhere, but I guess it's way better than it was before. And with a little more work, it will be even better!
A running total of hours so far:
9/5 3 hours (9am-12pm)
9/7 11 hours (9 am-8pm)
9/10 3 hours (9am-12pm)
9/12 3 hours (9am-12pm)
9/13 1/2 hour (12:30pm-1pm)
9/14 2 hours (1:30pm-3:30pm)
22.5 hours total!
Wednesday, 9/12: Characterized by Chai tea and collecting materials to work on the new promotional campaign. This is planned to be consortium-wide and should span to include the government councils as well as NPOs and individual citizens. There's now a folder with a nice stack of information, which is good because having a stack of papers usually means progress. Still no progress on my homework wtih that list though, because between classes and Bob Evans I didn't really know where to start my search. I've got a few ideas though, and Thursday is the day set aside to really start making some progress with this matter, because this seems like it could be either really easy or really hard.
Friday, 9/14: Turns out the list of NPOs was really easy to obtain. I had asked Tracy in the mail room at Alma where she thought I could get a list, and she said maybe try the County Clerk's office. So I called down to Ithaca where the Clerk's office is, and they directed me to the Chamber of Commerce. Sure enough, I called there and asked where I could get a list, and the lady was like "well I can fax it to you if you want." However, since I don't have a fax machine on campus here I instead went downtown to pick up the list, which was 6 pages or so. I sure did feel accomplished. I gave the list to Jan when we met at the Alma studio Friday afternoon. I got to help TJ hang some lights for the studio "stage" and clean the place up a bit. It's in some serious need of renovation, even though they just recently put a lot of money into it. The place is kind of scary, with spiders and other gross things everywhere, but I guess it's way better than it was before. And with a little more work, it will be even better!
A running total of hours so far:
9/5 3 hours (9am-12pm)
9/7 11 hours (9 am-8pm)
9/10 3 hours (9am-12pm)
9/12 3 hours (9am-12pm)
9/13 1/2 hour (12:30pm-1pm)
9/14 2 hours (1:30pm-3:30pm)
22.5 hours total!
Saturday, September 15, 2007
Day 2, 9/7/2007
The second day on the job and already a field trip! A trip to Grand Rapids to the meeting of the Alliance for Community Media (ACM). This was pretty darn sweet, because I got to spend a whole day hanging out with people who have been working with Public Access Media stuff for a long, long time and really know the field- a great networking opportunity for sure, and everyone was really nice and welcoming.
I think the whole point of this meeting was really a kind of AT&T bashing session, because apparently they're starting up into the cable businness now, in addition to the phone business, and they don't want to give public access channels any rights. Their denial of same treatment for PAC's and big broadcast channels is "discrimination" and violates the protective legislation. We had a lawyer at the meeting and everything; he was pretty cool and explained things clearly (and he gave out squishy stress balls and mini keychain flashlight things). Here's the outline of the violations AT&T is doing:
Pretty much, AT&T wants to take PEG (Public, Education & Government access) broadcasts and make them small and crappy quality. They don't want to give easy access to these channels, they want to charge the channels for the technology to get their signal to the AT&T station and they don't want to adhere to the 5% franchise fee + and additional 2% PEG fee (no one gets the extra 2% though because the cable companies kind of suck about it, and they're fighting even that 5%).
...Quality: Instead of the same technology big broadcast companies use to get their signals to AT&T, AT&T is telling PEG channels they have to use a T1 line to get thier signal in. If this is implemented, the picture size will be cut in about half and quality will be greatly reduced. Pretty much it will be the equivalent of You Tube quality videos put on TV, which is discrimination against the PEG channels because they have every right to the same quality programming as anyone else.
...Access: Instead of hitting "3" or "28" or "115" or whatever channel you want on your remote control to access the channel, AT&T is only granting partial access to the PEG channels. Instead of the direct access, they make it so the user has to go to the channel 99 menu, and go through multiple (like 7) menus in order to find the PAC they're looking for. Discrimination again, because why should it be so hard to get to certain channels?
...Technology: Even though legislation says that in order to use the public right of way the cable company must provide public access tv, AT&T doesn't want to pay for the technology to get the PEG channel signals to their little boxes and on the TV. They are trying to make the public access centers pay for the technology to transmit their signal, which isn't fair because they aren't making such requirements for other "bigger" broadcasts.
The ACM tried to file a motion against AT&T for this discrimination, to try and make sure they get the same treatment as other channels. AT&T isn't actually making any TV yet though, and so they said that since it hasn't happend yet there is no actual harm, and therefore no suit (even though all of their plans indicate that there will be harm when they implement services). They also said that the ACM doesn't count as a concerned or affected source, and so essentially said that each municipality has to file suit. This is bad because AT&T is a huge company with a lot of money, and each individual municipality doesn't have the means to fight the way they're doing business. It's a dirty maneuver, but tha'ts how things are going, and so the goal is to get some of the cities in Oakland County to start this up- Southfield, Bloomfield and Novi were mentioned as possibilities because of their location and relation with AT&T. We'll see what happens as this unfolds, but it's interesting to see things really happening.
I think the whole point of this meeting was really a kind of AT&T bashing session, because apparently they're starting up into the cable businness now, in addition to the phone business, and they don't want to give public access channels any rights. Their denial of same treatment for PAC's and big broadcast channels is "discrimination" and violates the protective legislation. We had a lawyer at the meeting and everything; he was pretty cool and explained things clearly (and he gave out squishy stress balls and mini keychain flashlight things). Here's the outline of the violations AT&T is doing:
Pretty much, AT&T wants to take PEG (Public, Education & Government access) broadcasts and make them small and crappy quality. They don't want to give easy access to these channels, they want to charge the channels for the technology to get their signal to the AT&T station and they don't want to adhere to the 5% franchise fee + and additional 2% PEG fee (no one gets the extra 2% though because the cable companies kind of suck about it, and they're fighting even that 5%).
...Quality: Instead of the same technology big broadcast companies use to get their signals to AT&T, AT&T is telling PEG channels they have to use a T1 line to get thier signal in. If this is implemented, the picture size will be cut in about half and quality will be greatly reduced. Pretty much it will be the equivalent of You Tube quality videos put on TV, which is discrimination against the PEG channels because they have every right to the same quality programming as anyone else.
...Access: Instead of hitting "3" or "28" or "115" or whatever channel you want on your remote control to access the channel, AT&T is only granting partial access to the PEG channels. Instead of the direct access, they make it so the user has to go to the channel 99 menu, and go through multiple (like 7) menus in order to find the PAC they're looking for. Discrimination again, because why should it be so hard to get to certain channels?
...Technology: Even though legislation says that in order to use the public right of way the cable company must provide public access tv, AT&T doesn't want to pay for the technology to get the PEG channel signals to their little boxes and on the TV. They are trying to make the public access centers pay for the technology to transmit their signal, which isn't fair because they aren't making such requirements for other "bigger" broadcasts.
The ACM tried to file a motion against AT&T for this discrimination, to try and make sure they get the same treatment as other channels. AT&T isn't actually making any TV yet though, and so they said that since it hasn't happend yet there is no actual harm, and therefore no suit (even though all of their plans indicate that there will be harm when they implement services). They also said that the ACM doesn't count as a concerned or affected source, and so essentially said that each municipality has to file suit. This is bad because AT&T is a huge company with a lot of money, and each individual municipality doesn't have the means to fight the way they're doing business. It's a dirty maneuver, but tha'ts how things are going, and so the goal is to get some of the cities in Oakland County to start this up- Southfield, Bloomfield and Novi were mentioned as possibilities because of their location and relation with AT&T. We'll see what happens as this unfolds, but it's interesting to see things really happening.
Thursday, September 13, 2007
The first day, 9/5/2007
So here's my little drawing that explains what I learned today in preparation for the meeting on Friday and also just for the general understanding of public access tv.
1) Public access tv is very important to communities because it is the only venue in which any ordinary person can put their ideas/voice on tv and be heard. There really are no other public venues that provide people with the opportunities that public access tv does.
2) In the diagram I've drawn, the area boxed off in red is the public right-of-way area that exists within communities. This 18ft space is the 10 feet from the middle to the edge of the road, and the first 8 feet of your property. This is where utilities such as telephone and electrical poles go. Utilities have to pay fees to the local governments to use this public space. The same *should* be true for cable companies, as they put their cables in this space and use the public area much like a utility. However, instead of paying utility fees, they are supposed to pay a "franchise" fee to the local goverment in return for the use of this space.
3) Even though the cable companies- in our area here it's Charter- are supposed to pay the franchise fee to local governments they don't always do so. It's kind of a situation where the government won't get the money unless they fight for it, and when it comes to very small local goverments such as the townships around here, they sometimes are unsure of whether or not to demand this money from the big scary cable company. However, the current cap of what governments can recieve from the cable company is 5% of the revenue acquired from that community. Thinking about this, if you have a community of even 100 cable subscribers paying $40/month... the cable company is making 4000 a month, and 5% of that is 200/month. This comes to be $2400/year a township could be collecting from the cable company in return for the use of that public space- something that the public is entitled to, really.
4) Mac3TV, which is the Mid Michigan Area Cable Consortium (my internship) is made up of 11 townships and 3 counties. The job of Mac3TV is to provide the venue through which people of member communities can come, learn the equipment, make their own tv shows and have them air. We have 3 different locations, one in Clare, Mt. Pleasant and the Gratiot studio in Alma. Membership in this consortium is important to both Mac3TV and to the local communities, though there are still many who have not yet joined and really should for their own benefit. The second job the consortium has is to "fight" for the rights of member communities against the big bad cable company, providing information and assistance to each member community. In exchange for membership, Mac3TV is given 2 of the 5% franchise fee from each community that is a member. This money is used to fund the studios, providing equipment, staff (though many/most are part-time, volunteers, or in my case interns).
5) One reason some communities have not become members is they are reluctant to demand their 5% from the cable companies. The reasoning behind this is that they think the cable company may raise rates for their subscribers if they demand this fee, which is not true. The cable company has a prorated fee that does not vary from area to area depending on whether or not they have to pay the franchise fee there. So essentially, these areas are missing out on free money for their township, which is too bad because who couldn't use a little extra money? Plus, they would have more power if they were to join the consortium because there is always power in numbers, and their community members would have the added opportunity to use the tv media to express themselves.
6) The other thing that is required of cable companies for using that public space is to designate a public access channel. This means that if you have a cable company, you have to leave a space for the people to use your service for themselves. The thing with public access channels is that if you have enough programming throughout the day to fill 85% of the schedule, the cable company has to give you another channel to use as well, to make sure there is enough capacity to fill the demand for the service. Mac3TV is right at this point where they need another channel and so this is in discussion as per getting the 2nd channel.
Seems like this is a lot of stuff to have learned in one day; maybe it isn't but I felt like I'dalready learned a lot in such a short time. And this is only the most basic information even!
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