Apple in trouble

Double trouble for Apple, as two software security flaws discovered

http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/nov/06/apple-mac-iphone-security-malware

Summary:

This article is in regards to Apple’s desktop operating system and the emergence of a new iPhone malware. The vulnerabilities that have been found in Apple are for users of Mac OS X. The first was found by a Swedish hacker called Emil Kvarnhammar; this enables an attacker to gain “root” control of a computer, known as the highest level of access, without the Intel of using a password.         

In my opinion this continues to put Apple in the spotlight for controversy, especially since Apple has not yet responded to the request for comments. Apple has become targeted yet again via hacking and vulnerability, this shows that Apple is suffering in regards of reputation.

LR: Essay Question

LR: Essay Question

• Try to reference your quotes. copy/paste them to a new blog posting with who said them alongside each one 
• You say "Marxist believe that one perception should dominant" but this isnt the case- They say that a powerful elite control the media and promote their ideologies. Rewrite this section in Para 3
• You need to flesh out your essay with more specific examples, especially the section on UGC

Quotes:

1. “the most important medium of the twentieth century” (Briggs and Burke).
2. “The internet has given readers much more power…The world is changing and newspapers have to adapt” (Rupert Murdoch, Newscorp)
3. (James Murdoch) “it is essential for the future of independent digital journalism that a fair price can be charged for news to people who value it”
4. “Web pages and blogs which are like a million monkeys typing nonsense” (Andrew Keen)
5. “great leveller” (Krotoski, 2012)
6. “A minority of media producers always serve a majority of consumers” (Pareto’s Law)
7. (Negroponte) “Monolithic empires of mass media are dissolving in to an array of cottage industries”

Paragraph:

Marxists believe that a powerful elite control the media and promote their ideologies and that there is one perception to story's in the media, and argues that Pluralism  and says more UGC allows the chance of dumbing down the audience as the internet consist of “Web pages and blogs which are like a million monkeys typing nonsense”. This is evident in the consumption of less serious websites such as listicles on BuzzFeed and a site called lolcats where there are cat videos and memes. These articles or stories on the internet are more about humour rather than serious news articles and is referred as ‘entertainment’ which is clearly dumbing down its audience.

        

Another Marxist argument is that the audience are being manipulated into thinking they are in control and have power. This is because “A minority of media producers always serve a majority of consumers” (Pareto’s Law). Even though citizen journalism is a part of the digital revolution for example YouTube post and Blogger, it is still owned by a media conglomerate for such as Google. This creates the perspective that they are using user generated content to voices their opinion on something but are still over powered as the media conglomerates are still in control and have the power in what we can access and see online, and they can remove or block what they don’t agree with. On the other hand the development of YouTube has allowed the development of cottage industry as people can create a life and a business from it which provides the consumers with power from a Pluralistic perspective.

News Corp

News Corp UK suffers £3.5m loss after £51m profit the year before

http://www.theguardian.com/media/greenslade/2014/dec/17/news-corp-uk-suffers-35m-loss-after-51m-profit-the-year-before

News corp UK has suffered devastating losses. This is not surprising as many of the demand for news has moved online and the ever-growing popularity of twitter has meant the means in which news is accessed is also changing from traditional print to digital. This has had a predictable knock on effect on newspapers as evident by this article.

In my opinion, many newspapers to survive will have to take necessary actions whether it is moving to a pay wall to ensure their future. If not, then they will continue to lose profit as many more switch from print to digital and they would also eventually have to do the same to exist.

UK goes digital

UK set to be first country in which more than half of ad spend goes digital

http://www.theguardian.com/media/2014/dec/01/gadget-obsessed-uk-top-digital-advertising-spend 

The UK is predicted to become the first country in the world where more than half of all advertising spend goes to digital media – thanks to a national obsession with gadgets, social media and online shopping. Next year more money will be spent on internet advertising than in traditional media such as newspapers, magazines, TV, cinema, radio, and billboards, posters and buses combined.

According to Group M paid search advertising will grow to £4.2bn, with about 29% of that on mobile devices, most of which is hoovered up by Google, which has more than 90% share of the UK market.

The next closest countries likely to reach the milestone are Sweden (47% of total ad spend will be digital), Denmark (43%), Australia (42%) and Norway (40%).

·         Group M is forecasting that more than £160m in print advertising will be lost from the UK newspaper market next year.

·         National newspaper advertising is predicted to decline 8.3% to £908m next year, and £80m year-on-year fall.

·         Regional newspapers are expected to see a 9.1% fall in print ad revenues to £820m, a fall of £82m year-on-year.

In my opinion this highlights the massive impact new and digital media is having on society and advertisers realise that online is now the best place to advertise their products. This links to the issue of newspapers constant losses, as advertisers no longer see newspapers as a major form of media in which they can advertise their rpoducts due to the decline of print media

Mobile news going big

Mobile and the news media's imploding business model

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/cifamerica/2012/mar/27/mobile-news-media-imploding

The article was on how new digital media and mobiles have taken over from news and advertising. The overwhelming share of this is phones, not tablets; and a reasonable view says this will rise to 50% in three years." from this we can see that mobiles and tablets are slowly starting to take over, and over the next three or so years it will increase even more. 

Smartphones will soon be the primary news source for most Americans. That's if anyone can still make money by reporting

However this makes sense as news and adverts will move along with the new technology that people are now using,  with so many people now having smart phones and tablets its become easier for them to access news and other media through one source, this makes it more convenient for them. 

The PirateBay

The Pirate Bay crew 'couldn't care less' about being taken offline

http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/dec/16/the-pirate-bay-taken-offline-filesharing

This article is about an online file sharing site called 'The Pirate Bay', from this site people could stream almost anything they wanted, from movies to full program sets and software. The site was taken down by Swedish police after they raided the site. However the one of the admins of TPB said that they weren't suprised and that they didn't really care about what happened as they expected it.

However another admin of TPB said, " “Will we reboot? We don’t know yet. But if and when we do, it’ll be with a bang. The people behind TPB are like one big collective mind. There are no leaders nor any one in charge. About 30-50 people from all over the world pitch their ideas against each other and whatever comes out of that is what will be the fate of TPB.” From this it shows that TPB may come back, and when they do they will bring something new. 

This article shows how technology is changing and how peoples needs are changing. As technology improves institutions such as TPB need to also keep up with it and make sure that they have everything to offer to their users. 

Hackers Hack PlayStation

Hackers claim responsibility for Sony PlayStation Network outage

http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/dec/08/hackers-claim-responsibility-sony-playstation-network-outage-lizard-squad

This article looks at hackers that have been targeting Play Station Network, they take down the site whenever they want and PSN (Play Station Network) cannot do anything, They have told users that they will address the problem, however they don't know where the problem is coming from. 

Before the hackers do anything, they will tweet post a tweet, for example, "PSN Login #offline #LizardSquad" This is seen by both PSN and the users of Play Station, through this they have been able to gain followers, maybe other hackers and they also are giving PSN a warning of what thy are going to do. However even though are Tweeting what they are going to do, Sony have not been able to find the root cause. 

Sony have been attacked before and they were damaged severely as In 2011, the service was brought down for several days leaking the personal details including credit card numbers, email addresses and passwords of more than 70 million users. Sony was criticised for its handling of the attack, and fined £250,000 by the UK’s data protection watchdog.