com125Blog#14
Online shopping is the process whereby consumers directly buy goods or services from a seller in real-time, without an intermediary service, over the Internet. It is a form of electronic commerce. Although online shopping as many advantages, there are also problems which may occur from time to time. Ordering the wrong product, receiving the wrong item and the need to return a purchase can often be significant enough to make a potential online shopper reconsider the decision to purchase again. When shopping in traditional brick and mortar stores, it is quite difficult to accidentally purchase the wrong item because the sales process typically involves you physically carrying the item up to the sales counter and paying for it. In online shopping, where the consumer never physically handles the item before the process is complete and the item delivered, it is certainly possible to purchase the wrong product.Online shopping, just like anything else in life, as times where not everything goes to plan.
COM125Blog#13
Internet advertising, also known as online advertising or web advertising may be one of the most effective advertising methods used, as it provides the ability to target specific markets while they are surfing the Internet. Internet advertising has its own unique selling proposition. Today I want to talk about the online video advertising. Video marketing is a form of marketing that includes mainly videos and clips that promote the benefits and unique selling points of a product or service. The unique attributes of the product or service is focused upon, making the customer think of the product and subsequently induce him or her into buying it. YouTube and Google are the most popular websites where the marketer can take advantage of online video marketing since each of these sites receive millions of visits every single day, allowing ample opportunity for effective product promotion.
Videos serve not only as a form of entertainment but also as a means of educating or at least informing people of the benefits and advantages of a certain product or business. If it is used efficiently in product promotion, the customers will not only be entertained but they will also be educated on why they need to purchase the product.
Instead of reading product manuals, people nowadays prefer to watch videos and clips that serve as promotional advertisements. This is due to the fact that watching is more interesting and is less time consuming than reading. Taking this into consideration, experts agree that video marketing effectively communicates the business ads. All of these are attained thru rich media experience and exposure, like watching numerous informative and educational videos about the product.
Online video marketing has its roots in the traditional television advertisements. The only difference between the two is that online video marketing ads reach more customers than the television ads since more people have access to the internet nowadays than thru television or rather more people prefer to surf the net than watch television as of today. Due to these overwhelming facts, building brand awareness has now become easier using online marketing strategies.
COM125Blog#12
Couple days ago, there was a news about virtual reality technology was applied into tourism industry in the field of virtual tourism. The whole idea of Virtual tour actually is the utility of a variety of modern high-tech means, on the network to build a virtual travel environment; in the sense that participants can be as immersive as the various tourist to enjoy their “tourist activities. ” I find it is interesting because it shows how the virtual and reality is interdependent with each other and complete each other. First of all, the virtual tour is available for the tourists anywhere and anytime, so that it save time for people to physically go to the place, especially for those people who do not have enough time or money for traveling. Secondly, I think it is also practical for those who are planning to go somewhere but have no idea where shall they go traveling. People can use the virtual tour application to have a pre-view of the places they may want to go. Via the virtual tour, they may have a more vivid experience about the places they want to travel, and have a big picture about how to travel when they really are there. Therefore, if I am going to travel to somewhere else in future, I wish that I can benefit from this kind of application, which allow me to not only travel around the world but also save time and money.
COM125Blog#11
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It has been a revolution of sorts with the growth of internet that has become a source of entertainment for the millions of people around the world. There are many methods in which internet provides entertainment to the users. For example, there are many sites offer free music that can be downloaded online. Other than these, there are web sites that provide music that can be purchased online. However, Internet entertainment is not without its problem. Among all the issues, copyright may be the most serious one. While the Internet can bring greater visibility to a creative work and thereby increase sales, in the copyright infringement, an unrelated third party is generally making a profit off of the copyright owner’s work. Even if the owner was only making a modest royalty from the sales, this is still money lost to the owner. Protecting intellectual property on the Internet has been a dilemma for the music and movie industry since peer-to-peer technology emerged. The most famous case should be Google Book. Google company was sued over its book search project. As part of the project, Google is working to scan all or parts of the book collections of the University of Michigan, Harvard University, Stanford University, the New York Public Library and Oxford University. It plans to let people search the texts. The company also intends to sell advertisements related to such searches.The publishing industry is united behind this lawsuit against Google and united in the fight to defend their rights. Finally, Google and its former publishing adversaries paid about $35 million of the settlement fund to create a registry program to compensate rights holders.
COM125Blog#9 Internet Security
With the advent of the Internet, social networking sites have become one of the most popular communication channels. The participation of online networking websites has been increased dramatically in recent years. As more and more individuals prefer to communicate and form relationships via online social networks, these websites have become a major medium for social interaction. From Facebook to MySpace to emergent sites like Twitter, social websites are increasing exponentially in user numbers and unique visits every day. Many of the people who sign up in sites such as Facebook and MySpace are not aware that they could be sharing their personal information with anyone and everyone. Previous studies indicated that undergraduate students are using Facebook for an average of 10 to 30 minutes daily and have an average of 150 to 200 friends in their account. With the advent usage of the Internet in the 21st century, participation in online networking sites such as Facebook, Twitter, MySpace and Friendster etc., has increased dramatically in recent years. This is especially so with the advancement of Web 2.0, which enables users to exchange and share information on interactive platforms. These websites are new communication channels for youths today. people are becoming increasingly comfortable with sharing their personal details and letting their guard down when communicating with others. They do not see their privacy as being at stake nor give much thought when posting risky details online. As a result, social networking sites are now prime targets for cyber criminals to obtain information at mass. the majority of Facebook users were comfortable with the sharing of personal information online with others. It almost seemed to be mandatory to disclose certain types of information about oneself. Online privacy in social networking sites, our area of investigation, is a major concern that users are very aware of, acknowledge and have taken steps towards safeguarding themselves.
COM125Blog#8
Social media could bridge the gap between people by providing a platform for social interaction. These virtual communities are innovative and interactive, potentially endowed to help foster a new kind of social experience. Instead of meeting up in person, people engage in virtual conversations to keep the relationships going. The way people interact with each other and the relationships they hold have been altered tremendously through the use of these computer mediated communication platforms. Relationships could possibility be strengthened with these platforms, shaped to help people connect with one another. However, in a quest to stay connected to the larger online community, real life relationships could be negatively affected.
Having only 24 hours a day, spending a lot of time hooking up on these social networking sites could mean lesser time spent physically socializing with others. The trend now is that people tend to be more willing to connect with other over social media platforms, than to hold real life conversations, claiming the accessibility and efficiency to be the reasons. Social media is a form of computer mediated communication, and is of lower quality than other forms communication such as face to face interaction. They lack non-verbal features of communication, such as the facial expressions, tone of voice, and other interpersonal features. Could the quality of communication and relationships in real life be hence compromised?
With mobile technology advancements, social networking sites such as Facebook, Twitter, and MySpace have created applications that could be used anywhere and at any time on mobile phones. People could hook up on these platforms at anywhere and anytime they desire. Whether we admit or not, surfing social networking sites on mobile devices has encapsulated the lives of many. People are beginning to hook up on these platforms more frequently, and become dependent on these as sources of interaction.
However, sometimes people may get too distracted by surfing on these social networking sites on their phones that they neglect having proper interaction with other people around them. Some people may be physically with their friends or family, but are mentally on social networking sites instead. People are seen checking their Facebook accounts for the latest happenings or updating their statuses while being with others, and are not engaging in proper face to face interaction with them. With the advent usage of the Internet in the 21st century, participation in online networking sites such as Facebook, Twitter, MySpace and Friendster etc., has increased dramatically in recent years. This is especially so with the advancement of Web 2.0, which enables users to exchange and share information on interactive platforms. These websites are new communication channels for youths today. They are easy on the eye, user-friendly and provide users with dynamic and real-time interaction. It is without a doubt then that networking online has become a daily norm. Crimes aside, however, these sites have privacy loopholes which allow data to be shared with advertisers. Controversy and criticism have resulted due of the lack of efforts to protect their users’ privacies. While social media may be an excellent way to get wind of the latest news and connect with others, users should understand the privacy and security risks they may face when using these sites. Therefore, privacy and security are determined by how much one shares with others and what he or she consumes.
COM125Blog#7
As computer and Internet use become a staple of everyday life, interactive online games for more than two players or multiplayer online games have become a popular object of investigation. From my point of view, the reason behind the popularity of online games are: firstly, them are fully commercial games that do not require advanced computing skills like the older text-based games,in the sense that they can be played by a much broader segment of Internet users. Secondly, to play online games you have to connect to the Internet, which mean that you can meet other people.There are a lot of game communities you can find on the Internet and most people in there are good people who are ready to talk and share their experiences with you. Online Games introduce users to computer technology and the online world, let them increase their self-confidence and self-esteem as they master the games.
On the other hand, this is controversial, online gaming may also lead to anti-social, such as aggression and frustration. People may play computer games, sitting before the table, staring at the screen, clicking mouse button, and the outcomes are cerebrum fatigue, visual deterioration and another day of waste.
COm125blog#6
YouTube is a video sharing website on which users can upload, share, and view videos, created by three engineers in February 2005, their names are Chad Herley, Steve Chen and Jawed Karim. The first YouTube video was entitled Me at the Zoo. The video was uploaded on April 23, 2005, and can still be viewed on the site.
As a worldwide served video sharing website, YouTube is available in 34 languages through user interface, which also offered the public a beta test of the site, six months before the official launch in November 2005. The site grew rapidly, and in July 2006 the company announced that more than 65,000 new videos were being uploaded every day. YouTube is considered as subsidiary limited liability company owned by YouTube LLC from 2005 to 2006. Google Inc bought out YouTube from the year of 2006.
Viewing YouTube videos on a personal computer requires the Adobe Flash Player plug-in to be installed in the browser. Videos uploaded to YouTube by standard account holders are limited to 15 minutes in duration. When YouTube was launched in 2005, it was possible to upload longer videos, but a ten-minute limit was introduced in March 2006 after YouTube found that the majority of videos exceeding this length were unauthorized uploads of television shows and films. In January 2010, YouTube launched an experimental version of the site that users the built-in multimedia capabilities of web browsers supporting the HTML standard. This allows videos to be viewed without requiring Adobe Flash Player. on July 21, 2009, YouTube software engineer Peter Bradshaw announced that YouTube users can now upload 3D videos from which the videos can be viewed in several different ways.
YouTube was constructed with a community in mind. The functions such as “Share this video” and “tell a friend” are automatically added at the end of each video, making each video simple to share. To make it considerably easier for users to find specific video files from large batches of results, YouTube shows the number of times each video has been played, and displays three random images from each video for search returns. Before the launch of YouTube in 2005, there were few easy methods available for ordinary computer users who wanted to post videos online. With its simple interface, YouTube made it possible for anyone with an Internet connection to post a video that a worldwide audience could watch within a few minutes. The wide range of topics covered by YouTube has turned video sharing into one of the most important parts of the Internet culture.
YouTube has also faced criticism over the offensive content in some of its videos. The uploading of videos containing defamation and material encouraging criminal conduct is prohibited by YouTube’s services. On YouTube, some participants broadcast extensive information about their identity. Moreover, they craft videos with content that is broadly appealing, and they aggressively promote and disseminate their videos. This can be considered quite public video making and viewing, because all three factors—identity information about the video maker, content relevance, and technical access to videos—are designed to be broadly appealing and widely available. Thus, public privacy has also become an issue when users share video on YouTube.
However, the brilliant seed of YouTube’s model includes code for each user to play YouTube’s videos directly from their own blog or website. Users are allowed to post their own music video online for the world to see, or see live performances of their favorite celebrities. YouTube has deftly designed itself around what appears to be one of the more significant contributors to the growth of an online product: Enabling a community of users to create content around content. Hence, the key reason for the success of YouTube probably is that they appeal to what people want.
COM125 Blog#5
In today’s blog I want to talk about product placement and e-commerce. this is an advertising I have seen few weeks ago. It is about the regular usage of brand placements in Hollywood movies. Apple deemed the top product placement brand with its appearances in 30 per cent of the top movies in the year 2010. Interestingly, Iron Man 2 was the single movie with most product placements as many as 64 identified brands. According to brandcameo researched by Brandchannel in 2010, 591 identifiable brands or products were involved in 33 movies that reach No. 1 at the box office with equivalence to an average of 17.9 product placements per film. There was a slight increase, compared with an average of 17.5 per film in 2009.Over the years, the filming and special effect technologies in the industry have been progressing, creating better theater experiences for the audience worldwide including 3D technologies that have implemented into the theaters. With strong financings from the movie investors in Hollywood, the movies are attracting new audience from emerging countries. Brand placements help the movie investors to mitigate the financial risks before the launch of the movies in the theaters.
Brand placements provide perfect market opportunities for the brand manufacturers to achieve better positioning to the audiences as their brands popping up in the minds of consumers whenever they have discussed about the movie. In the Marvel Comics film Transformers, dozens of brand placements are introduced such as General Motors, Chevrolet, Yahoo search, Visa cards and Nokia mobile phones and other brands. The appearance of these products in terms of external appearance and the use of functions, have been fully displayed. Among them, the role of eBay is emphasized as part of the screen in the movie make the audience memorable.
we are heavily bombarded by advertisements from the brand marketers from the traditional media to social media such as Facebook.com, Youtube.com and Blogger.com. Whatever we consume or utilize are the results after years of researches on phenomenology, ground theories and ethnography. However, some of us enjoy being associated with brands we desire or own. What United States of America has been marketing is her culture probably.
COM125 Blog#4
The Internet is a growing and a continually evolving creature that will live on in perpetuity. Now, with the new wireless web mail from cell phones and other communication devices, the Internet will be affecting more lives than ever before. Security and privacy concerns along with e-business regulatory issues will become more prevalent. Few days ago, I read a research article about online networking and privacy. It was indicated in the article that that more than three-quarter of the students in the research interview had created an online social networking profile, and men are more likely to have a greater probability to have a higher risk taking score than women, whereas women are more likely to have a greater percentage when considering the Internet privacy.
From my point of view, although the online social network such as Facebook is a fictional account of what really happened in our lives, it does play a crucial role in our social lives. Undoubtedly, Facebook has become the indispensable vehicle for the younger generations. The online social networking websites provide them a space to tell their friends their everyday life and also get to know how they are doing recently. It became not only the software to develop people’s social network, but more likely a place where they can find their belongingness. On the other hand, just like a double-edged sword, the online social networking websites also have their weakness, and we still need to be careful when we publish our information, because from my point of view, nothing is private at all once it is on the Internet.
