Wikipedia revisited

I checked my wikipedia changes and saw that everything I had changed has not been changed back. Im not sure if it's because what I added is true or not but, my changes are still there.

Illustrator Ad

This is my final illustrator project:

This is the original ad.

Illustrator update

I'm almost done with my Illustrator project but, I want to make one of the elements on my ad larger and more out of focus. What tool could I use, if there is one, to help?

Wikipedia Assingment

On the 25th I chose to edit the wikipedia page about Jimmy Fallon. The highlighted section is the part that I removed because I thought it didn't belong in the section about his education.


After I removed that part from the page, I added in that he received his doctorate degree along with his BA in Communications, which is true.


Every couple of hours I checked the page and kept refreshing it to see if my changes stayed or if they would change it back to the original page. I continued to do this from the day I made the changes until now (Nov. 29th) and the website never changed back to the original!

This is the screen shot of the current page for Jimmy Fallon:

Mid-term Assignment part 2

I decided to advertise my product using this background picture of a woman meditating and a sunset to go along with one of my advertising techniques, neuro-marketing.

Midterm part 1

When you think of the most talked about issues in America today, what comes to your mind? Homeland security, the recession, and the environment are three that come to my mind but, those issues pale in comparison to the topic that has every American talking. Health-care. Millions of Americans do not have health insurance and with the increasing costs of health related expenses, more and more are unable to afford it. Health insurance helps cover the cost of an innumerable amount of services from check-ups to MRI’s or CAT scans. Almost all health professionals in the country practice “western medicine” which includes prescribing medications and performing tests on patients. However, treating patients with herbal remedies and all-natural treatments is a field that has been used for hundreds of years and removes the need for a conventional health professional. Aside from herbal treatments, an extremely effective, natural, and cost-free method of health care is one that has been used since the times of the ancient Chinese: meditation. Mediation is the “practice of concentrated focus on an object, breath, or inner body in order to increase awareness of the present moment, reduce stress, and promote relaxation” (Answers.com). However, one key benefit of meditation is the benefit of having a healthy body and life. The Science Channel’s show, The Future Of…, presents a segment dedicated to the traditional practice of mediation. A meditation expert from Holland, Wim Hoth, uses the ancient ritual to improve more than stress levels. Hoth provides strong evidence that there is a definite connection between meditation and longevity of life. A master of “inner-fire meditation”, Hoth has the ability to control a bio-regulator called the vagus nerve which regulates blood pressure, heart-rate, and the production of antibodies. Because Hoth is able to reach such an intense state of meditation that he can increase his anti-body count which reduces inflamantion, a major symptom of illness and old age. Given the name “Ice Man”, Hoth is able to enter a meditative state and relax in a tub of ice water by controlling his body temperature, heart rate, and blood pressure. By improving health and lengthening life, the need for health care/insurance could become obsolete as the homeopathic medicine of meditation increases in popularity.

Although meditation is not a product by definition, various marketing techniques and tactics could be used to advertise meditation to the public. Emotional branding, rhetorical marketing, and across-media marketing are just three of the numerous methods advertisers use to appeal to consumers however, neuro-marketing and narrow-casting are the techniques that would be the most effective at selling the idea of meditation to the public. Neuro-marketing is a relatively new field of marketing that studies consumers’ cognitive response to marketing stimuli. Utilizing medical technology, neuro-marketing takes information from MRI’s to understand what stimulates the human brain. Because the brain is driven by old emotions and memories such as the smell of the ocean or the view of the setting sun, pleasant memories and visuals will be used to advertise meditation. A sunset, waves crashing on the beach, a beautiful and serene landscape are all memories and visuals that trigger an unconscious emotional response in the mind and could be used as a neuro-marketing technique to sell meditation. Because meditation is something one can practice on their own without having to buy a part of it, not putting a price on it would have a positive response in the brain.

Along with neuro-marketing, narrow-casting will also be used to advertise meditation. As the propagation of information to a narrow audience and not to the general public, narrow-casting aims advertisements at specific portions of the public. Because meditation is a natural practice, people who embrace non-western medicinal practices will be targeted to advertise it. By advertising in natural health, environmental, and nature magazines/other media outlets, the narrow audience interested in meditation will be targeted.

The Persuaders...questions

What in "The Persuaders" surprised you (or not)? Name one new thing you learned about marketing or politics from watching the film. Name one new thing you learned about yourself from watching the film, or one thing that the film reiterated about yourself.
One thing that surprised me from "The Persuaders" was what marketing expert Clotaire Rapaille discussed in that segment of the film. I was surprised that so many executives from Fortune 500 companies flocked to him to hear what he had to say about how to market a product. Although he has a degree in Psychology, how can he be so sure what the average person is thinking when they see an advertisement or what they want to see? I found it surprising that Rapaille is seen like a marketing God becuase he "knows" what people are thinking and what they want to see in an advertisement.
I learned that advertisers go through a lot of effort to put an ad that will capture the public's interest. Much more than just the product being advertised goes into an advertisement. I like to think that I am not persuaded by advertisements and that I don't notice them eventhough they are so prevalent in everyday life. But, the film reiterated the fact that we are constantly bombarded by advertisements and may not notice them all because we see them every single day.

"The Persuaders" begins by questioning the increase in the amount of advertising we typically encounter in our daily lives. How would you assess the amount of advertising you see? Too much? Too little? Just right? In your view, what difference does it make to know that people today see much more advertising in their daily lives than people 20 or 30 years ago?
As stated above, I believe we are constantly bombarded by advertisements but, don't realize it because we are so used to seeing so many ads every day. I see the right amount of advertising, or as much as I notice. There are probably twice as many things that are being advertised than I actually notice. The fact that people are seeing much more advertising in their daily lives than people 20 to 30 years ago seems normal. As times, technology, and people change, advertisements will change with them. Because we live in a high consumer society, advertisers must use any means possible to get us to buy their products. 20-30 years ago, people probably didn't care as much about what or how many things they owned, unlike people today.

Cropped vs Uncropped

This is the original image. As you can see it changes the entire meaning of the picture from the cropped one to original. The cropped photo is of a beautiful sunset but, the original picture is actually of an obtrusive oil rig.
"A photograph is often perceived to be an unmediated copy of the real world, a trace of reality skimmed off the very surface of life, and evidence of the real" (Practices of Looking 17). This statement about photography pertains to my original and cropped photos. Coming from an environmental standpoint, the reality is that oil powers the world and could possibly be used forever as a means of energy. The original photo shows the reality of the world with the giant oil rig in the forefront of the photo.
In my cropped photo, I used the rubber stamp tool to get rid of the oil rig to make the photo seem to be just of a sunset.

Cropped image

Altered image

Medium is the message collage: edited

Edited McLuhan collage...I used the magic wand and eraser tools to get rid of the background behind McLuhan's head and also space around the people's chairs.

This photoshop collage represents Marshall McLuhan's idea of "The medium is the message". The two figures next to the Brazillian and Chinese flags represent the content while using the Telepresence system from Cisco. The message, however, is represented by the background of the collage which is of the world. Becuase of the invention of the telepresence system, people from around the world are now able to talk live from the comfort of their office or home.

Photoshop is the message

McLuhan's famous statement, "The medium is the message", relates to Photoshop and how the content of it is not as important as the medium of Photoshop is. In Photoshop, people are able to create, alter, or do anything possible to a picture. Because of this opportunity for anyone to produce a different image, we should always think twice about a picture we are looking at because who knows if it is even real. The medium of Photoshop also allows practically anyone to become an artist and produce any image they can think of.

Photoshop question

In my collage, I put a picture of McLuhan in the upper left-hand corner and I made the edges softer. But, I wanted to get rid of everything from his picture except his head and body. I know there is a magic wand tool but forget where it is or how to use it.

McLuhan Project 1

This photoshop collage represents Marshall McLuhan's idea of "The medium is the message". The two figures next to the Brazillian and Chinese flags represent the content while using the Telepresence system from Cisco. The message, however, is represented by the background of the collage which is of the world. Becuase of the invention of the telepresence system, people from around the world are now able to talk live from the comfort of their office or home.

Medium Assignment

The Cisco Teleprecence program allows people from around the world to talk "face to face" with one another without being in the same room, even country. This innovation takes the place of people having to travel around the world for business meetings that are now able to be conducted using the program.


Cell Phones/Texting gives people the ability to communicate back and forth without talking to one another. Texting allows friends, family members, etc to stay in touch whenever they want and allows them to get back to the person they are texting whenever they like. A down-side of texting is that it eliminates face to face contact and removes us from human interaction.


The Amazon Kindle is an innovation that allows people to buy books online and upload them onto the device and read just like a regular bound book. The Kindle holds up to 200 books and gives readers the freedom to take the thin device wherever they want without having to carry 2 or 3 regular books which can take up space.