The Mountaintop Speech

I think the most polarizing speech to date is the Mountaintop Speech that Martin Luther King Jr. gave the day before he was assassinated. I heard the audio from the speech some time back, and his closing lines just stuck with me. It was as if he knew something was going to happen, and he told his fellow people that he may not make it with them over the mountaintop, but he has seen it, and they will all get there. He let them know that he has no fear of what may happen to him in the upcoming days, because he has done God's will by getting them to the mountain top. He is so fulfilled and full of hope that they will finally reach the "promise land." If you haven't heard this audio, I suggest you do, it's an amazing piece of our history.

AHH RADIO

I love the radio. I listen to sports radio everyday, and have for about three years now. I used to listen to it all day at work, and it made my day fly by. I just can't get enough of sports talk, eventhough they say the same thing all day, radio makes it more interesting than television. With the radio programs, you get somebody's personal twist on things. I personally like Mike & Mike in the morning, and The Herd with Colin Cowherd. They're great shows, and very entertaining. I was just thinking about how radio is so much more convenient than television in the fact that you can do multiple things while listening to radio. You can't exactly do much watching tv, and for that I think that radio will never die, like our newspapers are.

Week 6

I watched a clip from the Untouchables called the "White Slavers." In this episode Ness was trying to bring down an illegal prostitution ring run by Al Kapone (who was doing it from jail) and Mick Torrance. It showed both sides, the villians and the heroes. Each had a plot to bring down one another. I didn't get to see the end result, but Ness was bringing down all of Torrance's small operations to bring in the women, so I can only assume that good was going to prevail. To start out the episode and attract the viewers, there was a huge gunfighting scene. It surprised me that there was so much gunfire. The extent of my classic television knowledge is mainly Mission Impossible, where gunfire is minimal, but technical attacks and trickery are more acceptable. This image is of the Mission Impossible cast, it's my favorite show! I got this image from bygonetv.com

My Graphic

I chose this specific image, because when I think about my first experience with I Love Lucy as a child I think of this episode. I'll be honest, I've never really watched much of this show, but I vividly remember her working in the candy factory trying to keep up with the machine, and the only way to do that was to eat the chocolate and put it in her hats and pockets. I got this image from www.memphisflyer.com. I also chose this image because of the celebrity status that Lucille Ball had. She was one of a few to be "cleared" from her registry in the communist party on the claim she did it to please her grandfather. I never knew any of this until doing the reading in the book. The book states that the claim was quickly forgotten. To me it seems that her overall celebrity status, and love from the people did something that very few people, no matter how loved they were could do; Clear their names from the communist claims. That to me signifies somebody who had a very positive effect on a large amount of people throughout the country.

My Experience So Far...

Well, let me start by saying that all of this information is new to me. I never knew much of the history of radio, and the early stages of television. I didn't know that it started as a communication device created by Guglielmo Marconi.
What I found to be interesting was that there were so many ameratures that were so knowledgeable about the product that they could make their own radio stations and radio equipment. Now, you don't see that; this may be given the complexity of what you would be trying to create, or the lack of expensive equipment used to make electronic products (and all of the copyright and patent laws).
I was suprised at how complicated the process was to figure out who had the rights to the products and who were in partnerships. It started with GE, RCA, and AT&T buying shares from the British Marconi and it just kept getting more complicated. Westinghouse came in alliance with GE, AT&T, and United Fruit. These companies then split up the duties; AT&T would be selling the equipment, GE and Westinghouse would make the receivers and parts, and RCA would do the marketing. Now this alliance was for the radio.

oops!

Wow! I can't believe I forgot to post after the first week on the television that I watched. I enjoyed watching the Super Bowl, because I'm a huge sports fan. I don't have much of a rooting interest in either team, but I always enjoy a good game. The commercials weren't as good as other years; I'm also disappointed that I couldn't find any 3-D glasses. That's what I really wanted to see. I also watched The Office after the game. It was hilarious like always!

Week 2

This week I watched The Adventures of Superman Season 1 and Smallville Season 5. This is a great way to see the big differences between early television and and today's television. Some of the biggest differences include language, special effects, the structure of the storyline, and editing.

The two shows are about fifty three years apart (Superman 1952 and Smallville 2005). The language they use is completely different. For example, in The Adventures of Superman they don't use any vulgar words like today's television shows do. The biggest difference however, is the way that the story lines have become much more thicker. For example, in Superman there is one big story line that can easily be figured out, or you can at least put your attention into. With Smallville, each character has something going on within an episode and it seems that there is more complexity in the story which sets it up for a long series.
The way they use lighting to tell their stories too. For example, when Lex Luthor makes a decision in Smallville that makes his evil side appear, he is generally wearing dark colors and the lighting shows mostly darkness across his face. When something good happens, there clothing is usually brighter and there aren't many shadows in effect.