News in Satire

Many young adults and young professionals today turn to Satire news programs to get their daily news. Rather than  turn to NBC nightly news or other Prime Time news networks, we turn to The Daily Show and The Colbert Report. Is watching a satire news program as educational and worldly as watching a general news program? Or is brining amusement into news helping today’s youth engage in our society on a new level?

Therefore, lets look at the Februrary 11, 2015 episode of The Daily Show.

On February 11th, Jon Steward did his first show after announcing his retirement. Therefore the first section of his show was making fun of himself and his retirement, posting a tweet that where Arby’s tweeted a job offering at Jon Stewart.

However, Stewart did not linger long on this topic. Rather, within a minute he had moved on to talk about LGBT rights in the country today. Most specifically with rights in Montana and gay marriage become legal in Alabama. Showing news clips and actual interview, Stewart pauses the clips to make commentary and to point out how ridiculous some people sound.

The Daily Show talks about issues that are extremely important in our society today. However, it does so with a certain flare, satire commentary. This added satire is not afraid to be liberal, though some may critique on satire news programs being your only source of news being ignorant, watching satire news programs helps enlighten us. Though you probably should watch other forms of news as well, satire shows such as The Daily Show are a great source of news that makes it enjoyable to watch. It is a way of added amusement to your news.

The real questions is: how are we going to do through a political election with The Daily Show or The Colbert Report? The 2016 presidential race shall be interesting without these two satirical news frontrunners.

The News the Morning After

Its the morning after the Oscars. Hollywood is currently full of hungover stars. However, ABC’s Good Morning America is up with those oversized cups of coffee and those few starts they managed to pull out of bed after that Sunday night each February that is crowded with huge dresses, spanks, booze and little bald men named Oscar.

On February 23, Good Morning America is all about the Oscars. The majority of the show is called “Oscars Confidential” where the news show you what you did not see last night, such as how the A-list celebrities actually walk the carpet. Yes, there is an “HOV lane for stars” so that those who you really want to see get to bypass everyone else. However, last night the internet helped bring us behind the scenes of the Oscars. Stars instagrammed, tweeted, and used all forms of social media to show us what was happening behind scenes, while the rest of us was sitting on our couches watching at home. For example this Instagram video from Chrissy Teigen that she made during the “Everything is Awesome” performance last night, or Reese Witherspoon’s conversation with her mom DURING the Oscars.

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A post shared by chrissy teigen (@chrissyteigen)

https://instagram.com/p/za90xNihRw/?modal=true

When it comes to the behind the discussion of fashion, with a closer look of what everyone was wearing, it was as if you were watching the ABC interviews from the red carpet from the previous night. However, they try to make it more personal by zooming in and getting a closer look. Though, the audience could get a closer look last night on many of the stars outfits, as well as watch them get ready on their social media platforms. Rita Ora showed us a less glamour side on her Instagram on how she got ready to perform at the Oscars last night.

https://instagram.com/p/zarqmKRswi/?modal=true

While this morning newscast is usually located in New York, this morning the show is live from Los Angeles, since they were all at the Oscars last night. The audience is not dressed in their usual street clothes, mainly all this layers that are usually found from the audience in New York lately. Rather, the audience is dressed Oscar ready.

At 8am, Good Morning America stops for the local news. During this segment the locals newscasters reminds us in Michigan that it is currently in the negatives, as well as an apartment complex in Detroit is currently without heat, which sends shivers down our spines.

However, this news does not last for long, rather it is quick to cut back to our GMA cast so that they can talk about the Oscars. Though, they are quick to get back to the Oscars to break down the winners of the night before, the cast of GMA stops to break down local news: such as how the horrible weather has been affecting travel, security threats at Mall of America, gas prices, etc.

Good Morning America this morning was meant for those who missed the Oscars the previous night. It broke down

Meryl Streep’s reaction to Patricia Arquette’s speech on female equality

everything that happened as well as added some comedy to it. However, they spend the same amount of time on the moments of advocacy that were touched up in speeches last night, as Alejandro Gonzalez’s lucky underwear.  Last night was full of speeches about “staying weird,” and believing in yourself no matter now different you are. Speeches spoke up for both black and female inequality, however GMA barely touched on these moving moments, even though Meryl Streep could not get enough.

Most of what was shown on the show this morning could have been found on social media last night, but maybe with a few more details. So what are the stars doing now, while Good Morning America is recapping last night? Well, most of them are back to work, with their swag bags in hand. Just look to social media, the stars share.

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A post shared by Anna Kendrick (@annakendrick47)

NPR One: Bringing Local News to You No Matter Where

Yes, that tiny app in the corner holds all NPR has to often.

NPR One: The radio app that takes you out of your car and personalizes your NPR station no matter where you are.

Today, I listened to NPR for the first time since my mom use to have to drive me to the train for my daily commute to NYC all summer. Upon downloading the app I was immediately surprised. Upon first signing into the app I was brought to the local Michigan station of NPR. There, I found that most of the stories suggested to me were about the upcoming Super Bowl and the advertisements associated with it.

After skipping through multiple stories on the local Michigan station, I decided to switch to the NPR station that I am use to, New York. Being from New York, this is what I grew up listening to while sitting in the back of my mom’s car. Yes, that mean I am not your average NPR listener, I usually tend to listen to stations such as Z100 and the Pulse. And if I am turning to AM stations, I go to my local 1010 or 880 stations. However this app surprised me. Instead of having to listen to what I think is boring news, often with monotone anchors, this app brought me a new world of NPR.

This new world of NPR started with “Suggestions” page. This page brought me what the app though I would like, based off my Facebook profile as well as my liking of news stories. This started with a news story on the blizzard,  Juno. This week the Northeast was hit by a huge blizzard, Juno. Though the storm ended up not being as large as expected, there were still a lot of damage and snowfall to areas. My family, living only an hour outside of New York City, got over two feet of snowfall over the course of one evening, thus stranding them for a day. Since I am not home, I find it hard to find news on the storm. Whenever I look into it, the articles are mostly about New York City and Boston, since those are the largest populated areas that were hit. However, this app allowed me to listen to the local news. By just typing in my zip code, the app brought me home and allowed me to listen to what my parents are listening to.

After listening to stories on the storm for awhile, I went back to my suggestions page. There I found an interview with Nick Kroll on the final season of his comedy show. The suggestions page knew that I wanted to know more than local news, but also how I am interested in entertainment. I enjoyed listening to Kroll and hear him talk about his relationship with Seth Meyers and how Meyers refers to his shows as a “sketch-u-ational comedy.”

Though I was reluctant at first at downloading the NPR one app, overall I found it a pleasant experience. Now I know I can listen to my local station from home while I am at school at Michigan.

Live Tweeting the SAG Awards

On Sunday,  January 26, I live tweeted the SAG Awards Red Carpet. While watching, I found it unsettling that E! News’ normal host, Giuliana Rancic was not in attendance. En leu, Maria Menounous was interviewing the actors. Though she looked great, she was not good at interviewing the actors on the red carpet. She was exactly what feminists are fighting against when it comes to red carpet interviews. She was only asking shallow questions, not trying to dig deeper. In an outrage, I tweeted at E! News asking for Giuliana back. That tweet (as seen below) was definitely my most popular tweet of the evening, as people who don’t even follow me favorited and retweeted it.

https://twitter.com/ZtheBrow/status/559488573616168962

Celebrate the Difference of the Paper v. Web

The act of reading the physical copy of the NYT often makes your feel as if you are overtaken by the large pages.

Picking up the Sunday New York Times is like going to McDonalds and super-sizing your meal. Everything about the paper is greater, the weight, the feel, the pages of content: from the book review to the travel section and wedding announcements, the Sunday NYT  is a treat. But how is it different than the digital copy?

When looking at the digital version of the Sunday NYT one is more inclined to go directly to the sections they are interested in, rather than flipped through every section. Though the content is the same, scrolling through the digital copy and looking at the headlines is not like opening the oversized sheets and flipping through the pages.

This week, when I received the New York Times, I turned to the travel section. What is a better way to spend your Sunday morning than fantasizing about your next vacation? On page three a headline caught my eye, “Fashion a Mask for Carnival in Venice.”

Version of article as found in the physical Sunday NYT travel section

The content of the article is quite obvious from the headline. It is about the decorations of the masks during Carnival in Venice each year: how the masks are elaborated decorated in Swarovski crystal and how many hotels are now hosting workshops to create these masks.

When comparing the paper copy and the online article the main difference that stands out is the use of links in the article.

The online version of the NYT article

The use of links within the article online allows the NYT to become your own travel agent. Instead of reading this article in passing, while flipping through the Sunday paper and writing down all the information that would be needed to book, you are now just a click away. While reading you can go directly to the hotel’s websites that are mentioned in the article by just clicking on their names. As well, you can also click directly on the email address provided in the article.

In the NYT innovation report, the paper wanted to make many differences in the digitalization of their newspaper. In this article, it is clear that they achieved the personalization aspect (for recommended articles are on these side), as well as making the article easier to follow (through the use of links).

Everything about Zoe

Welcome to my blog, Everything from A to Zoe, featuring me, Zoe. So who is Zoe? Well, currently I am a senior at the University of Michigan finishing up my Bachelor of Arts in Communications and English. So pretty much, I do a lot of reading, writing and TV watching.

As a twenty-something in today’s society, I use a variety of different news sources and media platforms to gather my news each day. With my oversized teacup, I sit every morning and scroll through three different news platforms.

Twitter, The New York Times, and the Skimm as seen on different media device that constant of my morning news routine.

First, I turn to The New York Times, and yes it has more to do with just the crossword puzzle (even though I do not find a Monday to be complete with finishing it). Though I receive the physical copy of The New York Times when I am home in New York, while at school and traveling I receive the daily paper on my iPad, as well as am constantly receiving push notifications on my phone.

My second source of news each morning is through twitter. Twitter allows me to scroll through a variety of different “news” sources at once. And yes, I am aware of the quotation around the words news. This is because for me news is about more than just hard-hitting news stories. Rather, I also look to a variety of magazines on twitter such as: People, Elle, E! News, etc. for the latest news on celebrities, entertainment, fashion.

Yet my morning ritual is not complete just scrolling through my twitter and reading The New York Times, but rather I also wake up and read what a half-a-million other Americans are reading, The Skimm.