Case study- Flickr

Source: http://www.flickr.com

Flickr is an image and video hosting website, web services suite, and online community. They provide services for users to share and embed personal photographs. We can find flickr on blogs as the service is widely used by bloggers to host images that they embed in blogs and social media. It was developed by Ludicorp, a Vancouver-based company that launched Flickr in February 2004. Flickr instead of other social networking tools because Flickr is more interactive, you can give your friends, family, and other contacts permission to organize your stuff – not just to add comments,but also notes and tags. And as all this info accretes as metadata, you can find things so much easier later on, since all this info is also searchable. Flickr create awareness by showing public pictures of the organisation and the kidney patients.

Project Research Findings- The KDF organisation

Source: http://www.kdf.org.sg/about.aspx

The Kidney Dialysis Foundation (KDF) is a non-profit charitable organization founded by Dr Gordon Ku in 1996. With ethe support of the Ministry of Health, to make treatment fees more affordable to low-income patients.Kidney Dialysis Foundation (KDF) was established with the commitment to provide high quality, subsidised dialysis for the most needy members of our community, the majority of their patients are from the bottom 10% income group of kidney patients in Singapore. Medical social workers from restructured hospitals refer patients from the bottom 10% income group to the KDF. The organisation depends on volunteers who step forward to render their support in terms of finances and services.

The KDF aims to look after the well-being of patients by nurturing hope and confidence to make their life more meaningful, even for the most destitute.

KDF has served over 519 patients of which 53 have undergone successful kidney transplantations as at 31 March 2009. It is currently serving about 274 patients and annually, $6.4 million is needed to continue this life-saving mission.

Their age group

he patients were mainly from the 41 to 60 year old age group. As at 31 March 2009, this group of patients constituted 66.8% of the total population. The elderly patients (more than 60 yrs old) represent 25.5% of the total patient population.

Creating awareness

KDF has created a Facebook account but there are only 27 fans even though they do update their wall frequently. I think they need to work abit better on creating more awareness to the public. For example, they can make use of other social networking tools like Twitter, Flickr, Youtube, etc.

New Media Landscape

Lionel Chin is the co-founder of Ripplewerkz, which is an all in one design house which offers high quality Web, Blog, Print and Corporate ID development. Boasting an impressive portfolio of projects such as Nuffnang, Prominent bloggers/Celebrities (eg. Allan Wu (The Amazing Race Asia), Wong Lilin (Mediacorp), Nico Chua (FM 933 DJ), Lunch Actually, Airtrade and The Eurasian Association (Singapore) etc, the name Lionel Chin certainly resonates in the digital industry.

5 key points the Speaker had mentioned during his presentation.

• Having a good portfolio is important to show the client your ability and what you are capable of.
• Twitter as a new media tool to promote business.
• Start as a freelancer first and build up the portfolio.
• Understand that the reality of the outside world in the working society is much more challenging compared to now.
• Understand the client’s needs.

3 things that has inspired you from this lecture.

• The websites that he designed inspired me to become a web designer to design webpages for others in future.
• The amount of money he earn inspired me.
• The speaker is so young yet he has his own company already.

Do you think its useful to have a guest speaker to share their expertise, experience and “Tips & Tricks” of the trade? (Explain)
Yes. It is useful as it’s a great way to bring up-to-the-minute expertise to a cohort-based course. Also, it enables the guest speaker to interact with the students. Students get to ask questions and they get their answer immediately. Through this lecture, we have learn about the problems that we will face and how he handled them one by one. This helps to get us ready to be in the working society and easily adapt to the new unfamiliar environment in future.

National Archives of Singapore

First established by an act of parliament in 1968. It was known as the National Archives and Records Centre (NARC) back then. With the addition of the Oral History Department, it was renamed the National Archives and Oral History Department in 1979. In 1993, the National Archives of Singapore was instituted by the National Heritage Board.

Who are they?
The National Archives of Singapore (NAS) houses the collective memory of our nation that allows current and future generations of Singaporeans to understand our different cultures, explore our common heritage and appreciate who we are and how we became a nation.

As the official custodian of the corporate memory of the government, NAS manages public records and provides advice to government agencies on records management. NAS is responsible for the collection, preservation and management of Singapore’s public and private archival records, some of which date back to the early 19th century.

NAS protects the rights of citizens by providing evidence and accountability of government actions. Its repository of archival materials makes NAS an important research centre for those in search of information about the country’s history. There are educational programmes and exhibitions to promote public interest in our nation’s history and heritage.

What do they do?

• Manages archival holdings. Acquires and preserves records of national and historical significance, records which document the rights of citizens and obligations of the government, and makes them available to the public.
• Conserves and preserves paper documents which have deteriorated.
• Implements effective records management for the civil service, and identifies important public records for permanent preservation.
• Reformats images of fragile paper records onto microfilm and digital media for effective long-term storage.
• Captures and preserves the moving images and recorded sound heritage of Singapore and organizes traveling exhibitions to bring our history to Singaporeans.
• Records memories of people who have influenced and participated in Singapore’s history through recorded interviews.

What type of services they provide?

-Records Management and Preservation

NAS implements an effective records management programme for the public service.

Vital records are scanned and output onto microfilms for preservation in climate-controlled conditions. Records with intrinsic value are carefully conserved. In 2003, NAS achieved ISO 9001:2000 certification in imaging and conservation services, in recognition of quality and operational efficiency in our key preservation processes.

-Providing Access

Public access to our collections is available through our Archives Reference Room or online at www.a2o.com.sg.

-Sharing Knowledge

NAS shares expertise with the community through consultation and training, and also conduct guided tours of NAS to educate the public on the nuts and bolts of archival work. We run regular seminars on using archival resources, records management and oral history methodology. NAS provides internships and courses on archives and records management.
-Archives Conservation Services

Archives Conservation Lab provides professional conservation services for paper records such as anoxic treatment, deacidification, leafcasting, mechanical cleaning, manual repair, tissue mounting, encapsulation and high value (rare) book binding using archival method. Our experienced conservators will be able to recommend the type of treatment(s) required and provide an estimation of the charges based on the physical condition of the records as well as offering advice on proper storage and handling methods.

Source: http://www.nhb.gov.sg/NAS/index.htm

Do they use any Social Media & Web 2.0 technologies for public communication & education?

Yes, they do.
They use the Access to Archives Online Singapore (a2O), a one-stop portal site on heritage information dating back to 17th century. a2O allows users to seamlessly search information across NHB’s various independent databases and view selected photographs, maps and plans, listen to oral history interview samplers and watch snippets of audio-visual recordings, round the clock. Information on recently acquired materials by NAS, Online Exhibitions, how to access our archival collection as well as student programmes are also provided.

Source: http://www.a2o.com.sg/a2o/public/html/#

Elements of the Communication Process and Shannon-Weaver model of communication

Communication is the process of sharing information and the elements of the communication consists of a message, a messenger, a receiver, encoding, decoding, channel.

The messenger encode his message according to his intent. The message will go through a channel such as email, face-to-face or phone conversation, letter, poster, presentation, etc. The receiver will then decode the message. However, interference might occurs during the process which misinterpreted the receiver of the intent of the messenger.

Examples of interference could be the message is unclear. Like usage of words, expressions or one’s accents can cause receiver to have trouble decoding the message.

The messenger’s state of mind could also be the cause. Emotions could probably change the way the message will be understood. The body language, tone or moods could cause misinterpretation too.

Another example would be the wrong channel that is used to convey the message of intent and content which they might get lost.

Shannon-Weaver model of communication

A creation by Claude Shannon which expands on Harold Laswell’s theory of communication which states:”Who (says) What (to) Whom (in) What Channel (with) What Effect”

Elements of the Shannon-Weaver model of communication: a source, an encoder, a message, a channel, a decoder and a receiver.
Three other factors: physical noise, semantic noise and feedback.

“The destination in the journey is the receiver. Without the receiver, there is no one to communicate with. But the destination is not the final step. The final step goes back to the start. The receiver provides feedback. This is the heartbeat of communication.”  -Derek Barry

Stats: Old Media’s Decline, New Media’s Ascent

Article: http://mashable.com/2009/01/29/stats-old-media-decline/

In this article, a survey was conducted among the adult internet users in US. The survey had shown that network TV news is the most widely-used form of media in 2008, followed by local newspaper and local TV news.The trends in the survey tells that media consumption habits are quickly changing as some new media are performing better than others. Example, for the past three years, blogs usage had increased by 11%, social networks usage by 9% and videocasts usage by 4%. Slower growers like RSS feeds usage increased by 2%, podcasts usage by 2% and business news sites usage remain the same. Traditional media on the other hand, some mediums are declining faster than others. Local Tv news usage had decreased by 12%. However, cable network news usage had increased by 2%.

There is a declining usage for traditional media and some form of new media are catching on faster than others.

It’s quite a surprise to see that new media such as internet new sites, blogs, or social networks were not at the top of the list. Although it shows a significant increase in percentage from year 2006 to 2008, traditional media like network TV news, Local newspaper and local Tv news were still widely used for the past three years as shown in the survey. Having said that, the percentage under traditional media had shown a slight decline of comsumption from year 2006 to 2008 while new media shows a significant increase in percentage. This shows that new media has slowly gained acceptance by the consumers.

In conclusion, new media might be a threat towards the traditional media economy as people are getting more dependent on the internet. New media might pose a serious challenge to traditional media in future. The print news declines while online news grow. The chart had sort of tells the story as traditional media usage had declined while on new media, it had show the increased of usage.

My New Media Terms

HI!

Hi. This is my first post.

I’m Carolyn from Temasek Polytechnic, currently studying first year in Interactive Media Informatics.I’m 18 this year.

I hate squeezing with people in the bus every morning on the way to school. I hate crowd! I have to take 3 buses to get to school. I want my own car. I’m going to get my car licence soon…