Media Chatter

How many people have been to a college campus and not had a single clue where to park? How many people have lived on or near a college campus and been troubled by noisy students or late night parties?

I believe we’ve all seen or dealt with one or more of these problems before, but what can be done to remedy them? Currently, I am a student at a university and I have discovered several ways that it is dealing with these situations.

Firstly, the school has parking spaces designated by color, so that if you are a student you may only park in certain color coded places. If you park where you are not supposed to the campus safety officers write you a lovely little ticket. Also, so they are not discriminating, there are designated faculty spaces as well. From what I have heard they are not afraid to leave tickets on faculty that park in student spaces. This may not be the most effective solution but it is a start. There is still much struggle to find a decent parking space.

Secondly, an agreement has been made between the neighbors and the campus that after 10:30 p.m. the soccer field lights would be turned off. That may seem like a small thing but the lights can be very bright and disturb several neighborhood houses. Also the lights from the tennis courts are supposed to be turned off.

The college has also maintained a set of sound ordinances for the students. I believe they cannot play loud music in rooms after 8 p.m. As of now, I don’t know of many students who throw parties on campus. Most leave to visit clubs and such for entertainment. You can judge for yourself if that is good or bad, but it seems to be working well so far. The campus stays fairly quiet from student troublemakers.

Overall, there are many different ways to handle the problems, but the best thing the colleges could do is to discuss things with their neighbors and try to come to some type of compromise.

Advertising these days are taking some of the bumps and bruises from people who believe that the advertisements are as much to blame as the products that they advertise for causing social ills.

A well-known case in point involving cigarettes and advertising is Camel’s old cartoon mascot Joe Camel. Joe Camel was created in 1989 by R. J. Reynolds for an ad campaign for their Camel cigarettes. They stopped the campaign in 1997 after years of accusations that Joe Camel was deliberately made to advertise Camel cigarettes to children. Even though the campaign has ended, a spoof of Joe Camel, Joe Chemo, details on what exactly the Joe Camel campaign did to children in influencing them to smoke. I will admit that when I was little and naive, I thought Joe Camel looked cool and asked for a cigarette, but my parents quickly set me straight on that.

During the Super Bowl a couple of years ago, there was a Budweiser ad with a horse farting and causing a stream of flame to go forth and singe one of the characters in the ad. Now, I think that was directly aimed to teenagers and college students, because that is what that kind of humor is most likely to be found funny back that age bracket. That same age bracket is the one that can’t drink legally or is barely the age that can drink legally. It does make one wonder, doesn’t it?

But even if there is an unobjectionable ad to most, someone is going to find a problem with it. Take the recent Apple Jacks ad campaign, with a “Bad Apple” trying to beat “Cinni-Mon” to a bowl of Apple Jacks. Because we all know that Apple Jacks don’t taste like apple. But an organization called the Produce for Better Health Foundation, says those ads will cause kids to dislike apples and not eat them. I’ll leave you readers to make your own decisions about that one.

I think people are more critical of advertising in this day and age because we are tired of falling for all the tricks of the trade. When you pop open a can of beer women in bikinis don’t suddenly appear. In reality a can of beer opens and all you see is a loud middle aged divorcé screaming about how much he loves you.

Advertising hasn’t the credibility it once had—back in a time where it was easy for people to believe what they saw. I think the downfall and the ultimate breakdown of credible advertising was caused by the Mentos (mints) commercials. These ads featured ordinary people in extraordinary situations. For example: a young man is on his way to an interview. He has on a nice suit. He decides to have seat on a bench but what he doesn’t know is that the bench has just been painted. There are now white stripes going up and down his nice suit. So, what does he do? He pops a Mentos mint into his mouth and gets the idea of sitting and laying down on the bench until the suit turns into a pin-stripe. He goes into the interview and wows them all. “Mentos, the fresh maker” appears at the bottom of the screen.

We all know these advertisements are stupid and sometimes will make us avoid buying that product. Advertisers are becoming more intelligent in finding their audience, catering to standards that aren’t as quirky.

Commercials constantly blast me with information, from when I first started to watch television, to this very day. The first commericals that I vaguely remember, came on Saturday Morning. Saturday Morning commericials were aired between cartoon episodes. I have a vague memory of enjoying watching the commericals because they advertised all the new toys that I wanted. Now, I realize that the commercials were targeted at children just like myself, who sat and watched early morning cartoons.

One of my most favorite advertisements was for the beer, Guinness. The Guinness advertisment was a commercial in England, and it was called “surfer”The commercial consited of 4 or 5 surfers that surfed a gigantic wave. The wave faded into beautiful white hourses running out of the sea. Along with the gigantic wave, and the impressive surfing, the music that accomponed the commercial was thrilling. Overall the commercial instead of blasting me information, blasted me away with amazement.

The commercials that I dislike incorporate the use of “ittritation advertising.” Usually these kinds of commercials last longer than average. This is why I dislike these commercials, because they last too long, and use repetitive lines to make the viewers try and buy the product.

Commercials have been, and still are, a big part of when I watch telelvision. Some commercials, like “Surfer” leave me in sheer amazment, others make me turn over the channel. Overall, they are a big part of our society, and influence us in what we buy.

Advertising is important to producers and companies for their products. There is also a time and place where this advertising should take place. Advertisements are made for certain age groups, genders, and cultures. So therefore advertising should be regulated for young children. There should be no reason for young children to be watching an advertisement for Trojan Condoms. The parents of young children should take a step into what their children are watching on television or looking through magazines. It is also their responsibility to know what their children are watching or reading in a magazine.
Sometimes you have parents that you can’t rely on to monitor their children. So advertising that is for children should be regulated to fit their appropriate age range. Television stations like Disney, PBS, and Nickelodeon should have their advertising regulated to make sure that children are watching things that are appropriate. Children don’t need to be seeing advertisements for cigarettes, alcohol beverages, and condoms. These are things that parents need to teach their children about and not let their children learn on their own. Young children are very naïve and would possibly try these things because they saw the advertisement on television or in a magazine. All in all, regulating advertising for children will provide a healthy lifestyle for them to grow and mature.

There are so many commercials that run in a year that I think are good commercials that get the point of the product across and then there are those commercials that just make you laugh. You see those and think what the heck was that and what was the point of that.
Some of my favorite all time commercials were the good ole Budweiser fogs. This campaign that Bud put out was not to inform the public about its beer but more less to get their attention and for entertainment. I thought they were awesome! Hearing and seeing three fogs sitting outside or a bar in the swamp saying “bud” “wei” “ser” just mad me laugh.
The best time for commercials and to see the newest ones is during the super bowl. Each year millions of people turn into the supper bowl to watch the football game. Advertisers know this and they pay millions of dollars for thirty seconds of air time for their product. Most company uses this time to show off the new products or the funny commercials and new campaign ideas for existing products.
Some companies such as Pepsi has the ad campaigns from the past on their websites and they even have a place to view their existing campaign ads and commercials.
Commercials and ad campaigns over the years have gone from informational to wild and outrageous ones. Some commercials have nothing to do with the product at all or some very little but they get the message across to the public. Companies will pay millions to get their tv ads on big time watch shows such as the super bowl, just for 30 seconds or so.

I love to watch television, but I usually do not enjoy most commercials. One that I do enjoy, however, is the Doublemint advertisement. When I was a child, this is the first ad that I remember seeing. I always thought that the “Doublemint Twins” were pretty and that the tunes were catchy and cute. Now, the new “Doublemint Twins” are back on a new commercial, and this commercial is my favorite one now. The tunes are still catchy and make one remember what the advertisement was about. You will being singing the song all day long.

Aspects about a commercial that I look to for enjoyment include a catchy slogan, a memorable song, and/or a witty or humorous line. If I enjoy a commercial the first time I see it, then I will be less likely to turn the channel when it comes on. Otherwise, I will flip through the channels until all commercials are finished on the program I am watching. Commercials that I enjoy are right to the point and leave no room for confusion. To me, a commercial can make or break a product or service. Companies spend a lot of time and money on advertisements, but I will not spend my time or my money on them if they get on my nerves or don’t even catch my attention.
Some commercials absolutely get on my last nerve. One such ad is Southern Window Manufaturing Co.’s. This is a local commercial that I see when I am at home in Pickens, but it is so boring. Whoever is speaking in the commercial is so boring and not enthusiastic at all about his or her job. Why should viewers be excited? Anyways, this commercial is too long and too boring to be on television. This company needs to stick to billboards.

Commercials can make or break a product or service that a company is offering. I enjoy commercials with a catchy slogan, a memorable song, and/or a witty or humorous line. If I enjoy a commercial the first time I see it, then I am less likely to turn the channel when it comes on again. If I dislike the commercial, I will channel surf until all commercials are finished on the program I am watching. Companies spend a lot of time and money on commercials advertisements, but I will not spend my time or my money on their products or services if it does not even interest me enough to watch their commercials. Commercials are important to both the company and the customer.

Most people despise commercial breaks, but commercials have always been one of my favorite things about watching television. I like thinking about the creative ways an item or place can be advertised and sold to the audience. I also like analyzing the different advertising techniques commercials use.

When I was younger, there was a particular commercial that I loved. It was an advertisement for Coca-Cola. It took place on a beach. A little boy was drinking a coke out of a glass bottle with a straw; he got down to the last drop and could not stop sucking on the straw. He wanted everything that was in the bottle! He sucked himself into the bottle. His sister ran over to the bottle, in which his brother was stuck in, picked it up, and called to her mother, “Mom…he did it again!” This is the first ad that I can remember, and probably my favorite. I liked it because it was clever and humorous.

The ad that I dislike the most is probably the string of commercials for the TRUTH campaign against tobacco companies. I don’t dislike them because I support cigarettes, because I don’t, I just don’t understand many of them. I don’t like commercials that are too deep, or in depth, to the point that I cannot understand the meaning.

Many people, including myself, are critical of advertising because it seems like the goals of most ads are to get us to conform to what our society wants us to be as consumers. There are also so many bad advertisements that actually make bad activities look like good things to do. There are many ads that portray premarital sex and just having sex “anywhere, any time” as being okay. There are ads that actually seem like pornography instead of advertising, such as Hardee’s ad that shows a half-naked Paris Hilton washing a car in a rather inappropriate manner . These types of ads are just gross. In my opinion, they shouldn’t be on television. Many people are also critical of advertising because ads do not reflect us as individuals. Ads just try to sell their products to us. Advertisers only care about pulling us in and pressuring us to buy their products.

There are commercials for certain brand name jeans, like Levi’s and Wrangler , for instance. What if some people want to buy Wal-Mart or K-Mart jeans? Some people just don’t have the money to spend on more expensive name brand jeans or any big name product for that matter.

Most teenagers today are greatly influenced by advertising. Some of them feel that they have to wear name brand clothes and shoes to fit in with their peers. They are pressured by big names like Abercrombie & Fitch and American Eagle , for example. Teenagers should feel comfortable wearing whatever they want, whether it is a big name or not. They shouldn’t be looked down upon if they’re not wearing all the “trendy” name brand clothes and have other name brand items.

I feel comfortable using generic brands because I know I am saving money and I am not conforming to what advertisers or American society expects me to be. I choose for myself what products I will buy. I know that some big name brands are better than generic and I use them based on quality, but I never buy a name brand item to impress others and make myself look good. That should not be the case.

In conclusion, some advertising today has gone too far in trying to shape people into what society wants them to be. I am sure that there are plenty of young girls who feel they need to be super thin like the models and actresses in ads. There are also many people who see the condom ads, the beer commericals, and cigarette ads and think all of it is appealing. Some ads distort the truth and some are only trying to bring conformity to America. Every individual should be careful about advertising and he or she should make their own well-informed decisions about the products they want to buy.

I would have to say that my earliest recollection of watching a television show commercial would have to be the commercials for Toys R Us. As a child I would sing the little jingle about being a Toys R Us kid. I can remember seeing all the different toys and telling my parents that I wanted almost all the toys that they showed on the commercials.

Right now, my favorite ad is the one that comes on Direct TV that advertises for the NFL Sunday ticket. The commercial shows overweight, middle-aged men acting and singing about the NFL Sunday ticket as if they are in a musical. It is my favorite right now because I think it is so funny and a wonderful parody for Disney movies where there’s always a lot of singing.

I would have to say that the ads I despise the most are the ones that advertise Gieco insurance. I hate that little gecko and I’m getting tired of hearing people say, “but I saved a lot of money by switching to Gieco”.

How many people think that commercial breaks in a television program are completely stupid and annoying? How many of us would like to not have to watch any commercial ever again in our lives? Do you think most Americans feel the same way?

Somehow some people have gotten it into their heads that commercials are a bad thing and that we shouldn’t have to deal with them during our shows. They seem to have gotten the idea that they own the shows and the TV networks and that they should be obedient and not interrupt ‘our’ shows. It doesn’t matter if they bother other people’s shows but never should they dare to put a commercial in the middle of ‘our’ show. I have to admit that sometimes I am guilty of that feeling as well, but we must understand that while ads are annoying they are essential to the continuation of the shows we have come to know and enjoy. If they took the ads out of public television it would change the entire industry.

Currently, some commercials are more popluar than the shows they are placed in. There are places on the internet like clipland.com who store old commercials in a database for people to download and watch if they want to. Some of my friends have even jokingly started designing their own commercials and or ads.

Commercials, as annoying as they can be, are necessary to our style of TV watching. If we want the shows that we like to continue we must bear with the pain of commercials.

The only commercials I paid attention to when I was younger were the ones that advertised toys! My favorites were My-Size Barbies, Dolls that did weird things, and Power Wheels. I really like watching these commercials. When it got close to Christmas time, I would sit down in front of the TV and wait for the commercials and make a list of everything I wanted. It seems like commercials to a very good job at targeting children.

My favorite TV ads today are the Serta commercials, with the little counting sheep. I think I am attracted to these ads because they are animated and cute, and they are also fun to watch. It’s not just a bunch of information about a product, it’s actually entertaining. The ad itself doesn’t make you think much about the product, but one day when you need a new mattress you will probably think of Serta.

My least-favorite TV ads are the Master Card commercials, the “Priceless” ads. I particularly dislike these, because it seems like they run out of ideas. Each new one gets worse and worse and sometimes they don’t even make sense. Also, they just get annoying. I really really don’t like these ads. They advertise “There are some things money can’t buy, for everything else, there’s Mastercard.” It feels like they are just trying to play on sentiment and the whole idea of their ads seems rather deceptive to me.

There are a lot of commercials on the television today, some ok, and some not so good. I don’t really remember too many commercials from when I was young, except for those that were advertising dolls and other toys that I thought I had to have.American Girl Dolls.

My absolute favorite commercial right now is the commercial for the new hummers (H3).Hummers. There is like this huge monster that comes doen from no where and places the “H3″ on the ground and lets it go like it’s one of it’s children. The idea is that the hummers are so strong and can endure a lot like monsters are thought to be.

There are plenty of commercials that I don’t particuarly like so much. Just about all the car dealership commercials irriate me the most. For example, Fairway Ford.
Of course there are many other commercials that don’t appeal to me what so ever, but the dealerships to me are the worst.

One of my earliest memories of commercials was an ad plugging the purity of South Carolina’s drinking water. The whole commercial is a dialogue between an inquisitive little girl and an informative father-like man. It is pretty low-budget production. The conversation, done in voiceover format, is set to random nature scenes like lazy streams and brilliant waterfalls. I remember how much I used to despise that commercial, mainly because of the little girl’s voice. I mean really, I was a young pre-pubescent boy who already loathed females. Once the annoying voice was added, I couldn’t stand it.

Today, one of my favorite commercials is promoting Dr. Pepper. The commercial is set to a song that repeats “I would do anything for love” about 4 times. Each time, a guy is shown doing something for his girlfriend that only guys that are “in love” do like buying tampons. Of course, he is drinking a Dr. Pepper the whole time. Towards the end of the commercial, however, she tries to have a sip of his Dr. Pepper, and he runs out of the house, leaving her along on the couch while the lyrics to the song say “But I won’t do that.” The commercial is hysterical, especially for us guys with girlfriends who would do “anything for love.”

In turn, commercials that I tend to dislike are low-budget, local commercials. They tend to be fuzzy and a lot louder than other commercials, so when Jimmy is advertising his fishing store all you care to think about is locating the remote so you can turn him off. The same goes for car dealerships.

My earliest recollection of watching a television commercial would have to be when I was in elementary school. During the summer my sister and I would stay with my grandparents while our parents were at work. While there, we would see the Kool-Aid commercials come on TV. Back then the commercial consisted of a dancing Kool-Aid pitcher dancing around during the summer with kids playing in a sprinkler. That commercial always got me and my sister every time. We would talk about how much it made us want some Kool-Aid. The first thing we would do when walking into the grocery store with our mother would be beg for some Kool-Aid. However, since then my tastes in commercials have changed dramatically. My favorite commercial these days would have to be the Meow Mix commercial for cat food. I love watching the little kittens sing. It’s just so adorable. Since seeing the commercial Meow Mix is usually what I buy for my cat. I guess that commercial worked on me too! My least favorite commercial is the Verizon commercial. The one with the man walking around saying “Can you hear me now?Good.” about eighty bazillion times. It is so annoying and I do not like the repetition. I get it the first time. They need not tell me the same things over and over again. There are some ads that appeal to me and others that do not as with anyone else.

The first novel sized book that I ever read was The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien and it spoiled the way I read books from then on.
While I was still in the sixth grade my older brother got me hooked on reading fiction/fantasy books. At first and for a long while the only books I read were by Tolkien, but my library slowly expanded to encompass not only tales of Middle Earth but random authors that not many people have heard of like Niel Hancock. I can still remember the times when my mother would take me to the used book store in the Marketplace shopping strip. We would look through old books that seemed much older than me and also the shop had a side business of selling really awsome fudge. We went for more books to add to my collection but always seemed to leave with some fudge.

The books I like to read now are pretty much the same. I don’t really like main stream books because they tend to be mostly hype. For a good read I have to be able to completely suspend my disbelief and that depends largely upon the authors writing ability and style. There are several books that I’ve read that I completely hated the story and thought it total rubbish, but I still read it all the way through because the author had a really good style of writing and description. At this point I am trying to analyze the styles of writing I enjoy and see if I can mimic them in my own tales. I am constantly on the lookout for more authors who I enjoy reading, but I rarely have the chance to read anything now. Every now and then I look at stores like
Books a Millionand Amazon.comfor books by the authors I like.

I think my favorite genre for reading would have to be fantasy, but that is mostly because I haven’t found any sci-fi books that interested me.

It is hard to believe that book sales haven’t decreased that significantly because I personally don’t read as much as I watch television and movies. There is still hope for humanity—we are not yet overcome by the electronic age. We may spend our lives working towards attaining the finest electronic devices but there is still an urge to use our imagination. That is the defining purpose of the written page: to send the imagination of the reader into new realms of the brain. When I do read I find my mind works on a totally different level as opposed to watching television. Television is passive and reading is active. I remember reading 1984 by George Orwell and being immerse in the dark world that Orwell created. My imagination went wild and I found that when I finished the book I was disappointed.

Books are also a great source of information. Television offers part of the true and a book reveals the whole. A chef on television only has a few minutes to teach a recipe but a cook book is there indefinitely; there to guide with patience. A film can depict what is happening to a character but a book can dig around in his/her soul.

There will always be an audience for books. Anyone able to sit down with a cup of coffee and a table to prop your feet up can appreciate the written word.

My earliest memories of reading books was when I was around the age of 4, but my parents read to me even before I can remember. Picture books and books that make sounds are the ones that I started liking first. It was so exciting as a child being able to read my first book to my parents. It took me so long to get through one book, but my parents were so patient with me. As a child, books with colors and pictures were my choice. I would, literally, flip the pages of the book to see if it had pictures in it before I would begin to read it. If it did not contain such, I would choose another one.

Now, I enjoy reading books too. It is hard to find time to read in this stage of my life. School is nothing but books, and so sometimes the thought of reading turns me off. The last book I read was a devotional book titled, Purpose Driven Life. It was suppose to take 40 days to read it, but the book was so wonderful that I completed it in a shorter amount of time; not only that, but I also read it for a second time. My pleasure reading is found in articles out of magazines as well. Magazines and books are both great to read because they provide you with different things. Magazines are more current, whereas most books can stand the test of time.

Moreover, book reading can relax me and help me to take my mind off the stress of school and work. I need to find more personal time to read books, and I think this blog has motivated me to do just that. Here is the website for Purpose Driven Life

As a child, I love to read. I especially loved reading the Boxcar Children series. I remember that when my teachers would take my class to the library that I would always try to find a Boxcar Children series book. I just remember that I always loved going to the library more than I liked going to art or P.E. My parents made me read after school everyday and for an hour during the summer. So, as a child I always had to read, but as I grew older I started to like reading. Now, I love reading. I am constantly reading something, besides textbooks.
I love reading any kind of suspense novel or anything by John Grisham. In fact, one of my favorite stores is Barnes and Noble. I also like to read books that I can learn something from. Not necessarily school type knowledge but knowledge that is useful in everyday life. I like to read books that relate to whatever situation I am in at the time. For example, last summer when I went on vacation I read, Sisterchicks Do the Hula, which is a book about to best friends that go on vacation. I like books because they provide an escape from day to day life. Books are one of the best things to buy because when you really like them you can pass it along and share it with your friends. In fact, that is how I hear about a lot of the good books that I read are just from friends.

When I was younger books never really interested me. In school, when teachers use to assign book reports, I use to look them up on the internet, or simply not read them, and catch up what had been going in class discussions. Usually, during “reading time”, I used to sit with a book on one page, and daydream. That was how I dealt with books, until recently.

Daydreams, and internet searches for sparknotes soon faded away and eventually stopped, as I read my first book that was not forced upon me by school teachers. Instead I was given a book, it was called the Alchemist by Paulo Choelho. As nights went by sitting up in bed with a night light reading, I soon realized that I loved it, and soon bought other books, which include Taking On the World by Ellen McArthur
, and Harry Potter by J.K Rowling.

The above books, I read purely for pleasure. In fact, I am reading the forth Harry Potter book right now called, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, which is throughly enjoybale. The reason why I have picked up reading books, is because they seem to be an escape goat from reality. The books let me escape from being a work and athletics. For maybe ten minutes a day, I read. In this ten minutes, my mind is relaxed and revitilizes itself for whatever the day brings. Overall books are becoming a bigger part of me, they relax and help me to escape from being a student athlete and the stressors that it brings.

Honestly I am not a big of books I really don’t read for pleasure, but mostly read when I have too. My first experience with books the Casey at the Bat, a baseball book about a slugger coming to the plate with a chance to win the game for his team. Casey takes three mighty hacks and strikes out. The book was one of my favorite books of all time. That tells you how much reading I have done over the past years.
I did read some books for pleasure but never was able to stick with them to end. I did however read a book called Where the Lilies Bloom. The book is about these kids whose father died and the older daughter takes it upon herself to look after her brother and sisters. I read the book for class and after we got done reading it we wrote and performed a play on it.
For another class when I was little I read the book Where the Red Fern Grows which is about this kid and his hunting dogs. That book brought a tear to my eye when I read it. He loses his dogs when a mountain lion attacks him one night on a hunt. The story is a great story and really enjoyed it.
As far as me reading for pleasure, I really don’t do that. Reading is just not something I enjoy doing. I have never really looked or tried a book for pleasure and finished it.

I have always loved books. As a baby inside my mother’s womb, I was read to and as a child, I read all the time and continue to read today. As a little child, my parents read Bible stories to me and such books as The Little Engine that Could , Corduroy , The Little Mermaid, and the Sesame Street books.

Later on in elementary school, I read books from such series as The Baby-sitters Club , R.L. Stine’s Goosebumps , and the American Girl series. In middle school, I read books of the Fear Street series that were also written by R.L. Stine. I also started reading books by mystery and suspense writer Mary Higgins Clark. I really enjoyed her books because they kept me on the edge of my seat, wondering who the killer could be in each book.

In my freshman year of high school, I started reading the Bible for myself. I only knew a few Bible stories and a few familiar Bible verses, but otherwise I did not have a clue about the Bible. I read it all the way through and still read it today. In high school, I also started to read more literary novels like The Scarlet Letter, Their Eyes Were Watching God, and To Kill a Mockingbird. I was required to read these certain titles for my English classes, but I enjoyed them tremendously. I read many other classic novels on my own due to this interest. Besides these books, I read all of the Left Behind novels that are about the end of the world according to the book of Revelation in the Bible. These books are my absolute favorites, besides the Bible itself.

Today I continue to read the Bible and classic literary novels, but I also read political books now. I have read Hillary Clinton’s Living History and several of Bill O’ Reilly’s books, for instance. Right now I am reading God and George W. Bush. It is about Bush’s political life, but also about his relationship with God and how he makes decisions about his life with God’s help.

I enjoy reading because it is stimulating and thought-provoking. Every book contains so many thoughts and ideas about life. Books can help us to be better-educated citizens and look at the world in different ways. Books are exciting, interesting, and educating. I believe they are the solution to ignorance. Books expand minds, and in my eyes they will always prevail over television. Without books, I would not be able to survive.

Some of my earliest recollections of books include going to the library with my mom and brother. My mom would read to us often and made sure that we read everyday by making us read at least 30 minutes a day over our summer breaks from school. We had lots of books at our house I loved to read. Many times I would opt to stay inside and read rather than going outside and playing with all the other kids in our neighborhood. Some of my favorite books included: Where the Sidewalk Ends, The Very Hungry Caterpillar and Boney Legs.

Back then I loved to read for pleasure, but once I started school and reading became mandatory I slowly began to dread reading. I am slowly getting back to reading for pleasure when time permits. When reading for pleasure I enjoy any books by the authors Zane or Toni Morrison and I also enjoy reading autobiographies.

Book It… That’s all that needs to be said about my earliest recollection of books. Book It was a phenomenon I experienced when I was a ripe little guy in primary school. Somehow, Pizza Hut had teamed up with schools to form a program that gave kids an incentive to read. The way the program worked was a student got to pick five books, length was irrelevant, and read them throughout a certain time period. The reward was free pizza from Pizza Hut. At the end of the year, the class or student who had read the most books received a pizza party in class. A pizza party was a good as it got in the primary school. Those words were gold. Early on I loved to read, for the pizza or the knowledge who knows—probably the pizza, but I actually read a lot.

Until the 3rd or 4th grade when it became the teacher’s fashion to make students read longer books. We were shocked when we were introduced to these “novels” as they were called. Not only was Book It out the window, but reading these books was mandatory. And on top of that we had to write book reports, which who knew what that meant. I was traumatized. My happy world of The Berenstain Bears and pizza parties was stolen and replaced with Snot Stew. From that moment on, my demeanor was to read as little as possible. My annoyance with forced reading only intensified when I moved up to middle school. The book reports became more complicated. Instead of 75 words about the book, I had to write 150 words and a poem about the book, put it in a cereal box, and decorate it with something representative. The only thing I hated worse than reading at this point was being crafty.

High school was much worse. Not only did I loath reading by now, but I was introduced to the concept of summer reading. It’s as if the school board held a meeting solely devoted to creating ways to make students hate books, libraries, librarians, etc. Summer was to be a time of liberation, when children could roam free, unencumbered by thoughts of anything related to the months of August through June. Well, at least that’s what it’s supposed to be. I despised summer reading. I didn’t do it during the summer—that wasn’t even an option. I did it during the first week of school. I just felt bad all summer about putting it off. So either way, my summer was ruined.

Today, no thanks to the brilliant minds that invented summer reading, I enjoy reading for pleasure. When I finally came to the realization that reading, when unforced and with interesting and relevant subject matter, was enjoyable, I abandoned my declaration to stop reading. I actually spent money on books—a revolutionary concept. Now I enjoy reading books on worship, finances, the progressive church, leadership, and even dating. The very thing that once represented all that was evil and wrong with the world has become something that I trust to help me become a better person.

My earliest recollection of books comes from bedtime when I was little. My mom or dad bought my brother and I the Sesame Street book collection and they would read them to us at bedtime. After that, I started reading Dr. Suess Books on my own. The first one that I remember reading on my own was The Cat in the Hat. I loved to read, and began reading pretty much whatever I could find.

During elementary school I started reading The Babysitter’s Club books. I absolutely fell in love with them and still have hundreds of them today. Also in elementary school, my school started participating in the Accelerated Reader program, in which you read books from a huge list of titles and take comprehension tests to earn points, which you spend on toys in the “Accelerated Reader shop”. In late elementary school and through middle school I became interested in the Dear America book series, and obtained a large collection of those as well. I also started to read books by R.L. Stine, which sparked an interest in mystery and thrillers. In school, I would be the kid that got in trouble for reading a book instead of paying attention in class.

Now, I still enjoy reading very much, but as I entered high school I got very busy and the only books I really had time to read were the ones that were required; but I found that I enjoyed these books as well. Some of my favorites today are Wuthering Heights, A Lesson Before Dying, and The Secret Life of Bees.

The availability of cable and television has made a decrease in book titles available each year. I believe that this decrease of books is due to the technology of television and cable. The youth today would much rather watch television than read a book. I know when I was growing up I would rather watch television than sit down and read books. I believe that the youth today is very lazy compared to other generations. We have many advances in television and educational cable shows that help younger children. Television stations such as PBS and the Family Channel provide much educational experience for children.
Books offer a gateway into another world for some people. Books let peoples imaginations grow and explore different things. Books offer a way for people to be able to read. There are some people today that don’t even know how to read. I think books can be very educational and have many interesting things to learn from them. I always remember reading books for classes during school and getting so much out of them. Books offer leisure and pleasure when you can’t be right in front of a television. I think books offer more of an insight than watching television. As any parent would say don’t watch too much television it will rot your brain. We should get younger children today to start reading more books and watching less television.

I believe that there are quite a few reasons that TV and cable haven’t substantially decreased the number of new book titles available each year. Books offer certain things that television does not. Books are lightwweight and for the most part rather small. They are more portable than television. Books provide entertainment with less hassle. Books do not require cords, antennas, or outlets for power. A person can simply pick one up and dive into entertainment and/or learning. Bo0ks are also less expensive. A book can be purchased from Barnes & Noble for extremely cheap.The price of the average book is nowhere near that of a TV.

Books can be read on your own time. You pick the book up when you have time to read it. You can fast forward or rewind the book as you please. This can not be done with most regular TVS. The rise of systems such as TIVO may soon put an end to this benefit of books though. These systems allow you to record, rewind and fast forward live television. TVs are also getting more and more portable everyday with Apple’s new ipods as well as other innovations.

Another reason books are not as good as TV is that they have more “time” and “space” to include things. This means that a story you read in a book will be more in detail than that same story on TV because of time and acting issues. It was take hours and hours to completely act out every line than can simply be read in a book. For this reason, movies are often nothing like the books that they are based on.

For these many reasons I do not think that TV has overcome books yet, however I do see the possibility of it happening in the future with TV’s audience getting larger because of new happenings and book audiences getting smaller because less and less children are reading.

When I was young, I always had people reading to me, interesting stories, to me. In sunday school, I would always hear a good story and loved to listen, I didn’t really zone out any. I also didn’t mind reading interesting stories and even as I grew older I didn’t mind reading the things that I wanted to read.

Now today, I am forced to read stuff I care absolutely NOTHING about. I am made to read boring class material on history and other things that really don’t interest me. So whenever I get the chance to read something I enjoy reading, I appreciate it even more now, whether it be in a magazine, a book, or whatever.

I like to read romances when I do read a book. I’m not really in to all these deep books that talk about stuff that’s not imaginable. I love the book The Notebook, which has now been made into a movie. The Notebook. I love this book, because it too, is a romance and is my favorite. There are many other books that I “enjoy” reading, but class material has never appealed to me.

My earliest memories of books were ones that Mom would read to me every day when I was very little. The particular one that I can remember was one that was titled Baby Animals. The small cardboard book was adorned with pictures of various baby animals (every one of them quite cute too ) and I loved it because Mom would read it to me the exact same way with the exact same silly inflections in voice every time. Once I was able to read by myself, I also read two cardboard books with side handles, whose themes were an airplane trip and a car trip. I don’t remember the titles anymore, but those are the breaks.

These days, I have a huge number of books. Hardbacks, paperbacks, encyclopedias, biographies, World Almanacs, all the Harry Potter books, tens and tens of sports and politics books, and various others. I read a whole lot for pleasure and my very favorite kind of book to read is any book about baseball; that is my absolute favorite topic in the world of pop culture. An exemplary book for the genre is The New Historical Baseball Abstract by baseball statistican Bill James. I haven’t read that book through from start to finish yet because that is a lot of information to take in, but I hope to do that someday.

I also have a lot of books on politics as well. I don’t want to wear my politics on my sleeve, but I don’t think it will hurt to mention that I have both of Rush Limbaugh’s books The Way Things Ought To Be, and See, I Told You So.

I will never get tired of books. In fact, I will rue the day if books end up becoming obselete, because there is nothing like reading a book.

I read the magazine, Highlights, all through my childhood. I was always so excited when the magazine would come in the mail each month. Highlights had all kinds of cool stuff inside. It taught how to make crafts, that never really turned out like the pictures, poems, and stories about everything under the sun that a kid growing up should know. I love the pictures that you had to find all the hidden objects in, that was my favorite part. I loved reading Highlights as a child.
Now, I love to read Shop etc. and O Magazine. They are both two of my favorites. Although I don’t have a subscription to either, I buy both pretty regularly. I love Shop etc. because it actually features stores that I can shop in, not just pricy NYC boutiques that hardly anyone can afford. It also shows all the new trends of the season. Then, I love to read O, just because I admire Oprah a lot. I love many of the articles she feature in her magazine and think that you can actually learn something after your through reading it. For me, if I am going to take the time and money to buy a magazine and then sit down and read it, I want it to be something meaningful or helpful. I think that is definitely reflected in the type of magazines that I choose to buy.

My earliest memory of reading a magazine was along time ago but in third grade. The magazine was called the Weekly Reader. I remember reading the magazine and answer questions at the end of it. We had to read these magazines until I left elementary school in the sixth grade. I hated that magazine I never liked reading it at all. They were educational magazines that we had to read useless information and answer questions to see if we comprehended it.
Now first enjoyable experience with magazines was SI for Kids. It is a kid’s version of Sports Illustrated. This magazine I thought was great. I had built in sports cards of athletes and each edition had special section for the athlete featured in it with a huge poster. The magazine also had little games and a kids section where you could follow outstanding kid athletes. The magazine also had section where it had action shots in funny positions and people wrote commentary for the photo’s which I always enjoyed. At the end of the magazine they feature a comic every time and he always got into trouble with some sports stunt.
My first experience with comics was not a good one but when I got my own subscription to a good quality enjoyable magazine in SI for Kids.

Muckraking was performed by journalist who got there hands dirty, and dug deep for the inside scoop of the story. The performance of muckraking was ideal for magazines that wanted to sell their magazines to the working class people because muckrakers challenged the government and America’s countries system. They pin pointed the weakness and highlighted the problems within the government. An example of a magazine that muckraked is “Mc Clure’s Magazine,” in this magazine stories were told of “political dishonesty in the city governments and the problems of labor and working people.”

We then can derive that factual stories of the society attracted people in the society to read the magazines. Thus, the new challenging stories increased sales because the magazines contained factual stories that involved the readers.

The reason why muckraking stories are missing in magazines today, is because we have new worldly issues, which include, the Iraqi War, Hurricanes, and poverty in other countries. Thus, why should we fill our pages with dug up stories? The answer is that we should not. In today’s magazines people want to invest in a magazine to read about their country, their hobby, or they simple read to learn more about themselves. This is then the reason why muckraking takes a back seat in today’s magazines.

The earliest magazine that I can remember reading was back when I was six or seven years old and living in England at Upper Heyford Air Force Base during the time Dad was stationed there during the Gulf War. The first magazine of my own, I believe, was from a pile of throwaway magazines in the post office. It was a Nintendo Power. I had been playing Nintendo for a while and I had figured out, probably from my babysitter’s teenage son’s issues, that there was a magazine about Nintendo games, my favorite thing to do. So, I grabbed Nintendo Powers when what was inside interested me and I eventually got a subscription for it when I was much older. I have never thrown any of them away, although Mom threw away those first few because they had fallen apart. The oldest ones I have right now are coverless 1994 issues featuring Super Mario All-Stars and Ken Griffey, Jr. presents Major League Baseball, both for the Super Nintendo.

My first subscriptions were for Beckett Baseball, the best magazine for baseball card collecting, and the now-defunct Game Players, a video game magazine featuring reviews for more games on more systems (I got both of the subscriptions in the early 90s. The video game magazine was more mature-themed than Nintendo Power, which is why I kept reading it for a while until I got bored of it.

These days, I have an on-and-off subscription to Game Informer magazine, I collect Althon Sports annuals, and I get the occassional Nintendo Power or Beckett Baseball if any articles interest me.