Twitter Posts - Affordances and Constraints

A twitter post is a piece of text from the website Twitter. A tweet consists of up to 140 characters and can include images and vines as well as utilise hashtags (e.g. #IAmACeleb) to join discussions on topics along with others using the same hashtag. The character limit both allows people to be blunt and to to the point, stopping walls of texts but at the same time stopping people from having longer and more in-depth discussions. Users can reply to someone's tweet and start dialogue with others being able to join at any point if they want. People can follow others, meaning that when they tweet it appears in their timeline. Tweets can also be retweeted meaning that the tweet reappears in the timeline of everyone who follows the person who retweeted it so they can also see the tweet. The downside to twitter is that some people can use it to abuse others and hide behind their profile so there are little to no real life consequences.

Transcript Excerpt Analysis

ENGLISH TRANSCRIPT EXCERPT ANALYSIS

‘bout 5 centimeters (3) then below the start of that line about towards the bottom just up from the bottom (2) draw (.) like (.)an opening or closing bracket but like horizontal and on it’s side, so like a curved line over the top’

At the start of this excerpt the speaker shows their local dialect in how they say ‘about’ in that they cut off the ‘a’ out of habit. This serves to quicken the rate at which they speak. It can also be inferred that as they are speaking informally to the other person as they are talking in their local dialect.

After this, there is a 3 second pause (which during a conversation is a considerable length of time) when the speaker waits for the other person to catch up to the point they have explained to, whilst simultaneously trying to think what to say for the next part of the explanation. The pause also allows the conversation to keep going, despite temporarily stopping, as the other person can catch up without having to interrupt the flow of the conversation by asking the speaker to stop. From that you can infer that the speaker is instructing/explaining the other person on how to do something as they are taking care to make sure the other person is able to keep up with what they are saying as well as from the nature of the way they are talking to the other person.

The speaker also uses fillers in their speech (in this case ‘like’), punctuated by short pauses, as they quickly think of how to explain the next part of the task to the other person coherently and so they can follow the instructions given, It also allows the speaker to utilise simile’s in their explanation. The example of this in this excerpt is ‘(.)like (.) an opening … bracket’ which gives more detail when explaining what the thing is and allows the other party to visualise what they need to do. The use of similes in this context (explanation) is that it makes the other person image in their mind which is easier than having to explain it with words.

Mini Saga

The dust floats aimlessly in the air, slowly coating everything in the room, keenly watched through the slither of light, the slow rhythm of his shallow breaths disturbing the stagnant air. The dust covered badge is the paper weight on the stack of colourful cards that came via the post.

Gods Among Us Commentary

English Gods Among Us Commentary

The audience I am aiming at is people with an interest with movies and that industry as well as young adults (20’s/30’s) as the topic of the article spans back 10/20 years to current times. I open my Gods Among Us article with a direct challenge to the reader in order to immediately engage them with the article and to urge them to continue reading. With the reader at this point captured by the article, I start to lay out my reasons for Tarantino being classed as a ‘God’ in the industry, which will hopefully evoke one of two responses from the reader, those being that they either;

1. Agree and continue reading because they agree.
2. Disagree and continue reading to hear my side of the debate to counter with theirs.

I continue with my argument by using repetition to force my point that this director has made many great films consecutively by saying ‘hit after hit after hit’, followed by pop-cultures references as evidence of this when I reference ‘Reservoir Dogs’ (which I in turn follow with the bold statement that it is heralded as ‘The Greatest Independent Movie of all Time’) and later in the article reference that the next title is the equally famous ‘Pulp Fiction’. Following the Reservoir Dogs reference I use a comparison of another famous director (Steven Spielberg) combined with pop-culture reference with ‘Jaws’. The intent of this is that it hopefully puts my argument into perspective to the reader. I close of the opening paragraph with a declarative statement to illicit more debate from the readers who disagree with me.

In the following paragraph I use the metaphor ‘Pulp Fiction … regarded as Tarantino’s masterpiece’. I use this metaphor as ‘masterpiece’ generally makes you think of art and all the connotations that art brings with it. I couple this more pop-culture references by mentioning actors ‘Samuel L Jackson, John Travolta and Bruce Willis’ who are all accomplished actors and show they type of talent Tarantino attracts. Using both of these techniques aides my case during this section of the article.

                                                                                     

Next paragraph, I acknowledge the opposing opinion to avoid a disconnect from the readers whose opinions on the subject disagree with those in the article, which keeps them engaged with the article, as the  articles objective is to persuade/argue my point. I also use jargon appropriate to the movie industry, when I use the term ‘Cinematography’ which refers to the way Tarantino films his scenes. This adds to the credibility and legitimacy to the argument I am making as it displays knowledge and understanding of the subject.

I begin to reach the conclusion of my article I give a brief overview of Tarantino’s career so far as further evidence of my case which contains small amounts of my own personal opinion to add personal feel to the article so the reader can visualise the other side of the debate. I then conclude the article by conceding ground to the opposing argument which lets the reader know that this argument put forward considers other opinions and is for open debate and not bias, one sided argument, meaning they are more receptive of the argument which helps achieve the purpose of the article which is to persuade the reader of my opinion.

Column Article

A love/hate relationship with Twitter

How one of the most useful things on the internet never ceases to annoy me.

[Picture of Twitter logo]
The source of my headache.

If thirty years ago you’d asked someone what the world would be like if anyone, anywhere could communicate with someone on the other side of the globe instantly, effortlessly and for free, you may have received a few reactions. Some may have said that it would help bring the world closer together, that with greater communication would bring greater understanding, leading to peace between contrasting groups around the planet. Or if you’re a cynic such as myself and you don’t believe any of that hippy nonsense, then you may have said something along the lines of ‘Great! More people to annoy me with stuff I don’t care about’. As of 2014, social networking site Twitter has upwards of 250 million people using their site to share the most mundane and uninteresting going-ons in their lives.

As much as I bash Twitter I still find myself oddly drawn to it as a service, as it is more the people that use it that give me headaches rather than the actual site itself. I find that if you can narrow down the people you see to those who share common interest as you it can actually be rather useful and interesting. Imagine the potential from having a group of minds focused around a single subject all contributing ideas and opinions from all over the globe.

                                                                                                

But no. We use this great advancement in communication in technology for stupid reasons like taking pictures of food or to moan about some of the pointless stuff we can. I’m all for having a moan as [SPOILER ALERT] that’s what 90% of this article is about, but complaining to a bunch of people sat in front their computer screens wont make the bus come quicker or make you that sandwich because your hungry.

The worst part is the hive mind Twitter users seem to have. When a hash tag comes up that requires people to even attempt to be witty, the average is five jokes. Five. Five jokes that are constantly repeated between twenty thousand or so people trying to scrounge retweets from others in an attempt to validate their poor attempt at comedy. After seeing the same awful joke for the twentieth time inside an hour, the urge festers inside you to put your fist through something. It’s like the people mindlessly copying and pasting it straight into my timeline never had the thought cross their mind that people may possibly have seen the joke before. It would be like if the Edinburgh Fringe had every comedian repeating the five jokes from the back of Penguin bars, its terrible.

On top of this is the Twitter hate hive mind that befalls people who excessively tweet stuff that (ironically) annoy the masses, honorable mentions going to TV presenter Piers Morgan and footballer Joey Barton, to the point that the people blindly sending hateful comments towards those half the time have no idea what they themselves are going on about. Even worse is the racial hate some get like ex-footballer Stan Collymore, the amount of racial abuse and abuse in general this guy gets is sickening. Admittedly he’s not a saint, far from it, but does the guy deserve to be living with hate more akin to the 60's and 70's than 2014?  No. And chances are half the people abusing the guy over Twitter would never even dream of saying such stuff to the guy in person.

Although this being said, being a football fan, Twitter allows for some great … ‘debates’, if you can call 19 year old's swearing and generally taking a shot at one another about anything other than the teams they support ‘debating’. I can. From a neutral point of view, it’s almost as entertaining as the football itself, some times more so.

I suppose the upside of Twitter is that any annoying crap that some one wants to say they have to be inside 140 characters, which makes it kind of bearable  but not by much. Tweeting about your mad Saturday night and wanting McDonalds to deliver will still make me hate you, just hate you in a small amounts of words.

The worst part is even though I've spent the last god knows how long explaining everything that I hate about Twitter, I can’t stop using it. As much as I complain about it, whenever I have a spare moment, like waiting for a bus or what ever, I whip out my phone and browse Twitter. I wish it was a simple as ‘stop using it’ as many have often said I should do when I bring up how much I hate it. It’s like a subconscious addiction to see what people deem important enough to tell me about.

In all though, I can see why Twitter has had such a wide appeal to people, even it does just boil down to everyone just spouting out what nonsense pops into their heads. Maybe I am being cynical for the sake of being cynical, if close to a quarter of a billion people worldwide use Twitter, it has to be doing something right. Maybe it’s everyone else that’s wrong.

I’m inclined to go with the latter.

Gods Among Us Article

Gods Among Us #10 - Tarantino

King  of Cult Cinema

You look at Quentin Tarantino’s filmography and I challenge you to find some one who is yet to see a Tarantino film. Although being relatively new to the scene, releasing his first feature length film in 1992, Tarantino has quickly shot up the rankings due to hit after hit after hit.

In 1992, Tarantino released independent movie Reservoir Dogs. Cult hit, regarded as ‘The Greatest Independent Movie of all Time’. What other director can pull that off in their first full length release? Even Spielberg had to make lack luster titles before Jaws. Perhaps its his unique and memorable characters or unique scene styles. One thing is certain; Tarantino is undeniably at the top of the list when it comes to creative genius.

You need look no further than the titles under his belt. Tarantino follows up the cult hit Reservoir Dogs with Pulp Fiction, another cult hit, regarded as Tarantino’s masterpiece. The hit film casts Samuel L Jackson, John Travolta and Bruce Willis, and expertly displays Tarantino’s unique style of cinema, which often divides opinion among cinema goers and film fans.

His is a style of cinema which you can see in a film and instantly recognize it as Tarantino’s. The long and detailed scenes of dialogue between few characters are both a source of praise and criticism from viewers; their opinions are irrelevant as no matter what it is this unique type of cinematography that make Tarantino films Tarantino films.

You can’t argue that he isn’t up there with the best, since 1992 Tarantino has released 9 feature films; two thirds of which contain star casts and are critically claimed as some of the best pieces of cinema in the last 20 years.

You can argue that Tarantino cannot stack up against goliaths such as Spielberg and Lucas, an argument that falls on deaf ears. When all have retired, then you can stack up merits, awards and following but few have produced such quality in such short time as Tarantino. Few can compare to his style and casting that always make for memorable scenes and characters. Only 20 years into his career and already at the top, we wait to see what new heights this great mind can reach.

Dramatic Monologue

[There is an old, tatty stained sofa in the background with a similarly stained pillow draped in a thin blanket. In the foreground is a small wooden table with a faded Nescafe jar containing a few copper coins, a stack of papers to the side. Underneath the dusty window stands a rusty radiator. Dangling above the table is an exposed light bulb. Stanley is sat on a wooden stool behind the table, with his back to a wall twiddling with a 2p coin.]

I did used to work y’know? I wasn’t a leech of society I am now.

[Flips 2p coin in the air and catches it]

It was nothing important, unless you can count binning gone off food and mopping up toilets for 16 hours a week important.

Not that I complained, I was thankful. Chucking rancid milk for a living? If you can call this living.

[Flips coin again]

I earned barely enough to keep me head above water. Rent in this part of town wasn’t too much, enough so that someone like me could afford a roof o’er me head. I can’t say I was happy with me situation but it could’ve definitely could have been worse. I had the bare essentials, roof, clothes, food and heating.

[He motions with his head towards the radiator opposite.]

I did a good job, I was a good employee. I was earning a crumb above the minimum wage, but at least I was earning something. I’m telling you, its all about who you know.

I’ve seen it happen to others. You slip up once, it’s no big deal. Twice? Suddenly ‘your service are no longer required’. Basically someone the manager knows needs a job and you’ve given them an excuse.

I mean, it was going in the bin anyway, I didn’t think it be a problem.

You’d think getting another job would be easier than getting your first job.

[Flips coin]

Nope.

[Catches coin, leans forward]

Nowhere will have me; my former manager won’t give a reference. Says ‘there’s no point’, says ‘a thief like me would be lucky’. They’ve always had it in for me. It’s funny, in a way it was them who drove me to it.

[Deposits coin into jar]

The ironic thing is I’m getting more now than I was when I was working. [Slight Chuckle] I can see why people wouldn’t work when you can make a living doing nothing. And the people like former me have to pay for it! All if have to do is leave the flat every week to deposit the cheque.

[Hacking cough]

                   

Been getting tired recently, I don’t know why.

Introduction To Me

Ethan Guppy – Series Review

After 16 series, the slice of life series ‘Ethan Guppy’ aired its final episode in April 2014 after plummeting ratings and viewer numbers caused the higher ups on Channel 4 to can the show, quoted saying ‘Well it just got boring in the end’. With the death of this titan we take a look at the last 16 years of Ethan Guppy.

The series’ first aired in May 1998, to get great expectations. Following the life of new young Bristolian Ethan Guppy, the series promised a brutally honest view of a lad growing up in modern day England.  However to the dismay of viewers, the first 4 seasons were arguably some of the worst TV ever broadcast in the Northern Hemisphere. Many complaints about the series were that for the first few seasons the main character, Ethan, never actually spoke, just a bunch of sounds as he crawled about his daily business, sleeping and defecating. There was no character development, little meaningful character interaction with only a few characters ever actually being present at all.

It wasn’t until the show entered its 12^th season that the show really came into its own, rewarding the loyal fans who had stuck around for 12 years of crap TV. Tonnes of new characters with varying importance to the series, all of whom our protagonist hated to some extent or another. Perhaps one of the greatest things about Ethan was his bitterness and cynicism in situations, seeing as how the main character and Sod’s Law have a great running relationship, as well as having relationships with some classmates whose hostility rivalled that of North Korea and the Western world.

It seems during these seasons the producers realised the untapped potential of the series, leading it down a more mature, blunt and crude direction. Once the series moved post-watershed midway into the 13^th season, the series peaked when its mid-season finale beat out the greatly anticipated Great British Bake Off final in October 2011, much to the dismay of host Paul Hollywood who (allegedly) said ‘What the f… is wrong with this country’. The increasing popularity of the series lead to guest appearance from Greg Wallace, when the main character runs into him in a kebab shop in Brislington village.

One of the greatest appeals of the series over its 16 year course was the variety of scenery that our protagonist visited, going as far afield as South East Asia and Devon, to exotic locales such as Indonesia, Thailand and Barnstaple. Although Ethan planned to go further both West, South and East, to the promising lands of Swindon, Nottingham and Mexico, the show has been axed before his dreams of being a globetrotter could be realised.

Ultimately, it was the lack of creativity in the series that lead to its untimely demise, as the show began to become too repetitive with the main character repeating the daily motions for the best part of 3 seasons as the main character settled into the routine of college. This was the final nail in coffin as viewers feared another 12 years of mind numbing boredom and left in the biggest mass exodus in TV since The Bill. It’s been a good 16 years of top television but this is the end for the series as there is a snowballs chance in hell that it will ever comeback.

4/10. Will binge watch when unemployed.

My Idiolect

My Idiolect

Do you have a favourite filler word that you use?

I use mostly sounds such as ‘uh’ and ‘um’ or a simple pause as I think.

Do you have special words for Good and Bad?

Good = ‘Alright’. Bad = ‘Bollocks’ & ‘Awful’ as well as other expletives.

Are there any words or phrases you avoid?

Words I hate hearing include words ‘YOLO’ and ‘Swag’, ‘YOLO’ has unfortunately worked its way into my vocabulary after using it too many times in an ironic way. Phrases I hate hearing include phrases like ‘Banter’d off’.

What is your favourite expletive and when would you take care not to swear?

I swear too often than is socially accepted, if I had to say my favourite word would 

have to be ‘shit’ as it can be used in multiple contexts and instances and still make sense. I would take care not to swear around young children.

Are there any words that you have trouble pronouncing?

Other than foreign words, I don’t really have any problems pronouncing words.

How do you answer the phone?

When answering the phone I just my normal voice.

Do you have any particular habits in conversation?

During conversation I usually just nod and make sounds like ‘mmm’, or if something is being explained to me I follow with ‘OK’.

How would you describe your voice?

My voice medium pitch with a feint west country accent.