Critical Report

If I really do have to be honest, I have to say that when I did choose Advanced Online Media as a module I thought it was going to be all theory and a bunch of essays to write. Never have I been more wrong. It was actually filled with interesting information about the evolution of social media and how everything behind it actually works. I was really excited when I heard we were going to have to create an app as part of of one of our assignments, it totally changed my view on the module as a whole and opened my mind to the topic. Little did I know about how much work goes behind all of those Buzzfeed articles and quizzes I spend so much time on, yet when I had to recreate my own version of a Buzzfeed article I enjoyed every single second of it.

The mobile app development assignment was obviously my favourite part of the module, as from the first day I got way into it and even got to contacting friends of mine who happened to be computer experts to try and create an algorythm that would help me show what I wanted to do with my idea. However, I don’t think I actually realized how much of a computer expert you have to be, leading me to a big disadvantage when I had to re-organize all of my thoughts on what I could do based on what I already had. I also really enjoyed working on a Buzzfeed-like piece regarding Leo DiCaprio’s oscar nomination as I found it was a quite enjoyable piece that could be written in a relaxed way and could feature videos, memes and gifs, which are some of my favourite content on social media as I believe they attract attention, especially on social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter. I also started understanding a lot more how important social media sharing is when it comes to readership. However, seen as I’m not a huge fan of social media except for Instagram, I found it hard to keep up, especially when it came to live blogging. Another thing I discovered is very useful when it comes to live blogging and sharing news is Storify. Although it is incredibly easy to use and contains an amazing number of news, I just didn’t feel right working with it as it is not really my style.

As part of my individual project I decided to take a view on body shaming, a topic that I found not only particularly interesting and deserving of attention, but which was being talked about a lot following Kim Kardashian’s nude selfie and that I was writing another piece about for a lifestyle blog. I developed it as a multimedia package as I found it was the form that would get the best of each other form and would be the easiest for people to follow and understand. I looked at the topic from different points of view, starting from body shaming and self-love in today’s society, following with how it is treated and dealted with on social media platforms such as Instagram and finishing with body shaming in relation to today’s celebrities. Although I already had quite some personal knowledge about it, I thought it would be interesting and useful to read the different reactions to the topic not only on social media but also on magazines and journal studies. Overall I was happy with what I wrote but I do wish that I had integrated more graphs and maybe even created a survey for readers to answer, promoting it on social media through the use of trending hashtags. However, I must admit that this was the consequence of changing my mind not only about the topic I wanted to write about, but also on the type of media I wanted to do it with. At the beginning, I had thought starting a challenge where I would try the 10 best pizzas in London in a day and live blog the challenge with comments, pictures and reaction videos. However, I later realized that this wouldn’t work as it would have needed the audience to already be numerous from the beginning so that they could follow the challenge and react live. This idea would have probably worked had a celebrity been doing it and besides I also thought about the fact that the challenge could truthfully be carried out in a number of days and be reported as “live”.

As for the mobile app development assignment, I knew what I wanted to do since the beginning. About the time we were told of the assignment and what it consisted in, I had watched the 1995 movie Clueless once again and the idea immediately hit me: what if I could come up with an app that recreated the computer generated closet that Cher Horowitz has in the movie? At first I thought it was a long shot from something that could actually be done, but the more I researched the topic the more I found out that similar software had actually been invented and put on the market. Quite a number of brands had created softwares to run on online shopping websites where one inserts their measurements and it allows you to get a rough idea of how the clothes would fit on you in real life. I also had a look at the different apps on my phone that had a similar objective, trying to understand what this app would need to have in order to distinguish itself from all the other on the market. Conducting my own survey really helped to understand what kind of characteristics I absolutely wanted on the app, also helping me make my case to why the act would be a succeed. All in all, I was happy with my presentation, despite all of the problems that occurred right before it and that led me to present with the powerpoint in my hand. What I had tried to do in the days before the presentation was trying to get everything straight so that I would then be able to answer all of the questions I would be asked about it. While I did give considerable thought to budget, I must admit that I should have researched better the campaigning by celebrities and the costs it would take for them to become an ambassador for the app. I was happy with the information I put on my pitch document as I covered the history of the company I would be selling the app to and what made it different from others, plus integrating the results to my own survey in order to support my thesis that the app would be successful, especially within a young audience if it was available for free with pro features available at an additional price.

Overall, I wish I could have enjoyed the module more. I didn’t feel connected to many of the topics being discussed in class, leading to do some slacking during the course of the semester. However I must admit that it did help me understand what kind of articles I want to write was I to ever end up working for an online publication or a blog. Also, I really did enjoy working on the app development project and I am currently thinking of working on it for some more time in order to try and develop it in real life maybe.