1. Your Media Diet

1. Your Media Diet

Your task for this assignment is to record your media consumption for 5-7 days straight. Take note of how many hours you spend reading, watching television, using the Internet, or engaging with any other forms of media. While you do not have to give an exhaustive account of every TV show you watch or website you visit, do note what types of books, TV, websites, etc. that you consume. You can also describe which particular shows you watch or sites you visit daily/on a regular basis. After listing your media diet for each day of the week (length of time, types of media), you should provide a brief analysis. Questions you might address in your analysis include: What does your media diet say about you? How do you think it might compare to the media diets of other people your age? What might your media diet suggest about American society more broadly? Are there changes you'd like to make regarding your media consumption? How might your social location influence your media intake? 




Monday: I woke up at 6 am this morning because of stuff for my 8 am class. Checked facebook and then my email. 
            Around 12 pm I checked Fb on my phone because although I turn on silent, I have been having fb notifications sent to my iphone.
            While walking to work, I also check my phone around 2. 
            Then, after lacrosse practice from 5-7 or 7-9, before I am about get homework started, I check it then too. 
            I text and use my phone to make phone calls and write emails to people like my boss all day. 


Tuesday: Woke up at 8 am and go to work at 9 am. So I am check fb on my iphone too. 
             Around 11 I leave work and check then too. Also I call my dad to see how he is.
             Check facebook and get on the internet at about 5 pm after classes before practice.


Wednesday: The same thing as Monday. 
Thursday: Don't check my facebook until around 2 pm because I have way too much to do before then. 


Friday: Have to get onto gmail to talk to my boss and figure out a project. So in the morning I am trying go figure that out on the internet


          Also check my facebook before I get to practice at 5:00 pm on my phone.




That's just my weekdays. On the weekends, I catch up with some of my television shows via Hulu. I also write an email novel every other week to my sisters to keep up with their lives and mine. My job is based ON the internet and technology, so after looking at this little schedule, I am definitely incredibly dependent on technology and especially the internet. 


I am currently loathing mac computers though, because I have been having to come to the library for two weeks now to use a computer due to software, password and hardware problems with my 1-year old mac computer! If you get anything from this blog, it's to back everything up on a back-up drive and as soon as possible!


I think what I have realized about myself is that I probably spend more than half my day on the internet and that I have become so dependent on technology that I thought it was the end of the world when my computer initially freaked out on me. I think that I DO find it hard to not have the security of having internet access all the time. Because, for me, it's a way of staying in touch with people when I really don't have the time to see them face to face. But then I lose that face to face interaction with my friends and I think that is more valuable than the relationships I've made and the "time" I have spent talking with my friends on fb chat. I get scared to think that our society will become too involved in the internet. And social networking and relationships we make, will be through technology and not through personal face to face interaction. I think that we (especially my generation that has grown up with the internet) are lazy. Lazy and demanding and that leads us to not set our priorities straight and stray away from what is really important. Therefore, I hope, that everyone can spend time away from technology to just appreciate what's in front of them. It's incredibly hard, but I hope that people will want to preserve parts of life and social interaction before the internet was invented.