HW# 5: Television after 1990, Late Night with Conan O'Brien

Late Night with Conan O'Brien is a American late-night talk show involving stand up comedy with various popular comedians, musical performances, interviews with celebrities, and making simple humor out of comedy material. It was on NBC from 1993 till this recent February 20th 2009 as the host Conan O'Brien headed towards The Tonight Show for Jay Leno's position. The new host for his own themed Late Night series is Jimmy Fallon.

(The Broadway Open House famous picture)

Conan's show imitates and spins-off from 1950 to 1951's Broadway Open House which was the original idea of throwing out a variety of comedy at late night hours with tap dancing, vocalists, comedians but it did not succeed very well because people in the early 50's with few television sets were not convinced they should stay up at 11 pm to watch tv. Over time though, after viewers began to warm up to television, VP of NBC tried it again and developed The Tonight Show with host Steve Allen. Ever Since 1954, The Tonight Show and Late Night Shows which was each hosted with a new host whenever thier contract was up were devoloped and successful to this day.

(the set of Broadway Open House)

Late Night Show with Conan O'Brien was unique in its own ways and also innovates from the other Late Night shows based on the way his stage was set up, doing shows outside of the set in areas like Finland, Canada, New York, the U.S. etc making fun of events going on in time. Conan did some episodes based on "time traveling" in Ancient Greece, the 80's, The Civil War and the future, plus he also was the first on Late Night to use clay animation for an episode.

(animation, cartoon work)

He took the opportunity of new technology to make clay animation along with showing quick clips of other television and comedy to prove his humorous points. Back in the 50's they could only record the humor of dancing, human acts, and visuals of posterboards to make the show successful. Conan had limitations based on the theme of his set up with a stage, desk, and audience with vaudeville stage performances, but he could travel, record his show, and bring it back to enertain people with his experience somewhere else. He was also the first on Late Night to be able to Broadcast his show in 2005 through iTunes where he could make a profit from selling episodes on the iTunes website. Now over time it was broadcasted to hulu.com where it is free and the Late Night Show with Conan O'Brien's web pages gives ingternet users the opportunity to explore recaps, fan pages and more. This helps the audience get involved at a faster and more dedicated pace. There were the most fans and viewers tuned into Conan's farewell show this February than any other host has had before with 3.4 million viewers.

Society and culture forced and influenced the Late Night Show to make fun of what actually happens in society. But in a way, it is a resistance to what is going on in the world such as war, poverty, politics, economy, family life, etc. for the meir fact it makes fun of it all. It has the same affect to viewers such as the show "M*A*S*H" was a light comedy about war. The Comedy in the television show lightens the weight of the world on people to show that this is just life and this is the crazy stuff we have to live with everyday so we could laugh at ourselves every once and a while for the mess we got into. It is not as mind numbing as the Brady Bunch life for example, but it does draw the viewers away from the serious and emotional side of politics, economy, and more to relax it out. Conan's show went for 16 years and even put up with history such as 9/11, the Blackout, and presidential elections of Clinton, Bush, and Obama.

HW #4: News Section: Publication of Bass Pro Shops Magazine and Website

Bass Pro Shop


The broad market that this website and and magazine publication applies to is the idea of the outdoors and demographics that are used is how this store and merchandise advertise their stuff. Targeting the audience through their interests and then market it psychgraphically to make money off these needs knowing that people need nature or else they will go crazy. If we as humans did not have nature, then we do not feel fullfilled as a being to get away from reality. Thats when bass pro shop could take atvantage of this reality that they could put a price on somewhere we can run away to to feel better.

When I (or the audience) read this magazine and go online, it is because we are drawn to it by our personal interests. Bass Pro Shop makes me want to go buy everything outdoors that they have even though I can't afford it because there is so much to do with it that I can see how all their overwhelming amount of products suck the audience in. They have anything and everything that the outdoors has to provide for hunting, fishing, camping, shooting, personal protection, clothing, services and events, games, real fish, watersports, electronics, offroading, even outdoor/indoor home furnishing. Resturaunts are in the store yum yum yum. When I walked into the store, it was like candyland for the outdoor user and buyers. Attraction to Bass Pro Shop is easily convenient and admirable.





(Funny video of kids jumping in the fish tank)

The content of Bass Pro Shops are slightly dramatic in a natural form of modest publication. It is very colorful and has alot of stuff left and right to look at and ooo ahh about. It competes on the rack with just its name, but not so much by the eye catching stuff. The short and sweet information is in the colorful pictures of what they are selling and its information while the long stories are usually success stories about the animals that people hunt or the competion events won. Outdoorsmen library is there for tips, advice, reviews, and product reviews. Holidays are supported and advertisements are also within the website and magazines.

This place makes their money through its advertisements and sponsors which are not junk sponsors either. Toyota, Cub Cadet, Under Armor, Yamaha, Nascar are big names seen. Charity work and Foundations such as the SCI Fountation are involved as well to give back to the audience. They are basically their own brand name.

One suggested story idea writers could propose for this publication would be generally on their success stories about the fish they caught or good promoting stories based on equipment used that got people further than those of other products. Other stories written would be about life or death experiences like a guys survival of getting mauled by a bear.

HW# 3 : Control Room Analysis

I believe Al Jazeera's view of the news on war time was to see everything that happens in a honest viewing media. All information possible and footage covered was mainly uncut and unedited so that the audience can take in the pathos effect of the truth about war. Samir Khader, senior producer of Al Jazeera states his view of this is it "shows Democracy, free debate, respect of the other opinion, everything should be dealt with intelligently with openess. By using all these things they can shake up regency and tell them to wake up, wake up! There is a war around you!" Watching the footage of death happening and the media behind the scenes showing every detail hits an individual with truth. this video includes Samir's view along with many others.

Video of Al Jazeera's

The US media's view upon media on wartime seems obligated to show the world information and or censor what they really have to show us. It is a controlled media upon American military. Thier central command station has formal news shows and questionings such as cnn, nbc, fox, bbc who interview people a part of the war. They do not show explosions or affects that would absolutely impact many in a pathos way, but rather an logos perspective and conversation about the impact of wartime.

U.S. military is gathering information from the news and using is to defend themselves. They feel like there are many oppertunities that could have been taken against Saddam Hussain and I can see how they use the media in a staged perspective. For example, during Control Room, it showed the soldiers putting an American flag over Hussain's face as a symbolic meaning, or the soldiers will be doing thier duty of controlling the countryand turing the bad into good for Iraq.

U.S. Troops Drape Saddam Statue in American Flag

My opinion is that the media's role in wartime is to show their specific audience what the government as well as the media theirselves feel is relevant. I feel that the media is given a certain picture which they are to show to their specific audience and moral standard by which they are to abide. An example of this is how Al Jazeera tends to show more raw footage to the Arab nations, while Fox, CNN, etc.. tend to only show biased footage that depicts American heroism or patriotism, never allowing any anti-American footage or news that victimizes the seemingly radical Arabs.

HW #2 Military Photo

If i worked for the Durango Herald newspaper, I would probably decide not to post the picture of the wounded soldier.

But.....

if it were another, bigger, balsier newspaper such as The New York Times I would.

The Durango Herald is a more small town family paper that impactes everybody because the town is close. We can see this from the video Jammin Juniors as it is on the front page of thier website advertising how close the town is. By seeing a picture such as the Babbitt photo (above), everyone would most likely represent and relate to it. I believe the picture really is not that bad because it's not terribly gory and it shows the heroism and reality of what is going on right now with our country at war. If it were a big newspaper though, I would ask for permission from the family to post the picture as well. If you look at the picture after you read the article that went out with it, the photo is not really as bad as people make it sound when imagining it, so seeing the photo would emphasis how much rhetorical analysis are in the picture.

For example, we can see that the wounded soldier is married, showing his dedication and pride and the soldiers are trying to help him keep alive from dying. It is not like he is being killed by other american soldiers, I mean this is reality for what we should expect when our soldiers go to war. If it were a picture like this child hurt in the Iraq war in the Durango Herald, then it seems there would be major problems!

(child killed in Iraq war)

People such as Dalai Lama would be against this sort of thing and by seeing this picture they would find a way to protest against The Reality of War. But, as the audience we all have our views on a touchy issue such as war that it is risky to promote these pictures.

IT'S LEGIT!!