A lot of people do or don’t realize the importance and effect communication has on our lives, our interests, our thoughts and our emotions and how we feel about ourselves, others and the world in general.
When we get into a car and flip on the radio, to find a station that we like, to putting on a CD into the disk player, when we turn on Pandora to find a station or when you open up the Spotify app on your iPhone or Mac in order to listen to that favorite song you’ve been liking, and when you reach out your hand to raise the volume because you want to hear that as loud as you can or when you put on some head phones so that you can listen to it personally or when you share a song to your facebook page so that everyone can listen to what you are listening to, this attempt to communicate makes our lives more interesting and makes our lives that much more fuller.
Whether that song is a rap song from the bay area or a song by the Red Hot Chilli Peppers or a song by The Beatles or a new release by an EDM artist, or a Classical instrumental by a 17th century French composer, or a tabla instrumental, this communication by these artists makes our lives that much meaningful and can make our lives more productive.
Can you imagine the effect what the track “The Message,” by GRANDMASTER FLASH had on the people around them when it was first released and what kind of an effect it had on the culture as whole of America? Think of the effect the music itself had on the minds of people and then think of the lyrics which were being communicated. This was released in 1982. Think of or do some research of what was going on in that year and why they were talking about what they were talking about. Today, in the year 2015, that song still relates to so many people.
Now think of the song or listen to the song “Five Minutes of Funk” by WHODINI. Compare that to the song I just talked about. You can also compare it to “Rappers Delight,” by Sugar HIll Gang.
Now compare that song to a Taylor Swift song. And just look at the variety of music that exists and the variety of channels where you can listen to or look at music videos and how that effects how you think about the world and think of the amount of fans Madonna has and how much anything Madonna would say can influence their thinking. Bono of U2 is a good example of this. I don’t even like U2 that much but that doens’t change how much they can have an effect on people just by something they would say.
Music itself is an outpouring of communication from an artists heart because it is something that they love.
This is the subject of music.
Let’s talk about the subject of news.
I don’t know how many people like to listen to the news on the TV or in the form of paper but news is all over the place.
I was looking at a newspaper recently which had news about someone being murdered, a car crashing into a pizzeria, ten people being assasinated, a person being found guilty of murder, and there was only news article about how to get an education. This is on the first page of that newspaper. The name of that newspaper is actually LIFE. So what are they communicating to you?
Newspapers can fill the world lots of fear and create a feeling of a chaotic environment or they can fill it with valuable information.
A newspaper like the THE WALL STREET JOURNAL, brings us news of the business world, news from all over the world, news about politics, economy, tech, market news, the art world, and even real estate and this brought to millions of people daily and for the people who read this journal daily, it is an important part of their morning while their having their morning coffee or while they are on their lunch break.
Broadcasting stations such ABC, NBC CNBC and others, daily and continually communication to you news which probably don’t want to hear from others parts around the world and things which are happening in the USA. I generally don’t like to listen to the news because it doesn’t really interest me to hear what is on there. There are other sources to get that information.
And then there is the continual advertising you see on television in between movies and tv shows and the news, there is just continual advertising there and you see this on billboards (depending where you are) and also on the radio, there is just a massive amount of advertising and people have to do this advertising. Think about how these communications from these different companies affect how you know about them and how they affect what you think about and how you think about their product or service and the world around you.
Radio stations have a lot to do with this by the kind of music they play on the radio including the massive advertising that is done there.
The film industry makes hundreds of movies a year. Genres range from Horror, Action, Comedy and Drama. Millions of people go to the theater to watch that movie they have been wanting to see because they are expecting that this communication from this movie is going to satisfy something about themselves or their life and they in turn communicate their opinions about it to others. People love to communicate!
Most movies carry a message or theme that is being communicated via the images and action which you are seeing on the screen. For example, the movie GRAN TURINO by Clint Eastwood carried the message that a person can change who they are and care about others and that whn you do this your life can change forever.
That is just one example of so many movies and the writers and directors who made it which understand what communication is about. They understand that by showing this scene for this long or by using this light here or by placing the camera and then moving it really fast over here will create the effect they want to create and actors who are very well respected know about this instinctively.
And not with live streaming Apps like Meerkat, so many people spend so much time either broadcasting themselves or watching other peoples streams and they spend hours on there just trying to communicate with anybody and with anyone.
Media and it’s communications effect our lives so much, that we hardly take a few minutes to think about it. If it were not for communication, there is a good chance you would be dead.
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