Fixing Up Normal College Gals Lifestyle

For this assignment, I was actually feeling unwilling to do it. We use media so much daily in our lives tracking it second per second was truly going to be a nuisance. However, I found that I use my phone in chunk amount of time and very rarely use it here-and-there. That made it convenient when I was logging all my media consumption information. However, if you would have asked me to do this a year ago it would not have looked the same. When Apple updated their iPhone’s to alert you on how much phone time you were consuming weekly, I had a wake-up call. I was reaching 10+ hours a day. That is an issue. I went on a social media cleanse for a month. My grades got better, I was more engaged, I could see there was a difference. Even when I downloaded all my social media back, I set my phone to be black and white, so scrolling through random social feeds would be a little more boring. Now, my phone is normal color again and I still have all my social media. I will admit, sometimes I am still on it way too much but after last year I tried my best to make a habit out of it.

 Overall, tracking my media did surprise me. I did not realize how much I was actually using a computer. Especially, for hours at a time. The same thing goes for my phone. To me, when I sit down to look at my phone it feels like maybe only ten minutes had gone by, where in reality it was an hour and Ellen DeGeneres videos just got the best of me. I think I was also surprised at how little I was watching the television. Different nights throughout the week when I have the time, I’ll sit down for hours at a time and binge-watch my Netflix shows. To me, it seemed a lot more frequent than it actually is. I know a lot of people have a problem with how much TV they watch regularly, so maybe I’ll take some pride in that! I have noticed that there are specific forms of media that appeal to me than others. For example, I do not really enjoy being on a computer. The computer screen tends to give me a headache rather quickly. Media outlets I prefer tend to be television or podcast type outlets. TV screens are (usually) far enough way my eyes are fine, and podcasts don’t hurt your eyes.

While my media of preference is TV, I often find myself using other media while watching it. Potter says this on page 111, “While listening to this music, people are typically exposing themselves to other media, or they are doing something else such as talking on the phone, jogging, working.” While my example is TV and not music, I always find myself mindlessly scrolling on all my different social media pages on my phone while watching TV. A lot of the time, I’ll be watching TV while being on the phone with someone as well. Sometimes, I will even watch TV, talk to someone through speaker phone, and scroll on my phone.

Media influences my life in a lot of ways. Down to the clothes I wear, to the food I eat, and to the shows I watch, Among many, many other things. Cable and satellite TV lead a lot of different things in my life. This just confirms Table 6.1 on page 112, that cable and satellite TV are at their peak among the other mass mediums. By this I mean, I am subscribed to Hulu, a service I pay for monthly that provides me with radio needs, tv needs, and an amazon account. I also have a Netflix account I pay for monthly that I use heavily. This is a trend I noticed in my life around 2013, that cable was out, and this was in. This reminded me on the idea Potter presented on page 113. The idea of “Decline and adaption”. Cable TV consumed a lot of my life until I was around 14 years old, that is when my parents booted cable out of the house. Introduced was streaming services. This is a trend I noticed amongst many other people; they were doing it too. Television had to adapt to the next bigger and better thing and that was streaming services.

Media consumes a lot of our lives. For me, it is my phone and television. This is something I’ve noticed I’ve been a fan of my whole life, who knows if it will change with the new trends and technologies. For now, I’ll be picking my next Netflix show.

Media Log

February 10, 2020

• Feb. 10, 8 a.m. Cell phone, 15 minutes. Checked email, texts, social apps network apps.
• Feb. 10, 9:30 a.m. Cell phone, 10 minutes. Talked on phone.
• Feb. 10, 11:30 a.m. Use laptop, 60 minutes to do some homework.
• Feb. 10, 1:00 pm. Use laptop, 50 minutes to do schoolwork.
• Feb. 10, 1:50, pm. Use phone, 10 minutes to check social networks.
• Feb 10, 2:00, pm. Use laptop for 3 hours to do homework.
• Feb 10, 6:30, pm. Use phone to make 15-minute phone call.
• Feb 10, 10:30 pm. Use phone for 2 hours. checking socials, etc.
• Feb 10, 1:00 am. Use phone for 10 mins, to set alarm and check email.

February 11, 2020          

• Feb 11, 9:45 am. Use phone for 25 minutes, to check emails and socials.
• Feb 11, 10:45 am. Use phone 15 minutes, out of boredom.
• Feb 11, 12:15 am. Use phone, 5 minutes to make a phone call.
• Feb 11, 12:45 pm. Use phone, 15 minutes to entertain.
• Feb 11, 1pm. Use laptop, 3 hours for homework.
• Feb 11, 4pm. Use phone, 5 minutes to make a phone call.
• Feb 11, 6:30 pm. Use phone, 15 minutes to make a phone call.
• Feb 11, 8:00 pm. Use phone, 2 hours to check social media.
• Feb 11, 11:30 pm. Use phone, 10 minutes to set alarm and use social media.

February 12, 2020

• Feb 12, 9:00 am. Use phone for 25 minutes, to check emails and socials.
• Feb 12, 10:00 am. Use phone for 30 minutes during breakfast.
• Feb 12, 11:00 am. Watch YouTube 15 minutes during class.
• Feb 12, 12:30 pm. Use laptop and phone, 30 minutes for homework.
• Feb 12, 1:00 pm. Use phone to make 15-minute phone call.
• Feb 12, 1:30 pm. Use laptop for 2 hours, for homework.
• Feb 12, 3:45 pm. Use laptop for 1 hour, in/for class.
• Feb 12, 4:45 pm. Use phone for 1 hour, to check social media.
• Feb 12, 7pm. Use laptop 2 hours, for homework.
• Feb 12, 9pm. Use phone to scroll on socials/watch tv, 2 hours.
• Feb 12, 11:30 pm. Use phone to set alarms.