I really liked the idea in class where we had time to look for blogs or websites that we can relate to or just simply enjoy reading.

CHEEK MAGAZINE! I discovered this magazine when it was first created, had only a few likes on the facebook page and was still pretty small.

I fell in love with the concept, I felt like I immediatly could relate and was excited to finally find a feminine magazine that did not only talk about beauty and fashion (fashion is a big big interest of mine, but I cannot stand endless pages of beauty tips in magazines as I never found them useful nor relevant).

3 girls are behing this project :

FAUSTINE KOPIEJWSKI – she started as a music journalist and played drums for years in a few different girls bands before joining famous magazine “BE” as assistant editor of the “culture” section.
She talked Hard Rock with Lady Gaga, caught a plane with Rihanna, had a glass of water with Robert Pattinson… She is fundamentally against “name-dropping” (could not agree more) and hates “personal branding”

MYRIAM LEVAIN – she started working for “Le Parisien” before joining the fashion magazine crew “ELLE” and then “BE” like Faustine but working for the society section. Obsessed with South America, latinos culture has no secret for her.

JULIA TISSIER – After spending a couple of years at French news papers “Libération” , she also worked for “BE“. Beside her passion for weird news and sex articles, she is responsible for the “portrait”, “fashion” and “society” sections of Cheek Magazine.

Cheek Magazine falls into 6 sections which are all equally awesome :

– CULTURE

– SOCIETY

– FASHION

– GEEK 

– #WEBTHEFUCK  (speaks for itself)

– Y COMME ROMY (a weekly story, Romy being introduced as the  woman nowadays from the generation y with relationship issues, talking about sex, work, being broke…  I feel like I can really relate, and it’s always hilarious.)

I was deeply affected by this attack, how scary is it to be a journalist nowaydays? How scary is it to defend rights, and freedom? It shouldn’t have to be that dangerous. Those people died, they will forever be missed, it is now our turn as the younger generation to keep fighting for this freedom and show these guys we don’t need guns to be stronger than them.

When is this going to stop ? I have been terribly affected by what happened in France in the past couples of days. I’m scared, I’m scared for my family, for my friends, for everyone. More than 10 journalists killed for drawing satiristical cartoons, policemen killed for defending their country and civilians killed for no reason. I am not going to express and write my opinions on this blog because that is not necessarily what it is for but FU*K!

There is thing group on Facebook «Melbourne French Team» which I am apart of, and they decided to create an event in Federation Square on Thursday night at 6pm to pay tribute. I was really pleased to see that more than 1000 people attended (according to «THE AGE» more than 5000 people came).

The next day, the newspapers application «Le Monde» pops up on my phone -again- saying people are being held hostage in Paris. Twice, at two different places in Paris, at the same time.
4:00am : I can’t sleep, I have another look at my phone and read that the terrorists have been shot dead.

ANGER SADNESS REVOLT COMPASSION STRENGHT SOLIDARITY WEAKNESS HORROR VIOLENCE SHOCK DETERMINATION UNION SORROW FEAR…. CHARLIE!

“In 2005 I was part of a large and ambitious project within the Bachelor of Communication (Media) program at RMIT that provides a blog for every Media student for the duration of their undergraduate candidature.” –  Adrian Miles

ADRIAN YOU’RE A LEGEND  

 I was really excited – just as much as nervous – to start studying and working with a blog as I had never had the chance to do that before. Coming from New-Caledonia, I went to uni for a few months there doing a bachelor of English literature at the start of 2013 but hated it. The French education is so much different from the English. What I love about the Australian education is that, teachers encourage the students’ creative side, their passions, their interests… They encourage you to do stuff you are really into (Alison who is also an international student from my class agreed with me on this point) unlike the French education that is completely narrow-minded and do not let students really flourish creatively.

As Adrian Miles mentioned, “blogs are very useful to document your practice, to encourage and support reflective and process based learning, nurture peer support and learning, provide a record of achievement…” They are so useful and so many good things come with it. You can share your articles, thoughts, blog posts on it so your peers can see it (and vice versa). It can then be discussed in class and everyone can give each other’s feedbacks and critics.

Also I believe that blogs (even though I had a shit time trying to figure out how they worked) are very ‘playful’ and communicative. Knowing how to use them now can only help and prepare me for a media career.

PS: big thank you to Emerald for helping me understand the blogging world, and giving me good advice!

Embedding a video into a web page used to be a real challenge with all the different formats and softwares in the early days of the web. It has nowadays become almost as easy as cutting and pasting.

ON YOUTUBE:

1. When you locate a video you’d like to add to your page on YouTube, look below the video for a Share button as shown below.

2. When you click the Share button, click the Embed button which is displayed directly below the Link URL, as shown below.

3. Copy and paste the code into your blog.

ON YOUR BLOG:

1. Create a new post

2. click onto “ADD MEDIA” and then on the left “INSERT EMBED CODE”

3. Simply paste your code there and you’re done!

reading week #1

Adrian Miles – The new path to knowledge

Think of a student who enters the school library seeking a book. They first consult the catalogue, searching by author name and title, but have no luck. Next they ask help from the librarian, who confirms that the book isn’t there, but can help the student find other, related material using a subject search. As a result our student is now armed with a Call number and while locating the book on the shelf finds two other useful titles nearby. She takes all three books to the counter, “borrows” them and that evening at home opens the first. She notes the title of the book, publication details, and the editors name. Perusing the table of contents she finds the two chapters she believes relevant and marks their pages in the book with some paper bookmarks. Later, after she’s done some reading she’ll copy direct quotes into her workbook, being careful to note what page each quote comes from.