September 27, 2013
Feeling out of the loop because you’ve never heard of some of the things mentioned in the pop culture survey? Well, so was I. I spent about half a day looking into them and trying to find out what all the fuss was about. Here’s some information and links that might save you some time.
Some of the social media and websites students use regularly (Question 5) which were not very familiar to me:
- Ask.fm (http://ask.fm/): The website provides no information about the content of the website without signing up. The iTunes preview for the Ask.fm app (https://itunes.apple.com/app/id635896473) classifies it as social networking and rates it as age 12+ due to infrequent or mild levels of the following: sexual content or nudity; cartoon or fantasy violence; alcohol, tobacco or drug use or references; profanity or crude humour; and mature or suggestive themes. Its slogan is Ask and Answer, and screenshots of the app show questions that users apparently answer. Most seem fairly harmless, such as “What is in fashion today?” but inappropriate answers could be given by some users. Ask.fm has recently been linked to incidents of cyberbullying (http://www.cbs2iowa.com/news/features/top-stories/stories/connects-against-crime-askfm-concerns-22846.shtml). According to this news article, each Ask.fm user has a profile and anyone can anonymously post a comment or ask a question.
- Wattpad (http://www.wattpad.com/): “Wattpad is the world’s largest community for discovering and sharing stories. It’s a new form of entertainment connecting readers and writers through storytelling, and best of all, it’s entirely free. With thousands of new stories added every day, an incredibly active community of readers, and the ability to read on your computer, phone, or tablet, Wattpad is the only place that offers a truly social, and entirely mobile reading experience” (http://www.wattpad.com/about, paragraph 1).
- FanFiction (http://www.fanfiction.net/): Fanfiction website with a range of genres of fanfiction and crossovers.
- Kik Messenger (http://kik.com/): Kik is a free instant messaging application for mobile devices. The iTunes preview for Kik (https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/kik-messenger/id357218860?mt=8) categorises it as social networking and says that users must be at least 17 years old to download the app due to frequent or intense mature or suggestive themes. The Be Web Smart website (http://www.bewebsmart.com/internet-safety/is-kik-okay-for-kids/) explains that some people use Kik to send and receive nude pictures and inappropriate messages.
- DragonVale (http://www.backflipstudios.com/games/dragonvale/): A game where players raise baby dragons on islands in the sky, available as an app for iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch, Android and Amazon.
- deviantART (http://www.deviantart.com/): “deviantART is the largest online social network for artists and art enthusiasts with over 28 million registered members, attracting 65 million unique visitors per month” (http://about.deviantart.com/, paragraph 1).
- ASOS (http://www.asos.com.au): Online shopping for men’s and women’s fashion
- Cheer With Nico (http://www.cheerwithnico.com/): Wakeboarding site
Specific online video collections and sites mentioned in Question 6:
- PewDiePie (http://www.youtube.com/user/PewDiePie): PewDiePie is the alias of a Swedish video game commentator, Felix Kjellberg, whose YouTube channel became the most subscribed channel on YouTube on August 15, 2013 (http://www.tubefilter.com/2013/08/15/its-official-pewdiepie-becomes-most-subscribed-channel-on-youtube/). He specialises in Let’s Play videos of horror and action video game genres.
- Jenna Marbles (http://www.youtube.com/user/JennaMarbles): An American YouTube star with more than 10 million subscribers, she shot to fame with a video tutorial about how to apply makeup while drunk. According to an article in the Daily Mail (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2308780/Jenna-Marbles-YouTube-star-rose-fame-hilarious-drunk-makeup-tutorial-billion-hits-8-2-million-subscribers.html, paragraph 5-6), “her straight-up, funny, no-holds barred, profanity-laced videos” are popular with teenage girls because “she speaks directly to them about issues that are important in their young lives.”
- Kingsley (http://www.youtube.com/user/ItsKingsleyBitch): A young African American guy giving his no-holds-barred opinion on various youth-related topics on his YouTube channel. This one, If I Were a Teacher, is pretty funny (if you don’t mind constant swearing): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ev29AhnVDfI&feature=c4-overview&list=UU-vSh8UCm0tFaLYAIXqqKLA
- The Key of Awesome (http://thekeyofawesome.com/, http://www.youtube.com/show/keyofawesome): A musical comedy show spoofing celebrities, pop culture and the latest internet memes.
- Bart Baker (http://www.youtube.com/user/BartBaKer): Parodies of various pop songs.
- TF2SFM videos (http://wiki.teamfortress.com/wiki/Source_Filmmaker, http://tf2sfmvideos.tumblr.com/): A collection of videos made using Source Filmmaker (SFM) software, most featuring characters from Team Fortress 2 (TF2). “Source Filmmaker is a video capture and editing application that works from inside the Source engine. It allows users to record themselves many times over in the same scene, creating the illusion of many participants, as well as supporting a wide range of cinematographic effects and techniques such as motion blur, Tyndall effects, Dynamic Lighting, and depth of field” (http://wiki.teamfortress.com/wiki/Source_Filmmaker, paragraph 1). Student A said she liked the smooth animations.
- PMVs & GMVs: Student A, who loves art, said she watches PMVs and GMVs, but I’m not really sure what these acronyms stand for because each has several possibilities. The most likely explanation seems to be that she means Gaming Music Videos and Pony Music Videos, which are animated music videos using footage from the cartoon My Little Pony. I can’t believe this is actually popular with girls her age, but she said she’s interested in the music and animation on these videos.
- Pioneer DJ (eg. http://www.youtube.com/user/pioneerdjglobal): Videos of people using Pioneer DJ equipment
I hope that helps you feel up to date with what’s popular – at least among the Grade 10 students I surveyed.
You can find more about some of these things on my Pinterest board ‘What’s popular?’ http://www.pinterest.com/robynsensei/whats-popular/
2 Comments
Bridging the Generation Gap 