Section A

NRS stands for National Readership Survey. The role of the NRS is to provide audience research in use for print and digital advertising in Britain. The survey covers over 250 magazines and news brands, showing the size and nature of the audiences they achieve.

The October 2015 NRS reported that 944,900 women visit the Daily Mail app from a mobile or tablet every month. How might this information help the Daily Mail plan its advertising strategy?
This information can help The Daily Mail understand what kind of advertisements and content they should post on the Daily Mail app. As a lot of women visit the app, they could cater the content posted on the app towards women. The Daily Mail can also compare this information to their other demographic audiences and see who uses the app most. For example if men use the app roughly the same amount as women do, they can cater the content and advertising towards both men and women.

Section B

Independent film company – Warp Films
Warp Films uses new media to promote their films by having a website where you can find their latest projects. The film “This is England” was promoted by them through their website and social medias such as Facebook and Twitter. Rating pages and awards won also helped with the promotion of the film.

Demographic segments – Family (kids, parents, single mums/dads), Location, Income, Gender, Ethnicity, Sexuality

The Dark Knight
In 2008, The Dark Knight was given an age rating of 12A. This decision became an extremely controversial one owing to the number of scenes in the film that many deemed to be too violent for children to view.
In a typical year, the BBFC recieves around 450 complaints in total, and so The Dark Knight comprising 42% of all complaints for 2008 was exceptionally high for a single film.

Notes for The History of the BBFC (documentary):

Set up in 1912, job was to protect the public from sensitive and explicit parts of films. Alot of censoring and removing scenes from films. Cinema was meant for family entertainment, everything should be clean and happy, after 1950s more adult content was allowed. Due to this, the BBFC had alot of friction with the people who didn’t like the idea of more adult or teenage content being shown in cinemas.
Arthur Watkins (first cheif censor for BBFC 1948-56) – post war explosion of movies, alot of adult films were being released. Film companies were desperate to get their film passed by Arthur Watkins, however he was very strict with what was passed.
John Trevelyen (cheif censor 1958-71) – Councils could let films be shown even if the BBFC didnt approve, therefore making the BBFC look foolish. Nudist films were being passed as the “A” category due to this. A nudist film was getting alot of revenue, and got all its money back in the first week. Alot more nude films were made after this as it was seen as a success. Over the years, swearing and male frontal nudity is being allowed in films. John cared about the film the “artist” made, and if they need a scene of shock then that is okay. However when censors viewed a Ken Russel film with excorcism, devils and sex, they wanted it banned. They wanted Ken Russel removed the majority of important parts of the film. The film was passed as ‘X’ with cuts, but Ken kept a lot of scenes in the film which the board didn’t like.
Stephen Murphy (cheif censor 1971-75) – Family man, made films before. Right person at the wrong time, unfairly treated. He had alot of pressure, and was too much for him.
James Ferman (cheif censore 1975-99) – “A man of intellect, came from a background of making films for television”. A film that was beyond the previous standards was passed by James Ferman. He believed the film was made to disgust and revolt rather than turn people on. When the police seized the film he told them this, and told them they had misunderstood the law.
There was no certificated films for home video between 1982 and 1984, so younger people could watch adult films. In 1984, the BBFC introduce censorship of home videos, where they had to classify every video in the shops. They also rebranded the BBFC, and changed ‘A’ and ‘X’ ratings to the U, PG, 12, 15 and 18 ratings. After a shooting in hungerford, people felt the usage of guns in films should be relooked at – in particular Rambo. People differed in opinion to whether Rambo should be a 15 or an 18, and eventually the film was passed as an 18. James Ferman was very strict with weapons, and removed scenes with weapons used, including a scene where sausages were used as weapons in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 2.
Clockwork orange – scenes that were shocking – violence and rape. The film was reluctantly passed as an ‘X’ rated, however the director received letters threatening violence to his family, and therefore took the film down.
More recent – The public were worried about the imitability of violence on children.
At U and PG you cna see naked people without any sexual activity, at 12 you can see implied sexual scenes with small parts of nudity and at 15 you can see full nudity and sexual activities may be portrayed but without great detail.
A film like Borat was rated as a 15 due to the irony and the fact the film was not meant to be taken seriously and that 15 year olds can understand this.
Strong language is seen to be offensive and people don’t want their children to be exposed to swear words. Films were rated 15 if there are too many uses of swear words, and the context of the swearing changes what the rating could be.

A Clockwork Orange (Stanley Kubrick) and its relationship to the BBFC – Timeline:

• 1967 – A screenplay based on Anthony Burgess’s novel was shown, and the distributors were advised that a film showing ‘an unrelieved diet of vicious violence and hooliganism’ would be unlikely to be acceptable.
• 1971 – When the finished film was submitted to the BBFC, it was passed as an X (18) with no cuts. Stephen Murphy defended the film by saying “Disturbed though we were by the first half of the film, which is basically a statement of some of the problems of violence, we were, nonetheless, satisfied by the end of the film that it could not be accused of exploitation: quite the contrary, it is a valuable contribution to the whole debate about violence”.
• 1972 – Only shown in one cinema in London due to the X rating
• 1973 – Concerned about reports of copycat violence, and threats made to the safety of himself and his family, Kubrick withdrew the film from circulation in the UK.
• 1999 – After Kubricks death, his family agreed to permit the release of the film again. It was submitted to the BBFC and recieved an 18 certificate to replace the old X certificate.
• 2000 – There was muted response from the public, and the video version was also rated 18.
• 2019 – Released as part of a special Kubrick season, 20 years after his death

09/05/19

A Clockwork Orange (Stanley Kubrick, 1971)

Applied theories:

Passive audience theory – Newspapers in the early 1970s reported that A Clockwork Orange had influenced young people into committing crimes – the ‘moral panic’ was that scenes from the film would be copied in real life and British teenagers would adopt the characterisitics related to the characters in the film. This moral panic relates to the British media’s constant vilification of young people. For example:
“Murder like Clockwork” – Daily Express
“What Breeds Violence” – The Daily Telegraph

Cultivation theory – There were suggestions that exposure to the frequency and intensity of the violence and sexual violence in A Clockwork Orange would impact young people in that they would become desensitised to them. Therefore, this would mean that the likeliness of viewers engaging in these acts in real life would increase, as a result.

Male Gaze theory – Laura Mulvey’s Male Gaze theory suggests that women in film are sexually objectified by the camera – this means that the audience is often forced to view women as weak, defenceless and as just sexual representations. The negative media effect aspect for audiences is that this attitude towards women may start to apply to real life situations. In A Clockwork Orange, female characters are often represented as sexual objects or individuals who can be exploited/abused. There are also arguably no strong female characters. There was a fear that this type of attitude in the media towards female characters, if continually represented, would change how society treated women.

Active Audience Theory – Active audiences may be able to enterpret some of the key themes and messages in the film, such as:

• Ant-establishment and critique of authority
• Critique of fascism
• Satirical comment on violence in the media
• Exploration of Freudian themes

The Law

Libel
You could face a lawsuit if the media product is published containing information about someone that is untrue and damaging their reputation. This can be in the written form, through the use of imagery or radio broadcast.

Slander
Carries the same legal implications as libel, and involves making a false statement in the spoken word.

Copyright and use of intellectual property
User-generated content – Content created by non-professionals who then distribute their work online
Many of these UGC videos feature mash-ups of other people’s work; for example, covers of songs, and parodies.

The Copyright Law
The use of other people’s work is regulated under the copyright law and in this technilogical age it can be difficult to understand where the boundaries lie. In 2014, the Intellectual Property Office (IPO) amended copyright law so that the parody of material is allowed as long as it is not produced to compete with original work.

Copyright Task

1. Wired argues that millions of people break the law everyday, nearly all covers were non-commercial and had no negative impact on the market.
2. I think UGC artists covering songs should not be subjected to copyright laws unless the cover has a negative impact on the original content creator.
3. The video maker is being sued by the record label Ultra Records for using Kaskades music in her make up tutorial videos.
4. The opinions of the artist and the record label differ because the record label want to profit from the content made by the artist, while the artist creates music because they enjoy it and want others to enjoy it. The video maker who is being sued was also a fan of the artist and was inspired by him, so he wouldn’t want to sue someone who is using his music because she is a fan.

Media Effects

There has long been a debate about the impact that media products have on their audiences and this is commonly known as the ‘media effects debate’. Theories associated with this are:

• Passive audience theory
• Cultivation theory
• Moral panic theory
• Active audience theory

Passive audience theory
This theory states that audiences have limited resistance to media messages/unable to reject messages from the media. Main concerns were about the idea of ‘copycat’ effects, and this assumes the audience will copy whatever they see on screen. Also known as the ‘hypodermic needle theory’ as the media ‘inject’ ideas into people’s heads.

Cultivation theory – Gerbner and Gross (1978)
This theory suggests that over time, repetition of viewing violent acts allows certain ideas and values to become normalised. By repetitive viewing of violent images, for example in TV, film and video games the audience may become immune towards negative and/or violent representations, as per ideas about desensitisation.

Desensitisation – The idea that prolonged exposure to violent images numbs the effect of them. The more you become accustomed to violent images, the less likely they are to have an impact on the audience.

Moral Panic theory – Stanley Cohen (1972)
An instance of public concern or ‘panic’ in response to a media product that is regarded as threatening to certain groups or debasing agreed moral standards within society.
Theory originally coined with research into the subcultures of mods and rockers and the way in which these groups fashion and media image negatively impacted on young people.

Case Studies

• Hungerford 1987 – Michael Ryan massacred people with a crossbow dressed as Rambo.
• The murder of James Bulger could have been linked with the film Childs Play 3, with the 10 year old murderers being influenced by their exposure to the film.
• In 1999, the Columbine High School massacre was blamed on the video game Doom and the music of Marilyn Mason.
• In 2007, the video game Manhunt 2 was banned owing to the fact that it was likely to incite violent behaviour in teenagers.

Active audience theory
This theory is critical of the previous ‘media effects’ theories for being ‘outdated’. David Gauntlett (2004) for example, states that there are major problems in undermining audience intelligence and scapegoating media texts (films, TV shows etc.) by saying they are the root of the problem without considering sociological and psychological human issues.

Definitions

• Censorship – Keeping material from an audience. Such material includes graphic images, speech or ideas which may be considered harmful, sensitive or offensive to audience members. Such material and levels of censorship are determined by governments, media outlets and regulatory bodies.
• Classification – The decision made about the suitability of a media text for a particular age range after the content has been viewed by regulators. The classification will be in the form of an age certificate (film and video games), warning signs (music , video games) or broadcast time (TV, film).

Media Regulation
Refers to the control or guidance of media content by governments and other bodies. This means media production and consumption are monitored. Example: ’18’ certificate being given to a film for cinema release.
The media industries are subject to regulators of various types. Some are government-appointed. This means that the media can be controlled by laws set out in parliament.

Regulatory bodies:

BBFC (British Board of Film Classification) – Film
PEGI (Pan European Game Information) – Video games
OFCOM (Office of Communications) – TV
IPSO (The Independant Press Standards Organisation) – Press
ASA (Advertising Standards Authority) – Advertisement.