Item 2. E – Good design for screen genre

A good document design for screen genre need to fulfil many criteria, and it is different from print-based text. For example, reader who read on screen usually see words and image combined with logo, menu, hyperlinks, and video clips (Walsh p.30 2006) Hence, a good document designer should follow the principles of screen design.

Slide 1

Slide 2

Slide 3

There are many ways to define a good document design for screen genre. The slides above seem to be similar in terms of design. However, Reep (p. 135, 2006) explained general document consist of balance, proportion, sequence, and consistency. The slides above did not fulfil balance design. The graphic are place in different areas each slide, thus it look imbalance when reading from slide 1 to slide 3. Besides, Reep (p.136 2006) stated that experienced designers seldom use equal amount of space for text and graphic page after page. Nevertheless, slides above have same space for text and it interfering the reader’s ability to use the document.

On the other hand, Nielsen (1997) explained in order to create a scannable text, it has to highlight the keywords for easier reading. However, the slides above contained all highlighted text. This make the reader have difficulties in finding the important keywords.

Salience is an essential theory to keep in mind, as it can create a visual clue to assist the reader to notice and remember the document easily. Factors such as foreground, background, relative size, contrast, colour, and sharpness can create salience for reader (Kress & van Leeuwen 2006) However, slide 3 does not create salience to the reader. This is mainly due to the size, and sharpness of the picture used in the slide. Furthermore, there are too many picture in one slide, hence the salience to the reader is narrow down.

Reference List

Kress, G and van Leeuwen, T 2006, Reading images. Chapter 6: The meaning of composition.

Nielsen, J 1997, ‘How Users Read on the Web’, Useit.com, viewed 19 April 2010, <http://www.useit.com/alertbox/9710a.html>

Reep, D C 2006, ‘Chapter 4: Principles of Document Design,’ in Technical Writing, 6^th edn, Pearson Edu, Inc, New York, p. 173 – 190

Walsh, M 2006, “’Textual shift’: Examining the reading process with print, visual, and multimodal texts,” Australian Journal of Language and Literacy, vol.29, no.1 p24-37

Item 2. D- New forms of media publishing

Technology growth has become a norm in today’s media trend. The media user begins to switch to a better technology in order to follow the trend. New media enable user to receive, create, and share information with the world, such as comparing TV and the Internet. The broadcast TV is declining as it only works as a ‘push’ medium, while the internet serve ‘pull’ service which user can search information they want instantly (Naughton, 2006). However, broadcast TV is not completely diminish, as some segmented audience still need it. For example, current news, and World Cup final. Therefore, the ecosystem would not disappear but a changed ecosystem. (Naughton, 2006)

Besides, current popular media such as Youtube, Facebook, Twitter, and online newspaper have changed the communication between author and reader. Youtube user can compose an entertaining video to communicate with the audience whenever they want. In addition, composing video is faster to in delivering to the audience compared to journalism. Moreover, Facebook and Twitter is changing the trend in journalism as well. Facebook and Twitter can be linked with blogs, hence the journalist can update through Facebook and Twitter with click on their computer or mobile phone. The update is done within few minutes as compared to print journalism. Clark (2009) stated that every media is moving to online as a trend to compete in the market because printed news are slowly being push to one side.

There are some issues on new media such as Youtube videos that affecting the political campaign. Petersen (2008) stated some minor videos can create major awareness from the audience. For example, “Obama Girl” actually can hurt the candidate without siding any other parties.

Reference List

Clark, JL 2009, ‘Print Journalism VS. Online Journalism’, Writing Hood, viewed 19 April 2010, <http://writinghood.com/online-writing/print-journalism-vs-online-journalism/>

Naughton, J 2006, ‘Blogging and the emerging media ecosystem’, viewed 17 April 2010, <http://reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk/fileadmin/documents/discussion/blogging.pdf>

Petersen, S 2008, ‘The Press and Political New Media’, The Bivings Report, Bivings Group, viewed 19 April 2010, <http://www.bivingsreport.com/2008/the-press-and-political-new-media/>

Item 2. C- Explain briefly types of blogging communities & methods to build blogging communities. Then, discuss the structure of one blogging communit

A blogging community is a group of blogger that being formed under one blogging platform. For example, Blogger.com, Xanga.com, and MySpace.com These bloggers might have different topic in their post, however, all the bloggers have one common interest, that is share the information that they are passionate about. There is also an interesting blogging community definition. Anthony (2009) explained that many people always think blogging community occur in cyberspace, nevertheless, there is an offline blogging community. That is blogger organize a gathering event is bar or restaurant to share their blogging thoughts. Most importantly is to socialise, make friends and share ideas.

Here is a method of creating a blogging community, this is a seven-step process suggested by Nikkis (2010)

Step 1: Read and discover other blogs you share the common interest.

Step 2: Leave comments on others blog, not to forget leaving your blog address on the comment box. Thus, the others can find you.

Step 3: Often reply comments, not necessary a lengthy comments but a simple one will do. The others will know whether their comments had been heard.

Step 4: List the blog in the directories.

Step 5: Often write more than a post in one day. This will provide variety of information to the reader.

Step 6: The content of the post have to be entertaining in order to keep the content fresh. Hence, reader would not feel bored when reading the blog.

Step 7: Marketing your own blog. Signature is essential tools to use in message board on forums and email.

There are three types of blogging communities: (White 2006)

1. Single Blog/ Blogger Centric Community:

One owner or an organisation owns the type of blog, thus there may be more than one blogger in this blog. However, this is not a blog where accumulate all the post show off to the reader. An example of this type of blog is eHow.com.

2. Central Connecting Topic Community

This group of bloggers does not attract as much blogger as Single Blog did because Topic Centric blogger focus on particular issues and interest. Hence, they take need some time to gain attention from the community. Most of the Topic Centric blogger post about food, travel and political issues.

3. Boundaried Communities

Boundaried Communities is the type of blogs that collect other blogs and blog readers under a single platform. The blog functions similar to forums as it have tools such as discussion board and social networking features. Besides, bloggers get to connect to other blogs fast and easily. Example for this type of community is Bloggst.com

The example of Central Connecting Topic Community is a group of food blogger. Eat Local Challenge. This blog has similar characteristics with Central Connecting Topic Community. It has a group of blogger to share to passion western food. Moreover, it has tools such as hyperlinks, RSS, comment box, and social networking links.

Reference List

Anthony 2009, What Is A Blogging Community, The Travel Tart, viewed 18 April 2010, <http://www.thetraveltart.com/what-is-a-blogging-community/>

Nikkis 2010, How to Build a Blogging Community, eHow, viewed 19 April 2010, <http://www.ehow.com/how_2152382_build-blogging-community.html >

White, N 2006, Blogs and Community – launching a new paradigm for online community?, The Knowledge Tree, Australian Flexible Learning Framework, viewed 18 April 2010, <http://kt.flexiblelearning.net.au/tkt2006/edition-11-editorial/blogs-and-community-–-launching-a-new-paradigm-for-online-community>

Item 2. B Classification of blogs & opinion about the most appropriate classification approach

There are various kind of blogs to be categorized, different readers find different type of blogs interesting. Hence, here are the types of blogs, subject matter, devices, and media for better understanding.

The subject matter can be classified as:

Travel blogs – Travelling experiences sharing

Political blogs – Political issues discussion

Educational blogs – Information of careers, job, and schooling

Music blogs – Opinions about music

Blawgs – Blogs that discuss on legal topics

(Revell 2009)

Devices for blog can be categorize as:

Moblog – PDA and Smartphones

Vlog – Web- Cameras

(Revell 2009)

There are different types of media for blogging:

Vlog – Blogs that compose by video

Linklog – Blogs with hyperlinks

Tumblogs – Blogs that contains missed media

Phlog – Gopher Protocol

(Revell 2009)

As blogs nowadays uses combination of styles, I do find it hard to identify the type of blog. However, I will classify the blog with the topic the blogger used if when I find it hard to classify them.

Upon comparing the classification of blogs with Revell and Margaret Simons, I find similarities and differences between these two authors. I do find pamphleteering blogs, political blogs, and Blawgs blog have similar function, that is in expressing strong point of view of certain issues. The different is pamphleteering blog does not necessary focus on political events. Educational blog, Digest blog, and Popular Mechanics blog have similarity as in most educational blogs collect information from certain platform in order to educate to the readers. On the other hand, I find news blog and music blog have the same features as well, that is providing latest information from events and press conferences.

There are some types of blogs that Revell did not mention, that is diary and gatewatcher blog. Diary blog is very popular among in the Asian cultural as this type of blog states the happenings around the blogger such as family and friends. Gatewatcher blog is very rare among the classification of the blog, as it is about a group of people who control the information exposure to the audience (ABC Radio National 2008) This is where Revell did not mention.

Reference List

ABC Radio National 2008, A Taxonomy of blogs, The Media Report 2008, viewed 19 April 2010, <http://www.abc.net.au/rn/mediareport/stories/2008/2372882.htm>

Revell, M 2009, Blogging Types, Webeditorblog¸ viewed 18 April 2010, <http://www.webeditorblog.com/ >

Items 2. A – Blogs as current phenomenon & benefits to the community

Current blogosphere

Source: Sifry

Source: Marketing Chart

The report above shows the numbers of weblogs in the blogosphere. The report was complete from March 2003 to March 2007. It shows over 70 millions weblogs existing in the blogosphere while 120,000 weblogs are created each day (Sifry 2007) In 2008, the size of the blogs has increased to 133 millions (Marketing Charts 2008) This shows the blogging community is growing rapidly as years passing by and has hit mainstream.

Current Trend in Europe, Asia and Malaysia & Types of blogs prevalent in certain countries

The current blogging trend in Europe is about institutional affairs, political issues, and agriculture issues. Bloggers seeks to find answers from their government. The bloggers also join a community to improve their country. (Bloggingportal.eu 2010)

On the other hand, BloggerBlog.com (2006) stated that 46% of the Asian blogger blog to build and maintain social relationships. While 74% of the readers prefer blogs by their friends and family. Besides, Asians blog reader does not find business and political blogs interesting. However, South Korea and India have different trends which post about self-improvement is becoming popular.

In Malaysia, there is over 74% of the blogger are below 25 years old and 64% of them are female. Nearly half of the blogging community use the medium to express their opinions. Moreover, most of the bloggers also blog about technology, travel, and music and this is similar to Asian blogosphere trend (Ooi 2006)

Benefits of prevalent blogs to the community

Political blogs

The European blogger who blog about political issues are to make the country a better place, hence, the issues can be aware and notice if political bloggers join the community to raise awareness. Blogosphere such as Bloggingportal.eu aggregate all the bloggers to strengthen up community and provide information to the readers.

Society blogs

Most Asians prefer to give personal opinions in their blogs, and certain blogs can provide professional and credible opinions in certain issues or reviews to the readers. For example, SapiensBryan is a blogger who provide latest technology news. The reader can gain information about latest technology from this blog.

Reference List

BloggersBlog 2006, 'Blogging is a Social Activity in Asia', Bloggers Blog, viewed 16 April 2010,

Blogging Portal 2010, Home, Blogging Portal, viewed 18 April 2010,

Marketing Charts 2008, 'Blogging Hits Mainstream', Integral to Media Ecosystem, Marketing Charts, viewed 17 April 2010, <>

Ooi, J 2006, 'Study: Blogging for social connection and self-expression', Blogs, CNET Asia, viewed 18 April 2010, < id="61971059">

Sifry, D 2007, 'The State of Live Web', Sifry's Alerts, viewed 18 April 2010,

Item 1. Purpose of the blog

The purpose of this blog is to discuss the issues of blogging phenomenon, types of blogs, and the blogging communities. The blogger of this blog wants to achieve his purpose by adding his opinions and media in those mentioned issues with sources to build this blog as credible as possible. The target audience, targeted audiences are university students who blogs and are aware of the blogging phenomenon.