BARBARIC!!!

This is a video of Senator Robert Byrd, the oldest member of Congress, making a speech on CSPAN in regards to the Michael Vick dogfighting charges. The genre is definitely humor. The speech wasn't meant to be funny, for Byrd is completely aggravated about the entire incident. However, his long pauses in between phrases and sentences, as well as his "barbaric" rant, takes all seriousness out of the speech. No one took this speech serious, not even the media or I'm sure even in Congress. The speech's intention lies within Byrd, whom obviously is a dog lover, and it was meant for him to address his opinion on the Michael Vick case.

The audience is those who are aware of the Michael Vick case, followers of the media, and of course dog lovers. Unfortunately for Byrd, because no one took this seriously, his argument against dogfighting is not effective at all.

About Me!!

HI!!
I'm a freshman at the University of Michigan studying Movement Science in the school of Kinesiology. I'm a capricorn, I'm from Detroit, and I have one sister named Camille. My favorite food is spaghetti so if you're my friend you'll have your mom make me some :). I'm also a very devout Christian man. My dream is to one day become a Sports Doctor, where I can surround myself in my addiction for basketball. I've played basketball since I was 8, and the only thing that kept me from playing was a bad knee injury I sustained while in high school. That injury forced my mind to expand, and I began writing poetry. When I was 17, my 1st book of poetry entitled "Divine Intervention" was published. On my 18th birthday this past January, I passed the 4000 mark in sales, and I need 1000 more to make it into your local BarnesandNoble and Borders book stores!!

I joined this class because I have a very extroverted and silly personality, making me a natural people person. I'd like to use a site like Youtube to further popularize my book with hopes of making my next book a bestseller!!

P.S. I live in East Quad unfortunately, and I haven't eaten there since my freshman orientation in August 2008!! LOL!!

These videos define my silly personality. I know we were asked to pick one, but you need both to know me.

LEAVE BRITTANY ALOOOONE!!!!!!

Genre: Vlog (Video blog!)

Audience: The intended audience is supposed to be those who are very critical of Brittany Spears when she was acting like a lunatic. She didn't know what to do with her kids, or her hair, and her career was in a spiral downward. This caring fan stands up for her.

Stance: Brittany has soo much to deal with, that she is just going through a rough time. People are being too mean to her and too critical. Leave Brittany alone!

Purpose: To get the media to ease up on Mrs. Spears

I personally think this video doesn't convince anyone to leave Brittany alone. The guy sounds too whinny and like a screaming little girl to be taken seriously. Maybe if he was screaming or crying, I would take him seriously. I actually take what i said first back, this video did make people leave Brittany alone, because all the attention went straight to this guy.

Mad TV: Sad 50 cent

Right now in the music industry 50 cent along with some other rappers have been starting drama with other rappers whose records have sold more than theirs. 50 cent is the main rapper doing this, but it is funny because he is so rich and has had so much success, yet is acting like a child.

The Genre of this video is humor. 

The audience is basically the entire hip hop community and young people because those are the people that would know about the drama going on. 

The purpose of this video is basically to show how ridiculous the entire situation is. The fact that such a grown person is basically "crying" over the fact that he is not number one is used to show how people have gotten out of control. The serious aspect of this video is that these rappers turn to violent threats over childish comments. This affects people everywhere because they look up to and copy everything these rap celebrities do. When these celebrities start nonsense over nothing, it sends a negative message. This video uses humor to portray it as ridiculous that such a successful person would lower themselves to that level and basically show how it is not the "cool thing to do."

The stance of this video is arguing against the reasons rappers start public drama. By making fun of 50 cent in a fashion that compares him to a little kid, it stands against adult's entertaining petty arguments that turn violent. The video states all the things that 50 cent has, and then compares them to the little things he is complaining about, which just proves how stupid he sounds and further argues how ridiculous these feuds are.

The video is extremely effective in that its comparisons and portrayal of the "gangster rapper" show the situation for what it truly is, childish. This video is also effective because it uses humor to address such a serious issue. Teenagers do not enjoy boring documentaries therefore, the fact that they use humor makes it interesting and more likely to be watched. Also, the video targets a very popular rapper who is the main person in the drama. By breaking down the head person, the video shows that it is all pointless considering one of the most famous rappers doing it does not even have a good reason to start drama and violence. If the video had used some rapper not many people know, it would not have been as effective because people wouldn't have cared.

The Poop Painter of New York City

Genre: documentary

Audience: New Yorkers; city dwellers; dog owners; people who walk on sidewalks; NYC code enforcement officers; people freaked out by the smell of dog poop.

Purpose: This guerilla-style video intends to draw attention to the bad-neighbor behaviors of a dog owner in the neighborhood and to question the proportionality of the response by the "poop painter." It is a comment on the delicate social ecosystem of large cities, where callousness can undermine the implicit behavioral contact between neighbors. At the end of the short video, the commentator turns the camera on himself to personalize the criticism and his unease about the behavior of the dog owner and the poop painter.

Stance: It is less an argument than a question about personal responsibility. Is the poop painter undermining (in a very small way) the beauty of the neighborhood when he/she spraypaints the sidewalk? Or is the foul of sidewalk poop so eggregious that graffiti is warranted? - Jonathan Martin

Michigan Naked Mile

The following video is a Fox News segment:

The Genre: News story, Human Interest

Audience: The University of Michigan community, Students, Administration, Ann Arbor Residence

Purpose: The purpose of this video is to try to uncover students' intention for participating in the Naked Mile. This segment was filmed during University controversy, apparently the administration disliked the tradition and encouraged every student not to participate in the run.

Stance: The segment depicts this particular Michigan tradition as nothing more than college angst. The reporter emphasized that the Naked Mile is a clear and fun tradition. The students argues that the run is a celebration of the end of the semester. The personal interviews highlight that most students will not remember the nudity.

I think this segment truly depicted the spirit of the Naked Mile. It showed that students had an event to look forward to and discuss after a long semester. Also it showed that the students embrace the tradition.

Russell Barth's "Pot is Medicine"

The following clip is a video responce from Russell Barth, an author, activist, and Canadian medical marijuana license holder.



This was made in responce to an anti-marijuana video made by another YouTube user, hellorodney, which you can view here if you want http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4EaMS6BctDU

It can be argued that this video has many purposes. I believe that the video originally was intended as a video responce to hellorodney's claims concerning many issues surrounding the effectiveness of cannabis use. It ends up being a video that helps to inform the general uninformed population about the effectiveness and safety of medical cannabis use, as well as being an informative instructional video for the pro-marijuana supporters who are fighting against the criminalization and prohibition of marijuana but may not be doing so in the best possible way.

The stance of the video that Mr. Barth is arguing is that he feels that it's unjust to classify marijuana as being a harmful drug without scientific backing, that marijuana has many practical medicinal uses, and that he believes the prohibition and the war against marijuana (especially in America) has never worked and never will.

The genre of this video is an informative videoblog with a bit of politics mixed in.

I believe that the intended audience for this video are the YouTube user known as "hellorodney", as well as any pro-marijuana supporters who are fighting against the criminalization and prohibition of marijuana.

As much as I enjoyed this video, I dont feel that the video itself is effective as it's original intended use. Unfortunately, hellorodney has not said anything in responce to Mr. Barth's video to suggest that he has learned anything or changed his mind regarding his own personal viewpoints on marijuana. Also, the video does not have that many views, and the production quality is not the most appealing to the average YouTube watcher. Barth's video relies on content alone, which is good for us who are patient and are interested in what he has to say, but the 8 and a half minute argument is too long for the average YouTube viewer who is more interested in finding 10 second clips of household pets acting silly for instant humor gratification. If we are to assume that the video was also intended to inform other marijuana activists about the proper way to fight for the taxation and regulation of cannabis, even if over half of the hits that this video got were from pro-marijuana activists, it's unlikely that a majority of those pro-marijuana activists were the ones who Russell thought perpetuated the stereotypes and really needed to watch and learn from this video.

"Mac v PC"

Mac v. PC; I’m a Mac and I’m a PC… We know the commercials all too well! This successful marketing campaign by Apple has been highly effective and has strongly benefited Apple at the expense of PC makers in recent years. The video I am sharing is a music video parody of the classic Mac v. PC advertisement commercials we all know and love. Enjoy!

Genre: Parody; Advertisement; Humor; Music Video; Rap; Commercial

Audience: Most people in our commercial consumer culture know and understand the “Mac v. PC” ads; most people have seen the Apple commercials “Mac v. PC.” This video is aimed at the general consumer and more specifically people interested in technology and computers. However, this video more specifically targets people in younger age categories who enjoy rap and music videos and know about technology and computers, and the infamous “Mac v. PC” commercials. People who enjoy entertainment, humor, and advertising would also enjoy this commercial.

Purpose: This video is a professional, yet humorous, parody of “Mac v. PC” commercials. It argues the ridiculous nature of "Mac v. PC" ads in their basis of arguing I am better than you. After all, both are computers with only a small difference. Additionally, while the video provides a realistic and detailed argument explaining the difference between “Mac v. PC,” it makes fun of the “nerdy” nature of the original commercial and “spices” it up by providing rap music. This in itself is a parody because the rapping almost makes the video seem nerdier. I mean who raps about computers. This is an effective element of generating humor and interest. The video successfully takes a “cool” subject like rap and applies it to a conventionally nerdy subject like computers. The objective of this commercial is not to sell computers, as is the objective of the original “Mac v. PC” commercial (obvious, since this video was not released by Apple or PC). Rather, the purpose is to entertain and provide parody to an already successful campaign by Apple. Also, this video seems to make a statement about ad creation; you must target a younger niche audience with elements like rap. You must capture people’s emotion, something music and humor create. This rendition, is almost more successful than the original Apple “Mac v. PC” commercial, and the humor it creates focuses towards a younger generation. This ad generates interest.

Stance: This video largely argues the ridiculous nature of the "Mac v. PC" feud. In the end, both are computers with nearly the same components. The original ad argues I am better than you, which is quite juvenile and ridiculous; it is an argument over a small degree of difference. Additionally, while the video does not take a stance as to whether Mac’s or PC’s are better, it makes a statement about successful ad campaigns and the power of today’s generation of consumer’s and their interest in things such as rap and music. Today, commercials cannot be boring. This argues for the successful and necessary components of ads. You must target audiences through their interests. This video targets younger individuals, using rap and humor to connect with them. Additionally, you can take successful elements of an original idea, and transform certain elements to generate appeal among other audiences. This video shows that you can make an already successful ad campaign more successful by targeting differing and younger niche audiences, whose interests lie in rap and music videos. You can sell and provide information to almost anything or anyone with the power of music/rap and humor. This video also makes a bold statement about rap, in today’s culture. People of today’s generation love rap and will rap about most anything; rap has become a pervasive and important element of younger generations. Just as sex sells, music and specifically rap sell. Overall, this video seems to argue and point out that in today’s consumer culture, advertising must use previously successful ideas, and amend them to capture emotions of other audiences through elements such as humor and music. The video makes a statement about advertising and personal appeal. You can make almost anything a funny parody today, and it will be successful. This video argues that the first "Mac v. PC" ad was successful not only because it was interesting and humorous, but it connected with people's interests and emotions, as this video did. This video argues for the successful elements of successful ads.

Effectiveness?: This video is highly successful with over 2,900,000 YouTube views. The humor this video creates, by taking a well-known commercial and transforming it into a parody, really entertains. If a specific company produced this video, I would be more likely to buy their product because of personal appeal generated by this product commercial. The professional nature of the video aids in the success. It almost seems that this is a real commercial. Overall, this is a highly successful video because it captures emotions and interests using elements such as humor and music. Almost anything familiar and funny will be successful today. Ad exec’s should really pay attention to elements of this video.




Jeremy J. Petersen

Bratz Dolls May Give Girls Unrealistic Expectations of Head Size

The following video is from the Onion, "America's Finest (Satirical) News Source."

Genre: Satire, Comedy

Audience: Parents, basically anyone old enough to understand the message-especially females.

Purpose: The Onion always does a great job of creating realistic, professional videos that convey a message. The purpose of the video is to criticize the makers of the Bratz dolls and perhaps even girls who aspire to look like these dolls.

Stance: This particular video derides companies that create unrealistic dolls for little girls-- specifically the company that makes Bratz dolls, but the message can be generalized to all such companies. The Onion argues that Barbie and Bratz dolls create false images of what girls should look like and those who play with the dolls are often at an impressionable age.

I think that this video is particularly effective because it conveys a message through humor. Although the producers could have focused on other features of the dolls, they use head size, which is even more ridiculous.

Foreman Grill Parody

The following video is a parody made by MadTV. It was released right around the period that the George Foreman Grill began getting popular and Mike Tyson was embroiled in controversy for his fight with Evander Holyfield. Enjoy.

Genre: Parody; Humor

Audience: Anyone who is familiar with the George Foreman Grill, knows about Mike Tyson's controversial past, and has seen the commercials for the grill. Also, it is aimed at a teen to young adult crowd for the type of humor it uses.

Purpose: Revealing how ridiculous some of the "Made for TV" appliance commercials and the people who act in it are. Also, the goal is to be humorous in parodying the commercials.

Stance: The stance is to show how ridiculous some of the "Made for TV" appliance commercials can be and how low celebrities and athletes will stoop to in their careers when they need money. It does this by making the grill a beat down contraption and having Tyson paired with a random TV extra. It also hints at the idea that the creators of the commercials are naive to think that people will actually believe the celebrities and athletes actually use the product. Instead it shows that their motives are generally to resurrect themselves and make money. In this case, Tyson is attempting to clear his name from the rape charges he had at the time.

Effectiveness?: I think the video was definetely effective in providing humor through its parody of the Foreman Grill. In terms of the stance, it did a better job of revealing how ridiculous the celebrities who are brought in to sell the item are. I still felt it was effective in parodying the actual use of the item but it did a better job at mocking the people selling it.

Political Satire

The following video is made by College Humor. It was made before the election. It shows what our world would be like if Obama or McCain won based on the political parties say about the opposing candidates.

Genre: Political Satire

Audience: Anyone familiar with politics

Purpose: To show that democrats or republicans are often too critical of the opposing party. They make them seem much more extreme than they really are.

Stance: One should not believe everything politicians say about the opposite party.

I believe this video is very effective. It is funny yet makes a great point that people should be realistic when listening to politicians about other parties.

Video Game Satire

The video below is from the Onion, a fake news organization. On the surface, the video clip is a news scene that declares that video games prepare their players for the apocalypse. However, the reporters are actors, and they are not serious. Here is my rhetorical analysis of this video:

The genre of the video is satire.

The intended audience is the generation of young people that plays too many hours of video games and the parents of those people.

The purpose of this video is to make fun of these players who spend hours on end pressing buttons to move in a virtual, nightmarish scene.

The stance of this YouTube video clip is that video games are impractical, overly violent, and bad for the players’ health. For example, killing zombies that do not exist in the real world is impractical. Fighting with grenades and machine guns is overly violent. In addition, playing video games alone all day is bad for the kids’ physical and mental health.

This video is effective in presenting the view that video games that fill young people’s minds with violence are a waste of time. Children should stop playing them; parents should be aware of what they buy for their children or allow them to play; and video game companies should make less violent, more useful video games, if possible. I can totally identify with this video, since I used to play video games. They ones I played were not particularly violent, but I did waste a lot of time on them. Anyways, enjoy the video!

Snuggie Parody

genre: parody, humor

Audience: Makes fun of 'snuggie' consumers of all ages, though it is intended to provide humor for younger audiences (teens-20's) who can relate to the absurdity of this advertisement.

Purpose: exemplifying the lengths advertisers go through in order to sell their products.

Stance: The parody criticizes the creators of Snuggie for selling an ordinary blanket with sleeves for $60 when it clearly looks awkward and bizarre. The parody is made humorous by the exaggerations: collegehumor claims snuggie will make you socially awkward, disrupt your sex life, and give you herpes. They even relabel it the "WTF blanket."

Effectiveness: I think the parody is pretty effective- it uses humor and sarcasm to relay the truth to a
audiences= Don't fall for ridiculous infomercials.

About Me

Whats up y'all,
My name is Zubin and I'm a freshman. I'm 18 years old and I live in Bursley Hall. I'm interested in becoming a doctor (typical Indian...). I'm on the Ultimate Frisbee team and that takes up pretty much all my time. I am either at midnight practice on Sundays, or 6 A.M. practice Thursday mornings, or doing work. I like long walks on the beach, candle light dinners, and the occasional game of pictionary. I'm a gigantic sports fan, and I will rep the Detroit Lions till the day I die. I'm the vice chair of the Athletic Relations committee on MSA (Michigan Student Assembly). Anyways, here is my favorite viral video:

Hello! My name is Jeannette and I am a freshman (LSA) applying to the Ross School of Business. I am from Los Angeles and have lived in and out of the city for my entire life. My interests include, music, basketball, and art. I love to sing, draw, and watch ESPN. I miss home, I miss the Hollywood club scene, and I miss having a car. Speaking of cars, I am in love with the BMW M6 (lol). Sometimes I am random and go off topic, but usually its because the topic I move away from is boring. Ummmm I took SWC 200 because I needed a credit, but now that I know what it is about I am pretty excited to be taking the class. 

I think youtube videos where people fall or make some out of script error are the funniest. I get irritated when people post millions of videos when they can't sing and their voices are painful on the ears. Here is one of my favorite youtube videos, enjoy! 

The old guy

My name is Jonathan Martin, and I got my first email account in 1989. Of course, you had to know basic computing language just to send an email and all of about a dozen people were online. I was in college, editing the student newspaper at the University of Washington in Seattle, when I first used the the world wide web, to look at images of art posted by the Met in New York. Unfortunately, I didn't have the good sense to follow friends and colleagues to Amazon, Real Networks or Microsoft. Instead opted for the adrenaline and inquiry of daily print journalism. I've worked at newspapers across the West, and am currently working (as of today at least!) as a reporter for the Seattle Times. I'm on a sabbatical year at UMich via the Knight-Wallace Journalism fellowship, where I've learned how to tell stories on video, how little I want to go to law school, and how to play hockey. My wife, an attorney, and our two children (Noah, 7, and Anna, 3) are freezing their butts off but are otherwise happy to be in Ann Arbor.

My current favorite video comes from McSweeneys' Wholphin project.

www.astateof.com/films/delicious

About Me

My am a sophomore in the College of LSA.  I am from the South side of Chicago.  Currently I have been working on a Independent Concentration Program, Global Governance.  I primarily took this class to because I needed an extra credit.  Also this class seems interesting and is a creative way to think about communication and the share of information.  I hope this class can further my understand of the influential power of vital videos.  During highschool, the Mikva Challenge, a non for profit and nonpartisan organization, organized students to lobby and upload videos regarding youth issues.

In addition, this video is one I have seen many times and forwarded, mainly because my friends and family believe the main character act similar to myself.  This situation is one I've encountered and the character's action was surprising and hilarious!

About Me

My name is Kasey. I have lived in Michigan for the past ten years, but I have also lived in New Mexico, Ohio, and New York. I am currently a member of Michigan Undecided. I like to explore caves, white water raft, kayak, rock climb, hike, and mountain bike. Also, I love to play the piano, eat lots of food (especially dessert when I am stressed out), and sleep.

I took this class because I wanted to have fun this semester analyzing and creating films. So far, I love the many YouTube videos that I have never seen before. This class is exceeding expectations!

My favorite online video is “Hungarian Rhapsody #2” Victor Borge style. Victor Borge is known as an excellent pianist who often includes a twist of humor in his performances. This video is by far my favorite because it is so funny!

My name is Michael Stewart, technically I'm a Brain, Behavior, and Cognitive Sciences major but my long term goal is to get into dental school. I'm taking this class primarily because I needed another credit, but also because I carefully looked through all of the possibilities of half-semester courses and this one stood out way, way above the rest. The course description was calling me, speaking my language, a familiar tongue in a sea of foreign tongues. Viral videos are an interesting phenomenon, I look at it in the same way that most people would view the movie box offices or the top 10 most popular music videos countdown. And what an appropriate name, viral videos, because they do in-a-way behave like viruses, which are cool in and of themselves. YouTube definately helped the art of viral video phenomenon explode. I love YouTube, I stumbled upon it during the Summer of '05 while looking for a website that I could upload a video to. I was looking for one that I didnt have to sign up for, so I passed it up. However, it did stand out above the rest of the video uploading sites that I found due to it's non-cluttered, easy-to-use interface, with videos uploaded in Flash so that codec issues were never a problem for people who couldnt view your video, so it wasnt a shock to see it explode like it did in the subsequent months and years.

More about me, things I enjoy doing include religiously checking my favorite sites (YouTube, Wikipedia, Digg, Kotaku, Engadget), blogging on Xanga.com, reading webcomics (Cyanide and Happiness happens to be my favorite), listening to Pandora online radio, playing computer games, building/fixing computers, all that good stuff. Unfortunately, school doesnt leave alot of time for these things, so I'm forced to step outside into the hot, blinding sunlight which burns my pasty blank-as-paste nerd skin. Out in "real life", I enjoy 'chilling with my homedogs', being active in events and political/social issues that I care about alot (Hash Bash '09 anyone?), watching way too many movies, and eating healthy.

Anyways, this is not by far my favorite viral video, but it's probably the most SFW one. It's security camera footage of a man who is stuck on an elevator for 41 hours. It's a particularly interesting video to me for many reasons. The production quality is good, simple and to the point, the music that they chose for the video and the speed at which it was played gets the point across while getting straight to the point while taking up less than 3 minutes of the viewer's time. It's also an important psychological resource. In the cold, small elevator with bright lights, he felt the need to keep the alarm on in hopes of someone hearing it, he began to have aural hallucinations, and he began praying although he was non-religious.



Moreso than the video itself that is interesting is the story that we dont see on camera. Part of the reason that some YouTube videos become popular may not be because of the video itself, but is instead about the story surrounding the video. From what I understand, after the experience he took an 8 week vacation without his employer's permission and they fired him from his job, where he had worked for 15 years. During the next 4 years, he fought in court to sue them for 25 million but ended up having to settle on a "hardly six figures" number. He lost all contact with his former colleagues, and his girlfriend left him. He lost his apartment, spent all his money, and searched, mostly in vain, for paying work. Last I checked, he was still unemployed.

About Me

Hey everyone. My name is Michael Kopinsky. I am a freshman from West Bloomfield, MI and plan to major in either economics or business. I enjoy playing basketball and golf, watching just about any sport, listening to music, and hanging out with friends.

I took this class because I always spend time browsing the most popular videos on Youtube. I thought it would be interesting to discuss what makes them popular and also how Youtube has completely changed the media.

One of my favorite videos is Barack Roll. The song in the video was popular in the 80's and has recently become a viral video in itself. I find the video funny and it is impressive how the maker combined all the clips just perfectly to go with the song.

About Me

Hi,

My name is Max Migdal and I am a Senior in LSA from West Bloomfield, Michigan. I am majoring in psychology and minoring in political science. Some of my interests are playing and watching sports, watching movies, spending time with family and friends, listening to hip-hop music, debating politics, and traveling.

I'm taking this course because it offered the opportunity to learn about the realm of digital media and persuasion. As our society becomes even more technology dependent, it is going to be vital to understand how to utilize this realm. Seeing as how I want to be a lawyer, I felt that it was perfect to learn how persuasion works in this area.

The video I chose is the Latarian Milton news story. I chose this video because the idea of a 7-year old going for a joy ride and offering a matter of fact interview to reporters afterwards was hillarious to me.

check it out- Mariokart Love song

Heyy!

Ok so about me..I'm a freshman and am currently undecided, but Im leaning towards pre-architecture. Im from Okemos, MI, right by East Lansing. I love UM (even though I've been a spartan for 15 years) and am reallly excited to take this class. Im in a lot of groups on campus, as well as greek life. Lets see...I also love just hanging out with friends, watching movies, and working out.

My favorite online video is hands down MarioKart Love song, because when it comes down to it, we're all N64 nerds. Check out the lyrics- they're a little ridiculous, but at the same time they make sense and you cant help but smile when you hear this.

walawalawalawala luigiiiii

~Sheena

About Me

Hi,

My name is Jeremy J. Petersen and I am an LSA sophomore developing my own concentration in Entrepreneurial and Global Leadership Studies. My interests include playing and watching athletics, spending time with family and friends, reading, listening to music, investing, business, law, politics, and expanding my knowledge.

I am taking this class because I have interest in film creation and online media. Film and online media are great methods of communication that I foresee dominating the future of communication. For that reason I want to learn about these exciting areas of communication to gain the ability to successfully use them in future occurrences.

My favorite Youtube video is Stevie Starr the Regurgitator. This man is amazing and it baffles my mind that he can really swallow and regurgitate things like Rubix Cube's. Check this out, it’s crazy.

Peace

Introducing: D'Anne Witkowski (a.k.a. your instructor)

In the spirit of your first assignment (you know, the one that's on your freshly posted syllabus where you're supposed to tell the class about yourself and post one of your favorite online videos and tell us why you like it), I thought it only fair that I should jump in and go first. Not that first is better, but it is my hope that I might offer a model for you (of sorts - you don't have to do your post exactly like this. I am not here to stifle you) and eliminate the potential anxiety of being the first person to post.

So: About me. I am a lecturer at the University of Michigan in both the English Department Writing Program and the Sweetland Writing Center. I have an MFA in creative writing (poetry) from UofM and I did my undergrad work at the University of Detroit Mercy.

My interests include reading (actual books as well as things I get from the Internets), writing (poetry, creative non-fiction, etc.), pop culture (though I don't watch much TV), music (listening. I'm not a player. Of music. Or player in the other sense of the word), spending quality time with friends and family, politics, teaching, and animals (I have a dog, Henri, and a cat, Jasper). Two of my interests, poetry and monkeys, are represented on my blog Touched By A Monkey.

As for my favorite viral video, I really dig "You Are So Beautiful (To Me)" by Everythingisterrible. It's media with a message. And it's really creepy. And sad. And funny.

Welcome to Viral Video Rhetoric!

Hello! Welcome to the official class blog for Viral Video Rhetoric. I'm D'Anne Witkowski, your instructor. Thanks for taking this class! I'm looking forward to an action-packed educational adventure this semester.

A note on how this blog is organized: you'll notice that to the right there are lists. "Stuff To Read" is just that. Reading assignments for this class (though some of your reading assignments you'll find via C-Tools. Don't worry. I'll let you know). "Stuff to Watch" is, again, just that. This is a list of online videos that have gone viral, particularly videos that employ the kind of persuasive and rhetorical strategies we'll be discussing in this class. "Sites of Interest" is a list of sites that we'll either talk about or that pertain in some way to viral videos. Some of them are viral marketing sites that want your money. Inclusion on this list is in no way an endorsement, nor are you required or even encouraged to use these services. They are there for your reference.

Your first assignment is to post to this blog yourself. You'll get an email inviting you to join this blog. You'll need a Google email address, so if you don't have one, please get one even if that annoys you. We must all make small sacrifices for the sake of education.

May the viral force be with you.

A shout-out from Obama Girl

Yes. This really happened.