Throughout the week while I keeping track of my media intake, I was surprised at some of the habits I had. Before we recorded all of our media intake, I thought I wasn't going to have so many hours written down, but in the end I kind of did! I knew that the music and radio category would fill up fast, and that the reading and writing would probably have the least. This assignment showed me that media (especially music) is like an addiction for me in that I always find myself around it, using it, and craving it.
The chart clearly showed that the radio and music category had the most hours. Music is one of my passions and is a very big part of my life. Whether it is classical, indie rock, R&B, salsa, or hip-hop I always tend to find myself surrounded by music. I listen to the radio to and from school and pretty whenever I drive somewhere. I also listen to music at school during guitar class and band. Even when I am at my house the radio, the iPod, the CD’s, the cassette tape (Haha!), or Pandora is always playing music. Every day I try to listen to a different genre of music so that I can expand my musical horizons and appreciate all kinds of music. One thing that I am guilty of is leaving the radio on all night while I’m asleep. I love to sleep to music and wake up to it, but I know there’s probably a better way of saving energy rather than just wasting electricity when I’m not even awake. This assignment made me realize how much of an impact music and the music industry has on my life.
The chart clearly showed that the radio and music category had the most hours. Music is one of my passions and is a very big part of my life. Whether it is classical, indie rock, R&B, salsa, or hip-hop I always tend to find myself surrounded by music. I listen to the radio to and from school and pretty whenever I drive somewhere. I also listen to music at school during guitar class and band. Even when I am at my house the radio, the iPod, the CD’s, the cassette tape (Haha!), or Pandora is always playing music. Every day I try to listen to a different genre of music so that I can expand my musical horizons and appreciate all kinds of music. One thing that I am guilty of is leaving the radio on all night while I’m asleep. I love to sleep to music and wake up to it, but I know there’s probably a better way of saving energy rather than just wasting electricity when I’m not even awake. This assignment made me realize how much of an impact music and the music industry has on my life.
Two of the categories I had the least amount of hours in were reading and writing. I feel like as time goes on, reading and writing aren’t being done as much especially with all of the new technology in the world that sometimes does the work for us. Sure I may read an article about the world falling for American media or read about the cover girl of Teen Vogue’s latest issue, but other than that I’ve never really taken the time to read an actual book. I was able to read more than two books last semester in my Critical Reading class, which for me was impressive. Along with that I’ve noticed that I don’t write as much anymore as I used to. I used to write a lot whether it was writing in a journal everyday or writing a letter to my friend. Now the only writing I do is for homework. I was shocked to find out that I spent more hours on Facebook than I did on reading and writing. I hope that I never become addicted to using the Internet for everything I do. Although I don’t do these things as much anymore, I still enjoy writing letters and mailing them, reading the newspaper, and going to the library to check out an actual hard copy of a book that I want to read.
The last two categories that I wasn’t consuming much of either were television and movies. Throughout the week I’m usually too busy with homework, school activities, and other stuff to even turn the TV on. I never watch TV unless I’m really bored and have nothing else to do. When watching movies though, I tend to prefer watching romances and comedies. The same goes for TV show preferences, and that is a habit that I’ve noticed. It seems like as I get older I get pickier on what I would like to watch and sometimes that just leads to me not watching anything at all. Another habit I’ve noticed when I actually do watch TV is that I always watch the news when I wake up and get ready for school. I like to watch the news because it keeps me informed on what is happening not only in our country but in the rest of the world.
Those are all of the habits that I’ve noticed when doing this media diet. Now that I know approximately how much time I spend using, watching, and listening to the media, I'm definitely going to be more cautious now of what I do and how much time I spend on it. I'll admit that a lot of what I did was unnecessary (like watching Kourtney and Kim Take New York! That's my guilty pleasure!) and that I could've done something more productive like read the newspaper and find out what is going on around me. I'm definitely going to keep this in mind now whenever I do something that involves the media.
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