Category Archives: Uncategorized

Could This Be The Copyright Law Update We Need?

Posted on May 20, 2013 by Ralph Hanson

There’s been a lot of controversy surrounding copyright law as of late that charges that it is hopelessly biased toward the rights of large, corporate media (i.e. Disney and the like). Under current copyright law, it is apparently legal for … Continue reading →

Posted in Chapter 13, Uncategorized | Tagged , , | Comments Off on Could This Be The Copyright Law Update We Need?

Remembering Roger Ebert

Posted on April 8, 2013 by Ralph Hanson

“Roger Ebert loved movies. Except for those he hated” It was hard to get the news last week that Pulitzer Prize winning film critic Roger Ebert had died of cancer.  Just the day before he died, Ebert had announced on … Continue reading →

Posted in Chapter 8, Uncategorized | Tagged , | 2 Comments

Questions Worth Asking (Maybe)

Posted on March 28, 2013 by Ralph Hanson

And we’re back after a pause for getting fun things like taxes done. Is Nike getting what they want from the Tiger Woods “Winning” ad? (Ad Rants) How does the the 2013 movie box office compare to 2012’s at this … Continue reading →

Posted in Chapter 11, Chapter 15, Chapter 8, Chapter 9, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , | Comments Off on Questions Worth Asking (Maybe)

Pop Culture Charley – Handicapping the Oscars

Posted on February 24, 2013 by Ralph Hanson

Charley Reed has done enough guest blog posts here that I’m no longer going to consider him a guest poster.  Instead, I’m going to put his great commentaries on pop media culture under the heading Charley’s Pop Culture.  Here are … Continue reading →

Posted in Chapter 8, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , | Comments Off on Pop Culture Charley – Handicapping the Oscars

When news catches up with my long-term pop culture diet

Posted on February 11, 2013 by Ralph Hanson

I’ve been planning for several days to write a blog entry today about three movies from 1968 that I’ve watched over the last couple of weeks  – 2001: A Space Odyssey, Ice Station Zebra, and The Shoes of the Fisherman. Why … Continue reading →

Posted in Chapter 8, Uncategorized | Tagged , | 1 Comment

Amazing Media Quotes

Posted on February 6, 2013 by Ralph Hanson

A round up of unexpected things I’ve read recently.  None of these are from The Onion! NPR Station Urges Listeners to Have Sex and Make More Listeners “Chicago’s NPR station, WBEZ, is making a more intimate appeal than usual during … Continue reading →

Posted in Chapter 10, Chapter 12, Chapter 7, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , | Comments Off on Amazing Media Quotes

When Super Bowls Turn Naughty – Do We Care?

Posted on February 4, 2013 by Ralph Hanson

During the 2004 Super Bowl, singer Janet Jackson exposed her nipple for 9/16ths of a second, resulting in 8 years of litigation over whether CBS would have to pay a $500,000 fine for the “fleeting nudity.”  In the end, courts … Continue reading →

Posted in Chapter 1, Chapter 3, Chapter 9, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , | 1 Comment

25 Years of Opinion

Posted on January 8, 2013 by Ralph Hanson

Twenty-five years ago this week I started teaching college at Northern Arizona University.  Among the classes I taught that semester was Opinion Writing. Today, I’ll be starting in on a fresh section of that class, only now it’s called Commentary … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , | Comments Off on 25 Years of Opinion

Questions Worth Asking (Maybe)

Posted on November 29, 2012 by Ralph Hanson

What if a student pretended to have a Mexican accent for an entire semester of a speech class, and then revealed his real San Diego accent on the last day of class? What kind of stories spread the fastest on … Continue reading →

Posted in Chapter 10, Chapter 5, Chapter 8, Uncategorized | Tagged , | 2 Comments

When Fox Accidentally Aired a Suicide on Live TV

Posted on October 1, 2012 by Ralph Hanson

During the day, Fox News has been known to show live car chases for as long as an hour at a time.  The coverage typically is fed to the cable news giant by an affiliate’s news or traffic helecopter. Today, … Continue reading →

Posted in Chapter 14, Chapter 9, Uncategorized | Tagged , , | Comments Off on When Fox Accidentally Aired a Suicide on Live TV