Week 4 EOC

According to Don Draper from Mad Men, "advertising is happiness". Advertising is about spreading a word on a product and having people relate to it. If they can relate to it, they will buy it. The ads you see try and make you buy a product because you NEED that product or because that product appeals to you from its sonic characteristics. Marketing is about reaching out to consumers. The type of people you try and sell your product to is how you build your market. Marketing is an essential part of any products life because without it, it can’t prosper. Advertising is an added bonus to your product that may help it sell, but it also may kill your product. Establishing a strong market and a strong consumer base will eventually make your product stronger. Word of mouth is more powerful than an advertisement. Advertisements can may make people relate, but what’s more powerful: relating to your product because of some random saying, or relating to it because everyone else uses it too. People don’t try and differ from the norm that often. Trying so usually gets you casted out like a lepur. Think about how powerful certain products are just because they never market, but because everyone uses them. In the end, you can market without advertising, but you can't advertise without a market.

Week 3 EOC

America should have a dollar that benefits everyone, a mix between strong and weak. If the dollar is too strong, prices go up, and people stop buying as much, and if the dollar is weak then we can’t buy enough goods. It has to be in the middle, because otherwise, we’re on a bad side of the pole. If the dollar is in the middle of good and weak, we can still be looked at as a strong country and still pay for a lot of the goods brought into the country. Consistency is any dynasty’s friend, and if you are in the middle you last long. Longevity is going to get you real strength in the end. Americans have this connotation that we have to have the most powerful bill along with everything else in our country. They don’t see the real beauty in satisfying the country because you can get whatever you want, and still get more profit. What made me pick this choice is the way I feel about over priced things I need in my life. If this was implemented, and we focused on achieving a “middle” dollar, I feel we’d be a more profitable society. We would buy more products because they are affordable and because we can get more, not necessarily for less, but for a price we can afford. Weakonomics. com says, “When the dollar is strong, our dollars are able to buy more foreign goods. For example, imagine the US and Canadian dollars were equal in value 1 for 1.” On the flipside it says, “The more money we spend overseas, the less money we spend here in the states. We’re basically shipping out our precious greenbacks.” I rather buy more goods overseas and still have a lot of money in our country. What do you think?

Week 2 EOC

I have an extreme sneaker obsession and am the kind of guy to wait in line for one pair. Air Jordans are my particular favorite and recently (December 23, 2009) Jordan Brand released a very exclusive pair known as the Space Jam 11s. I literally salivated at the thought of owning them and was at the mall at 6 in the morning. I waited and waited and waited and finally I see people walking out with boxes. I run inside and go directly to Finshline, assuming everyone would be at Footlocker. When I get there, the guy smiles and asked if I was there for the Space Jams, which just led to a sarcastic remark I held to myself. He asked my size, and went to the back and told me they didn’t have my size, but called Footlocker down a couple hundred feet from the store. He said, since he felt so bad, he would have them hold a pair and he would personally cover the tax (which is 15 dollars). I got my sneakers at Footlocker, but Finishline is my new sneaker store because of that man. On a sour note of customer service, I once bought a hoodie from a store (no names because it was the worker not the stores fault) and brought it home. I took it out the bag and noticed it had a black splotch on it around the pocket. I bring it back and the guy insists it was my fault, pointing at it with black stained fingers. He says he couldn’t do anything about it and I ask for the manager. The manager comes out and I tell him what’s going on, while pointing out the workers fingers and the manager apologizes and offers me an exchange plus an extra item to make up for the inconvenience. The next time I went to that store, I noticed that same employee wasn’t there.

Week 1 EOC

To me, music is one of the most important medias in our universe. It teaches us about what’s going on at the time and it shows what the musician is feeling. I feel as though music is one of the many outlets to show any emotion, whether it be anger, happiness, sadness, troubles, reality, fantasy, addiction, relief, and any other emotion you can think of. As long as you are speaking the truth about everything and you are portraying what you’ve seen then your going to be ok. My favorite music is hip-hop music. Why? There is literally too many reasons to list. Mostly because the rawness of it. It can be really gritty while still being happy. It can be really happy while still being angry. It is pure poetry and shows the trials and tribulations of the rapper at the moment while it also shows how that rapper thinks. The production style is like no other. It can incorporate samples, synthesizers, live instruments, singing, yelling, chanting, call-and-response, along with any other instrument used in any other type of music. I have something big to say to this world, and I believe that no matter how people respond to it, as long as I say exactly how I feel at all moments, and make good music, then that’s all that matters.