The End?

Well, this is it. The end of our scholastic year. I've learned some things in this class, but if I was to pick one to write about, it would be that we all, with the proper application of blood, sweat, and time, can participate in the collective group discussion occurring on the internet. I wasn't the most prolific or the most concise, but these blog posts gave me a real chance to express myself in a way that probably taught myself more about me than the state of the blogosphere.


If I have one regret, it was the lack of interesting (to me) topics to post about. If only I had been able to comment on an ongoing presidential election year or some such thing, I believe it would have been a great opportunity to show my aptitudes.


If you've been reading my blog, or even just bits of it, I appreciate your time, and hope that you'll keep following. Who knows? We're just a few months away from the Primaries ramping up. It'll be an interesting trip.

Foreign Movies - Realm of the Stuck Up

Man, foreign movies, what a topic.

Really, foreign movies aren't an more original or interesting than domestic films, but the ones that manage to translate and become popular are usually the cream of the crop. This results in a skewed perception by movie critics. No films made in France aren't any better because they're made in France, they just happen to be one of the better films out of that country.

That said. There are quite a few films made outside the Anglo-Western English sphere. I've only had an opportunity to see a few. For some reason, American film goers really hate subtitles. I mean, I even heard rumbles of people complaining about Avatar which translated the Native American parallels' tongue into English. Really? Did you just want them to speak English?

Anyways, here a few foreign flicks I've had the pleasure of checking out:

Metropolis
Run Lola Run (Great for getting into foreign films)

22 Bullets
Let the Right One In
Shaolin Soccer
Kung Fu Hustle (One of my all time favorites)

Ong Bak

Hobo With a Shotgun

And quite a few more. I'm one of those self styled movie buffs.

2012 Republican Primaries

Check out these statistics gathered by ohmygov! It's quite obvious that Social Media is intrinsically tied with politics. It is a whole other thing to see the actual numbers.

FACEBOOK FANS

1) Sarah Palin	2,761,054
2) Mitt Romney	793,127
3) Mike Huckabee	535,011
4) Ron Paul	302,299
5) Bobby Jindal	122,389
6) Newt Gingrich	107,046
7) Michele Bachmann	97,755
8) Tim Pawlenty	71,841
9) Rick Perry	51,839
10) Mitch Daniels	42,300
11) Chris Christie	32,456
12) Haley Barbour	17,290
13) Rick Santorum	12,987

TWITTER FOLLOWERS

1) Newt Gingrich	1,309,037
2) Sarah Palin	422,884
3) Mike Huckabee	129,320
4) Bobby Jindal	55,983
5) Michele Bachmann	35,688
6) Ron Paul	31,539
7) Chris Christie	28,564
8) Tim Pawlenty	25,856
9) Haley Barbour	11,444
10) Michael Steele	8,738
11) Rick Perry	5,686
12) Mitch Daniels	1,978

I've been meaning to post about this particular video for a long time.

Health Reform Explained Video

This is it folks. This is a video that takes a complex, controversial issue, and then calmly explains the idea with neutrality and clarity. This is the pinnacle of what 'English for New Media' is all about.

Recalling Reading

Behold, the fruit of my (and Dan's) labour.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E-Q1SX-gfes&feature=youtube_gdata