How well does contemporary media regulation protect the public?

In order to protect the public from harmful or unsuitable films, the British Board of Film Classification (previously film censorship) was set up as an impartial non-government body which classifies films for various age groups: U, 12A, 12, 15, 18. A similar board was later set up in 2003 after the BBFC became unable to classify all films and video games. So PEGI was set up to classify video games in the same way as the BBFC does for films. E
Examiners look at sex, violence, language, drugs, antisocial behaviours, and tone when classifying films. In order to be have classifications which are as impartial as possible, the BBFC uses a minimum of 2 examiners for each case, although external examiners may need to input for more difficult cases. Specialist advice is taken under consideration when legal matters come into hand- i.e- what you can and cannot legally show in the cinema. Guidelines are available on the BBFC website to better educate parents and viewers on what is in a film before they watch it/ allow their children to watch it. The BBFC try and alter their rules and regulations slightly to the current public opinion in order to make sure that their ratings reflect contemporary British values. The BBFC has been known to refuse classification for certain films of extreme content, leading to the “video nasties” of the 1980s, although now days it is more likely that a film will receive an 18 certification in order to prevent it from becoming a scandalous illegal film that the public, who previously would have had no interest in it, are now desperate to see. In this way, the BBFC are constantly working to keep the public from harm but still give adults freedom to judge for themselves what they wish to watch.
As 37% of the population aged between 16 and 49 now describe themselves as “active video game players” it is only right that video games now have a board of classification similar to the BBFC, this is why PEGI was created in 2003. Ratings on the front of video games show at what age PEGI deems the game to be suitable, this has nothing to do with game difficulty, it merely concentrates on the violent, language, drug use, antisocial behaviours etc in the game, and how those behaviours are presented to the audience. Although PEGI do try and encourage parental guidance on what a child should and should not be playing, via symbols on the packaging, the lack of online information suggests that they may not be protecting the public from harm as effectively as the BBFC.
There are several factors which can lead to contemporary media regulation not protecting the public, the first and most obvious being that there are some outlets of mass media which are unregulated. An example of this is television, which is regulated only after/if a number of complaints have been filed by the public. After 9’o clock, films showing scenes or messages which are inappropriate for children can be showed, and there is no way of knowing whether or not young children or venerable people are watching. The television channel companies themselves have no legal obligation to show only certain classifications of films, and it is up to the owners of the channel to decide what they want to show based on how they want their channel to be perceived. This means that contemporary media regulation, no matter how efficient it is in the cinema and on DVD, is completely void on television as there is no way of enforcing it. However, a similar popular non-regulated way to access film is on Youtube, which, other than a small minority of videos being 18+ (although you can obviously just lie about your age) most videos have no classification and so are available to the youngest of children. The difference between this and TV, is that the BBFC has recently become responsible for regulating music videos after the producers have submitted it to them. Of course there are billions of videos on Youtube, and the BBFC cannot be expected to regulate all of them, so, despite these recent improvements, regulation is not really protecting the public online.
Although cinema and DVD releases, as well as video games, are regulated, the regulation requires complete cooperation from parents to truly be efficient. There has been significant issues with parents, who act as “gate keepers” to stop their children using/watching inappropriate content, buying this content (especially video games) for their children even though they are younger than the designated age suggested by PEGI. This is most likely due to parents being poorly educated on the subject of video games, and not fully understanding the threat that these games can pose. There is little information online for parents buying their children these games, meaning that although PEGI put symbols on the front of each game packaging, the parents may not even know what the symbols stand for, or how these things (violence, sex etc) can damage their children.
In the case of film there is a lot of evidence to suggest that the BBFC does in fact protect the public from harm. The Hunger Games for example, which was a 15, was made into a 12A with cuts to make it appropriate for a younger audience. This shows that the BBFC’s intention is to make films that cater for the different needs of the audience, and will make cuts to films if needs be, proving that their intention is to protect the public.
However, there is significantly more information to suggest that the BBFC is not succeeding in its aims to protect the public. Films such as the woman in Black have caused controversy as the BBFC have seemingly not taken the initiative to raise the rating for a film, or have not made sufficient cuts, this suggests that the they are not necessarily capable of keeping the public safe and protecting them from harm. In the case of the Woman in Black, the BBFC suggested to the public through their choice of classification that they could be biased towards a certain production or director. The producers and the director of the woman in black (James Watkins) wanted the film, which features the suicide of very young children as well themes of horror, to be rated 12 so that they could rope in the audience of Harry Potter to go out and see the film due to the main actor. Instead of being impartial as they are meant to be, the BBFC agreed to this, leading to The Woman in Black becoming the most complained about film in history. The film was cut to make it apparently more suitable for younger audiences, but it should be mentioned that the entire tone of this film is described even by the BBFC as “quite bleak throughout” even though the guidelines for what should be classified as 12 states that “disturbing sequences [should not be] frequent or sustained”, prompting the public to see this as contradictory.
Another key example of where the boards which we entrust to protect vulnerable have been unable to keep audiences out of harms way, lies in video games. There have been several cases of extreme violent crime whereby it could be alluded that video games could be the cause. In the case of Anne Maguire, who was stabbed 8 times in the neck and the back by a student in her class, it should be pointed out that the pupil, William Cornick had be rumoured to have “an addiction” to the game Dark Souls 2, in which gamers can savagely stab and chop up zombies in return for points. At a young age children’s development can be particularly susceptible to this constant use of violent video games which imply that extreme violence is an acceptable thing.
Although there are more examples of the BBFC and PEGI being unable to protect the public harm, this is likely due to newspapers reporting only on stories which reiterate this message. By “exaggerating the extent and significance of certain events”, the newspapers are deliberately creating what Stanley Cohen coins a “moral panic”. Most instances of violent crime being linked to video gaming or violent films can also be linked to mental illness or childhood trauma, and the fact that these people are also watching violent films or playing video games is not driven by cause and correlation, but simply by coincidence. As a general rule, the BBFC and PEGI do protect the public from harmful or inappropriate content, as they generally stop youngsters from viewing things that they should not be. There has been some speculation about the link between poor regulation and violent crime yes, but contemporary media regulation must be created for the ‘man on the Clapham omnibus’ and so cannot be blamed for the crimes or trauma of unstable people

evaluation question 3 draft

Four participants were asked theme related questions

I have collected both qualitative and quantitative data, asking both simple yes and no questions, as well as more detailed questions.

I created a survey of 6 questions to gain audience research, and handed it out to 20 students. I didn't want to put too many questions as the students may have been reluctant to do it.

The questions

1) Is the theme of the movie evident from this poster 

2)What sub genre would you say this movie is, based on this poster

3)Is this poster scary

4) Is the phrase "she never forgets" threatening 

5)does this poster encourage you to watch the film

6)does the typography Cannote horror 

Qualitative data results/conclusion:

evaluation question 2 draft

 Synergy and iconography. As you can see, we have used the same icon in every poster when advertising it, the scissor icon. We have almost branded ourselves using the scissors icon, so our production is recognizable by that. We found that it is important to have consistency within the product to reiterate the brand.

Here we have our poster in a movie theater

-Billboards
-Bus stops
-Cinema's
-Video games

App:

Social dummies:

Use of social networking to advertise-

Instagram

Facebook

Twitter pages

NEW and improved movie poster

Wednesday 3rd February: lesson

Jasmine may 

Notes for media: press regulation and freedom 

Question:

A lady's daughter us stabbed a and paralysed but survives and go onto have children etc

Science then, the lady and her family have been harassed terribly including turning up at doorstep

Press regulation is the idea of the government regulating the press, and putting boundaries on what and what they can do, and how far the press can go with getting information 

One one side of the argument, it says that press regulation is a form of government control and a regulatory system reiterating social control 

On the flip side, it could be said that its a parody of a social control agent, and a nosey money scheming institution

However in the lady's case

It's argued that the press violate their freedom by intruding people

Should the press be regulated? 

Freedom vs violating people's privacy 

Notes:

1: regulation and political bias

Payed for classification by bbfc, heavily biased regulation as its to do with money

People campaigned about breaches of the regular

Netflix content (Internet and online) stuff is still able to be uploaded with little regulation 

Media watch are a pressure group; they encourage people to complain about the decline in our moral standards 

Bbfc-everyone has freedom to choose what they watch, adults responsibility 

Media watch- we should take a moral stance to stop the decline of morality

Could be argued that we need to regulate what children see as it influences them, and children are the future 

Bbfc have become more liberal over the years, they don't work for the government 

2:

Why posters

Creativity vs conventions

We have conventions for marketing & legal reasons, blurb and copyright 

When we follow it. posters it becomes formulaic

Old posters focus more on creativity whereas new posters have to follow set set conventions more

Posters nowadays have too many legal obligations

Eg billing blocks have to be related to the image 

Slightly breaking away from modern posters by getting independent artists to do the posters, expanding the creative side

Following conventions too much limits creativity

3:

Levison inquiry; what is the case study