Jesus & Mo

There has been recent controversy as something that started with two students wearing a shirt with a cartoon of prophets Jesus and Mohammed has escalated into a national and political debate.

This is an example of this cartoon. Maajid Nawaz, a Liberal politician in Britain has received death threats on twitter because he tweeted a cartoon of this and found nothing wrong with it. However his fellow adherents of Islam did not take this side of the matter and 20,000 Muslims quickly moved to sign a petition for Nawaz to be removed as a Liberal politician by Nick Clegg. Channel 4 covered the news of this situation and covered out the Mohammed part of the Cartoon (They did not show his face) as they feared it would offend viewers.

Here is a link on Maajid Nawaz's views towards this whole predicament and how he explains his actions: http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/jan/28/speaking-islam-loudmouths-hijacked

There is a website where there are many existent Jesus & Mohammed Cartoons. In some of these cartoon s there is a use of strong language made by the cartoon of Mohammed which may help to understand as to why many Muslims are offended by this. It is mainly Mohammed who is portrayed as standing against everything their religion is about. For example, in the picture above it shows Jesus & Mohammed at a Bar drinking. This is offensive towards Muslims because in their religion they are not supposed to consume any alcohol.

The link to this website: http://www.jesusandmo.net/

Interview with Characters 1

We did an interview with 3 of our focus group members Elena, Pisit & Aidan. They talked a bit about their faiths. Given us details about why their faith is important and what it is all about. Elena spoke about Russian Orthodox, another branch of christianity. Pisit talked about being Buddhist. Aidan talked about being Taoist and even gave an poem about Taoism.

Radio Times and Faith Off

We believe that our programme idea will work well with Radio Times. This because they are trying to target a more youthful audience. Also the radio times is the best selling and most profitable magazine in the UK today. One of the ways they will try to do this is through the app DisoverTV which gave us the idea of possibly creating an app for our programme. On this app it could include the schedule for the program as well as character insight, weekly topic discussions, information on various religions and religious articles. The app would also include episode recaps and promos for the next episode. An idea maybe to possibly put a quiz section in the app, about the characters and their faiths, making viewers more interactive and giving them a chance to meet the characters on the show by answering key questions.

Radio Times 2

Radio Times is owned by immediate media. They've got 56 magazines and they have all the BBC magazines, they bought the lot. Radio times is the most profitable magazine in the UK, but the average age of its print readers is 57. So they want to hold on to the print readers but they want to reach out to younger audiences. One of the things they ways they wish to do this is with their Discover TV app for iPads where you an get best of recommendations for younger audiences. There is Radio Times website and they are trying to build that base but you don't make allot of money out digital, hence the quote ''digital pennies versus analogue pounds.'' the point being you make good money on print media, you don't make so much in digital. The profits digital wise are pennies, and the analogue profits are pounds.

 

 

Here's is an article that the guardian did about the radio times and its aims to break into the digital industry: http://www.theguardian.com/media/2014/jan/19/radio-times-immediate-media

Post-Group Meeting

We have held our first group meeting with our focus group. It was quite interesting as most of them were comfortable with each other. They were very suggestive and open. There is 8 people, 4 boys and 4 girls. We have 3 Christians; A Catholic, Anglican and an Orthodox. A Buddhist, a Taoist, A Judaic, An Agnostic and a Muslim.

Our discussion lasted about 30 Min's, which we also recorded. We introduced our ideas to them such as for our ancillary products; The poster and magazine interview. We also made the suggestion of visiting the Kings College Chapel and they all thought it was a great idea. The group was quite shocked about our findings in the results from the survey. Particularly about the part that 73% of people in our college thought that Religion was a positive influence in the world today. Many of them seemed to agree to the fact England is not as religious as it once was, as it was also found in the Article in the Daily Mail.

Here's a clip of our discussion where two people talk about their faiths:

 

VICE

We want use a more vice-documentary style. They look at things through different angles, they are able to get a younger audience to wtch these things as they make them in an interesting way. Seeing as our documentary is based on the lives young people aged 17,18 or 19 this is the best way of learning how we would attract a more younger audience.

Focus Group 1st Meeting

We have arranged our first meeting between us and our Focus Group. Our intention for the first meeting is mainly focusing on getting to know each other, so that everyone can be more comfortable with each other. In this meeting we will also make a suggestion to the group about doing an activity together, again increasing comfort ability around each other. Introduce the main ideas of the programme, make it clear to them what the idea of the programme is and discussing the ancillary products as well as our findings in research. After we do this we will then offer them the chance to voice their own opinions and suggestions, for example if they have a different view as to how we should do the documentary.

Another thing that we thought would be could is trying to get them on Twitter and put a 140 character statement about their faith and why it is important to them. Then we will make it clear to them about our selfie idea and what we plan to do more with social networks. Our selfie idea is that we will change it every week so the parts of the face look different. Our plan is to film in a period of four weeks, so we will meet every Tuesday at 14:00 with an update.

Facebook, Twitter and Production

We have now set up Facebook and Twitter pages to spread word about our documentary. Our intention with both pages is not only to spread the word about our documentary but also to collect new ideas and feedback from our audience to see where we could improve etc. These are the links:
https://www.facebook.com/#!/GanzeDaviesProductions  https://twitter.com/FaithOffCCSS

 

The pages will also be used to introduce our characters on the show and more about their faiths e.g what is good about their faith? what makes their faith different? Our idea for our poster will also be presented on the page. The poster idea which is similar to Channel 4's ''Seven Days'', where apart of each persons face is attached to form one face. So we will ask our participants to take a selfie (a picture with just them in it, preferably a close-up of their face) and a 140 character statement about them and their faith on Twitter. Twitter will also be used for more discussions using a hashtag. For example, people who find out more about the show and want to offer their views on characters and the show will be able to comment using the #FaithOffCCSS hashtag. Facebook is used more for information and advertising, such as videos.

 

 

When we meet with all our characters, we will allow them to make suggestions about what they think the documentary should be like. Our intention at this first meeting is to put them in pairs to do different activities so they can become more comfortable with each other to make our documentary process easier. There might be a trip for us to the Kings College Chapel in Cambridge to hear the choir sing. Another idea is to maybe attend one of our participants places of worship if no there is no issue with the other participants.