Category: Annotated Bibliographies

Digital Spaces As Built Environments

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Rothman, Michael. “Iggy Azalea Quits Social Media After Body Bullying, Her Team Takes Over.” ABC News. ABC News Network, 19 Feb. 2015. Web. 29 Apr. 2016. <http://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/iggy-azalea-quits-social-medial-body-bullying/story?id=29074260>.

Shortly after her rise to fame and to number one Billboard hot 100 singles Iggy Azalea became victim to cyber bullying. Days after returning from her Hawaiian beach vacation with her fiancé she came online to notice that Twitter users across the world where tree tweeting her hateful statements about her body. This was not the first time she had been under scrutiny. she had been “memed” and mocked over many things including her supposed lack of talent, canceled tour, race, and other aspects of her personal life. To protect herself, she took a social media hiatus after tweeting that her management would take over her accounts. She added, “The Internet is the ugliest reflection of man kind there is.” Iggy Azalea leads us to question the purpose of social media and the negative outcomes as a result of being so easily accessible online. Iggy, returning to personally run her social media accounts a few months later, came with very strong messages for people online. She advised her fans to not listen to what others have to say about their personal lives and called for twitter to create more ways to cipher out posts that are negative.

Florida, R. and Jackson, S. (2009). Sonic city: the evolving economic geography of the music industry. Journal of Planning Education and Research, 29(3), 310-321.

Because of the Digital Revolution that began around the 1950s, technology has evolved to the point where music distribution is no longer spread through at a slow pace as it did in previous generations. The internet is a newly emerged form of contagious diffusion, which is defined as widespread diffusion of an idea through a population in a very short amount of time. The process of music being purchased, sold, shared online is called Electronic Music Delivery is what makes this process so effortless (EMD). Diffusion is an idea, characteristic, or objects that spreads to different areas throughout time. A form of diffusion that does pertain to music is stimulus diffusion which is when an underlying principle is innovated into something new and improved which could be applied to remixes or when artists are featured in a song. Easily accessible music, because of Electronic Music Delivery, has caused the music industry to become more condensed and focused on in major urban cities over time. This goes to show that online areas and spaces are have effect on and can change the way we do things in real life.

Cortez, Samantha. “7 Tips On Attracting Visitors To Your Web Site.” Business Insider. Business Insider, Inc, 16 Aug. 2012. Web. 29 Apr. 2016. <http://www.businessinsider.com/how-to-get-visitors-to-stay-on-your-site-2012-6>.

In “7 Tips On Attracting Visitors To Your Web Site”, writer Samantha Cortez gives inside tips to readers on consumer appeal on websites. Studies have proven that the average person, when visiting a wept, will stay for less than a minute. An important focus in the business world is figuring out what keeps customers and clients on the website. While studying this, analysts also must focus on what drives users away or could potentially return to the site. She states that no matter what type of business the site is representing there are general practices that can be integrated into the online space that could bring drive users away. The authors of this article present seven tips useful that allowed for the creation of an appealing website. Most of the recommendations somehow resembled the first “Create an Appealing Design” statement the authors made. This article is important to business’ and common people alike as it goes to show that the layout and accessibility of an online space could potentially affect a customer’s likelihood to come back.

“Gentrification in America Report”

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Maciag, Mike. “Gentrification in America Report.” Governing: The States and Localities. E.Republic, Feb. 2015. Web. 07 Mar. 2016. <http://www.governing.com/gov-data/gentrification-in-cities-governing-report.html>.

All across the United States, urban areas are experiencing an influx of well-off residents in areas which were previously underinvested. This influx is tagged with the name gentrification. Because of the affluent moving to the area, the housing process in the area begin to increase dramatically which displaces the residents. Statistics have shown that almost 20% of low income area in the the US have experienced gentrification. Cities that experienced gentrification in the most places were New York, NY, Philadelphia, PA, and Chicago, IL. The researches also found that neighborhoods that went through gentrification saw losses of the minority population and went through population increases while the opposite was seen in areas that failed to undergo it. Atlanta specifically has gentrified more than double of what it did from 1990-2000, going from 13 areas to 30. The city of Atlanta also noticed an increase of bachelor’s degrees held by adults in the areas increasing as gentrification. They also suffered a slight increase of poverty rates in the portions of the city that did not undergo gentrification. This article defines gentrification and gives specifics of where it has occurred around the nation.

“Georgia Senate Gives OK to Super Bowl Tax Breaks”

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Salzer, James. “Key Georgia Senate Panel Gives OK to Super Bowl, Shopping Tax Breaks.” AJC. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, 2 Mar. 2016. Web. 6 Mar. 2016. <http://www.ajc.com/news/news/state-regional-govt-politics/key-georgia-senate-panel-gives-ok-to-super-bowl-sh/nqcNQ/>.

Because the Atlanta Falcons invested in building the new Mercedes-Benz stadium which cost over $1.5 billion, they put in a bid to the NFL to be considered to host the Superbowl. In efforts to further persuade the NFL, Governor Nathan Deal, Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed and the Atlanta Sports Council proposed a bill to the Georgia Senate to have sales taxes on tickets to the big game waived. Tax breaks in the past have proven beneficial to our city as they have often created jobs and generated plenty of business for retail stores. The Georgia House and Senate assessed the pros and cons of offering tax breaks on super bowl tickets and found that it would cost the state and city $10 million but having the game in Atlanta would bring in over $400 million as estimated by economists. Because this bill is so broad it could also cover large sporting events such as Final Four games. This bill will possibly allow the city to have more economic growth and prowess through tax breaks on Superbowl tickets.

“Demolition of Georgia Dome Scheduled for 2017”

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Tucker, Tim. “Demolition of Georgia Dome Scheduled for 2017.” AJC. The Atlanta Journal Constitution, 30 Jan. 2016. Web. 06 Mar. 2016. <http://www.myajc.com/news/sports/football/plans-in-works-to-decommission-the-dome/nqFFh/>.

Recently it was decided that the Mercedes-Benz Stadium will not be opened for business for an additional 3 months after the original date intended. Because it had been previously decided that the dome will close in March of 2017, local vendors and employees of the Dome are worried about not working for three months as the new stadium’s opening date is not June 2017. The construction company in charge of the Dome’s demolition stated that in order to have the significant amount of parking needed for the new stadium’s large attendance, they need to begin the implosion as soon as possible. The takedown of the dome is predicted to take from 6 to 7 months, which would not be in time for the 2017 NFL season. The parking decks would not be prepared in time due because of the time it takes to build such massive parking structures to hold such weights and the MARTA tracks that are so close. This opening date push back and not opening of the dome during the over lapped dates will mean that the Atlanta soccer team will not be playing in their new stadium or the Georgia dome for the first three months of their first ever season. Conclusively, there has been no revisiting of the demolition date of the Georgia Dome and it can potentially backfire locals and their sports teams.

“Mayor Reed Transfers 10 Property Deeds to APS”

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Saporta, Maria. “Atlanta Mayor Kasim Agrees to Transfer 10 Property Deeds to APS.” Saporta Report. N.p., 04 Feb. 2016. Web. 05 Feb. 2016. <http://saportareport.com/53810-2/>.

The article “Atlanta Mayor Transfers Property Deeds to APS” by Maria Saporta is important to our studies of the rhetoric of built environment for many reasons.  Saporta  aims to inform the readers of Mayor Reed’s plans to make amends with the Atlanta Public Schools over their budget cuts taken to help fund the Atlanta Beltline. Because the schools took budget cuts to support the Beltline, the schools were promised repayments which would be generated form the Beltline’s tax revenues. Because rthe city had not sent these repayments as they had promised, “the Atlanta Board of Education filed a lawsuit against the City last spring to gain control of the deeds of four former APS schools”. The Atlanta Public School system planned to use the vacant schools to sell to private firms who would revamp the school or land it was on. This is important because the turnout of the vacant schools could prove to help the area or add on to the built environment. Positively it could allow for new economic growth in the generally low-income areas, or it could lead to more gentrification and marginalized citizens having no other option but to leave their homes.

“Atlanta’s Popular BeltLine Trail Still Has Miles to Go”

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Mehrotra, Krishna. “Atlanta’s Popular BeltLine Trail Still Has Miles to Go.” The Wall Street Journal. Dow Jones & Company, 31 July 2014. Web. 5 Feb. 2016. <http%3A%2F%2Fwww.wsj.com%2Farticles%2Fatlantas-popular-beltline-trail-still-has-miles-to-go-1406837184>.

Krishna Mehrotra’s article entitled “Atlanta’s Popular BeltLine Trail Still Has Miles to Go” is very influential for my studies of the Atlanta Beltline. The author includes a few hints as to how the Beltline is contributing to the built environment. Because legislation has allowed for the Beltline to be funded partially by taxes, money is being sourced from important aspects of Atlanta’s budget such as the Atlanta Public Schools. This legislation was “an agreement [using school property-tax revenues] between the city, the county and the public-school system, the BeltLine receives a portion of those parties’ property-tax revenues”. This agreement led to issues because the school system did not receive the revenues that were supposedly generated by the Beltline. The article also mentions that gentrification is taking place and parallels the Beltline to the Highline in New York City. Gentrification is occurring because “housing costs will be too high for current residents to remain” which runs lower income families out of their homes. I chose this article to represent my studies because it frequently shows how the addition of the Beltline may harm lower income families but also because it showcases some of the perks of the development of the Beltline. This article has light flaws because it lacks praise for the Beltline. The only statement made which was positive is when Mehrotra states “Skip Engelbrecht said business has tripled at his furniture store, Paris on Ponce, since he opened up a backdoor entrance from the BeltLine 2½ years ago” and a short intro of a woman praising her lack of need for a car because of living in such proximity to the Beltline. Otherwise the article rambles on the expense of the Beltline and ridicules the city for investing in such an expensive project.