Entry 5

Infographic

Directions:

1) Identify my essay

http://futureofmusic.org/article/article/music-and-how-money-flows

1)    Outline the infographic essay

Introduction: The author gives out the question to show the main idea that is about the ways of musicians and songwriters get compensations of the whole infographic article.

Body: The whole article is divided into two big aspects.

A.   For radio and radio-like services, musicians and songwriters get compensations.

B.    For digital stores and on-demand streams, musicians and songwriters get compensations. (Three different kinds)

1.     For record labels that have a direct deal with services

2.     For record labels that are represented by a digital aggregator/distributor.

3.     For artists who own their sound recording copyrights and use services like CD Baby or TuneCore.  

2) Provide the Rhetorical Situation of this essay

• Purpose: Give the audiences a big and clear picture of how and how much songwriters and musicians get compensations.
• Audience: All the NPR News audiences who are interested in this topic.
• Stance: neutral
• Genre: An introduction paper
• Media/design: Chart, picture, text

3) While you are only outlining the essay--not writing it word-for-word--you can still get a feeling for what this essay would look like. How is the infographic different from the traditional essay you outlined?

In infographic, the author uses chats to replace many of words and only uses several sentences to add more information. In other words, in the infographic, the blanks, the lines with arrows and statistics are dominant. In the essay, the author uses words to explain the main idea. There is less margin in an essay.

4) Strengths and weaknesses of the infographic: what does the infographic do better than the essay? What does the essay do better than the infographic?

Comparing the infographic with essay, it is more readable and easily for readers to understand. There are two reasons. Firstly, no matter the infographic or the essay, it is involved a lot of statistics and the distribution. The blanks and lines with arrows can clearly indicate the relationship among parties. Who get the money? How much they get? The infographic shows the direction and distribution visually. Secondly, the infographic has more space, which readers feel much confortable to read. They are not afraid of burring by tons of thousands of words. However, when the author decides to use infographic, he leaves out many things that are not considered as the main idea. Sometimes, it will cause bed impacts. As for me, I do not understand what C and SR mean by the author. Readers need more information about these technical terms. Articles can definitely make the idea more comprehensive.  

5) How does this qualify as an essay and not a series of pictures?

They are not simple pictures. There are links among them. They have introduction and body. Although this infographic does not have conclusion, it is still like an article.