After having spent the better part of my adult life working in the media, I’m still fascinated by the impact it has on the hearts and minds of people. There is truth in the idea that the media shapes our culture and our public perceptions. As someone who spent so many years on the inside, I can attest to it. When I see controversies and personalities capturing the public attention, I’m not so much interested in what everyone is saying as much as I am why they are saying it. I have to wonder and ask the pop-culture icon, “What’s in it for you?”

Perhaps my own fascination with the ease with which public perception can be shaped is why I gave Blade his career in holofeatures and made him so skillful at media manipulation. It just seemed a necessary skill for him to have.

As a writer, I’m aware that I wield the power to shape public perception. Anyone with any kind of platform does so to a degree. In our age of one hundred forty character sound bites, the more controversial and upsetting, the better. But to the people who find themselves bristling in righteous indignation and organizing against the flavor-of-the-moment, I offer this question:  What does the controversial figure have to gain from your ire?

I run another blog, less about writing and more about things of a more personal nature.  On that blog, I asked that question and I offer you the link here if you’d like to read more about masters of media manipulation.

http://caliscomfycouch.blogspot.com/2013/05/using-controversy-to-raise-brand.html