Hello Mr. Stevenson...

I sent an email to Seth Stevenson, but at the moment, he has not responded.

My email said...

Hi Mr. Stevenson,

This is Jacob Pollard, and I have a few questions to ask you if you don't mind.  My English teacher has told us to look at examples of Op-Ed writers and choose a specific one to look at their posts.  I picked you because I liked the topics you discussed in your posts.

For one of our assignments, we must analyze how you used concession in one of your posts.  I was wondering if you had a specific article that you thought had a great example of it.  I was thinking the one about the Clio Awards would be good, but I didn't know.  Also, do you have any related issues to the Clio Awards that might be good?  Do you have an article that you feel has been your best work?

Thanks for all your help!

Sincerely,
Jacob Pollard

If he responds, I will gladly update this... =)

The Awards Ceremony - Bogus or Not?

In Seth Stevenson's article about the Clio Awards, he clearly is upset about the awards ceremony.

http://www.slate.com/id/2254394/pagenum/all/#p2

CLAIM - He basically said the the Clio Awards ceremony was complete bogus and that they were definitely wrong.  His third paragraph starts out with the sentence, "The bar was similarly lowered at the Clio Awards ceremony last night."

CONCESSION - Although he doesn't believe the first place winner should have been what it was, he sort of agrees that it was good.  But right away, he completely changes his mind again.  "The visual effects here are impressively seamless, and I enjoyed the sly Aussie wit—most evident in the moment when a man dunks his wife, hoping someone better might pop out of the water. But it's hard for me to understand why the judges felt this commercial stood head and shoulders above the rest of this year's entrants."

Support Points -
1. He explains that the commercial that won it all is nothing special.  "It's not like this spot presents an innovative new model—something we've never seen before."
2. He also tells us that the Levi's commercial, Old Spice's "The Man Your Man Could Smell Like", Dos Equis' "Most Interesting Man in the World", and Apple's Mac vs. PC campaign all got bronzes, but he thought they were all better than that.

•  He explained the Old Spice commercial by saying it dominated "with its laugh-inducing surprises and charismatic lead performance." 
• Also the "choreographed set-switching—first he's in a shower, then he's on a sailboat, then he's on a horse—was masterfully executed" in the Old Spice commercial.

3. Gold went to Luvs diapers viral video, which he thought didn't deserve it.  He said, "it pretty clearly failed to go viral, since I'd never heard of it before."

I agree with his logic on the award choices.  I believe the awards that won are totally pointless, and some don't relate at all to the product they are selling.  I did find it interesting that he picked an awards show that I have never heard of before.  I'm not really a fanatic about awards shows, but I know some of them, just not this one.