Facebook Stuff Again

As the semester dies down and we're not covering new things in class so much, I find it a bit hard to think of something to blog about. So, I guess I'll just kind of ramble about Facebook stuff.  When I deactivated my Facebook in March of last year, I thought it would be for good. I never thought I'd want another one again. However, as of about a month ago, I thought it was necessary. As much as I didn't want one, I felt like I needed one.  But I got along just fine for a year without one, so...how badly do I really need one?  It's a little irritating sometimes, but this whole idea that's been pushed in my face (and maybe others' too, I just can't speak for them) that I NEED one is just so pervasive that it's probably why I'm on it all the time.  I've only had it a month and I'm already sick of it. I'm not saying other people shouldn't use it, but I don't know how much longer I can do it. I'm going to deactivate again, probably this weekend, but with the intention of reactivating it in a time span as short as a week or as long as a month. I'm not sure if I want it to be an on-and-off thing, or if I'll eventually permanently delete and not come back or get on board for good. It could just come down to the whole concept of balance, and how too much of something is bad, but that doesn't mean you need to cut it out entirely. However, I think it encourages me to waste my time worrying about trivial things, and that's the last thing I need.  I don't know...it's a bit hard to explain.  Sorry guys. I wish I had something more insightful to contribute in this week's blog post.

When Books and Video Games Collide

I was researching the future of publishing in one of my other classes, and of course I came across e-books.  What I was surprised to see was books that had an audio track, which is being perfected by an eye tracking system so that the music plays at the same speed that you read with sound effects. Other apps have interactive stories, either with pictures and commentaries like DVD extras, while others required the reader to interact for the story to move forward.


As a kid, I had a computer game called "Eagle Eye Mysteries," which was eerily similar to the concept of interactive books. You would follow a character, looking for clues that are written out on the screen in a story format and move around town trying to find the culprit.  This game is really old, before they moved from just text on the screen to more visual stories like when I upgraded to Nancy Drew Mysteries computer game that had no text and was all audio/visual.


Eagle Eye Mysteries and Nancy Drew sound eerily like the type of interactive reading that is now being developed.  This brings up the question, when will video games and reading intersect?  Have they already?  I wonder how long it will take people to realize they are just creating an interactive game, which is nothing new.  I think the reason it seems so revolutionary is because we are approaching from another perspective, from reading to interactivity rather than from TV and video games to interactive video games where you are part of the story.

This worries me. Will literacy be in danger if people think interactive stories with movies and videos are synonymous with reading? One day will I ask my child "How was your book?" and they will look up from their tablet where they were just playing a game and they say "I'm reading it right now." 

Ubiquitous, Indeed

I think it's fair to say that almost all of our lives revolve around computers.  As Carie pointed out with that picture, nearly everything we do to accomplish something is done with computers--listening to music, talking to friends, watching movies, even masturbating.  To think that even 20 years ago these things weren't even possible blows my mind. Computing really has become ubiquitous.  We are very heavily reliant on it.  It seems like I'm stating obvious things, but it's something I've really just started to think about.  What would happen if social networks like Facebook collapsed or were shut down?  What if computing somehow was no longer possible? What would we do? We've become so used to--and reliant on--digital technology that I find it difficult to believe that society would be able to function without them, even though that's what we did for a very long time before now.

Backsliding

Everyone is so focused on how disconnected and anti-social our generation is because of the computer, but it's like being in the eye of the storm, you can't truly see the impact it's had until the storm is over. We are in the middle of a huge upheaval, where everything we've known is changing thanks to advances in technology. Naturally, things are going to need to be broken down and readjusted.

Rather than looking at the technology revolution, I'd like to take a step back and look at history, using Shirky's chapter 8 as a guideline. The best example I can think of relates to my creative writing pursuits. The reason I love discussing my story and getting feedback from other people is that I sometimes get so stuck on an idea that I don't even realize it is not even necessary. For example, last week I workshopped my novel in which there is a camping trip. Someone asked why it was necessary and I realized when I was rewriting the story, I never even thought about the significance it. That scene had been there since the beginning and just seemed a natural part of the story. That's what I think of when I think about people's idea of "spending free time." Over the decades and centuries, these things have changed but become so naturalized in our society that redefining our idea of free time doesn't seem like an option.

Hundreds and hundreds of years ago, reading books was a luxury. Then it became normalized and reading/literacy was encouraged. People bemoaned the fact that no one spent any time outside. Then came along the TV and everyone frowned upon it and bemoaned the days where we snuggled up with a good book. Now in present day the internet is looked upon as an awful thing while going outside, reading, and watching TV are nostalgic moments we long for. The point I'm making is that our definitions are always changing, although we don't usually notice it. When I was a child, "gay" meant happy. Now I rarely even hear it used in that context.

Shirky points out in Chapter 8 that nothing will ever replace face to face socialization, and it's absurd to think that way. I personally think it's not accurate to say the internet is antisocial (I suppose it depends on how you use it). The computer is nothing but a tool that mediates our interactions with other people (in regards to social software). I can honestly tell you I talk to more people than I did ten years ago. That doesn't mean I just hole myself up in my room all day (granted, some people do), but I also think I have meaningful contact and exchanges with REAL people online on a day to day basis. Once the fad of the internet dies down, I'm sure we will realize that we still crave that face to face communication with other people. Although I am a fan of face to face interactions, I want to play devil's advocate: What is so important about face to face communication except that it's part of our culture? Anything besides face to face interaction wasn't possible a hundred years ago, so of course that's all they had. If technology existed hundreds of years ago, would internet communication be considered the norm and face to face as odd? it's bizarre to think about, but it's important to remember that everything we do is based on how we are socialized, particularly historically and culturally.

Submerged in Facebook

Okay, yes, the last panel is a bit raunchy, but I was stumbling the other day and this came up and I couldn't help but think of this class. I normally hate rage comics, but I thought this was very smart. It really makes you rethink the definition of progress. It also makes me rethink how important digital literacy is. Who knows, classes like this might be required of high school age kids in a few years. In a world where almost anything could be done from a computer, being digitally literate is becoming an essential skill. I realize this is a "well-duh" concept for those in the class, but I think this is what recovering alcoholics would refer to as "a moment of clarity." My generation's complete submersion in the internet continues to astound me every day. I hear people talking about getting rid of their Facebook, and how on the first week, they're already loving the life they lead without Facebook. They love not being tied down to viewing everyone's documented thoughts and playing stupid Zynga games and like being able to live lives in which they are not battered with a barrage of useless information. If anyone needs to get a hold of them, they can do it through the phone. To be quite honest, if people want to get a borderline instantaneous response from me, they simply have to send me a quick message on Facebook. With that little red notification tab at the top beckoning me to check it, I can't resist and all of the sudden that little flag has jumped to the top of my priority list. I have to admit, and existence where an online profile doesn't dictate what's important in my life sounds nice. But I hear people talk about it, and I have resigned myself to the fact that I simply can't do it. I would never be able to hack it. I would be so curious about what's going on with the people I care about. Now I have to admit, some of the posts and other content I don't give a rat's arse about. In fact, a few weeks ago I did a major culling of Facebook friends who were blowing up my feed with ridiculous posts of all kinds, and that took some of the pressure off.

But to say something in defense of Facebook, it is a great way to keep in contact with people who you don't get to see very often. I have a friend who just had a baby. I don't get to see her and the baby very often, but I use Facebook to keep up on how she and baby Rowan are doing, and it makes me miss her less. I don't think that anyone really needs to use Facebook any more or any less, but rather just be conscious of the content you're viewing and the content that you post. My biggest fear has always been that Facebook will morph into Myspace. And while I don't think that it could ever get that bad again, I see more and more similarities every day.

Shirky's Book

I'm not entirely sure what to put in today's blog post, so I've decided to just write about what I think of Shirky's book so far.  I've never really read anything like an analysis of how the technology that has developed throughout our lives has changed how group dynamics work in our society--which is what this books appears to be.  So it's interesting, but it gets a bit dry in places, especially when it comes to communication charts and whatever Shirky called them. Some kind of power slope or something (I did read it, I swear!).  I mean, I know those things are important, but I just kind of lost interest in places. I also think it's interesting that he hasn't mentioned Facebook yet.  I know this book is a few years old, but it's not old enough that Facebook wasn't already HUGE at the time.  Facebook is probably the most significant group use of digital technology in history.  Maybe Shirky's saving that issue for later, seeing as it can get so extensive?

Bad Web Design

Remember when the internet was new and websites were often plagued by horrible design choices by people who had no idea what they were doing? Nowadays people actually have eyes and know what looks good and what doesn't.

I mean, no one makes it a mess of text and images, right?

Okay, but at least most people have some concept of color usage these days.

Alright... So the purple on blue and yellow on blue-green isn't the best choice for this webmaster. Surely people have learned that animated gifs are not what makes the internet awesome... right?

I spoke too soon.

At least I haven't seen an under construction logo while surfing these bad websites. I mean, I think in 2012 we've all realized that websites are living things that always evolve, hence the logos are unnecessary.

Maybe I should just give up on hoping that the internet will look pretty. It looks like people are still going to be making these amateur mistakes. Whether it's trying to use complex features that make it impossible to navigate your site or disgusting color choices, these people make their companies look bad. The only advice I can give is to look at the website I mentioned earlier in this post and compare your site to the ones displayed. If it looks similar, there's something wrong with it.

Cutting Out the Middle Man

In Chapter 2 of Clay Shirky's book, "Here Comes Everybody," he makes an observation that the mass photosharing of Flickr would not have been possible if someone had tried to coordinate. He says there is a "distinction between Flickr coordinating users versus helping them coordinate themselves" (33).

Is this referring to a future without the middle man? We are already seeing a shift from the previously private and specialized industry of publishing to becoming something that anyone can do. For example, once I finish typing up this post, I'm going to click a button that says "publish post." In essence, I'm publishing something for the rest of the world that didn't first have to go through copyediting, permissions, etc.

So is this a good thing or a bad thing? We can now all be publishers, but what is going to happen to the publishing industry? Shirky makes another salient point that we experienced this similar chaos and confusion with the emergence of the printing press. Suddenly scribes were put out of the job. A market that had been available to only a select few had suddenly become publicly available to almost everyone. I would say that things have worked out since then, so do you think we are doomed with a mush of unedited, unworthy works or is this a step toward a more knowledgeable world? Are we in the middle of a revolution that will settle down as we learn to adapt?

Sensationalism in the Digital World

Dear God, I cannot express in words how completely tired I am of seeing dead celebrities on the cover of magazines.

Celebrities are truly immortal, and I don't just mean this in the schmaltzy way in which their contributions to this country will live on forever. I mean that even though mortality has taken away their earthly form, the go on continuing to earn money even after they die. It is incredible to me. The money from movie sales, record sales, estate auctions, merchandise, and everything in between, they all receive a cut as the contributing artist. According to Forbes magazine, the highest earning dead celebrity in the country right now is Michael Jackson. Try to act surprised. And he has that first spot firmly secured, too. He earns $125 million dollars every year, clearing the second placeholder, Elvis Presley, who only makes $55 million every year. But considering he's been dead for over fifty years, that's not bad. That's probably where Michael Jackson will be in about half a century.

I hate it when celebrities die of questionable causes and we automatically turn them into martyrs. And it doesn't always happen, either. When Heath Ledger died three years ago, there was a lot of coverage in the news, but there were no Oprah specials or anything like that. It was a tragedy to this country that an incredibly talented young man had lost his life, but it was nothing like this Whitney Houston ordeal in which we've completely blown her out of proportion. She was doing A LOT of drugs, and engaging in reckless behavior, and when she dies of an overdose, all of the sudden, this country is ready to canonize her. It is completely ridiculous. We talked about sensationalism in my TCOM classes quite often, and about Little White Girl syndrome. Two words: KASEY ANTHONY.

I don't have a very rosy outlook on this kind of thing. I don't think it's going to get any better. I think it's going to take some kind of world-wide pandemonium to get America to reevaluate its priorities in the media.

So I Got Another Facebook.

While this isn't altogether relevant to what we've been discussing in class recently, it is somewhat relevant to the class in general, and to something I've posted before...I got another Facebook.

While the old issues I've had with it in the past have been overshadowed by my reasoning for making a new profile, new issues seem to have sprung up.  First of all, I am unable to get this Timeline thing that nearly everyone else has.  If I go to the page that is supposed to have a "get it now" button, that simply isn't there for me.  It seems that certain people cannot access this feature, and I am one of them. Even if I were to use a different computer or browser, it still would not let me access this feature.  There is simply nothing I can do to get the "new and improved" Facebook.

The second issue I have is the fact that I haven't even had my new profile for a week and I am already blocked from sending friend requests.  This is because I have been requesting too many people I don't have enough mutual friends with.  But...since my profile is new, I'm not going to have many friends period, so I WOULD have mutual friends if I could add everyone I know.  Basically, I have to have friends to get friends. My ability to make friend requests and send messages are both blocked for a week now....pretty much for no other reason than that I have a new profile.  This is a problem.

Typography... Why Do We Care?

Dr. Donnelly asked us at the end of class to come back with an answer to the question, "Why is calligraphy important to our Digital Literacies class?" I'm not sure if he meant calligraphy or typographysince those are two very different things. Calligraphy is handwritten, while typography is printed matter. Calligraphy isn't directly related to our class, but that inspired typography, and the reason why it was so important to Steve Jobs.

I do think typography is important, although after taking three classes that gushed about typography and having read 3 books all about typography, I feel like people may be going overboard. I have lots of respect for people who spend their life making the typography that we take for granted, but does it really matter if the curve of the S is less than a hair uneven? I do admit I probably don't realize the work that goes into typography since it's such a commonplace thing, and maybe that smidgen of space destroys the whole aesthetics of the font.

To answer the question, typography is an important part of our class (and using the internet in general) because we are always using typography. We always use it every day and with so many options out there, we have to figure out what is the best font to represent our work.

Remembering Wrong...

"It's my job to creep you out," Professor Donnelly says.

Well done, sir. When talked about the concept of placing chips in human beings, and while it sounds like a completely science-fictional concept, it's being done to animals all the time, mainly pets, who if run away, can be easily tracked down. There's a man in Saudi Arabia who developed a chip that can be placed under the skin of human beings that not only tracks them, but also releases a deadly dose of cyanide into a person's blood stream if they are being disobedient or acting contrary to the laws of their government....

Now granted, this was about three years ago, and it didn't really come to fruition. But could you imagine? With The Hunger Games coming out and everything, there has been a huge revamp of interest in dystopian literature. Every time a new dystopian novel comes out, Brave New World, 1984, Fahrenheit 451, all of these novels experience a new wave of interest. Chips under the skin has already become a thing of reality. Now its just a matter if they're going to deem their use on humans acceptable or not.

This class often makes me anxious about the way the world is nowadays. It makes me scared. When Ranger just brought up some developments in the Treyvon Martin case that were released last Monday, how in fact it WASN'T an unsolicited vigilante act, but rather a case of self defense, even though Treyvon didn't have a weapon on him, he was physically assaulting the man who shot him.

Now, regardless of whether or not that's true, it reminds me so much of Animal Farm, it's frightening. It was a thought I was willing to bring up in class if I wasn't concerned it would take forever to explain. Basically, what happened was that after the animals chased the farmer off the farm and reclaimed it as their own, they began to form a new chain of command. Near the top of this is a pig named Snowball, who was a leader for the animals in their new government of sorts. There was a great battle in which the farmer tried to recapture the farm with the help of his men and Snowball was shot during the battle trying to take down the farmer. He sustained grievous wounds but was rewarded for his bravery. Then in a mutinous revolt, another pig named Napoleon used dogs to chase Snowball off the farm, thus opening the position for a leader. As the animals began to question this, saying, "Oh, no, Snowball was not a traitor! He was a true patriot, he fought bravely in the Battle of Cowshed and was wounded!" Then the "Grima Wormtongue" pig whose name currently escapes me says, "Oh no, comrades, he wasn't wounded, that never happened at all. He was actually fighting FOR the farmer. You are recollecting incorrectly." Or something along those lines. And even though the animals were convinced they'd remembered it one way, they resolved to think that Snowball was a traitor.

Now suddenly, this topic of Treyvon Martin has disappeared. No one's talking about it anymore. Its as if we all resolved to draw a solid conclusion based on here-say. And that's scary to me. And while it might be good that I'm thinking about these things in a very critical way, I don't like how uneasy it makes me feel. When my kids ask me what it was like when I was growing up, I don't want to say that the only thing I remember is being worried about the future. I suppose there are two ways I could look at it. The first is that it was a great time to be young. The voice of the young people hadn't been louder since the 1960s, and we were always eager to see what happened tomorrow...or some nostalgic nonsense like that. I don't want to say that we worried about the government and how they were going to screw us next, or how we had to resort to riding horseback because gas prices got too high

No. Just...No.

Was anyone else extremely freaked out by the whole chip thing?  It seems like the start of a dystopian civilization.  Like one of those things you read about in science fiction books but that never actually happen, at least not overtly in a way to cause widespread panic. But maybe we're just getting a little sharper as the years pass and we attend college.  I keep hearing the idea that Huxley was right and Orwell wasn't, but this chip stuff, tracking all your movements and killing you if you disobey....it seems a little 1984...okay, a lot. So I'm beginning to think they're both right. So..what do you think? Is it useless to resist? Or should we try to somehow stop this total control that our government is starting to try to exert over us as people with free will?

Powerpoint in the Wrong Hands

First off, I would like to say Tufte is a pompous bastard. Second of all, maybe I've been privileged while he's been living under a rock, but I've never made a PowerPoint without creating documents to go with it—even in high school. PowerPoint is not meant to be a document in itself, it is a visual aid. In college, I have never made a PowerPoint presentation without having a handout with more concrete information with paragraphs and fleshed out ideas. What does Tufte expect people in meetings to do with sheets of block text? "Okay guys, take the next 10 minutes to read over the handout and then I'm going to make a presentation covering the same exact thing that is written in the handout. Any questions?" I'm all for having handouts with PowerPoint, but I assume that's for you to look at after the presentation (or before) in case you don't remember everything they talked about in the meeting. PowerPoint is an outline for the speaker to make sure they don't go off track and to point out the important POINTS of the speech, which the speaker will then flesh out in his or her words. There are plenty of teachers I wish would have an outline for their classes without wasting my time on pointless rambles.

Tufte acts as if PowerPoint is used as the basis for all meetings etc. For example, he complains that students are using PowerPoint in school instead of writing a report (not true, by the way) and that "students would be better off if schools closed down on PP days and everyone went to The Exploratorium" (7). I feel like I shouldn't be qualified to say this since I'm only a lowly college student talking about a well-established whatever-he-is, but my God he is dense.

I agree with Tufte that NASA was being lazy in using PowerPoint in place of actual documents, but half of his points on the subject had nothing to do with PowerPoint. On page 9 Tufte shoots his mouth (or keyboard) off criticizing their PowerPoint and how skeletal it is for a presentation. Was he present for the presentation? Did he hear them make the presentation? I'm sure they didn't just read off the bullet points (granted, some college students do that) but used them as reference guides to show their audience the core findings in their research. Tufte also gets enraged on page 11 that the people who made the slide used 3 different ways in showing the same unit of measurement. How is that PowerPoint's fault? Sounds to me like it is the people who made the PowerPoint screwed up. On that note, backtracking to page 9, Tufte criticizes PowerPoint (and basically blames PowerPoint for the destruction of the shuttle) because the pros were in bigger letters near the beginning of the PP and the cons were in smaller font at the end of the PP. Again, how is that the fault of PP? Sure, try to blame technology, but we as humans are the ones who put this all together. The people who made the presentation are the ones who decided the order of their presentation. Even if they hadn't skewed it on PP, they probably would have done the same thing on paper by placing the more optimistic information at the beginning of the paper and the negative things at the end. We love to hide things that makes us look bad.

I do agree with Tufte that it is often annoying that everything is so disjointed on PowerPoint, but you can shrink the text and do comparisons with more than two graphs or texts with a little extra effort.

Another sentence I found amusing was on page 12 when Tufte said "The choice of headings, arrangement of information, and size of bullets on the key chart served to highlight what management already believed" (emphasis mine). Answer me this, Tufte: Who decides what to put as the heading? Who arranges the information on a slide? Who can control the size of bullet points? Let me answer it for you: The people who made the slides, not PowerPoint.

If what Tufte is saying is true about PowerPoint being used as the sole source of information, I understand his worry about misinformation or not being able to write a competent report, white paper or analysis. At the moment, I'm finding it hard to believe that most companies don't use detailed reports in addition to PowerPoints at meetings, which would be sad and pathetic.

On page 15 Tufte is grasping at straws in his attempt to tear down PowerPoint. It's pretty pathetic. He thinks that "thin visual content prompts suspicions: 'What are they leaving out? Is that all they know? Does the speaker think we're stupid?' 'what are they hiding?'" Let me just clarify by saying I've never had any of these thoughts, nor do I know anyone who thinks this way about PowerPoint. Everyone knows (but apparently not Tufte) that the meat of the topic is not in PowerPoint, but in what the speaker is talking about. They use their words (and hopefully handouts) to show us what they know. It's proven that we can only learn so much in one sitting, so by using PowerPoint it just helps us focus on the key points we should remember, not some random point we thought was more important than it actually was.

His spoof on Abraham Lincoln's address was also a joke. That speech was not meant to inform people, but to encourage them. PowerPoints are used for informational purposes, not to help make pep-talks. That's like a football coach using a PowerPoint slide on giving his team a pep-talk before a game.

I had a hard time taking Tufte seriously. I am one of those kids who grew up on PowerPoint who dusn't. kno How; to write: a fuLL grummaticl sentince w/ a sbject n’ a verb. What do I know?

Rethinking Advertising

In terms of talking about information retrieval and this difference between description and discrimination, it makes me completely rethink the way I view my internet experience.

Without thinking about it, we are constantly bombarded with advertisements of all kinds, sometimes without even realizing it. Banner ads at the tops of web pages. We might not actively click on them, but we see them, and although we don't actually contemplate consuming products, the image is in our mind, and subliminally, we will remember it if the need should ever arrive.

Not all spam gets filtered in to the spam folder on our email accounts, so we have to manually go into the inbox and delete them, often times without opening them. But we still see the subject line before we hit the delete button and even though we don't contemplate, just like that banner ad, that thought is implanted in our minds. This is why so much thought and psychology goes into advertising, because they know that they have all of two seconds to get the attention of the consumer, to implant that idea of that thought in their head.

When the internet came along, a whole new plane was created for advertising. Before, products were advertised via radio and television, which had already been developed into a science after thirty years. Now, with the internet, there are so many other factors that come into play. Like newspapers, the advertisement doesn't have to fit into a fifteen second time slot. There's time for a consumer to take in all the information at their own pace and digest the benefits of this product. However, unlike newspapers, now one-hundred times as many ads are being seen by that single consumer than with print sources.

People concern themselves with how internet advertising will impact us as a culture, but I think that it will do no more than radio and television advertising has done for us. Sure, everyone wants your money, but the responsibility lies with the consumer to decide where that money goes.

References In My Literature Class

Once again, themes from this class have come up in another class of mine. SO many coincidences.  In my literature class, we were assigned to read about different theories of literary analysis and the idea of the inability to separate form from content was mentioned.  Even the phrase "The medium is the message" was used! I was amazed and knew I was going to write about it. SOOOO many things relate to this class. I think it might be one of the most relevant classes I've ever taken!

I've also been thinking about the idea that we are not only findable with everything we do technologically, but we are expected and even REQUIRED to be.  It's a bit disruptive to our enjoyment of life to be constantly on call (or text or e-mail).

A Problem with Hyperlinks

Hyperlinks are probably one of the greatest innovations to come out of internet media that wasn't offered by any other media. (I say "wasn't" because now it seems that my digital satellite service now displays a box saying "Press Select for [blank]" occasionally during commercials for Pay Per View content.) However, there is one problem that I like to call Wikipedia Syndrome, as demonstrated by the following illustration from xkcd.


As a creative writer, I often have this problem when browsing the website TV Tropes, which is a collection of cliches and often used plot elements that was also featured by xkcd. One moment I'm reading about villains changing their ways, and the next I'll be reading the about the plot elements in Schindler's List. While reading that I'll open tabs to bittersweet endings, honor before reason, and troubled sympathetic bigots. When I'm done with Schindler and move on to those bittersweet endings, I'll be lucky if I don't open even more tabs!

Point being: Our tendency to click on hyperlinks in this new form of media can overwhelm us and trap us in distracting sites like TV Tropes. It's hard to resist, which is why TV Tropes is one of the sites that I use LeechBlock on in order to keep myself away from that pitfall.

Also, I hope I didn't ruin anyone's productivity with my own hyperlinks.

Eeny Meeny Miny Moe

Peanut butter is next on my grocery list. I cross out soup and move on to the peanut butter aisle. I stop, craning my neck to see the entire selection stretching over my head and to either side. I inspect a few labels of the peanuts at eye-level, but the the nutrition facts are pretty much identical. I step back, scan the rows one more time as if the peanut butter will jump out at me, then fall back onto the process of selecting I learned back in kindergarten. "Eeny... meeny.. miny... moe.. catch a tiger by his toe, if he hollers let him go my mom said to pick the best one and it. is. you." My fingers hover over Skippy. I toss it in my cart and continue down the aisle.

Was it the best process? No. Was it harmful to me? No. If I had spent 20 minutes trying to figure out which peanut butter is best for my needs, it would have wasted my time and I honestly didn't care that much. In the grocery store I often select whatever is at eye level, whatever brand I recognize or whatever is the cheapest.

What about in other aspects in my life? Is there too much information? When I read Morville's section on Information Overload (ironically the same title as my last blog, although I hadn't read this section yet), I smiled at the diagram that mapped out how a certain amount of information leads to optimized decisions, but anymore information would lead to a rapid decline in decision-making.

I was keenly aware of this dilemma when writing a research paper for my grad class. Our teacher told us we only needed to read 15 or so articles for our literature review, but I got so sucked into finding more information about the topic and worrying about which ones were the most important to my argument that I ended up with over SIXTY articles. Even at that point I had to stop myself from researching further. I still wonder what I would have found if I kept searching. What if reading two more articles lead me to the one that most supported my argument? What if? What if?

Information is good to some extent, but our human tendency when we receive too much information is to shut down. We decide it's not worth it and pick whatever seems most convenient at the time. How many times have we been searching for the "perfect" present for a friend/loved one, felt so overwhelmed that we ended up giving them a gift card?

With so much information spread out on the internet, it's easy to get lost. How will we know when we've found exactly what we are looking for without wasting our time? Will we get so frustrated and intimidated by the information that we make poorer decisions than we did before?

"Easier"

"On the Web, these prophets claim that artificial intelligence will make it easy for us to find what we need."

What does "easier" even mean, anymore? All the time, the world of technology is constantly changing, being altered, being updated. Its the thing to have the latest technology, to be completely up to date on the options that are available to us out there. For years now, the only Apple product I've opted for is the iPod, because I love music and I love the entertainment that the apps can provide for those small little spaces of unoccupied time, such as taking the bus to the grocery store or waiting in the dentist's office. And the iPod can't change much from here on out without becoming another device that Apple already manufactures. You can't make it a phone, because then it's an iPhone. You can't make it bigger, because then it's an iPad, making the need to buy the new model completely null.

iPhones and iPads are constantly being changed and altered with new models and software coming out every couple of months. I'm scared to death that if I purchase an iPhone, two weeks later, there's going to be a better one out on the market that I'll wish I had waited to purchase. Now granted, there is a certain amount of responsibility that lies with the consumer. My TCOM teacher last semester had a saying he was fond of: Caveat emptor, which is latin for BUYER BEWARE. This would involve doing some research about products before you buy, reading customer testimonials and researching if there will be any new models coming out in the near future.

This idea of things becoming "easier" is changing just as often as the technology itself. When the idea of what would be easier is realized, it is no longer the standard for what would be easier, because now, there is an even easier way to do it. It just hasn't been realized or enacted yet. As technology continues to progress, I fear that it is dumbing down the masses, whether intentionally or not. I am a big fan of editing software for video and music and I remember when I got Windows 7 and saw how completely elementary they had made the video editor that had come preinstalled. It was easy for me to teach myself to use the old software with practice, but the software had become so inane that I was literally "too smart" to figure out how to use it. It was far too simple. I had to purchase a higher end software so I could understand it.

So now the question I pose to you is: When does "easier" become unnecessary? When will the human race finally be content with how simplistic things are in this world of Google and automated teller machines. Will they ever be? Or are we facing the slow decline of our world as we know it?

Even More Things From My Life That Fit This Class

In my fiction class, we have been reading each other's short stories. One person wrote his story from the perspective of an alien sent here to warn us about another alien race that was planning to attack Earth.  This was twenty or thirty years in the future. He decided that since humans were so overly occupied with technology, that he would get the word out in the form of a blog, so the story was written in blog posts. 

Well, when he tried to talk to humans face-to-face, it didn't work. He HAD to use things like social media or no one would listen to him.  It was our preoccupation with technology, multiplied by ten.   Since no one EVER voted, he was the only one who did, and ended up being president because he, the only voter, voted for himself.  As a conclusion to the story, he ended up sending the other alien race iPhones, and they were so endlessly distracted that they forgot all about attacking Earth.

Also, I was on Tumblr last night and saw a pretty long (and, I think, valid) rant about how the person writing it hated "Western culture", because of the very issues about technology that we discuss in our class.  I actually think the term "amusing ourselves to death" was used, and the whole idea that "Orwell was wrong; Huxley was right", and a comic illustrating this point.  The final panels said, "In short, Orwell feared that what we hate will ruin us. Huxley feared that what we love will ruin us."  I thought the person had some very interesting and valid points.

Information Overload

The internet is still such a marvel that not many people give thought to the information that is being compiled at an exponential rate. In a few years, how are we supposed to know what information is credible and what isn't?

I used to think the first results that popped up on Google search were credible. Now that I know about web crawlers and SEO, I realize the possibility of the information I really want is being buried under other things that may not be as credible. The only reason one person would get their website higher up on a search engine is if they know how to take advantage of web crawlers. While this is not the sole way for users to find their information, this still creates a problem of too much information that has not yet been sifted.

I don't remember what article it was from that we read (it might have been from my 431 class, I'm not sure) but in the article it talked about the overreaction of the internet and that "useless" things on the internet is to be expected. Along with the printing press came lots of crappy books we all wish were never printed and the article argued that's how things work when something is given access to a wide variety of people.

My reservation about this viewpoint is the anonymity of the internet. It's often hard to find what is credible and who is posting what online. For example, a large corporate website often post articles without any author on them. How do I know their information is accurate? How do I know that person is actually knowledgeable in that subject? I suppose books faced a similar problem with the use of pseudonyms, but the internet is so widespread and ever growing and manifesting itself in our lives that it becomes important to know where and who we get our information from.

I don't have an answer to my question, which is why I would like to offer up the question: With so much information, how do we sift through it to find the best answer? Who will organize the data? I know that the web 2.0 video said we have to organize it, but that's a no brainer. Of course we have to, we are the ones who program and control computers. The bigger question is, how do we organize it?

Stay Informed

I've blogged before about the informational power of the internet. Anybody has the power to post any opinion or idea for the world to see as a matter of letting their voice be heard. An idea is extremely powerful, but it is completely useless if the world is ignorant to it.

Most recently, the informational power of the internet has been utilized to spread the word about a dangerous war criminal named Joseph Kony. Now, regardless of what your personal opinion is of the cause or the organization spearheading the effort is irrelevant in this context. What is truly remarkable is how an entire planet went from being completely ignorant of the history of his crimes to mobilizing and putting up posters to further raise awareness to those who were on the wrong side of the digital divide. Without the use of the internet and social media, the organization that is funding the cause to bring Kony to justice would be almost powerless without the awareness they have raised via the internet. This extraordinary power has also been used to mobilize people in smaller countries who want to rebel against their tyrannical governments. The Twitter Revolution and other movements would never have been made possible by the internet.

It is fortunate that young people are as connected to the web as they are. Young people who do not regularly watch the news might not be aware of cultural events and conflicts that have an impact on their country and their planet. However, with news via the internet, teens are more likely to stay informed about the world around them and form intelligent, informed opinions about them.

Why I Do Not Have A Facebook

There are several reasons I don't use Facebook. I started using it in its early days, but never did much for a few reasons. One, I had dial-up Internet that barely functioned, and two, it wasn't very user-friendly at all. It felt like almost everything I clicked on led to some app it wanted you to use that didn't even really accomplish anything. So I never really deleted it, I just kind of stopped using it. Eventually, in the first semester of last year, I was pressured into using it because everyone else did.  This lasted from October 2010 to March 2011--I shut down my second attempt at Facebook nearly a year ago.

I did this for several reasons. For one, the structure of Facebook itself discourages privacy and encourages people to be far too occupied with what everyone else is doing.  It seems one can't perform a bodily function without it being plastered all over Facebook and Twitter (which I don't have either, and never have).  Now, you might say that this is the fault of the user, and if you don't do that, then it isn't a problem.  But the very structure of Facebook itself encourages this kind of thing.  Nearly everything you click on is proclaimed to every one of your "friends".  You are fed information by them that you may not want to know or that might even upset you.  This happened to me, and it was a source of negativity in my life that I wanted to rid myself of.

People are surprised when I tell them I don't have a Facebook.  They tell me that if it upsets me, I should just block the people who are being negative. But that's not even the point. What I don't like is the site itself, and its structure. I just don't like it, and probably the only way I'll ever get Facebook again is if I need it for a job or organization.

Rethinking Privacy Part 2

In part 1 I talked about how people should focus more on how people are using their data rather than just obsessing over the invasion of privacy. Not many people actually stalk you with that information, it's used for marketing purposes and statistical data or even to ensure safety such as in places like the airport.

Leading off of the idea of the importance on how "invasion of privacy" is used, the concept of parents being able to track their children should be of more concern. Unlike companies and the government who track you as simply a number in a system, parents are interested in exactly what their children are doing and why.

When is it appropriate to stalk your child? "Stalking" is a strong word, but by definition it is pursuing someone with "unwanted or obsessive attention" (dictionary.com). Most teenagers would describe getting tagged with a GPS tracker as falling under that category. How about for young children who don't know any better than to trust strangers or wander off? I personally think GPS trackers, particularly in a theme park where there are so many distractions and so many people that it's easy to lose your child, where is that line when the child becomes too old to be constantly followed?

By insisting on tracking your teenager, it can create problems where the teenager thinks you don't trust them enough to make the right decisions. Shouldn't there be a moment when you have to be satisfied that you raised your child to make good decisions? If not, trying to control them into their teenage years or young adulthood isn't going to have any impact on them except make them resent you more for your lack of trust.

I think parents need to make their own distinction based on their child's personality and maturity when to let go of the tracker, although if they continue using it into their child's teenage years that would be cause for concern. We need to worry about defining that line between using tracking devices for safety or for stalking.

Responsibility

In a world where the internet is an open and free marketplace of ideas, one must realize that this "free" and open marketplace is not truly free. As I've said before, the internet levels the playing field, giving power to the humble masses of the untelevised and the uncontracted. This is a source, a wonderful outlet, to exercise 1st Amendment rights and let your voice be heard in an open venue.

However, this marketplace of ideas isn't exactly free. It comes with certain responsibilities tied to posting your opinion online for all the world to partake of.

With great power comes great responsibility....

Yes I just made that reference.

It's like Dr. Mike said the other day in other day in class, "Is everyone entitled to their opinion?" And of course, as he iterated, NO. They're entitled to have their informed opinion. Those two syllables make all the difference in the kind of opinion that should be allowed to be expressed online, via these 1st Amendment rights. To have an opinion is one thing. Exhibit A: The frivolous hypothetical example....Say your friend is wearing a new yellow dress. It compliments her figure, and the color brings out her eyes brilliantly. The stitching is just gorgeous and the material is to die for. You compliment her on it, saying that that particular designer is a genius, and she thanks you with a smile. This is the opinion of someone who is seeing a solution from one side of the glass. This could be an example of an uninformed opinion. But say you were to find out that the Chinese orphans that sewed that dress together in a sweatshop were paid only four cents an hour and were forced to stretch themselves beyond the means of most child labor laws. Suddenly, that dress doesn't look quite as fabulous. Now, you are able to have an informed opinion about that particular designer and how their business is run.

Now of course, that's a ridiculous example, but I didn't want to use a real-life example. The main point being that rather than shutting oneself off from all sides of an issue, you should expose yourself fully to all points of view before forming an original thought to post for all the world to see. Know that it is your responsibility to your first amendment rights. You can have any opinion you like, that is, any informed opinion.

Insights and More Tie-Ins

I think the ideas we've been discussing in class recently are really interesting. It's helping me understand how we use technology in all new ways, which I suppose is the point.  It's likely that most people our age, because we grew up with all this rapidly developing technology, have gone through our lives as passive receivers of technological information, without really taking the time to figure out hows and whys of it.  How it works and why it works and how and why we should or shouldn't use it.  The idea is to be informed, and this point is often missed on people our age--or maybe even people in general.

Another tie-in with one of my other classes is that we recently read a short story that takes place in a futuristic virtual world.  This world is much like the "real" world, but things like graphic violence and sex are not possible...yet.  As the story unfolds, the main character and others discover that new developments are being made, and that these things are increasingly more possible.  Someone stabs the main character, and he actually begins to virtually die--all the progress he's made in this virtual world will be erased if he dies completely.  The persons stabbing him thinks it's funny. Then he learns that his virtual girlfriend is actually a man in real life, and has a wife and kids. When the main character learns this, he goes from wanting to find some way to stay alive in this world, to telling his attacker to stab him more.

I believe the point the author is trying to make with this story is that technology can often cause us to detach from things emotionally, and to adopt the mindset that because something his happening in virtual space, it is irrelevant to or cannot affect people in the "real" world. But if one thinks about it, things that occur through technology are as real as anything else, but in a different way.  The things one does on the internet can affect real people in the physical world. I thought all that was relevant to this class.

YouTube Comments Glitch to 200 Character Limit: Causes Discussion on Discourse

Don't get me wrong. I've never perceived YouTube comment sections as the best place to have discussion on a topic, but given the right group of people, discussion could be useful.

However, YouTube (or should I say Google?) briefly had a glitch in which the character limit on comments changed from 500 to 200. Google employees cleared up this issue on the forums saying the 200 character limit was not intentional, but this news didn't even reach well-known celebrities on YouTube.

The popular video blogger and best selling author John Green had this to say on his twitter:

Of course, one can not avoid the irony that this was posted to Twitter, which has an infamous 140 character limit to text, the equivalent to soundbites on television. Despite this, Twitter is meant to be a place to see snippits of information, sometimes followed by a link to more information.

YouTube comments on the other hand don't have a specific goal in mind. Sure, it's meant to be used to give the creator of the video feedback, but it sometimes becomes a discussion. In the best (a.k.a. rarest) cases, there will be meaningful discourse about the subject of the video. In the worst cases, there will be religious or political discussion on a cat video.

Dan Brown made this video in response to John Green's tweet, outlining how 200 characters can actually be a good thing.



Dan Brown seems to be saying that limiting comments to 200 characters prevents users from being intimidated by the "immense wall of text" and forces commenters to "get to the point." Are we really at that point where 500 characters is considered too much for people to handle? I'm also very concerned about Dan's opinion that users should "embrace any and all experimentation on YouTube's part to try to make the comment section [better.]"

Dan Brown did bring up the interesting point that limiting the character limit on typed comments would encourage people to make more video responses. While I support this new form of internet discourse, it poses a problem for me for two reasons. (1) Not everyone on the Internet or YouTube has a camera, though it seems like a great majority do. Even though this is not a huge problem, it still leaves out a portion of the Internet population. (2) If all the text comments were changed to video responses, YouTube servers would have trouble handling the increased data flow. I think it's pretty common knowledge that videos take up more space on servers than text.

Of course, a lot of this discussion on whether YouTube should have a 200 character limit or not is moot, since it was not a legitimate change in the system, but rather a glitch. It did spawn a rather interesting debate on how discourse on YouTube should take place.

Rethinking Privacy Part 1

Morville's chapter five made me a bit more aware--and thus more paranoid about what the future holds for privacy.

To be honest, I've never understood why so many people are paranoid about their privacy. For example one of my teachers is angry that Ball State tracks when you are in the gym. At a glance that looks like an invasion of privacy, but what does privacy even mean?

As a society we like our privacy, but years ago before cars puttered around and expanded our living radius to more than 20 miles, communities were just as intimate. They knew who you were, where you were and what you did.

I think the issue here is what people do with your information. When my professor said he was enraged about Ball State's tracking system, I didn't see it from the same point of view. Despite our best efforts, we are going to become more "findable." I think the important thing is what is done with the information. Honestly, I doubt Ball State actually cares about you. They don't care whether you are in the gym or not. They don't use it to track you as a person, just to see how many people are in the gym.

Another example of privacy invasion is airport security with the new x-ray system. People feel like that is an invasion of privacy, but if the trade off of that is to stop terrorists, I'm okay with that. I can suffer having strangers who will never see me again be able to see the outline of my body.

Again, I think an important matter is to determine what the government/businesses are using your information for. People don't like security cameras, but it helps deter crime. If someone kidnaps me, I'll be thankful that they will be able to find the last place I was seen. These are rare circumstances, but they happen. Overall, the government/businesses don't care about YOU, they care about information to make their business run better and more efficiently. They aren't stalking you.

We need to rethink privacy because unless you plan on living like a hermit, our idea of "privacy" is going to be invaded on a daily basis.

With that being said, there is another type of privacy invasion that is different from observation by strangers: Invasion of privacy by parents/family/friends. While the government doesn't care about you, being tracked by family members has a whole new meaning. They DO care about where you are and what you do. For me personally, that's the real "invasion of privacy," not Ball State tracking my location every time I swipe my ID card.

Because this is such a big issue, I'm going to split it in to two blogs and post the second part next week. In Part 2 I will talk about the other type of privacy invasion by family and friends, specifically concerning tracking children/teens with a GPS tracker.

The Machine is using us...

My dad always told me don't believe everything you hear and don't believe everything you read. Don't believe everything that's on TV, and don't believe everyone that has power. Don't even believe everything that he says. He thinks that it is so important for young people to form their own opinions about what happens in the world, provided that they are well-informed. And most people with internet access cannot help but be "well-informed."

We talked today about why it's important that we know who the major players are in digital literacy. Government and business all concerned with how people are consuming and processing information they receive. Sarah posted a blog last week about how the internet offers equal opportunities in posting information and opinions online. Even in Wikipedia, anybody with an internet connection can go onto the website and edit articles to their heart's content, with or without citation. While this level playing field can be a good example of the First Amendment, that doesn't mean that information-devouring web surfers should be swallowing everything they read.

It's hard to think of our society as a series of robots, who are being fed information and processing it as truth, just like computers when they are built. Because we are human beings, and therefore are able to think, process, and form our own opinions, some may not want to accept that out of mental sloth, we are willing to accept opinions as FACT. There are man people who subscribe to a specific political party or title, who are listening to the words of their leaders and decided that because that is the opinion of their party, that is also their personal opinion. It scares me how easily some Americans can be so easily swayed by the power of oratory in this country. The automation of the internet and its vast cesspool of opinion and here-say is having a similar effect.

Now, the end of the Web 2.0 makes me think on a whole new level, especially near the end, where it makes the statement that we are going to have to do a lot of rethinking, especially ourselves. And that means, I think, the reexamination of how we process information, not only by receiving it, but decided what it means to us and whether or not we agree.

1984 Findability?

This new book we're reading is really making me think, which I guess is the point. It was written seven years ago and I've still never heard of this technology.  It interests and disturbs me at the same time.  But is it really all that different from tracking what we do online? Not really, since people do almost everything online nowadays.  It can be good in some ways and bad in others, just like any technology...but the fact that we don't have a say, that it's happening to us automatically, is scary to me.  It's coming to the point where almost anyone can find out anything about you with a few clicks of a mouse.  It's like something from 1984. And if you haven't read that, you definitely should!  It seems to get more and more relevant as technology is developed. Just a few thoughts that surfaced while reading Ambient Findability.

Unanswered Questions

The other day I made the comment that the Internet is much unlike other media in the way that it is accessible to more people than ever and that you can publish text, images, and video much easier than the past. In the past, you had to get accepted by publishers for text and studios for video. Now, everyone is able to publish and get their voice heard.

And then Dr. Mike asked, "Do they really?"

At first, I thought, "Well, of course! What kind of argument is 'Do they really?' anyway?" But it wasn't really an argument, it was rhetorical question that my confirmation bias kept me from finding the truth of the matter. No one else in class seemed to care, and we passed by it pretty quickly.

But now that question is gnawing at me. "Do they really?" It's like a Zen riddle.

I guess what we need to take into account is that with a million voices making up the static of discourse in the internet, is your voice really heard? Who outside of the class is reading this blog? Probably no one. We still have a gap between the static of information on the internet and the websites and users that get the most views.

YouTube is a great demonstration of this fact. There's no filter (other than the guidelines against violence, sex, and other inappropriate things), and there's a lot of low quality videos on the video portal. However, only a select few probably get more than 100,000 views on each of their videos, and even less get paid to do so.

Does that make my point invalid though? Although only a few select people get views and get paid for it, it's ultimately the collective of the internet that decided that these channels are worth watching and viewing. Sadly, this means the lowest common denominator determines a great deal of what is given the most attention.

What does this mean for the future of our society as we have more generations born into the internet? It's too late to tell right now of course, but in order to keep from falling into the pit of intellectual despair, we need to keep our minds open. We need to explore our resources. We need to stop paying attention to the content that gives us no meaning and become perpetual students, never satisfied with unanswered questions.

Does the Internet Provide for Equal Opportunity?

In some of the articles we read earlier this semester, they talked about how the printing press made more people into publishers. Things that had been accessible by only a small population is now open to more people.

Did it really?

In Clay Shirky's second book, "Cognitive Surplus" (we are reading the first book in this class later this semester) he talks about how publishing, which had at one point been accessible only to a small population of people, has now turned everybody into publishers. Blogs have turned everybody into writers.

Does it really?

Instead of just simply being "published" there are now tiers of publishers, writers, actors and anything else that can be accessed by the general public. What's the fun of turning everyone into a publisher/writer/actor? With every step of technology, the stakes of becoming a publisher/writer/actor also increases. Sure, you can self-publish now, but most people still won't consider you to be a writer until you have a publisher backing you up. With the rise of small, independent companies, even that is not as credible as the huge corporate companies.

We still consider "movie stars" as people who are endorsed and paid millions of dollars and show up on the movie theater screens across the world. This is how we wade through the millions of amateur videos on the internet. Anyone can be a musician now, but we have the highest respect for the ones we hear on the radio.

With the accessibility the internet gives us, this does not make us equal. To be honest, not everybody would make a good writer, or a good actor or a good musician. Now that anyone who wants to be any of these professions can, we have a flood of less than desirable information on the web. How are we supposed to sort it all out?

In my opinion, no matter how much power the internet gives us, there is always going to be a higher elite above that. While there is still some bad (in my opinion) music/movies/books in that "elite" industry, I don't think it's such a bad thing to have requirements in order to be considered professional. I don't think this will ever change anyway.

Intellectually Unpacking

Today, I liked Dr. Mike's comment about "intellectually unpacking" certain types of content. In terms of information access, technology, specifically the internet, has been a floodgate for those thirsty for knowledge. Wikipedia, for the most part, is a vast wealth of knowledge for the common man. The power not only to attain information via the internet, but also have the freedoms to go in and add information of one's own gives a supreme freedom to the common man with internet access. This creates an open marketplace of ideas. With information at your fingertips via technology, the Digital Divide is growing shorter and shorter every day. There are so many countries where there are whole populations without access to information technology. What would life be like if you couldn't remember the specific year a major war began? Today in class, no one could tell Dr. Mike what year the Civil War began until someone opened a web browser on their laptop and used technology to answer a question. Now, while this information technology opens many doors for people seeking valuable information, there is also the concern that the evolution of education may lead to the discontinued use of printed sources and a lack of ability to seek out information in an "analog" fashion (i.e. using a library to find information in printed sources). But even in that light, I think it's almost impossible to place a price on the value of technology's freedom of "intellectually unpacking."

More Opinions About Selfe's Book

There isn't really that much for me to discuss this week...I've been reading more of Selfe's book, obviously.  It's a bit of a dry read; to me it kind of drags on.  Of course, it continues to encourage parents to discourage their children from using computers for anything other than academics, which is irritating.  The people quoted in this book tend to act like education and mindlessness are binary opposites that have no gray area, that these are the only things computers can be used for.

To me, even watching people vlogging on YouTube can be "educational"; sometimes you go onto someone's channel and, by watching them talk about their thoughts on various things, you learn about them as if in a documentary...it can be really cool.  If you want to know about something, you can look it up on YouTube, usually. Tumblr can be educational, if you follow art or science blogs, or blogs that cover things like current events and politics.  Even Facebook can be more than just a "mindless" way to waste time; as someone in our class pointed out, riots and protests have been organized on Facebook. Once again, the lesson seems to come down to, "It's all in how you use it".

I also think it's kind of irritating how the politicians and people quoted in this book are pushing the "American way" of life on everyone, and how that's their definition of progress.  I mean, maybe things other than Capitalism haven't worked for other countries in the past, but why should we push our way of doing things on everyone? It has its flaws too!  Sometimes I feel like America is the arrogant douchebag of the world, trying to bully everyone into doing things the way it does.  Sorry if that was offensive, but I feel it's true sometimes.  I actually came across a meme (on Tumblr) that suggested something similar and found it pretty funny.  Just a few more of my opinions on the book.

Amazon to Test Brick and Motar Store in Seattle

It may sound like Amazon is going to start selling books at physical stores, but in reality, the company is actually testing out new ways to sell their tablets. Probably competing with Apple's stores, Reuters is reporting that the online behemoth is planning "to showcase and sell its growing line of gadgets, including the Kindle Fire tablet." So far there has been no reports on whether or not they are thinking of expanding to sell books at the store. There was speculation in Daily Finance that "it's quite possible that an Amazon Store could eventually carry a wide range of products." I do believe selling books in an Amazon store would fill the great vacuum in the physical book store market that Amazon helped create in the first place.

Do you think this is a good move on Amazon's part? Will customers go to a physical store to try out the new Kindle, or will they trust online reviews and buy it like online as usual?

Comfort Zone

Humans don't like change, and when we are shoved out of our comfort zones we act like it's the end of the world. Let me give an example: Facebook. How many times has Facebook changed their layout? Each and every time, without fail, there is a massive uproar. I've never heard anyone in the first week say: "Oh, I like the new design." We hate change. Within a week or two (for the more resistant Facebookers) people settle down and soon that layout becomes the norm until they do another layout change.

This isn't just portrayed in social media, either. As we read in Pencils to Pixels, people have always resisted change in technology. Pencils... typewriter... telegraph... Even Socrates was opposed to then notion of moving speech to paper because he thought it would make us dumber. Sound familiar?

This does, however bring up an interest question. Do we become accustomed to change because we have no other choice? We accept Facebook's newest layout because we have no other choice. We can't stop the universal shift toward the internet.

What do you think, if we had a choice to leave things the same, would we? Or would we realize that change might not be so bad once we get the hang of how to navigate and use it properly?

Illumination via Mapping Project

*I attempted to post this on Monday, but apparently it didn't go through. Thanks to Michael for letting me know.

Today when we had an opportunity to revise our maps, not only did it give me a chance to better understand this assignment, but once I got my ideas down on paper, I really got the true meat of this assignment. I'd never acknowledged how completely integrated my life was in technology. I rely on it for everything. My news, my social interactions, even my television. I have no idea when the last time was that I actually sat down in front of a television and watched a television program. I view all my favorite programs through the internet. There are people in my life whom I would never talk to if I didn't interact with them via Facebook or Twitter. Technology in itself is so important to my education. Were it not for the internet, I wouldn't have access to essential student resources such as Blackboard or Gradebook. I use my laptop to download textbooks from the Internet at a reduced price. In comparison to a print textbook, an electronic textbook allows me to find information easily and quickly just by entering my desired topic into the search bar. Overall, without it, I don't know how I would be able to function without the internet. The mapping project has allowed me to see that.

Born Into Technology

I haven't been in class recently (so sorry about that!), so I don't really know much about what's been discussed, but I have been reading Technology and Literacy in the Twenty-First Century by Cynthia L. Selfe on my own time, and I just sort of find it funny that we're reading a book on modern technology that was written in 1999...over 13 years ago. At first I thought it couldn't really be all that relevant, with the way technology develops so quickly, but at that point most of us in the class were really too young to know the issues and debates that were going on about technology in that time period.  We were sort of born into this rise of the Internet and computers and it has developed and matured with us, so many of us probably wonder why it's even being debated. We (or at least I) didn't or still don't understand how much societal change has occurred in our lifetime because of the rise of the computer and Internet age.

I didn't realize that all these debates were going on at all. Some of the arguments the book tries to make seem so backward to me now that we're 13 years in the future and now some of their fears have been disproved. I don't really like how, in the second chapter of the book, someone suggests that using computers or the Internet for anything other than schoolwork or research or very official, dryly academic objectives is some kind of moral faux pas.  Using something for entertainment isn't some kind of misuse, the way whoever said this is implying. That just sort of rubbed me the wrong way, I guess. And, oftentimes, entertainment and education overlap--which I think is usually the case with modern technology. And what about art? That definitely can take the form of what many people consider useless entertainment. There is a fine line here.

Just my two cents about the book so far...

Why the Internet isn't Reaching its Full Potential

Last week, I discussed how the Internet is a global village we all contribute to. Today, I'll attempt to explain why this hasn't quite caught on and why the majority of the Internet's population isn't using the Internet to its full potential.

In years before the Internet, we were always limited by our medium. Books could only hold so many words, cassette tapes could only have a few hours of audio if we were lucky, and VHS's typically only had one movie on them with little or no bonus features. (In the cases of large movies like Titanic, you had two tapes.)

This is becoming less and less so with the fantastic electronic media that we have today. Sure we're still limited to our hard drives and servers as far as our movie and music collection, but as far as text is involved, we have virtually unlimited space to work with.

Despite this, it seems that many of the users on the Internet aren't taking advantage of the great power that we have. Of course, there are problems with the sites themselves, (YouTube and Twitter limiting the number of characters on comments and posts respectively) but the real problem seems to lie in the fact that we popularized the Internet while the television was the largest medium of mass communication at the time. Short news bits are what we are used to, and we perceive that we have little time to read.

In case you didn't know, TLDR stands for "Too Long, Didn't Read."

I feel strange talking about my generation as if I am an outsider, but in many ways I feel so different from the majority of the 18-25 demographic. I'm not hooked on reality television or pop music. I prefer my media with a little meat and substance. Of course, this doesn't mean I don't like browsing through LOLcats or memes every once in a while, but I don't spend an hour looking at them on TV or listening to remixes of "Do a Barrel Roll" like it's art.

I guess I'm just disappointed at the fact that we have so much potential to change our world with the internet, but we're still caught up in our inability to process anything longer than a full page of single-spaced text before feeling fatigued enough to say, "tl;dr."

Simplifying Policies

Up until Gmail tried constantly to flag my attention about a new change they made to Gmail privacy policy, I denied that our society has a shorter attention span than in the past. Not only was the change that Google made interesting in itself, but they knew they would have to try several different methods to make sure I saw the change whether it was redirecting me to a new page right after I signed in or little bubbles poppping up in my email notifying a new change that I should read. What was that change? I got a screen shot of it:


If you can't read the small text, let me sum it up for you, "We are getting rid of over 60 different privacy policies across Google and replacing them with one that's a lot shorter and easier to read." Let that sink in for a moment.

That's the equivalent of telling people "You can't read all of the amendments? Here, let's make a picture book out of it. It's pretty much the same thing." Anyone else nervous? How much information can you fit in a simple privacy policy? I admit, I haven't actually looked at the privacy policy, but just the thought that corporations are dumbing it down for us makes me reconsider my dismissive attitude.

The more simple the policies are, the more loopholes can be found. Even if there are policies that we haven't read every single word of, they still exist and considered valid so if something happens, we can point to it and say it was in the policy. If Google is actually deleting the privacy policy and replacing it with a simpler one, we don't have the more extensive policy to fall back on if we need to. Again, that's like getting rid of the amendments and instead making them into one sentence bullet points. Creating a bullet point list is fine so we understand the gist of the amendments, but to get rid of the solid foundation of it would be unthinkable.

An Interconnected World

As we have been talking in class the past week, the main topic that has been dwelling on me is the idea of our interconnected world. A world where just a couple of decades ago the way that humans communicated, connected, and interacted with each other was completely different. Within my generation it is difficult for me to imagine what life would be like without the Internet or the portable electronic devices which so many of us rely on daily. Has this change also effected the way we learn? I believe it has. Without the use of the Internet the act of finding information takes up so much more time. The fast paced ability and multi-tasking of every college student is what separates us from past generations.  In the past people would study and major in one to two areas during undergrad. It is not uncommon now for someone to have several major areas of study along with a couple minors. I remember one of the first things that one of my professors said to me in one of my first classes here at Ball State. "What you learn this year and next will most likely be obsolete by the time you graduate." This is a true statement. The world changes at a rapid pace. I believe this is what we need to understand. The discussion we had on Wednesday about the two goals in which the university has for us directly relate to this idea. First of course is the development of proper educated citizens, which without gaining that you can't expect much in this current job market. And second more importantly critical thinking. Critical thinking involves using  skillful judgement to obtain the essential meaning or truth. With an ever changing world we must always continue to learn, and without critical thinking one would never be able to teach oneself.

School, Media, and Laws

It's so interesting to see how all my classes are tying in with one another this semester!  For example, in here we read The Medium is the Massage by Marshal McLuhan, which asserted the idea that "The media work us over entirely".  This, to my knowledge, means that our society is shaped by not only the messages the media deliver, but also by the media that are delivering these messages.  Examples of this include the idea that reading encourages one type of thinking, while the Internet encourages another. 

In my fiction class, we recently read Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury, which is centered around a society in which books are burned and only a certain type of entertainment--one that discourages independent thought--is allowed.  As we were given the first reading assignment from this book, my professor exclaimed "This isn't science fiction anymore! This is real life!"  I suppose he meant that today, many people no longer read books unless they have to; they prefer other forms of media, such as television or the Internet.  If what McLuhan states in The Medium is the Massage is true, then this has changed our society's collective way of thinking.  Two of my professors even used the same example of this, when they pointed out that even today's political debates are more a form of entertainment than what they were a few hundred years ago--that is, 7 hour speeches for which people sat patiently. Today, there are few people--few Americans, at least--who could stomach anything that required such sustained attention.

And then there is the issue of SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act), that wanted to completely shut down (at least in the United States) several websites, such as YouTube, Facebook, and Tumblr, illegal, as well as the sharing of any copyrighted information through the internet.  If McLuhan's media = massage assertion is in any way true, (and it appears to be,) this would essentially put our society back about ten years into the past. Even if some people rarely use the internet, it would still affect the spread of knowledge and cultural thought in general, and would indirectly affect these people. To me, the idea of such a law is not only inconvenient, but also chilling--What it would do, essentially, is restrict the flow of knowledge between people. To me, to make sharing information illegal is more a crime than watching a YouTube video.

The Global Village of the Internet

From: The Medium is the Massage (1967) by Marshal McLuhan

In 1967, there was no widespread use of The Internet, there were no chat rooms, there wasn't social networking, and there certainly wasn't Skype. The latest innovation in information technology was the color TV set. Despite this, Marshal McLuhan made a fantastic prediction that "electronic interdependence recreates the world in the image of a global village."

A few years ago, I found myself in the conundrum of whether I should capitalize the word "Internet." In a 2004 Wired article, copy chief Tony Long proclaims that it shall now be the standard for the publication to not capitalize Internet. In the article he states that Internet is nothing more than "another medium for delivering and receiving information."

A more recent article written by Dan Bloom of The Wrap implies that the capitalization of the word is still standard in newspapers, and he argues that we should realize that the Internet is not "some uppercase novelty." He lists seven reasons as follows:

1. We will, as a society, have finally acknowledged a deep shift in the way we think about the online world.

2. We will, as a society, have given substance to the belief, finally, that the internet is part of the everyday universe and not some uppercase novelty.

3. We will have come to understand that capitalization of internet earlier in history seemed to imply that reaching into the vast, interconnected ether was a brand-name experience when it really wasn't.

4. We will have realized that the earlier capitalization of internet seemed to place an inordinate, almost private emphasis on it, turning it into a Kleenex or a Frigidaire. But we now know that the internet, at least philosophically, should not be owned by anyone and that it is really part of the neural universe of life.

5. We will have realized that the digital revolution is over, the internet won and is now part of everyone's life, as common as air and water (neither of which starts with a capital letter).

6. We will have realized that the moment was right to treat the internet the way we now refer to the movies, television, radio and, dare I mention it, the telephone.

7. We will have realized that the New York Times was right back in 2002 when it said that there was some virtue in the theory that the internet was becoming a generic term, and that it would not be surprising to see lowercase usage eclipse uppercase usage within a few years.

By now you probably realize that I still capitalize The Internet. Why? To be honest, it's for many of the same reasons that Mr. Bloom stated above. I believe that The Internet is a means of communication, but I also believe that it is much, much more than that. The Internet as I see it is a proper noun referring to the global cosmopolitan city that stretches beyond the borders of sovereign states. It is in many ways one of the final frontiers in our society.

When referring to such things as internet service or internet providers, lack of capitalization makes sense, but when we refer to The Internet as a synonym to the World Wide Web, I believe we should give it the same respect we give to countries and cities.

The Internet is a diverse cosmopolitan city, with many roads, districts, social lounges, movie theaters, art galleries, directories to help you find your way, and most importantly libraries full of free information. The most fascinating part of this city is that you can easily become a co-creator of the world. You can easily register a blog and begin building a newspaper company on the corner of the street. You can log into YouTube and start broadcasting your own show.

When our society sees The Internet as a city we all reside in, we can begin appreciating the diversity of our world.

-Michael Cox

Irrelevant Technology

During the lecture on Friday, Dr. Donnelly talked about Neil Postman. He wrote three things on the board, and two of the had a particular resonance on me.

1) irrelevance
2) impotence

He went on to define these terms according to Neil Postman. Irrelevance referred to things in the world that "do not pertain to my life." This is similar to the statement about telegraphs where it was seen as unnecessary for two cities to communicate with each other when they have nothing in common to talk about. This may have been a valid argument decades ago, but we no longer live in small villages that don't travel out of a 20 mile radius in their lifetime.

Nowadays, families are spread across the country, even across the world. I have family all over California, Utah and Japan. My friends are all over the world. How is world news irrelevant? How else would my dad have found out I was okay when I was studying abroad in Japan when the devastating tsunami in March 2011 struck?

The spread of technology is not the only thing that is connecting us worldwide. Cars, trains, boats and airplanes have turned the world into a global community. People focus on the advance of technology through the lens of the past. We are not the same people we were a hundred years ago. As we began to interact with other cultures more and more, we grew less egocentric and became more aware of world and people other than ourselves. Technology has given us this opportunity to become more aware of society and to connect with other parts of the world.

To say that world news and technology does not pertain to my life is a very selfish, and close-minded way to approach technology. The true value of technology is its ability to connect us to people who see the world through a different cultural filter than we do.

For the second point, impotence, Neil Postman described it as pertaining to things that we can do nothing about. News is broadcasted, but it is pointless because we are helpless, we cannot do anything about those situations.

Since when does news have to mean we can directly provide aid? News and technology spreads awareness, which in turn finds people who donate. The great thing about the advancement in civilizations is that we have the ability to help, even if it's indirectly. With the click of a button we can donate any amount of money or supplies. We can donate our old clothes to companies that will then in turn ship it to those in need. How much money do you think would have been raised for any major disaster if there had been no news coverage?

The main point Neil Postman overlooks is that we have become a world community. What goes on in the world is relevant to our lives. We are not powerless because technology has enabled us to act even if we are not present. People love to complain about technology, but they often overlook how it has helped us and bettered the lives of people around the world.

- Sarah Chaney