New Media brings another matter to the table, the one about privacy. Not only we display willingly most of our private information online via social media today, but more and more of our transactions are made online. Despite the protection on many website when it comes to payment, we are never fully protected. Today, you can just buy credit cards numbers online. Stealing has never been easier, and there is no way to stop this kind of behaviour once and for all. Also, google maps has come up with an application on your phone that uses your GPS to keep track of your every move. It will be able to retrace what you have done in the day, where you’ve been, for how long… Those data are called « protected » but not only Google has access to them, but also someone who might be skilled enough to hack them. All in all, we are not really protected today and we are slowly turning into « 1984 » by Orwell where the government controlled everything…
Nevertheless, we can’t stop living with this privacy being a problem. Those devices have a beautiful impact on our life, in terms of practicality and connectivity with others. It’s like everything in life, it just demands balance…
Creativity
In the age of New media, it has become a lot easier to foster creativity. Creativity in its wider sense, would be the idea of expanding upon or creating concepts. For that, you might need reference material, and connection, overlaps between ideas. Therefore, internet and new media helps with the sharing information part. You have access to so much information that at some point or another your own creativity will arise…
On the other hand, this overload of information might remove the originality out of your work, you might be so inspired by others that you’ll just finished by having a pale coopy of their work… In an article on the New York Times: Disney tolerates Rap Parody, but why? » Brook Barnes explains that parody has always been good for companies. It has several positive points to it. First of all, it’s a way to give the brand some recognition, even if it has been tackled or critisized. There is no good publicity, especially when it comes by the form of funny parodies. It’s also a way for people to maximise their creativity and add to the table when it comes to actual content. The IP of Disney for example should not be set in stone, and new media is a way to expand on that, creating all new ways of seeing those characters.
Modelling Reality with Virtual Worlds
Virtual worlds can be an extension of our current world. Expanding on our fantasies and craziest ideas. It’s also a clever and unique way to give life to ancient worlds that have gone extinct. In « Room 100″, The Hotel Chelsea has been recreated in Second Life, after it was destroyed in real life. It give a … »second life » to old pieces. We could even imagine a creation of ancient pyramids or even the 7 wonders of the Ancient world that you may be able to visit. With the arrival of VR, this idea can even be extented to the point where you could entirely relive the day of a king in the 12th century somewhere in France for example. The possibilities are almost endless with virtuality. On the other hand, this enhancement of new technology with virtual worlds is another way to put everything single one of us separated from each other. It comes to less normal interaction between two human beings, and more and more interaction via a screen. Finally, as for the future of the virtual worlds, we already have a first glimpse with « Going to the virtual office in Second life ». In this article, it is stated that the « employees’ avatars will meet in virtual world’s from the privacy of a company’s new network. » People are just getting in the office via this virtual world. We can expand this idea and imagine that in some decades we will not need to meet in person for anything, at least not when it comes to the office. Maybe the check in will be done from our computer, in a virtual world. This might be the next revolution, the « virtual revolution ».
Blog about Twitter
Twitter is way different than a Blackboard discussion. On twitter it’s way quicker and easier to answer to someone. But the fact that you are limited in your answer prevents you from any kind of thorough explanation. It seems that Twiiter = shallow in a way…
But the user interface is way easier than Blackboard both to use and to look at. I think this is the main aspect in the entire experience. It’s pretty, easy to use, and efficient… So why bother using Blackboard? I do not have time for this!
Social Networking sites
Let’s compare four social networking websites:
-Facebook: It seems to be the « default » social media website. It is the one that set up all the upcoming changes and every social media released afterwards are more or less based on the same principles.
-Twitter: It brings an interesting twist to facebook with the limitation on each publication. The fact that you can just post the equivalent of one text message helps to improve creativity through limitation.
-Linkedin: This one is the best in order to create a business image. This is the mirror of our society with everyone having a double image. One perfect on Linkedin and another one when it comes to real life.
-Youtube: The best platform of social media according to me. It has helped created numerous videos on many many subjects. It is so rich that you can find pretty much anything you want inside. From informational videos to straight comical ones, people are free to create whatever they want. And thanks to a clever form of advertisement, they can get paid for it and turn that into a steady stream of revenue. Being a « Youtuber » has become a thing now, and our world is much richer with it.
Social Networking
Networking has greatly evolved in the past 20 years thanks to the New Media and Internet. 15 years ago, we could use our email as a way to interact with new acquaintances. Even today the email is the main medium we use to communicate on a business level because it is efficient, quick, but thorough as the same time. Today though, we have access to Linkedin, and Facebook on a lesser level. Those two social media are great in order to display your set of skills for the world to see and therefore build your network.
Linkedin in particular makes the job hunting so much easier. Everything is layed out both for head hunters and employees who might want to look for a new job. You can also choose what to say and what to keep secret, so you have a certain amount of control over your own image, which has become the most important these days. Because this very image that you give to the world is also the dark side that may lead to the downfall of this technology. We are showing only a part of ourserlves online and even if we tend to have control over it, some leaks might happen and our online image has become almost more important than our self and self esteem. We evaluate ourselves all the time with the number of like, retweets, or business relationships on Linkedin. We cannot live without the world’s validation at our doorstep.
Blog vs Wiki
Blogs and Wikis are two media serving different purposes. The wiki sole goal is to inform the persons visiting it. The wiki can be focused on many different subjects and, in essence the wiki tries to look into them thoroughly. They are here to « gather and share information as well as record discussions about a subject,wikis can help people improve their processes and get projects done faster. » (source: More on how to build your own wikipedia by Margaret Lotcher http://www.cio.com/article/2436789/time-management-productivity/more-on-how-to-build-your-own-wikipedia.html)
The Blog, on the other hand can be seen more as a storytelling media. Even if it is represented with many articles, they are dated and are more an explanation of the given moment. In a way they are more personal than wiki because the writer tends to give his or her own opinion on the subject. But they also are getting less and less attention as Jeff Bercovoci explained in his 2014 article « Yahoo’s Next Problem: Tumblr’s Traffic Isn’t Growing » (https://bbhosted.cuny.edu/webapps/lobj-wiki-bb_bb60/wiki/BKL01_BUSN._3110_MW2_1169_1/_26180923_1/Home?cmd=GetImage&systemId=Yahoo%27s+Next+Problem_+Tumblr%27s+Traffic+Isn%27t+Growing+-+Forbes__0.pdf) He says that « Tumblr, having become part of a faceless corporate colossus has ‘lost its cool’. »
Both of those media are quite important and contribute to the new world of information. They give us everything we need through Internet. Wikis in particular as today’s libraries. In order to do effective research, we have to use those tools, even more so in the corporate world than the college one.
Blogs are quite harsh tools for collaboration and are better used as a one-to-many medium. After all, this is the opinion of one person on the Internet…
As for the wikis, their use is quite cemented as well, they are encyclopedia on many diverse subjects, based on crowdsourcing.
Real Happiness, the power comes from within.
What is happiness and how do we perceive it in our society? Today, we are always looking for the next best thing that could get out of our otherwise boring lives. Grass is greener somewhere else, we tend to live with this modo. What if the real solution came from yourself?
constantincornon 