The Importance of Networking

While reading the assigned articles for this class, I found the one titled "The Strength of Weak Ties: A Network Theory Revisited" to be the most interesting. It discussed the importance of networking to get ahead in a career. It also went into the two levels of networking. The first level is strong ties. Strong ties include people who are very close to you like family and best friends. These people have similar interests and usually share a circle of friends. The next level is weak ties. These people are acquaintances and have less in common because they are part of a different group of strong ties. 

The article described the importance of using weak ties to get ahead in a career. Since a group of close people (strong ties) receive the same information, they do not hear new information that may be important. This is why it is beneficial to have friends that are in other groups of people. They get exposure to information that would otherwise be unheard of.

Before reading this article I never really thought of the importance of having weak ties. Looking at my friend group, I have a close knit group of friends at home and a few close friends at school. Along with this, I have a few acquaintances that I will stop and chat with when I have the opportunity. It's the acquaintance group where I hear a lot of interesting new information from. I had never realized how much would be different if I only communicate with my close friends. I would never hear new perspectives on issues. Reading this article showed me the importance of branching out and talking to new people and how it might lead to getting ahead in a career.

Facebook Messages

This week while reading AOL news, I came across an article related to Facebook. It was about the possibility that old private messages before 2009 were being displayed on timeline. This caused a lot panic because everyone thought that the messages that had once been private, were now being viewed by the entire Facebook community. Many people complained to Facebook and the matter was investigated. According to Facebook, the messages displayed were not private. The messages back and forth wall posts that had happened before Facebook developed the ability to comment on a post. Apparently a lot of people forgot Facebook's old feature and interpreted the back and forth posts as once being private. To many people's relief, the private messages remained private.

Imagine if this was true. If everyone's private conversations were displayed for anyone to read. Personally, I don't use the Facebook message function much, but I would still be mortified if people were able to read what I wrote in 2009. Some people chat their life away on Facebook and would have a lot to hide if the messages were posted. Most people put their trust in Facebook to keep the messages private. It's kind of scary to think of the power Facebook has over us because of the information that is posted each year. This is why it's important to limit how much gossip and such you post. You never know when it could come back to haunt you.

Here's the article I read
http://techcrunch.com/2012/09/24/reports-facebook-users-seeing-private-messages-pre-2009-showing-up-on-timelines-as-posted-by-friends/

Website Critique

A. What is the purpose of the site?

The purpose of the site is to post different types of issues that are currently being discussed. It gives the opportunity for any issue to be discussed without any type of bias affecting it. 

B. Who is the intended audience?

The intended audience is anyone who wants to learn more on an issue or has something to contribute to the issue being discussed.

C. Do you think that the site reaches its intended audience? Why or why no?

No becuase the site only offers only a few topics to discuss. For example there is only one topic listed for education and has no posts. This means that people cannot contribute to a wide range of discussions. No one seems to be accessing the site at all because there are only a few posts, if any, for each topic. The site only has about 5 different topics. This shows me that the website is not being accessed by the audience. 

D. Is the site useful to you? 

No this site is not useful to me because it does no offer much information I find valuable. For example, I went on the healthcare topic and read the one topic posted. The post title was really long and hard to understand. The post itself was really short and did not offer much insight into the healthcare system. It did not post any links or resources to go to if I wanted to learn more. Overall, I do not feel like I learned anything on this issue by accessing the site which defeats the main point of the site.

E. List one interesting fact or issue that is addressed.

SAT statistics were pretty interesting. I was unaware that scores were so low. The only bad thing is no one commented on the post and there was no reference to where they got the information. 

F. Would you encourage others to visit the site?

No, the site was not informative. I really did not learn anything new. I don't think recommending this site to others would be beneficial at all because the site has no substance. 

G. How could the site be improved?

There are many things that could improve this site

1. Have more general, current issues to discuss
2. I don't understand how buying from amazon supports the site. 
3. Make site look more professional (change colors, use some links to support ideas)
4. Make it more appealing to people who have knowledge on the topic 
5. Make each tab understandable and easy to use because I don't understand the purpose of some. 

Control

The topic for this week in Social Media Virtual Worlds seems to be control and censorship of the internet. We were assigned to read three different articles related to the topic. The articles included 

http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/sites/cyber.law.harvard.edu/files/Evolving_Landscape_of_Internet_Control_3.pdf

http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2009/08/building_in_sur.html

http://www.code-is-law.org/preface_excerpt.html

After reading all three articles, I began to think of how much would be different if the United States had more restrictions for internet and what my stand was on the regulations in general. 

Just think about what the internet would be like if we had similar restrictions as China. We would not be able to search "sensitive topics" that the government considered inappropriate.  Our whole collection of information from the internet would possibly be biased because we would not be getting the whole truth. The government could consider parts of the truth to be offensive and restrict view of the topics. If this were to happen, our society would be unable to have as much control and free speech as we do today. Social media sites would probably be deleted. The internet as we know it would be a lot different if we were subjected to the same restrictions as China. Because of this, I believe the internet should be a place were there is no government regulation. 

While considering my stand on this issue, a friend suggested I read this article http://www.scribd.com/doc/99220534/The-Technology-Revolution. The main idea of the article was internet should be kept without government regulation. Another main point was restricting the internet reduces our freedoms and the ideas of our founders. Since the internet has done well and grown without the interference of government, it should continue to be left out. I agree with this. The internet was designed as a place to express thoughts and ideas without the fear of being persecuted. If the government were to intervene, who knows how different and controlling everything would be. Hopefully, the internet will never be subjected to government regulation as it is in China and other countries around the world. 

Smart Phones

During class on Tuesday night, I was looking around the room and noticed something pretty interesting. Out of everyone in class, I seemed to be the only one without a smart phone. The class all seemed to have the 4 or 4s  iPhone while I sat there with my less than impressive Verizon Cosmo touch.  With all the current hype about the iPhone 5, I started to ask myself is it time to cave in and buy one? 

As of a few months ago, my cell phone plan expired so I can technically get an upgrade for a new phone. I have been debating if I should break down and enter the smart phone world since then. The moment our plan was up, my sister was at Verizon getting the 4S. So my delay is not a matter of timing and contracts. I know most of you are thinking, "Smart phones are the greatest things ever" or "why the heck don't you have one yet". I guess I don't know what I'm missing. Currently I am very happy with my fully functioning phone. It never has given me problems or headaches. So why should I trade it in for something else? I know I seem very attached to my little phone but why fix something that isn't broken?

With all the commercials and ads about the awesome things the IPhone 5 can do, I'm starting to doubt my little phone. It can't check Facebook or my email. It's only real functions are to call, to text, and to use as an alarm. So is it time for me to get the new technology? This technology will connect me to people at all hours of the day. Do I really want this? So many questions to answer. All I know is that each day I see the commercials, I feel as though I am getting closer to buying it. 

or

Twitter

Today I started to explore the hype surrounding Twitter. Before this class, I had never had the desire to go on Twitter. I don't really like change, so I was not too happy with the idea of having another social media site to learn. I also did not care about hashtags or reading what celebrities were tweeting. In my mind this is all Twitter was. Today I decided to put my negativity aside and give the website a try. This is mostly because it is a class requirement but also because it seems that Facebook users are starting to make the change to Twitter. Since I don't want technology to pass me by, I thought it was time to stop being stubborn.

Upon first inspection of the site, I didn't like it. Everything was new and confusing. There were @ symbols, # symbols and I didn't know how communication happened. After I started to read some tweets posted by my followers, I started to get a sense of how everything is done on Twitter. Basically, you just make a statement about something that is going on in your life and then add a hashtag with a comment related to your statement. It seems easy enough. I also noticed that tweets were not just made by celebrities. All this exporing made me realize that Twitter may not be so bad. I think as time goes by I may actually start to check it as frequently as Facebook. I'll keep everyone posted with my Twitter adventures! 

"The Heart of The Well"

After last week's article about the Whole Earth Catalog and the WELL, I felt I had a good base knowledge of how virtual communities began. I was happy to see that the reading this week was another article about the WELL. This time the focus of the well was not the general exchange of information but instead how that information started to change peoples lives.  The article is called "The Heart of The Well" by Howard Rheingold. 

The beginning of this article discussed one subgroup of the well dedicated to the discussion of parenting. If a child woke up in the middle of the night sick, parents could log on the WELL and talk to a doctor because someone was always online. Before reading this article, I never thought about how much we use the internet for little things. I'm sure everyone has gotten sick and resorted to googling their symptoms. Most of the time there is someone who has experienced the exact same thing and a doctor has posted the reasoning for it. It sometimes gives a sense of relief knowing that you are not alone and the medical symptoms are normal. 

After the article discussed parenting, it went on to talk about the power of the WELL. It gave examples of members who needed help and how other members responded. I thought it was truly amazing what could be done when a group of people far apart could pull their resources and make big things happen. The virtual communities that were created soon became like real communities because you saw the members doing anything in their power to get something done.

The final topic of this article was related to addiction to the system. Because people received constant feedback to their discussions, some people were always online. In my opinion this is especially true with today's technology. Since many people are using smartphones that have internet access, they are always online. People often do not know what to do when the internet goes out. This is a growing problem that will continue to get worse as communication through technology becomes even more common. 

Overall i really liked this article. After last week, I thought I had enough of the WELL but this article talked about the WELL in a way I was able to relate to. It was written by  a person who used the system in ways that I may use it. I also like how he included actual discussion posts. It was a good article that would be easy for anyone to understand. 

Turner Article

For class on Tuesday, one of the required readings included an article by Fred Turner. This article focused on the Whole Earth Catalog and the WELL's (Whole Earth Lectronic Link) contribution to online communities. When I first began to read the article, I was a little confused because I had zero background knowledge on this topic. I had never in my life heard of the Whole Earth Catalog, the WELL, or the culture that surrounded them. After I looked up a few of the major topics in the article, I was able to have a better understanding of what the author was saying. 

Before reading the article, I never thought much about how search engines and chat rooms were created. I would have never guessed that they stemmed from the creation of a magazine that allowed readers to send in their opinions and comments on certain products and items used daily. I think it's so interesting how easy it is for us today to go online and discuss our thoughts and opinions with others and receive immediate feedback. Back when there was the Whole Earth Catalog, there was only about two issues each year. This meant that feedback was very slow. Even though feedback was slow, readers began to fall in love with the same idea we are obsessed with today, which is the ability to share thoughts and opinions with people far away.

 The magazine soon lead to the development of the WELL. The WELL allowed us to communicate with others in real time which began the obsession with virtual communities. It is really interesting to see where virtual communities began and learn about the first people to use the systems. It clear that today's virtual communities have a wide range of topics and discussions. Even though there are many communities, they all have something in common with the first virtual communities. This being the ability to read and share opinions.  Overall, this article was very informational. I learned a great deal about the history of virtual communities and how far they have come. 

All Eyes on the Quad

This is really the first time (minus the little post I made 2 weeks ago) I have ever blogged before. It's kind of strange to  write something that other people can access at anytime but I'll give it a shot. My first topic will be related to the big hype surrounding "All Eyes on the Quad" that occurred yesterday on campus. The first time I heard about it, me and my roommate were watching Dr. Soltz's welcome back video we had just received via email. He ended the video by saying that everyone must watch the quad at 3:15 on September 6. Not long after watching the video, "All Eyes on the Quad" became a common  joke in my apartment. This was mostly because the saying started to pop up everywhere online and around campus. It started with email and soon started to appear on Facebook. The Bloomsburg Facebook page posted a flyer that soon began to circulate. This flyer was very convincing that something epic was going to take place at 3:15. Not long after the initial post, several of my friends started reposting the flyer with questions related to their curiosity. I began to see this flyer everywhere.  So much that I felt the need to be at the quad for whatever was about to happen. With my new twitter account, I also saw tweets relating to the big event that was about to happen. Unfortunately , I was unable to make it to the quad to see all the excitement. Since I felt like I was missing out, I had my roommate text to give me the play by play. Looking back at all this, I'm starting to understand just how much social media is affecting our lives. If it wasn't for email, Facebook, Twitter and texting, I probably would not have cared about what was happening on the quad. But because these things are used so heavily, I was extremely informed which lead to my curiosity. From what I heard, the quad wasn't very exciting.  With that aside, the buildup that was created through social media was pretty much perfect because I heard there was a great turnout to watch the quad at 3:15.