Strand 4 Topics: 3,4 and 9

Topic 3: Organizational Communication in CMC

One issue that has come up in the world of CMC is the use and misuse of the technologies given to you while at work.  While the advances in technology have led to a much quicker working environment with people being able to work at home and still attend meetings, it has also led to people misusing the technologies afforded to them by their employers.  There have been many cases involving employees using their email for private uses.  One story involved a lawyer sending on a private email, which was sent from a woman he had went out on a date with the night before, on to a group of people.  The email made it all the way to New Zealand and he faced being fired from his law firm. Most employees use the internet at their work for non-work activity.  One survey done by Vault 90 percent of the people surveyed had used the internet to look at recreational websites.   Technology has also been beneficial to the workplace as well.  The ability to teleconference makes it possible to communicate with people worldwide and telecommute to work. 

Topic 4: Health Communication in CMC

Health is another topic that has been affected by the changes in CMC.  There have been several health related communication advances that have changed healthcare, some for the better and others for the worse.  One of the first systems for health communication was in the School of Medicine at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland.  The goal of the system was to keep physicians in touch efficiently instead of wasting time sending people running, or hoping the other person was at a phone.   One of the features of this system that was very innovative was ‘Doc in the Box’.  This system allowed people to communicate with a real physician from home instead of having to go to a doctor all of the time.  One of the concerns with Health communication on the internet is that anybody can post something on the internet.   This causes problems because someone could seem very reputable but actually be lying or providing bad information to people.  Also this could lead to a lot of people just consulting the internet instead of going to see a doctor. 

Topic 9: New media Developments in CMC

The future of technology is often unclear and things that everyone thinks would catch on, often do not.  One of the trends that has caught on are wireless internet connections (Wi-Fi).  Wi-Fi is now the standard in internet connections and just about everyone has a phone that connects to Wi-Fi.  Another thing that caught on was web logs (blogs).  A blog is a series of postings arranged by first posting on a website.  Anybody can have a blog and there are several different sites to have one including blogger.com.  Wiki’s have also caught on.  A wiki allows a group of people to create a web page.  The most famous wiki is Wikipedia, which many people use daily for looking up things quickly.  One technology that never caught on was ubiquitous computing (UbiComp).  UbiComp is basically computer hardware on clothes.  Some things catch on while others don’t and Wi-Fi will certainly be involved in the future in some way.  

Artifact 10

The way we view movies is definitely changing because of the fact that people can watch movies just about anywhere they go.  Also people will get bootleg copies of movies and see them at home even when they are still in theaters.  There is also Red Box where you can movies at a gas station or McDonalds which is making new movies much more accessible to people.  The real question that is posed by the author is whether or not that this change is better for movies.  I think that the changes are better because instead of being limited in the way people can see movies.  The availability means that people will want to get movies more often.  This may mean that less people go see the movie at the theater, but more people will be seeing movies.  One problem with the movie industry is that people will actually post the movies online at sites, and you can end up watching them for free.  This kills the amount of money that the movie industry makes and is similar to pirating music online.  You get to enjoy the product without paying which is unfair to the movie makers.

Art Sharing Project

This artifact made me think about how places like museums and art galleries are having to adapt to the changes that are happening with technology. If embraced these changes could make the museum visiting experience that much better.  It is talked about in the article how smart phones and hand held devices can only make the experience more stimulating and interesting for the visitor.  Museums could also fall to the wayside if they do not embrace new technologies.

I think that if museums and galleries continue to embrace technologies like twitter and YouTube, they could easily grow because they will reach out to a younger generation as well as the current people they already attract.  Attracting new people to the museums would give them more opinions and also more customers to come and take in what they have to offer.

The health world online.

I found a lot of the things talked about in this artifact to be very interesting and I understand some of it, as I have gone on WebMD to look something up before.  These sites could be helpful and overall give you a basic understanding of something that may be wrong with you, but you shouldn't just check WebMD and self-diagnose yourself, if you have a serious problem you should definitely see a doctor.  The Mental help apps and such, I feel would be more helpful to a person because generally when you have a mental breakdown or anything, you don't have time to schedule an appointment or go see a doctor.  Although I found the price to be a bit steep for an app that only deals with one problem, that price could be well worth it, if i was afraid of Airplanes and were about to board an airplane.

One thing that i thought was really cool, was the game that was designed to help kids deal with cancer.  This idea is probably very helpful to kids, who don't really know what is going on inside their body when they have cancer.    This is just one way that technology is helping people with illnesses.  Another way that i have heard of, is using the Wii to also help people who are having motor skill issues.  I think that both of these ways are great ways of using technology in a way that is different than usual to help people with their medical problems.  I know that if I was a kid with cancer or someone with motor skill issues I would love to have a thing like an Ipod app or a Wii game to help me understand or recover from whatever is ailing me.

Artifact 7

I found this artifact to be unsurprising because so many people are trying to cheat and looking for the easy way out.  There are so many ways for students to take the easy way out and not actually learn.  At the college level this confuses me because you are actually paying to go to school and what are you actually getting if you cheat?  You are getting nothing more than a fake education and a piece of paper that you didn't earn.  What happens when you get on the job and don't know what to do? Then you are pretty much screwed and have no way to do what you needed to do.

I am glad that schools are cracking down on the amount of cheating that goes on.  It frustrates me that some people actually don't cheat and do their work while others just cheat off of the internet.  Plagiarism is a tricky issue on the other hand though.  Many times students can plagiarize without even knowing they are, which creates a tricky situation because most schools expel people who plagiarize.  A lot of the problem can be solved by good citing and making sure you know your sources.  

Anonymous

I found this video very interesting, not just because of the website 4chan but also because of the group Anonymous.  The group anonymous seems to have a lot of underground power that people don't know about.  If they can track down someone who abused a cat on the internet imagine what they could do if something more serious got on their nerves.  I looked up Anonymous' Wikipedia page because I was so interested by this group and they have also done a number of other things including taking down websites of people who are a threat to them and creating a political party in Iran.  This is a group I would not want to mess with at any time

This video also brought up another key issue, and that is anonymity.  Anonymity is disappearing from the internet because of the large amount of social networking places and such.  I think anonymity can be a good thing and a bad thing for the internet, on the good side it allows people to speak as they feel without being judged, but on the bad side it allows people to attack people without any retribution.  Anonymity is a touchy issue on the internet with people taking it in both directions.

Artifact Number 5

This is probably one of the most eye-opening artifacts we've had.  The porn industry has really led to major changes in the internet and has even pioneered much of the online buying industry, and how videos are watched online.  Porn is really the unspoken part of the internet that no one really wants to talk about, but everyone knows is a large use of people on the internet.  I know that just about every guy I know has gone on porn at least once in their life and it is a gigantic industry.

The fact that porn inspired many innovations in the internet today is also not surprising.  There is a lot of money in the industry and they have the freedom to experiment because no matter what people will keep coming back and paying for what the industry provides.

artifacts 4a and B

I found the first artifact to be completely shocking.  The robot thing looked exactly like a human and even made human like movements such as blinking its eyes or moving their eyes from side to side.  Although some of the movement was still a little stiff, the droid would still make me think it was a human at first glance.  This makes me wonder that we might have robots that completely run on their own soon.  I am afraid that our world might turn into a sci-fi movie where the robots turn against us.

The second artifact is something that i wish i had during school.  I could not hand sharpen a pencil to save my life  and this would make it so much easier.  It may not be the most current piece of technology but it is still a piece of technology.  Pencil sharpeners have been around for ever and have evolved from a knife, to hand crank mounted on the wall, to a little hand held bugger, and then to the best electric ones that did it right just about every time.  This artifact shows that technology is just about everywhere you are.

artifact 3

http://www.learnoutloud.com/Free-Audio-Video/Social-Sciences/Psychology/What-the-Internet-Is-Doing-to-Our-Brains/38140?utm_source=FROTD&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Free+Resource+of+the+Day

One interesting thing that Nicholas Carr said is that "Our basic instinct is to multi task."  I found that he said this to be interesting because all the time I hear about how people cannot multi-task, or the stereotype that men can't multi-task.  I don't necessarily agree with the statement that our basic instinct is to multi-task because there really are people who can't multi-task at all, they have to focus on just one thing and that thing.  The internet makes it hard not to multi-task though with different windows, tabs and things going on everywhere.

Another interesting thing that he said was that office workers would glance at their email inbox 30-40 times in an hour.  I found this interesting because whenever I'm on a computer the first thing I do is check my facebook, then i'll check my e-mail to see whether I got an email or not.  I can't even imagine how often people check their e-mail now that we have blackberry's and smart phones that can check email just about anywhere you get a phone signal.

artifact 2: Hamlet's Blackberry

Restless energy of the hunted mind
Listening to William Powers talk about his book made me very interested in his book, Hamlet's Blackberry.  I found what he talked about to be very interesting and the way he used philosophers from other times dealing with their own new technologies to explain his point.  He did a great job talking about this book and he talked about several topics in his book, especially how we've become dependent on the internet and that some things that used to be routine for us, now are almost completely unfamiliar.

My favorite section of his talking was when he talked about his family and how they all tried to ignore technology for awhile.  The part where they were talking about finding movie times in the newspaper made me laugh because many times, me and my friends have sat there and just looked up movie times on our phones.  Technology has progressed so far and life has gotten easier.  I can also connect with what he says about family time and the internet and such getting in the way.  Everyone in my computer has a computer of some sort and after dinner we all often go our own way and do our own thing, whether it be my parents sitting down on the couch with their laptops, or it be my brother and I going out to hang out with friends.  We rarely ever just sit down and talk.

I liked the quote the "Restless energy of the Hunted Mind".  This quote just struck me because often I just sit on the internet and hop around restlessly.  Without realizing it, I often spend hours on the internet just looking at various random websites and hopping around from one place to another or just talking to someone on Facebook.  One thing that I thought of was that if his book is available on a Kindle, wouldn't it be ironic that part of his book is about paper always being there?

Artifact One

I am not surprised that the Internet has become the leading source for news for the age group 18-29.  These people are the people who are also on Facebook or Twitter where they can now connect with just about anyone  or anything on one page.  Most companies have their own Facebook page where they can post what's new with their company, many sports teams also have Facebook pages where they keep you updated on the happenings of that team.  It's getting to the point where most people only need to check their Facebook or Twitter to know when something important happened in the world because someone will have said something about it on their Facebook or Twitter.  When Landon Donovan scored against Algeria in the World Cup this past summer, Twitter crashed, this shows that people go to their social media sites when something happens.

I am also not surprised by the growth in internet usage by the older generations.  Many of the older generations are embracing technology more and are using the internet because you don't have to wait to get the news, you can go to one site such as cnn.com and get just about all the news from around the world.  Also older people are starting to use Facebook and using it for several purposes.  I know my parents use the internet to find their news, even though they used to be television news watchers.  Every night at 10 our house would grind to halt and my parents would sit down and watch the news.  That has changed ever since they started using the internet a lot, now they only watch the news when they aren't already doing something or sleeping.  This shows how the internet is overtaking television as the leading news source for good.