Three Innovations

On Sunday, I read and interesting article on CNN.com that really got me thinking. The article was called Three Innovations that Changed America. The three innovations the article discussed were the creation of the interstate highway system, the spread of television across the nation, and the introduction and wide-usage of the Internet across America.

The article asked readers to think about which innovation they thought changed things the most. At first I certain that the Internet changed things in America the most. However, as I continued to read this article, I realized that all three of these inventions drastically changed America in very very different ways.

The interstate highway program allowed anyone to travel anywhere. People no longer

Interstate Highway System

had to stay cooped up locally. It gave people a new feeling, a feeling of freedom. In addition, it allowed the spread of goods and services across state lines.

The spread of television across the nation connected the nation. It allowed everyone in the country to be informed about events occurring through sounds AND pictures. Similarly to the interstate highway system, the spread of television allowed people to feel connected and not isolated in their towns or cities.

Finally, the spread of the Internet also allowed for a freedom. The Internet allowed

The Internet

people the freedom to read and find out about anything they wanted. People could read articles, watch videoclips, or talk to people all across the nation. The possibilities with the Internet are endless.

All three of the innovations gave people a freedom they never had before. All three innovations connected people to one another. People can stay local if they wish, but they no longer have to.

After reading the article, I think all three innovations equally changed America. I wonder, in five or ten years, if I am going to see an article asking which social networking website  has changed America the most!

“Shared Awareness” and Flash Mobs

In Clay Shirky’s book, “Here Comes Everybody,” he discusses the concept of “shared awareness.” He explains this concept as not only people or groups understanding a situation, but also people and groups understanding who has the same understanding as them.  This allows people to coordinate their actions more efficiently and in a faster manner.

With the invention of the Internet, and eventually social media tools, “shared awareness” has become such an everyday occurrence, that we may have even started to take it for granted. The concept of “shared awareness” can be found with the usage of Twitter, Facebook, Blogs, and other social media tools.

I was speaking with a friend of mine yesterday who tweeted that she received an extra charger with her new Apple computer. Immediately, one of her friends following on Twitter tweeted back at her saying he would buy the extra charger from her because his just broke. The gentleman understood that our friend had an extra charger. Instead of going to the Apple store, waiting in line, and paying an astronomical price for the charger, he was able to walk across campus and purchase the charger at a reasonable price, and almost immediately.

Another example of this concept of “shared awareness” that I have noticed regards our university’s new policy on Fountain Day. For the first time, this year, Fountain Day is NOT open to university alumni. Many of my friends were outraged about this new

Fountain Day

policy. As soon as the information regarding the new Fountain Day rules were released, many of my alumni friends started posting Facebook statuses regarding this change. The outraged alumni banned together to create a Facebook group detailing the actions that can be taken to try to get this new policy reversed. This Facebook group allowed the alumni to organize into a team to quickly and efficiently attempt to reverse the new rule, which is the essence of “shared awareness.”

Shirky also writes about “flash mobs.” Unlike “shared awareness,” I had never heard of the concept “flash mobs” before. I think flash mobs is more than a gimmick–I definitely think it is a powerful subversive tool. It is amazing how the Internet has changed our lives, even the ability to rally! I think what makes it so powerful is how protests can be disguised as anything, even something as simple as reading a newspaper or eating ice cream! Is there a limit on the power of the Internet?

Networking for a Cause

One of the classes I am taking this semester is a Communication Practicum. The class teaches not only how to put a public relations campaign together, but also, how to put it into action!

After learning about organ and tissue donation from our local procurement agency,  the Center of Donation and Transplant of New York (CDTNY), my class set the goals of getting 1,000 of our peers to register to be organ tissue donors, and educating 4,000 of our peers on campus.

Once we learned about the budget given to us by CDTNY and the different components of running a successful campaign, we broke up into seven different teams. The teams include: the logo/theme development committee, marketing materials/giveaways committee, special events committee, tabling and outreach committee, media/visibility committee, classroom presentations committee, and the web development/viral marketing committee.

Since April is Donate Life Month, our campaign will not be kicking off until then. In the meantime, the teams are planning what they are going to do and presenting their ideas to the class.

Yesterday, the web development/viral marketing committee, presented their ideas to the class. The three members of this group told us about the e-mail account they set up, the Facebook “person” they created, and the Twitter account they put together. They spent a good deal of time talking about the Twitter account for two reasons. The first reason is that this is the first time, in the history of this Communication Practicum, that the class has set up a Twitter account. The second reason why the three committee members spent a lot of time discussing the Twitter account was to stress the importance of us using it.

Our class wants to get our message out to as many people as possible. One of the ways we intend on doing this is through a “mass media attack.” The web development/viral marketing committee explained to our class that one of the best ways to do this is by using one of the newest, as well as one of the most widely used social networking websites: Twitter. They explained that by using Twitter and “following” our friends, friends of friends, and celebrities, and by “retweeting” our tweets, our campaign message will get out to hundreds, maybe even thousands of people!

Talk about viral marketing!

For example, one of the people our class is following on Twitter, is Ellen Degeneres. If we retweet our tweets, more people will see them because of the large amount of people following her. Our message will hit more people this way.

I wonder if our class continues to follow celebrities and retweet our tweets, if we can gain national recognition or, more importantly, help get as many of the 106,282 people on the organ transplant list, off of the waiting list.

The Power of Social Media and Networking

This morning I woke up as I do everyday: my alarm rang, I got out of bed, turned my alarm off, grabbed my BlackBerry, and hopped back into bed to read the news. I was startled to find a story on CNN.com about a shooting that occurred early this morning at Ohio State University.

The story was not listed under the “latest news” section of CNN.com which definitely surprised me. Rather, the story was listed among other stories about events unfolding or that had already happened in the United States. In addition, the story provided very little information ((it has been updated since I first saw it this morning and now includes more information)) about what actually happened early this morning.

While the story did originally say that no students were involved in the shooting, it was a scary thing for me to read, for two reasons. The first reason is the most obvious, I am a college student and am fully aware that something this terrifying can occur on my college campus at anytime.  The second reason that this article frightened me was because I have a good friend  from high school that attends Ohio State University.

Thats when it hit me! I realized if I wanted to know more about the Ohio State University shooting, I could get in contact with my friends who attend the university. I felt that it was still too early in the morning to call my friend, who actually happens to be my neighbor at home, so instead I logged into Facebook.

I would have logged into Twitter to see if she had Tweeted something about the shooting, but I know she does not have a Twitter account, so Facebook appeared to be my best option. As soon as I logged into Facebook, I found my friend’s page with the following as her Facebook status: “two rapes and a shooting all in one week, keeping it classy at the Ohio State.”

While her status did not tell me anything further about the shooting that had occurred, it did tell me that two rapes had occurred on the campus in the past week. This was a fact that the CNN.com article failed to write about.

As today went by, I frequently checked into CNN.com to learn more about the shooting. I eventually got all of the information I needed. But, I am writing this blog after learning something more than the details of the Ohio State University shooting; I learned that social networking and social media are extremely powerful in the act of disseminating information quickly. None of the news articles that I read discussed the two rapes at the university. I would not have known about these rapes if it were not for my friend’s Facebook status. I now truly believe, social networking sites can really educate and inform us.

Will Lil Wayne Ever Serve His Sentence?!

On July 22,  2007, rapper, Dwayne Carter III, better known by fans as Lil Wayne’s tour bus was searched and a .40-caliber pistol was found. After the gun was found, Lil Wayne was faced one count of criminal weapons possessions as well as one count of criminal possession of a loaded weapon and was facing a minimum of three and a half years in jail and a maximum of 15 years in jail.

Lil Wayne ended up getting sentenced to one year in jail. Although the rapper got himself into this mess over a year and a half ago, he has yet to serve his jail time. The rapper’s prison sentencing has been postponed, not once, not twice, but three times.

The rapper’s sentencing was first delayed about a month ago for dental surgery. Lil Wayne’s sentencing was supposed to take place this past Monday. However, a fire broke out in at Manhattan Criminal Court  as a result of faulty electrical wiring, said to the New York City Fire Department.  While many other cases were moved to a courthouse located across the street from the Manhattan Criminal Court, Lil Wayne’s case was not. His sentencing was rescheduled to take place this afternoon, but Judge Charles H. Solomon decided to move it to this coming Monday.

Does Lil Wayne have all the luck, or what?

The rapper has definitely not wasted or taken his extra time as a free man for granted. According to the Lil Wayne Fansite Twitter account, Lil Wayne has been busy recording dozens of music videos so his fans have things to watch while he is serving his jail sentence. Last night, Lil Wayne made a surprise appearance at the Jay-Z concert and Madison Square Garden. He got on stage and sang “Im Goin In,” with Young Jeezy–how ironic.

I have to ask. If Lil Wayne were an ordinary citizen and not a popular rapper and celebrity, would his jail sentencing been postponed three times?

ChatRoulette: Social Network of the Future?

ChatRoulette is one of the newest social networking sites to hit the Internet. Its growing popularity is making it a topic of many conversations. Unlike Facebook and Twitter, users do not communicate through messages. Rather, ChatRoulette users talk to one another with the help of web cameras.

Oh, and users communicate with complete strangers.

In the “New York” magazine article, The Human Shuffle: Is ChatRoulette the Future of the Internet or its distant past, the article discusses how ChatRoulette is a cross between Skype and web chatting. It also refers to it as the “anti Facebook” and an example of a “pure media shuffle.”

The site is pretty simple to use. Users go on the website and are randomly connected to other people via webcam. A user can chose to talk to another user with the webcam or to send instant messages. If a user decides he or she does not want to continue talking to the person her or she is currently chatting with, the user can hit the “next” button and is faced with a different user.

Users are supposed to be at l6 years of age. However, when a person logs in, there is no way to verify whether a person is of age or not. Conceivably, 13 year olds can log into this site. This is rather a frightening thought considering some of the things that people do on this site.

I had my first experience with ChatRoulette last Tuesday. My roommates and I wanted to see what all of the hype was about. We logged on and found ourselves in a chat with a man and a woman in the middle of having sex with one another. We could not believe what we were witnessing. When they finished doing the deed, the couple came up to the camera and asked us if we enjoyed the show. We were nauseated and decided to hit the “next” button to find a new user to chat with.

After hitting the next button after seeing users who were either not of age or who insisted on showing us their male genitalia, we were met with two young men who claimed to be in their 20’s from Florida. We spoke to them for about 45 minutes. The four of us gave them fake names and told them we attended school in Boston, not Albany. They kept asking for our phone numbers and we repeatedly gave them the numbers of Time Warner Cable and various pizzerias.

I think ChatRoulette gives online predators an entirely new meaning. Since there is no way to verify how old a person really is, anyone can go on. There is also no way to stop people from getting naked or doing things such as having sex on camera. When will there be a crackdown on this website? Will ChatRoulette be another social networking fad or is it here to stay?

Changes in Technology = Changes in Communication

Clay Shirky suggests “publish first, filter later.” With forms of microblogging, such as Twitter, this is very easy to do. Twitter allows its users to publish whatever they want within the 140 character limit. Twitter users can publish a thought, information, their whereabouts, anything! They can publish as many times as they want.

With regards to Twitter and other forms of microblogging, I think Shirky is suggesting we should publish as much as and as frequently as possible. I think he wants us to publish a great amount of material, whatever we want, and not worry about whether or not it is important or is going to be read.  Then, I think he wants us to go through everything and filter out the unimportant things or things that have no relevance.

It really is just amazing how “new forms of sharing take hold.” Shirky discusses how many steps it took to share a newspaper article years ago. From cutting an article out to labeling an envelope, many steps had to be taken. Now, sharing an article is easier and cheaper. A person no longer has to pay to read or share and article. With articles being published on the Internet, a person can copy and paste the article and share it not with just one friend, but with many friends via e-mail.

I am very curious as to whether or not these “new forms of sharing” have increased or decreased the amount of sharing taking place. Since it is so easy to access articles on the computer, do people really send them to one another? Are they more likely to tell a friend to read an article or actually send the article?

With microblogging sites such as Twitter, sharing has taken on an entirely different meaning. People are sharing important information, such as breaking news, but they are also sharing unnecessary information such as when they finished writing a paper.

While sharing has definitely become increasingly easier, faster, and cheaper, has it become better because of these “new forms?”

Amanda and Twitter

This past week, I spent alot of time familiarizing myself with Twitter, and as much as it pains me to admit it, I am starting to enjoy using the program. I swore I would never hop on the Twitter bandwagon, in fact I was anti-Twitter for the longest time.

I have come to the realization that the best way to treat Twitter is as a source of information. Yes, I try to “Tweet” on a regular basis to let my followers know what I am up to or to share information regarding my life or news in general. But, this past week, I have started to use Twitter as a way to learn about what is going on in the world.

CNN

I have even found myself following major news outlets, such as CNN and The New York Times on Twitter, more often then I find myself reading the articles posted online on these sites on my BlackBerry. If a Tweeted story interests me, I click the link to get the full story.

The New York Times

Since I am using Twitter more and more, I am also reading more and more. My professors, parents, and people I know in the journalism world all tell me the best way to improve writing is to read. I am definitely improving my writing as I read the tweets of the people I follow.

This week, I plan to use Twitter even more effectively by following more people, and thus, reading more. I want to make my tweets more informal and not just about what I am up to.

I believe Twitter is a fantastic learning tool for anyone who wants to inprove his or her writing.

Wikipedia: A Legitimate Source or Not?

When I first saw that my blog assignment was to answer the question of whether or not Wikipedia is legitimate, I laughed to myself. I recalled an experience with Wikipedia that I had in my journalism class during my senior year in high school.

My journalism class consisted of 25 seniors who were plagued with senioritis. The journalism class was supposed to print a newspaper but by the time March rolled around, no one really cared. We cut class to go to Starbucks and to take a dip in each other’s pools and hot tubs. When we did attend class, we were bored.

One day we decided to find out how legitimate Wikipedia really was. We decided to edit one of the entries on Wikipedia to see if anyone would notice or change it back to how it should be. We picked a very well-known American figure, President George Washington, and edited his birthday. We figured we would make his day of birth 200 years later than it really was. We figured this was a very noticeable change and would be fixed rather quickly.

Washington’s birthday stayed this way until some time in May when someone obviously changed in back.

The Wikipedia Logo

To make a long story short, I do not think Wikipedia is legitimate. Even though it now requires each edit to include sources and asks for the information to be verified, based on my experience with the website, I cannot help but not trust it.

In my experience at the University at Albany, I have found that most of my professors specifically state in their syllabi, not to use Wikipedia as a source. Their stance on Wikipedia is very similar to the stance of professors at Yale University, as seen in this article.

I think one of my sophomore year communications professors summed up what Wikipedia should be used for in a nutshell best. She said, “Wikipedia is a great starting point, but an insufficient ending point.” Basically, her advice was to use Wikipedia to find sources that will lead to more information and not to use Wikipedia as a source of information.

Even though Wikipedia has changed how it is edited and what information is posted, I still do not think its legitimate. I think the website is best used when a person scrolls down to the bottom of it and goes to the websites, books, or other sources listed in the “reference” section of the page and checks them out. Some of the sources listed are actually very helpful and can lead to additional and legitimate information about a certain topic.

Since there are so many scholarly and legitimate sources out there about hundreds of thousands of topics, I do not think we need to limit ourselves to Wikipedia.

The Power of the Media

The media has power. It always has. The media acts as a gatekeeper of information. It decides what stories are important enough to draw attention to and cover. It educates us on these topics and makes us more knowledgeable. In a sense, the media has had the power to tell us what to think about.

But will the media always have this power? Clay Shirky’s book, “Here Comes Everybody” teaches us how there is a dramatic shift in the way we get our information and learn about events occurring in our society.

Social media tools such as blogs and Twitter are becoming increasingly dominant in our society. It seems as though everyone is jumping on the social media tools bandwagon. People are sharing information, pictures, stories, resumes..you name it, social media tools are allowing people to share it!

What Are Social Media Tools, Such As Twitter, Doing to Journalism As We Know It?

I think it is amazing how times are changing and the media networks, such as CNN or “The New York Times,” do not have as much power as they used to have. Many of the big media networks are relying on the blogs, “tweets,” and photographs of ordinary citizens to stay on top of what is occurring in our world. I think this is great because it is forcing the big networks not to be so lazy in its news coverage, to become more competitive, and to disseminate news a quicker manner. I guess the big networks are starting to feel the pressure.

I believe that this shift in the way we get our information about events is going to make us smarter people. More people have blogs and Twitter accounts, so it is obvious that people are writing more. However, they are also reading more. Is it possible that society as we know it is becoming more literate as a result of social media tools?! It seems as though people have more of a desire to be in tune with what is going on with the world.

What is this going to do to journalism? Are these amateur journalists going to force conventional journalists out of the market?