Formspring..will it gain popularity?

I just learned about a new social media tool called Formspring.me from two of the girls I live in my apartment with. Since they joined Formspring.me, my two apartment mates have become obsessed with the website! They practically live on in.

While I, myself have not created a Formspring.me account, the entire concept of it fascinates me. This is probably because I am a Journalism major and Formspring.me deals with asking questions to anyone–friends and strangers.

From my understanding of Formspring.me, it is a social media website in which you make a profile and post a picture of yourself. Unlike Facebook where you have to add or approve people as your “friends,” to write on someone’s profile. However, Formspring.me can be linked to a person’s Facebook account.

FormSpring

Formspring.me is set up in a question and answer type of format. A person ((user or non user)) can ask a question on a person’s profile for the person to answer. The questions can be about something silly, such as, “which actor do you think is sexiest?” or serious, such as, “what do you think about President Obama?” Both the question and the answer are published on the user’s profile for everyone ((users and non users)) to see. The catch is, people have the choice to post questions with either his or her name or anonomously.

I think the anonymous aspect of this website is great because allows people to ask a question they normally might not ask a user in person. However, it is a little bit creepy because anyone ((strangers or friends)) can ask a user a question.

I am curious to see whether or not this website will catch on and become as popular as Facebook or whether it will just fade into the crypt of unsuccessful social media tool websites. Only time will tell.

Can We Really Be Private Anymore?

After reading and discussing The New York Times‘ article by Steve Lohr, titled “How Privacy Vanishes Online,” I strongly believed that anyone who put information on the Internet had only themselves to blame for his or her lack of privacy.

Even though the article made that point that while one person may not disclose his or her personal information, someone else may disclose personal information about this person. While this did not initially resonate with me, yesterday I realized that this could very well be the case for many people.

A few days ago, one of my male friends was “tagged” in a bunch of Facebook photos kissing another guy. Six of my friends and I noticed these pictures and began talking

Facebook

about them. At the time only three of the seven of us knew that our friend was gay and was dating the guy he was kissing in the photos. After much talking, wondering, and confusion, my friend came out of the closet to the four of us who did not know that he was gay.

My friend had no intention of these photographs ever hitting the Internet, let alone Facebook, where all of his friends and family could see the pictures. He also had no intention of telling anyone but the three people he had told and his boyfriend that he is gay.

When he found out through one of our friends that the pictures were on Facebook, he immediately asked his boyfriend to “untag” the pictures. His boyfriend did so, but the damage was already done.

This entire ordeal with my friend made me realize that as a result of the Internet, our privacy has truly vanished. Even if we, personally, do not disclose any information or post any pictures on the Internet about ourselves, someone else can. While writing this blog entry, I also remembered an incident that occurred a few years ago.

During my freshman year of college, a website existed ((it no longer does)) that allowed people to post pictures of other people and rate people on their looks, smarts, and promiscuousness. For some reason, my picture showed up on this website and I was rated “10” for looks, “2” for smarts, and “10” for promiscuousness. Obviously, these ratings are extremely skewed. But, the website had my full name and was searchable through Google. Thus, anyone ((my parents, professors, friends, and employers)) could type in my name and see all of this false information!  I felt extremely violated and as though I had no privacy.

I think this situation with the Internet is unfortunately inevitable. I wonder if it is going to get worse with  the increasing use and creation of various social media and networking sites.

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?