Next New

New media has come a long way and become a very large part of everyone's lives. A really interesting new development of new media could be a mix of virtual reality and social networking. It would be kind of social networking site that contains people live streaming. The live streams would allow you to virtually be apart of any location in the world of those connected. Traveling is expensive and some people may never have the opportunity to leave the country so allowing them to live vicariously through these virtual live streams would be really nice. It is a few steps further than just viewing pictures of videos because it would be real time.

Wiki So Far

I have not been active in adding any content to our wiki yet. I plan on becoming more involved over this weekend. I want to become more familiar with all that wiki's and even this blog can do. I am taking a computer programming right now and I think it has made me more aware of all the things that go into presentation. I would love to explore more into that when it comes to my blog and what I could do for our wiki. In regards to research, I came across many interesting things regarding audiobooks. I am a pretty avid audible listener and would definitely recommend it to everyone. I used to always be those people that preferred hard copy books and swore to never use an audiobook. When researching, I came across so many benefits of audio books and have realized it is not something we should look down upon. We should be doing the complete opposite and seeing it is a positive because it allows us to "read" any chance we get and keep ourselves learning at any time. 

P2P

File sharing is what any of use do when we distribute music files, documents, etc. Peer to peer file sharing is a little more evolved in the sense that you are on a P2P network. A blog post written by NMA Staff said that the "vast majority of viewers also contributed their own bandwidth and computing power to help deliver Steal this Film." I think it is very important to see the point they are making in that we should embrace and utilize P2P sharing and not shame it for what people may see as stealing. They also brought up the fact that they want to see what a "new media age might really look like, what its social and political shape might be, than focus solely on questions of revenue." Business is important but in terms of interest, it is great that people are trying to explore what new advances could be made with all the technology there is today.

Privacy

With the developments of new media came downfalls that include issues with privacy and confidentiality. New media has made it easy to publicize every and any aspects of our lives. Of course, the various outlets such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter all have privacy restrictions but there are ways to get around them. It is difficult to argue for privacy when all everything is now is making things public. Another issue that brings up privacy is any time we sign up for things, there is always terms of agreement. These terms are rarely ever read through by the users so majority of the times we don't actually know what we are agreeing to but just want to continue onto the following page. These agreements we ignore may be allowing websites to send out our information. I noticed a lot recently that people complain about how their ads are always related to something they had been searching or even just talking about a few days before. No one understands how it is possible but any time we search something or mention something, it is basically logged and placed into our interests. Companies are keen in knowing all our interests so that they can grab our attention with their ads. Situations like these are the ones that make users a little concerned about what privacy they have left.

Advice

If i were to be hired by Baruch College to make improvements using new media, there is a few things I would do. The first would be to create a blog for the college in its entirety. It would be nice to have a blog that gave a background of the college and have posts about its' achievements. The blog could also post about the events going on in the school. By having a blog, the college would be able to receive comments as feedback. The comments could help the college better understand the community and provide them with events that have a lot of interest. Another thing I would do is create a YouTube channel where the college could first post a tour of each building. I think this would be very helpful to both incoming students and existing students. The channel could really be dedicated to understanding all the things the college has to offer such as the renovated computer labs. The videos will be able to get really in depth of all the features available and get a sense of the community coming in and out of the frames. It would feel like you are actually there getting shown around the floors of the buildings.

Modeling Reality with Virtual Worlds

Virtual worlds can impact many aspects of our daily life. One of the ways virtual worlds can be used is in our learning environment. This course is a great example of the use of virtual worlds. Typically, us as students have to commute to our college and sit in on our lectures. Virtual worlds has allowed for an easy way to communicate with and learn from a professor. There are two sides to consider the pros and cons of the situation: students and professors. Students may view online courses with many pros because the hour long commute is no longer a problem. One big con to this is the "reliance of information service providers, viruses and low speed of connections" (Posey et al 1). On the side of the professors, they are able to get creative with their presentations. 

Another aspect of our daily life in which virtual worlds have now become a part of is our social life. Virtual worlds have made in a way made people more keen to staying in and experiencing things virtually rather than going out into the real world. An example of this is VLES (Virtual Lower East Side). I had been completely unaware that such a program existed where an actual neighborhood is presented virtually and you are able to experience it fully. The only pro I can see to this is for outsiders to familiarize themselves with an area to feel more comfortable navigating it in reality. The major con is one that Dave Itzkoff brings up in his article, "For decades, the Lower East Side has derived its coolness from at least a veneer of danger and inaccessibility. Venturing there for the first time required risking the disapproval of the locals, whether they were the immigrants who once populated its tenements, the drug dealers who shouted from rooftops to warn of unfamiliar faces, or the bartenders and bouncers who didn’t recognize you as a regular." It is a little concerning to think of the idea of 3-D social networking because it'll play a huge role in people no longer feeling comfortable enough to communicate in real life. 




Itzkoff, Dave. “I’Ve Been in That Club, Just Not in Real Life.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 5 Jan. 2008, www.nytimes.com/2008/01/06/arts/television/06itzk.html.

Posey, Guy, et al. “The Advantages and Disadvantages of the Virtual Classroom and the Role of the Teacher.” Normal, Alabama.

About Twitter...

Using Twitter for a class discussion has ups and downs. Although I think it is a great way to engage the students in participation, it is a little harder to track. Clicking on the #3810NET2 hashtag displays all our tweets but it is difficult to visually see a discussion like on Blackboard. I think it's new and something to get used to so I'm not against it, just not accustomed. Comparing it to an in-class discussion is a different situation though. Within these past few years, it seems as though nobody wants to participate anymore! Although, I am one of those students and always have been, it's just something I've observed. Twitter is definitely useful in this sense because it's easier to articulate something when you have the chance to sit and type then speak on the spot. Definitely looking forward to how Twitter can improve our communication.

Social Networking Sites

Nowadays, there is a multiplicity of social networking sites. A few of these are: Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Tumblr. Each of these platforms are different but same in the sense that it creates a community of users. Facebook has definitely changed over the years. I remember when every teen was solely on MySpace and Facebook seemed like a website for the older community. Now, Facebook has become a feed of viral videos and memes. People don't post much about themselves anymore. Twitter also contains a lot of reblogging videos and text posts but still remains a place to update what is going on in your life. With Twitter, you can choose to connect to the people you know in real life and so much more. Instagram is more or less the same but instead of text posts, the majority of posts are photos. Instagram is more a coordinated display of what your life is and has been. I think Tumblr is very different from these three social networking sites. I see Tumblr as a more private judgement free space where people can post personal thoughts to the public. The reason for this is that you can be anonymous on Tumblr. People don't really need to know who you are so there is a plethora of people you can connect with that may relate to you. Although all these sites have their differences, I think they all serve a big purpose in improving our community.

Blog Social Networking

          Social networking has been used in the corporate world when it comes to recruiting. This site called Linkedin has allowed for recruiting to become much easier in the sense of narrowing down candidates. The company's co-founder said that there is a setting that when you sign up for the site that says, "Are you open to being contacted about job opportunities?" (Langfitt, Frank). This is a benefit because doors to bigger opportunities remain open without the hassle of actively searching for them. It is important that the recruiters still recognize that nothing can replace a phone call to get to know the candidates better than a website. 
          Although there are many benefits that come with the evolving technologies, there is a dark side too. The opportunity that these new websites allow for is anonymous comments. Gossip web sites are very dangerous and have already been brought up in legal matters. An attorney claimed the sites to be "abusive, harmful, and embarrassing personal attacks on high-school-aged children" (Young, Jeffrey R). There are also sites about college campuses. This is the dark side because people can get involved in a lot of drama. Also, the content on these sites may cause distress to the people mentioned. 
          Technology is always advancing and developing. I think in the future, as things become more evolved, there should still be some regulations. The creators of gossip sites say things will not stop them but I believe there be some sort of regulations placed so these do not continue to operate. 


Langfitt, Frank. “Social Networking Technology Boosts Job Recruiting.” NPR, NPR, 22 Nov. 2006, www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6522523&sc=emaf.

Young, Jeffrey R. “They're Back, and They're Bad: Campus Gossip Web Sites.” The Chronicle of Higher Education, 31 Aug. 2009, www.chronicle.com/article/theyre-backtheyre-bad-/48220.

New Media | Audiobooks

There's no denying that recorded writings have been around a very long time. I chose to focus on audiobooks as a new media technology because their prevalence has definitely increased within the past decade or two. I will be researching the development and history of audiobooks and their effect on society. For our current state, I will find the ways in which audiobooks have steered our dependence away from physical copies of books and other writings. When looking into the history, I will try to see why audiobooks were not accessed as much as they are now. What has changed in its accessibility? Does this new or update in audiobooks development lead to the downfall of hard copies? These amongst many more questions will guide my research in understanding the new media technology of audiobooks.