Will I ever use any of this?

Well, I know that MMPORPG's were a lrage part of the course, but I have to admit that they didn't really get me. I tried a couple of them, namely Second Life and after several experiences, even though parts of it were cool to me, I just wasn't moved enough to become seriously involved with them in my life. However, if I ever have to use this sort of thing later in life, I will have a bit of a head start as I am somewhat savvy with them now.

I get a much bigger kick out of wikis and online discussions and things like that. My experience with the group project and contributing to it by editing our wiki was pretty cool. I also like online discussions. I mean, It's likely that I'll never meet most of the people in this class, but I enjoyed the discourse we shared on topics and the mutual courtesy that was exhibited as well as the feedback that was provided amongst people. It makes me look forward to another oppurtunity to do this sort of thing again in the future. With the wiki experience, I foresee wikis and online discussions being an integral part of the future and will approach them confidently if I ever have to use them. And that's not to say I'll only use them if I have to. I'm on Wikipedia at least once every couple of days now and learn a great deal from it. So, I may even end up making my own or actively contributing to one someday. Who knows?

So, yes, I will use some of the things I learned from this experience.

Reflection on the course

First, I have to address my group (1) and peoples' efforts and my opinion of the end result. I am pleased with it and am proud to have worked with the people I did. If I could go back, I would have began participating earlier on, as my participation in the course in general went through a lull in October. I would have written more.

But that aside, this was a cool course. I did learn a good deal from it. What I learned had more to do with how things that are pertinent to this course work and the usefullness of them. I see the merits in virtual worlds, online collaborations, social networking, etc... I see how the real world had become involved in it and I wonder if it might someday become totally immersed in it. I wonder if this is the beginning of some new big leap in progress. From what I've learned and seen, I would this is a possibility.

We want...Information!!!!

This has to do with the election and the internet. I mention a view or two of mine. Big deal.

I don't know what people did during an election year before the internet. How did they find out about the candidates? It must have been excrutiatingly difficult if you missd the candidates TV appearance or if no one canvassed your street. This was the first year I ever really payed atention to politics. I guess I could have been considered complacent beforehand, but oh well..I'm not anymore.

So...at the begining of the year, I was really juiced up about Ron Paul. I learned about him through a friend and decided to check him out. I wen to his website a bunch, watched all his interviews on Youtube, looked at his stances, yad yada yada...I did all I could to find out about the guy. ****I also looked into the other GOP candidates, but RP kept my entusiasm through the course of the GOP debates and primary season. I bypassed the democrats, mostly because I figured they'd win anyway and I wanted to keep tabs on my guy. I became increasingly excited as time went on. I was glued to the TV for every second of the debates, on the internet all time and I even donated a small amount to his campaign.

All that aside, I got all my info about al the candidates (I just realised the word "candid" makes up most of "candidate"...interseting epytimology there haha) from the internet (youtube was a popular stop) and TV which leaves me wondering...what did people do before the internet? I know this is a silly question, but there's actually a grain of sincerity to it.

Second Life as used by businesses and education

I read the article on Scond Life being used by businesses and education. I know I always say this in regard to virtual world phenomena, but I'm not surprised that is has taken the path it has, or at least that many are using it that way. Second life is fun. I consider it to be like lucid dreaming. That where you're dreaming and realise you are, so you egin to manipulate the dream in a way. Can you see the paralell?

Whenever I'm on there ad I see someone cruising around, I like to fly up to them and ask what they're doing or just other smal talk. I've talked to people from al over the country doing this. I haven't had anything that amunts to formal dialogue yet, though. It's usually just "Hi, what the heck is going on here?" and then flying away soon after. I think I'd like to participate in a class setting on there if given the opportunity.

I read game communities

I have never been involvd in any kind of virtual world, MUD, MMPORG, or anything like that. I've never even played Xbox live. The idea of it turns me off. Like it said in the article, many players want the virtual world to be their own private space. I guess I'm the same way. The idea of geting blown away within the first five minutes of lay is not too apealing. I suppose it is like anythng else, though.

I'm not surprised that the gamers have tried to form what amounts to a constitution or bill of rights. Otherwise, you'd have anarchy, right? That makes sense. Of course, with the degre of anonimity offered, and as it said in the article, some people are gonna run around and misbehave, uch to the dismay of the serious gamers. I'll give them a try and see how I like them.

Facebook Studies and Popularity

I read the thingabout how scholars are using Facebook as a field for their social science studies. I'm not surprised. I don't how successful they'll be. Most of the people on here have private profiles, so a stranger can't view them and find ou about their stuff. Oh well...more power to them. I think Facebook is public domain, as is the rest of the internet. Facebook is just a virtual public, only it allows the user the options of anonimity in viewing others, and privacy in others viewing them.

Now...why is it so popular? Human curiosity. I've said before that Facebook and Myspace allow you satisfy your curiosity and allows extreme efficiency in gathering important social information. People have called me to enquire as to why I changed my status on Myspace. They didn't have to call or see me to know I was 'smitten' . I myself have done similar things. You can keep tabs on 40 people simultaneously while sitting in one spot. It's all about the info.

Facebook + School

I read the thing about facebook becoming a hub for businesses and school. Well, I'm not surprised. I think it's a fine idea. Facebook is kind of fun, and when you can make any obligation more fun, you will obviously enjoy it more and people will respond and participate more enthusiastically.

I think this frees you up as well. I can contribute to important discussions whenever I want. Also, it allows you jot something down when the idea is fresh in your mind, making it available for everyone to view and digest before you forget about it.

I think it would be great if there was a meeting in a couple weeks, and the boss says Ok, everyone post ideas on Facebook before the meeting and participate with one another. In that time, the people could feed off each other's ideas, allowing for collaborative thinking, which will be available at everyone's own convenience. It's great, in my opinion. I hope the company I work for could adopt something like this.

You can't say that in public (Rachel Collins case)

I believe the girls were wronged. Before I begin my rant, let me say that there is no doubt that what she and her friends did was juvenile, stupid, and malicious. I agree with that much. In fact, I fantacize about punishing (an actual punshment, not just ignoring them or using relational or social aggression) people when they behave this way. I think it's awful and is even perhaps indicative of some kind of bad human condition. I'm a wuss, or maybe just too imaginative.

However, the internet, and Facebook.com are public domain, which is where free speech reigns. The comments were (I actually thought they were funny) mean and spiteful, but they weren't directed at the professor. They were directed at an effigy of the professor. They posted a little picture of her and said gross things and that's it. There is a difference between the actual professor herself, the tangible flesh and clothing version, and the intangible, pixalted version. I think defamation of character doesn't apply to the internet. Maybe I'm crazy, as most people might think when reading this.

The kids set up that dumb group as a virtual punching bag for the professor who was, even for decidedly stupid reasons, consistently aggravating to the students. Kind of like group therapy for people who share a common grievance, albeit a dumb one. This was comiseration in action. That's fundamentally it, in my opinion. If they were sending hateful or harmful emails to the professor, that would be another thing. I think the whole thing was blown out of proportion.

Social networking and the lurking menace

vesselsSocial networking sites are an everyday phenomenon these days. So much in fact, that a young person without a page on Facebook or Myspace is borderline anomolous. I got a Myspace about three years ago. After a year or so, I deleted it because I felt like I relied on it too heavily for information about my friends, when I could just call them. After a while, I made a new one and still use it. It's easy to think of it as a guilty pleasure, but then again, maybe it isn't.

Humans have a natural curiosity about one another, and with MS or FB, this curiosity is easily satisfied. Plus, one can browse through a wide array of subjects (people) while sitting in one place. Also, they offer people the chance to study a person in anonimity. You can check someone out without being caught staring. It's all extraordinarily convenient, so it's no wonder these things have taken off the way they have.

If there is a cohort that is particularly enthralled by SNS's, it is undoubtedly adolescents. Now, we all remember high school and it's boundless collection of social booby traps. So, with this in mind, many are concerned with the SNS's potential hazards as they offer kids instant access to other kids, which they will certainly use to scrutinize and punish one another. But, haven't kids done this forever? In high school, I was on both sides of the bullying. I dished it out, and I took it. Myspace didn't even exist yet.

I view SNS's as vehicles or vessels for social phenomenon, not advocates or proponents of them. The amount of bullying online, in my opinion, is no greater than the amount occuring in the lunchroom, playground, gymnasium, or hallways. One can criticize a SNS by saying it harbors teenage cruelty. The same can be said for the aforementioned locations.

Of course, there is the more serious threat of online predators. This should be taken lightly. There is the option of making profiles private, or unviewable by people 18yrs+, but that alone is not enough. I imagine, though, that successful predation would be both very rare and very difficult. There are lots of obstacles an online predator faces. Most kids are savvy to online predators. A kid in Chicago getting a message from a kid they've never met in Indianapolis will be suspicious because they know that this is the likely disguise of a creep. Most of them pose as children, because they know that if they tell the truth about their age, the kid won't talk to them. Most children and parents are educated about online predation. Besides, the kids are watch each other's sites. If Suzy, 15 gets a comment(a message that is viewable to all) from Joe, 27, Suzy's friends will undoubtedly raise Hell about it.

I have this stance because I've witnessed these things happen with my younger brothers and their friends at our house.

My thoughts on Digital Natives

Well, for the most part I agree with the article. However, as someone who is a "digital native", I must say that being a member of this cohort does not automatically predispose you to being technically savvy. Perhaps it is because I have never used these things much, or perhaps I have a piece of that ADD epidemic from the previous generation, but often, when I look at these things, it registers as scrambled giburish. (SP?) For example, I had to print the directions on how to subscribe to peoples' blogs with Google Reader.

I liked the part where you could scroll over a statement and the paragraph would appear to the right of it. My favorite was Graphics first vs. Text first. Not only I do agree with the little article, but I want to see it become reality. This is for selfish reasons. The reason is that I hate reading. Well, I don't hate it, but I'd much rather watch a video on the subject. For proof of this, I can watch a video of an academic or intellectual giving a speech on something and retain the info alot better than if I read the transcription of the speech. Maybe it's just me, but perhaps this affirms the theory that text is becoming support for graphics instead of the other way around. Maybe I am part of the phenomenon.

I would side with digital immigrants on the subject of text messaging. When I think about it, a text message is seldomly, if ever, more efficient or practical than a phone call. In fact, many avid texters will affirm the existence of texting nuance. Texting is taking on it's own slew of mores and norms, comparable to the way that actual, live, one on one conversation has its own. I think this is bizarre and silly. I think text messages are impracical and are only cool if they come from a romantic interest and are "suggestive". (I have actually experienced this and it is very exciting.) Other than that, text messages have no purpose in my opinion.

The end is nigh

This is the last semester I will ever spend on campus at Purdue University Calumet. I started in the spring of 2003, originally intending to major in construction management. I wanted this because prior to the semester, I spent the second half of 2002 as a laborer and thought it was really cool. My interst in construction was short lived, and in 2004 I declared my major as Psychology. I went ahead with it, feeling good that my schooling was beginning to show some direction. At least in that sense. The truth was, I was doing pretty bad in school. I wasn't serious about it at all. Well, I wanted to do good, but didn't know how and soon adopted the belief that failure was to be expected, and there was nothing I could do about it.

In the fall semester of 2004, I was signed up for 5 classes, all of which I either dropped or got a D in. The end of the semester was nearing and I knew I was in deep trouble. I had been in school for a year and a half and hadn't really gotten anywhere. I told my family that I had been fucking up and came to terms with the fact that something had to be done because with the devices I was working with at the time, failure was imminent. Coincedently, my social life was in the gutter as well, and work wasn't much better. So, with all three areas in my life in wreckage, I felt I was on a one way course to perpetual incoherence and amorphousness. I decided to seek counseling.

So now everyone knew my state of affairs. There was nothing to hide, it was all in the open. In the spring semester of 2005, I was taking 4 classes, most of which I had already taken and failed. Socially, I had surrounded myself in a different social network. I had a clean slate. Another shot. All the while, reporting once a week to my psychologist Donna to discuss the progress and the current events. The process of psychological treatment is another story all it's own, which I am likely to describe in subsequent blogs. For now, I'll work on wrapping this one up.

After I recieved good grades in the spring of 2005 and had integrated myself into a new social network in which I held a better standing, life was good. I was relieved of the looming sense of dread and proceeded to pursue things in my life that had gone unattended to. One was dating, but most of it was just how to enjoy life. So, from then til now, school had been something in which a I was immersed and it was only punctuated by the coming and going of semesters. The end, graduation, was far off and I remained in a boundless universe of textbooks, power tools (work), fishing lures, notebooks, and Miller High Life. No, I have not avoided the college partying experience.

But here, in my final semester, proof of school's finity is in my face. Unavoidable, inescapable. However, this is not a sad truth. More often than not, it is an uplifting and ispiring one. I used to fear the world and deny my place in it, but now, and moreso with time, I am accepting my place in it and I am ready to proceed. That's pretty much it.