As we come to an end...

I must say that I did enjoy this class. I've learned some new things, but most importantly gained a respect for those who are more involved in new media than myself. Granted, being an IMS major you would think that I would be a little bit more involved in new media than the occasional Google search or Facebook post, but I am not. I respect full-time bloggers, as I can honestly say that I don't think I could do their job. I liked keeping a blog, but I always had other things to do that made me put off updating. One thing that I did not like about this class was that I had to stare my lack of political knowledge straight in the face. I hope that I can take small steps to bettering my understanding of current political issues from here on out. I hope that I pay more attention to things like transmedia storytelling, copyright laws, origami unicorns, and little black boxes (that don't really exist). I will probably be forever terrified of Google after this class as well, but at least I am well-informed now!

Good luck on exams everyone, and have a great spring break!

Past and Present...

With this class almost over, I was thinking about what 'new media' used to be when I was younger.

Remember how cool VHS tapes and cassettes were to watch wind up?

Remember when CD's were the hottest new item on the market?

Remember when we went outside to talk to our friends, rather than jumping online?

Remember good television broadcasting like Rocko's Modern Life, The Angry Beavers, Ahh! Real Monsters, Doug, etc?

Remember dial-up internet?

These are some of my favorite things to think about and see how far we have come in only ten to twenty years.

Fell free to reminisce in the comments if you're still checking your blogger and see this!

Come on, use that keyboard!

I have certain teachers who NEVER use a keyboard, let alone tell you valuable information...EVER.

(For the record, I promise that I'm not referencing this class!)

For this other class, we have had six (I think) projects and labs to do that all relate to our final. You would think that if I have had the last several weeks to work on creating and synthesizing this final project, it would be something I was really proud of, right?

NOT.

The due dates for these assignments have changed at least five times, with and without sufficient notice. I've completed and turned in an assignment before I knew the due date was changed--more than once. Things have been added, subtracted, and all together moved so much that I hardly know what is going on.

With so many available means of communication...e-mail, blackboard, face-to-face in class, updated syllabus handout, etc...why do teachers do this to students? Pick up that keyboard and KEEP US IN THE LOOP.

Copyright or Copywrong?

**As a side note, I thought I was being very creative with the title of this blog until the phrase was used in class and I realized it was the name of our reading... DARNIT.

I will be the first to admit that my idea of copyright was certainly skewed. I did not know that it was created in order to encourage the creation of new artwork.


You learn something new everyday, right?

We also talked about copyright recently in my Web Development class. We didn't go into much detail--instead we simply made that point that copyright is a serious thing and we should always be sure to give copyright where it is due.

Well, that's certainly easier said than done.

I fully stand by my decision to go into graphics design as a career. Still, I know that I am taking some risks by doing so. I could have my artwork stolen very easily. I could also get into a lot of trouble for using artwork in a design that was copyrighted.

Not that I plan on using copyrighted materials, of course.

My point is, the line between what is public domain and what is copyrighted online is extremely blurry. You can find an image online that exists on hundreds of different sites. Which site, if any, holds the copyright to that image? If it is unclear, do you simply not cite the image or do you cite it from wherever you found it just to be safe?

There is so much grey area that sometimes I'm afraid of getting lost in the land of copyright obscurity.

Simply Sensational!

Is it too easy to become an internet sensation?

Take the Obama Girl video for instance. Out of all of the riveting topics that are written and talked about online, should that video really have become so popular? Should I really have a mental list of probably twenty-five or so of my favorite stupid internet cartoon videos that I watch instead of reading the news?

Probably not.

Sometimes, when I see the videos that become viral overnight, I lose a little bit more of my ever-dwindling faith in my generation. (Ex. Rebecca Black and Friday) Chances are, we should really care more about news that we do. I will be the first to admit that I know next to nothing about global current events and politics, and I am sure that I am not the only one.

So, why is it that my generation cares so little about things that affect them? Is it because songs like Friday are so good that we simply can't NOT watch them 24/7? Definitely not. I wish I had an answer or even a decent theory about why this is happening, but I don't.

I can at least speculate on why I think that I don't put more effort into reading the news... Put as simply as possible, there are too many idiots online. It would be quite an undertaking to look up a recent event or political standpoint and try to learn about it as objectively as possible. Practically every article or video is written or recorded by some random person in their living room. Even journalism is hard to trust because of the affiliations that news sources have with political powerhouses.

In short, the truth is so easily lost in the cacophony of voices that I chose to just let it be lost than risk pulling out all of my hair trying to dig it back up.

I think that this is a sad occurrence. I certainly wish I was more well-informed. I would love to be able to hold my own in a political argument or insert my own thoughts into a conversation about a recent global event. And sure, my own unwillingness to hunt for the facts is partially to blame. But that does not mean that all of the liars and half-truth-tellers online are blameless.

(Here's to hoping that this made sense to someone besides myself.)

**Maybe someone out there has a source that they would like to share with me that is relatively unbiased in their reporting? I'd be forever grateful.**

Politics and the Internet

I really enjoyed Cass Sunstein's point that "Unanticipated encounters, involving unfamiliar and even irritating topics and points of view, are central to democracy and to freedom itself."


I feel like this quote fits in very well with the topic of the YouTube debates. I wasn't very familiar with what the YouTube debates were until class, but I had heard the term before. Now, I am a huge fan. I wish that every election could be held in such a manner. Let's do away with the ridiculously over-scripted and ultimately fake and useless debates that are televised now, and bring in a new generation of debates that force the running politicians to actually think on their feet for once in their lives.


(Can anyone tell that I have a rather low opinion of our political system and the people in it?)


The American people are the ones taking the majority of the hits for what their politicians screw up, so why shouldn't they be able to voice their questions and concerns? Their questions may not sound as eloquent as the ones that we are used to, but at least they would be real questions straight from the mouths of those who are most affected by horrible political decisions.

Rather than writing a nice and neat letter to local congressman, creating YouTube videos puts faces on the many problems America has. They force politicians to realize that these are real people and real problems, not just letters that are cluttering up politicians' desks.

Politicians put on a glamorous mask and parade around with their eloquent words and pretty campaign art. But politics aren't pretty. They're dirty and terrible problems that need to be faced and solved, not swept under the rug. No longer should politicians be allowed to skate by under the radar, yammering on endlessly on topics that they are well-versed in and completely ignoring the topics that they know little to nothing about. The American people should be given the chance to be that irritating itch that politicians just can't seem to reach. They should force politicians to tread water in unfamiliar territory until they come up with a satisfying answer. Get rid of the crutches that politicians so often use and force them to be the upstanding and powerful figures that they claim they are.

Maybe it is just my opinion of the pitiful state that American politics are in, but burning the script of political debates and allowing politicians to break a sweat and provide real, substantial solutions to overbearing problems seems like a brilliant idea that should be given another shot.

CIPA, Filters, and Policies--OH MY!

I think that if this policy is properly implemented, it can be a very useful tool in schools and libraries. Although I doubt that children would purposely look up explicit content at school, it is possible that they could stumble upon it by accident. CIPA protects them from this and assures that they must use the computers for educational purposes.

Granted, there are ways around this. I'm sure most or all of us have previously used a proxy server to access internet pages that our school deemed inappropriate. More often than not, those pages were probably Myspace or Facebook. But, not all children know these tricks and chances are, even if they do, the sites that they access without protection will only be as harmless as Facebook.

Regardless of how harmless the sites children would visit if they got around a filter might be, the hope is that they don't stray from educational content. CIPA doesn't just filter out potentially harmful sites, it ensures that schoolwork is done on school computers. Let's face it, no matter how important we all thought (and maybe still think) that Facebook is in our daily lives, we can live without it for a few hours a day. Learning should definitely take precedence, and CIPA works towards accomplishing that goal.

It isn't quite as simple as that though. CIPA filters have a tendency to block sites that are educational, simply because they contain words that have been flagged as inappropriate. As a child, I found this side effect extremely annoying, which only made me want to procrastinate my paper more. As a teen in high school, not being able to look things up because of filters on the computers made me feel like I was being treated as a child when I shouldn't have been. Knowing that these filters can be modified and even shut off eases my concerns a bit though. Unfortunately, I didn't know that changes could be made to the filters until it was too late (about a week ago). I think an effort should be made to make children, teens, and even adults that utilize these public computers aware of the fact that the filters can be modified upon request--with a legitimate reason.