The Next New Thing

A new type of new media that I would suggest is a portable device that can let you air a live video streaming online. It's almost like a video camera but it has internet on it. So you can post your video instantly or have a live streaming video of yourself. It is very easy to carry it around and also fast to upload videos on youtube or any other website.

Our Class Wiki - So Far

The topic that I chose for wiki is how the new media are used in sports. I did a little bit of research on it and I found that NBA made an application on iphone and android phone that shows live games. This is great for people that doesn't have access to television. I will be researching more on different kind of applications that the NBA made.

P2P File Sharing

File sharing is the sharing or exchange of files between people using computers connected to the internet.File sharing can be the person uploading the file then sharing it to other people and the one that are downloading it. These files can be images, videos, music, computer programs and documents. A lot of people use P2P programs for free. They use this software to swap files like music, images, or video over the internet. Movies that just came out or song that's new are illegal to download through a P2P software. It is ethically wrong to download these free files. The article "$1.5 Million Fine for Downloading 24 Songs" by Daniel Kreps shows an example of downloading illegal songs. A minnesota mom was fine about $1.5 million by records company because she downloaded 24 songs of their artists. She uses Kazaa as her P2P software program to download these songs. Her trial still continues on and she is fighting about her case.

Privacy & Confidentiality

Sometimes you question yourself if your privacy is protected when you use new media. For example there is no limit for you what to post on social networking sites. You don't know who is checking your profile and what you post there. It can be your employer checking your everyday life and what kind of person are you outside work. I have heard a lot of employees got fired because they posted inappropriate pictures or they posted something bad about the company. So, you need to be careful what you post on these social networking sites.

Advice to Baruch college

The suggestions that I would make to improve the college using new media are:

• Some kind of an online messenger that students and professor that can allow them to have an online conversation. Students and professor can sign in and chat. This will help communication better and more lenient for us. 
• Doing an online appointment with counselor. Some student go to school full time and work full time so it will be hard for them to fit the appointment in their schedule.
• Make a mobile website for Esims. 
• Record lectures and post it on YouTube in case students miss the lecture for whatever reason.
• Do a live online tutoring.

My term research project

My topic for my term research project is Social Networking : Better or Worse Than the Real Thing? I found a lot of interesting articles through Google news search engine. I found pros and cons about a social network. I learned that social networking sites can makes socializing easier, companies can make a promotion page, and more. I chose this topic because I'm interested in people's opinion about social networking. I learned that both social networking either in real life or virtual are both good for you. As long as you know the cons about exposing your life online.

Creativity and New Media

This "me" in the second life socializing with another person. You can do so many things here. For example, chat with people, meet new people, customize your clothing, and etc. You can personalize it as much as you want. It's up to your imagination and creativity.

Creativity

Nowadays, people are becoming more creative using the new media. There's no limit to their imagination. Also, businesses uses new media to create a creative business plan to either drive their sales or advertise. Also for social networking sites, everyday the makers of the social networking try to add more creativity on their sites. That means more creativity more innovation. Users of these social networking sites also help them add more features on their sites. For example, Twitter. Some of the features on their sites are made from the users' ideas. As it says on the article "Twitter Serves Up Ideas From Its Followers" by Claire Cain Miller, "Twitter, though, may rely on user-generated innovation more than any other company."

Modeling Reality with Virtual Worlds

Virtual worlds is the kind of world you want to be in. Everything there is perfect. You're not shy, you can socialize with anybody, youbody is fit, and easy to make money without working hard. The first time I tried virtual world is the game SIMS. On a Facebook app there's an app that you can play SIMS without paying for anything. At first it was interesting. You create this character with your own customization. You can choose any color of your hair, body types, different kind of clothing, you can pick anybody to be your girlfriend or boy friend and you can build your own house. After a while I got bored of it because it's so easy to build a bigger house, buy clothes, get money. There's no drive for me to keep playing this game.

The advantage of virtual worlds is that you can be yourself even more, than being in the real world. You can also relate with other people that's in the virtual world. They are most likely has similar personality of yours. It also let people know how your area of your home looks like. The virtual lower east side is a the actual lower east side area but the online version. There people can chat and socialize. As it says on the "I've Been in That Club, Just Not in Real Life" article by Dave Itzkoff, Mr. Manitoba said, “but it could be a fun, entertaining thing, and if I guess if I lived in Nebraska, I would love to see it.”

The disadvantage of virtual world is that people tend to spend money on intangible things. They would spend on their own "house", new "clothing", and etc. This can get people addicted because it is their fantasy of how living in the real world should be. In the article "No Budget, No Boundaries: It’s the Real You" by Ruth la Ferla it says “Throughout the recession we actually saw an increase in spending,” This is bad for people that is out of jobs or broke. I guess they're really into the virtual world that they forgot about reality.

Blog about Twitter

Twitter is a social networking sites that people use to update what are they doing or talk about the trending topic. There is a big difference between a blackboard discussion and Twitter. Blackboard discussion only allow students that are in the class reply to your post. Twitter let all your followers to reply to a tweet or knows as retweet. On twitter people constantly update their status. Whether they're getting coffee at Starbucks or getting an A on an exam. Blackboard discussion usually happens when there's a topic about the class that the professor want you to talk about.
Twitter and in class discussion. They are very different. In class discussion you interact more in person and you can say as much as you want rather than posting 140 characters on twitter. I think Twitter is not that efficient to use it in a class. Twitter should just be for socializing.

Social Networking Sites

Over the years I have join over 5 social networking sites. The four social networking sites that I'm going to compare are Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, and Friendster. The two that I constantly checking on are Facebook and Twitter. Before Facebook came out, I used to have MySpace and Friendster. It was back in High school when MySpace was very trending and popular. We can edit our lay out of our page, put music, different theme and upload photos. Then  Facebook came out. That's when I was freshman in college. Back then Facebook's requirement was at least 18 years of age to join. So, Most of the college the students were in it. A lot of people started making Facebook because of the applications they have, easy to find people, instant messaging chat, and more. I also had Friendster back when I was in highschool. Friendster is very popular in Asia. I joined it because I wanted to keep in touch with my friends and family overseas. Their sites is very simple compare to Facebook or MySpace. Last but not least, Twitter. I love Twitter. You can follow your favorite athlete or celebrity. Also, you can follow a newspaper sites and always be updated with the current event. It is very popular in Indonesia, where people from age 12-30 must have Twitter to be "Social".

Social Networking

Social networking is a used of a website to communicate or share their life with other member of the website. A lot of people use social networking sites today. Even businesses are more and more into the trend. They usually advertise their product or service. I myself use social networking sites every single day. I use it to contact my friend, to keep updated with their life and keeping contact with friends in another country. I also constantly update my status on Facebook. Every time I open Facebook, It asks me "What are you doing?" So seeing that every time I open the website, I update what was I doing at the time. In the article "Being There: The subtle art of the Facebook update", by Virginia Heffernan it says "Status updates are part of a Twitter-like feature that induces­ members to publish their answers to the question “What are you doing right now?” Responses, which are confined to 160 characters" what makes Facebook great is that Facebook does not limit how many characters you can type in one single status update. That's why I love about Facebook. One thing that is bad about social networking sites is that people upload "sexy" pictures of themselves. That can create a lot of problem like stalking or rape. Mostly that upload this kind of pictures are young girls. On the article "Teens getting savvier about MySpace, especially girls" by Alex Zaharov-Reutt. " it says "A new national survey of teenagers conducted by the Pew Internet & American Life Project says that more than half (55%) of all online American youths ages 12-17 use online social networking sites." I feel like young kids ages from 12-15 need parental control over their access to online social networking sites. Parents does not really know who are they friends with, who are they talking to, or what are they going through from that website. 

Blog vs. Wikis

Blog is the writing of a personal opinion. It can be about the current event or just their daily life. People usually blogs in chronological order. Also they can put their favorite links for people to visit. People can follow other people's blogs just to be updated with the current event or they are interested in their life. What their daily basis life like. Other bloggers also can comment on your blog. This is what makes blog interesting. We get different kind of opinion and perspective on things. One of the things that amuses me is that there are armies that blogs. I would never think that an army would do such a thing during war. But in the article "Pentagon Keeps Wary Watch as Troops Blog" it says "Policing their daily flood of posts, videos and photographs is virtually impossible — but that has not stopped some in the military from trying." (James Dao)

Wiki is a website that allow its users to collaborate their works and edit other people's works. People work together on a topic and they all contribute different kind of information. If at anytime the information needs to be updated, people can just go back anytime to edit it. So, the information will always be updated as the time goes on. As it says on the article "How To Use Wikis in Business", wiki is "It's a well-researched, well-written, and highly regarded source of information. If one person makes incorrect or inappropriate changes to an entry, others can roll the page back to the way it was before, or keep the changes and edit them further."

There are pros and cons of Blogs and Wikis.
Pros for Blogs:

• Write your own opinion about something and people can't edit it and change it
• Comment on other people's blogs
• Personalize it 
• Put music
• Free to write anything

Pros for Wikis:

• Collaboration
• Other people might have a better information and they can just update your post
• Other people can correct the grammar or spelling
• Can always be updated

Cons for Blogs:

• People can't correct your grammar or spelling
• People can just post offensive things on it
• Comments can be rude

Cons for Wikis:

• Possible conflicts with each others work
• Disagreement
• Wrong information from other people

I think if wikis can do tutoring online, it would be great. Students would just make appointment with a tutor and they can video chat and starts the tutoring. Also, proofreading papers. It would be such a big help to students. This definitely will improve students' works.

Social Networking: Better or worse than the real thing?

I will be researching if the social networking is better or worse than real life. I want to find out if people actually like to interact better online or in person. Also I will find articles that shows which one is actually benefits people. I will research on the social networking websites, like Facebook, Twitter, and MySpace.