Hurricane Sandy and New Media

For this assignment I wanted to really test how powerful is the new media. After Hurricane Sandy New York suffered a great loss of homes and personal property. Some people lost everything.... When I tried to researching information for volunteering it was extremely difficult , I was surprised by how many questions I had to answer in order to sign up to volunteer. I was able to find a couple of good websites and encouraged all of my Facebook and Twitter friends to get together and help out with what ever they could. I got 10-15 responses , which I was happy about, what i didn't realize was the exposure of hurricane aftermath I provided. I had many people call me later on asking how they can help and I even saw people who are on my friend's list show up at the shelter to donate. So when you think that you are not being heard by many people because you are not receiving a lot of responses back , do not be disappointed, because once the message becomes public, everyone ( in this case my friends) has access to the information provided, and you never know how they can use it. Below is the small video that I created the week after Hurricane Sandy.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/0t7xhp4238z2xhz/Hurricane%20sandy%202.mp4

Creativity

Creativity on the web has reached its new height . It is amazing how quickly websites respond to the user’s feedback and how much value they place on the feedback. What is amazing to see is that companies like Twitter encourage their users to come up with the design that they work on to implement. According to the article by Claire Cane Miller “Twitter Serves Up Ideas From Its Followers” , it has been a hit. Who is better to ask for the website design and tweaks than the actual users? It is surprising to see how many features on Twitter were actual suggestions by the users ! Who would have thought? I think it is a great approach to make the website better, it is always good to know that one’s feedback and suggestions are taken into account. It makes one feel connected to the “brand”. Don’t you wish all of the online websites took your idea into suggestion ?!?

Modeling Reality with Virtual Worlds

After reading a couple of articles I was surprised by the popularity of virtual sites. It also changed my opinion about them. Before I thought that virtual websites are a waste of time that take people away from reality and actual interactions. Then I read an article by Nicole Saidi “ iReport “Naughty Auties’ battle autism with virtual interactions” and it changed my mind. I never thought that virtual world interactions can help people with autism, it is such a great idea ! Since the interactions and surrounding of the virtual world are very close to the actual thing , people with autism can prepare themselves to socialize in the real world and not get nervous.  It is amazing how accurate virtual worlds have become. The creativity behind creating a website that is so close to the real thing is amazing!

There are also cons to virtual world. The article by Dave Itzkoff “I’ve been in that club, just not in the real life” shows how close the virtual world is to the real one.  I don’t think it is a good way to live your life in the virtual world and not experience the real thing. I think that interacting online has side effects of becoming isolated. People do not want to go out into the real world anymore because they can do the same at the comfort of their home. I think it can be a problem…. Just like with anything virtual world have pros and cons, after reading the articles it did make me realize that virtual worlds are not bad all together and can benefit the society, I am just not sure if the benefits outweigh the negatives yet ….

Social Networking Sites

It was a different experience for me to visit Myspace.com after so many years of being on Facebook. It seems to me that Myspace gives its users more freedom to design their personal page. It is a great tool for artists to express themselves and stay connected to their fans . In my opinion myspace is targeted more towards younger crowd because i remember from experience that it takes a lot of time to bring ones page to life. Older generations do not have the time or patience. Facebook is similar to myspace but is more simplified. Facebook users tend to be a little bit older and therefore do not have a lot of time to personalize their page . This is when Facebook is ideal because it is easy to set up and maneuver. Twitter is the most simple program but that is when you learn the basics of it. To me, twitter is not as addicting because it has a lot of irrelevant information and random posts that do not make any sense, limit of 140 characters might be the reason. One of the other social networking websites that i really like is Instagram. I love to see pictures of my friends and i am connected to the people that i know. It is not cluttered and is very easy to use . I am a huge fan !

Social Networking

Social networking… When I first saw out class assignment I had no idea what to write about, but the more articles I read the more I realized that we are literally surrounded by social networks. I am pretty sure that each and everyone one of us has at least one social networking account such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and etc. It is amazing to realize what a big role social networking plays in our life. Not only does it help us stay in touch with our friends and family, it can also land us a job of a lifetime. In the article Social Networking Technology Boosts Job Recruiting by Frank Ligfit , the author made a good point by quoting Maureen Crawford-Hentz , "Social networking technology is absolutely the best thing to happen to recruiting — ever." I have been in the situations when I didn’t have a job and what was the first thing that I turned to ? Social networking websites. I asked my friends on Facebook if they knew any companies that were hiring and made a post to see if people would comment and recommend something. I also created a profile on Linkedin to stay in touch with my previous co-workers in hopes that other companies would take a look at my profile and become interested. In the article “What’s next? Your future in social networking” by Chuck Hamilton , the author talks about “virtual worlds” that are created every day. One cannot deny that many of us spend more time in front of the computer, phone or tablet than anything else that we do during the day. The amount of time that is spent on our electronical devices does seem like we all live in a virtual world more than in the real one. A great example is Obama’s campaign which targeted online users and created database of supporters. Not only did Obama campaign save money by not wasting paper on mail cards, they also saved time for themselves and voters by allowing supporters to organize themselves online however they choose. Quote from “How Obama Tapped Into Social Networks’ Power by David Carr pinpoints the idea behind the campaign that won many votes for Obama “Senator Barack Obama understood that you could use the Web to lower the cost of building a political brand, create a sense of connection and engagement, and dispense with the command and control method of governing to allow people to self-organize to do the work.” This is just one of the cases that shows how powerful social networking can be in our society. It is also something to think about because some of the information that we see in the “virtual world” can be very deceiving. In the future more people will join social networking; the question is what will happen when people get tired of it? Is there a next big think on its way?!?

Blogs vs. Wikis

Blogs and wikis.... there are pluses and minuses to both in my opinion. Wikis are collaborative websites , blogs are more of the online journals. There is typically one author in the blog, while wikis allow many people to be authors of the page. Although blogs grow slower and depend on posts that the author makes, wikis grow fast since there are many users. It is not always a good thing though because some posts on Wikis can be really irrelevant to the subject. Therefore wikis should me monitored closely. Blogs on the other hand are "clean", you as the author decide where to lead the conversation. A great example is the one from the article in The New York times that talks about troops who blogged about their experience in Afghanistan. I personally like blogs more, I think it allows you to do as much as wiki but you go at your own pace and you write about what matters to you and not necessarily to everyone else.

Reference:
https://bbhosted.cuny.edu/webapps/portal/frameset.jsp?tabGroup=courses&url=%2Fwebapps%2Fblackboard%2Fcontent%2FcontentWrapper.jsp%3Fcontent_id%3D_11492280_1%26displayName%3DLinked%2BFile%26course_id%3D_679216_1%26navItem%3Dcontent%26attachment%3Dtrue%26href%3Dhttp%253A%252F%252Fwww.sci.brooklyn.cuny.edu%252F%257Erhein%252Fbaruchnewmedia%252Fbaruchnewmedia.com%252Fwiki%252FSummer_2012_Dynamic_Course_Outline__NET1.html

Blogs : http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/09/us/09milblogs.html?ref=politics&_r=0

How tablets are changing the way we do things....

For my project I would like to research how tablets are changing the way we do things. This past weekend I bought my first tablet and I was immediately amazed by how much more I can get done on the go. Not only do I feel like I am more connected to my friends and family , but to the world in general. I am usually very busy between full time school and work, before I had the tablet, I would have to be home and on the computer to skype. Now, my friends and family can skype with me anywhere ! I also feel more connected to the world since I have news, weather, books, movies and etc all in one device.
I also feel that the more people and business make the switch, the more our society will change . The first time I encountered a tablet was when I was in the restaurant and the waitress was taking an order with her Ipad. What ever we ordered was automatically sent to the kitchen which expedited the process of our order. I was amazed ! I would love to research how the tablets are changing the way we do things in our society since I am also learning the benefits of having one.