Modeling Reality With Virtual Worlds

Virtual world is a computer-based simulated environment where an avatar are created to represent the user. People can use the virtual for gaming, entertainment or learning. For example, League of Legends, Minecraft, Second Life and TropicMind. In the virtual world, people can communicate with others and explore different scenarios. 

One of the pros of virtual worlds is that it allows the user to socialize with other people who shares a common interest. Virtual worlds also allow people to express their imagination. According to the article "After Second Life, Can Virtual Worlds Get a Reboot?" Minecraft is a virtual world that allows kids to exercise their imagination and to connect with others who also want to build and create things. It allows people to explore their creativity and share it with others. One of the cons of virtual worlds is that people who spend a lot of times in virtual worlds is escaping the real world. Other cons are the possibility of money laundering and safety of children in online worlds (The Washington Post).

Virtual worlds foster creativity by creating an environment that fits your need. According to the article "Avatar II: The Hospital" Dozens of hospital, medical schools and health foundations have stake out space in the online community Second Life, where participants can build their own virtual clinics and stage just about any training drill. With the creativity of virtual clinical, Nurses and doctors can explore different scenarios that they may face in real life. 

I think the future of virtual worlds can benefit us greatly. I believe that schools will incorporate virtual worlds in classes so students can discover and explore different scenarios in the real world. 

Sources
http://www.forbes.com/sites/dianemehta/2013/04/30/after-second-life-can-virtual-worlds-get-a-reboot/
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/story/2008/04/01/ST2008040103032.html
http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052748703909804575124470868041204

Creativity and New Media

In the game Second Life, I created an avatar who represent me in the game. In this 3D virtual world, I was able to chat and meet other peoples. In this virtual world, I was able to travel and explore numerous places. This game allows users to have a second life. Users can self-express by dressing up and design a new 3D of themselves.

Dancing

Flying

Visiting the museum

Creativity

New media fosters creativity by allowing users share their ideas on a platform. Then the company can use those ideas to improve their products. According to the article “ Twitter Serves Up Ideas From Its Followers” technology companies have been the most active in relying on others to innovate for them. People’s ideas are the base for new media. By sharing their ideas on the internet technology, companies can design new products accordingly to what the people want. Creativity is innovation that help create new media. Without creativity, there will be no new media.

Source
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/26/technology/internet/26twitter.html

Social Networking Sites

Facebook

I created a Facebook when it seemed Myspace just died out back in 2007 and everyone switched to Facebook. I do not use Facebook as much as I use to. There is a lot of spamming from games and advertisements, leaving you with a lot of annoying notifications.  I mainly use it to stay connected with family and friends from out of state or in another country. Facebook is a social networking site that allows you to posts statuses, post your location, and post pictures. You can privately message people or publicly post on their wall. You can also tag people in pictures and videos.

Myspace

I used Myspace a lot back in 2005 and 2006. Myspace allows you to share your interests in music and creativity by uploading music and customizing your page with html coding. It is more of a blog to share stories about yourself then connecting with friends. When I made a new account I found that there were a lot of changes made and I am just confused with the layout now. Facebook is a lot simpler and I feel it is more professional.

Twitter

I made a twitter solely for the purpose of this assignment.  Twitter is a social networking site that is faster paced than Facebook. It enables people to send and receive messages that are limited to 140 characters.  I feel it is easier to stay informed with this networking site because of the fast pace. If you want to know trending topics from all around the world you can find hashtag and read what other people think about the topic. What I find very appealing is that you can actually communicate with celebrities.

Pinterest

I’ve been using Pinterest for about a year and a half now.  Pinterest is a social networking site that allows you to pick topics you are interested in. It then generates picture icons based on your interests. You can also search things you are interested in, favorite them, and organize them into your own categories. You can simply login with an email, Facebook or Twitter account.

Social Net'g

Social networking technology is a platform for people to connect with one another with ease. Individuals use these social networking technologies to interact with families and friends. They also use the social network to share their thoughts, feelings, news, pictures and stories. The usage of these social networking technologies has created a new way of communication between people. However, the corporate uses these social networking technologies to generate revenue. Corporate often post advertisements to social networks to promote their products and services. Sometimes corporate would also ask users to complete surveys or polls, in order to improve their products and services.

One benefit social networking technologies offers society is connecting job recruiters to potential applications. In the article “Social Networking Technology Boosts Job Recruiting” states that “social networking technology is absolutely the best thing to happen to recruiting ever.” Job recruiters are now using social network site such as Linkedin to find applications. Recruiters nowadays do not have to read through numerous amounts of resumes in order to find potential applications. Typing keywords in the search engine leads recruiters to the potential application with all the skill sets they required. However, there is a dark side to social networking technologies. The loss of privacy is the most concerning disadvantage towards social networking. Companies often buy users information from social networking sites in order to target their products and services towards them. There is also a concern of identity theft. Users who do not fully understand the privacy setting in social networking sites are most vulnerable to suffer from identity theft. Cyber bullying is another dark side to the social network. According to the article “They’re Back, and They’re Bad: Campus-Gossip Web Sites,” Young states that “Students have more ways than ever to post anonymous attacks on classmates.” In traditional days, students were only getting bullied at school but with the creation of social networking technology they’re getting bullied all the time.

In my opinion I believe that social networking technologies are going to evolve to fit people’s needs. Nowadays, more peoples are using Instagram and Twitter because they require less personal information making them less susceptible to loss of privacy.     

Sources

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6522523&sc=emaf

http://chronicle.com/article/Theyre-BackTheyre-B/48220/

Blog v Wiki

Blogs and Wikis both enable communication of information by a person or a group. Both blog and wiki are an example of new media. They both have at least three of the five critical characteristics of new media technologies. Blog and wiki both provides a platform of feedback. Users can provide feedback in a blog in a form of a comment and in a wiki by letting users edit the page.

However, there are differences between blogs and wikis. According to Grill, “some analysts suggest that blogs are poised to be the next generation opinion/editorial page.” Blog are usually created by a single author who shares their opinion on a topic or subject. Whereas, wiki are created by multiple authors who are sharing their knowledge on a topic of the subject. According to the article “Wikipedia: No Longer the Wild West?” states that Wikipedia will assign editors to approve public edits for some of its entries. By doing so, the information on the Wikipedia is becoming more reliable.  Blog are usually posted on a daily basis or a weekly basis. But wiki are posted all hours at a day since multiple authors can edit the page. Blog are used for one to many communications. Wiki are intended for group communication.

The meaning of convergence is providing a platform for people to express their knowledge and opinion with other people. In today’s networked world convergence plays an important role because people often can find an answer to a question by searching the topic in Wikipedia. According to the article “A Rorschach Cheat Sheet on Wikipedia?” talks about how 10 original Rorschach pictures and common responses for each picture can be found on Wikipedia. This shows how the convergence betweens people with new media is a powerful tool in today’s society. Blogs can be used for collaboration between bloggers. Where bloggers can help each other and promote their blog. Bloggers can collaborate by writing a post together by sharing their opinions on a topic. Just like how YouTubers collaborate with each other by appearing in other YouTuber’s video.

A new use for the wiki is to collaborate with other social media. Wikipedia can collaborating with YouTube, where Wikipedia allows YouTube video to be shown on their page. For example, if someone is doing research on the presidential debate, they can do the research on Wikipedia but at the same time they can also watch the debate.

Sources

http://www.cnn.com/2009/TECH/08/26/wikipedia.editors/index.html

http://faculty.washington.edu/kegill/pub/www2004_blogosphere_gill.pdf
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/29/technology/internet/29inkblot.html?ref=business

Social Network: A Purposeful Loss of Privacy

Social networking has changed the way people interact with one another.  Websites such as Facebook and Twitter allow people to keep in contact with family and friends from all over the world at their fingertips. This is a great positive but these websites also pose a great risk. Some people do not think twice about posting personal information, such as their full birthday, phone number and address. If they do not correctly utilize the privacy settings on these websites, they are at risk for a loss of privacy and identity theft. Employers are now looking up applicants and employees on Facebook and looking to see if any inappropriate pictures and information were posted. This can lead to a being rejected from a position and even fired.