The Next New Thing

A new media i always wished for was the ability to be able to smell things through a picture on the screen or video. Like on demand smell. I am a avid fan of the cooking channel and food network so i always want to be able to smell what they are cooking. Although it is a form of torture especially late at night it would be an awesome new functionality and add a whole new experience to watching and looking at food being made on your screen. It would definitely need to have an option to allow you to turn it on and off. It would add a whole new dimension to the new media experience.

P2P File Sharing

File sharing is the process of distributing or giving people access to computer files or programs such as audio, media, video, and documents. P2P stands for peer to peer. P2P file sharing is the practice of sharing files on the computers of other users on a given server. Companies like Napster, Spotify, Limewire and Infinit use these application architectures. Popular P2P site bittorrent main function is to provide users to access files from other users computers. Although illegal it is very popular as a means to get access to tv shows, movies, music, books and pretty much any form of multimedia.

Sources:
http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/13.01/bittorrent.html

Privacy

Since the day the internet was born the issue of identity theft has been a problem. People would give out their private information to fraudulent emails, phone calls, texts, pretty much any means of communication. People make fake websites to look like that of a legitimate one, such as a bank, then try to get you to input all your information stating it is necessary and imperative to do so. People have fell victim to these tactics since they first began and still do. Some unfortunate people give out their social security number or passport information. Then they get into real trouble because now their identity is at risk. Identity theft ruins so many lives every year and is not a laughing matter. It can all start with someone viewing you Facebook or Twitter account, and then before you know it, they have all the information necessary to take you identity away from you. By then it will be too late to do anything because I will never know it is happening. People think that just because there are millions of users on the net that they will never fall victim to these things. But they’re wrong. The more people there are to prey on, the better it is for scammers. They can weed out the ones who are smart with their personal information and hunt the ones who aren’t so wise. The more users, the more likely there will be careless people. Starting from the year 2010, there have been a multitude of large scale hack attacks on major websites including SNS and banks. Facebook, yahoo, chase, twitter have all fell victim to these attacks. Not only that but the hackers now have all the login information of all the users of those websites. There was also a bug called the heartbleed that made headlines not too long ago. This bug allowed hackers to access large databases including people username, passwords and other vital information. Like many people they use one password for multiple sites and if just one account gets hacked, the damage these hackers can do is devastating. That is why creating multiple strong passwords is important for your safety. This is just one of the issues regarding privacy on social media today. There are countless other issues regarding our privacy on the web. People should be aware of the dangers and adjust accordingly to use the internet to their benefit. 

Creativity and New Media

So this past winter i went on a ton of snowboarding trips. I thought to myself, how awesome would it be if i can capture my trips on video? So i set out to buy a go pro camera and did exactly that. Me and a couple friends decided to drive to Blue Mountain Resort out in Pennsylvania for the weekend. I took a ton of footage and pieced it all together for us to watch later. It was a ton of fun editing the video as it was my first time and i think it came out pretty decent. I am continually taking videos now of everything that i do with my friends and i have a blast doing it. It gives you an everlasting memory of your most cherished moments and you can be so creative with it. Ive posted my video on youtube and provided the link below. Enjoy!

Link:
Blue Mountain

Creativity

When Soulja Boy released his song Crank That, it rapidly climbed the charts until it took the spot for the number one song. People then started to create videos of the song by piecing together words that cartoon characters would say in order for it to sound like the Crank That lyrics. Now Crank That is not a very kid friendly song, its actually intended for a more mature audience. The article stated that Disney and Nickelodeon did not press any charged for using their characters in these videos. They actually commended them for their creativity. For them to go through countless episodes to wait for certain words to pop up in order to put it all together to create a tiny snippet of the song. If thats not creativity i dont know what is. Now a days there are a ton of these parodies on the internet. Some of them are explicit but for the most part they are fun and very creative. Its humorous to see these cartoons come to life in a whole new aspect. 

Source:

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/24/business/media/24crank.html

Modeling Reality With Virtual Worlds

There are so many functionalities with virtual reality. The possibilities are literally endless when it comes to virtual reality. One example is the game Minecraft. Minecraft is a sandbox game meaning that you are in control of everything. Its a block style game where you can create just about anything imaginable. Another thing that we can simulate is life itself. There are simulators out there where you can create an avatar of yourself and interact with the world like you do in real life. You can socialize with other players, go out to clubs, eat and play. Now there are some draw backs to virtual reality, the first one is the fact that its not real. Its just a simulation of real life. With that in mind, people can get caught up in their virtual worlds and lose grasp or reality. Now that is a very extreme and rare case, but it can happen. With technology advancing at a fast pace, there definitely is a threat of this happening more often. Of course the benefits are great as well. With travelling costs on the rise it is hard for businesses to send people out for meetings. Virtual reality will aid this burden by creating virtual meetings. Rather than being there physically, you can be there virtually yet perform the same tasks as if you were there in person.

Virtual reality is a breeding ground for creativity. Simply because you can see the results of your ideas almost instantly ,and with these advanced technologies, with precision and accuracy. Like i mentioned above, the game Minecraft allows users to create literally anything they can imagine. There are articles on what some of the people create and its just phenomenal. People build whole cities and towns to scale. It amazing what you can do with a bunch of blocks. Also since we can now simulate things we might not be able to do in real life, it gives us a whole new level of possibilities.

The future of virtual reality is going to be amazing in my opinion. Technology is growing at such a rapid pace, i cant imagine virtual reality not being just eerily realistic. I feel that one day virtual reality will actually be able to mock reality in some way. Its awesome but very scary at the same time. I think there should be a cap to what we can do with virtual reality but i know there are just going to be so many things we will be able to do with it. Not everything will necessarily be beneficial either. Im sure there will be people who use it in very unethical ways and in the future im sure we will run into many problems and will probably have to devise many laws regulating the functionalities or virtual reality.

Sources:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/dianemehta/2013/04/30/after-second-life-can-virtual-worlds-get-a-reboot/
http://www.cnn.com/2009/BUSINESS/11/05/second.life.virtual.collaboration/index.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/06/arts/television/06itzk.html*

Social Networking Sites

There are four SNS that i visit very frequently. Facebook, Twitter, Myspace and Instagram. Now Facebook is by far the most frequented site of the four i list. Facebook has changed its interface throughout the years and i know we all dreaded the multiple changes and tried to delay the update for as long as possible. However i have grown to appreciate Facebook's layout and interface. Since i visit it daily i am very comfortable with all functionalities. Not only that but most people i know use Facebook the most, so i get most of the updates and post from there. Not only that but there are a lot of video clips including news, vines, music and many other genres.Most of the posts i see on Facebook are related to personal lives, its almost like a tweet of a blog. Short concise message about a persons happenings.

Twitter on the other hand has a more simple layout and not as densely populated as a Facebook feed. Twitter also has a much different style when it comes to posting or tweeting. Most of the information you get in a tweet is informative. Usually about an event that occurred, news, anything that captivates attention. Its like an SNS to get your daily news from and updates on that event.

Myspace on the other hand is very easily customized to your preferred taste. You change your background photo, set music to play in the background, and change the fonts and colors. You can customize just about anything which is a cool aspect to Myspace. Also there isnt a news feed like Facebook and Twitter. Instead people solely post on each others pages.

Lastly is Instagram. Instagram is a SNS where you post a photo or video about pretty much anything. Its like a mix of Twitter and Facebook. You take the posts you would see on Facebook and then format it into a Twitter style format. Its a very simple layout, you scroll down through a bunch of photos that have hashtags describing the picture. You can also comment on these pictures and like them. Instagram is solely photos and videos, nothing else. You cannot just post a comment, you need to have a photo accompanying it.