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
Monday, June 29, 2015
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*
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*
Wednesday, June 24, 2015
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.
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.
Monday, June 22, 2015
Social Networking
Social Networking Sites have made a huge leap in creating new trends to getting through our day to day lives. The prospects of SNS is endless and will just continually and exponentially grow to expedite menial tasks. However with everything there are also negative aspects to SNS. First lets start off with the positives. SNS is responsible for spreading information faster than any other media. Sites like Facebook and Twitter are sources for a lot of the news, closely ranking to newspapers! Nowadays companies are usually on two or more social networks for recruiting purposes. The efficiency and wider pool of applicants is appealing to businesses. With the use of websites like LinkedIn, companies can hire from a larger pool of applicants and be able to narrow their search more efficiently. Students also report to doing better in school because of SNS. Because they can go on forums or discussion groups to help each other out, they have reported to getting better grades.
Now some of the negatives of SNS. I think most importantly is the lack of privacy. Sites like Facebook is easily accessible by anyone with access to a computer with internet connection. Being able to post photos, status' and personal information that is not necessarily confidential is somewhat of a threat. Not only that but other users can post photos of you as well and tag you, even without consent! Of course if you are responsible there will be no privacy issues and the use of SNS is greatly beneficial. However you must mind what you say and post. Before i said that SNS had the potential of helping students get better grades. Well it can have an adverse effect as well. Studies show a significant increase in GPA from non social media users to social media users. Social media is deemed to be a huge waste of time. There is also a problem with people not being able to interact face to face anymore. Now that the world is so connected virtually, the social skills of today's people have drastically decreased. People tend to look down at their devices rather than look up and socialize. I have experienced this first hand, especially when people meet for the first time. The first thing either party does in an awkward situation is take their phone out of their pockets and fumble around with it. Its kind of pathetic and scary that people don't know how to socialize. Its okay to be awkward, its normal.
I think that SNS is an amazing tool to have and i know it will only grow larger with time. Every day there is more and more functionality with SNS and nothing will stop the growth of these technologies. The advancement of these technologies has already passed its tipping point and there is no stopping it. In the future there will be huge advancements and benefits from all these new technologies. However i have this gut feeling something is going to go terribly wrong in the process and we as a society will have to pay a huge price for it, learn from our mistakes, and start all over.
Sources:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6522523&sc=emaf
http://www.marketingweek.co.uk/cgi-bin/item.cgi?id=59708&u=pg_dtl_art_news&m=pg_hdr_art
http://chronicle.com/blogPost/Who-Cares-About-Facebook/25877/?sid=wc&utm_source=wc&utm_medium=en
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/14/technology/internet/14facebook.html?_r=1&ref=business.
http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB115412710465720901-Ah3MvEIHa4T2Ck8IgsXrr01znUw_20070728.html
Now some of the negatives of SNS. I think most importantly is the lack of privacy. Sites like Facebook is easily accessible by anyone with access to a computer with internet connection. Being able to post photos, status' and personal information that is not necessarily confidential is somewhat of a threat. Not only that but other users can post photos of you as well and tag you, even without consent! Of course if you are responsible there will be no privacy issues and the use of SNS is greatly beneficial. However you must mind what you say and post. Before i said that SNS had the potential of helping students get better grades. Well it can have an adverse effect as well. Studies show a significant increase in GPA from non social media users to social media users. Social media is deemed to be a huge waste of time. There is also a problem with people not being able to interact face to face anymore. Now that the world is so connected virtually, the social skills of today's people have drastically decreased. People tend to look down at their devices rather than look up and socialize. I have experienced this first hand, especially when people meet for the first time. The first thing either party does in an awkward situation is take their phone out of their pockets and fumble around with it. Its kind of pathetic and scary that people don't know how to socialize. Its okay to be awkward, its normal.
I think that SNS is an amazing tool to have and i know it will only grow larger with time. Every day there is more and more functionality with SNS and nothing will stop the growth of these technologies. The advancement of these technologies has already passed its tipping point and there is no stopping it. In the future there will be huge advancements and benefits from all these new technologies. However i have this gut feeling something is going to go terribly wrong in the process and we as a society will have to pay a huge price for it, learn from our mistakes, and start all over.
Sources:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6522523&sc=emaf
http://www.marketingweek.co.uk/cgi-bin/item.cgi?id=59708&u=pg_dtl_art_news&m=pg_hdr_art
http://chronicle.com/blogPost/Who-Cares-About-Facebook/25877/?sid=wc&utm_source=wc&utm_medium=en
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/14/technology/internet/14facebook.html?_r=1&ref=business.
http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB115412710465720901-Ah3MvEIHa4T2Ck8IgsXrr01znUw_20070728.html
Wednesday, June 17, 2015
Blog v Wiki
Lets list some basic differences between a blog and a wiki. A blog: a blog is a personal web page featuring diary/journal type commentary and usually links to outside sources, articles or websites. A blog usually shares opinions and has a one to many communication relationship as in the one author of a post is shared amongst the many readers of that particular blog. Usually a blog post goes stale over time therefore there needs to be a steady stream of posts to keep interest. The amount of content that can be released is relatively slow considering you only have one person to update the blog. A wiki on the other hand is a website whose intent is to spread knowledge by collaborating multiple authors input. A wiki is a many to many communication relationship as in there are multiple authors and editors of a certain post and then it is shared with many other users. Content is constantly being changed and updated, its continuously growing every second.
There is a huge importance on convergence especially in our networked world. There is so much content and information out there on the internet. Blogs and wikis are the catalyst that brings together the variety of information into a concise user friendly website. Blogs are usually opinion related on a variety of subject from politics to fashion to current events. Although blogs arent the first place you look for information with credentials, there is still a lot of useful information you can take away from them. Such as the comments that a user leaves behind. The voices of many is powerful information. It can be used to see what is going on in our heads, what we think is right and wrong, trending and not. It almost like an unofficial survey but kind of better since its unfiltered. Now the thing with wikis is that they are great for obtaining new knowledge on pretty much every subject area. However the thing with wikis is that they can be edited by anyone and although the content is reviewed before submission its not 100% accurate. You kind of have to read and take in the information with a grain of salt. I'm not sure if this has been implemented yet but wikis could try to collaborate with educational institutions and before a post is made, it has to be accredited with being valid information. Or instead of all content being accredited by a institution, at least let the users know which information is accredited.
The internet is a weird and fascinating place where anyones voice can be heard. The information out there is plentiful and worth exploring. Wikis and blogs are two vessels that hold a lot of potential for efficiency and the ability to obtain quick information.
There is a huge importance on convergence especially in our networked world. There is so much content and information out there on the internet. Blogs and wikis are the catalyst that brings together the variety of information into a concise user friendly website. Blogs are usually opinion related on a variety of subject from politics to fashion to current events. Although blogs arent the first place you look for information with credentials, there is still a lot of useful information you can take away from them. Such as the comments that a user leaves behind. The voices of many is powerful information. It can be used to see what is going on in our heads, what we think is right and wrong, trending and not. It almost like an unofficial survey but kind of better since its unfiltered. Now the thing with wikis is that they are great for obtaining new knowledge on pretty much every subject area. However the thing with wikis is that they can be edited by anyone and although the content is reviewed before submission its not 100% accurate. You kind of have to read and take in the information with a grain of salt. I'm not sure if this has been implemented yet but wikis could try to collaborate with educational institutions and before a post is made, it has to be accredited with being valid information. Or instead of all content being accredited by a institution, at least let the users know which information is accredited.
The internet is a weird and fascinating place where anyones voice can be heard. The information out there is plentiful and worth exploring. Wikis and blogs are two vessels that hold a lot of potential for efficiency and the ability to obtain quick information.
Wednesday, June 10, 2015
Research Topic
With the rapid growth of these social networking services or sns. We have been increasingly putting our privacy at risk. In the past companies would have to keep your active participation by issuing certain programs such as loyalty cards. However, social media has made data so readily available that anyone can access and readily use your information. Our generation is regularly posting, liking, following and tweeting information into this thing we call a data dump that can be easily mined. To us these activities may seem normal and harmless, nevertheless we should not keep our guards down and become victims of regular and unremitting output of personal information. I will be discussing in depth the adverse effects of the trends we are following on social media services today.
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