Thursday, February 18, 2010

Project so far...

My project is going to look at the various ways people stay connected with others and their society through the web. The main debate about people using solely the web to stay connected is if relationships and the way we communicate are becoming more impersonal and anonymous. By anonymous, I mean can you really trust that the person who wrote you really is who they say they are? (Think about the people online who tell young girls that they're 13, when really they can be 47.) This topic is important because if communication is becoming less confrontational and more impersonal, what will happen to our modes of communication in the future? I think that we are extremely dependant on the web for staying connected--either with friends or family, or with staying connected to our world and what is happening. Why would we rather type something to someone rather than just call them on the phone? Are we becoming less confrontational and becoming more scared to actually have a conversation? Instead, we rely on the web to be able to say what we want, be able to edit and perfect it, and be able to stay connected to our world that way.

Tuesday, February 16, 2010

3 Articles for Annotated Bibliography

Robitaille, Suzanne. "New Telecom Connections for the Deaf." Businessweek.com, 9 Oct. 2002. Web. 16 Feb. 2010.

This article, although from 2002, still holds key information about the web helping those with disabilities to stay connected. In this article, Robitaille talks about how deaf people are using the web more proficiently to stay connected with others, not only with email or text based documents, but also with telephones. This article is important because it shows that the web is not limited to just one group of people. It is transforming and adapting to the many different people who use the web daily. The web is becoming more and more flexible with the kinds of people who use it--it is constantly evolving. This is useful for my project because it shows the different ways different people use the web to stay connected. The web can be used for people of different backgrounds, whether they can hear or not.

Payton, Susan. "7 Ways to Promote Your Offline Event Using Social Media." Mashable.com, 10 Feb. 2010. Web. 16 Feb. 2010.

This article gives people who have upcoming events, ways to promote them using various social media sites. It talks about the various ways you can use sites such as Twitter or Facebook, or even blogs. This article is important because people are using the web more and more each day to promote their events. It's faster than inviting people through snail mail or even by phone. This relates to my project because it's another way people stay connected through the web. Instead of getting an invitation through the post office, we are now getting invitations to events through the web.

Parr, Ben. "Google Goes Social with Google Buzz." Mashable.com, 10 Feb. 2010. Web. 16 Feb. 2010.

This article talks about the new Google Buzz, which is much like Facebook and Twitter, combined with email, blogger.com, youtube.com, and everything that Google allows you to do already. This is important because it shows how the web is adapting to our culture and the various ways we use the web. Instead of Google just being a search engine or used for email, it now can be used just like Twitter and Facebook. Everything a person uses on a daily basis, is now not on ten different websites, but one. This is important to my project because it shows how the web and different sites are adapting to our culture and the ways we use the web. Because people are using sites like Facebook and Twitter more and more every day, Google needs to step up their game if they want to stay on top.

Tuesday, February 9, 2010

Final Trailer: How do you connect?

What is an author?

After reading Lessig's "Remix" it made me think about how we are all multimedia writers. Right now, I'm being a multimedia writer. Anything we write, remix, or post on the web is a reflection of the author who put it up on the web to share with others. What's difficult to figure out is when multimedia writers, like us, cross the line into copyright issues. For example, on facebook it's illegal to post pictures that have been copyrighted. So, when people began posting pictures for the Doppelganger, is what they did illegal? Could they have been sued? What if they were? We rarely know when we cross the line because it's so fine, but what do we do when and if we do cross it? These copyright issues are difficult to understand completely, and because we are all multimedia writers in some way, are we crossing the line more than we know?

Tuesday, February 2, 2010

Trailor Draft

Making this video is definitely easier said than done.