Category Archives: Student Blogs

@JacobWalton
The Internet has been around for almost 20 years, and yet very few people seem to understand how it works. Every time someone makes some new form of art-a video game, a movie, or some music-it is posted online. However, in digital space, it is tremendously easy for people to pirate it. This often deprives the creator of a vast amount of monetary gain. To defend their art, many corporations have reacted violently to internet piracy. For example, many video game companies, such as Blizzard, now only allow their games to be played while connected to the internet, even if the player is playing alone. though it makes the game harder to steal, it leads to so many people being online at once that the server crashes, and then no one can play the game. I believe that companies have a right to protect their property, but they must find a way to do so without limiting the medium.

@chrisdtc101

The freedom of online information has been a touchy subject among people lately, and has even grabbed the attention of the US government who tried to pass the SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) in the end of 2012. I believe that in today’s world, musicians, authors, film producers, and other producers of electronic goods need to recognize and accept that the Internet cannot be policed as well as they would like. If a producer chooses to release their product online, whether as an eBook, posting a video on Youtube, or releasing a song on spotify or iTunes, they need to realize that it is going to be taken and misused by other people on the Internet.

We live in a unique era where people can “pirate” and steal things easier than every before. I believe that anything that is posted online with the knowledge and approval of the product’s creator is free for use as long as it is cited and credited when used by someone else. This is an easy decision when concerning individual blogs, youtube videos, and websites, but is harder when the product is an important source of income for the producer. For someone who films writes on a blog for a living or runs a website, use of their writing without consent or citation is a serious problem.

Unfortunately, we live in a world where we cannot post anything online and expect the masses to respect private property and not pirate something. It just isn’t realistic in today’s society. I think that producers need to post their content online only if they are ok with it being reused by other people.

Media changes the user in several different ways. In today’s times, Facebook and twitter are so tied in with society that almost every single person has an account. Not only that, but almost everyone has a direct method to access their accounts, whether it be smart phone, laptop or tablet. From personal experience, I know that I almost always have Facebook open on my computer at home. I also receive notifications on my smart phone, which puts a “real time” effect on it. This is what Shirky was talking about when the idea of media becoming part of us was mentioned. Media offers people a way to communicate without having the delay of things like meeting up, mail delay, etc. Some people even rely on media as a sort of backbone to a life that they always wanted. This can be seen in games like World of Warcraft and Sims, where the character is totally customizable and can be set to even look like the real player. A big question that I have, is how would people who are friends on media interact in real life? If there are two people who are friends online based on what is seen, then would they be able to interact in real life? Shirky talks about this by bringing up the idea that media is becoming a common thing to all people, so common in fact, that I believe one day we will be so tied in to media, that it will be a basis for our lives.

@chrisdtc101

The explosion of social media over the past several years has given people with access to new technology and the Internet to live a second life. This second life takes place in a virtual world filled with interactive places such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and games like World of Warcraft that allow us to create and customize our avatar. Coleman and Shirky state in “Hello Avatar” that, “an avatar is computer-generated figure controlled by a person via a computer.” The avatar is customized to our liking and gives people the chance to live what they would consider their ideal life: The life they wanted but could never have in the real world.

Media changes us because we can hide behind a computer and express our thoughts while avoiding any confrontation if we want to. We can make friends we would likely never make in real life. Either a type of person who wouldn’t want to associate ourselves with in real life, or someone who lives across the world and would never enter our environment without the Internet. Interacting through people on a computer gives us anonymity and allows us to pick and choose what the world sees of us. On social media websites like Facebook and Twitter, we can portray our highlights and the happy moments in our lives while leaving out the bad parts of our lives. This can alter the perception people on the Internet have of us.

The Internet changes us because it gives us the power to create a different interpretation of who we are. We only have to tell people bits and pieces of ourselves, and we can make ourselves seem more socially acceptable or more popular on the Internet that we may be in real life. The Internet gives us a chance to escape into our ideal world and for most of us, our ideal world is not the one we’re currently living in.