Convergence and Web 2.0

Convergence is the coming together of mass media-internet, television, newspaper and all other methods of communicating.  Henry Jenkins finds it important because it is shaping a new way of taking in information.  Jenkins brings out the point that people are viewing convergence either as the gatekeepers releasing all information or a select few still controlling what is being put out.  Convergence is also breaking down barriers of previous media assumptions like time and availability so that you can get info anytime and anywhere.

Peterson believes that convergence culture and web 2.0 are creating slaves out of everyday users. He shows that people get on to a website, like Flickr or Facebook and share information and pictures about them and their activities.  Those people interact with friends, giving comments and rating each other's pictures, creating another world inside of a web 2.0 application.  Then the makers of the web 2.0 application get advertisers and even create things like Google's Adsense program to try to think they are giving back to the users.  All the while the web 2.0 creators are making the bulk of the money from advertisers because of the free or extremely cheap slave labor they get from everyday users in the world they have created.  Eventually the web 2.0 application is sold for millions of dollars, like Flicker, to a larger corporate entity because it is seen as an investment of free laborers, or slaves, that will continue to use the web 2.0 application and draw in advertisers.  Though crowdsourcing using results in the users getting some sort of monetary payment, I believe Petersen would still find the model of crowdsourcing to be a slave-like environment for the user.  Web 2.0 companies like istockphoto regulates what they will accept to put on their site, and wen someone purchases it the initial creator of the photo gets a fraction of the amount paid, enslaving the photographer to the web 2.0 application and being a cheap paid slave for that entity.

Convergence and Web 2.0 are bringing communities together and developing new communities everyday.  People come together through web 2.0 applications, share information, pictures and interest, creating communities amongst interest groups and similar people throughout the world.  While we need to be careful as to the extent we involve and rely on new media in order to connect us as communities, the web 2.0 world is ever-growing and developing into an all encompassing connector.

Privacy-Dividing Communities

Having the police think you are an American spy is fun.  The police stopping you in the street to make sure you are registered seems adventurous.  Police banging on your apartment door, checking your registration and then investigating whether or not you are part of a crime that occured is intimidating.  Picking up your phone and hearing the police tap your phone line is scary.  While living in a small rural town in a snow covered Russia, I found myself in these situations, wondering what happened to my privacy.  I then thought about home, here in the United States of America, where a person's privacy is theirs and not impeded upon by any force.  Or is it?

New media technologies have brought change to privacy.  GPS, social networking sites, cell phones and even the use of government security cameras on the streets all are developed from new technology and is infringing on personal privacy.  While most of these can be avoided, in the fast paced world of adapting to new technology we are very suseptable to losing what is most important to us.  Or do we freely give our privacy away?

Posting pictures, giving personal information and giving constant updates are the heart and soul of social networking sites.  Appearing to be clean fun, the use of these sites puts you and everything you and your 'friends' say about you on the world wide web for all to see.  Is that privacy?  Knowing this, why do people still do it?  Watch this video about privacy and social networking sites.

People want to feel connected, feel like they are a part of something big, or just keep in touch with friends and meet new people.  While this is all solved by partaking in social networking sites, it leads to self disclosure of privacy. Due to a popularity in these networking sites, people are drawn in, and then they feel they need to openly follow and do whatever they seem is needed to stay up with what is new and happening.  

Yes, I am on Facebook.  When I joined a couple years ago, I was leary of joining it because I did not want to be part of a site like Myspace.  My friends ensured me that it was not at all like it, and that only college students with college based email addresses could join and be part of it.  I look now and see how Facebook has unfortunetly evolved into something just like Myspace.  

Ever been on that date when all the sudden you feel your cell phone vibrating, and as you look over towards your date you see their expression that they hear it going off?  Cellular phones have been very helpful in connecting people, maybe sometimes too much.  While social networking sites are seen as the bigger privacy invader it turns out cell phones actually make the largest impact on your loss of privacy. Check out this article on cell phones and its invasion on your privacy.

It seems as if you can never get away from being connected to someone, and that somehow a person is going to get a hold of you.  At work, school, on a date, sleeping, in the bathroom, etc., we willingly put ourselves susceptible to this privacy invading technology.  While it may come off as being useful, in the long run it destroys the freedom of peace and privacy we deserve.  

How much further will this development in giving up our privacy occur?  Should we hold back on technological advancements until society can decide and deal with the engaging situations we now face?  I dunno.  Will I continue to add pictures to my Facebook page?  You better believe it.  Now, next time I go on a date, should I turn my cell phone off...

Facebook:Social Upgrade or Society's Downfall?

New media technology and the Internet have given rise to social networking sites, namely Facebook.  Connecting people from your local community to all across the world, this new technology has given the individual freedom to access to the world.  From keeping relationships between family, friends, co-workers to even becoming a dating service, Facebook has given people a new way to communicate with everyone at the touch of their fingertip.  Or has it warped the society and destroyed true communication between individuals and communities?  

Having friends and family all over the world, Facebook has given me the opportunity to keep in touch and share pictures with people I possibly before Facebook would not have seen again.  On a more local basis, though Facebook has me in touch friends that live here in the Salt Lake area, I have found myself becoming more lazy in actually going to see them and talk to them.  A simple message, comment on their status or picture, or even a little poke(though I thoroughly think they're ridiculous) and I feel as if I have connected with that person, prompting me to not have to truly go face to face with this individual, or at least give them a call.  Even the use of chat on Facebook is not true communication.  Repeatedly I have talked with people more on chat then I have in person.  I have come to see how this affecting my social ability to interact and communicate with people that are within my own community.  Isn't Facebook supposed to help people cultivate and maintain communication and interaction amongst it's users?

Like Michael Bugeja addresses in the reading from last week, people are moving away from developing and sustaining lasting relationships and filling it with new digital devices which we feel will help us avoid loneliness.  Bugeja goes on to say, "Because we lack practice interacting with others face-to-face, or act on impulse using technology, we cannot always foresee how people might respond to our thoughts, words, and deeds." While users believe they are communicating more with people, they really are communicating less and especially at a lower level of communication.  With people within communities not communicating amongst each other, a separation occurs causing loss and greatly affecting the outcome of the area.  Though through the use of Facebook in creating an event or letting a mass group of people know about a city planning meeting, etc, not everyone has access to the Internet nor do they all have Facebook, causing a divide amongst community members and further widening the gap.  The only answer as Bugeja says it is, "face-to-face interaction good, other kinds bad."  

Facebook comes with its good and its bad.  Determining how much use is too much is the hard part to figure out.  So, if the old fashioned method of face to face communication is best, maybe we should bring back the typewriter too?

Check out the video of social interaction on Facebook from Youtube-

Digital Divide

Living in the Ural Mountain region of Russia, I found myself every week hoping that the local Internet cafe would be up and working.  Depending on the city or area I was living in, sometimes it was reliable and other times the cafe would be closed.  While my conceptions of a technologically challenged Russia and the lifestyle people would be living in the third world country before I had arrived had quickly evolved because of the use of technology that a large amount of the everyday people had in their possession.  Walking into the small, poor light rooms that contained usually 10-15 computers, though out dated, they yet seemed to power the Internet and provide me with the capability to stay in touch with the outside world.  Depending on what Internet cafe I was able to go to decided on whether it was broadband or dial up service.  If I was lucky, I would find myself with broadband Internet, sitting next to a teenager who was intensely playing an online game.  At random times the power would go out or the Internet go down and the gamers would start to swear and complain to the cafe operators, while I was just glad I was randomly saving my long emails.  Throughout the rest of the week as I was in the community, going into peoples homes and seeing the varying types of technology and their ability to use it, I saw that a digital divide occurred.  This was happening not only from the standard I was used to in the United States and my ability to use technology but it also was happening among Russians themselves.   The factor of money was often the determining factor in whether the person surrounded themselves with technological devices, but even more prominent was the age factor.  The younger generations of Russians relied more heavily on technology and had a better grasp of how to use it in comparison to their older counterparts.  Cellphones, computers, mp3 players and DVD players were among some of the larger determining factors of whether the individual was technologically up to date or not.  Walking into the corner store or going to the market if an older person was cashier, when you were ready to pay they would pull out from underneath the counter where the register sat a manual counting device, sliding round buttons on several different lines to count how much it would cost you.  But if the person helping you was younger they almost always would go straight to the electronic register.  I even saw on several occasions older customers ask the cashier to use the old fashioned type of counting both for their own understanding of what was happening, but also because they believe it was more accurate and would not screw up.  Most often when I would walk into the local post office, the crowded area would be full of older people, mailing everything from bills to a simple letter.  Not having the ability or opportunity to send it via email, they would use the trusted and true old method.

These examples from my experience while in Russia are found here in the United States, which is not considered a third world country.  The generational gap has given the younger groups an upper hand on technology and its everyday use.  While many have adjusted, it still is not as natural for the older crowd, leaving them behind in the ever growing development of technology and its use, creating the digital divide.

GoldFarming

Imagine playing your favorite video game, and getting paid to do it as well.   A new form of labor called goldfarming is developing in the poorer countries of the world.  While that might sound intriguing to many people, when reality hits this phenomenon of gold farming is a new form of slave labor.  With the advancement of new media technology, goldfarming is the newest business that is connecting individuals, communities and countries.

There are several issues with the act of gold farming or leveling.  First, many gamers and other people look at it as cheating.  Paying someone else to essentially play a game for you or to advance your character is in no way the proper method the game was made or designed for.  People that have money and want to be an advanced player faster can pay for that rank without actually spending anytime playing the game themselves.  Second is the issue of slave labor.  The gold farming is labored out to poorer countries, where labor can be found cheap.  The workers slave behind a computer not making a fair amount of money.  Though they often receive a place to stay, they still need to purchase food, travel and all other expenses, leaving them without the opportunity to save money and build a future.  The facilities are often typical to that of a sweatshop and the work is demanding.  Health issues for those employees are fore coming, like eyesight issues, carpitunnel in the wrist and back issues from sitting for the long shifts.  These factors make the labor that of a sweatshop.  Still with all these issues pointing towards goldfarming as being slave labor, some employed in the field love what they do.  Third factor is that turning virtual goods into a profit for real money.    How do you know how much to charge for something that is virtual?  People are seeing virtual items as more realistic now, believing they are true commodities that can be purchased and owned.  Many still view that virtual items are not real and are not spending their hard earned money for items that they cannot touch, hold or feel.

Henry Jenkins talks of new media and its effect on society, which also applies to the growing phenomenon of goldfarming.  With new media connecting the world, especially by the internet, has given individuals from different countries the opportunity to operate businesses and sell items.  Goldfarming fits perfectly into this because an individual in one country can hire someone in another country to level their character for very cheap in comparison to having to pay for the price of labor with the country they live.  Goldfarming is connecting people, communities and countries, using the new media technology that is breaking the previous barriers that did not allow for such connecting of people.

Playing video games has been taken to a new level.  Why play and advance yourself when you can hire out and have yourself advanced through the game?  None of this would be possible if it were not for new media technology connecting communities and individuals.  But, with this connection, are certain people or communities abusing others throughout the world by developing a new form of slave labor to obtain what they want?

Crowdsourcing-Dividing Communities

Today's reading and discussion in class was extremely interesting.  As I read the article I found an immense amount of information that helped inform me of a large and growing money making method that is shaping the future of the Internet and business not only in our communities but throughout the world.

Reading through the article I began to imagine myself being involved in a crowdsourcing company making extra money.  In deed this is what many people have come to realize and actually do, making the websites flourish and grow.  This interaction not only brings the average joe out of the background and into the foreground (if their work is any good) but it brings together ideas, thoughts and designs from all over the world, all at the fingertips of the computer.  But does everyone have that opportunity?  Does it bring together communities or does it divide and hurt communities while bringing together a larger group of Internet users?

While this was going through my head, the idea of Walmart and its known way of bringing its business within a community came into my mind.  Walmart has been found over the years to enter a community, close knit and bound with local stores run and owned by the locals who earned a decent living, truly giving to the community.  When Walmart comes into the town, they lower their prices to get the customers from the local shop owners, drawing away money which eventually destroys the hometown stores.  Yes, Walmart will employee many and many locals to work in the store, but the pay for what they do is much less than fair and often the help does not have a knowledge of product they sell or even have proper customer service skill, as the locally owned shops did have.  Over time the corporation raises the prices of products back up to where they were, and the city turns to be much worse off then before dealing with higher prices for lower quality merchandise, horrible customer service and a corporate entity that can do what they please to the susceptible locals.  Crowdsourcing in a way is doing the same thing, but on the Internet.  Look at istockphoto.com, for example.  They accept photos from anyone, amateur or professional and sells it for much less than one would pay for the same product from the local professional photographer.  This seems good for those that do specifically call themselves professionals, but hurts the professionals in ways just like the Walmart diagram I explained above.  Once the online company has run its competition out of business, they can then in return raise the price back up of the photos, which might very often be done by amateurs.  I feel in some ways the use of crowdsourcing could have this effect on the community and in the world wide perspective, giving the amateur professional status.

Realizing who has access to the computers and the ability to run the programs necessary in order to participate within the crowdsourcing group is alienating many people.  People of varying ages that either have no computer or knowledge to participate in a crowdsourcing group, people with low income and no computer facilities, etc. are all part of the large group of people not involved in this money making business.  Will this change anytime soon, I don't know, but I highly doubt it.  Those making and participating within crowdsourcing will have it to themselves.

These issues are at the forefront of crowdsourcing and its affect on community and how it is dividing communities apart from each other, while bringing those privileged together to work in groups gaining more money.  Will my imagination of getting involved in crowdsourcing actually happen?  Who knows.... Anyone wanna start designing hats?...

Internet-Harmful or Helpful

The Internet has brought many good things to people throughout the world.  From connecting people from various places to the ability to receive news from anywhere in world, it has literally given new freedoms to the individual.  On the downside, there are problems that have come with the good.  Identity theft, money scams, just to name a couple.  But what about social interaction between people?  Has it hurt or helped the social relations and business of individuals and groups?

In the article by Philip Brey that we read in class about the social and cultural implications of the Internet on society, he has a list of both perceived benefits of the Internet and perceived harms of the Internet.  He speaks to the point of the harmful effects of the Internet on social relations and how it hurts face to face relationships because people will take less time and effort when offline.  I feel that this is very true to an extent.  Many people use the Internet as a way to communicate with others, yet they still seem fine from doing it.  Facebook has been the latest craze in staying in touch with old friends and developing relations with new friends you meet everyday at school, work and in everyday life.  It is seen as a tool to help enhance, but sometimes that is all that people will use.  I personally have found myself being both ways with the use of Facebook.  While I have and kept in touch in people from years ago to people I just have recently meet, it helps me keep in touch because I wouldn't have otherwise.  On the downside, I have found myself to be slacking in some areas of social interaction from Facebook too.  Because of the fact that I can see their status updates or look at posted pictures or items on their page, I can understand what is going on in their life right now.  And if I get enough motivation, I sometimes will send them a message or chat for a brief second on Facebook Chat.  Some of these people were good friends, people I would otherwise call if not meet up with in person because I would want to have that interaction with them to see how they are doing.  For that reason, I have found my social interaction being hindered by the Internet.

Myspace has developed into a way for people or groups to get their music, photos, videos, ideas, etc, out into the general audience, helping their interaction with people everywhere.  Not only does this help them with the public, but helps generate publicity with companies and individuals who want to promote them on a higher level and make them bigger.  There has a been a big influx of music groups that have come from being popular on Myspace to now having their hit music heard over the radio.   I have several friends with bands that have Myspace pages, with their music, band and personal info, tour dates, etc.  The Internet has created a new resume for these people, helping them to be seen and heard and how the general public views them. 

There is no clear cut understanding of whether the Internet is harmful or helpful with social interaction.  It allows for both good and bad, but that definition to an extent is different for each person.  Find that out for yourself and adapt to it.

Technology, Politics, Society

Reach in your pocket, and you'll find a cell phone, with many capabilities that enable you to stay connected to other people via telephone, email, chat, and the list could go on.  Open your book bag and you can grab out your laptop, which only will enhance your ability to keep in touch with the world.  This type of scenario is common these days not only among college students, but is widely growing throughout different age groups.  With this capability of being connected, it brings out points in the readings from last week about the political and social implications of this growing phenomena.

In the article written by Winner, one of the ideas he brought about in the reading was how computers and that technology in general has changed how we interact within and affected the retail sector within our community.  Cell phone stores are popping up all over the community.  People in all ages have embraced the use of cell phones, even shutting off their landlines, completely relying on their cellular phones.  No longer do you see phone booths on the street or outside of buildings.  Interaction between people within the community has evolved to where people can talk or text whenever and wherever with no limitations.  Another example within the community of how technology and computers have changed retail business is the rise of Red Box DVD automated rentals.  One dollar rentals that you can get any time of the day and that you can return when is convenient for you has driven several movie rental stores out of business.  Winner wrote this article as a political idea and political stance that is looked at by some as a way that the Internet, computers, and technology should be handled.  As my group discussed this article, we did not think that it was the way we would the technological world run.  I did find a lot of the points that Winner brought up as valid and a great insight into the changes that have occurred and that are still coming for technology and society in the future.

In the article about Hackers Ethic and their way of looking at how technology should be run, it brings out their idea of how anyone can be involved in technology.  Catch is, not everyone has the privilege to access technology, hence dividing people.  But they feel that information should be free and open with no restrictions.  After reading and discussing with my group their beliefs, I feel that the hackers are almost anarchist.  They don't want anyone in charge, regulating, but in reality whoever has the most technology and most influence would have the most power.

The Magna Carta reading was intense, but held some of the ideas of democracy in its theory of how technology should be handled for society.  It talked about the marketplace and how it drives the society to change technology.  Like in the article by Winner, one subject brought up in the Magna Carta was the idea of how the new technology has replaced old methods, questioning which was better.  Adding to the other examples of how technology has shaped and changed society, is again back to the cell phone and its use for the releasing of information to a wider public faster than old methods.  Just last week as i was walking to class, I received a text message from a number of someone I did not know.  After opening the message, I read about the Utah legislature proposing to raise college tuition.  The text went on to encourage me to gather with other college students at the Capital the next morning at a certain time to protest it.  Whoever sent me the message used technology for political reasons.  Before the use of cell phones, it would have had to been done by flyer, word of mouth or television.  From the modern use of cell phones and texting, messages can be sent to a large group of people in an instant.  Using technology to try and inform people to engage them in political action is one more example of how society is using the technology to their advantage.

With the different theories of how technology should be handled as it affects society and its interaction with our everyday activities, it is hard to know which way is the best.  While each of the articles had valuable methods, no one of them is ever going to be perfect.  It is true that technology is shaping how people interact one with another.  While some of these advances help connect communities, others are dividing society from true interaction from each other.