The Next New Thing

An idea for a New Media that currently doesn't exist may be virtual reality machines that connect all your senses and movement to tiny devices that connect directly to your brain. This will probably be future technology in id say about 20 or more years. Although Technology is currently still advancing it may come quicker then that. Uses of this new technology could be within the parameters of gaming, traveling, traffic safety, and many more uses. This may be similar to some products that certain companies are currently working on such as google Glass. Where your technically looking at the real world and a digital world at the same time, displaying things such as directions, emails, reading materials all displayed side by side. The user could move his hands as a signal for certain controls of controlling the settings and stuff. Hopefully this kind of technology could change the way we live for the better. 

Our Class Wiki - So Far

For our class wiki so far, I have currently not added any content onto our wiki yet. However, I have done some research regarding what I'm thinking about adding and what I want to contribute towards my goal. From what I have read on the blog so far, some sections such as the Youtube section needs to be updated with more up to date information as trends tend to change fairly quickly, some of the YouTube Stars listed have stopped making videos or have been replaced with more newer content Creators. Some page ideas that I have been thinking about adding to the wiki, are how Youtube has changed and some videos that get millions of views are things that feature makeup tutorials, Travel documentaries, Gameplay recaps, or Gameplay in general. These are some topics that have not made it onto the wiki yet and I hope to add these there. I have currently researched the following topics regarding Youtube, Gaming and Social Media. These three topics are what I mainly want to focus on and be able to contribute towards the wiki. 

P2P File Sharing

File sharing by definition is the the ability or practice of transferring files from one persons computer to another. According to "Content Producers should take advantage of P2P, not fear it" by NMA staff, P2P file sharing means Peer to Peer file sharing. P2P file sharing mainly occurs through sites that have to do with downloading or torrenting. Some sites that they used in their article included PirateBay, Digg, SlashDot, and BoingBoing. How these sites work is that people who have already downloaded or owns a specific file can share their file via their website by acting as a seed where others can then download that file. The speed of the download depends on how many seeds or people currently have the file up for others to download. Some examples of P2P file sharing can include music, games, and movies. The most popular ones being music and movies. 

Advice to Baruch College

My advice to Baruch College if they want to incorporate new media to improve the college may include things such as creating more hybrid courses, fully online courses, teaching professors how to use new media, teaching via things like FaceTime, and Skype from virtually anywhere. Although Baruch is already beginning to incorporate new media into the college, I believe that the biggest factor or problem may be that some professors don't really understand new media, and how to use it, thus they stick to old media. Some professors that I have come across sometimes don't allow electronics in classrooms which includes phones, laptops, and tablets. They tend to like the old fashion way by using pen and paper. Although some people may not have a problem with that, i believe that how things are taught and learned should be evolving along with technology not only because with technology almost everything is virtually made easier, but because with new growing trends and way to learn, most kids aren't going to want to learn face to face or write things with pen and paper. Many will probably want to learn via internet, and taking notes with electronics. 

Privacy & Confidentiality

Issues of privacy and confidentiality can be arise with the topic of new media. Some of these issues include things such as cookies, billing and shipping addresses being saved on certain websites, sites saving your payment information, sites that sell your information or eyes to advertising agency to make money by selling targeted ads to certain customers. To some consumers their privacy and confidentiality mean everything however to others, they are willing to give that up for a service. For example many of us have or use a google mail account. So how does google benefit from giving us a free e-mailing service? well its simple, because in the beginning when you click accept you are giving google permission to use your information for advertisements, contact info, and tracking what kind of info you receive. Amazon is another site that also in a way can cause issues of privacy and confidentiality to arise. When you order from Amazon for the first time, or make an account with them, Amazon sends a cookie to your computer identifying you as an individual and every time you visit Amazon after that they know what your preferences are, your billing and shipping, what kind of products you would be interested in, and how they can advertise to you effectively. All in all, many of us do not read the fine print where companies may ask you to give up some of your privacy and confidentiality for a free service, but I don't see anything wrong with that, however that is solely my opinion.

Creativity and New Media

With the development of New Media, it acts a vent for creativity. For example I used a game I used to play called MapleStory. For some this may be a throwback, however from what I can see they are still thriving and developing new creative ways to improve the game. Below are some pictures of the game itself and a character that I had created.

In the picture above, it shows the options of choosing genders, hair color, style, outfits and etc. in this virtual world, Although the characters are more cartoon like then those of second life it still inspires communication and creativity in this world.

In the picture above, it shows one of my characters in the virtual world. As you can see you can dress up your avatar, have different jobs, do different things such as buying and selling goods, leveling up, and etc.

In this last picture, it shows that  every avatar is different based on how the user wants to dress them up, virtual avatars communicate and engage in transactions, sharing ideas about the real world and the virtual world. 

CREATIVITY

I believe that New Media helps foster creativity in many ways. For example according to the article "Youtube Traffic Characterization: A View From the Edge" by Phillipa Gill, Martin Arlitt, Zongpeng Li, and Anirban Mahanti, their paper presents the statistical human traffic that goes on in the New Media sharing site, Youtube. In their article they mention that over a three month period, they observed over 25 million transactions and over 600,000 downloads. As a user of Youtube as well i can agree that many of the popular videos usually get millions of views. Thus it also gives the creator more purpose to create new content and share on a regular basis. Not only do the content creators get paid for doing what they love and enjoy, they are also satisfied knowing that other people love to watch their work. Through this process creativity is born as more and more people want to get youtube famous whether its Vlogging, Travel guides, Gaming Guides, Beauty tutorials they all began with one persons creativity. Other new media sites such as Instagram promotes creativity as they are challenged to create new content for their posts and continue to grow their following and get more collaborators. 

Modeling Reality with Virtual Worlds

There are many ways virtual worlds can used, some of which include business meetings, exploring virtual versions of the city you live in, and also in the fashion world where you can shop, try on clothes on virtual avatars. Some pros of virtual reality may be that it gives the users simple access to places or things that they may have a hard time getting to or doing in the real world. It also changes the meaning of social communication because many people nowadays meet each other virtually whether they are playing games or hanging  out with friends. Cons of virtual may include the lack of face to face communication as virtual worlds are "virtual". Other Cons may include people who don't have access to the technology will not be able to keep up with the trends of society. According to "Going to the virtual office in Second Life" by Mark Tutton, the developers of Second Life, are looking to expand their business in a way businesses can virtual meetings on their secured networks which may them private. I myself believe that this is the direction where the future is headed, as now we depends more and more on technology as it is constantly being upgraded and changed. On the other hand, An article named "No Budget, No Boundaries; It's the Real You" by Ruth La Ferla, there is a different take on virtual worlds. She talks about how people can spend cash in exchange for virtual currency in that articular world. It is said that even though spending in the real world went down due to recessions and etc, people don't stop spending on lavish products in the virtual worlds as they can afford it there. These virtual worlds foster creativity in a sense that, technology around us is getting more and more advanced. Especially where there has been integration between physical movement in the real world correlating to movement in the virtual world with the help of oculus rift, and Virtuix Omni, soon virtual reality is gonna be on a different level than what we currently experience. 

BLOG: Social Networking Sites

The four social networking sites that I will be discussing are Facebook, Twitter, Reddit, and Linkedin. My first impression of Facebook is that it has a very nice setup that is easy for anyone to understand. I have been using Facebook for awhile now and I haven't had any trouble with their setup. It is definitely a good networking site in my opinion as you can search for friends, join groups with similar interests whether its for games, buying and selling, discussions, a study group, Facebook makes it simple for you to have access to those options. The second social networking site Twitter seems simpler than Facebook. It basically lets the user "Tweet" what their interested in, what they are doing, or anything for that matter. Aside from sharing your life story and events, they have a cool feature using the #hashtag that connects all Tweets that use that #hashtag. I find this a very convenient tool that have caught onto other social networking sites such as Instagram and Tumblr  On the side bar after you log in it has a convenient list that shows the most popular trends or #hashtags up to date so you can check those out if they appeal to you. Overall its a very solid social networking site. The third site I will be discussing is Linkedin. Linkedin is actually a more professional version of Facebook. They both offer the same things however, linkedin is more of a job finding site since it takes your experience and resume and puts it into your profile. Everyone seems to be more mature on linkedin in a sense that it doesn't have random videos shared on it, unlike Facebook. The final site Reddit, it is similar to that of wikipedia but people can discuss certain topics freely without being restricted. It provides sub topics also known as subreddits, these are for people who want to focus on a specific topic they are looking for or interested in. The setup is similar to twitter in a sense that the top shared and top viewed are listed on the first page. The pages are set up so that you can scroll down each one and see what other people have posted and if you decide your up to it you can even contribute to the specific topic and create new links to share with other people. Like Facebook reddit has many groups or pages that can be made whether its for gaming, buying and selling, or just talking about random topics you'll be able to find them on reddit. 

TWITR: Blog About Twitter

Twitter discussion compared to both blackboard discussion and in class discussions have their own similarities and differences. They are similar in a sense that they all have one thing in common, people talking to each other. Twitter discussion is similar to that of a blog where you can comment on what other people "Tweet" and share your opinions and thoughts about what particular topics. Blackboard discussions are similar to that of twitter discussion but it does restrict who can read and respond to what people have shared. In an in-class discussion the comments and opinions are formulated in real time and it is restricted to the people within the classroom. For twitter and blackboard discussions it gives people time to formulate their ideas and thoughts into sentences, however in in-class discussions it is hard to do that in such a short period of time since everyone is waiting on answers.

Social Networking

Social Networking can be used in many ways whether it is corporate or not. According to Frank Langfitt's Article "Social Networking Technology Boosts Job Recruiting" one form of use for social networking is recruiting people for jobs. One example that Langfitt used in his article is Linkedin, which is a social network comprised of over 8 million professionals spread throughout the world. Through the site employers of recruiters are able to search for candidates that have qualities or specialties in certain areas with the click of a button. The benefits of this technology to society may include things such as ease of job recruiting, connecting people from other countries or locally with ease, it can help spread information quickly, and it can also help law enforcement in solving crimes. However, according to Clive Thompson's article "Brave New World of Digital Intimacy", it shows a so called "dark side" to social networking. In the article the idea of personal privacy was brought up, seemingly they compared it to a giant party where everyone can eavesdrops on everyone else. This meant a loss of privacy to the users as they posted heaps on information about themselves when Facebook began such as what they liked, their favorite shows and other things such as birthdays or special events of their lives. In my opinion I think that social networking will start to evolve and continue to grow as technology is constantly advancing, thus the good may outweigh the bad aspects in the future. 

Blogs vs Wikis

Blogs and Wikis have their similarities and differences. According to Wikipedia on Wikis at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wiki a wiki is " a website that provides a collaborative modification of its content and structure directly from the website." On the other hand a Blog whose name derives from Web log, is different in how content is added. According to "How Can We Measure the Influence of the Blogosphere?" by Kathy E. Gill a blog is structured similar to a "collective diary." In a Blog the one who creates and posts the information is known as the blogger who is the only one who has access to post while the public may have the option to comment on the post, they do not have the access to directly edit the post. While on the Wiki anyone in the general public has access to it and can edit the page however they please. How can blogs be used for collaboration? Well blogs and wikis both have many uses. Blogs specifically can be used for collaboration because it can spread one persons view and share it with their audience. Thus, the people reading the blogs may have the same views or may have been persuaded by the bloggers post. For example they could have been sharing views on a specific product, a specific debate, or even their opinions on food. A wiki is used more as a database where people can all contribute to a specific topic for example this is shown in the Wikipedia on Wikis. Everything on that page is generated by the public, who slowly add bits and pieces of new information as the years progress. A new use for wiki's that has not been done yet might be to implement specific pages for certain things, for maybe things such as business projects, sharing of information on companies, where there may be some restrictions to what the public can do since it may hinder the company reputation. Convergence in todays world is important because it is in a sense another form of communication connecting people even though they may not be face to face in front of you. 

Amazon: Whether it has a positive or negative effect on the Future?

For my research project I will be talking about Amazon as a whole and its effect on the future. For example some positive effects would be how students can get their textbooks and materials for school quicker and cheaper on Amazon, Customers are able to purchase items from virtually anywhere they have internet whether it is at home or outside in Starbucks, and items that may be hard to find on your own can be found on Amazon with a click of a button. However with positives there are always negatives. Some negative effects may include a decline of traffic in local business, people go out less often to buy things, people may grow dependent to ordering online, it can also affect social interactions as people would be interacting less socially when ordering from Amazon. For my research topic, I will be looking more in depth into the effects of Amazon towards the Future. We will be able to see some positives and negative effects it may have and how this new media will continue to change our lives.