Mario? Luigi?
Growing up I was exposed to gaming on a computer in 3rd grade. I remember we used floppy drives to play Number Munchers, which was one of my favorites, or Oregon Trial. Computer class used to be so much fun with those simple games. Then when I got home I would go over my friend’s house and play Nintendo. Super Mario Brothers 3 was my absolute favorite and I remember playing it every day. I finally got Super Nintendo at my house and it came with the All Star collection of games which consisted of all of the Mario Brothers games. I loved to play that and even when I got older I did not want to give it away. That was when life was sweet and innocent. Now all of the games available are killing each other. Everyday I would be talking to my 23 year old male friend and I would ask him what he was doing he would say “shooting people in the face.” That was in reference to Call of Duty 4.
Not only has the type of games changed over the years so has the quality of the equipment. We went from two dimensional to 3D, you feel like you are right there, you can sit at home and put on a head set and play with people all over the nation. Online you can play with people all over the world. Business Week reports that “Second Life is one of the many so-called massively multiplayer online games that are booming in popularity these days. Because thousands of people can play at once, they’re fundamentally different from traditional computer games in which one or two people play on one PC.” How could you not get addicted? My extent of gaming now that I have grown up is Sudoko. But I know that many people use gaming for more reason than just a game. The military uses it to train soldiers, I know many athletic teams use games stimulators to help players practice and gain skills. With new systems like the Wii you can physically use your body to do different motions such as bowling or tennis.
Add comment June 30, 2008
salfred
Tags: gaming, Second Life, Super Mario Brothers
Do we believe Wiki?
Should we trust Wikipedia or anexpert‐led encyclopedia more? How could Wikipedia be better set‐up to better provide accuracy? Should it be open to everyone or just verified“experts”?
Wiki???? Should we trust Wikipedia? Should we trust the Encyclopedia? What’s the biggest difference? Hmmm well we can start by one is published and one is online? How long does it take to get things published? How fast does data or facts change? The encyclopedia may be a good resource for things that stay constant but Wikipedia is a far better source for the new age that incorporates change. Wikipedia is a collaborative tool which means anyone can add an entry and it has an infinite amount of space for information. With technology booming, I don’t know too many people that don’t resort to the internet as their primary source of information. With this being said Wikipedia is a wonderful tool because it has information on anything you could possibly want. For example, last semester I had to research a magazine so I chose Cosmopolitan magazine. Wikipedia had all the information I could possibly want to know about Cosmopolitan. Would the Encyclopedia have that? No. With Wikipedia being a collaborative environment people that have valid information can come up and post. If the information is not valid it will be taken down or corrected. With everything on the internet you have to leave a margin or error. But I feel the benefits are far greater than to knock the credibility. In Clay Shirky’s Here Comes Everybody he emphasis how the internet has allowed us to form online groups which can deal with issues that are larger and more complex. With this being said Wikipedia can do that with people from everywhere contributing to the information. Two brains are better than one; with this it is millions of heads so imagine the results. Although the idea of verified “experts” sounds better I feel that it would still be limiting. I feel it is left to everyone to post if people see mistakes they can fix it. With the millions of users I am certain it will not stay up long before it is fixed.
Add comment June 30, 2008
salfred
Tags: Encyclopedia, Here Comes Everybody, social media, Wikipedia
“Google it”
The Should we be afraid of Google?
Is Google taking over? You bet it is. The fact that in people’s vocabulary has changed to say “Google it” is a prime example. Anytime there is anything unanswered people resort to the internet as their primary location for information. But where do you think they go to look for it? They go to Google. There are a few exceptions to the rule that may go to Yahoo, like me, Ask Jeeves, MSN, etc. But primarily the phrase that pays is “Google it.” Personally I prefer Yahoo, perhaps because that was the first engine I was exposed to and that is also where my email account it. The funny thing is every other environment that I am in uses Google and while I am in that environment I use Google. But as soon as I am at home or doing personal research I go to Yahoo. Weird huh? I can’t explain it myself.
But Google has expanded sooooooooooooo much that it is taking over the internet. Should we be afraid of privacy matters? That is an important issue but according to The Economist, “Google has not betrayed the trust of its users over their privacy. If anything, it has been better than its rivals in standing up to prying governments.” But at the same time in The Search, John Battelle states, “We may share (private) information…(if) we conclude that we are required by law or have a good faith belief that access, preservation or disclosure of such information is reasonably necessary to protect the rights, property or safety of Google, its users or the public.” What this means is you need to only disclose information that you don’t mind being shared on the internet. But hasn’t that been instilled in us with all of the scammers anyway? I believe that although Google is expanding and possibly taking over within the next few years, we have a responsibility to use precautionary measures to protect ourselves. I would relate it to birth control pills, I know it is a little out there but most of the pills are somewhere between 98-99 percent accurate, well there is that 1 percent chance that you could get pregnant, now that may seem highly unlikely but there is still that chance. If you want to be 100 percent sure you should use another form of contraceptives. Well with the your email for example they can open it if they need to but will they, probably not, but just to be safe avoid posting things you do not wish to be public knowledge.
Add comment June 24, 2008
salfred
Tags: Google, privacy, The Economist, The Search
A Bill of Rights for Users of the Social Web????
A Bill of Rights for Users of the Social Web
Authored by Joseph Smarr, Marc Canter, Robert Scoble, and Michael Arrington
September 4, 2007
We publicly assert that all users of the social web are entitled to certain fundamental rights, specifically:
- Ownership of their own personal information, including:
- their own profile data
- the list of people they are connected to
- the activity stream of content they create;
- Control of whether and how such personal information is shared with others; and
- Freedom to grant persistent access to their personal information to trusted external sites.
Sites supporting these rights shall:
- Allow their users to syndicate their own profile data, their friends list, and the data that’s shared with them via the service, using a persistent URL or API token and open data formats;
- Allow their users to syndicate their own stream of activity outside the site;
- Allow their users to link from their profile pages to external identifiers in a public way; and
- Allow their users to discover who else they know is also on their site, using the same external identifiers made available for lookup within the service.
This is the proposed bill of right for users of the social web. Before I read the document I thought it was going to have a great deal of rules that would be out of the ordinary, but these “rights” are common sense. I feel that any individual should have the right to there own information after all it is their personal information. With so many horror stories of fraud I believe people are really cautious of what they put on the web to begin with. But for both those who are and who aren’t it should be up to there discretion who they share their information with. This will instill a certain level of assurance when entering information into the web. The three important terms used are “ownership,” “control,” “freedom” doesn’t that sound like common sense to you when it comes to your own information? The question I am having is how do we make people comply with these rules? How do we make them universal? This is a great movement in the right direction and if we as users can figure out a way to embed this into the social web we could feel a little more at ease when releasing personal information.
Add comment June 16, 2008
salfred
Tags: bill of rights, control. ownership, freedom, privacy, social web
The Long Tail Online Vs. Offline
In reading the Long Tail, by Chris Anderson, he describes how the conventional method of going into a store and purchasing something has shifted to the online world. In the online world he says there is something for everyone. He says there are different niches and now if you are searching for something in particular you do not have to go to a store to search for what you want you can get it online, nor does it have to take up floor space. Examples of this he uses are Amazon and iTunes who can sell almost as much as they want because they don’t have to deal with shelving stores. With this I got to thinking a little differently then sales products but instead I thought about cooking recipes. In the olden days people used recipes that had been passed down or they went out and bought a cookbook. Now with the long tail an ample supply of recipes can be found virtually. This not only saves space and time, rather than having thousands of cookbooks or papers lying around. You can simply go onto the internet and find the recipe and not only can you find the recipe but you can find different version of the same recipe and see which you like the best.
As a shop-a-holic, I personally agree that the long tail is a much better system. I love to shop and I prefer shopping online as opposed to going to the store because it is much easier to find what you want because you have everything at your finger tips and you can even compare prices. Often times I even if I plan to go shopping conventionally, I shop online on the stores website first. That way I have pre-selected what I want and don’t need to waste time.
In watching looking through some vlogs I went to Ask a Ninja witch was a funny blog and I feel that it would be better as a vlog than a blog because you can get the comedy more. When looking at WebbAlert’s vlog that was a little different, that was more like a news anchor, I felt like I was watching the news. Overall I feel that although vlogging can be highly entertaining to watch but I agree with Garrett Graff when he says that you can’t see if you are interested or not unless you see the whole vlog, whereas in a blog you can skim over it to find out. I would categorize vlogging more of something you may do on the weekends or at night after work and blogging something you can do at all times something more convenient.
Add comment June 13, 2008
salfred
Tags: online shopping, The Long Tail, vlogs
We the Media
For my first blog entry I am supposed to respond to the main points of Dan Gillmor’s Book We the Media and why they are important. A perfect example of “new media” is what I am currently doing, blogging about what I believe Gillmor thinks are the key ideas. All of my classmates and I have read the same material but if you look at each persons blog posts you will notice variations. Does that mean one person is correct and one person is not? No, it just means the ways we went about explain what is important and what is not is different. Gillmor’s key message I believe is highlighting the use of “new media” with tools such as blogging, the internet, and technology and creating a form of communication New media has created more of an interactive median compared too being fed information. This allows you to be the consumer and the producer at the same time. We the people are becoming the source of the media.
I feel that although the criticism behind it I feel “new media” is a great change, leaving news to the people. In the traditional days “big media” feeds the news and we as consumers have no choice but to accept what is being said and believing that is news. Not to mention they get to decipher what news will be giving to us and what will not. By being consumers and creators you can have a wider variation of information in comparison to the limited information being delivered to you. So you may think why do we need “big media” anymore? Well we still need a main credible source to deliver the news. That is the major flaw with the “new media.” Although we hope the information is credible it is not as reliable to me as “big media” information.
I feel this We the Media, was a great book that really outlined the up and coming changes that we as PR professionals will be facing. It is time to jump on board and stop trying to fight it.
Add comment June 9, 2008
salfred
Tags: big media, new media, social media
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