GIYF

Search Engine Society (Halavais, A. (2008). Search Engine Society: Search Engines, Search Divides, Social Search.) begins by mentioning how search engines are now thought of by our society as a kind of a cure all for the common question, and how we are now referring to machines before people when seeking answers. On almost a daily basis, whenever someone asks me a question I don’t know the answer to or don’t feel like explaining, I tell people to “ask the internet, the internet knows all”. The first chapter also covers what a search engine is, and comments that the term might be applied to smaller scale or less publicly available data storage units like a local hard drive. At first I disagreed with this notion, but, technically you are searching through data for a specific type of result, using an engine built to allow for this function, so the term seems to fit.

While I feel that niche and specialized search engines that focus in a specific area, like yellow pages, are currently popular and do a good job of providing information confined within a certain area of interest, I think that they will die out over the next couple of years. I believe that major search engines will only refine and develop more specific search offshoots, such as Google scholar is to Google. Why would people use multiple sites in order to find the information they are looking for when they could just go to one source they are familiar with? I also think that Google will move away from having a homepage for their search engine (www.google.com, although I think they will still keep it around) and will rely on search boxes built right into the browser’s GUI, or the Google tool bar. Also, it seems logical that Google will use a side search option that allows users to search on the side of their browser within a separate panel, rather than in an entirely new web page. When you think about what is displayed on a major search engine’s dynamically generated page after you perform a search, it could easily be condensed into a side panel and would still be perfectly readable, and more convenient, especially in this panel was collapsible and expandable. It is in this manner that I believe Google and other major search engines of the net will move away from their existence as a web page, and more towards being built into browser GUIs. We can already see the beginnings of this with Firefox (www.mozilla.com) utilizing a search engine box built into the browser.

The next exciting step to watch for is how search engines will continue to transform and better integrate into portable multimedia devices. Using an internet search engine on most cellular phones at the present can be a little rough and tedious, but will technology becoming cheaper, as it always does,  cell phone processors, memory, boards, buses, displays, etc. are all improving to the point where we can use them as miniature PCs. Sure there are already, and have been for some time, cell phones that allow you to browse the internet, use mobile messanging services, and of course, make phone calls, but I have yet to use the cell phone that allows me to do all of these things while making the claim “this is as fast and easy as using my desktop”, and I do believe we will get there. Portable media devices may even outdo desktop PCs in terms of ease of use because they demand it, the are used on the go. As the book mentions, location based technologies are being integrated into cell phones that allow search engines to display results who’s relevance is dependant upon your geographic location. With GPS systems becoming ever more popular, this is essential, as we will see this feature become standard in phones over the next 10 years. Search engines will need to recognize that you are using a mobile device, detect your location, which currently they can do via IP address, but not down to a 30 foot radius, whih also raises some security questions. There needs to be a trust system built into portable media devices that determines which sites to lend GPS information to, or else any website out there, or more importantly, and individual using the net, could easily track your ever footstep. The search engines who excel in this area, providing speed, a user friendly interface, and the most relevant results, will dominate. This is one more reason why niche and context specific search engines will die out, is because users will not want to establish trusts all over the internet with their portable media devices, they will find it much easier to trust one site, and then use it’s many specific offshoots as mentioned above.

Outline

Authors:
Michele Aulenti
Jessica Fine
Derek Varga

Introduction

1. What are the current tribulations and dilemmas in computer mediated dating?

2. What are the positives resulting from online dating?

3. What are the current issues and circumstances in face to face dating?

The Bias of Online Dating

1. One of the major problems in online dating has been predators and pedophiles preying on young adolescents and young adults.

2. Many Internet users lie about anything from their appearance, age, geographical location, income, anything in order to enhance an opportunity to date someone online, thereby deceiving the person they are trying to court.

3. With face to face dating, there is a more immediate connection with the person, where as the Internet almost acts as a filter between the dating participants.

4. By putting personal information and pictures online, protection of privacy and staying safe has become a real risk factor among the online dating scene.

5. What are the methods of online dating and how do they differ between adolescents and adults? How does exposure to different types of applications or websites (AOL chats, match.com, etc.) sway the way they choose to date?

Coverage does Matter

1. Accuracy is of utmost importance when covering sensitive issues, such as pedophilia in the world of online dating. It’s important in order to warn and not scare those who are interesting in the online dating scene.

2. By revealing a wealth of information about online dating, facts will be extracted in order to shed light upon associated stigma.

3. Information about online dating seems to be more accurate and relevant in published articles and blogs, rather than books, since the subject is relatively new.

4. A comparison between how much emphasis is put on the potential positive results of using an online dating service versus the emphasis on the potential negatives (in the form of warnings, etc.)

5. A comparison between how much emphasis is put on the potential positive results of being apart of face-to-face dating versus the emphasis on the potential negatives (in the form of warnings, etc.)

6. Ending relationships online versus face-to-face relationships.

Articles available about our subject of online dating

1. There is a significant amount of information available in shorter online scholarly sources.

2. Many published books have been found which can aid in putting this research paper together.

3. The longest articles are in the areas of managing impressions online and the reasons why people choose to online date.

4. Some of the most recent articles mention the popularity of online dating within dating websites.

5. Online dating coverage has become very popular since the emergence of popular sites such as match.com for example, and how people within our society have been successful with these types of sites.

Computer mediated online dating versus face-to-face dating

1. What are the major differences?

2. What are the dangers?

3. What are the advantages?

4. How does online dating work? Do users prefer chat rooms versus registered dating sites?

5. How does face-to-face dating work? Do people meet at work? Clubs? Bars? Libraries?

6. How fast does an online relationship progress as compared to a face-to-face relationship?

7. How do one-night encounters compare in online versus in real life?

8. At what point does online dating move to a first face-to-face encounter?

9. What is it like for teenagers to date online? What about teens dating face-to-face?

10. What is it like for adults to date online? What about adults dating face-to-face?

Risks and Responsibilities

1. Do the businesses that own these websites have just as much of a responsibility (or should they), to ensure the safety and privacy of their clients?

2. What common cautionary measures do online and internet dating share?

3. There might be an issue with the importance of information the articles have regarding our subject.

4. Examination of the attempts of online networks and dating sites to separate minors from adults, and their effectiveness.

5. Privacy policies and agreements of online networks and dating sites that users agree to when they sign up.

Conclusion

1. The full truth, the good and the bad, about online dating will be revealed in this white paper.

2. The vast differences between adults and teens dating online will be exposed.

3. The risks will be made prevalent about interacting online with strangers and possible pedophiliacs.

4. Face-to-face dating will be compared with online to show the similarities and differences, in hopes of raising the stigma of online dating.

5. Online works provide a good gauge of coverage, but we are not using these sources as prime sources.

6. Will our topic become more prevalent in published books in the future?

7. What is the outcome of online dating participants? Who (teenagers or adults) will be apart of this outcome?

8. What approaches will be taken if matters of online dating will become a problem in the future (e.g. pedophiles and privacy)?

From cell phones to personal fabricators

In the first chapter of his book Smart Mobs, Reingold, .H (Rheingold, H. (2002). Shibuya epiphany (pp. 1-28). Smart mobs. New York: Perseus.) discusses the current thumb tribes and cell phone (keitai) scene in Nippon. He discusses how in these urban settings, text messaging in the communication medium of choice for the younger crowds, and also how most of them are now internet equipped, though most teens do not think of it as the internet. The i-mode, Nippon’s wireless service provider allows for this degree of texting/mobile internet use. The author calls the i-mode “Japan’s singularly successful wireless internet service.” I took this to mean that the i-mode was Japanese citizen’s only option for wireless internet service? I know that wired internet service providers would be able to have their internet made wireless via access points, but, I am not sure if the i-mode covers all/most of Japan making it the most convenient option. The story of text messaging teens in Shibuya relates to the book’s title or overall theme in that it describes what this new technology has allowed for in terms of communication and meeting up. The keitai give Japanese youth a way to be private, and organize without anyone else around them being privy to it. Before keitai, they would have to communicate via a land line in their home, having their conversations picked up on by anyone within range of their voice. The author also describes how the plans of these youths also often change several times throughout the day and evolve via keitai communication as the day goes on. The author also examines the role of cell phones in Finnish culture, and notes how they are more like an extension of the hand than a fashion symbol like in Shibuya. He also discusses a new term “swarming” which describes mass collaborative efforts to meet up and organize social events via new technology such as cell phones. I also found the notion of being able to purchase things from vending machines with your cell phone to be particularly interesting. Wy not everything? I would love to walk into a store and use my cell phone like a credit card. Granted, security measures would need t be put into place so that if you cell phone were stolen it would not allow some to drain your bank account. I could see finger print recognition working for this, or retinal scan. I predict that laptops and cell phone will eventually merge and one singular (no pun intended) communication/life remote device will emerge. I see this happening over the next 20 years.

The behavior described in this chapter, with respect to Shibuya teenagers, seems to parallel that of American youths’ behaviors. I can see many similarities between the two in that many American teens prefer to communicate via text message rather than land line phone calls or even cell phone calls. I can see why though, it is more private, wastes less time, it is generally cheaper, and you can text message pretty much anywhere in a discrete manner as to not attract attention, especially useful in school. I can also see swarming present in our culture. I’m not a teenager anymore but I still consider myself part of the cell phone generation. I text message in order to organize nightly plans, meet with friends or fellow students, or just send pointless comments to a good friend or significant other throughout the day. I might not send 80 text messages a day like the members of the thumb tribes of Shibuya, but I definitely exhibit the same behavior on a smaller scale.

In Czerwinski’s Digital memories in an era of ubiquitous computing and abundant storage (Czerwinski, M., Gage, D.W., Gemmell, J., Marshall, C., Pérez-Quiñonesis, M., Skeels, et al (2006). Digital memories in an era of ubiquitous computing and abundant storage. Communications of the ACM, 49(1), 45-50.) he discusses the idea of wearing a camera that would video tape our life daily and give us a digital record of our memories. This idea of having a digital record of our memories is flawed in that memories consist of emotion, perception, mood, and many other factors which are not captured in video. They may be evoked while watching the video, but it is not the same as simply remembering an occasion. The author also discusses the notion of having biometric devices attached to use that would process different data about our biological status, such a temperature. He gives the example of an older gentlemen being able to tell that a fever is coming via a device attached to him that reads his temperature. I found this particular example to be a little far fetched in terms of it’s practicality. If someone has a fever and is sick or getting sick, there are signs, not only visible to yourself but other’s around you. Unless the elderly person was living alone and was so detached from reality that they could never even recognize that they were not feeling well, I don’t see it being of much use (even in this example, if the senor told them they had a temperature, chances are they would not react accordingly). I really did not see the need for a record of our memories, which was the premise of this writing, since we usually currently record the ones we consider to be important, unless they occur spontaneously. What I would however find extremely useful would be to have cameras in cell phone, that actually took decent quality pictures and videos, are very easy to use, are quick, stream photos and video to a PC or server, and are small in size. You might be saying that these already exist, which is half true (i have one), put I have yet to see the camera that has all of these capabilities and provides a quick, smooth, easy experience for the user; I have yet to meet the person who is perfectly happy with their cell phone camera, they are always lacking in some way or another. If cell cameras are refined to this level in the next few years though, which I believe they will be, I believe that this will ultimately be the device we use for capturing “memories” on a daily basis. I just don’t think people (most people…) really care to record every moment of their life and are generally turned off by that idea at this point in time. Granteed, there are always exceptions and I’m sure some people would go nuts over having a head mounte camera to capture their ever waking moment. The author also mentions dangers inherant in this type of technology, in that people could essentially break into your memories and steal a record of them, your memories could be sepinad for court use, and we may record things that we do not wish to remember.

Gershenfeld, N. discusses (Gershenfeld, N. (2005). Fab (Selection). New York: Basic Books.) his research and development experience at MIT with respect to personal fabrication machines. These machines would basically create anything that has mass by arranging atoms in a specific configuration in order to reproduce from atomic blueprint whatever it was that you desired. The first thing I thought of while reading this article is recycling.When we recycle something, let’s say a plastic milk bottle, we take an old milk bottle that may be used, damaged, etc., break it down, and recreate a new bottle from the same material. In re fabrication, we are taking atoms and rearranging them to create something from scratch. One point the author fails to make (please correct me if he mentioned it) is that you would need to continuously supply of material which could be broken down in order to create these desired items. The law of conservation of mass states that you can not create or destroy matter (Nasīr al-Dīn al-Tūsī (1201-1274)). Therefore, you are always recycling something else in order to create something new, which would essentially take care of waste materials. Another positive of using these types of machines would be that everything would be built with atomic precision, in that there would theoretically never be defective items produced by one of these machines since they would all be exact duplicates created from the same atomic blueprint (as discussed by the author). Computers and other precision part and devices woul be built perfectly, with their only possible area for flaw being in the original design. If this new type of neo-alchemy being described was actually utilized by the general public on a massive scale, when coupled with the internet, they would essentially destroy most of the goods and services industry, turning most everyone into a DIYS (Do It Your Selfer).

My computer broke…

Bibliography

The bibliography is attached to this post bibliography

Blogging = $

The first few chapters of Naked Conversations (Scoble, R. & Israel, S. (2006). Naked Conversations. Hoboken: John Wiley & Sons, pp. 1-62) were well written and fun to read. What made the beginning of the book so enjoyable was the manner in which it was written, which was in the form of a story, focusing on Microsoft and how they attempted to achieve a more human image through the use of blogging. Although the writing may not be as deep as a “real” story, it did have some interesting characters and describe the resolution, or partial resolution, of a problem over time. The whole point of the story though was to demonstrate how the use of blogs can be beneficial to both a company and it’s customers/consumer market. Blogs allow for the human element of a company to come through and be visible to the public, as well as allow for informal two way communication between the parties. This is a valuable resource for companies that the authors claim will be essential to ensuring their success in the future. They put emphasis on how blogging should be used strictly for communication in the form of feedback, and not include advertising and marketing ploys. Company blogs are in themselves a form of advertising though since they are promoting the company and their image.

I think that company blogs are a good idea, and should be utilize by all companies since they are low cost and allow for direct interaction between company and consumer. I think that it does indeed promote a positive image of the company that says that they care about their customers and want to know their thoughts and opinions. I would not put company blogs on as high a pedestal as the authors do though, in that I don’t believe it will be as essential as they claim over the coming years. Also, I think only certain types pf comapanies could really use blogs to their full potential. Blogs should be set up for companies who consumers are really interested in and care about, or at least exist within the realm of an area of great interest to a significant amount of consumers. Basically, if it’s an area customers do research in. Some examples would be tech comapies (as mentioned), fashion, sports, music, game, and movie related companies, basically any area consumers are already interested in. Otherwise, I do not see companies drawn a large amount of consumers into reading about a company that exists within an area they had no previous interest in, even if they like/purchase their products. I can’t see myself posting a comment on or reading Charman’s blog about their new type of toilet paper…although that new quilted stuff is fantastic. I just can’t see the consumer interest.

Blogs to riches (Thompson, C. (2006). Blogs to Riches. New York Magazine, February 20. 26-35.) ocused mainly on blog popularity, it’s difficulty to achieve, and it’s causes. Th article describes how there is only a very small portion of blogs out there that receive high amounts of traffic (from the article I would categorize high traffic as in the hundreds of thousands of views per day). Even if a blog is essentially just as good as a more popular blog on the same topics, or even if the lesser known blog is pretty much a clone of it’s parent blog, it will often still not draw nearly as many visitors, and this is largely due to how many other sites link to that blog. These higher traffic volume blogs are referred to as A-list websites by Thompson, with the lowlier ones being B and C list. The article stresses the importance of “inbound links”, which are links on other websites that direct users to your website. Basically every time an outbound link is placed on a site, readers are diverted to another website. One can easily see why having tens of thousands of inbound links is the biggest contributer to an A-list site’s success. Thompson does mention though that inbound links are not always the only means for achieving success in the world of blogging, and gives the example of fleshbot, which is an adult blog which many people would not want to openly admit they visit, or link to, yet it has become very successful.

Plato, Daigo, and Wallstreet

“Play is older than older than culture”, a quote which is repeated through out Huizinga’s book ((1950). Nature and significance of play as a cultural phenomenon ) seems to emphasize how play is a characteristic of many living things, and therefore precedes culture. He spends half of the first 27 pages of his book discussing what play actually is, how it is defined, what it’s purpose is, and how we play. He notes some possible reasons for play though including the need to discharge abundant energy, it is an immitative instinct, it fulfills a need to relax, and that it provides, training for real life scenarios. Despite these reasons for it’s existence, Huizinga tells us that play exists to serve something else, or fulfill a great need.

Huizinga tries to determine what play is from a relational perspective, in that he compares it to things such as laughter and non-seriousnesses, saying that they are related but not synonymous. He also tries to characterize play by defining some traits which always apply to it such as that it is always voluntary, play exists within a definite time span, play begins and ends at distinct times, play exists within a certain defined space, and play has a defined set of rules. I disagree though in that I don’t think play exists within a definate time spawn, I think it can be in spontanious spurts, and that play exists within a distinct space; play can start in one place, and move into another physical space without breaking play. I see where he was coming from when he said that play has a set of rules, because I do believe that there is a general unspoken set of guidelines, limits, and social norms when playing, but not a strict ridged set of rules, unless it is an organized game.

The second half of the first chapter is dedicated to examining how play relates to rituals, with a specific focus on the rituals of “savages”. Huizinga describes how rituals are rooted in play essentially because they involve acts that that do not affect the “real world”, but instead the participants know that what they are experiencing is in a sense false. It seemed to me through the second half of this chapter that the author really want to apply this concept to major religions, and even hinted at it, bu kept shying away from it, maybe out of fear? He also quotes Plato to put a positive spin on things, basically stating that we are God’s play things, so we should act as such, and play, because only God is worth of true seriousness.

“God alone is worthy of supreme seriousness, but man is God’s play thing, and that is the best part of him. Therefore every man and woman should live accordingly”

Anfrew Hinton’s (ASIS&T Bulletin, August/September.) bulletin was much more directly related to video games in tht it discussed their evolution as multi user online environments. He describes a concept of how we essentially have 3 iving spaces, home, work, and a frequented place of non-seriousness, and how this third place is becoming MMO environments for many people. He writes about how Quake was really the first MMO game, and how it was so successful not because of the quality of the actual game itself, but because of the community that was able to develop around the game due to it being left open. When I say open I mean that users had the ability to create their own content for the game and even redesign certain parts of the game itself, then share that with the world (community).If I had to make a comparison I would say that Quake did for gaming what the web 2.0 did for the internet. It put massive amounts of control into the peoples’ hands.

World of Warcraft, another game mentioned int he bulletin achieved enourmous success for the exact opposite reasons. The game does not allow for any user alterations of generated content, but instead relies on the community within the game as the main source of appeal. The community did not develop because of how the game allowed for user contribution, but instead provided the means for users to get to know each other better through the capabilities of the game itself, such as voice chat. In WOW, Hinton says, “It turns out that a player’s level and in-game wealth end up being secondary to the personal character traits of the person behind the character in the social milieu of the game world.”

At the end of the bulletin Hinton also raises some interesting points about ubiquitous computing in that ubiquitous computing has become such an integral part of our lives, put we now have virtual worlds emerging, and the two are starting to overlap at certain points. e gives the example of someone in real life talking on their cell phone to someone’s avatar in second life. This makes me seriously wonder what the future holds in the way of communication and social interaction via technological mediums. Will our digital representations of ourselves become just as or close to as important as our real life ones?

I pose this question to anyone who reads up to this point, is it proper to say that you “live” in one of thee MMO environments. I don’t mean in terms of being alive, but, more so existing. Do you extend, temporarily tansfer, or not have existance in this MMO worlds?

With the advent of these MMO style games, many gamers are not going out to the store and picking up a CD or cartridge in order to play the game they are most interested in, they are not buying a product, they are simply downloading software then paying (often monthly) for an ongoing experience, keeping up the payments to keep the experience alive. Pine, B.J., & Gilmore, J.H discuss the concept of commodities, goods, services, and experiences in their book (1999). The Experience Economy. Cambridge: Harvard Business School Press. I feel as though their first chapter relates on online gaming in that games are, and have been, moving in the direction of creating an experience for a “guest”, that will leave them with something memorable, and an insentive to either continue paying for that experience, or to continue buying games of a particular series based soley on how it made them feel while they were playing, as opposed to how entertained they were. Games are one industry that is not in danger of becoming commoditized, prouctized, or any other “tized” that may have been mentioned, because they are already sitting right on top of the currently desirable by creating these experiences.

With many of the current online games, the companies who produce them have to put little effort into keeping their users entertained and making sure that they have a desirable experience because all of the users are providing that service for each other. The company just has to develop and maintain the virtual environment, and the whole experience production is handled by those paying for it, as opposed to the Disney land example the authors give, that is constantly challenged to innovate and utilize the newest hardware to push the limits and provide some cutting edge experience to it’s guests.

I am genuinely excited about the future of virtual worlds, mmo games, ubiquitous computing, and collaborative user generated virtual experiences in general, and seeing how all the lines that divide them slowly start to fade away until you have something completely new and unique unto itself.

Second Life

I created a second life account as well as a virtual self/avatar. I tried to make my avatar look as close to my real self as possible but that proved rather difficult. The facial features seemed very rigid and I could not get them to smooth out the way I wanted to. Also I could not achieve the texture I wanted for my hair, I know the program allows for custom textures, but, I could not really figure those out. I think I used a wood texture for everything just so it did not look plain. Upon creating my character I was dumped off on some tiny island filled with a few other new players. I eventually figured out how to bring up a world map and “teleport” to a new destintion. One feature I liked in Second life was the ability to fly, which saves time and effort when trying to get from here to there, when there might be difficult to reach, high up, or a far away place. After escaping the newbie island I headed over to what seemed like a club. The club had techno music blasting and people dancing, also, I noticed that the music was being streamed in from the internet once I heard a plug for the radio station.  I tried to talk to a few people but they ignored me and did not seem very interestedd in chatting with a stranger. Eventually I figured out how to dance (there are a few pre-set dance modes), bound the dance modes to keys like macros, and rotated them.

Overall though I found the game to be very laggy and the rendering of the enviroment to be of poor quality. Also, it was very easy to glitch the game and end up in a wall, underwater, or in some other form of black hole. I did not really understand the whole currency system, how to create or use things, and I found anything except basic movement to be a challenge and not at all intuitive.

Proposal

This proposal will focus on a current problem within the relm of sociable media.  We’ve chosen to specifically cover the dangers of online dating.  Derek Varga, Michele Aulenti and Jessica Fine will be co-authoring the final research paper.  In addition, we will conduct research, put together a presentation and author all other documents related to this project.  Rather than dividing tasks among group members, we will work synergistically as a team to accomplish the goals of this project.  This will allow for each member of the group to have an active role in every task and be familiar with all of the resources.  This will result in a well rounded presentation. 

The problem we will be addressing is the dangers of online dating.  We will focus on online predators specifically.  This topic has become more and more relevant in society today.  It has become a problem for any and everyone using the Internet today.  With sources like myspace.com and facebook.com, most people are displaying their personal information online for all to have access.  While young teens use the sites to keep in touch with friends, older predators may be using their information and preying on them, unknowingly.  Our goal is to cover the topic very specifically so this information may be directly passed onto this young age group and they can protect themselves accordingly.

The immediate audience for this presentation will be the Interactive Communication Introduction class, however our final paper will target an audience of mainly young pre-teens and teens.  Since this paper will be written at a college level, we suspect this would be read by educators of young teens, who would then use our white paper as a source to teach. 

We have had contact with danah boyd who gave the names of several people who she considered experts on the topic of online dating.  The two contacts danah gave me are Andrew Fiore and Nicole Ellison.  They were very helpful in providing their research papers as well as links used.  From these links and articles, we stumbled upon a few other authors we are now contacting.  They are Judith Donath, whom we’ve read this semester, Dan Ariely, a professor at MIT and Jeana Frost, also involved with the MIT online dating project. 

The articles we will rely on will be “Online Match-Making with Virtual Dates” written by Martha Lagace which talks about how Technology influences relationships, virtual dates and how couples communicate online, and the interfaces of dating websites and what should be improved. The next article is called “Risky Business: Why people Feel Safe in Sexually Explicit On-Line Communication” written by Diane F. Witmer which talks about fantasizing in Cyberspace and how embarrassing CMC can be and why people feel secure when doing such actions, how people communicate in the computer age by using this medium they can communicate with other people by any sorts of communication i.e. by e-mail or within social groups, Rights and Responsibilities: Thorny questions for system administrators and users which mentions about privacy and how people need to know their rights and responsibilities of keeping their passwords or usernames private and finally it mentions seeking solutions to how to know what privacy is and what is good privacy. The last article we will be using is called “The Emergence of Romantic Relationships online” written by Main Findings which talks about percentages and information about people who do online date and if they are heterosexual or just single and the article tells us the differences.

The top academic journal or industry publication that relates to the work we will be addressing is called “My date with a fraudster; Ex-colleagues. Sex Pests. Oh, and conmen. Welcome online dating” written by Catherine Murphy talks about the dating scene and how fraudsters are becoming more popular with on-line dating. This especially happens in Ireland.

A website that relates to they key ideas we will be focusing on is http://www.isafe.org/, which focuses on educating students, teachers, law enforcement, parents, and others on current internet safety strategies. The website makes use of various resources such as chat rooms, virtual training, and even contests in order to educate on principles of internet safety.

There are several key ideas that will play particularly important roles in this project. One of these is that of determining what type of personal information is safe for youths to publicly display on the internet. Another is how youths should safely interact with those who they meet on the internet and what precautions they should take when making new contacts. Finally, we will focus on what type of action parents and educators should take if they suspect of confirm that a youth’s safety may be at risk due to a contact they have established over the internet.

Our plan for assembling the annotated bibliography is simply to keep track of all the readings and sources.  We will do so by keeping a running text file which contains the names, titles, links, and any other pertinent information about the resources. This will make for a quick assembly with relative ease. 

Research Plan

Research Plan

The Week of October 29th: Individually we will research articles and be ready to collaborate the information we have found to put it in to our Annotated Bibliography on Saturday.

The Week of November 5th: Individually we will work on the outline by assigning each member of the group a section of the outline to work on by themselves and by Tuesday of that week we will meet as a group to discuss what we have done.

The Weeks of November 12th, 19th, 26th and December 3rd: We will meet as a team and work on our White Paper and presentation.  We will finalize and revise on these dates.

Schedule Document

Thursday, October 18, 2007: We prepared a research plan for how as a group we will collaborate the material found so we can get a head start on our next assignment, the Annotated Bibliography. Each member of our group will be responsible for finding and sorting through research.  Finally, we worked on the proposal so it will be ready to blog tomorrow.

Saturday, November 3, 2007: We will meet today with our articles that we have found and produce our annotated bibliography. Our hope is to have all our research done and start compiling the articles to use in our White Paper format.

Responsibilities

Individually each of us will research information about our White Paper topic.  When we find articles and information, we will collaborate as a group and discuss what we have found to see how it pertains to our topic. Each of us will contact at least one author by e-mail to see if they have any other information that we might not know of. For example, we contacted danah boyd and to see if she knew of any other authors besides herself who wrote about this topic.

Agenda

I will be meeting with Jessica and Michelle on Thursday of this week in order to begin planning out the details for our project. This will include going over our individual responsibilities, discussing how we will go about writing the white paper, our presentation, finalizing our proposal, and going over research methods. Durring this time we will refine the scope of our project, deciding which areas to focus on the most, and how much attention to pay to each. We will also be putting together a schedule which includes goals and deadlines to help us keep organized. We will be meeting in the Quinnipiac library. The meeting will take place at 5:00pm.

Second Life….Done Right by Sony!

This fall Sony will be allowing Playstation 3 owners to log on to a massive 3D environment called “Home”. Home will allow users to create a user customized 3D rendering of themselves, own a virtual apartment, interact with other gamers, play games, watch movies live in the environment, display gaming trophies awarded for achievement in game play, and download content such as clothing, furniture, and games. Oh, and it’s in HD, free, and very very pretty… Video Linkage

Citizen Journalism

In his article Twenty years of personalization all about the daily me, Walter Bender discusses his work at MIT attempting to construct a way for people to basically customize their daily news, with relevance to their personal interest. He discusses several applications that were put together in order do just this, all of which seemed to focus heavily on geographical data about a user and customizing their news based on information about people from a particular region as well. One application that was mentioned was called Fishwrap, that reminded me of a cross between RSS aggregator and an open (public) blog. It provided news in a variety of areas customized to a users interests, but also gave them different views on political and controversial subjects, much like debate in a blog or forum. Overall though I would say the programs are most easily comparable with RSS aggregators, which essential did the same thing as the software he and his student developed. I originally thought that RSS may have developed out of his work at MIT since it is so close to what he was describing, but, according to Wikipedia.com it was originally created by Netscape. From what I can infer from the article, Bender essentially wanted these applications to act as automatic editors, which sorted through news and determined factors such as relevance, importance, contextual significance, and how many articles on a subject to present, and in what order. I do not think we are quite at this level yet with RSS feeds, although they are growing more customizable in terms of what specific content we want to let through. The technology has not yet reached a level of intelligence yet to the point where it can process, sort, and present information to us nearly as well as we could do ourselves. The doppleganger program mentioned tries to accomplish this though by observing a user’s trends over time and feeding them news based on what it “learns”.

With so much information available and the means to decide which news we want to be fed on a very specific level, with regard to interest, it may be likely that we start to devote all of our time spent reading news to reading only about a few immediate areas of interest. This could potentially cause us to miss other news which may not pertain to one of our main areas of interest, but could have a large impact on society and be of importance to us. In the article entitled Democracy and Filtering, Cass R. Sunstein argues just this, worried that the more we customize our news intake, the less variety we will have in our areas of exposure, including exposure to traditional news stories (aka the stories major media outlets are covering). I could not help but agree with her since I find this notion holding true for my own habits personally. I find myself referring to an ever increasing amount of sources for news on a daily basis, but the more I try to customize my new feeds and the more sources I include, the areas in which I am receiving news on seems to shrink. I definitely do not think that this holds true for everyone , but, it makes sense, the notion that the more you can get exactly the news you want on the areas you are most interested in and in greater quantity, the less you will venture outside those areas to get news on other topics. On the other hand though, I feel as though when we are exposed to news in areas that lie generally outside of our typical areas of interest, we research that story further when we are on the internet, as opposed to if we had seen it on TV or read it in the paper. The reason for this is that additional coverage is so easy to obtain, we simply shift out fingers quickly and more information is provided.

Online Communities

Sunstein also makes mention of an observation that when people organize in online in communities centered around specialized area of interest, people seem t take more extreme standpoints, and basically take things a level or two further. From my own experience this seems to hold true in most cases, and I believe it is mainly due to three factors, being A. there is buzz or excitement generated by the group when these like minded people discuss their similar viewpoints, B. They feel safe, they can take their opinions to the next level and be less wary of ridicule or other criticizing them, and C. Because they are now in an environment full of these like minded people, they feel they have to distinguish how their views differer from other in the group, stressing certain aspects of their overall opinion.

New media for receiving the news such as blogs, allow users to be both the consumer and producers, but still emulate traditional properties of other media, in that an editor is doing all of the filtering, then reporting the news, an others are consuming it, and commenting on it. It is true that this method allows for a much higher degree of interaction than media such as broadcast or newspaper, but I do not believe that we take on the roles of consumer and producer at the same time for the reasons listed above. One news source which does allow people to play the role of both the editor and the consumer at the exact same time though is Wikinews. Wikinews essentially consists of articles which are originally posted by a user or users, then edited, reshaped, clarified, and added on to by other users who are at the same time being informed by what they are reading. In his work entitiled Wikinews: The next generation of alternative online news, Alex Bruns attempts to explain why people are turning to sources such as Wikinews as a news source, citing the centralization of major traditional media sources, which do not give multiple perspectives on the issues they are reporting on. One of the things that these major news sources do have going for them though is that they are often more objetive in their reporting that online bloggers, who may take a firm stance on an issue and be highly opinionated. Wikinews attempts to take the strengths form both of these competing news sources though, in that it offers multiple perspectives since the editing of the news is open to the entire world, and it also attempts to remain as objective as possible.

Team and Project Management

Conventional Teams

The concept of a team itself presents it’s own inherent challenges since you are expecting a group of people, who may or may not know/worked with each other, to perform together and cooperate in order to produce something or to achieve an end goal. People are not carbon copy machines, and therefore are very different ethically, emotionally, in terms of energy level, and in virtually ever other aspect imaginable. A conventional team, that is a team physically present together most of the time they are working, requires a set of guidelines for team harmony, productivity, and growth. Virtual teams, or teams who’s members are not physically present for the majority of the time they are working together, require the same guidelines, but modified for the different working conditions.

While some teams stay banded for long periods of time, others exist only for brief periods, making it exceedingly difficult for members to establish trust in their team mates, thus ultimately leading them to a high level of productivity. In his book entitled Building a high-performance project team,Verzah ((2005). Building a high-performance project team. The fast forward MBA in project management. New York: Wiley.)(Source) tells us that a team consists of “a group of people working interdependently to produce an outcome for which they hold themselves mutually accountable”. Chapter 10 of his books seems very much ortiented towards team leaders, and serves as a guide for them to be able to effectively manage, improve, and nurture their team. This chapter seems very well put together and thought out, with many step by step frameworks, diagrams, and analogies to help you better understand the material. He really stresses the importance of how a leader should create the type of environment the team feels comfortable working in, and furthering the professional relationships between members. I have worked in leaderless teams before and had successful results, but, I do agree with him in that having a person dedicated to advancing the team does help to motivate the members and build trust. I thought his idea of having a celebration after a project is completed as a final step was a very important concept, and I believe that having an informal gathering before a major project is started can be just as important. I remember when I was working for a design company in New Haven as part of a team, our leader took us all out for mini golf before we started a 3 month long project, and a very nice dinner after it was completed. The initial meeting helped me to bond with the other members, and the dinner afterwards kind of solidified the team and made us really reflect on what we accomplished.

Some good points that Verzuh made which I feel are worth mentioning are that a leader sets the motivation and energy level for the team. If a team leader is not energetic or does not seem to be fully motivated, the team will reflect that in their own attitudes. Also, really involving the team and getting their opinions on as many aspects of a project as is reasonable, helps to pull the team into the project and really give them a sense of ownership. Also, meeting with the client and having them get involved in meetings really gives the team a good sense of professionalism. In my experience, I have found that team leaders who can be friendly and down to earth with you, but not too laid back, really help to motivate the team. If you let a team leader like this own, you feel as though you have not only let down your leader, but also a peer.

Virtual Teams

Virtual teams are inherently at a disadvantage since they are not physically present in the same place when they work together, and are therefor not able to communicate, interact, and experience each others presences in a non-mediated fashion. This makes it harder to build trust as a team and develop a sense of who your other team mates actually are. The team also lacks a sense of identity, which Lipnack and Stamps (Working smart: a web book for virtual teams (pp. 189-222). In Virtual teams: reaching across space, time, and organizations with technology. New York: Wiley.)(Source) mention in their web book Virtual teams: reaching across space, time, and organizations with technology, for which the authors suggest coming up with a team name or identity. They also stress the importance of being goal oriented, deciding what the purpose of your project is, and building a team around that, rather than trying to do what you can with a given team.

Constant communication is key when working with a virtual team and one should take advantage of every available medium in order to better relay thoughts and ideas. The authors suggested having a roster with the team members names and responsibilities on it, but also several contacts, so that team members could get in touch with each other with relative ease. Also, as certain factors change such as resources, number of team members, or finances, the project should be altered dynamically along with the goals and tasks of the team. Virtual teams shoul be heavily task oriented in that each member is solely responsible for the completion of a specific tasks and goals to avoid confusion, which is more prevalent in virtual teams.

Overall, Verzuh’s reading on convention teams seem to focus mainly on “growing” a team, getting them to the point where you want them, and then maintaining them at that level and how to deal with any compromises to the integrity of the team that might arise. On the other hand, Lipnack and Stamps book seemed to focus mainly on keeping a virtual team alive, through the use of good communication, a greater focus on individual purpose and responsibilities, and information accessibility.

!!! Killing in Burma !!!

CNN Video Coverage (Image from Time.com)

Protesters, journalists, and others are under attack by the military in Burma. Monks seem to be the main target of the military at this point because they are so vast in numbers, and are very well organized. The internet has also been shut down in Burma, from what I understand this has been accomplished via multiple firewalls. Some bloggers have managed to tunnel, hack, or otherwise sneak their way through to get their blogs posted, displaying pictures and videos of the events. With the internet now shut down though, communication has been made much more difficult. I invite everyone to draw as much attention to this issue as possible. Many organizations are also wearing the color red on Fridays to raise awareness. Trouble between the people and the government, especially the military is nothing new to this region, but, this is the first I really read about it, so, I figured I’d spread the word.

More images

ありがとう 日本

 Technology

…………………… Sony had an “underground” release of it’s new PSP hand held system today, and when I say underground I mean there was a great deal of confusion about the actual release date (I got 4 different answers from a local gamestop). No one is really quite sure why sony did not try to build hype around the release of the new system, or maybe leaving everyone in the dark was an attempt at just that. The new PSP has many features which the older one did not have, including being slimmer, lighter, quicker load times, a video out cable, and customizable interface themes. I won’t be picking one of these up for a while, I’m perfectly content with my own older model for the time being.

I work with strangers

The Web 2.0

The internet revolution is gaining momentum and quick with this rise of the “web 2.0″, in which everything is interactive, social, spawns communities, and is free to use. That mentality does not hold true for all of the sites on the new web, but it does for many of the popular widely used ones, and serves to contrast the “web 1.0″, which contained mostly static pages which informed, but did not allow for any great degree of social interaction. I remember being fascinated with the web at age 13 and wanting desperately to have my own website so I could write and post whatever I wanted on a global network. I picked up an HTML 4.0 book at Barnes and Nobles and began coding in notepad. After about 2 weeks of solid effort, I had a page with an introduction, a bio, and several randomly placed pictures of my favorite comic book characters. I also remember searching the web and finding many similar, just as poorly designed, websites made by fans of pretty much anything popular. They were all hosted by ISPs, or some free hosting company that threw ads all over your page, like Angelfire. I feel less special now that everyone I know has about 12 “web pages”, mainly consisting of blogs and network sites. What the web 2.0 really did was give not only allow people to view sites, but to manipulate them, add to them, subtract from them, in some way alter them, and to do so in a way that was centered around interaction and communities. Peer collaboration is that same interaction, but with a purpose, a goal, or visible result.

Mediated vs. Non Mediated Communication

In the past 15 years there have been many advances in information and communication technology which allow us to communicate via new media, at vary speeds, all with differnt levels of formality and types of etiquette. Each media is often used for a different purpose as well, such as videos on the web for the purpose of review, and text messaging for quick trivial communications. Each media has also spawned whole new sets of “social cues” (Donath, J.(2004). Sociable Media. In W.S. Bainbridge (ed.), Encyclopedia of Human-Computer Interaction. Great Barrington, Mass.: Berkshire Publishing.) which we use to communicate with in different forms of these mediums. Donath notes the advent of “emoticons”, which are used in text based media, and consist of standard characters, and make a symbol which convey meaning, often emotion. Donath also mentions how the speed at which the communication takes place determines the level of formality in the message itself. She also states that Asynchronus media, or media in which communication does not take place simultaneously between parties, responses are also more formal. I do not fully agree with this though since technologies such as teleconferencing, video sessions, and instant messaging client are used formally in the business environment and still maintain a high level of formality. Donath hints at an important point though about all these new communication technologies in that we have the ability to communicate simultaneously with many people whom we know, yet be physically alone, and also to be surrounded by people physically and yet know no one. When are you more alone, or in greater company?

Out with traditional models, in with the new

The web as we know it today allows us to collaborate and produce with others ike never before. Everything from software to encyclopedias (http://www.wikipedia.com) is being produced by web users all over the world who do not know each other personally but share a common goal or interest. Tapscott refers to this process as “peer production” (Tapscott, D. & Williams, A. (2006). Wikinomics (Intro & cap. 1). New York: Portfolio.) In his text Tapscott mentions how businesses who recognize this growth of online communities and peer production and support it, using it to their advantage will survive, while those who resist it will have a much harder time. One example that quickly come to my mind is google, which left their Google Maps web application software open so that web programmers would create applications to work with it, feeding it information and yielding their desired response. There now exist several sort of mashup applications which combine Google’s application with their own (see my last post). Google recognized this concept of supporting online communities, the value of free open (semi) source apps, and encouraging development by outsiders.

This concept of peer production has allowed for what Tapscott refers to as “Wikinomics”, which refers to a new world where consumers no longer take a passive role, but instead collaberate with each other via the web in order to produce as well. Through Wikinomics, “prosumers” (Tapscott, 2006) now rival the industry world and develop their own alternatives to everything from software to media (news). They have also been able to cater to niche markets by opening online stores, such as ebay stores (http://www.ebay.com) which allow them to sell to consumers anywhere in the world, without brick and mortar. Not all prosumers rival industries though, they also aid them, such as the P&G chemistry department looking for new ideas from anyone who simply registers on their website. The company does offer cash incentives to develop useful ideas, so they are paying for being able to use the world’s knowledge, but are only paying one person. In essence, it’s kind of like having one super employee with the knowledge of the thousands who sign up.

The Information Economy

Over the last 15 years our society has exchanged information in great number of new ways, and over great distances, in great quantities, as high speeds. In his book (Benkler, Y. (2006). Wealth of Networks (c. 1, 7). New Haven: Yale University Press.) Benkler describes how pertinent information organization and creation is to our information economy, and how the rapid changes regarding these areas in the last 15 years will inevitably cause adaptation in our economic structure. He also mentions how peer production has caused industries to re-examine their current methods since consumers are now producing high quality alternatives to their own efforts. Although many of these peer produced products (PPP?) are indeed high in quality, it seems to me as though the industry can always take their product one step further in one aspect or another. In the case of software, the GIMP (http://www.gimp.org/) is often a perfectly good alternative to using photoshop, but adobe provides support, and is an industry standard. If I am having trouble with photoshop there is a number, email, website, etc I can utilize in order to recieve help. There are forums for the GIMP, but, they do not reach the level of support you would recieve from adobe to my knowledge. The same goes for the media. I think people are still more likely to trust a major broadcasting station over a rouge webcast on the internet, even if it is a popular one. There are more dire consequences for a major station who gets their facts wrong than there for a webcast run by a bunch of collaborating amateurs who do the same. I don’t think all peer produced and open source alternative lack slightly in this way, MySQL and Apache are both industry standard level products, and are both open source peer productions.

Peer production has really attacked the niche and given people a reason to turn to products, shops, news, focusing on exactly what they want, when they want it, how they want it. Corporations’ biggest challenge over the next 10 years will be how to deal with this phenomenon, and compete against complete web based product customization offered by the peers.

Mashups made easy via Intel

Intel has released a Mashup Maker that is integrated into your browser and allows you to essentially combine two areas of interest and yield a page which displays results concerned with both.

Mashups (Now with Link Love(TM) )

Anyone remember when Tom Cruise freaked out on Oprah? This is a mashup which combines the event with Star Wars, Hulk, and a few other movies I could not recognize.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x5qOS4Q39sg

Brokeback to the Future

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JojoMIZTr44&NR=1

Goonies of the Caribbean

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iJSp2jNI7Co

We shape the future, technology is a result…

Why new technologies emerge

If there is one thing that I took away from reading these three articles, it is that society shapes the future, and the integration of new technologies arises from a desire to better satisfy our own wants and needs. The emerging of new technologies is not some unstoppable naturally occurring force that will take place whether we like it or not, societal change promotes these new technologies and they reflect our own lifestyles, values, desires, faults, insecurities, fantasies, etc. Although technology is shaped and created to reflect our society, once these integrations occur, our society is thus greatly altered according to how we use the technology. We wanted a way to communicate quickly and easily to anyone anywhere on the planet, and once that technology was developed, our society changed dramatically as a direct result, even though it was given birth because of our desires. Jenkins (http://loc8ed.com/library/jenkins-2006.pdf) talks about how such communication technologies, along with information technologies, have lead to a collective intelligence. When use the internet personally, I usually check the same 5-10 websites durring a session on the computer, which are popular websites among people of my age in our society. I do every so often venture out to websites which are not on this top 10 list, but even then, they are usually within the first page of a google search. When I am looking for information on something, I will often venture to popular sites like wikipedia or youtube. My point is that there exist popular souces of information on the net which the majority of internet users are not only referencing, but contributing to. I believe that we are essentially creating pop-intelligence, as part of this collective intelligence. As I scan though the blogs of people who who’s writing I have become very familiar with, I can now almost instantly pick out where they start to pull their information on an obscure topic from an outside source rather than their own knowledge, it reads like a text book. 9 times out of 10, I will search the topic on wikipedia, or another popular information database driven site, and pull up their blog entry almost word for word. And again, this information technology has evolved out of our own needs for readily available sources.

The future………….???

Jenkins tells us that we should not think in terms of what is currently possible with the technology we have available to us, or even what we think might be available 10, 20, 100 years from now. Instead, we should simply dream, and work towards the achieving the dream as our goal, not try to figure out what we can achieve with the tool set at hand. On the other hand, it is becoming the job of the media industry to try and predict this future we are dreaming up in order to evolve to survive. The media’s job used to be much simpler in that they provided informaton and entertainment, and we pretty much had to take what we could get from a limited number of resources. Now, it seems as though the entertainment industry and informational media sources are trying their best to cater to our needs and simply keep us as an audience. One of the ways they are doing this as Jenkins notes is not by completely switching mediums, but “extending”,and “converging” in terms of providing the same information and entertainment via different media (websites, rss, internet video feeds). But what about the converging of physical technologies; hardware? I can’t agree more with jenkins when he states that we posess gadgets today which perform multiple functions, even more than we really need, and yet we are carrying around more and more of these things! I know I currently carry around 2 cell phones, a PSP, and a usb flash drive with me at all times. I disagree with Jenkins though in that he believe this trend will continue and argues against the notion that there will ever be a single universal device which we carry around to perform all of these oh so necessary functions. I think we will be there within the next 10 years. In a world of rapidly emerging technologies though, how well do we even know how to use all these gadgets, computers, programs, etc.? I can’t think of anyone I know of as a computer scientist that is familiar with every function that…say… a modern computer running windows, can perform. The truth is that we do not use most of the functions which a piece of technology is capable of, and most people have problems even with the ones they use daily!

Nelson (http://loc8ed.com/library/nelson-2003.pdf) wrote about technological ignorance and how everyone should basically know how to use a computer because it is really not as complicated as professionals make it sound. The graphic on the cover of his book Computer Lib emphasizes this point with force, with the image of a clenched fist in the air. Nelson pretty much demands that society educate themselves in the area of computers because they are becoming so integrated into society. Although how a computer works in theory is not all that complicated, I believe familiarity the best way to describe what is needed by society. I don’t believe that we really need to know how computers work, but instead just need to be familiar activities we perform routinely. This seems to be a daunting task for many older generations, and an increasingly easier one for younger generations (I have watched a 12 year old hack into an MMO server). Like Jenkins, Nelson pushes us to embrace technology and approach is with a great deal of emotion, shaping it how we see fit. I believe there is a huge responsibility of the software developer of the world here to provide a machine which behaves intuitively, and reflects our society. The majority of the world is using 2 operating systems right now, which is pretty insane when you think about it. How can you build an interface for the world, which has an extremely low level of customization? But, as Nelson said, it is a process, and those who are naive think that a technological revolution is coming, while those who understand it realize that it is a process. Ease of use and a better reflection of society will come over the course of time, and that any major software company that does not realize this will ultimately be replaced by one who does.

Side Note…

 

I found Nelson’s description of “Discrete Chunk Style” particularly interesting. This style pretty much describes our class, in that we have a subject, write a blog about it, then receive comments on ur reaction to the material.

Once we have the skills…

Negroponte (http://loc8ed.com/library/negroponte-2003.pdf) sort of takes Nelson’s ideas on society’s need for technological competence to the next level. He believes that once this comfort level is reached (he does not directly state this, I am inferring that it would be necessary in order to achieve that which he describes), that we can start to utilize technology in order to “do it yourself” in several areas, he focuses mainly on building your own house. Essentially he describes the ability to leave all the math and conditionals up to the computer, but have the users doing all of the design work, optimally allowing them to get exactly what they want in a house. With the cad programs that exist today a relatively tech savvy individual could design their house, but I do not believe that the average person will ever be able to take it from the idea to the finished product, or at least construction all by themselves, there are just way too many little technical aspects involved. I do however believe that the middlemen and people of certain occupations can be replaced via technology. I have been able to repair my own car, computer, gaming system, and camera via information gathered on my computer. I have also designed my own clothing, interior decorations, posters, bumper stickers, and software applications via my own home PC. As technology advances, do it yourself-ing definitely becomes much easier, mainly due to the increased accessibility to information and software programs.

Final thoughts

These articles really got me thinking about how technology reflects society, and in turn that looking at technology should give us some insight into our society. I know that technological advances in the areas of medicine, educational tools, and science are occurring daily, but when I really stopped and thought about what really gets the most attention, entertainment came to mind. I thought about HDTV, 1080i displays, blu ray discs, fiber optic internet connections…and how few people even know anything about those technologies beyond what they hear in a commercial or from a sales person. But, does that matter? I think the authors of these three articles would be more concerned with questions like, is this what you want, is it how you imagined it, and do you know how to use it?