It seems technology is opening new forums for communication.  Yet, in reality, new forms of online communication are taking over traditional forums.  We don’t seem to indulge in casual conversation anymore.  Technology is seen as “bridging the gap” between distant communicators.  However, perhaps more accurately, it has created a wall that we can shout over, but we rarely cross over to speak face-to-face.

Traditional communities are relocating online as a result of our increasingly tech-focused lifestyle.  In essence, an online community facilitates impersonal communication.  The societal divergence from eloquent discourse has lead people to stake their claim online with choppy sentcs n’ abrvtd msgs; consequently, creating an isolated online community.

One specific example of an online community is known as World of Warcraft.  It is a community of science-fiction gurus enthralled by the possibilities of professional gaming.  Members of this community develop an avatar to roam World of Warcraft and accumulate attributes upon maturation.  All community members interact via satellite or online networking.  They update one another on their avatar progression and strategic battle plans.  In World of Warcraft the avatar is the product–it is a direct reflection of the personality within the community member.  Community members equip their avatar with necessary weapons and threads to represent individuality, valor, and style.  Ironically, these attributes are simultaneously being ignored in reality.  Online communities are an act of seclusion and impersonal communication by using technology to transfer written messaging.

So, yes, I’ve got a question…WHY?  We spend an increasingly long time talking online about things we could easily discuss in person.  I simply don’t get it.  Keep it real guys, say hello to people you pass by and stop waiting for the most opportune moment to txt msg or IM people.  Get out there and do something crazy; have a “convo.”

This is in no way a new concept. With the advent of TV people have complained about being talked to. Just talking heads offering information… not very conducive to conversation. But with the internet, people can interact with language, images, and music in real time. This is conversation in a digital world, and there are many advantages to this new realm. In nearly every situation, online communication requires the creation of an avatar, or online persona. This is the freedom to be whomever you want while interacting online. Talk about an ultimate freedom of speech. Yet digital material doesn’t satisfy us like real paper, or photographs, or live music. 

The balance here lies in combining online communities with real world communities. Without the check of actual human interaction, our online persona are free to expand without any connection to reality. In order to give depth to who we are, there must be accountability for our thoughts and actions.

The best of these online communities seem to form around communities that already exist in the real world. A good example of this would be Chicago’s own bike forum. Located at www.chifg.com it is a memebers only (though nearly everyone is accepted) board that allows members to post new topics, and add to old discussions. The core of this revolves around organizing events around the city where people can meet up. From the sales of bike parts, to when and where the next race will be are discussed at length. The goal though is to meet in real life, and until then, the forum allows people to connect with each other. 

This is the direction I want to move in. I find the internet to be the most growing field in many industries today. The impression that I have is that while there is tons of information floating around, it still feels empty of human spirit. 

Right now, I am working with the Loyola Bike Club to get a free bike rental program running on campus. I designed a basic website for them, but am now struggling with what I can include on it. I don’t want it to be the end destination for people looking for information. I want it to be a launching point for their interest in bikes. There is a balance that needs to be found online between giving everything people are looking for, while encouraging them that there is even more in store for them if they come to our meetings.

Perhaps we can attribute this growth of the internet to the seeming need for convenience that Americans display. It certainly is easier to create a persona than actually live with it. And it is easier to read the information you want without having to hear about the things you aren’t interested in. I think that a better balance can be reached, but the question is, how?

-jared

I felt like a voyeur at first, but maybe it’s just that these people are exhibitionists. In any event, this is the first time I have really let myself get sucked into any digital community

Tangent: Through my blog, and my recent introduction to so much new, advanced digital media technology (via this class), I feel I have gotten more familiar with a lot of technology that I had initially negated and scorned, out of fear, and a sense that things were changing to quickly for me to catch up. I see now, though, that utilizing this new technology is often to my advantage– I can convey ideas, opinions, information in a new, more broader way. I can reach more people. More people can reach me.

I digress. what I really got on here to do was post this video I found while youtubing. Wait, I guess that’s another digital community I have been sucked into. Okay, that makes 2. Wait, and facebook. But that’s it. No, really.

In any event–

Of course, in response to this video are a host of videos expanding on the ideas of web 2.0, how our kids’ very minds are changing, how technology is hard-wiring us differently. Instant access, at my fingertips. All is knowable. I am god.

Oh, this is all very exciting.

–Kate

This very blog attests to the fact that the power of newspapers is waning.

Most folks these days agree that newspapers will not survive in their common printed form. As the internet grows more and more popular, the sense of doom surrounding the newspaper industry is ubiquitous– for the vast majority of young people, the internet has surpassed the newspaper as their source for political news. (We must not lose sight of the irony, though that most blogs are little more than a compilation of news stories found originally in newspapers.)

So: should we mourn the face that the newspapers are dying off? Why shouldn’t we celebrate the triumph of technology in the face of a pile of pulp and cellulose?

Well, there’s 2 big reasons I’d like to talk about (I found these reasons in a newspaper article–please take not that I am here defending the very medium that I am helping to make obsolete. This is very po-mo.)

First off, we bloggers aren’t engaging in the extremely crucial practice of investigative reporting. We all know how integral good, investigative reporting is to a healthy democracy– Watergate’s the crowning example.

The New Yoker article (link above) mentions how journalism scholar James W. Carey says that members of a democratic society need to cultivate “certain vital habits” of democracy—the ability to discuss, deliberate on, and debate various perspectives in a manner that would move it toward consensus.

Isn’t this idea of participatory, active, and vocal citizens what the blogosphere all about? Are we not on our way to a better democracy for it?

Perhaps. The web is indeed a powerful platform with the ability to create communities.

However: “Despite the many failures at newspapers, the vast majority of reporters and editors have devoted years, even decades, to understanding the subjects of their stories. It is hard to name any bloggers who can match the professional expertise…” contends Alterman.

So, access may go up, but quality goes down.

Alterman offers a very interesting perspective on the importance of newspapers, and the limits of technology to really bring our nation together: it has to do with the very definition of a “nation” itself.

The internet has led to a cluster of communities, each with their own version of “truth” and “reality.” Bill Moyers said that what is most important for a journalist is not how close you are to power, but to reality.

Well, the blogsphere has made this slippery concept of reality even harder to pin down.

The Alterman article references the 1983 book “Imagined Communities”: “The political scientist Benedict Anderson recalls Hegel’s comparison of the ritual of the morning paper to that of morning prayer: “Each communicant is well aware that the ceremony he performs is being replicated simultaneously by thousands (or millions) of others of whose existence he is confident, yet of whose identity he has not the slightest notion.” It is at least partially through the “imagined community” of the daily newspaper, Anderson writes, that nations are forged.

Newspapers are more than ink and bylines, then– they are the bloodlines of a nation, and their demise may indicate the demise of a whole lot more than an industry.

–Kate

Well, there are a few problems that I have with facebook, and I want to take a minute and talk about them. First off, why is it okay to have all of that information on the web? It always scares me to think about the goldmine of information on nearly every college student in the US. With advertising headed towards personalization, my intrests shouldn’t really just be sitting in the public domain. 

Secondly, who is taking advantage of facebook? Right now millions of students are communicating through facebook comments, wall posts, picture tags, etc. But at the same time, hundreds if not thousands of administrators around the nation are browsing through picture albums, and reading wall posts to find out who is breaking the rules. I feel like the boom in security cameras around campus fits neatly with the ability to monitor students through their own cameras and words. Maybe all of that Big Brother talk at home while growing up just makes me weary of any surveillance…

Lastly, while facebook proclaims to expand our ability to communicate with each other, how much of our actual, verbal communication has been substituted with type and emoticons? After living in Fordham this year, I have begun to realize that during the rides on the elevator, it is nearly always silent. Somehow we have begun to feel okay about looking at pictures of strangers, while closing up when given the opportunity to actually interact.

I’ve made it my goal to talk in elevators, and forego facebook in the hopes that something more real than digital type can link me back to humaity. I’ve just been wondering too much lately about the amount of time spent in front of a dead, glowing screen, instead of face to face with a living, breathing person. There is no equal to the connection that can be made when directly speaking to another human; too many emotions and feelings are expressed in every action to be bundled up inside some type. So please, comment below on how you feel about facebook. Better yet, you could come talk to me, or talk to your friends, or that guy in the elevator.

Hey folks,

It’s about that time.  I’ve been sending job applications to international public relations agencies. 

My head is ready to explode.  I’m about to send an important email.  Then…WAM BAM THANK YOU MA’AM!

My computer shuts out.  So, my question today is this…

It seems as though my computer must be somewhat functional in order to retract my documents.  Does anyone know of any quick & clever gadgets that could help me retrieve my valuable work?

Do tell!

 I will be in charge of a conversational piece entitled “Techno, Heck No!”  As products of our environment, I believe we’re all a bit too Techno-Dependent.  So, this weekly segment will introduce thought-provoking questions and concerns in regards to technology.  I hope you all feel qualified to comment.  Together, let’s take a closer look at our tech-directed future.

 Today, my question is this…

 March 29, 2008 at 8 p.m. CDT [Earth Hour] I zapped my apartment’s lights and said “Well, I’m keepin’ it GREEN!”  My mind started to drift and I ask myself – I wonder how many people throughout the world are doing this same thing?  How many people really care?  And finally, Can new technology miraculously solve our cultural habit of inconsiderate energy consumption?

 We, as a global community, seem eager for more tech-gadgets and general consumption…Where are we headed from here?  In the future, will Earth Hour become Earth Hour(s)?

Autumn is Jessica’s internet identity. A shy, unpopular girl in reality, Jess has attained a cult following as “Autumn” on the internet. It was a sphere of Jess’s existence that her parents knew nothing about, until the school prinicipal called her father to explain that a series of “compromising” photos had been found by a concerned parent.

Jessica had become an idol of goth kids everywhere with her MySpace page, but her parents forced her to delete her entire account as a lesson in internet safety. You never know who is going to access your account and take those images out of context, explained her dad.

Jessica still chokes up when she talks about having to eviscerate her online identity, which was inseparable from her “real” everyday identity. (Though she restarted her MySpace site shortly after it was deleted.)

Her story and the story of other young kids is available in the 2008 PBS documentary, which analyzes the very public private lives of kids growing up online.

It analyzes the way that electronic hangouts have largely replaced real ones (hey we’d probably be talking about this in a classroom if not for the internet), as well as the generational gap– our generation is far more comfortable with exposure, and discretion and privacy seem to be a thing of the past.

90% of our nation’s kids are online, and the internet has created the bigget generation gap since the advent of rock and roll, contends Ann Coulier, author of “MySpace Unraveled“.

“When I’m online, I’m a real person, I’m myself,” says one teen featured in the documentary. “I can be 100% myself, because I know these people aren’t going to judge me.”

Her parents know nothing of the online communities which she frequents. But it’s not really surprising: Why talk to your parents about what’s on your mind when you have the whole wide world to talk to?

We’ll be using this space to talk about the limits of technology and all the fascinating ways that the internet affects things like social interaction, maturity level, the public and private sphere, learning habits, the generation gap, and more, oh, much more.