The Next New Thing

I picture the next new media to be something that closes the distance between people and computers even further. With all these new media sites we have noticed that people are getting more and more connected to their computers and spending more time on them. I can imagine a product that allows people to be connected to the internet at all times. While today's cell phones do this for us I see the future being similar to Google's new product the "Google Glasses". These glasses allow you to take photos and also scan your environment and give you information about your surroundings like alerting you that a particular subway isnt working as you walk in and suggest an alternate route for you to take. They also alert you if you have received a new message on facebook or a new email.  Products like the Google Glasses are the next step in new media and I believe that there wont be many steps after this one before we start having computer chips implanted directly into our heads.

Our Class Wiki- So Far

I have not added any extra information onto the class wiki besides my bio so far. The section of the wiki I am working on is the presence and effect new media has economically.In my research for my term paper however, I did come across a lot of information on how new media has effected the way companies have began marketing and increased their connection with customer's wants and needs. Many companies have started using Twitter as a medium to increase brand awareness and create clever slogans. Particularly the people behind the KONY 2012 were able to raise massive amounts of money to their cause through their YouTube video and their marketing on Twitter through their hashtag of #KONY2012. Also companies like Proctor & Gamble have used new media to get customer opinions on certain products and better identify what exactly they like about a product and what they do not. For my section of the of the wiki I plan to expand these ideas and explain better how new media has been able to help companies reach out into new markets, better brand themselves, generate more profits, and reduce their losses.

P2P File Sharing

1. What is File Sharing?
File sharing is when music, documents, videos are shared between computers. File sharing is literally what it sounds like. It can occur through physically burning information on to a CD, placing it on a flash drive, or transferring the information over the internet to others.

2. What is P2P file sharing?

Peer-to-Peer file sharing is a sub division of file sharing. Programs like Limewire, FrostWire, and Bit Torrent allow its users to act as distributors of information to other users and at the same time allows them to download content from others as well. Peer-to-Peer literally describes how information is transferred from one person to another. A good example of P2P file sharing comes from an article in the Times: "A wave of streaming sites, which allow people to start watching video immediately without transferring a full copy of the movie or show to their hard drive, are making it easier than ever to watch free Hollywood content online. Many of these sites are located in countries with lackluster piracy enforcement efforts, like China, and are hard to monitor, so media companies do not have a clear sense of how much content is being stolen."

3. What are some examples of P2P file sharing?

Some examples of P2P file sharing include how sites like Frostwire are used to download music, Bit Torrent is used to download movies, and other programs as well. I know that many people actually have used Torrent to illegally download expensive video games and other software like the Rosetta Stone language software.

Cited Materials:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/05/business/media/05piracy.html?_r=1

Privacy

While New Media fosters many advantageous things like the sharing of ideas and connecting people around the world there are some significant draw backs to it. Most notably is how privacy is being compromised in a different way with every new social media site or website that people use. An example of this is how recruiters from a company may look at the Facebook profile of someone who is applying for a job with them. Facebook is mainly used as a social site so the content may not always be professional and employers may find some compromising photos of this person applying from a night that they went out. Judging from this photo an employer my determine that this person is not a good fit for their company although they may have a very strong work ethic and that photo is from a day they had off. There have also been cases of people being denied purchases/jobs because these companies are able to determine their credit score from their I.P. address. Just to elaborate on the extent of how much a person's privacy is invaded is how ads of their recent searches on google come up on their Facebook profile. While this is labeled as "smart advertising" this is actually considered an invasion of privacy for many people. The internet has provided many wonderful things for people around the world but with each new advance it seems as though everyone's personal details become less and less personal.

Advice

If asked to give Baruch advice on how they could use new media to improve the college I would tell them to follow others colleges who have employed the use of social networking sites to their advantage. many other colleges have started using Twitter as an additional means to connect the students with their professors and the other students in the class. The professor could have an account for their specific class which the students would follow, and then post updates on twitter like room changes or class cancellations through the site. There have been many situations where professors have cancelled class last minute or the morning of and many students end up going to class because they did not check their e-mail inbox. An update through Twitter would provide students with another channel to receive the message and prevent confusion. In addition to this, colleges could have a Facebook fan page where they can keep students informed about school events, services, deadlines etc. Many students do not know fully all the services that are available to them and having a Facebook page could help reach out to these students. A Facebook page could also act as a strong way to boost school spirit. As mentioned before, the college can post about school events and get more students involved.

Creativity and New Media

For this entry I created an avatar in second life. Besides reading about it from the articles posted for this class I also have a co-worker whose dad actively plays this game. He is a retired mechanic and spends most of his free time engaged in Second Life. Seeing as it has a substantial following I wanted to create my own avatar in it and see for myself  what all the hype was. I selected the robot to be the digital representation of myself and decided to go exploring in Dublin, Ireland (the second life version of it that is). As it turns out, Dublin is a pretty lonely place. I walked around for quite some time trying to find someone to interact with but sadly I couldn't find anyone. I stopped at a news stand for sometime then continued my search for the rest of the second life users. Eventually I stumbled upon a nice bridge by the coast and since there was no one else around I had my avatar enjoy the view. If I had any money in second life I would've bought a guitar and had him play a nice Irish jig by the water.

Creativity

The internet has proven to connect people around the world like never before. Through new media sites like facebook, youtube, and tumblr people are sharing ideas and communicating with others halfway around the world. Such open connections serve as a perfect environment to help foster creativity. An example of this would be the meme phenomena. This is where the use snapshots of well known characters add a caption describing a situation that many people relate to. Baruch even has its own page on facebook dedicated to such memes. This is just one example of how people use new media as a creative outlet. Another example is a website called deviantart.com. This site allows people to post their artwork online, organizes it, and allows anyone to view and appreciate it. I personally know a few people who are avid users of this site and have collaborated with other artists they met on deviantart. Since people are now sharing their ideas through new media this also allows people to interact with others b providing their own interpretation of another's work. For example on deviantart many people who are skilled at drawing will post their art online but others who know who to use computer programs with take that persons art and color it in with their artistic style reflected in it. another example comes from an article in the New Yorker that talks about how a remix artist used some software to create a mashup of Jay Z's song "Frontin" and Beck's "Debra. "After several months of work, he completed the track, called it “Frontin’ on Debra,” and posted it on his Web site. With an enthusiastic push from Beck, “Frontin’ on Debra” was made commercially available in October on iTunes". Another example comes from an article in the New York Times that speaks about how a youtube video was made of Disney characters singing a popular rap song by cutting sections of the movies they were from from and pasting it together to make it look like as if the characters themselves were singing it. As we can see new media has certainly helped foster the creativity of people and allowed them to come up with many new interesting, and  entertaining forms of art.

Cited Readings:


"http://www.newyorker.com/archive/2005/01/10/050110crmu_music">http://www.newyorker.com/archive/2005/01/10/050110crmu_music

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/24/business/media/24crank.html?_r=1