New Communication Technologies/ Reporting For News

Overall, my semester in New Communication Technologies was very successful and i enjoyed every moment of it. I had enjoyed Dr. Wachanga’s teaching throughout the semester and i also enjoyed my classmates who helped me blog the way.

This class pushed me to work harder than most of my other classes and educated me on the dangers and benefits of new technological advancements.

What i learned from this class is relatable to my everyday life and will help me in the future. I cherish every moment in this class and Dr. Wachanga educated me to the fullest extent. I will forever be thankful for a teacher like David Wachanga, because he pushes students to their limit to achieve a good grade and be successful.

I have taken away a lot of information from this class that i will use in the near future, and i will be anticipating the new technologies to drive in years to come.

I look forward to enrolling into more classes like this one, and i am eager to take another class with professor Wachanga. 🙂

Our meme presentation was on the yodeling boy from Walmart. We chose this kid because he is going viral across the world and is the most present meme that we have today.

The yodeling boy was famous for his unusual yodeling act in the middle of a local Walmart. This video went viral within months and is all over the social media platforms.

Each person in our group contributed equally, and i took the part explain how this specific meme went viral and what spread it.

I think this presentation was the most interesting and most fun things we have done in this class, because it was so fun and enjoyable to see what other memes there are today and what other groups had to say about them.

My classmates were very helpful when discussing with them my proposal for research, and they gave constructive criticism on how to improve my research as a whole.

For my research proposal, I chose to look at whether it is okay for data collecting companies like Cambridge Analytica to look at our information over social media platforms like Facebook, and whether it is beneficial to our society or not. After looking into the cambridge analytics scandal, i wanted to look more into the issue and what can prevent this.

Privacy over social media is a major issue today on the internet, and lots of people are getting hacked and even identity theft nowadays.

My classmates told me to use credible sources and scholarly articles to conduct my research, as it will be difficult to take information from a non-credible source.

 

For my audio podcast, i really enjoyed gathering my interviews and piecing them together into a good sounding podcast. It was very easy collecting the sources for the audio portion of this project because most people do not like being on camera, but when i asked them for an audio statement, they weren’t even hesitant, because most people don’t like being on camera.

The software i used for this was Adobe Audition, and i used the campus computers in the radio station part of campus. I had to learn the software which took a couple of hours, but i ended up getting a good grasp on how to use it. After figuring it out, it was simple to place the interviews and my voice over into a long podcast and it sounded great.

For future audio assignments, I believe i will be prepared to piece together a podcast because i feel like i am very confident with the software now after doing this project.

For my video interviews, it was very difficult trying to find the best credible sources to interview for my specific topic. I was struggling to come up with someone to ask at first.

Once i got out in the field and looked for sources, I found some people who seemed perfect to discuss about my topic. I found some students that were very active users on social media, and knew some things about Cambridge analytics and hackers over the web.

Placing the interviews together into one story was probably the most i struggled with. I used premier pro to place the videos together, i had to use one of the campus computers to do this, but after a couple of hours of learning the software, i was moving smoothly with the project.

I wanted to make sure it sounded great and was succinct. Before this class, i had little to no practice with video editing. Yet, this projects helped me a lot with learning how to piece together a good quality video.

For my feature story about whether it is okay for data collecting companies to access our information, I found it very easy capturing my photos for this assignment. At first, I was unsure on what i should capture in my pictures, I did not want multiple pictures of people on their digital devices, i wanted a variety.

I tried to find lots of people on campus who looked engaged into their digital device, because i believe this can be seen as a good photo for my topic. I also found some other students that were on facebook, and i tried to find as much technological devices as i could.

Other than technology pictures, it was difficult for me to find something else to take a picture of, because my topic was kind of difficult for a variety o different images.

Overall i found it very easy trying to capture the different types of images and camera angles. I wanted close range shots along with some long range. I was looking for more variety than repetition.

Capturing these pictures has helped me a lot because i am interested in doing photography work in the near future and i believe that this was a great start to that.

My topic for the feature story project is whether it is beneficial for our society to expose our personal information to the governments eye. I directly focussed on Facebook as a whole.

I believe technology has advanced so much lately that we do not know how safe or unsafe the internet really is. After reading about the Cambridge Analytica scandal, I was very interested in figuring out how much privacy we really have on the web. I believe that it is not right that data collecting firms are accusing our information over social media platforms like Facebook.

I will ask my interviewees many questions pertaining whether they think it is okay that companies like Cambridge are accessing our info. Also, I will ask what they think we should do to change this and what would truly be beneficial for our society.

I am unsure on how I will be taking my photograph for this yet, but i know that i will need some people on their digital devices and people on facebook.

The audio and video interviews I will plan out so that i have a different view from each interviewee. I will be avoiding repetition within the interviews.

There is continued speculation that the internet is making us become less intellectual and more dependent after each generation. Some ideas that make me a believer of this topic include; search engine stupidity and multitasking.

Ever since the creation of google, people have been using the internet platform as a source to look up information and ask questions of the unknown. Many students listen to a lecture or speech and If they are unclear with words, instead of asking, they look them up on google. Author, Nicholas Carr, makes a good delivers a good point in his article, “Google is making is stupid,” when he states that the internet has become our primary source of information, and is effecting our way to learn and interact in everyday activities. Students today are not processing what they learn as much as they used to, because they are becoming too reliant on looking up the answer other than learning it.

Clay Shirky makes a strong point when he states that technology in the classroom is a bad thing, I believe so as well. If us as students always were on our phone and multitasking, then we would never fully process all of the information into the brain because we are occupied by other social aspects. While in class, being on your phone would be considered a distraction, not multitasking. I know that on my part, I am not a very good multitasker, I would have to be told something twice or maybe three times until I can really understand. This would just make the classrooms misdirected and kids would not get the full education that they deserve.

In the article, “does the internet make you smarter?”, it talks about how the advancement of technology is going to make children less intelligent. As the generations pass, the more people will be reliant on technological devices and google. Soon, to process information, everyone will need to look towards google first before learning the information first.

In todays society, Digital technology has made a major impact on our lives, and continues to alter our society in generations to come. Social media has become our societies major activity for entertainment, and Facebook has become one of the most utilized social media platforms of them all. With Facebook becoming one of the worlds major social media platforms, it comes with question as to: is Facebook making users lonely? or more connected? Due to people being so involved with their phones, our societies fear is, not being accepted by others on social media.

In Stephen Marche’s article, “is Facebook making us lonely?”, he explains that the media is making it more difficult for humans to connect with one another nowadays. His thoughts could be seen to be true, as our communication over text and social media databases has became more prevalent over time instead of having a person-to-person communication. It is also stated that being lonely leads to isolation, and when you are isolated, you are dissconected. Although, in the article, “Facebook isn’t making us lonely” written by Eric Keilenberg, he is pretty much going against Marche’s theory and referring back to his article as “not a lot of proof”. Keilenberg thinks that there is no evidence to see that social media has made people introverted, and that if anything is making us more connected as people. In the article “The Intimacy of Anonymity” by Tim Wu, he infers that posting on the internet leads to over-sharing, and at that point it feels like a reality TV show. As humans, our search for approval and likes on social media has made us vulnerable and formed a culture of over-sharing. Yet, on the other hand, I can see why this is becoming a trend, because it is common to be discovered over social media to land jobs, or opportunities from companies in need. This gives us humans, a need for exposure and a need to catch others attention.

I would argue that social media is making us more connected as a society, because it is easier to communicate with people you couldn’t have without the digital technology. In my life, I stay connected with everyone that i was acquainted with, due to my digital device and I am perfectly okay with it. Being a college student, I wouldn’t be able to keep in contact with all of my high school buddies without my cell phone and social media. I don’t think this has made me more introverted, yet I can still be close with the people i need to even though we lives many miles apart.

In the article “Love Online,” is narrated by a father whose son, Henry, was involved in an online relationship. Henry had met Sarah in an online discussion group, and they hit things off from there. After exchanging each other’s phone numbers, Henry and Sarah were getting even closer by sending each other virtual gifts and virtual candy. Sarah’s father has been screening his daughters’ phone calls and listening into the conversations between Henry and Sarah. The father did not approve of this at all and thinks that his daughter should not be talking to boys unless they know another personally. Sarah’s father then filed a courtship and gathered every conversation that Henry and Sarah had and put it on paper. Although, Henry and Sarah’s relationship was shown to be a strong bondage, and henrys father agreed to accompany him on a trip to see Sarah. After making the trip and spending time with each other, they have many commonalities and were social off the bat. Yet, the relationship terminated later after the interaction, not due to the distance or because the real life experience didn’t meet expectations, they just couldn’t get passed the fact that Sarah’s father didn’t approve. After many years passed, Henry continued to try the online relationships, and encountered many other women over the internet.

 

This article exemplified the major impact that technology plays on our lives and even our relationships. In regards to Sarah and Henry’s relationship, they considered themselves “dating” even though they only sent numerous messages and a handful of pictures. This caught my attention, because I don’t believe that this could be considered “dating” unless both counterparts are interested in each other’s personal traits too, not just because of their conversations online. Although, this relationship lasted a long time and they both had the same amount of interest to see each other in person.

 

I think that the internet is a good way to meet someone, but not to date. Also, its obnoxious to have a long distance relationship that lasts longer than a month over an online social media platform. On the other hand, that is just my opinion, and people are free to have arelationship in any way they please. This shows how large the internet can play a role in our lives, and maybe soon, everyone will be dating online, due to the fact that everyone is invested in their cell phones and technical devices now a day.