Last Assignment: Where to Put it

After finishing the third major assignment, a huge weight was lifted off of my shoulders. In addition, I was faced with a new issue. Where could I put this production so it could reach my intended primary audience of Millennials and my secondary audience of employers? With various social networking sites and blogging readily available, I have a lot of options. I chose to post my production on Facebook as well as Twitter, to share with my friends and followers who are mostly Millennials. As for getting to the employers, I decided to post it on YouTube so it can get to more of a general audience.

Both Facebook and Twitter as well as YouTube are considered Web 2.0 locales as Danah Boyd points out in her writing on Web 2.0 and how the spread of content and information is being altered due to Web 2.0 emergences. Web 2.0 has unique characteristics, including the interaction aspect and the concept of networking versus the broadcasting of information. Social media like Facebook and Twitter are prime examples of this.

The only real difference in the two types of websites is that Facebook and Twitter are more networking sites since only my friends and followers can see my posts. The majority of these people will see my posted video whether they like it or not.  YouTube on the other hand, makes videos viewable to everyone in the world who has access to the Internet. They only thing is that people have to consciously search for it.

As Henry Jenkins says in his “Why Participatory Culture is Not Web 2.0,” this concept known as Web 2.0 exists to “capture and harness the creative energies and collective intelligences of their users.” He describes Web 2.0 as a business model instead of a theory of pedagogy, or the study of the methods and practice of teaching.

Although I am mainly informing the audience about my exigency of what separates Millennials from other generations and why it may affect the future workplace atmosphere, there are no limits to the digital production I created. After posting it on Facebook and Twitter, I literally cannot control where it goes or who sees it from there. They may share it with friends via the “share” button on Facebook, or “re-tweet” it to their followers. By allowing and initiating this great spread of information, my audience will view it at the very least. They may go on to respond or create their own exigency as well. The options are essentially endless once it goes viral.

According to a post on Navarrow Wright, “TechCrunch recently reported that Facebook accounts for 38% of sharing information online." Facebook developer Isaac Sailer-Hellendag writes about the share option on his Facebook Developer blog.  As he states, this sharing option is “one of the most powerful and simple ways for users to share articles, pages, video or Flash content,” which ultimately opens up the way information is spread on the Internet. Hopefully the Millennials who view my production on Facebook will utilize this unique option, and share it with the rest of their Facebook friends so my audience can be broadened even more.

In a way, sharing this production via Twitter and Facebook is a way of “harnessing collective intelligence,” as Tim O'Reilly says in his article. This way, I can share what I’ve researched and learned about so others across the country and the world can learn from it and pass it on. I am, as O’Reilly says, adding to the “global brain.”

By selecting Facebook, Twitter and YouTube as my online Web 2.0 locales for my digital media production, I am advertising and sharing my creation with the online world, specifically my friends and followers, as well as anyone who consciously or unconsciously searches for it. Because most of my friends and followers are my primary target audience of Millennials, this seems appropriate. It’s harder to target my secondary target of employers, but by posting it on YouTube, hopefully I can overcome this barrier.

Huh. Gaming > Playing Outside?

As a kid who grew up in the late 90s and early 21st century, sure, I was surrounded by video games. However, my parents never really saw the value of them, and consequentially I was one of the few kids in the area without an Nintendo 64 or Playstation. Would I complain about it today? Heck no. I've never really truly been into the whole gaming thing, with the exception of a few Harry Potter or Lego Racers computer and Game Boy games back in my day.

Instead, I was a kid who grew up outside, playing kick the cone or cops and robbers with the neighbor kids. Looking back on it, I do remember spending a few days or evenings on a friend's couch, playing Donkey Kong or Tony Hawk Pro Skater 4 (or whatever it was). It wasn't a common occurrence though. I was more often found goofing around, blowing off steam with friends or family outside in backyards.

After reading Henry Jenkin's "Artform for the Digital Age," I was slightly upset with what he said in the last few paragraphs. He described games of today as being a big part of children's lives, since they "no longer have access to the real world." This upset me. How can it be that today's younger generations are growing up without being actual kids and getting outside to goof around with neighbors or friends? Are they really sitting on their little butts, staring at screens like Jenkins suggests?

After considering the difference in digital technologies and medias from today's world and the world I grew up in, I guess I could see that. Video games do in some way spark creativity or imagination as Jenkins says. Will Wright got at the same points of how children learn and channel their inner creativity through gaming in his article "Dream Machines."But simply playing "house" in a backyard on a bright summer day can achieve the same thing in my eyes.



Because of how I grew up, I still don't have a great interest or passion for video games. They're fun every once and a while, but not on a regular basis for me. I will say that I played my roommate in the latest COD game last week at our guy friends' house. I don't think I've ever seen those guys laugh so hard as they did when I couldn't figure out how to not shoot the ground or the sky. And hey, I got a good laugh too, but I'm definitely still not a gamer. And sorry to say, but my kids will be growing up outside, not behind a screen.

I'm no expert

Call me out of the loop, but I've only heard of Web 2.0 after reading the assigned readings for this week's class. I realize that people may be chuckling or in disbelief after reading that, but it's true! I'm not really informed when it comes to all this computer talk. Yet. I hope to improve that soon.

That being said, I still don't quite understand all the Internet or web jargon. Terms like servers, platforms, browsers are just a few I'm a little lost on. I tried to look them up and get more background information on them, but this proved to be just as difficult considering each term has several other unique terms of which I still don't understand. This may take awhile for me to understand completely. I'm sure class will help tomorrow, as always.

What I did get out of this set of readings was the difference between broadcasting and social media and how it may be affecting how we get information. In Danah Boyd's writing on streams of content and the flow of information, it is apparent that social media and media sharing has been becoming more and more popular over the past few decades. Because of this, broadcasting has been pushed out of the way.

It only makes sense, looking at everyone's Internet activity today. Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Blogger and Tumblr are only a small sample of the social media sites that almost everyone seems to be on these days. Because of this, people are starting to get news and other information from status updates, tweets and pins, instead of from the TV news stations, newspapers or radio.

I can relate to this. The last time I looked at a website like NBCnews.com, or even my home state of Minnesota's primary newspaper, StarTribune.com, was...well...I honestly can't remember. In fact, I remember seeing a Facebook status on a recent fatal car accident right by my house in MN and from there, I went to StarTribune.com.

The way we get information and news is changing. Boyd also makes an interesting point about how "networks are homophilous."This also makes sense to me. I only search things on the Internet that pertain to me, whether on my own time, or on school projects. Boyd is wary about our culture becoming more prejudice and ignorant because of this idea. I'm only friends with people on Facebook who I actually know (and whose statuses I can somewhat tolerate...). I only follow people on Twitter who I like, or can relate to. I bookmark sites that I visit most, like Facebook, Skinnyski, Gmail and Blogger. I don't diversify my Internet use intentionally. And I know I'm probably not alone.

As a whole, it's obvious that our culture is changing due to social media sites, as Boyd points out. The way we get news is going from broadcasting to networking. In addition, our views and diversity may be altering for the worse, as we spread and receive information faster and more efficient than ever.

Millennials: How the media has developed us

Back together at last

Last night marked the first night of my ski season 2012. I couldn't help but write a post on it, I am way too excited. This past Monday, Houghton received a few solid and quite dense inches of that glorious stuff called snow.

I was in the library all afternoon and night, just fidgeting at the flakes fell from the gray clouds, wondering if it's be worth it to strap on my rock skis and headlamp later on. I vetoed it, unsure of the conditions, and of course because I had an absurd amount to do before this upcoming break.

Then, in the middle of my shift at our Fitness Center on campus on Tuesday, one of my friends walked by and gave me some day-changing news. The trails were actually groomed. Of course, I worked till the sun went down, so he told me to grab a headlamp. I was thinking more and more about it, and that's when my dear mom texted me. A smile spread across my face as she told me about an e-mail she got about the trails being lit tonight. Well, there went all hope for getting anything done for the rest of the night...

Right after my shift, I caught some dinner with a few friends and my cousin, then husteld back up to my room where I set some priorities straight for my night...

Yup, dumped the books for some boots. Grabbed my skis and poles, gave em a "welcome back" kiss, then proceeded to change and fly out the door to the trails.

I didn't stop skiing or smiling once I hit the snow until I skied all the groomed and lit trails. I was amazed with the quality of the grooming, even with such little snow. Once finished, I called my parents to share with them my pure joy of skiing before Thanksgiving for the 3rd year in a row. 

That being said, it's safe to say I'm back in a relationship with my skis. It's been too long. 

More Peer Reviews!

Yo. Here's the last of those peer reviews!

Julia:
Arg: Horoscopes are not scientifically or astronomically correct.
Strengths: Visually appealing, good color scheme. Very informative.
Develop: There is a lot of text, maybe break it up with images or charts somehow?

Meredith:
Arg: Photo manipulation can alter what we think is "normal" in terms of appearance.
Strengths: Good photo editing!
Develop: Maybe put it in a context more, I know it's not finished yet, but add text.

Olivia:
Arg: Encouraging travel throughout America; every state has something unique about it.
Strength: Visually appealing, creative!
Develop: Add some borders to the state lines, it's a little hard to tell where one ends and one begins. Also, keep it uniform with every picture being of a landscape or text.

Kim:
Arg: Promoting UP Unique Creations and what they do/make.
Strengths: Cool layout, I like the color scheme and the photos.
Develop: Watch the white space/positioning

Katelyn:
Arg: Presidential Candidate's image and how it may influence the country's view of them.
Strengths: Very well organized, nice pictures and descriptions
Develop: Lots of text, maybe try to shorten it/separate it more. Think about the size as well, it seemed a little small, but there is a lot of info.

Courtney:
Arg: Promoting participation in writing a novel during November event.
Strengths: I liked the layout, the font and the colors
Develop: Vary the sentence length more, seems a tad choppy. Also, is there an organization that puts it on?

Devin:
Arg: Eating on campus vs off campus as a college student.
Strengths: Good photos/descriptions, well-supported plan overall
Develop: Layout, photo explanations

Hannah:
Arg: a blog for her sister
Strengths: Colors, layout, very personal feel to it.
Develop: Font - it's a tad illegible, but it does add personality.

Jana:
Arg: Promoting Halonen Landscaping services
Strengths: Good visual, I like the layout and the simplicity of the ad as a whole.
Develop: More contact info?

Peer Reviews!

Here's the peer reviews from today's class:

Sarah:
Argument: Promoting Vocal Achord, Tech's acapella group.
Strengths: Very visually appealing! I really like the fonts and the design as a whole.
                 Specifically, I really like how the second design you showed us has the combination of the
                 bass and the treble clefs, it's very easy to tell what kind of group it is.
Develop: Colors! keep it simple though.

Charlie:
Argument: Promoting Club Indigo
Strengths: Easy to read, good font/color. Very informative! Stands alone w/ no narration.
Develop: Maybe keep the transitions standardized. Also cut down the info on some slides.

James:
Argument: Music piracy
Strengths: Very visually appealing. Good color scheme! Well organized.
Develop: Maybe rearrange the key on the CD graphic, it took me a bit to figure out the statement next
               to it without looking at the graphic, but overall it's very good!

Cassandra:
Argument: Promoting Greek Life at Tech
Strength: Visually appealing, energetic
Develop: Watch the speed, I couldn't keep up for a few slides. Also, try to standardize the colors/font.

Good luck with the rest of your projects! Woohoo!
              

Complications

I think I just finished a rough draft of my media production for Major Assignment 3. Why do I say "think?" well, I'm sure there's stuff I'm missing and stuff that needs to be changed still. All I know is that I faced a few challenges, and I managed to overcome them. And now I'm addressing them here!

1. I chose to use iMovie to create a short video of who the Millennials are and what media has affected them and how it has affected them. Let's just say that iMovie is vastly different from what it used to be, oh 5 years ago. I had to use my computer and technology knowledge to explore the new set up. This provided challenges in itself.

• The timeline for iMovie hardly exists anymore. Now it seems like a continuous stream of movie, transition, and music all in one:

• That leads me to problem 2. The audio in this new iMovie is significantly more difficult to work with. Instead of being able to cut and arrange audio right in iMovie itself, I had to work between Garageband AND iMovie. This was a great source of frusteration. But I managed. Thank you, silly middle school years full of goofing around with Macs.

2. Garageband is also vastly different. Took me quite a bit of exploring around the new Garageband as well. More frusteration. But yet again, I managed, and finished my "rough draft," if you will.


I made sure to pay attention to the copyright laws, too. I credited each photo used and each song used. I even stuck to the time limit of all but one song. So I should be ok.

I forgot how much I love making movies and producing media like this. 2+ hours just flew by, and let's just say I'd much rather keep putting movies and songs together than study for Statistics. But hey, we can't have it all. And with that, time to get crackin' on that math. Guess that's another reason why I'm an STC major and not an engineer!

The generation of praise and excessive coddling

I've seen this video from 60 Minutes before, and just stumbled upon it when getting some research done. I thought it brought up an interesting point that I could tie into my project: The Millennials have been arguably overexposed to excessive praise, coddling and phrases similar to "you're special, and you can do anything and be anyone you want to be."

It is somewhat ridiculous how much I can attest to this. Every year of soccer I participated in from age 5 to 12 I got a trophy, just for participating. There were no winners and no losers. Everyone won. And looking at myself today, I sadly truly do expect rewards for good work, even in the smallest circumstances.

60 Minutes also sparked the thought of looking into children's TV shows of the 90's in me. Mister Rodgers is a prime example, like they said. I'm just writing this here so I can get my thoughts out, but TV shows are a good medium I can use in my project for additional research.

I'm still targeting my topic towards technology advances and how it had effected the Millennials as people today. From TV shows to computer games, the Internet, and eventually cell phones, we are a vastly unique generation. Well, back to work.

More Progress

I officially dove into the research today for my project on how developing technology affects generational personalities. So far, I'm learning a lot about the various generations of the 20th century as well as various technologies that have developed over the past century. So far, I'm keeping the two separate so I can examine them and compare them in greater detail once I gather enough information.

Once article I found particularly interesting is the Population Bulletin: 20th Century Generations by Elwood Carlson. All of the tables and charts and graphs really highlighted the key contrasts and similarities of the 6 main generations of the 20th century. For instance, I found it quite appalling how my generation, the New Boomers, has the lowest rate of children under 10 living with both parents (due to divorce, mostly), even compared to generations of higher death rates due to lack of medical care and during wartime. Although it doesn't have much to do with my topic, I still found it fascinating.

I also found Time magazine's photo essay on 20th century technologies. This will be a good basis for my future research and when I tie things together for the analyzation of the generational personalities.

In addition, I haven't officially made a purpose statement yet. So here goes:

Purpose: I will be examining the US generations beginning with the Hard Timers (born from 1890-1908) and ending with the New Boomers (born from 1983-2001). Specifically, I will be looking at their varying personalities and what factors contribute to the differences, especially developing technology and media. I am studying this topic because I'm interested in examining how technology affects us as people and specifically how the personality differences may affect relationships in the workplace.

This topic may be a bit big, but if I can narrow my search a bit more, it may help. For example, I could only look at developing media technologies. Once I start more research I will see what happens!

As for my medium, I'm not sure if I want to tackle the infographic idea. A blog may be a better choice, but I don't want it to be too boring. Yet another decision to make!

Planning, researching, fun fun fun

Now it's time for the game plan of this major assignment. I'm sticking with researching the generational personality differences from the early 1900s until the current millennial generation and how developing technology influences these differences.

 Right now, making a movie looks like a lot of work in the midst of a busy semester for me. I looked into what making an infographic would take, and found a website called Easelly that provides themes and templates for creating infographics. Once I start researching I think the rest should fall into place. Hopefully.

I also started snooping around for some articles I can use to gather information for this project. Pew Research wrote a quality article on the characteristics of the Millennials that I found interesting, for example. We, the millennials, are described as "confident, self-expressive, liberal, upbeat and open to change." We are confident with new forms of technology because we are digital natives, in contrast to older generations who are unfamiliar with them because they are digital immigrants. We express our different but ultimately similar personalities through social media and other forms of digital media. We tend to be liberal and free in our young and expressive age. We are upbeat and energetic with youth. And finally, with ever changing technologies, we have to be open to change.

By examining my generation, this is just the beginning of my research. I will still need to do an in-depth   examination of the other generations of the century and ultimately compare them all. Then I will look at the technologies of the time and tie it all together. I look forward to looking at the contrasts and similarities, then creating an info graphic to illustrate them.