Solve The Issues.com

This site was created to "bring democracy back from the people."  The about us section expands on this idea by saying the United State's current political machine has become too cumbersome, resulting in slow, corrupted legislation.  The site posts topic forums where site visitors can comment, leaving their remarks about current issues.  The site criticizes currently elected officials saying that while they may be honorable people they are not qualified on many of the issues they review.  This statement seems hypocritical to me since most site visitors will have even less qualifications required to make informed decisions about the issues plaguing the United States. 

The site also claims to be a place where ideas can be solved, bringing together the left, middle, and right. In reality the site seems to be rarely visited.  Most topics have 1 or 2 comments and under two hundred likes on Facebook, both indicators the site does not receive a lot of traffic. In addition if the site creators really want this to be a hub for political debate the quality needs to be greatly improved.  For example if they plan on using the abbreviation U.S. for United States they need to include the periods.  In addition, I questioned the sites authenticity since under the support us page, a link to amazon is provided. 

While this site was not at all useful to me I thought the forum topics such as education and energy to be interesting if not cliche discussions. Overall I would not recommend this site to other due to lack of user interaction, poor web design, and lack of pertinent information. 

PASSHE Media Summit: Andy Mehalshick

For those who could not attend the Media Summit on Saturday you missed Andy Mehalshick's engaging lecture on his experience as a journalist.
What I found to be the most captivating piece of Mr. Mehalshick's speech were his thoughts about social media, saying that while it is a great thing it will never replace the essentials.  As a journalist he was saying it will never replace the face to face meetings, the knocking on doors, and the interviews.  This sentiment contradicts some of my previous posts where I discusses social media's impact on businesses and even politics.  However he made many itneresting points and had examples to support his arguments, shopwing that social media will never replace what it means to be a journalist, or as Andy said, the instincts and the passion. 
Another interesting piece from his speech that I think we should all remember; passion is what makes a great journalist. He states that while he has seen some very intelligent people walk through the doors at his news station, the great reporters are the ones with the most passion. Now, while most of us are not journalists I think this piece of advice applies to everything, no matter how smart you are, no matter how well read you are, no matter how many degrees you have, if you want to succeed at what you do you need to have passion.

Social Media Security

Audra's story about her friend and the music video of Jason Alexander pretending to be Brad Paisley online urged me to look into security for social media: Google supplied this article

10 Social Media Security Considerations

 The article begins by stating possible social media security issues include involve identity theft (obvious), brand hijacking, privacy issues (obvious), online reputation management (less obvious), and users' physical security.

The ten steps he suggests for a safe social media experience are:

1. Register your full name on sites such as http://knowem.com/ in order so you can know if anyone is using your name
2. Set up Google free alerts which notify the user every time your name is used.  This will notify you if someone posts about you or tries to sign up for anything using your name.   
3. Discuss social media with your kids. Since "scammers" could easily target young people on the internet the article suggests ensuring they are not posting anything to compromise family security and monitor what they are doing online.  
4. The next three, be discreet, maintain updated security, and lock down settings, are pretty obvious. I my parents hassled me all through high school about making sure I'm careful about what I do online.
5. Always delete messages from unfamiliar uses such as scammers.
6. Don't share personal information through games or applications.
7. Always log off social media sites when finished (I'm sure we've all been hacked before).
8. Don't use geolocation features which will criminals when your house is empty and thus easily robbed.  

 While I found most of these tips to be self explanatory I never really considered the issues associated with online reputation management and people using my name to make accounts or other fraudulent activities.    

 

Solace in the Internet

After discussing the WELL in class and learning that it is still an active website I decided to check it out. The site describes itself as its own territory, like a virtual nation. As we learned in class the WELL was the catalyst for modern day social media. It was the first water cooler, the primordial ooze from which the online community rose, and led Howard Rheingold  to first coin the term "virtual community".

In Rheingold's book he tells an anecdote in which the narrator describes his computer as a place of solace.  It's interesting to think about since I know when have I have any kind of question I turn to the internet. If I have a question about a definition of a word, or an exact date I know Google is simply a few clicks away and thanks to the "did you mean feature" I can even use Google to ensure my spelling is correct.   More than once I have said to my friends "why are we arguing about this we all have smart phones" hinting that the answer be searched on the internet instead of our brains. 

Social Media and Goverment

Rheingold's talk reminded me of one I had this summer with a friend. Just as he discussed the impacts of social media and collaboration on business, we discussed its impact on government, specifically the United State's government.  During its creation, congressmen were elected as a plausible way for each state to be given fair representation since the communication abilities of the time would never of allowed for each person to voice their own opinion.  However now, as we have discussed multiple time in class already, people are constantly connected to their phones, their facebooks, and twitters. My friend argued that social media has provided us with a new form of independence that would ultimately be the death of democracy. I argued the opposite, that social media could be used as a way for every one's voice to be heard, not just lobbyist, not just campaign contributors but everyone. Just as easily as we set up surveys online, political topics of all kinds could be posted to online community sites. Online participants could be separated by town or state and votes could be tallied and the individual voice could be heard not just the largest one.

My Twitter Experience

When I posted on facebook that I had gotten a twitter, mentioning that it was required for this class, people warned me to be careful that it could be very addictive. I personally do not see the lure associated with it. Perhaps because I have only 11 followers or because the interface confuses me. Yes twitter makes me feel as though I've never been around a social media site. In fact first time I used it I ended up "favoriting" someone's posting? I'm stilling trying to find out if there is a like button..... Overall I feel as though twitter is just a waste of time but maybe once I spend more time with it I'll become addicted like everyone else.
I considered making an instagram and pintrist as well mainly because my step sister seems to love it but also I figured the learning experience would help provide some nice in sight for this class. But then I reconsidered since I have so little time as it is and because Facebook already wastes enough of it.

So is that what social media has become just a waste of time, a way to procrastinate?

"Mister Splashy Pants"

Ted Talk!

This Ted talk is a four minute blitz by a co creator of Reddit discussing the power of the Internet and, as the talk is called, how to make a splash in social media.

For those who want the highlights (though I do strongly recommended watching, its very good). The speaker begins talking about a whale, who was eventually, begrudgingly,  named Mr. Splashy Pants by Green Peace. Green peace an environmental organization, was attempting to put an end to a Japanese whale campaign and decided they want to track a whale's journey by implanting it with a microchip.  To humanize this whale they decided to give it a name and the name Mr. Splashy Pants won by a landslide. This was possible due to sites like Reddit , which allow readers to vote "up or down" the articles they like or don't like it this video also discusses factors important to social media.  

But most importantly this video helps intensity my point in my previous post, "tweets are cheap"
Near the end of the video the speaker lays out two points I think are truly pivotal about social media and the business world
1. The Internet provides a level playing field. "your link is just as good as my link which is just as good as your link"
2. The Internet is free.

Coupled with the fact that the social media site, such as Facebook, Twitter, Reddit, are visited by thousands if not millions of people per day, the Internet becomes the best and most efficient way to advertise a product.  Why waste money on the once cherished commercial slot during prime time, when you can advertise for half if not a tenth of that price on a social media site which I argue more people will see. 

A read an article which stated that social media will not save a business, that is just a tool to be used by a business and I agree social media is not the key to any business but I believe there is no greater more financially savvy method for any small business entrepreneur to compete, be heard and overall achieve a level playing field with his or her competition.

"forget your brand. Tweets are cheap; it's what companies do, not what they say, that really matters."

I googled social media and the environment and found an article about the BP oil spill and twitter. http://www.fastcompany.com/1686631/why-environmental-activists-embrace-social-media Twitter and Facebook makes advertising anything easy. I imagine 95% of people check their facebook,twitter,and instagram more than ten times a day. I know most times when I open mozilla firefox I start by checking my facebook and making sure the world hasn't ended... (and by that I mean scrolling through my newsfeed and see what others have posted today) So with people easily connected all the time what better way to get your point across and to make people more aware of issues that affect them everyday. This title also speaks volumes. Tweets are cheap. There are none of the politics nromally associated money when it comes to social media, its free for everyone; free to share, argue, grow, like, and and hopefully change. Anyone else agree or disagree with me? I'd like to get some other opinions on this.