Reflection coming soon. Forgive me, o all-seeing all-knowing course coordinators; I've been sick (dying, almost). And fellow classmates, please feel free to give me any and all of the "diggs" you have remaining (if there is indeed a limit). Watch this space!
Monday, March 31, 2008
Friday, March 28, 2008
Communication without limits - A Reflection
I could say that in my case, that I am truly reliant on the internet, at least for now. I am currently in Melbourne and I had problems getting an internet connection here, but finally, here I am posting up this reflection post.
Now on with the reflection =D.
The internet is something many of us take for granted because we access it every day and spends countless hours on our computers, most of the time we don’t notice the abnormal amount of time we spend typing and clicking away at the keyboard. The internet is something I cannot live without and I think it applies to most people reading this post.
The internet helps me breach the distance between my family and close friends and I am going to give a few examples of what I mean later on. For now, let’s start off with what has the internet done for communication? The internet has eliminated many factors that used to hinder communication over long distances and this can clearly be shown in many ways such as instant messaging and emails. This is my first year in Brisbane and I am pretty much homesick half the time, and I can honestly say I would have gone crazy if not for the ability to communicate with my friends and family through the wonders of Windows Live Messenger
Windows Live Messenger is truly something that has made studying away from home something easier but it is not the only program that I use to breach the great divide of distance. There are 2 more programs that I would like to introduce and they are Skype and CheapVoip. Sometimes I feel that just typing away at the keyboard isn’t sufficient enough for me. Yes many will say that Windows Live Messenger provides the same services as Skype but for some reason the quality is different and I’d rather spend an hour talking on smoothly and clearly with Skype rather than spending half the time guessing what my friend is saying.
Chatting and talking online maybe something that has become a necessity for me but sometimes I just can’t resist the temptation to call back to Malaysia or even to Melbourne where all my friends are. With CheapVoip, I have literally found my holy grail where I can make cheap phone calls back to Malaysia or any landline in the world for a very affordable price of 1.5 aud per minute. This is a good example of communication breaching the different mediums and it’s something that I think is pretty useful for people on the go like me.
Besides real time communication such as instant messaging and online phone calls, there are many other ways for us to communicate with our friends and love ones. Here’s my example of how I use certain applications on the internet to breach the distance between my friends and family. When I came to Brisbane, I was literally alone because all my friends are either in UK or in Melbourne. The first few days in Brisbane was very hard for me, but I survived by using communicating with my friends over certain mediums such as Facebook and Flickr. A communication medium does not need to be real time communication, and I believe that through the internet, communication has evolved.
For instance, I am currently here in Melbourne for Holiday, and I upload the photos of what I do in Melbourne onto Facebook and Flickr so that my mom who is in Malaysia can access it and have a look at what I have been doing over the Easter break. My friends who are in UK and some who are in Malaysia can view the photos and through my experience here, relive the sights and places I have gone while I was in Melbourne.
Now the question of what is the difference between Facebook and Flickr comes to mind because I am literally comparing the uploading photo function for both of them. In my case, I feel that it does not matter which method of uploading photos you use, but the important thing is that you are able to communicate with your friends and family and share the message which in this case is “my experience in Melbourne, for the world to see.”
Raising the question of communicating through Facebook and etc, we cannot look at communication in the old fashion way where it is merely used for sending simple messages or conversations across. Like I said, communication is evolving and it is bringing more and more ways for people to communicate or project their thoughts and feelings out on to the internet for their peers and family to see.
Communication is something that has always been around but over the years, methods of communication have changed. Just like how communication over the telephone created by Alexander Graham Bell has evolved into mobiles which we can carry everywhere. Our era of communication is based on the internet and its definitely changing for the better.
Blogger is a very good example of a method that people use to project their thoughts and feelings through the internet. Take me for instance, I have a personal blog and have been using it to share my experiences in Brisbane with my friends (for personal reasons, I shall not be sharing the link on this website). Another example of blogger would be our class blog which I am posting on now, I am in Melbourne, sitting outside in the cold air in a little suburb called Devon Hill, posting this up. I have had problems with the internet at a few of my friends’ places and I finally found a house with a working internet connection. By utilizing blogger, I can post up blogs, my experiences and even my assignments from anywhere in the world as long as I one thing present, and that is an internet connection.
After such a long blog post, I finally come to my conclusion. I have been saying over and over throughout the post that the internet is evolving. I believe to be very true because we may not notice it but our ways of communicating have changed from just simple instant messaging to a whole lot more. I for one, sometimes take the internet for granted mainly because it is something that has always been there but think to yourself, has there been any times when you had internet problems and you were unable to get on the internet. Did anyone feel stranded? Did anyone feel like something is missing? Like you were cut off from the world? I have tendencies like that when my internet connection at home, in Brisbane goes haywire. I know some people may say I am addicted to the internet, but look at it this way.
The internet is my mobile phone to the world. Most of us can’t live without our mobile phones and we feel like one of our hands is missing when we leave our hand phones at home. I am using this analogy and linking it with the internet because in my case it is true. I am sure some if not most of us think the same. Internet is something in our lives that we may something take for granted till its missing. The internet in its self is a great communication tool and I hope that I have brought certain new ways for some of you to communicate with people around the world.
A reflection,
Chin Mun, YEE
41530836
My Reflection
by Qianchi LIU (Ecco) 41134823
Introduction
As we know, this course social and mobile computing is base on using ‘Social networking Site’, for example, Facebook, Yahoo Pipes, Flickr, Blogger, Hi5 and so on. Most of them have attracted millions of users, and many of whom have integrated these sites into their daily practices. Why these web sites are very popular? In my opinion, because of these sites are really doing people’s needs. Basically, social networking site is not only a kind of interactions between users and computers, but also with other users. In these web sites, they can share their photos, videos or files, and communicate with others. In this situation, computers and network have become a media platform.
Therefore, by using these web sites, it is good opportunity to communicate with others online, and express your ideas, experience and comments.
Background
The first social networking website is ‘163 Photos’ which is same as Fleckr in China. I felt it is very convenient to share my photo with my family and friends online. Furthermore, there are some other social networking sites I use currently.
Facebook
It is one of the most popular website in the world, which has almost 98 million users in worldwide. Basically, it can send/receive E-mails, chat with friends, share your photos, design your own website, and so on. However, the most important is it used social networks, which means put every user into different networks and relate them together.
Blogger
Blogger is a website which you can post your diary, photos on your home page to let other people to view it. In addition, they can post their comments to your website, and discuss something with you.
Yahoo Pipes
This is an interesting website, which relates to connect different web pages together, and shows its update in time. The most special part in this website is its setting interface that using visible way to connect different web pages together.
Flickr
It is a professional photo sharing website, and very easy to create your own album to share with your friend.
Reflection
After I used these social network websites, I think the most important reason of why these websites are very popular in the world is they are all base on people’s need. As we know, social network websites relate on interactions between people, computer and people. The example of it is Facebook, which provide a network communication platform. It has many interesting features, such as:
The Wall
The Wall is a kind of message board on users’ homepage. If anyone who has the purview, they can view your Wall and leave a message to you. Otherwise, people also can send messages to your friend for private conversations.
The Gift
This is an interesting function, which is you can send fictitious present to your friend, and it will be displayed on their homepage, however, senders’ name are optional. Facebook also provide the fictitious present shop to users select.
Marketplace
Same as ebay online, Facebook also has its own market trade platform; users can post their trade information on it.
Pokes
Pokes is a special way to say ‘hey’ on Facebook, however users give them more and more means. In Facebook’s FAQ section on the Poke Feature said
“A poke is way to interact with your friends on Facebook. When we created the poke, we thought it would be cool to have a feature without any specific purpose. People interpret the poke in many different ways, and we encourage you to come up with your own meanings. ”
Status
To tell your friends where you now or what are are you doing in real life.
Networks
I think this is the most significant part of Facebook, in the diagram of Facebook domain, it shows every account should in a Network, such as SchoolNetwork, WorkNetwork, RegionalNetwork, and so on. Thus, that means if people in a same Network them would have some relationships, for instance, have same friends, classmate or teammate. It helps people to communicate with others and meet different friends who relate to your real life.
Furthermore, as Facebook in China, they proposed a new idea called identification system, which means everyone who wants to sign up; they have to use their real names. Then, if the system confirms your name, you will have more purviews in Facebook. However, the internet society of China has clarified that so far the Ministry of information Industry has not officially made any related policies. Therefore, this system is still in experiment. In my opinion, I think it depends on peoples’ request. It can be optional but not has to be.
On the other hand, Facebook increased my feeling of connection to our peers, the world just become much closer, and I met many old friends on it.
Conclusion
In conclusion, Social Network Website is the largest part in Web 2.0. However, it also has to improve, such as, to protect people’s privacy and real name identification system. In addition, the Social Network Websites are not suitable for every people, depends on our needs and interests can improve more advantages to our daily life.
References:
Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Facebook
Chinadaily, http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/language_tips/2006-10/23/content_714363.htm
My reflection
The Internet in its initial stages was a military network which later was rolled out to the public.
Even though the technology existed, Web 2.0 has only existed since 2004.
Making social networking sites possible only from the last few years.
Social Networking for me has been an opportunity to connect with long lost friends, keep some form of contact to people who normally I don’t see and a general time wasting activity.
It has also allowed me to broaden my horizon and connect with likeminded individuals who live in different countries around the world.
Showing me their cultural differences, world views and universal values.
Apart from the nice side of Social Networking it has also become a place full of static noise.
Meaningless blogs about what someone ate or did today, sites such as Facebook with profiles that have a friends list filled with over 200 random people for no real reason, bulletin notices in Myspace that get filled full of meaningless quizzes and answers and Facebook applications that have pointless roles.
Facebook
I found Facebook to be a potential security threat based on what information can be entered in their system.
For example under account you can enter your Credit Cards' details. I don’t see how this would relate to the usage of Facebook.
I don’t like the idea that you are forced to reveal your full name.
I found application requests to be annoying and useless as I don’t actually actively use applications such as those vampire ones.
Facebook does have a invaluable “News Feed” feature which shows up to date actions done by your friends. This has been recently adopted by Myspace. I don’t see much value of Facebook since I don’t actively use it with my friends, the main reason for this is because Facebook lacks the blogging feature. The blogging feature is a central part of why I use Myspace.
Last FM
I found Last fm to be an interesting concept and it had allowed me to find music I previously never heard of. The scrobbling feature was nice it allowed to build a radio station that is available to play from any computer. I must admit I didn’t use the social features of last fm and found the neighbours list of users didn’t change from the first week I started using it.
Twitter
Never seen the real point of this and still don’t. I don’t want to text what I’m currently doing wasting my credit or knowing what other people are doing at this current time. If I’d like to know I can use other mediums to just contact them.
Delicious
I found it to be a nice way of keeping bookmarks that were available from any computer.
It allowed me to looking up others bookmarks when bored which led me to find interesting new internet sites I wouldn’t have known about. Now I’m not all into using bookmarks, the main sites I use I’ve always tried to memorise them or just learn to use Google to find them.
Flickr
I didn’t see much use of this in my situation, I’m not much of a photo up loader on the internet.
It does have its use when looking at photos taken by other people and alternatively it can be used to store images for backgrounds like in Myspace.
Google Calendar
Google Calendar is a good idea for people who have schedules that need to be shared but in the instance of myself, it was useless. Firstly the effort of inputting the data and then no one actually needs to read my university timetable. If they did they’d get a copy anyway.
41181706 - Anthony Staniszewski
What I thought...
Introduction
At first I thought it was funny when it was explained to me that we would be signing up to all these social networking programs and that our grade would depend on us using them to some extent. I had been consciously avoiding signing up to these things because many of them I saw to be overly self centred and I felt that often people gave a false image of themselves. For an example of self admitted pretentious behavior on a social network please redirect yourselves here http://www.myspace.com/brisantic . So you can understand where I’m coming from when I say that I didn’t want to be a part of that. Upon signing up I was told by several “purists” that I had sold out, I thought that was funny. My own experience with the programs was actually positive and I found many of them useful and fun.
Background
For this report I signed up to the following social networking programs:
- Flickr
- LastFM
- Google Calendar
- Delicious
I also used “pipes” to make a collaborated feed of the different feeds for each program, I called this my “ultimate stalking link”.
Flickr is used to share photos with friends and groups established on the site. Photos uploaded by me can be seen by my friends and others in my groups. This can be used to see what others are up to if they are the kind of person that takes many photos, or alternatively it can be used to upload work that can be then reviewed by peers in your group, a process currently used by tutors and students in MMDS2200.
Facebook is used as a network to connect friends from all over the world. Each user creates their own “profile” where others can look at your photos, leaves comments, send private emails, and leave public messages. The user can leave a note indicating their status and peers can share quizzes and mini games and other kinds of extras.
LastFm like Facebook involves creating a profile viewable by others, but this one is less customizable and the majority of the information is automatically generated. It lists what music you have been listening to on any device where you have installed the appropriate plug-in. Then over time creates charts of your favorite songs based on what you listen to the most. The idea is that other users will see music that you listen to all the time and will try it out. If you network yourself with many other users with similar tastes in music you can find far more music through them than you could have by yourself.
Twitter is used to keep the people who are interested updated on what you are doing. Yes it’s that simple. This update can be accessed through the website or it can be sent directly to your mobile phone via a sms message.
Google Calendar simply lets you make plans on a calendar and then gives you the option of sharing some of that information with others. The idea here being that you can keep certain people up-to-date on your schedule with out having to tell them personally, this can make organizing events and meetings simpler as you wouldn’t need to ask them about their availability.
Dilicious is a program that allows you to share websites with others who are interested. If you come across an interesting website you can tag it so that it appears on delicious and others who can see that tag and access that site. It’s like recommending sites to others.
Focus
Since signing up for these programs some have had a greater impact than others (twitter) and some I have practically neglected (google calendar) and so in my reflection I will be focusing on Facebook, LastFm and Twitter. I feel I should say that I used these the most because I liked them the most, or I felt that they were the most useful to me at the time. I could see google calendar being wonderfully useful if I was in some kind of serious career… but I’m not, so I don’t find it useful.
Reflection
I’m going to start off with Twitter because honestly I want to get it out of the way. Initially I loved the idea of twitter and thought that being constantly updated on what others were doing would be really fun. Almost instantly however there were far too many messages coming in and I found the program to be a burden. I didn’t want to turn off the updates though because I still wanted to know what was happening. Over the few weeks, I found that I got an idea of the personalities of some of these people I was following and throwing in a few comments here and there I started to feel a sense of belonging to the group. I then had a love hate relationship with twitter as I both appreciated the information and hated the occasional overload. The problem doesn’t lie with the program but like many of these programs the solution will come naturally as the users find and develop etiquette of acceptable use and choose more manageable numbers of people to follow.
I can see twitter being infinitely useful in other situations like a group collaborating on a project or keeping in touch in with friends at a large function. I’m at this point trying to get my friends signed up to twitter but have run into problems with the program’s search (on a side note I just checked my phone and had 15 unread messages, it’s killing me) function, when I type in someone’s exact user name and the network fails to find them. This isn’t a huge program as those same contacts can be found through linking other contacts. The main problem I have is convincing others to sign up to something so public and personal, this shows that it’s really not for everyone and some people like their privacy.
My experience with Facebook was much more positive, almost immediately upon signing up I had people who I assumed were dead (they must have been because I hadn’t seen them in years) adding me as a friend and asking me what I had been up to all this time. I after the initial excitement of catching up with long lost friends and friends from overseas that I never see (obviously) I found that facebook is much more passive. From day to day there aren’t many updates or comments going around but the connection is constant. It’s impossible to loose contact with a friend who maintains his/her profile, although you might not talk to them often but you will have some idea (based on how much they use the program) of what they are doing with themselves and where they are headed in life. I know from my parents that there were many friends that were lost because of a change of address and with digital (unchanging) addresses I can see this being a thing of the past, we will accumulate friends and information our entire lives. Keeping that in mind I can’t see this technology as a phase or something that will go away, these programs will continue in some shape or form simply because people want to keep in contact.
Anther point my use of facebook was more passive and more focused on keeping loosely connected with old friends as apposed to constantly communicating with everyone. I was invited to take part in all kinds of mini games and quizzes that seemed to serve no function other than to waste my time. Something that I don’t want this to become is a pastime or some kind of addiction. There are many people that use it for that and I don’t have a problem with that but I already have more time consuming hobbies than I can deal with so I’m not likely to have more than a passive presence on facebook.
The program that I was the most interested in and entertained by was and is LastFm. Of all the programs this is the one I had actually planned on joining before we were asked to participate in this experiment. Music is something I am extremely interested in and for years and years the radio has failed to provide me with new bands that I like. Finding new music that satisfied my tastes has always been a process of social networking based on recommendations from friends. When I heard that there was a website that did all of that for you, one where you could see what people actually listened to (not just talked about) I decided that this was something I wanted to be a part of. I feel that last point is significant in that in the music world many people think too much about what other people think of them and as a result talk about bands that aren’t really their favorite and they don’t really listen to much at all. With LastFm’s weekly charts I was able to see what new bands my friends had found and better still I was able to listen to clips of them and gain my own first impressions.
Alternatively upon networking up with some others in the course I was able to quickly identify if I had much in common with them musically. Unfortunately more often than not neither party would recognize a single band in each others charts, leading to a less than useful result. Like facebook LastFM is useful as a passive tool to keep in touch with gradually changing information. Over time I can see LastFM becoming more and more useful as I find more people with similar tastes and get glimpses of the new music they are listening to. This program could go as far as you wanted to and could become the sole resource for both finding new music and talking about music with others.
Conclusion
In conclusion I found that all the different programs certainly had their uses but the use to the individual varies from person to person and also the extent to which they are used varies and the way in which they are used. Personally I find LastFM the most useful but I have my plans for Twitter and I will keep Facebook updated. In the future I can see google calendars being useful also Delicous can have the same rewards as LastFm. So despite my initial reservations about social networking programs I can now say that I value them. I can see that there will be a need for a simplification in the process and with pipes we are seeing the beginning of that, so that all these different tools can be combined in one.
‘Social networking Site’ and how I use them
Introduction
When I knew that I will be required to sign up for several social networking sites for Social and Mobile Computing Course, I was really excited. Mainly because I used to like social networking sites, or I should say, addicted to them. It was friendster that introduces me to the social networking hype. I even joined others social networking sites shortly after that. Then as my university assignments, work and other real life activities started to increased, my activities on them decreased. In addition, those sites being a lot less interesting to me, to the point that I see them only as a waste of time and actually feel guilty if I spent my free time for them because it does not serve the my initial purpose of using them anymore.
Therefore I though, this is a good opportunity to start using them again, at least I have enough reason and less guilt to start wasting my time on social networking sites again. I also would like to know what improvements and changes offered by current sites have to offer. This article will outline my experience with the several social networking sites and as the title said how I use them.
Background
This section contains brief descriptions for social networking websites that I have joined in the beginning of the Social and Mobile Computing course.
Del.icio.us, a social bookmarking site, is generally a place to share the links to the websites that you interested in with other people. Those links can be described using tags. You can also view other people bookmarked sites and browse it using the tags.
Flickr, a photo sharing site. It is a site for people to upload and share their photo collections. Users can categorised their photo as well as give them tag to describe them, in addition they can also marked the location where the photo was taken [1]. Other users can browse their photos using the mentioned descriptor.
Google Calendar is a solid online calendar application. Users can add events into their calendar by using the site as well as importing the events from other calendar application, on the social aspect users can create public events, invite people and get comments from them. In addition it offers personalisation to the users, enabling them to change the look and feel of the calendar [2].
Facebook, is a social networking website with a lot of promising features. You can send messages to your friend using wall or messages them, share your picture albums and also videos with them, status and news feed to keep your friends updated with your activities and other functions such as pokes and gifts [3]. It also has the application framework, which allows developers to create custom application for facebook to be used by the users.
Last.FM is a music-based social networking website. Last.fm profile allows the users to share the song that they have been listening to with other users. Last.fm then gives the users recommendations based to logged song list, other users can also give recommendations. Other functions such as forming a group based on their interest as well as events which allows users to get notified if events matched their music taste are coming, they can also marked themselves as attendance of the event [4].
Focus
This article will focus on my opinion of the function of the social networking sites mentioned above and how I interact with them. That includes what functionalities that I use and whether I use the social context from the websites and also whether it serves the purpose that I seek from them or my initial thought towards them. Some of the good functions and the drawbacks will be included in order to delivers the main focus of this article.
Reflection
After using the social networking sites for quite some time, I divided them into two categories based on how I use them. First is the ‘good functionality’ websites, they are the ones that offer steady and useful function but I do not really use the social aspect out of it. Del.icio.us, Flickr and Google Calendar fall into this category. Second is the ‘social networking’ websites, they are the ones that I use because of the social context that they offer, such as facebook and last.fm.
Del.icio.us offers quite an interesting and useful service, but I am not really keen to share my bookmark with many people, I do not really want people to know what sites that I am interested in. It is good that I can mark my bookmark to a private, so rather than sharing my bookmark I mainly use it to store my favourite websites then use it a portable bookmark. I have more than one computer and I spend large amount of my time either in the office or campus as well, so it is good to have my bookmarked sites in Del.icio.us. So despite It is a social bookmarking service, I am not using the social part of it to the fullest. Except browsing other people bookmark using the tags that they are given, which is really useful.
I use Flickr to upload pictures to be used on another sites, for example blog, facebook or posting pictures in forum. It is relatively easy to upload pictures into flickr, they have flickr uploader and I can also use it to upload my pictures from iphoto. Because there is nothing artistic with the pictures that I have taken, I do not feel the need to show them off into the world. I used to like drawing pictures and I would love to share my drawings with other people with the same hobby and hear their opinion about my works. So If only I am into photography, Flickr is a really nice social networking site.
Google Calendar despite having a good functionally the social aspect does not appeal to me. The reason being people that are interested in my schedule or the ones that I need to inform of my schedule does not use Google Calendar nor spend the time mostly in front of the computer. Just like Del.icio.us I ended up using it for personal use. I always use ICal as my calendar application, and google calendar offer most, or even more, of the functionality from ICal that I use. I see it as portable ICal. I can export my schedule from ICal to Google Calendar not the other way around. Therefore I do not see it as a replacement for ICal, because I need to synchronise ICal with other calendar in my other gadgets as well.
Facebook offers good and promising social functions for me to use. I signed up because some of my friends that study overseas like myself use it quite often. I was not really interested on it because I was already using friendster, that at that time already not as enjoyable to me as it did and became slowly neglected. I saw Facebook as friendster alternative with better layout and less unappealing users. When I started to really using it in oppose of having an idle account only, and I have to admit it was fun. I found my high school friends and even my elementary school friends there.
Getting touch with old friends, sending messages and know how they are doing and what they up to are the main purpose for me to use facebook. I used to send wall and messages quite often, that was when my friends still use it as the main interaction on Facebook. But my enjoyment in using the facebook start to went downhill after the start of the application era. At first I get hundreds of request for using the application, less that half of them interest me, but those request is not that annoying because I can just reject or ignore it. The fact that rather than using facebook as a communication tools, for most people at my friends list, facebook transforms into online games to fill up their free time to the point that If I do not add the application into my profile I have less interaction with them. Even the wall that was a place to exchange messages, transformed into publicly viewable forward emails, those email you got in your inbox which is a forward from someone then the receiver send it to other group of people and it continues, with all the useless messages and images posted. Therefore I find facebook slowly become less appealing to me as the users do not really use it as social networking websites anymore.
Last.fm is other social networking sites that I truly use the social side of it. I was always interested to sign up on Last.fm but have not got the chance to explore it. The concept of music-based community is really interesting to me. I imagine I can finally find people with similar taste of music then get recommendation of other music that I probably interested in as well. It was not really enjoyable the first time I joined, that is before the songs on my play list scrobbled. As I leave my computer on for couple days just for letting last.fm to get my taste of music from the scrobbled songs, things start to get interesting. The recommendation function which makes me interested in the website truly delivers what I wanted to get. I do not listen to radio that often anymore because I do not like half of the song get played anyway, so it is a nice way to know what other music I might like and listen to them. I can also find the videos from the artist that I like on last.fm, I usually search for them through youtube which sometimes showing the fan made videos instead, although marked as official by the uploader. Besides that, there is also neighbours users, you can see their profile and find out what other artist that people who listed to the same music taste with you.
For me, last.fm have a ‘show off’ factor into it, which in this case is not a bad thing. If you want to show off your music taste, the concerts that you have been going into or if you want to be the one that most listened to the songs for particular artist, last.fm is a nice website to get it. You can also show your taste of music with application for other websites [5]. The good thing about Last.fm is that it offers fewer holes for the users to abused them and transform it into personalisation nightmare. Although, you cannot avoid raging fan defending their favourite artist or the ones that feel the need to say a bad things about certain artist just to make the fan upset. Last.fm offers different thing from the social networking sites that I have joined such as facebook, friendster or my space, mainly because there is a thing that keep me interested in using it, which is music.
Conclusion
The enjoyment of using Social Networking Sites will be different for all people. It is based on their personality, preferences as well as security concern. For myself, I want to use Social Networking Sites to communicate with old friends or find people with the same interest as myself. There are things that I would like to maintain for myself thus make the social context from some sites unappealing to me. In addition to that, how people interact with these sites are varies as well which for some add into negative sides. The disappointing acts from other users in the social networking sites is one of the main reason for me to dislike a social networking site.
Reference
[1] http://www.flickr.com/tour/
[2] http://www.google.com/intl/en-GB/googlecalendar/tour.html
[3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Facebook_features
[4] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Last.fm
[5] http://build.last.fm/
41062784
Aristyaningtyas Kusumo
Thursday, March 27, 2008
Change technology or technology Changed us?
Introduction
Information technologies have become increasingly important in the human society. Most of the tasks were solved with the aid of computers. Over the past two decades, internet has progressively played an important role of lives of millions of people. They can survive without television or radio, but not without the internet. The Internet has been a source of entertainment, information, and communication to many. Countless numbers of online communities are formed via the internet to the extent where people view online communities as significant as real life comminutes. The hottest trend of how internet website built is social networking website. The business value of these websites can reach billions of dollars, for instance, Facebook. Google is offering 2 billion to buy over the currently most talked about online community websute, Facebook.
Background
I have signed on a couple of social networking website. They provide diverse areas of focus and service .
Facebook
A free social networking website. Facebook‘s ability of allowing users to join groups and add friends, provides them with an avenue to form online committees .Video and photo sharing features provides a platform where users can stay in touch with their friends even if they are not in the same region and keep themselves updated with one another’s’ life. The introduction of add on applications, for example, games and social meeting have dramatically enhanced the sociability of user.
Flickr
Flickr focuses their service on photo sharing where users can upload a number of high quality pictures. Their service is widely uses by bloggers as a photo repository. Flickr allows users to tag their photos which ultimately acts like a keyword or category label, enabling users to search for specific photos with more ease.
Last.Fm
Last Fm is a cool music community website. Music files are shared among users within this website and users have the option to create custom radio stations. Last FM allows users to receive music recommendations from other users who enjoy listening to same of genre of music using a system known as "Audioscrobbler". It is almost possible to locate any song by any artist with the availability of Last Fm’s vast music library base.
Twitter
A very interesting social networking website where users can send updates of their status to the twitter server using device like mobile phones and instant messenger. Users’ friends will be able to receive updates of his status through the web or their mobile phone.
Google calendar
An online application where internet users are able to organize their time schedule as well as share events with their friends and family. The application allows user to upload their schedules and other interesting events online. Built-in tools such as mobile phone notifications and search tool helps to prevent them from missing your pre-plan schedule. It is a very useful online application.
Focus
Social networking websites have significant influence on our lives without people evidently noticing it. The topic that I will be reflecting on primarily deals with how these social networking websites have influences our lifestyles.
Reflection
Facebook
Research has shown that Facebook has 50 million users. The popularity of Facebook does not lie only among teenagers and student. In fact, it is well received from everyone ranging from professionals to new mums. Research has shown that woman make up 57% of those in the 18-34 age group and users are willing to spend an average of 5.3 hours each month on the website. When one has spend so much time dedicated to Facebook, influences are inherent. I have one year of experience with Facebook which I realized that it does have a substantial impact on me.
The Photo sharing and Wall Post applications in facebook have provided a more convenient alternative for me to receive updates on my friends’ lives, some whom may live thousands of miles away from me. I seldom call up my friends nowadays and enter mundane conversations such as “How are you ?” or “How has life been so far?” However, with the ease of Wall application, I am able to leave a message for him/her at my convenience. Another application provided facebook is friend search.
I realised that it has become very common for people to use Facebook as a dating website. Facebook requires users to create a profile of themselves and include information about their marital status, education and work history, as well as photos of themselves.. They then build up a network of friends by searching lists of online members and making contact with people they know. Users have to accept confirmation to be friends before their full details are visible to others. This feature provides an environment where singles have tones of opportunity to meet up with others singles. For instance , I personally made a lot of new friends through this website. The large number of games application in Facebook also enhanced the socializing platform. Users are able to make friends anytime, anyway and enjoy friendly competition with one another through these games application which certainly will enhance relationship with friends. Through Facebook, physical distance among family, friends or even strangers are instantly reduced in matters of minutes or seconds.
Flickr
Flickr is our life photo album. In the past, we use photo albums to store our entire life memories so that we are able to view the pictures once in a while to reminisce about the past. However, life changes with the fast development of social networking websites. We now store most of our photos online. Flickr is specially designed to provide service for user to store and share their photos with friends where they are able to view at their own convenience .Comparing Flickr and other social networking websites such as Facebook and Friendster. Filckr tends to lose out on the fact that they are less interactive and significantly less features for an online social environment. Facebook provides much more applications for user to allow interaction with one another. I don’t usually log on to Flickr because what Flickr provides are just a subset of what are available in Facebook and Friendster. On the other hand, Flirkr is widely use by blogger as a photo repository which makes up to their disadvantage.
Last.Fm
With Last FM , the way we choose, buy and listen to music has gradually changed. More and more groups or individual singers publish their music for free online, which means that we can listen to any music anytime. With the invention of this online music sharing website, we are considerably more exposed to a wide array of music and at a lower or costless way. Our choice for music will no longer be influenced by price tags, record label or where the albums are positioned among the shelf space. This evolvement of listening to music with the radio or CD players to online music file sharing has occurred for a period of time and with this outburst of online music website, this change is going to manifest in the lifestyles of majority of people in coming years.
Twitter
Twitter is a website which I will describe it as an information distribution system. Updates of where the users are, what they are doing can be easily retrievable by their friends. I used it to disseminate and coordinate instructions when organizing events . With the help of twitter, it is easier for me to contact all my friends at one go instead of the old fashioned way of calling them one by one It is possible for users to add links within twitter such that if users have a personal website and seeks to drive traffic for that particular website, all they have to do is to befriend other twitter members and they will be able to locate the links that users have posted on the twitter website. Essentially, all they have to do initially is to create a personal profile on twitter which works in a similar as Facebook.
Google calendar
Google calendar is a very good tool for disseminating your schedule and get updates from friends and colleagues. I used it to update my friends on my weekly schedule, and coordinate lunch, dinner and social events. Indeed, it saved me a lot of time from calling friends individually, which in the past has caused much confusion and anger during the process. Several companies are using this as a means of arranging meetings for their employees. The substantial amount time saved by using Google calendar has attracted many users to sign on to this application especially when time if often viewed extremely precious by many in this modern and fast-moving society.
Conclusion.
With the flourishing of the social networking technology, we are able to perform tasks with less time and effort. We have the ability to receive first hand information about their friends and the people around us just by a click on the browser. The tools provided by all the social networking websites have granted us with so much convenience that we are starting to adapt our lifestyles to suit the change in IT environment. Ironically, computers seem to be taking control over us, when it is supposed to be the other way round. On the surface, we seem to get closer and closer with one another. However, I feel that we are slowly drifting away from one another. I believe that if people relied on social networking and computers to communicate with each other and start taking them for granted, it will unavoidably create unforeseen problems in the future. For example, people will gradually feel uncomfortable while making conversations with others in-person or in the worst case scenario, they lose the ability to adapt or have difficulty in fitting to any social circle. With the fast advancement of the IT technology in the future, there will be no doubt that we will live in a virtual world and we will have serious problems with personal interaction. I feel that there should be always a balance toward all matters. Make full use of the latest technology to our advantage but not rely on it totally.
Reference :
http://www.physorg.com/news84027254.html
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/femail/article.html?in_article_id=512535&in_page_id=1879&in_page_id=1879&expand=true#StartComments
S41094262
Lee Yiu Wing
My Reflection
INTRODUCTION
For a long time I have resisted those who told me to sign up for various social sites. "You should join livejournal," they would say, and I would reply "Not right now, maybe later." I would get emails inviting me to join Facebook, which I would promptly ignore. But when I was offered 15% participation marks to try out various social networking sites, I couldn't say no. And it turns out I was right. I'm not meant to be social.
BACKGROUND
the web sites I looked at were as follows:
Flickr:
A social networking site based around sharing photos. Once uploaded photos can be shared with others, as well as being tagged so it is possible to search for photos.
Facebook:
A social networking site which allows you to keep in touch with friends. It has a friends list, as well as networks and groups. It also has a large number of aplications to do a variety of things.
Last.FM:
A social site which keeps track of the music you listen to and offers recomendations of new music. It also allows you to keep a list of friends and lists people who have similar tastes in music.
Google Calender:
This site allows you to record your appointments on an online calender. You can make your calender public or private, however if you make it public it will be visible to everyone and even appear in Google searches.
FOCUS
I guess I should start by saying I am not normally a particularly social being. Before doing this course the extent of my internet socialization was email and instant messaging, and now I suddenly find myself with much more. Of course I don't tend to use all of them very much, and I don't find myself particularly suited to most of these sites at all. My reflection will focus on my experiences with these sites and what I liked and didn't like.
REFLECTION
The main example of this is Flickr. I think it is a good idea, I can see the uses of it, but they don't apply to me. I am not in the habit of taking photos, and do not in fact even own a camera. Because of this I don't have any photos to share with my family and friends, or with anyone else for that matter. I do, however, occasionally look at photos others have place there. Google calender was also pretty useless due to the fact that I am extremely unorganized, and it is normal for me to not know what I am doing until the day before it happens, if then. I am also uncomfortable with making my calender public, allowing anyone to see what I am doing when, even complete strangers who have stumbled on it using a Google search.
The other side of the scale lies with Last.FM, as I am constantly listening to music, especially when I am working at home, and I have just spent the last couple of weeks doing assignments. I downloaded the audioscrober and connected it to windows media player, and it lists all the music I listen to on my page. Then it gives me interesting information on what I listen to. For example, it recently listed Battelore as one of the bands I listen to most, despite the fact that I only have 2 of their songs on my computer, however over time this has change to reflect the amount of music from different bands I own. It also points out all those song I have that I never took the time to tag properly, some of them appear on my page with the wrong information, and the site says it can't find the artist, largely because it is listed as 'compilation' or 'buffy soundtrack', since it is to much effort for me to find out who actually wrote the songs. Then there are other times I have gone to look at my page and it has left me notes saying a song was not recorded because it is insufficiently tagged, and tells me to correct this. I haven't got around to it. I enjoy listening to the music recommendations, and although the social side of the site is limited because I don't know of any of my friends who use it, the site is quite helpful when I am using a public computer and want to listen to music. I may one day even look at that list of people it says have similar tastes. I am quite happy to allow all of my music to appear on the list, as all my friends like different types of music, and my tastes are so varied I consider it normal to jump from Cradle of Filth to The Beatles to crazy Japanese music that where I don't understand a word they say. I also like the pretty collage of album covers it makes from my music.
While Last.FM is the most used of the social tool I have signed up to, Facebook is probably the one I have used most for social reasons. However, this was hindered by the fact that most of my friends on Facebook have been on it for a long time, and are rather static in what they do with it, or I already speak to them too often using instant messaging, and as such we don't often have anything worth saying on Facebook, or if we do it gets said on msn. We can be rather boring sometimes. I do enjoy playing with the different Facebook applications, and comparing my results to others. Apparently I'll only survive for 55% of a horror movie...oh well, at least I lived through the first half.
CONCLUSION
In conclusion social networking sites are not for everybody. In my own case, I used Last.FM, however I didn't use any of it's social features. While the fact that you don't have to deal with these people face to face can be a distinct advantage, hiding away in a dark room playing on Facebook is not as enjoyable as actually going out and spending time with friends. The main reason, however, that I do not have a use for these sites is that I have no desire to talk to people who are not my friends over the internet, and I already have many different ways with which I keep in touch with the people I want to talk to.
Social networking sites rate and review.
Written By Dean Jullie (41188424)
Introduction
To begin I should put it out there that I have fallen for social websites and fallen hard at that. When I’m at my computer there seems to be less and less to do other than logging into the five or so social websites to which I belong. It seems I feel content when I get to my Facebook page and there is a comment or friend request waiting for me, however; when there’s not a single comment or request aimed at me I begin to experience disappointment and a little despair. I believe the true experience is when one of every type of social website is combined together, thus providing the user with a complete and satisfactory social experience.
The following topics will take a look at five different social websites each aimed to expand your social network via the internet.
Facebook
Facebook is a social site that provides users with the technology to SPAM APPLICATION REQUESTS. But on a serious note Facebook is a social website that is simply a means for someone to keep in touch with and share photos with their friends. Another quirky feature of Facebook is the applications feature, the applications you can use in Facebook once selected, are linked to your profile and can show different things ranging from sending a friend an e-beer or throwing an e-sheep at someone. The main focus for Facebook is the friends database, Facebook’s combination of messages super pokes and pictures make it a pretty decent way of keeping in touch with friends from school, friends overseas or just your close friends.
Google Calendar
Pretty much what it reads, Google Calendar is an online equivalent to the Microsoft outlook calendar system. This social site allows the tracking and viewing of other users calendars. While this software/website may sound un-secure the process is restricted to how much information you choose to upload onto the online calendar. As a user you can edit your calendar to show details such as work shifts, university times or general catch-up with friend dates.
Twitter belongs in a class of its own when it comes to status updates. Once logged into the website a user can simply update their status. Twitter faces everyone with a single question ‘What are you doing?’, then in 140 words or less you write your status and post it to the site. Anyone following your profile will be able to read your status, it’s that simple. Twitter also takes this status notification setup one step further by adding an external element, the mobile phone. If selected twitter can send you text notification messages whenever the people your following update their status. Likewise you can update your status via mobile phone.
Last.FM is the ‘Social Music Revolution’ or so they claim. Last.FM provides an online music service to users where whenever a user listens to a track on their computer the details of that song are uploaded to your page. Last.FM provides a way to add friends, contact friends and see what your music compatibility rating with other people is.
Last but not least we have Flickr, this is a very neat and tidy way of sharing images you as a user upload with the rest of the Flickr community. When an image is uploaded tags can be added making that image searchable on Flickr. Users can leave comments on any images they view adding a feedback element to the user’s experience.
The focus of this reflection is to provide an insight into the way I view online social networking sites and a little into how, when combined they provide a full experience.
From first being a member of only the one social website aimed at maintaining friends online, I have been introduced to multiple forms of online social networking. There are many websites that collate information about users for fun purposes but do not really count as social sites, for example What Pulse is an online community that is team based where each user uploads data from their computer containing the number of keystrokes and clicks that have been made. Each team then gets a ranking on how well they are doing in comparison to everyone else. This site has little to no communication between its members and provides no quick or current feedback to the user. A social networking site must in my opinion be so simple and feature packed that our grandparents could use it.
One thing that does come into question when using the online social sites is security and how much information should you really post on your profiles. The answer to this question is a relatively simple one, the amount of information available to the world is directly in proportion to the amount of information you choose to apply to your profile. I for one use a separate email address for work purposes and a not so important email address for social websites or anything online for that matter. My second email address contains limited information about myself; likewise do my profiles on social websites. Having basic security like this enables users to in a sense hide behind their online screen name.
Now to the more important side of my experience with online social networking, how well they worked. If I was to pick a favourite site it would be Facebook, now I’m not saying I love Facebook because I don’t its just that it combines images and text and even some music all in one as well it is probably the easiest to find friends and meet people with. The worst experience I have had on one of these sites would defiantly have to be Google Calendar, this being said if I was a really organised person and had the use for a calendar like this I would probably find it a lot more useful. As it stands I don’t have any use for Google Calendar, unless my workplace started using it to show us shifts and we could add our availability (now to get my boss using a computer hmmm). Flickr would probably come in second last, sure its good and neat at what it does but the social side of it is a lacking a little something. When searching through the images on Flickr I find that I don’t really search through the pictures with the intent to comment on a picture. I feel that’s how most users would find it and therefore it seems to me that Flickr doesn’t do as good a job as Facebook’s photo management.
Twitter is the site that I would rank reasonably high as well; Twitter even has a Facebook application allowing your twitter status to be shown in Facebook. Twitter provides a status notification system that far outreaches many of its competitors, the fact that mobile phone technology has been brought into it means great accessibility which means easier to use and can be used more frequently. The ‘Social Music Revolution’ Last.FM is pretty fun to use I will give it that, providing up to date information on what songs your friends and colleagues are listening to and weekly statistics like top artists and top songs. Last.Fm to me lacks the common social networking that some of the other sites provide, I think, however; Last.FM was intended to run like it is as more of a singular use site.
In my opinion most of the sites I have learnt and used have their key features which make them unique and usable; using a combination of your favourite social networking sites is, in my opinion the way to go. If your not a big music fan and don’t like knowing what your friends listen to then don’t sign up with Last.FM, likewise if you don’t really have a need to share your pictures and comments on others pictures Flickr isn’t for you. I think now, knowing all of these sites exist I will find it hard to quit one or the other sites as long as my friends continue to use them. I think the best experience possible for online social networking doesn’t just come from one website; it will come from your tailor made selection of social sites.
- What Pulse.
Keystroke counting team based site.
http://whatpulse.org/
- Facebook.
Social networking site.
http://www.facebook.com/
- Last.FM.
Social music site, shows recently played tracks.
http://www.last.fm/
- Flickr.
Picture / photo sharing site.
http://www.flickr.com/
- Google Calendar.
Public Calender website.
http://www.google.com/calendar/render/
- Twitter.
Status notification site, also utilises mobile technology.
http://twitter.com/
Social NetWORKS
This image represents the multitude of people that communicate via social networks like Facebook and how they are all related to one another: 
By Alan J Lambert
The phrase ‘social networking’ is a comparatively new addition to the already mystifying dictionary of computer-speak, and it represents one of the very latest internet phenomena. In essence social networking means evolution, a theory which has developed into a practical purpose and its popularity can mainly be attributed to its flexibility and how easily it can be harnessed by its users. Social network sites allow their users to create and submit their own content – whether that’s a simple comment, a collection of photos or an entire homepage of their own.
Social networking relies on the idea that content can be shared with others, either publicly or in private groups and this allows users to keep in touch, search for users of other interests or share information with people in similar situations.
The focus of social networking sites is to use and develop the idea of a community, sharing things with existing friends and making new friends as you go. Social network sites such as Bebo, MySpace or Facebook allow a user to create his or her own profile, add comments, text, information about themselves and even uploading music, song lists, photos and videos. Groups can be created from virtually any subject in these sites. In a group people with similar interests, hobbies, employment and many other things which can bring large groups of people together from across the world instantly from any computer terminal.
There is practically no limit to the application of social networking. Sites like MySpace which allow artists to upload their music and share it with the world is an example of how social networking can be used to gain employment, online dating is also similar, as it allows people to see a person’s photo their status and even share email or telephone calls before they decide they want to commit to a romantic relationship.
Multiplayer games such as second life also falls under the category of social networking as it allows users the ability to meet and interact with other users around the globe in a 3D virtual interactive environment. Blogging also falls under the social network banner, as it allows you to create your own personal website onto which you can post links, photos and anything else you like to share with friends and complete strangers.
Privacy
With increased popularity of computers and high speed connections security on your computer and its internet accounts is vital, as it prevents data tampering, sabotage or even your personal work being copied. The same goes with social networking sites. There are many safety and privacy issues relating to the use of a social network site mostly involving how a site can make your personal information free for everyone to see. Therefore it is vital that information such as your home number, address, places visited often and even relationship information should be carefully considered before posting. A good rule is not to post any information online you would not be happy for anyone to read. Some sites allow you to control who can see your information or posts, usually controlled by a friends ‘list’ whereby they have to be logged in and on your list before they can see your home address.
When creating a profile on a social networking site information such as address, phone number and credit card details are usually optional, and it is therefore not required for them to be entered given the nature that anyone could use this free information to access banking details or transfer money. Most social network sites offer some form of messaging system, so it is relatively easy to start a conversation with other users. You must still be careful about which personal information you tell people and how they are planning o use it.
Along with this social networking comes with a range of legal considerations, which are usually included in the websites terms and conditions area. It is important to observe copyright laws before uploading video footage, text or photographs that do not belong to you without prior permission. Sexually explicit or violent images or text may also cause your account to be suspended or even possible legal action.
Originally designed for students of Harvard University Facebook a relatively new site designed by 23 year old Mark Zuckerberg, has stolen the lime light from MySpace with the companies estimated value of $10 billion and over 43 million users. So why is this site so popular? The basic operation and the user experience doesn’t differ much from other sites of its kind, users simply need a valid email account to register, you can supply as much or as little information as you like, things such as hobbies and interests, education and employment are just some of the area’s most popular. It is then possible to insert a profile image and search other users for relationship status, hobbies and generally the idea is to allow you to find likeminded people who share similar interests as you, helping you develop friends around the globe without leaving your house.
One way Facebook is different from the competition is that it allows different ways of communicating with people on your friends list. Every profile includes the wall, a simple interactive message board that an account owner and friends can post short messages to each other, simple and highly effective. It is possible to send people in your friends list a full message, full and private, from you to him closely related to an email. RSS feeds also allow you to keep track of activities of friends and new information on Facebook.
Facebook also allows users to upload photos and images and arrange them into albums, without the use of an external site such as Flickr. Your friends may also leave comments about your photos which the user can then vet and delete incase there is any violent or undesirable comments left on the images. Facebook can mainly dedicate its success to the lack of social network sites that cater for the older users, and also the simple layout not over run by ad’s and popup windows advertising Viagra and “You Have Won” windows.
Blogging
Blogging is the process of keeping a kind of online diary where users may leave comments, so more or less a online board where only authors can post large amounts of information. The reason why blogging has become so popular is due to people writing online, their thoughts, what has happened and allowing user feedback on what they thought about certain things. Sure other sites allow this exact same feature, but the user knowing that he is in control allows a difference in what information they feel comftable posting. If you use a board then it is likely that other users have been there longer, and you may watch what you say as you will be considered a new comer. But with a blog you are master, you control everything and you may post information and long boring diary entries about whatever you wish, imagine if anyone ever read or commented on these. But some blog sites such as the COMP3505 blog can show practical uses, such as viewing and commenting on other people assignment work and how information can be manipulated to serve practical purposes.
Last.fm
This site deals with music lovers. You can automatically keep tabs on other users and friends by means of online profiles with loved and hated music aswell as what they have played recently. RSS feeds also make it easy to keep track of other users behaviors. The software included in this site allowed users to upload their windows media player playlists and history however provided little coverage for users of other systems such as Mac or Linux. The included software was easy to use and powerful. The speed of the music downloads was comparable to radio and at a much higher quality. The search function allowing artists to be grouped into similar and tagged to easily find artists of the same genre is a powerful tool in this package and has led to its current popularity.
Along with all of these and many more sites comes a list a mile and a half long with programs that can enhance the users interaction with social networking sites. MyEdit 1.0 for example is a MySpace tool that has been used to personalize many MySpace pages without the dorky explorer window as its only interface. ShareThis add on also allows an easier interface for Facebook when communicating with your friends. To conclude the social networking may very well only be in the early stages of development and already this popular, only time will tell what this creative and endlessly flexible design will become. From the use of social networking sites the connection between myself and other users has increased, mainly thru last.fm, as musical tastes are a major part of the people whom I connect with. Other hobbies also effected the users I communicated with. Only one thing is certain for the future of social networking, my experience is not over.
Feel free to visit MySpace http://ajlambert.spaces.live.com/
Alan J Lambert
41405710
Ultimate Guides - Facebook and other social networks ISSUE 2 2008
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_network
www.techcrunch.com/2007/07/24/9-ways-to-build-your-own-social-network/
www.whatissocialnetworking.com/
www.orgnet.com/sna.html
Becoming Social in an Instant Instant Instant
Introduction
I admit that I am neither the most sociable nor am I the most active person when it comes to socialising. It is not that I don’t care about other people, but it is only a fact that it is not in me to ‘talk that much’; the other way of saying this is I am not so much of a vocal person. For instance, I would rather sit with a group of people and listen to whatever they have to say about how their day went. Because for all I know if they ask me about mine, all I can blurt out is the usual “It’s awesome!” and so it goes on. For me, presence is two sides of a matter: chatting online is different from ‘being there’. Social networking websites has made communication easier for people like me.
In the next few paragraphs, I will be relating the impact of online social networking services to the entire society – How it promoted social efficiency, and how it produced the wonders that worked for the social and the not-so-social people, like me, to easily interact and communicate with others (Kopomaa 2000).
Background
For the purpose of this assignment, I will be drawing most of my knowledge based on my experience of using various social networking websites, including the ones that were recommended for the students to explore.
Facebook is now known to be one of the largest social networking website amongst the people of today. It not only allows people to easily connect with others around the world, but it also presents users with the most abundant and entertaining features. One of this, is the ‘wall’ provided in each user’s profile page, where people can post messages for the user to see. It can transmit virtual actions to other users; the earliest one is known to be the ‘poke’. It allows users to update their ‘status’ to inform their friends of their current condition. It also provides a photo application where people can upload unlimited photos and share it with others to see. As days and months passed, more and more applications are developed and can be added to ones user page, all of which can be used to interact with other users on facebook. This is by far, in my opinion, is its most appealing aspect.
Last.fm is a music community website that allows users to build musical profiles based on the music they listen to, from the website’s streamed radio stations or from the user’s portable music player or computer. It records every detail of the song the user is listening to and generates recommendations pages, which links users to more songs of the same genre, as well as other users that have similar music taste.
Twitter is another social networking website that mainly provides instant messaging services. One can post ‘updates’ and messages of up to 140 characters to the Twitter website itself, via sms, or other-third party applications such as facebook. These messages, also known as ‘tweets’ are sent to all other users who have signed up to received them. Users may receive these tweets via the Twitter website, sms, rss, email or through an application.
Flickr is an online photo sharing website that allows users to upload photos and share them with other people online. It allows users to organise images by using tags to categorise the photos so it will be easier for other users to find.
Focus: Social Efficiency
The proliferation of social communication devices in the age of information technology is a blessing to the hopes and desires of the modern individual. Many of this social communication software not only provide interactivity, but also, mobility that allows users to have a sense of control over the complications of modern life. The hit of modern technology today is something known as social networking that offers the possibilities of letting people of all ages associate with one another across the miles or better yet, just across the room!
Perhaps, the roots for which made social networking websites click is the fact that it contributes to social efficiency by instantly connecting people, and thus, gradually and effectively generates various and specific online communities wherein people can move around freely. Social efficiency maybe described as the amount of interaction among individuals, while having sole control and freedom to engage in social activities whenever one wants (Williams 1982). I would like to elaborate these issues on the following paragraphs.
Instant Connections
Imagine 50 years ago; back when mobile phones, computers, the internet and all other social networking services are still waiting to be discovered, when there was no easy means of transmitting messages from one place to another. Back then and from the longest of time, paper is considered to be one of the most remarkable social medium. With a pen, it can convey and communicate thoughts and ideas, which is probably its most distinctive attribute. People then started to use paper as a social medium by sending letters to and from faraway places. It has served its purpose well, but after all these years, it is rapidly becoming obsolete, in terms of its use as a social conveyor (Koelsch 1995).
In this modern day and age, printed words and pictures are easily transported to new multimedia technologies, in this case, Web 2.0, particularly the various social networking tools that have been made available for all to use. It eliminates all the hassles of writing a message down on a letter, letting people run around to send them, and waiting for several long days to receive them. For instance, I would only have to rely on facebook or twitter to send my simple regards of ‘Hi! How are you doing?’ or greeting to a friend who is celebrating his birthday; no need for the purchase of a card and the trouble of mailing it over, no waiting on to receive them, in a shorter term – instant! The same thing goes for Flickr. By uploading images, I am able to immediately share it with other people miles away from me.
Making connections with other people this way is fast and convenient. Personally speaking, talking to people on facebook or twitter is easier because there is no need for physical contact and the tools are readily being provided for. If facebook tells me that it is the birthday of someone I hardly know and hang out with, then I would eagerly write a birthday greeting on that person’s wall, for the simple reason of ‘why not? It’s just writing on the wall.’ In addition, I would feel better for being nice that I care to greet that person. So in a way, social networking websites provide the opportunity and enforce people to actively socialise, even when they do not feel like it.
Instant Communities
In the Web 2.0 environment, social networking websites unites people together, thus, gradually forming a community where different people can relate with each other and be able to share the same interests, regardless of temporal and spatial constraints (Anderson 1983). Electronically participating and communicating with others through these social networking systems stimulates sharing of compound practices and customs, which gives the individual a sense of being part of a community (Rennie 2006).
Facebook, Twitter, Last.fm, and Flickr are specific communities that allow individuals a space to belong to. Each community consists a network of friends and the existence of combined interests as well as constant participation that makes each community active.
The aforementioned social networking websites serve as a meeting place for people to share and discuss interests. By interacting in this manner, it gives out a sense of belonging and a strong relation to the people you hardly even know. For instance, Last.fm and Flickr has given me the opportunity to share my interests and in return, know about what other people’s interests are—what type of music they listen to, what songs they are into now, etc. Likewise, Flickr allows me to look into my friends’ life by looking at the travel photos they have uploaded. In reflection, this allows me to look at myself anew—I would feel proud of myself, the-not-so-actively-social individual, for actually care to look at what other people are up to. The cause for actually bothering to know how other people’s lives are going, what they’re interests are, etc. branches from the reason that I actually belong to this community. By registering, in these networking websites, I immediately became a member of this social community; therefore, interacting with others is seemingly a necessity to continue to exist.
Conclusion
The contribution of social networking websites to the society is undeniable. Its function is nearly impossible to face-out from each individual’s lives. The attraction of these tools lies in their ability to provide stimulation, enjoyment and satisfaction through ‘instant-ness’. People who are not used to actively socialising with other peers become explorers, in a sense that they start to voluntarily participate and begins to react to whatever stimulus each community presents (Jallinoja 1991).
I admit that I am neither the most sociable nor am I the most active person when it comes to socialising. It is not that I don’t care about other people, but it is only a fact that it is not in me to ‘talk that much’; the other way of saying this is I am not so much of a vocal person. For instance, I would rather sit with a group of people and listen to whatever they have to say about how their day went. Because for all I know if they ask me about mine, all I can blurt out is the usual “It’s awesome!” and so it goes on. For me, presence is two sides of a matter: chatting online is different from ‘being there’. Social networking websites has made communication easier for people like me.
In the next few paragraphs, I will be relating the impact of online social networking services to the entire society – How it promoted social efficiency, and how it produced the wonders that worked for the social and the not-so-social people, like me, to easily interact and communicate with others (Kopomaa 2000).
Background
For the purpose of this assignment, I will be drawing most of my knowledge based on my experience of using various social networking websites, including the ones that were recommended for the students to explore.
Facebook is now known to be one of the largest social networking website amongst the people of today. It not only allows people to easily connect with others around the world, but it also presents users with the most abundant and entertaining features. One of this, is the ‘wall’ provided in each user’s profile page, where people can post messages for the user to see. It can transmit virtual actions to other users; the earliest one is known to be the ‘poke’. It allows users to update their ‘status’ to inform their friends of their current condition. It also provides a photo application where people can upload unlimited photos and share it with others to see. As days and months passed, more and more applications are developed and can be added to ones user page, all of which can be used to interact with other users on facebook. This is by far, in my opinion, is its most appealing aspect.
Last.fm is a music community website that allows users to build musical profiles based on the music they listen to, from the website’s streamed radio stations or from the user’s portable music player or computer. It records every detail of the song the user is listening to and generates recommendations pages, which links users to more songs of the same genre, as well as other users that have similar music taste.
Twitter is another social networking website that mainly provides instant messaging services. One can post ‘updates’ and messages of up to 140 characters to the Twitter website itself, via sms, or other-third party applications such as facebook. These messages, also known as ‘tweets’ are sent to all other users who have signed up to received them. Users may receive these tweets via the Twitter website, sms, rss, email or through an application.
Flickr is an online photo sharing website that allows users to upload photos and share them with other people online. It allows users to organise images by using tags to categorise the photos so it will be easier for other users to find.
Focus: Social Efficiency
The proliferation of social communication devices in the age of information technology is a blessing to the hopes and desires of the modern individual. Many of this social communication software not only provide interactivity, but also, mobility that allows users to have a sense of control over the complications of modern life. The hit of modern technology today is something known as social networking that offers the possibilities of letting people of all ages associate with one another across the miles or better yet, just across the room!
Perhaps, the roots for which made social networking websites click is the fact that it contributes to social efficiency by instantly connecting people, and thus, gradually and effectively generates various and specific online communities wherein people can move around freely. Social efficiency maybe described as the amount of interaction among individuals, while having sole control and freedom to engage in social activities whenever one wants (Williams 1982). I would like to elaborate these issues on the following paragraphs.
Instant Connections
Imagine 50 years ago; back when mobile phones, computers, the internet and all other social networking services are still waiting to be discovered, when there was no easy means of transmitting messages from one place to another. Back then and from the longest of time, paper is considered to be one of the most remarkable social medium. With a pen, it can convey and communicate thoughts and ideas, which is probably its most distinctive attribute. People then started to use paper as a social medium by sending letters to and from faraway places. It has served its purpose well, but after all these years, it is rapidly becoming obsolete, in terms of its use as a social conveyor (Koelsch 1995).
In this modern day and age, printed words and pictures are easily transported to new multimedia technologies, in this case, Web 2.0, particularly the various social networking tools that have been made available for all to use. It eliminates all the hassles of writing a message down on a letter, letting people run around to send them, and waiting for several long days to receive them. For instance, I would only have to rely on facebook or twitter to send my simple regards of ‘Hi! How are you doing?’ or greeting to a friend who is celebrating his birthday; no need for the purchase of a card and the trouble of mailing it over, no waiting on to receive them, in a shorter term – instant! The same thing goes for Flickr. By uploading images, I am able to immediately share it with other people miles away from me.
Making connections with other people this way is fast and convenient. Personally speaking, talking to people on facebook or twitter is easier because there is no need for physical contact and the tools are readily being provided for. If facebook tells me that it is the birthday of someone I hardly know and hang out with, then I would eagerly write a birthday greeting on that person’s wall, for the simple reason of ‘why not? It’s just writing on the wall.’ In addition, I would feel better for being nice that I care to greet that person. So in a way, social networking websites provide the opportunity and enforce people to actively socialise, even when they do not feel like it.
Instant Communities
In the Web 2.0 environment, social networking websites unites people together, thus, gradually forming a community where different people can relate with each other and be able to share the same interests, regardless of temporal and spatial constraints (Anderson 1983). Electronically participating and communicating with others through these social networking systems stimulates sharing of compound practices and customs, which gives the individual a sense of being part of a community (Rennie 2006).
Facebook, Twitter, Last.fm, and Flickr are specific communities that allow individuals a space to belong to. Each community consists a network of friends and the existence of combined interests as well as constant participation that makes each community active.
The new virtual communality also has a room for self-realisation. Interaction is rapid and superficial, yet in certain social relations it can have a long personal history and may both maintain and strengthen close ties. The connections of the past are endlessly present in creating each moment in the present time (Kopomaa, 129).
The aforementioned social networking websites serve as a meeting place for people to share and discuss interests. By interacting in this manner, it gives out a sense of belonging and a strong relation to the people you hardly even know. For instance, Last.fm and Flickr has given me the opportunity to share my interests and in return, know about what other people’s interests are—what type of music they listen to, what songs they are into now, etc. Likewise, Flickr allows me to look into my friends’ life by looking at the travel photos they have uploaded. In reflection, this allows me to look at myself anew—I would feel proud of myself, the-not-so-actively-social individual, for actually care to look at what other people are up to. The cause for actually bothering to know how other people’s lives are going, what they’re interests are, etc. branches from the reason that I actually belong to this community. By registering, in these networking websites, I immediately became a member of this social community; therefore, interacting with others is seemingly a necessity to continue to exist.
Conclusion
The contribution of social networking websites to the society is undeniable. Its function is nearly impossible to face-out from each individual’s lives. The attraction of these tools lies in their ability to provide stimulation, enjoyment and satisfaction through ‘instant-ness’. People who are not used to actively socialising with other peers become explorers, in a sense that they start to voluntarily participate and begins to react to whatever stimulus each community presents (Jallinoja 1991).
The privatization of our way of life is at the present very much characterised by temporal and spatial changes (Kopomaa, 129).
Social networking tools makes interaction and communication easier because it transcends time and space. It grants users a lot more by providing instant and continuous access that allows users to flexibly and instantly participate around a community, which heavily contributes to social efficiency.
References
Anderson, Benedict (1983). Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism. London: Verso.
Jallinoja, Riita (1991). Modern Life: Signs of the Times and Practice. Helsinki: Suomalaisen Kirjallisuuden Seura.
Koelsch, Frank (1995). The Infomedia Revolution: How it is Changing Our World and Your Life. Canada: McGraw-Hill Ryerson Limited.
Kopomaa, Timo (2000). The City in Your Pocket: Birth of the Mobile Information Society. Helsinki: Gaudeamus.
Rennie, Ellie (2006). Community Media: A Global Introduction. Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield Inc.
Williams, Sir Bruce (1982). Living with Technology. Sydney: Commercial Printing House Pty. Ltd.
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