Where will Social Media go into the future?

Where will this fast pacing trend lead us? Will it lead us to another World War or will it bring the world together? Will it help us end some of the problems in the world or will the world watch through the media as our world collapses? Many of these questions can be predicted from the evidence around us, but the future is unknown to us. As Jared Diamond said in his essay in, "The end of the world as we know them", "Unlike any previous society in history, our global society today is the first with the opportunity to learn from the mistakes of societies remote from us in space and in time".  He means it's not too late for us to learn from all the mistakes that the world has made.  We can change our habits and make social media more of a tool, then a weapon.  We can use this new world as a safe world from all the harms of Earth.  We need to start now for the future of humankind.

Connections

In Mitchel Social Media blog, he makes a very good point on how social media is helping out with the disaster of Hurricane Sandy.  In any disaster such as Hurricane Sandy, Social media is a great resource to learn what's going on.  It keeps everyone informed on the situation and it evens gives you the option of helping out if you want too. Plus with such a disaster happening, awareness of natural disasters will rise in the public getting people more prepared for upcoming disasters.

The mind control advertisments on kids

Schlosser, E. (2011) Kid Kustomers. In S. Cohen, 50 Essays (pg. 353-358). Boston: Bedford St. Martins.

 In the essay "Kid Kustomers" by Eric Scholosser shows us how advertisers draw kids into buying their product. Since many parents are working and spending less time with their kids, the only option they see fitting is to spend money on their kids giving advertisers an advantage. Children find these products in Children's clubs, the internet, and the television. There are children divisions in many of the major ad agencies who only focus on kids. They observe children's fantasy lives and apply it to their product. With this the aim for most of their advertising is to get children to nag to their parents on buying them what they want.

Dealing with threats from the Virtual World to the Real World

Chamberlin, T. (2012, November 4) Links between social media and crime surge as Facebook referenced in thousands of offences logged by police. The Australian. Retrieved by http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/links-between-social-media-and-crime-surge-as-facebook-referenced-in-thousands-of-offences-logged-by-police/story-e6frg6n6-1226509825963

The police of Queensland, Australia logged 5,000 offences that Facebook was involved.  One example of many such events was an assault of a mother which was led by a heated argument on Facebook.  Crimes that link to Facebook are many of the following: prostitution, murder, stealing, drug offences, stalking, kidnapping, and trespassing.  The Right to Information laws revealed that Facebook is linked to 19 murders, 12 attempted murders, 728 assaults, 542 sexual offences, and 370 fraud cases.  This is cased by putting too much detail on Facebook of your personal life which is information to others now.  Detective Superintendent Brian Hay worded it perfectly describe the situation with the crimes linking to Facebook, "The more you put out there, the more you put a target on your back.  This idea of being private on the internet is a redundant notion.  We've got to accept that it is very real, tangible and could come back to bite you."

Social Media Bullying

EMC Editorial. (2012, October 25) Social media a double-edged sword when it comes to bullying. EMC News. Retrieved from http://www.emcfrontenac.ca/20121025/editorials/Social+media+a+double-edged+sword+when+it+comes+to+bullying

Just this past few months, the world was met by a girl named Amanda Todd whom commit suicide from being bulled people over the social media.  After this incident everyone's eyes opened to this concept of bullying over the social media.  The idea of bullying isn't anything new that we have learned from, but the type, tone, and ferocity has changed when you mix both bullying and social media together.  Once you have been caught in this mixture of tormentors, its difficult or impossible to get out.  When an outcome like Amanda Todd comes out there's always a positive side out of these sad consequences, it's that society can review this situation and learn how to intervene when something like this happens.  Everyone has a role to play when i come to bullying because social media is making it easier for bullying. But if we use this tool correctly we can use it to make it easy for us to stop bullying.    

Social Media is a useful tool to fight crime.

Kent, J. (2012, November 16) Police Scan Social Media to Fight Crime. NBC Connecticut. Retrieve from http://www.printthis.clickability.com/pt/cpt?expire=&title=Police+Scan+Social+Media+to+Fight+Crime+|+NBC+Connecticut&urlID=496135002&action=cpt&partnerID=1127115&cid=179734571&fb=Y&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.nbcconnecticut.com%2Finvestigations%2FFacebook-Twitter-Instagram-Social-Media-Police-179734571.html

Connecticut's police departments are now tracking post, pictures, and check-in's in applications such as Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, etc,. to solve crimes.  The best information used by criminal investigators are friends and followers that people have whose privacy settings are not very secure for their privacy.  Police take everything that the social media has offer them to stop crimes, but while police use there tools, criminals have these tools as well at their bidding.  In the police departments they have a squad of officers called matrix officers whom build undercover profiles  and interact with criminals online.  Captain Geoff Morgan from the Branford Police Department tells us that in the past two years, social media is a useful tool to gather evidence and suspects towards cases.

Facebook vs. Earth

WARNING: CONTAINS LANGUAGE. VIEWERS DISCRETION ADVISE!!!!!

Well one idea i want to pull out of this video and put on the plate is what you post on facebook, would you really say it in the world that we live in today.  A lot of people these days put their whole life and thoughts on facebook and feel that the virtual world is a safe place to share all of it.  Well those people are don't see that the virtual world and the world they live in are one of the same, but there's one difference, everything that's in the virtual world stays in the virtual world.  Meaning everyone will know parts or most things about you and with that knowledge people can morph it into their own thoughts.  Well continuing along with what you post are the check-in's or posting your current location, why would you want the world to know where your at.  I see post where people post there location of where they are at their house.  Well after that everyone knows where your house location is so the whole world of creepers and strangers can come visit you.  When these many things can happen, I think the Earth is safer, Facebook. 

Bad Customers

Barbara, J. (2012, November 11) Is Social Media Bad For Business? Forbes. Retrieved from http://www.forbes.com/sites/julietbarbara/2012/11/11/is-social-media-bad-for-business/

The Chief Customer Experience Designer at Sensei Marketing, Jeff Wilson, created a sparkling discussion called "Social Media is Creating Bad Customers".  Well every business is it's own media company, it gives them an opportunity to meet potential customers, both good and bad.  To bring good customers though you need a social strategy that takes time and effort.  With a good social strategy, your engagement with customers will promote brand awareness.  While taking these risks on your social strategy, you'll come across bad customers, because your social media creates a guilt free, anonymous environment with no accountability.  With that Wilson concludes that there are four factors that empowers a person with bad behavior against companies: No guilt, the mob, relative anonymity, and no accountability.  

Books vs. Video Games

Johnson, S.(2011). Games.  In S. Cohen, 50 Essays (pg. 196-202). Boston: Bedford St. Martins.

The essay "Games" by Steven Johnson describes the differences from reading a book to playing video games. Video Games promotes eye-hand coordination, but also promotes aggression and violence to conflicts. With that it also helps to increase your manual dexterity and visual memory. With reading though, it's hand to gain a different viewpoint due to the assumptions that the thought of it is boring in our mind. This on the other hand doesn't show the advantage of stretching your imagination while reading a book. Games are good at storytelling, but books give you information and mental work to process and store information. Reading books forces you to make a world in your head instead of going to a virtual world.

Well both reading and playing video games are in their own worlds. Video games are a world that the creators put in while the reading world is your endless imagination. Well as you can see in today's society, games are taking over books. People would rather be lazy and use other peoples imaginations, then their own. I mean we are depended on other people's imagination to entertain us rather, then making the mental effort to entertain us. Plus if we ever want to read, who needs a book that'll cost money, we have the internet to read the book off for free.

What do we really live for?

Thoreau.(2011). Where I Lived, and What I Lived For.  In S. Cohen, 50 Essays (pg. 403-409). Boston: Bedford St. Martins.

The essay "Where I Lived, and What I Lived For" by Henry David Thoreau shows us, his arguments on living in the woods. One of the ideas he brought up is reducing things into proportion, meaning to reduce our time on useless habits and spend it on more useful things. Another point he adds is that we can live without a post office or any forms of communication. When we hear about robberies, murders, and other crimes, we don't read on and see another, because on is enough. This is just gossip to spread around. We think of great and worthy things in reality, and not the fears that shadow us. The lies that we live in can be revealed from the shadows and shows other people to see who people really are.

To be honest some of Thoreau's ideas were hard to translate, but others were easy to see. I see ideas in this essay that are connected to social media, like in the first on I stated. Connecting the idea of reducing things into proportions, going on the social media is a waste of time where it won't help you progress your life. Let's be honest too, when we see a lot of these news articles on the media, we really don't react, but simply ignore it and move on with our lives. This brings us to the thought that when you read these types of articles, you think that this won't happen to you while in reality, anything can happen. Living in lies like these can block your vision of what's real and what's not. Even pretending to be someone that your not on the media can lead to labeling you for life.

It's a another whole world out there.

Right behind your computer screen is another world, where whatever you type, whatever you do, it'll be there forever, for everyone to watch and see over and over again.  Its a perfect place to hurt and ruin someone's life.  This world can either be a tool or a weapon.  It is used both now in our day in age.  People use it to help with their research, show off their ideas, and stay connected all around the world.  People also use it as a fighting tool against someone, to hurt someone, and even destroying cultures.

Television. Is it good or is it bad for children?

Winn, M.(2011). Television: The Plug - In Drug.  In S. Cohen, 50 Essays (pg. 438-447). Boston: Bedford St. Martins.

The essay "Television: The Plug - In Drug" by Marie Winn, shows us the disadvantages that television has on family life.  Now in America, over more then three fourths of the United States owns more then one television sets in their household.  With having more television sets, this led the television to be on of the most important influences in children's lives.  With more then one televisions in one household, this has lead to a decrease and diminish of family life.  Along with the damage to family life, it damages the involvement and relationships to real people while there's a one way relationship with the television show characters.  As children develop a greater relationship with the television and media, it develops a weak and separate bond from their parents.

Well in all honesty I disagree with this essay to somewhat of an extent.  True you'll lose family time watching the television, but it really doesn't mean the destruction of family life.  If you watch it with the family, then you and your family can create that family time by discussing what shows on or make jokes or just laugh together, just have a good time.  Children can be controlled by the television if there wasn't any parent or adult influence or just that connection to talk about what they watched.  I work for a before and after school childcare service and I have kids act out scenes from "Star Wars The Clone Wars" and shows like that, but that isn't bad at all.  We talk about the shows and laugh about it and it doesn't necessary destroy that interaction with real people, well unless you just locked up in a room with just the television, then yes. Television isn't bad at all, just who is enforcing the television is a different story.