Modeling Reality with Virtual Worlds

Virtual worlds are quite gripping, and I remember them being around since I was very young. Most of these virtual worlds applied to games like Sims or Runescape where players would embody a character online and play accordingly. I watched my cousins play these games habitually, and always questioned what was so compelling about it. They answered it was "fun" but they were definitely experiencing more than fun. They were experiencing an online community, interacting with other interested users, and yes, having fun as well. 

Today, these virtual worlds have expanded beyond video games for purposes of just common interest, or a career field like in healthcare. In the New York Times article "In Room 100, It’s Sid and Nancy All Over Again," the author discusses a virtual world created to preserve the older Hotel Chelsea experience before the manager was replaced along with its bohemian style. Fans of this experience log onto an account and enter this virtual world to interact with other users and pre-made avatars. In the WSJ article "Avatar II: The Hospital," the author discusses nurses and doctors using virtual worlds to practice emergency/hospital scenes. In these scenes, nurses and doctors get to practice on patients and in medical situations that apply to real life. 

Virtual worlds are beneficial in channeling creativity, creating online communities, and allowing individuals to be more social. My cousins didn't like socializing with family members, but they loved socializing in these virtual worlds. Common interests bring people together in these worlds and allow them to interact as well as think creatively in decision making to different situations. Unfortunately, they do harm human interaction, but at the pace they are going, virtual worlds aren't a significant harm. I see virtual worlds growing more in the educational aspects like that in the healthcare system, for tutorials, training or practice in a school or career field. 

Blog About Twitter

Discussions are possible on Twitter, BlackBoard and in class. On Twitter, discussions tend to be a lot of short, quick points that convey the individual's POV in a sentence or two. The discussion can go back and forth with replies. Similarly, a discussion on BlackBoard consists of posts and replies, but they tend to be much more concentrated, and an individual is able to delve into their opinion with a lot more depth in a single post. In-class discussions land somewhere in the middle of quick discussions without much resources present, but communication is a lot more set in a time frame, which doesn't exist on Twitter but may on BlackBoard with deadlines.

Social Networking Sites

I chose to look at Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat, and Tumblr. These four social media sites are quite interesting and serve different purposes. On a personal level, Facebook keeps me connected to my friends, family and previous teachers...as it does for many others of different ages. Twitter focuses on quick updates an individual lets their followers know - whether it's about an article they read, a concern they have, or any situation they can quickly sum up. Snapchat's main focus is communicating through quick pictures, video, and messages for a max. of ten seconds. Tumblr focuses on blogging pictures with comments or descriptions on topics the blogger tends to focus on. It's interesting to see the different target audience and purpose these sites have.

Social Networking

Businesses and individuals use social networking to meet new people, interact with groups, stay connected, etc. Using social networking for such reasons are a benefit to businesses and individuals. For example, Linkedin is a great social networking site to connect professionals with businesses and industries they work for or are interested in, along with helping those looking for jobs find them based on past experiences. 

The WSJ article "Moguls of New Media" states, "24-year-old cosmetologist who until a few months ago worked at a makeup counter in a mall, she now has a manager and a start-up jeans company and has won promotional deals for two mainstream consumer brands" about MySpace user Christine Dolce. Dolce effectively used social networking to kickstart her career through her connections and growing popularity on MySpace. This is just one way social networking is beneficial to individuals. On the other side are businesses that are able to promote their business and attract consumers by simply being active on social networking and posting pictures, sales and keeping people updated with what they're doing. These technologies, like MySpace, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, etc. all keep people connected with one another -- making the world a little smaller than it is. 

On the other hand, there are downsides to these technologies. A major one being privacy. The Wire article, "Facebook Privacy Is So Confusing Even the Zuckerberg Family Photo Isn't Private" states "...if you really don't want intimate photos out there, don't put 'em on Facebook. But also, don't expect to hide something if you do — everything can be shared and re-shared these days." The article discusses how Randi Zuckerberg, Mark Zuckerberg's sister, posted a family photo that she intended to be shown just to friends, but got shared by a Vox Media marketing director. This happens several times on social networking sites with photos or information that once posted, is really not under your own control.

Regardless of this downside, I still believe social networking sites will continue to grow. As I mentioned before, they make the world seem a little smaller than it really is by connecting so many individuals, groups, and businesses together. I definitely see a growth of small businesses on social networking sites, it's a great way to reach out to people who tend to use those sites a lot and want to a quick way to follow what a business is offering. 

Blogs vs. Wikis

Blogs and wikis have become essential examples of new media, and while they may seem similar, they must not be confused as interchangeable. In her paper "How can we measure the influence of the blogosphere?" Kathy Gill states blogs emerged in the late 1990s and by 2002, there were an estimated 500,000 blogs in the universe, and possibly somewhere in the millions today. Wikis became popular in the late 90s, with the first wiki software developed in 1995 by Ward Cunningham as a way to manage site content. Of course, one of the most popular wikis today is Wikipedia. 

So what's the difference between these two? Well there a quite a few.

Gill states in her article the "Primary characteristics of a blog include: 

• Reverse chronological journaling (format) • Regular, date-stamped entries (timeliness)

• Links to related news articles, documents, blog entries within each entry (attribution)

• Archived entries (old content remains accessible) 

• Links to related blogs (blogrolling) • RSS or XML feed (ease of syndication)

• Passion (voice)" 

Blogs often have one author and sometimes a few contributors, and tend to be opinionated. On the other hand, wikis are meant to be collaborative on shared knowledge, and are constantly being updated. In the article, "How To Use Wikis for Business," the author explains how a Los Angeles Times wiki failed as the Times tried to make an opinionated article into something conversational, which would have worked well for a blog but not a wiki.

Convergence has become very important in today's networked world as more and more people begin to contribute to and share information available to either groups or the public. Converging allows for different media platforms to come together, so kind of like the emerging of wikiblogs, or simply news platforms adding rss feeds or wikis to their sites.

This brings me to the importance of collaboration, especially with blogs. Nowadays, blogs are used for collaboration with the public or within organizations, just to simply share experiences or opinions or knowledge. For example, Blogs@Baruch were introduced to most of us freshman year as a way to share our stories and experiences at Baruch with students in our class. Another example is business blogs where the authors share their opinions or experience with certain strategies or ideas and other bloggers tend to reply with their thoughts. 

Blogs and wikis are truly interesting new media technologies that are leading to more convergence and collaboration online. Maybe a possible future use for wikis can be for group research projects in Baruch (even though I'm sure some other universities may do this already).