The “power law distribution” or “long tail” phenomenon, as seen in behavior online on the Wikipedia, suggests that the concept of an average user of wikipedia is meaningless. Support your answer: how do you think a local, “JMU only” version of the Wikipedia would compare to the worldwide version? Would it be very similar? Higher quality? Less quality? Why?
I will admit that I am a little confused about the concept of the power law distribution. According to figure 5-1, there is a sharp drop off point between the top few contributors and the rest of the participants, so wouldn’t this concept apply more to larger social systems with more disproportionate contributions? As stated by Shirky, “Imbalance drives large social systems rather than damaging them…the spontaneous division of labor driving Wikipedia wouldn’t be possible if there were concern for reducing inequality.” With this said, would Wikipedia be a better tool in a larger social system because there is more inequality amongst users? This makes me believe that a “JMU only” version of Wikipedia would have less quality compared to the worldwide version. Students at JMU are alike in a general sense: education, involvement, motivation, race, income. I feel that since we all have this general stereotype, the average nature of our social system would be meaningless to Wikipedia.
Tuesday, September 29, 2009
Saturday, September 26, 2009
Privacy Versus Freedom of Speech
In a well-publicized news story, a man was caught “on camera” exiting a "gentleman's club" when Google photographed him for their StreetView project. He later sued Google because the revelation was unhappy news to his wife. Do you think Google is in the clear when they photograph the view from streets in your neighborhood?
“Despite the very best efforts, and the most sophisticated technologies, we cannot control the spread of our private information. And we often want information to be made public to serve our own, or society’s purposes.”
It has become extremely difficult to shield our personal information and entirely protect it from the outside world. Whether it is a photograph that you get caught in the background of, a personal wall post on Facebook, or paparazzi shot, it is hard to stop our personal information from spreading across the media. There has been an ongoing battle between privacy and freedom of speech and Abelson predicts that these tensions will continue to get worse in the upcoming years. When it comes to Google taking pictures of the man walking out of the gentleman’s club, I think that Google would be in the clear because they were photographing a public place. However, if Google were to take pictures of the view in my neighborhood, I think that’s a little different. I find it unethical to publish pictures of people in the privacy of their neighborhood, even if Google were to say it’s under the First Amendment.
“Despite the very best efforts, and the most sophisticated technologies, we cannot control the spread of our private information. And we often want information to be made public to serve our own, or society’s purposes.”
It has become extremely difficult to shield our personal information and entirely protect it from the outside world. Whether it is a photograph that you get caught in the background of, a personal wall post on Facebook, or paparazzi shot, it is hard to stop our personal information from spreading across the media. There has been an ongoing battle between privacy and freedom of speech and Abelson predicts that these tensions will continue to get worse in the upcoming years. When it comes to Google taking pictures of the man walking out of the gentleman’s club, I think that Google would be in the clear because they were photographing a public place. However, if Google were to take pictures of the view in my neighborhood, I think that’s a little different. I find it unethical to publish pictures of people in the privacy of their neighborhood, even if Google were to say it’s under the First Amendment.
Community of Practice
Consider the concept of a “community of practice.” How can such a community offer opportunities for learning?
A “community of practice” can offer opportunities for learning because it gives a group of people a chance to “converse about a shared task in order to get better at it.” This concept gives a group of people who all have common goals the ability to interact with one another in order to achieve these goals. While taking part in an activity together, people can create and share their identities and knowledge by contributing to the practices of their community. A community of practice is especially helpful in organizational settings when employees and management are trying to motivate innovation, trade ideas, and share previous knowledge and experiences in order to achieve organizational objectives.
A “community of practice” can offer opportunities for learning because it gives a group of people a chance to “converse about a shared task in order to get better at it.” This concept gives a group of people who all have common goals the ability to interact with one another in order to achieve these goals. While taking part in an activity together, people can create and share their identities and knowledge by contributing to the practices of their community. A community of practice is especially helpful in organizational settings when employees and management are trying to motivate innovation, trade ideas, and share previous knowledge and experiences in order to achieve organizational objectives.
The Invisability of Social Media Tools
If Shirky is right, and we’re headed to a period where social media tools like YouTube, Flickr, and social networks like Facebook become “invisible,” what’s the impact on things you spend money on as consumers? Books? Movies? Music?
“The invention of a tool doesn’t create change; it has to have been around long enough that most of society is using it. It’s when a technology becomes normal, then ubiquitous, and finally so pervasive as to be invisible, that the really profound changes happen, and for young people today, our new social tools have passed normal and are heading to ubiquitous , and invisible is coming.”
Social media tools have become extremely encompassing in today’s society. Soon they will be so pervasive that people will see them as a normal part of everyday life and won’t even see them as an interesting entity. These tools are getting more and more accepted because of the fact that people can create and share media with one another without any need for professionals. You don’t have to wait for others to approve your work before you publish it. On the other end of the spectrum are the things that consumers spend money on like books, movies, and music that are difficult and expensive to publish because they need to be filtered first. Eventually people might want to stop spending money on these things and the creators of them will not want to have to go through the publishing process but will just use online tools instead.
“The invention of a tool doesn’t create change; it has to have been around long enough that most of society is using it. It’s when a technology becomes normal, then ubiquitous, and finally so pervasive as to be invisible, that the really profound changes happen, and for young people today, our new social tools have passed normal and are heading to ubiquitous , and invisible is coming.”
Social media tools have become extremely encompassing in today’s society. Soon they will be so pervasive that people will see them as a normal part of everyday life and won’t even see them as an interesting entity. These tools are getting more and more accepted because of the fact that people can create and share media with one another without any need for professionals. You don’t have to wait for others to approve your work before you publish it. On the other end of the spectrum are the things that consumers spend money on like books, movies, and music that are difficult and expensive to publish because they need to be filtered first. Eventually people might want to stop spending money on these things and the creators of them will not want to have to go through the publishing process but will just use online tools instead.
Friday, September 18, 2009
A Failed Attempt at Citizen Journalism
Can you find any examples where "citizen journalists" have failed miserably to report accurate news? And if you do find examples (you should), does this make the concept of amateur journalism a bad thing? Why or why not?
One example took place back in 1938 when Orson Welles made a broadcast claiming that there was going to be an alien invasion. The result was a nationwide panic as thousands of Americans fled from what they thought was a pending attack; while others armed themselves in defense against the extraterrestrials. Orson Welles was by no means a professional journalist when we made the inaccurate broadcast, but the impact of it was so huge that people still talk about it today - over 70 years later.
Something as huge as this does make amateur journalism appear as a bad thing. Not only did Welles have a great deal of the country believing his falsification, but he had people fearing for their lives. Some amateur journalism may not be a bad thing, but before posting an type of information, a person must be 100% positive that it is correct because even though they aren’t unleashing a wave of panic throughout the nation like Welles did, they have the potential to stir up some kind of unfavorable attention.
One example took place back in 1938 when Orson Welles made a broadcast claiming that there was going to be an alien invasion. The result was a nationwide panic as thousands of Americans fled from what they thought was a pending attack; while others armed themselves in defense against the extraterrestrials. Orson Welles was by no means a professional journalist when we made the inaccurate broadcast, but the impact of it was so huge that people still talk about it today - over 70 years later.
Something as huge as this does make amateur journalism appear as a bad thing. Not only did Welles have a great deal of the country believing his falsification, but he had people fearing for their lives. Some amateur journalism may not be a bad thing, but before posting an type of information, a person must be 100% positive that it is correct because even though they aren’t unleashing a wave of panic throughout the nation like Welles did, they have the potential to stir up some kind of unfavorable attention.
A Quick and Easy Way to Get Your questions Answered
You have an important personal question you’d like answered. Explain the procedure for getting your question answered and why this method appeals to you (you don’t need to get specific, but let’s assume the answer does not require specific expert knowledge, as from a doctor).
These days, with social networking on the rise, it has become extremely easy to communicate amongst the web. People are able to post thoughts, ideas, news, questions, and opinions through different social tools like Twitter, blogging, and Facebook. As Shirky states, you don’t have to be a professional to be a publisher. The internet has become something that people can participate in; allowing them access to publish what’s on their mind and to connect with others. “To a first approximation, anyone in the developed world can publish anything anytime, and the instant it is published, it is globally available and readily findable.” For this reason, if I had an important question, one of the easiest way to obtain an answer would be through these social networking tools. Someone could post a question as their Facebook status and would be sure to get a couple of responses in return (It of course depends on the actual question being asked. One wouldn’t want to publish something too personal!) Other tools that are available are websites like Yahoo! Answers. In this instance a person could ask a question and random people can respond to it. The answers are ranked by users and the best answer is presented first. With all of these tools though, you have to remember that the people responding are not experts so you have to take their responses with a grain of salt!
These days, with social networking on the rise, it has become extremely easy to communicate amongst the web. People are able to post thoughts, ideas, news, questions, and opinions through different social tools like Twitter, blogging, and Facebook. As Shirky states, you don’t have to be a professional to be a publisher. The internet has become something that people can participate in; allowing them access to publish what’s on their mind and to connect with others. “To a first approximation, anyone in the developed world can publish anything anytime, and the instant it is published, it is globally available and readily findable.” For this reason, if I had an important question, one of the easiest way to obtain an answer would be through these social networking tools. Someone could post a question as their Facebook status and would be sure to get a couple of responses in return (It of course depends on the actual question being asked. One wouldn’t want to publish something too personal!) Other tools that are available are websites like Yahoo! Answers. In this instance a person could ask a question and random people can respond to it. The answers are ranked by users and the best answer is presented first. With all of these tools though, you have to remember that the people responding are not experts so you have to take their responses with a grain of salt!
Saturday, September 12, 2009
Shortfalls of Social Tagging
Many organizations waste time and money researching answers to questions already answered or creating content that may already have been done by others within the organization. What shortfalls of social tagging does Trant identify that might prohibit a searchable tagging system to be a successful aid within an organization such as a business or school?
According to Trant, “There is concern over the relativistic nature of socially created vocabularies, the lack of term consistency, problems with synonymy and polysemy, and the inherent inconsistency of a user-generated vocabulary. All of these characteristics may limit the value of a folksonomy as an indexing language and retrieval tool.”
I think that Trant means that when dealing with folksonomy, it is questionable whether the words that people create are actually a good representation of the resource and relative to the information. Since tags are compiled by the public, the terms used might not be consistent because of the variety of people creating these tags. Synonymy is the similarities between words and polysemy is the uncertainty of a words meaning. These can be a problem because when words sound similar or when people are uncertain of a meaning, they might use the wrong word as a tag. These shortfalls would prohibit a searchable tagging system from being a successful aid within an organization because people would have a greater chance of retrieving the wrong information because of the erroneous tags that are produced by the public.
According to Trant, “There is concern over the relativistic nature of socially created vocabularies, the lack of term consistency, problems with synonymy and polysemy, and the inherent inconsistency of a user-generated vocabulary. All of these characteristics may limit the value of a folksonomy as an indexing language and retrieval tool.”
I think that Trant means that when dealing with folksonomy, it is questionable whether the words that people create are actually a good representation of the resource and relative to the information. Since tags are compiled by the public, the terms used might not be consistent because of the variety of people creating these tags. Synonymy is the similarities between words and polysemy is the uncertainty of a words meaning. These can be a problem because when words sound similar or when people are uncertain of a meaning, they might use the wrong word as a tag. These shortfalls would prohibit a searchable tagging system from being a successful aid within an organization because people would have a greater chance of retrieving the wrong information because of the erroneous tags that are produced by the public.
Potential Pitfalls of a Hierarchical Organization
This chapter talks about the challenges that face an organization that grows too large, requiring a lot of staff devoted to management. What are some of the potential pitfalls in an organization that’s large and organized by a hierarchical organization chart?
The larger a group becomes, the harder it is to come to an agreement, because every person added requires more effort to keep a connection with. While managers are obviously beneficial for organizational purposes, there is also a downside to a large organization with a hierarchical structure. Shirky explains how running a large organization is difficult enough as it is, especially while expending limited resources for every transaction it takes. When it comes to time and attention, an organization is putting a great deal of effort in discipline and structure, which makes it difficult to actually put energy into the task at hand. However, money is always a huge factor as well. The cost of management itself is pretty high in the first place, so some tasks might not even be worth pursuing because they are out of budget. Others might need to be approached in an unorganized way because transaction costs of meeting and putting together a plan is too expensive.
The larger a group becomes, the harder it is to come to an agreement, because every person added requires more effort to keep a connection with. While managers are obviously beneficial for organizational purposes, there is also a downside to a large organization with a hierarchical structure. Shirky explains how running a large organization is difficult enough as it is, especially while expending limited resources for every transaction it takes. When it comes to time and attention, an organization is putting a great deal of effort in discipline and structure, which makes it difficult to actually put energy into the task at hand. However, money is always a huge factor as well. The cost of management itself is pretty high in the first place, so some tasks might not even be worth pursuing because they are out of budget. Others might need to be approached in an unorganized way because transaction costs of meeting and putting together a plan is too expensive.
Organizational Management
Describe a group you are a member of (online community, church, job, etc.) and how it is organized. Is there management? How is information distributed within the group?
“The value of hierarchies is obvious-it vastly simplifies communication among the employees. New employees need only one connection, to their boss, to get started. That’s much simpler than trying to have everyone talk to everyone.”
-Clay Shirky, Pg. 28-29
An organization that I am apart of is my sorority. It definitely has a hierarchical structure because there is a president, vice president, exec, and cabinet. The president works with exec to organize and plan things for the sorority while the vice president is in charge of cabinet. The rest of the girls attend meetings, give input, and go to events. We have weekly meetings where the president and exec give announcements and plans for upcoming events. At the meeting we sit in order of the year that we pledged, this way, the girls with more experience sit in the front.
The president of a sorority is like the manager of an organization. Members of a group may have different visions for the task at hand or different methods for approaching it. The point of a manager is to take a leadership role and organize a plan that not only is the best route for completing the task but also satisfies the group members or the company (sorority) as a whole. Without a manager, there simply would not be an organization. A manager is needed to tie the loose ends together, or else everything is going in different directions.
“The value of hierarchies is obvious-it vastly simplifies communication among the employees. New employees need only one connection, to their boss, to get started. That’s much simpler than trying to have everyone talk to everyone.”
-Clay Shirky, Pg. 28-29
An organization that I am apart of is my sorority. It definitely has a hierarchical structure because there is a president, vice president, exec, and cabinet. The president works with exec to organize and plan things for the sorority while the vice president is in charge of cabinet. The rest of the girls attend meetings, give input, and go to events. We have weekly meetings where the president and exec give announcements and plans for upcoming events. At the meeting we sit in order of the year that we pledged, this way, the girls with more experience sit in the front.
The president of a sorority is like the manager of an organization. Members of a group may have different visions for the task at hand or different methods for approaching it. The point of a manager is to take a leadership role and organize a plan that not only is the best route for completing the task but also satisfies the group members or the company (sorority) as a whole. Without a manager, there simply would not be an organization. A manager is needed to tie the loose ends together, or else everything is going in different directions.
Saturday, September 5, 2009
The Impact of Main Role Websites on Newly Emerging Groups
If managers aren’t important anymore towards the formation or control of groups using online tools, what do you consider the main role websites such as Meetup.com, Facebook, or MySpace have provided newly emerging groups?
According to Clay Shirky, “Here Comes Everybody is about "what happens when people are given the tools to do things together, without needing traditional organizational structures." And that is exactly the point of main role websites like Facebook and MySpace. These websites give groups an online platform to aid in the sharing of information. No matter what it is that individuals are looking for, whether it is facts, opinions, or ideas on a topic, that information can be found online within these social networks. These days, instead of having managers for the formation and control of groups using online tools, people can rely on computers to organize their ideas, analyze data, and answer questions.
On page 21 Shirky states, “By making it easier for groups to self-assemble and for individuals to contribute to group effort without requiring formal management, these tools have radically altered the old limits on the size, sophistication, and scope of unsupervised effort.”
Facebook has provided my sorority a way to keep in touch. We can share ideas, exchange information and send pictures in an effective and efficient manner. Most girls probably check their Facebook more often than they check their e-mail, so it is the best way to contact everybody in the fastest way possible.
According to Clay Shirky, “Here Comes Everybody is about "what happens when people are given the tools to do things together, without needing traditional organizational structures." And that is exactly the point of main role websites like Facebook and MySpace. These websites give groups an online platform to aid in the sharing of information. No matter what it is that individuals are looking for, whether it is facts, opinions, or ideas on a topic, that information can be found online within these social networks. These days, instead of having managers for the formation and control of groups using online tools, people can rely on computers to organize their ideas, analyze data, and answer questions.
On page 21 Shirky states, “By making it easier for groups to self-assemble and for individuals to contribute to group effort without requiring formal management, these tools have radically altered the old limits on the size, sophistication, and scope of unsupervised effort.”
Facebook has provided my sorority a way to keep in touch. We can share ideas, exchange information and send pictures in an effective and efficient manner. Most girls probably check their Facebook more often than they check their e-mail, so it is the best way to contact everybody in the fastest way possible.
Friday, September 4, 2009
Captured on Film
With so many cell phones on the market today able to take photos (and video), do you ever worry about being “captured” in a not-so-flattering moment? How would you deal with a friend who decided to share such a picture or video with others?
There have been countless times that extremely unflattering pictures have been tagged of me on Facebook. It’s even worse when I’m spotted in the background of a picture in half-motion with a stupid look on my face and my friend spots me and thinks it would be funny and clever to tag me. And its EVEN WORSE when my friend knows that I hate the picture and that I don’t want it to surface and once again thinks it would be funny and clever to tag me. Well…it’s not funny and it definitely isn’t clever. Putting a picture on Facebook is an open invitation for people to look at it and when a friend puts up an unattractive picture, it is there for everyone to see.
Facebook is a phenomenon, especially in college. It’s all about posting pictures to pretty much let other people know what you’ve been up to and who you hang out with.And these days you can even post pictures from your cell phone. It’s rare to go out and not hear someone say, “You better tag me in that!” (Or something along those lines). And at a party it is pretty normal to see flashes going off and groups of girls posing for pictures. Then it makes me wonder how many pictures I’m in the background of. How many unflattering pictures of “Kara in mid-sentence” are actually floating around the internet? The thought of that makes me feel slightly ill.
Koan 6, “Nothing Goes Away, ” ponders on what actually happens to the data about us. Say a picture of you is sent through e-mail, when that photo is shared, is it stored away and somehow accessible forever? Is it impossible to completely erase something from the computer once it’s been entered? The thought of that is slightly scary to me.
There have been countless times that extremely unflattering pictures have been tagged of me on Facebook. It’s even worse when I’m spotted in the background of a picture in half-motion with a stupid look on my face and my friend spots me and thinks it would be funny and clever to tag me. And its EVEN WORSE when my friend knows that I hate the picture and that I don’t want it to surface and once again thinks it would be funny and clever to tag me. Well…it’s not funny and it definitely isn’t clever. Putting a picture on Facebook is an open invitation for people to look at it and when a friend puts up an unattractive picture, it is there for everyone to see.
Facebook is a phenomenon, especially in college. It’s all about posting pictures to pretty much let other people know what you’ve been up to and who you hang out with.And these days you can even post pictures from your cell phone. It’s rare to go out and not hear someone say, “You better tag me in that!” (Or something along those lines). And at a party it is pretty normal to see flashes going off and groups of girls posing for pictures. Then it makes me wonder how many pictures I’m in the background of. How many unflattering pictures of “Kara in mid-sentence” are actually floating around the internet? The thought of that makes me feel slightly ill.
Koan 6, “Nothing Goes Away, ” ponders on what actually happens to the data about us. Say a picture of you is sent through e-mail, when that photo is shared, is it stored away and somehow accessible forever? Is it impossible to completely erase something from the computer once it’s been entered? The thought of that is slightly scary to me.
Information Restriction by Google and Yahoo
Both Google and Yahoo have been criticized for censoring their search results in China. What are your feelings about this? Why should Google, or why should Google not, produce different search results for different countries?
The digital explosion truly is changing the world. Today, people seem to be throwing books and newspapers aside and instead look toward the internet for information retrieval. There are millions of websites out there and I think that every person should have the same access to the information on them, especially since regular people like us could be the ones creating them. However, with websites like Wikipedia, some of the information might not be true so I understand why some would be skeptical. But I think that it is up to the individual to decide whether or not to believe it. This why I do not think that Google should produce different search results for different countries. On page 13 of “Blown to Bits” it states,
“An ugly downside to the explosion of digital information and its movement around the world is that information may become less available even where it would be legally protected. Publishers fear ‘libel tourism’-lawsuits in countries with weak protection of free speech designed to intimidate authors in more open societies."
I understand that different countries have different cultures and government styles and I understand that Google might be trying to avoid any possible lawsuits from more conservative areas, but I don’t think it is fair to omit information from people. I mean information is information and like I said before, it should be up to the individual as to what to do with it.
The digital explosion truly is changing the world. Today, people seem to be throwing books and newspapers aside and instead look toward the internet for information retrieval. There are millions of websites out there and I think that every person should have the same access to the information on them, especially since regular people like us could be the ones creating them. However, with websites like Wikipedia, some of the information might not be true so I understand why some would be skeptical. But I think that it is up to the individual to decide whether or not to believe it. This why I do not think that Google should produce different search results for different countries. On page 13 of “Blown to Bits” it states,
“An ugly downside to the explosion of digital information and its movement around the world is that information may become less available even where it would be legally protected. Publishers fear ‘libel tourism’-lawsuits in countries with weak protection of free speech designed to intimidate authors in more open societies."
I understand that different countries have different cultures and government styles and I understand that Google might be trying to avoid any possible lawsuits from more conservative areas, but I don’t think it is fair to omit information from people. I mean information is information and like I said before, it should be up to the individual as to what to do with it.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
