Last Blog

Hey guy and girls,

This is my last blog for the semester, but I will definately further explore the art of blogging. I found that this process was very different to keeping a journal and it was also very useful during the discussion forums to refer back to. After changing the setup of my page I found that a lot of my blogs are missing and you need to go into the archives to find them which is a pain but they are there. (Just incase you can't find them John)

I just wanted to share that I think this exercise was very beneficial and also encourgaed me to engage and critique the lecture content. See ya guys and good luck on the exam.

Regards no longer the Virgin Blogger

Proximate Communities

Hey guys,

Finally decided to write again because I was annoyed about losing my other post. Today we had our last online forum chat and it didn't seem to go as well as the first one last week. I think a lot of people had said as much as they could think of in the first chat.

Collective Interaction - place-based
Well in the proximate community discussion we spoke about the issue of Urban Villages and then got onto the weird topic of virtual pets. I found a really cute website that alows audiences to interact with their own virtual pet and personalise the features. The link is http://www.neopets.com/addpet.phtml?view=all and it looks very Japanese. I also has a look at the nintendo dogs game as everyone was talking about it http://www.kidzworld.com/site/p5944.htm looks very good, I can see why there was discussion.

Collective Interaction - geographically dispersed
Looking at Putnam and Pew's views it is obvious there is a direct disagreement when discussing the impact of technology upon society. Robert Putnam holds a very conservative view as he focuses his discussion upon the emergence of the selfish individual who doesn't dance with his/her partner. However Pew argues that businesses can use vitual communities to make more profit on line so this is good for society. He also argues that technology has also given rise to interaction between cross-relational and cross-generational individuals online.

Networked Interaction - geographically dispersed
Peer-to-peer communication for example online communities such as www.Hi5.com and www.myspace.com . These sites allow for individuals to create a network of individuals with the same interests and common ground so they can for friendships and relations. The act of social networking - e.g. friendstar.com

Network Interaction - place based
Discussion here discussed examples such as the mobile telephone where an individual would usually answer the home phone with their name but because the mobile is a personal device you no longer need to as most individuals who call know it is your phone. (Personalised social network) This is person-to-person instead of peer-to-peer. Here you can interact in many different activities while being in the one place. Lecture ecample: you can lecture, recieve a text message and do this while downloading your emails at the same time seamlessly.

Well that is my basic overview of the lecture material and how I interpreted it. I though this lecture was one of the most interesting this semester. Cheers, I'll try blog again soon.

So angry

I just pushed the Back button and lost my awesome blog for today. I will have to post another day then. It discussed proximate communities and I even drew this diagram.

Well just thought I would say I really enjoyed todays Chat session and had more to say than I thought. Hope everyone enjoyed it as much as I did.

The Protocol Debate

After attending Wednesday nights lecture I have been pondering many different ideas about the issue of governance and who is actually in control of our media usage habits. There is such a gap between the whole purpose of the Internet (non-hierarchical network) and the nature of Protocol (hierarchical).

Who believes that the Internet is used by young children for purposes that are illegal, to view pornographic material, chat to strangers or to seek out 18+ material? I think that most children use the Internet for educational purposes and to chat with friends they already have a promate relationship with. However I do know that there are a sample of young children that would use this tool to do such things and there are people online for the wrong reasons so I do believe the Internet needs to be regulated in more ways than one.

What I am concerned about is the power and control of the United States or ICANN on these types of issues. Who is to say that their Presidential system has the same values and beliefs as our Australian Government? They don't and they can not possibly, so how is it that they can regulate our usage or an individual from India for example. So what is next for the Internet and it's governance?

"The founding principal of the Net is control, not freedom. Control has existed from the beginning." (Galloway 142)

KCB201 Chat

Just at uni wasting time in the KCB201 Chatroom and learning how to use it. It is a great concept to use chatrooms to find out other students ideas and opinions about the reading and lecture material but I think it is also a disadvantage when we are being marked upon it. I discussed this with other individuals in the room and they all agreed.I suppose it is only worth 5% and you really just need to have some sort of interesting input to the discussion that relates the the subject material. All in all a very good idea and also demonstrates to us the change that technology is having upon our everyday lives.

It was also suprising to read in the newspaper that my old school, John Paul College allows students to use Ipod, mobile phones and other electronic devices while in class as they believe it is the only way to teach children these days. They think because students will study at home whilst listening to music, chatting on msn and reading their textbooks that it is appropriate to do this at school. This also ties into issues that I discuss in KCB301 with the idea of interactivity and utilising many different media at the same time. I guess at this moment I am a perfect example of this: blogging, chatting and checking my emails at the same time.

Virtual Community

Hey guys & girls,

Just commenting on some other things I found on Hi5 the community space that I have been a part of for about half a year now. I don't think it is set up very well for the users who like to meet people with the same interests as I only just found out after 6 months that you can join interest groups. I joined the 'all ride Yamahas forever!!!' group because I thought they would all be passionate about their bikes and have some interesting this to say only to find that they are a bunch of old men with no clothes on, or older biker women or young females around the age of 22 with hardly any clothes on. I then decided to join the 'only Sexys!!!' group to see what they were talking about and it was full of people commenting on how sexy they were and how horny they were (go figure).

However it wasn't this that fasinated me, it was the lack of conversation and interaction between the users. There were about 650 members that had joined and not even 10% were utlising the service. I think the extra option to join the interest groups could have been left out in this community space or the space needs to be designed is such a way that makes it user friendly and easy to locate.

Here is the site if you are interested in joining. www.hi5.com

See you all in the lecture.

"Walled Gardens & Creative Commons"

After thinking about this weeks reading 'The Grey Album' I began to think about content I come into contact with throughout my daily life that may involve issues in telation to 'copyright wars'. For instance my friend had a CD in his car that he had copied his favourtie songs onto in order to create an enjoyable mix of music while driving his car. This is because he does not like listening to the radio due to advertising breaks in the music and programming involving discussion such as the B105 morning crew. So in copying a number of mp3s onto one blank CD he is creating his own music listening experience without having to pay for it.

The problem with this however is that the owners of the music and the musicians are not recieving any benefit from this. Whether it be downloading free mp3s off the internet or simply owning an Ipod that stores thousands of songs, copyright laws are being tested and boundaries being cross by individuals all over the world. Another example that comes to mind in this situation is the copying of DVDs that are hired out from video stores. Brainstorming this idea I visioned the advertisment at the beginning of the movies that says "you wouldn't steal a car, or someones purse but burning DVDs is stealing".

I also on many occasions hear on the radio two songs being mixed together to create a new song, which in most cases is very enjoyable. The issue here is that in some cases the owners of the rights to these recording that are being re-released as mixes are not aware of its use. In these instances the creator of these new works is in breach of copyright laws. To avoid this situation individuals only need to pay an initial fee to use the content if they are given permission by the owners of the rights.

It was commented by Johnathan Ziltrain (as cited in Rimmer, 2005) that there is a need for revisions in copyright law. This is because in some instances individuals such as Disc Jockeys have provided the public with a transformative use of the original works. In this case the work or creator is protected by the defence of fair use.

So in todays technologiacally advanced world there are many tools for individuals to be innovative creators but there are many old laws that restrict our creative minds. This is my interpretation of what the lecture is implying "Walled gardens and creative commons". I believe this issue will not be resolved due to the changing nature of technology and the ease in which we are able to recreate and interact with our own entertainment!

VIRTUAL COMMUNITY Hi5

At the conclusion of last year a friend approached me while I was surfing the net and told me about this really good virtual community that allows you to create a personal profile, invite your friends to join and then you can also view their friends profile as well. He said it was a great tool to use in order to keep in contact with friends and also make new ones. Once viewing the site www.hi5.com I was then interested and decided to have a look around. He then assisted me in setting up an account & that is my story, I have now been a part of this online community for about 5 months and I am finding it quite beneficial.

Hi5 is a place for meeting new people, connecting with friends and sharing ideas. The sign on page says "Find old friends, meet new people and browse photos" which is basically what you end up doing. This online community has taken a more broad approach in comparision to other communities that focus on specific purposes such as dating or finding old friends. The Hi5 virtual community member may interact within the confines of the community by reconnecting with old friends, casually meeting new friends by searching through profiles, or to finding someone that they might like to meet or date.

When you sign in you connect with your close group of friends and eventually as you visit the community you find more and more of your current friends online. When viewing your friends profile you are able to view their connections and friends so you are able to communicate with connected groups of friends as well as search strangers profiles. However what makes it a community is the feeling of knowing people that are connected with your real world friends. So in a sense it feels like a physical and real relationship as you may have already met or seen this person in passing.

I have found this through many personal experiences over the past 6 months that I have viewed friends profiles that have a list of people connected to them that are my personal friends as well, so you then add them to your own personal profile and become virtually connected. Also I have unexpectedly come across people that I may have seen out one night on the town in Brisbane and maybe had a brief conversation with. I find it really exciting when you see someone out that you may have something in common with only to think you will never see them again until you log in to your Hi5 profile on the World Wide Web. So this program must be set up through area codes as otherwise it would be difficult to search through individuals all over the world just to find a friend who lives locally.

I believe the aim of Hi5 is to get young people to interact socially with old and new friends through taking advantage of the people you know, and the people they know, and the people they know. Once you invite people onto the service and connect to friends already using the service, you discover a network of old friends and new people that you can meet. The service is free and it also includes features such as joining interest groups, chat, email, messaging, uploading pictures, you can view visitors to your profile, browse people, classmates, interact group mates and people within the same network as you.

You can view other peoples photo galleries and view their personal profiles. The personal profiles contain information such as personal demographics, age, gender etc, the types of people you would like to meet, sexual orientation, interests, faviourtie band, music, movies etc and you are also able to personalise your profile page to suit you. After doing this you can then add the person to your friends list if you wish. After adding an individual to your friends list you can then block them if you decide you do not wish to be connected to them any longer. For instance I came across a female that had a thing for my boyfriend and she and I do not get along so I decided the best thing to do is block her from viewing my profile.

I think people return to this site as the is an element of suprise because you don't know who you will come across that you used to know or if you have mutual friends with others. It is also a great way for singles to meet new people as my boyfriends room mate discovered as you can search through thousands of people on the one site that may turn out to live next door. Members can communicate through sending messages, email, online chat, interest group messages and making comments on others profile pages. You can also click on little buttons to give people a hi5 which may be for being cute, a diva, funny, a hero and lots of other little quirky things. Example below:

I think this site is very successful in terms of its member capacity and the frequent use of it by my friends. It is also successful in people using it to find partners, friends and people to date as I know many individuals who have met through this community and are still friends. Due to this I belileve the site must be extremely profitable.

Hope you all have a look and enjoy searching this site as it has become a regualr internet space that I visit and think is beneficial to my social experience.