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Chapters 7, 8 and 9 in Dan Gillmor’s “We the media” were very interesting chapters that informed the readers more about modern technology..
Chapter 7 talked about how citizen journalism and how it can open completely new doors in the field of journalism. Citizen journalism means more freedom, they have the liberty to expressed his or her thoughts in anyway. For example, blogging about personal experiences. Gillmor alsmo mentions wikipedia and about wiki’s in general. He mentions wiki is the largest reference in today’s time and Google is trying to challene it by becoming the largest information organizer in the high tech industry.Chapter 8 was very similar to “did you know 2.0″. It basically talks about the role of media or the evolution of media. Gilmore mentions Moore’s law and how technology is just growing everyday.
Dan Gillmor the author of “We the Media” has brought us insights relating to technology and media. It would be interesting to see how Wiki media will evolve in the future, as it seems to be the largest online reference now. At the same time, Google is trying to challenge to becoming the largest information organizer in the high tech industry. There is going to be information war in the Internet. At some point, people have all the freedom to voice their opinions either through blogs or online forums alike. Many well known online news media companies such as CNN, MSNBC, etc have adapted this trend. As the information channels quickly reach audience, it could greatly affect the way people make decision through their daily life. For example, people make decision on what they eat, shop, or drive based on the opinions or reviews they could possibility find online. People even become like or dislike on certain things based on the information and opinions gathered from the Internet. People enjoy freedom of speech, however not every country gives that kind of freedom. Likewise, the search giant Google or media giant CNN can only report up to a level about the news or information in China. The news information are getting to audiences at a much faster rate, almost instantly as it is happening. People subscribe to web services such as syndication feed which updates the news headlines on regular basis. News media sometimes tend to draw audiences attentions by exaggerating the effect of the events, hence the media can get wider audience on the issue. Savvy bloggers and Internet users need to learn what is the correct information from rumors. As the information become more readily available to audiences, people need to learn as quickly as email filters to determine what information are important to them.
After reading more and more chapters of We The Media, the topics and ideas that Gilmore mentions keeps me thinking. It is truly inspiring to read about how everyday people now with today’s technology can become journalists and the world of writing is much more open and available to everyone. I never realized how restrictive writing was for journalists in the past, and how different it is today. Today, there is such a liberty and freedom felt and expressed that it is mind boggling. When Gilmore wrote about how amazing it was that new technologies were everywhere, camera were in all places, and in the smallest gadgets. He mentioned how his phone has a built in camera, and laptops have built in cameras. The world is growing exponentially and who knows where it will be in the future! It has already grown so much since the days when journalists were fired and got into serious trouble for expressing their views to the masses.
Chapters 7,8,9 of We the Media were a little troubling for an aspiring journalist, yet at the same time reassuring. Let me explain. When I read about the news station that fired their employees for citizen based journalism my first reaction was, great, here comes another trend that is going to end newspapers once and for all. But when I thought about it more I realized that the convergence to online production has opened up so many more doors for journalists, like blogging or websites that allow anyone to contribute. In fact, we have realized a “freedom of the presses” that has never been seen in history. If you are interested in journalism, and you love to write, there will now always be a venue to perfect your craft.
Did You Know 2.0 came back to haunt me in chapter 8 of We the Media. The author brought me back to Moore’s law and how technology is just growing and growing and growing. This made me think back to a visit I made to the Fresno Bee last year. I was given a tour of the newspaper by a recent graduate from SJSU who now works there as an entertainment columnist. He said that older, more traditional journalists are losing out on opportunities because they refuse to learn about new technology advancements like blogs, social networking sites, how to create content for online use and how to do something as small as reformatting a .jpg file in Paint. PAINT! He said that every new computer skill I pick up is that much better for me because the industry is changing and journalists who know to make podcasts, blogs, vlogs, etc. are more desirable.
Technology will never slow down. It’s only going to advance, evolve and pick up momentum. This is one of the main reasons I decided to take this class. I knew that learning how to use Adobe programs, how to make a podcast, how to make a vlog was going to help me further down in life. And it already has. I just started an internship, and one of the reasons I was hired because I knew how to use InDesign.
In Chapter 9 of We the Media, the author begins by talking about deception on the Internet. Gilmor describes phony websites that are set up to create a buzz about new movies. “The exposure of the deception again brought to focus a reality of the modern age: for manipulators, con artists, gossips, and jokesters of all varieties, the Internet is the medium from heaven,” (174). This reminded me of what I learned about the Internet in a class that I took last year at UCLA. The class was called cultural geography and gave students a broad look at the world we lve in. Our professor talked about the diffculties of regulating the Internet because there is no way to make and enforce rules that apply to everyone. In one particular instance, a so-called “cyber rape” that occured on a second life website called LAMBDAMOO. There was no way of punishing the individual who committed the crime except by banishing him from the website. However, he later returned to it under a different name. The Internet is considered a “cloak room communmity” because any person who accesses it has the right to pose as somebody else with no real consequences. The same idea also applies for media. Anybody can get online and post content and lie about where it originated. Just like how Hollywood studios created “fan websites” to promote new movies. Issues such as this make people question the reliability of information found on the Internet. The Internet is simply too large for all of the information to be looked and proved true, so it is up to the public to question the validity of information online.
When I read further and further into each chapter from this book, I find the topics and content in it a lot more interesting. It only gets better! I have taken media classes in the past and learned all about the changes being made and how it is currently affecting news and media all over the world. Chapter 7 talks about the rise of citizen journalists and how everyday normal people can now become that reporter or journalist that they always see on television. One news station in southern California even laid off numerous employees and opened up their website to citizen journalists. This enables them to upload videos and write stories that are currently happening around their home town. The problem that arises with this is that stories and articles can be less reliable and inaccurate. On the plus side, I believe this portal allows more people to be active and participate in what’s going on in the world around them. People will be able to give their input, say their ideas, and express their voice as well. Blogs and wikipedia are being used on a daily basis today.
In the movie, Terminator, the characters talk about Judgment Day or Dooms Day and how it may come true some time in the near future. Robots and computers will destroy all of man kind. Chapter 8 talks about the exponential growth of technology and how it is increasing everyday. Can we slow it down or stop this advancement? Almost everyone in the world revolves their lives around technology. Heck, you can even talk to your car and tell it to perform certain tasks through the sound of your voice and a push of a button (Ford Sync by Microsoft). What’s next? A computer built into some sunglasses or a cell phone that can control everything and anything? The world is amazingly changing at rapid speeds everyday and if you don’t stay up to date with technology then you’re just falling behind.
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I agreed with Dan Gillmor regarding to the First Amendment. We fought over little thing like whether we should included the word god in our national anthem, but other country, journalists don’t have to option to express their opinions. Governments would oppress and monitor what being said or written. Journalists might be jailed or be killed if they are willing to speak their mind against government’s objective. Also, information can be misleading and taken out of context if the writer isn’t careful. New software like Photoshop CS3 can easily manipulates an image from its original context. Writers must used references or sources to back up their story. Technology makes our job easier, but we have to be careful of how they are being used.
One of the chapters that stuck out the most to me during this reading series was chapter 8. I felt this chapter related to a lot of what we’ve been discussing and learning about in class. On one of the first days of class we were given a lecture that included information on Moore’s Law. According to Gillmor, “Moore’s Law is about exponential change: it doesn’t take long before you’ve increased power by thousands-fold”. Gilmor also discusses how journalism “feeds” off of all these new innovations, namely new devices for collecting and distributing data that can hold a huge amount of information. Gillmor also discusses how easy it is to share information today. I found it funny when Gillmor said “Hundreds of millions of people in the U.S. and abroad are using camera phones (soon to be video-camera phones)”. My cell phone is a video-camera phone, so Gillmor was right on target there. I wonder if he predicted what happened with the iPhone from Apple? All of this information made me reflect on what we’ve been learning in class, what with the Web 2.0 video, the presence of campaigns on YouTube.com, the sharing of information on Twitter, etc.
This past week I read chapters 7, 8 and 9 in Dan Gillmor’s “We the media” and as usual it was a pleasure.
Chapter 7 talked about how citizen journalism can open completely new doors in the field of journalism. Nower days we can get access to insider “off the record” information through blogs. I understand that people are thrilled about that, however, I believe we should still take this information in, in a critical manner. Citizen journalism means more freedom, but it also means to me that there might be more inaccurate information out and we need to select and still read various sources to believe something. I believe with increasing citizen journalism we might see a rise in lawsuits (for instance when things are disclosed to the public without consent of the affected). As far as blogging about personal experiences ( like the blog from Iraq) I think this is a fantastic way to get a “real” insight in how different people feel about this war and how the people affected by it live their lives.I was surprised to read that the alternative press has not really taken advantage of the net. I was glad to see that Gillmor talked about wikipedia and about wiki’s in general. It’s fascinating how everyone uses Wikipedia nowerdays.
Chapter 8 reminded me a lot of the video “did you know 2.0”. It basically talks about the exponential growth of technology and the correlation between that and the role of media or the evolution of media. I was also surprised how many laws about these things are out there :-)…Metcalfe, Moore, Reed…WOW! I liked the fcat that google makes it possible to sort out reliable blogs, this was an issue I adressed earlier and it’s good to know that there is some sort of monitor out there. I thinik a reputation syatem is extremely important with growing citizen journalism. We basically have so much information coming at us, we will need some help sorting it out.
Chpater 9 adressed issues that blogging can bring, in particular cutting and pasting. I had heard about the fake John Kerry picture before, it is crazy how the internet creates a whole new world of possible criminla acts. Thinking about this makes it hard for me what I can trsut and what not and how I can find out the reliability of something. The anonymous nature of the web, is a bit threatening to me. We don’t know who might be behind an alias…As Gillmor says, we need to create a hierarchy of trust and we simply can’t take everything for being a true story if the source is not in our hierarchy.
SJSU J&MC New Media Class, Spring 2008 