Final Paper Blog Post 2. Process

In doing some research about the green movement and it actually stands for I can conclude that it wont change the direction of our disposable society.  Going green is definitely helping the environment and its an important movement with real results.  But its only a minor dent into the growing problem that Slade describes in Made to Break.  The problem is much more involved then car pooling and buying a green light bulb.  It is in our mindsets that we must constantly purchase new products such as cars and cell phones even before our previous one is inoperable.  The second fact is that almost everything we buy is planned to not last very long.  Advancements in technology and constantly evolving the products that we use everyday requiring us to keep up with the times and purchase the newest, most advanced products.  The green movement is good, but unless it puts a stop to the advancement of technology, I don't think it will change the fact that we live in a disposable society.

Final Paper, First Post

For my final paper I will answer the question addressing Giles Slade's book "Made to Break."  I find this topic very interesting and relevant to our current time and the near future.  Society has made progress in going green with the recent movement to help reduce the use of harmful things that destroy our environment.  Although we have made progress on this topic, and I believe we will continue to make progress, our society cannot break away from being a disposable society.  Our lifestyles are too embedded in using products that are meant to be thrown away.  Technology also plays a large role in our disposable lifestyle.  In Slade's book he gives detail to how the advancement of technology leads to making its predecessor obsolete.  Products such as cell phones, cars, TV's and refrigerators will continue to advance and the need to update and replace will always be in demand.  My further research and Slade's book should be able to provide information in supporting my answer to this question.

Facebook Part 3

The third part to Kirkpatrick's "Facebook Effect" primarily discusses what platforms are and how Zuckerberg was able to include a platform for facebook.  Basically having a platform allows other companies to make their own applications that can be installed into users facebook profiles.  Added the platform to facebook allows for much more interaction with facebook users and also outside companies to join in on the "facebook effect."  The possibles to applications are endless as thousands of programmers are all taking part in developing applications for facebook.  Kirkpatrick mentions some of the applications that are very popular and still used today such as photos, the wall, and causes.  These applications allow users to have a greater interaction with the site and also with friends and family.  What I also found interesting is that Zuckerberg had no plans in charging companies for their ability to develop and use applications on facebook.  He feels that this should be free to anyone who wishes to engage with the facebook platform, sticking to his long term view of his company and facebook.  I also found it interesting that facebook is developing the largest database for information for advertisers.  Companies can now advertise on facebook and feed their ads specifically to people who would be interested in their product.  After reading this I logged onto facebook to take a look at the advertisements that I never care to look at on the left hand side of the page.  I can see that the advertisements are in conjunction with the certain websites that I visit.  This aspect of facebook will change the way companies advertise to their customers.  So can see as you read through Kirkpatrick's book that Zuckerberg truly didn't know the potential of facebook when he first developed it, and it still continues to advance and become larger and more aspects and applications are being added.  The possibilities are endless.

The Social Network

Watching the social network was gave a little insight to the beginnings of facebook and how Zuckerberg was able to develop his idea.  They portrayed him to be an intelligent, cocky person that had a fearless attitude.  The movie shows how Zuckerberg and his room mates started from nothing and developed a website first for the people of his school, and soon to the people of the world.  After reading the book, "The Facebook Effect,"  by David Kirkpatrick I was able to see that there was a little cinematic drama added to make the movie slightly more interesting.  Nevertheless the movie was a good eye opener to the beginnings of facebook and its future impact on the internet and society.  The amount of interest that developed at such an early stage of the company shows how groundbreaking Zuckerberg's ideas were.  Although The Social Network altered the appearance and personality of Zuckerberg it was still interesting to watch and learn about the development of facebook.

Facebook effect part 2

The second part of Kirkpatrick's book describes the beginnings of thefacebook becoming a large social phenomenon.  It was interesting to learn about how venture capitalists from the west began to take interest in thefacebook and I find it truly amazing of the amount of money that was willing to be spent on a company of such a young age and small size.  The amount of attention thefacebook was getting a such an early stage shows the importance of the idea Zuckerberg had and its impact to come in the future.

Once the bidding war between The Post and Accel ended, the company was ready to take building and expanding on Zuckerberg's vision.  Not only was thefacebook able to recruit top programmers from other top companies such as Amazon and Google, but their ability to recruit young bright adults that haven't graduated from college yet.  People were beginning to catch on to the impact thefacebook could have and how large it could actually become.  For someone to stop in the middle of their degree and become a full time employee of a up and coming company says a lot about how successful it would become.  The atmosphere that was created around the office was also something I found interesting.  The laid back flip-flop attitude helped stay true to the idea of thefacebook and how Zuckerberg and company were not going to play by the normal script of a multimillion dollar company.

Facebook Effect Part 1

It is very interesting to read about the start of face book and how it has become the social powerhouse it is today.  Zuckerberg ran into many issues while first building face book into what is it today, but the choices he made turned out to be the right ones, and face book has now become a revolutionary movement in the social network realm.  The idea started out relatively small, with only targeting college students and requiring an .edu email address.  By expanding on other social networks already available, Zuckerberg was able to expand face book into what it is today.

It is interesting to think back before the time of face book and remember when AOL instant messaging was one of the most popular ways to be involved in social networking and chat with friends.  This concept has been expanded by face book and other social networks to a much more intricate and sophisticated way to build social networks.  With millions of people now joining the face book movement, people from all over the world and multiply languages can all join in on the largest social network in the world.  The social implications that face book has on society is the ability to be far apart from people, but still be able to keep in touch with them.  The way society is communicating with each other is changing, and the normal face to face interactions has now moved onto the internet.  I think that the future will only expand on this notion and face book will become more and more apart of peoples lives.  Although I have face book, I think the fact that people are using face book rather then having face to face interactions will have a negative effect on society.  As we move into the future, we will see just how big the face book effect will become, and its overall effect on our society and culture.

Wikipedia Midterm analysis

I thought that our assignment on the Wikipedia audit was very interesting and also eye opening.  By taking a deeper look into Wikipedia, I was able to learn where the information from these articles was coming from.  Ive learned that Wikipedia isn't really the best source for information about certain topics.  I think the main function that Wikipedia holds in terms of information seeking is that it can touch the surface on topics to give the reader the main idea of the situation, but I wouldn't recommend using it as a scholarly source.  In our audit of the Katrina article on Wikipedia, we found that many of the sources were bias especially the information on the sociopolitical aspect of the article.  Although the factual information about the storm was accurate, such as statistical damage and other quantitative information.  The overall analysis of Wikipedia is that it contains a large amount of bias that needs to be taken into consideration while using Wikipedia to gain information.