Hitting the Escape button on print culture?



        After reading Christine Rosen's article on the book she read, I opened up to the idea that viral media is really taking over the world. She points out the fact that we now have "digital literacy," when we only used to have actually book literacy. Learning how to read is one of those traditional things that your parents are supposed to teach you how to do. Nowadays, parents themselves are being taught how to use technology from their children. For example, I had to teach my mom how to use the keyboard and how to use the mouse on a computer. (which she still has no clue how to use) Christine talks about how  "It is the busiest port of entry for popular culture and requires navigation skills different from those that helped us master print literacy." She is spot on with that comment.
         The skills necessary to be digitally literate is pretty hard to master itself. Honestly, I would not know where to begin on learning how to use a computer or an iPad if I was to learn today. I am so grateful to be alive during this multimedia revolution. Technology is exponentially advancing every year and it is scary to think that some day print media will be very rare, if not extinct. Digital literacy’s advocates increasingly speak of replacing, rather than supplementing, print literacy, Rosen paraphrases.

  In the New York Times article "Becoming screen literate," the author also takes on a whole new meaning while looking at technology. These days millions of people can alter or enhance many different medias. For example, Movie mash-ups can be created with software and have alternate endings, songs or even characters. "Hollywood mavericks like George Lucas have embraced digital technology and pioneered a more fluent way of film making." He has masted a way of manipulating images and movies to make an amazing product that no one else can come close to making. The question that stood out to me in this article was, "How can we browse a film the way we browse a book?" I really don't see how we can do that with proper literacy without actually looking at scenes and looking back at the emotions we would have missed at a one time showing.

Bottom line is that I don't think print literacy will be erased completely, but the more and more ways that technology is advanced, the quicker people will forget about reading an inconvenient paper back book.

My site is better than yours!

I always wondered how sites were categorized online. How the credible and major sites made it to the top of the google list makes you wonder what those companies do to get there. Pagerank as we discussed in class is an algorithm based system that allows for sites to be rated better than others based on visitation and clicks on certain parts of the website.
http://www.clippingimages.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/05/pagerank_google.jpg

Someone brought up an interesting question during class that still was in my mind. They asked how people could cheat and just visit there own sites and make frequent traffic to create a buzz for themselves. With google being the only way people research(well most people) it is a big demand to have your site be the number one hit on google search.

I started researching for another class project and thought about different ways to research that were discussed in class. Like narrowing searches with quotation marks or looking up subjects and really searching for specific answers. This helped very much in finding not only good answers, but credible ones at that.

Reflecting on the Reflected

In analyzing my most recent post, Iagree with Ms. Vance. My blogs "read off like dashed blurbs" and honestly she is right, I would not enjoy my blog at all if I was to read it either. I really haven't had any noteworthy blogs this semester and now figuring out what it takes to make a profound blog. Time is one excuse that I keep finding myself using which is a inappropriate one.

From reading Rushkoff's book this semester and learning about the blogging world, I have come to see that the way I portray myself online has not been one that shows my real personality. My blogs have not been what you would call fun to read or insightful, but that is because I never really took the time to see how a composition as small as a blog can really have an impact.

For example, In chapter 6 about Identity, I see how face-to-face communication is diminishing and you see more and more people having tons of "friends" online.It goes to show you how a once small circle of friends can now be expanded to thousands just by sharing something on your facebook or twitter. "These are the type of ‘social glue’ comments that connect people." I never thought about mass communication in the sense that we are who we choose to be online and we try and create this perfect person.

That blog example was an extensive work that blew mine out of the water. In a recent post I wrote,"We discussed in class how it can benefit you to befriend people that can later on help you in a certain aspect of your life. For instance, the examples about choosing a teacher you once had and tell a friend to take them as well." I now realize that this line was a bland and general statement with no depth or explanation with it. I mean to broaden it to show how our peers can act as a stepping stool for things we couldn't achieve without networking and finding out what is better than going out on a limb and guessing.

I have re read and noticed my mistakes from all of my previous posts (all of my posts themselves).From the last post onward I will make my blogs more creative and showcase my personality a tad bit more.  I have been enjoying the blogging the past couple weeks and really value what they help you see. I like how blogs make you expand more on a certain topic more than just talking about many topics. it gives you a chance to show your wit and intelligence in a literary way. I think I will continue to blog even after this class ends.