Blog 7: Required Blog for iSpy

After googling myself, it was sad to see that nothing came up about me. There were many links with “Mike Burch”, but none of them were actually I. I have done this experiment before and noticed I had to add “lacrosse” to find something. If I added lacrosse, I had some player profiles come up from high school and college. I found it interesting to find many Mike Burch’s with facebook and myspace pages that came up (still none that were actually me).

I would not like to be one of many “John Smiths” because I would not feel as unique. Although Michael is a common name, I have never met anyone with the same last name. More than half of my friends from high school were named Mike but we all had nicknames to help separate us. If someone called out “John Smith”, more than half the room would answer. I think diversity is important in finding out who you really are. Our culture magnifies our diversity and allows us to show people who we really are inside. Clothing and music are just two examples of how we can define ourselves to strangers. We can usually make pretty good judgments on people and their beliefs just by the way they dress.

Surveillance operates in everyone’s life. Every store we go into now days have cameras throughout watching your every move. I do not use it because I think it would be creepy and would be arrested. You hear many stories of people getting into trouble for spying on people who do not know they are being filmed. Every time I go into a fast food restaurant, I look up to see myself on the camera above the register. Sometimes I make a face or act oddly because I know I am on camera. Surveillance in stores helps catch criminals and usually makes them think twice before committing the crime. If I were going to rob a store under surveillance, I would have to wear a mask to hide my face.

Blog 6: A Historical Election

It was very interesting to be a part of the 2008 presidential election. We all had a chance to witness a historical moment in our country. I had never really been interested in politics until this year.

Although it ended up being a landslide, it was great to see the first African American to be elected into presidency. I stayed up all night watching the two speeches. I found it interesting how the media portrayed the race throughout. One thing I did not understand was why we had to wait so late to see the speeches. Certain channels delayed the speech because they knew people were willing to wait up to watch. This gave companies the chance to advertise their products more since they knew people were going to stay up to be a part of history.

This generation had certain tools and technologies other generations did not. Youtube and MySpace pages were full of personal opinions that could be accessed easily by all users. The public could now post their ideas and beliefs without any hesitation. I believe this gave our nation more power as we felt more vocal and could influence the election more.

Personally, it was fascinating to see all the support for Obama on my facebook. Everyone had changed their statuses to show who they were voting for last Tuesday. I did not have to ask anyone whom he or she was voting for because more than 50% of my friends had it online. It will be interesting to see how new technologies continue influencing people and helping our country grow stronger. I for one cannot wait to see what happens in our future with this historical election. No matter whom we voted for, we all had to take a step back this election.

Blog 5: the cult of the amateur

The root of the word "amateur" comes from the Latin word "to love". Amateurs are those who do something because they love to, not for external motivators. I personally, am an amateur of music. I enjoy listening to all types of music and find myself listening to music throughout daily routines. I listen to music when I am bored, stressed, and happy. We do not value our work done for love as much as required love because it does not pay as much. Working for enjoyment is not the same as working for money. I am passionate when I can be of some assistance to someone because it makes me feel better about myself. I am involved in multiple community service groups that fulfill my passion of helping people. I do not think it is right for people to live with useless money when others could use it to survive. I wish I could find a career with my passion but many of the community service jobs are volunteer work. I will certainly continue doing community service on the side of my career. I would love to focus my entire life on things I am passionate about but in reality, it would not fulfill the lifestyle I intend to have.

One of Keen's frequent targets in Cult of the Amateur is Lawrence Lessig, professor of law at Stanford and one of the frequent proponents of ideas like Creative Commons licensing and other ways to think about copyrighting in the digital age. I found Lessig's arguments against Keen's book more convincing. I found the argument of people telling me what is good or bad was terrible. I do not need my culture to tell me what movies or songs I like. I did not agree with Keen's argument in this scenario.

Blog 4: Millennial Generation & The Election

Reading Millennial Makeover: MySpace, YouTube and the Future of American Politics could not have come at a better time. With the upcoming election around the corner, it will be interesting to see how our new generation (The Millennial Generation) is influenced through internet-based communications. Our generation has newer technologies that will help change the way we look at voting. We can now upload personal videos and can voice our opinions more easily.

Personally, I watched many of the debates on the Internet compared to the television. Since a couple of the debates were held on Friday night, when most of the Millennial Generation should be out enjoying their night, it was common for us to watch it the next day on our laptops. Many of the videos were taking right from the debates itself; it was like we never missed a thing. Not only did our generation have the debates recorded for us, but many other political videos on a more personal base. People posted comments and blogs to voice opinions that varied throughout the country. I know these new technologies and ways of communication helped influence my decisions on the presidential election. I think it will be interesting to see which party favored from the Millennial Generation’s newer ways of voting and to see where we will go from here. Technology grows each day resulting in more ways of attaining our information. Who knows, maybe one day we will be able to vote online.