Modeling Reality with Virtual Worlds

Virtual worlds are becoming more and more popular. I believe that we can apply these worlds to actual locations. In a business sense, i think we can apply virtual worlds to construction sites. That the administrators and investors who are involved in a project can see the advancements as the project progresses. During progress of the project, the virtual administrator will update the advancements. In the virtual world the people invested in the project can see what they are up to, what materials are being used, and who is working on the project. Saki Knafo writes, "Second Life is a multiuser virtual environment, a computer program that lets online users construct" and view the progress of the virtual world. This shows how easy it is to access this world and construct and view what is going on. I would say the only downside to this is maintenance of the world. It would not be so hard to update the virtual world, especially when the administrator is the only one adding the information.

Social Networking

I think a new way social networking, through the use of technology, can be used is in public forums. When there are events for an upcoming movie or a release for a new book, there should be computer hubs where the guests can log onto their social networking site and talk about what they are seeing, hearing, and feeling. This can not only connect these people to their friends, but they will also be a channel of people actually at the event. As Nicole Saidi writes, "While many think such computer interactions could eventually be helpful" it shows that people rely heavily on computer interactions. If you have this channel the guests would be able to connect to people who share common interests. Of course, like everything else in the world, there is always a dark side to this. Computer interactions are always a target for predators, identity thievery, and scamming. As technology grows so does the advancements in the "dark side." I believe that we can keep ourselves more advanced then the scammers and keep our technology stronger and safer. I believe that more and more people are spending their social life behind a computer, but we should not keep it as a taboo, we should embrace it and find out ways to integrate online socializing into public forums. This way we can make it easier for people to have face to face interactions using the computer.

Check Out Social Networking Sites

The 4 major social networking sites that I visited were Facebook, MySpace, Friendster, and twitter. Prior to today I was a member to both MySpace and facebook. I haven’t heard of Friendster and twitter I was just hesitant to join. From what I see these 4 sites are very useful to stay in contact with people and just to find out new things about people.
Facebook- I would say I use facebook the most out of all these sites. Facebook is easy to use with very direct buttons allowing you to browse the network with ease. I think I use facebook the most because it is most popular with the people I am in contact with. It’s a great place for friends to post pictures of gatherings and get togethers. I think one of the most important aspects of facebook, for me, is the birthday reminders. Although all the other sites have it, most of my friends are on facebook, so I get the reminders of their birthdays.
MySpace- MySpace was the first of the social networking sites that I was a member to. This was because when I started, unlike facebook (back in the day), I was able to create a profile with just an ordinary email address. Now facebook allows you to sign up using any email, but before you needed a school email. MySpace is very useful in the fact they let you customize your page to the fullest extent. They allow you to change the backgrounds, fonts, and pictures. This allows many users to use their pages as advertisements for their company or service. A lot of musicians post their music on their page to get feedback from other users around the world. Stores, djs, and party throwers use their pages to update their fans to tell them where they will be on what dates. People can also send direct feedback by leaving them a message.
Twitter- Twitter is a relatively new site. This allows people to "follow" people they admire or just their friends. A lot of celebrities have a twitter, where they constantly update their status letting the fans know what they are up to. This is an interesting site where people feel close to the people they admire. You can also follow your friends, but for me personally, I don’t find them to be that interesting. I think that twitter is a great way to promote the privacy of celebrities. Ever since there have been celebrities there has been paparazzi. As we have seen on TV shows such as TMZ or many others TV shows on VH1, celebrities don’t like camera men following them everywhere they go. I think twitter is giving the fans the information they want to know reducing the necessity for the paparazzi.
Friendster- I've heard Friendster before but never looked at it deeper. I never made a username because most of my friends are on facebook. It wouldn’t be such a bold statement to say that none of my friends are on Friendster. I signed up this morning and it doesn’t seem that bad. I see it has advertisements (possibly viruses due to the nature of the ads) and many tabs for social networking. The one that caught my eye the most was the classifieds. This combines the standard social networking site with a craigslist type of network. This allows you to post anything from for sale items to volunteer opportunities. I think that with more popularity this web site can be as big as the others.

Blogs vs. Wikis

I believe that the networking we have established through new media is unbelievably large. Throughout the world, as long as you have a computer, you are connected to millions of people. This gives people the opportunity to share their ideas on one page. These common pages are known as wikis or blogs. The difference between a wiki and a blog is on a wiki, their must be some type of page maintenance, where the information submitted has to be monitored and censored to see if the information is correct or useful. In a blog, people have more freedom to respond to one another and it gives other bloggers the opportunity to read those responses. When dealing with such a controversial topic such as the war in Iraq, people definitely have different view points. According to Ezra Goodnoe, author of "How to Use Wikis for Business" he describes a case where wikis were being tested to see if an editorial can be written from different people around the world. He describes the editing as "three days of maintenance hell." I believe this to be due to the fact that the wikis have to be more controlled then blogs. Blogs are pages that users can submit their point of view in response to someone else’s comments. When people are submitting their changes to a wiki, it is chaos and you get "maintenance hell." Wikis and blogs are similar in the fact that they both give users the opportunity to submit what they feel is important, pertaining to a certain issues.

I think a new way to use wikis is to create a script. I think that if everyone would add a scene based on a main story line, I think it would create such a masterpiece. Having such diverse minds and people contribute their part into a movie or a play would create such an interesting stroy.