I read an article that cable companies are going to start transitioning into a new way of billing customers. Cable companies such as Comcast are looking to start billing customers bases on their data usage. Do you think cable companies are starting to resort to this type of billing structure because of the fact that many people now watch their television shows and movies online rather than paying a monthly cable bill? Do you think maybe this type of billing will make the numbers of internet television watchers decrease? This is very similar to the various phone companies who have gotten rid of their unlimited data plans and begun billing according to the number of data kilobytes that a user consumes. How do you think consumers are going to feel about this?

20 Day Stranger is an app that was created to share 20 Days with a complete anonymous stranger through pictures and words on your mobile phone. One can think of it as an anonymous snap chat friend. How much success do you think and app like this would get? In this era people have become so open with sharing their everyday lives with complete strangers. While others only participate in very minimal public social media platforms. Do you think an app of this sort could cause a lot of issues with people using its purpose the incorrect way? Some may say this app is too “creepy” while others may say it’s an ingenious idea that will expand your horizons within the realm of people you know and connect with. You can watch the promotion video for the app here and sign up to participate in this experiment here.

As the world develops, technology is being more and more incorporated into our lives.  With this incorporation comes the breaching of our private information. With websites such as google, Facebook and Twitter constantly collecting our information through our web surfing whereabouts, it is important for users to take precaution when entering information into these various technologies.

Personally, when using social networking websites, I do not sign up with my professional email for any social media platforms. When your professional email is linked to many subscriptions and social media platforms, it is more likely for your job to find you on the internet. Although I am not a frequent user, Facebook is a more personal place for me to connect with my family and friends, rather than for business reasons.

Another way I protect my privacy on social networks is by using my nickname for my profile rather than my legal government name. Our name is a big part of our identity. I believe that our name is extremely connected to various personal and private information such as your social security number. Also when shopping online, entering credit card numbers into the computer becomes very sensitive information. It is recommended that online shoppers should download an on screen key board when entering payment methods into browsers. This is something that I have done due to the fact that my credit card information has been previously stolen when I ordered products from amazon.

I frequently delete my browser history and cookies in order to prevent websites and advertisers from compiling so much of my information through my web searches. Especially when using my iPhone I tend to remove all of my browsing history and turn off all location integrations within my phone applications. I am also very cautious of what applications I download on to my phone. I do not have the Facebook iPhone application simply for the fact that the application has a large amount of access onto the personal information on our mobile devices.

As a frequent traveler I have always been asked to completely shut off my phone and hand held electronics during the duration of a flight. This was regulation that airlines were always very adamant about making passengers do despite the “airplane mode” feature that was integrated into many of our devices. However after flying to Houston this past weekend I noticed that this policy is no longer in place. As aircraft passengers, we are now able to keep all light wight electronic devices powered on as long as it is in airplane mode. I always wondered why we were directed to power off our devices in the previous years. After research the FAA determined that having the cell phone device powered on is actually not harmful. You can read about it more here.

Generation Like described the use of the social network world in marketing. As a user of social networks, I am able to view how social networking platforms such as Facebook, Youtube, and Twitter help individuals market themselves. Generation Like portrays social media “likes” into currency. In this phase of social media, likes have the power to determine the significant you hold within the cyber social world.

In my opinion the “winners” would be the people who successfully market their business through the showcase of their lives on social networks. The losers would be the people and ideas that go unnoticed due to the popularity of other users. Likes are what consume the interface of the internet. But where do we draw the line of this significance, or do we ever draw the line?

I believe that teens are fully aware of the “like currency”. Through this video there are various “internet famous” people who know exactly the business that they are in. There are teens all over the internet that try to gain popularity on the internet. There are teens who study the patterns of the internet and plan their videos according to what they think will gain likes. Sometimes it doesn’t matter how outrageous the content of the video is. The social platforms that we used to use for communication, have turned into a complex money making business.

Phantom pocket vibration is a syndrome that causes your brain to think  your phone is vibrating or ringing when it really isn’t. How many of you have actually experienced this? I think living in this technological age, we have all experienced at least a taste of this syndrome. It’s almost as if there is a type of anxiety that is attached to the “social” technology world. People during this era are extremely attached to their electronics, feeding off of these virtual notifications. Whether it is a text message, email, or Facebook notification. A Nokia study shows that, “the average mobile phone user checks their phone every 6.5 minutes during the day or 150 times during their waking hours.” Why do you think we are so hooked to these electronics? Do you think this syndrome will eventually get so advanced that people will need rehab?

The topic I’d like to focus on is the “fad” of social networks. Just like that cool pair of the bell-bottom jeans and those nifty sneakers that have wheels attached to them, the Internet goes through phases. First lets go back in time and think back to the popular social media tools that took over our society roughly ten years ago.

-Xanga

– Friendster

– MySpace

 I always wondered why websites just seem to fall off that face of the earth. Well not literally fall of the face of the Earth, but the public just seems to stop caring. Chat rooms filled with hundreds of people have suddenly become a ghost town. Why is that? It also seems as if social media websites lose their popularity AFTER drastic improvements are made to the site. Does the world hate the idea of change?I always see people complaining about new modifications to their favorite social network. Or does the website become redundant and is change exactly what we long for?

In my opinion, communicating is the foundation of producing. From the time of the telegram to now a time of an instant text message, communication has greatly evolved. Living in a technological age communication has become a key concept within businesses. The idea of communication through technology has broken the boundaries of distance. With the luxury of web based video chat platforms, such as Skype, Oovoo, and FaceTime, companies both  are easily able to communicate with one another. These tools have made it more efficient for businesses to travel both locally and over seas with out the opportunity cost of time and money. Before, companies may have had to make impulsive decisions when working with international clients, simply because the communication process was too lengthy and inaccessible. . Now we are able to communicate within seconds all across the globe. This allows for the production of goods to not only be made more efficiently, but more detailed. Every opinion is taken into consideration when using the tools of communication in the production process. However there can be down sides to the use of technology when communicating. We have all probably experienced occasions when there is miscommunication and a message is not correctly conveyed. Whether there is misinterpretation or technical difficulties. But generally it’s an occasion when we can thank our wonderful “SMART” phones for that lovely “autocorrect” that’s never actually CORRECT. However that’s probably a whole other blog post that I could write.