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.

After having watched the video showed in class on cookies and its potential harmful effects I had blocked sites on google chrome from collecting my data. Since I do purchase a lot of things online I wouldn’t like it if a company was gathering information on me. Now I know how ads pop up products I had been viewing the other day. I have also went ahead and deleted any personal information off of my Facebook. I have even taken the extreme as to using an alias name like “John Smith”, so that it would be very hard for employers or colleges to look me up. I’m also going to start using search engines where they do no track my searches. I understand it is helping the company gather information on what users are searching most but i believe its my right to keep that information between me and my laptop.

This article on Mashable spotlighted two videos about social media: “You are what you share” and “Everything You Wish You Could Say to Your Facebook Friends“. I couldn’t agree more with the article title “No One Cares About Your Social Media Posts”, with the exception that it only matters if it’s actually important. “You are what you share” basically summarizes a majority of people’s habits of posting on social media and people’s reactions to those posts. I noticed in the video it only highlights the social media posts that tend to seem generic and nothing really extraordinary or significant. Majority of people who are active on social media might see these kinds of posts daily so they can relate to the comments and reactions in the video. However, the video excludes social media posts that are significant, controversial, extraordinary, and outrageous. If the video included those kinds of social media posts, then I think people would actually care because we don’t always see things that shock, surprise, or amaze us. Often times, some people don’t realize who’s on the other end looking at their posts.

People always tell each other to be careful of what they post on social media because it can find a way to haunt us or get us into trouble, but when should people start caring or paying attention to what’s posted on social media platforms? How do we determine if we’ve crossed the line of posting something inappropriate for social media? Do we determine this based on how it will affect us or someone else personally/professionally? How seriously should we even take social media? How mindful/careful should we be about what we post?

Looking back on this class throughout the semester, there is undoubtedly a myriad of things I’ve learned, tools I’ve gained, and knowledge reinforced from when I walked in the door in January. Fortunately, these things are not only extremely relevant for the rest of my academic career, but in all life areas as well. The topics covered were ones that I was passionate about and loved to continue to learn more about. In terms of classroom activities, I would say three things that I gained knowledge on that I can apply in grad school (and beyond) are how truly useful, fun, and dynamic working on wikis and Google Docs is, how clear cut and advantageous making a mind map could be, and last but not least, how to properly look up sources and cite them from virtually any medium.

Now, I always knew about Google Docs, but I rarely used it. I was always wrapped up in (the now seemingly obsolete way of) writing documents on Word and then sending them as attachments via e-mail. To really get into a habit of sharing Google Docs, as well as being able to create a wiki first hand and watching it grow was nothing short of great for me. The wiki was just a wonder to watch becoming what it is now. And these are things that I can no doubt utilize in school and in pretty much any career in the future. The same with a mind map.

I’ve always brainstormed before and made outlines, but I never truly realized how beautifully organized making a mind map could be for your ideas. And again, this is something that can virtually be used in any job trying to brainstorm in a structured fashion. Such an awesome thing that I’m glad we got into. And in any field where you have to write things with references, I’m truly happy that we focused on proper citations so much.

While it wasn’t as fun as making mind maps and creating wikis, continuing to learn how to properly cite sources is yet another integral component that one needs in their repertoire of skills going into their respective careers. And I believe the constant reinforcing of activities that prompted us to use citations were great exercises that prepared us in that way. The only thing I would probably say that we could have learned more about that would help in my academic career and beyond is how everything that we did ties into the business world.

Now, surely one can take everything like the wikis and mind maps and be able to translate those ideas into the business field. But I do feel like if we focused a little more on how they would be able to, and which tools are best for which specific areas (ie. mind maps possibly for marketing, and Twitter for reporting), it definitely would have been that much more beneficial career-wise. Nevertheless, this is not a major issue in my opinion because I can definitely still take what we’ve learned, in its totality, and apply it in my future. And that, in my opinion, is the mark of a great class.

I can sit here in my last semester in Baruch and talk about how I read Homer’s Iliad, and learned limits in Calculus and brain elasticity in psychology, but the things I can truly utilize once I leave here are things I learned and focused on in this course. You need to know what’s going on in the world in terms of technology; you need to be aware of how crazily significant the change in society is and still will be as we further ourselves in this digital age. And to be able to study these infinitely important aspects in a structured academic environment is something that all people should do, and will springboard you into the future in that much more of a beneficial way.

I saw this post on Facebook and it caught my eye, it is a video that talks about how we have these social tools but we are not really that social anymore. Yes we are able to connect to more than one person at once but we are looking at a screen. We spend so much time on these social networks that we do not interact with each other. I agree with this to some extent because when I see people sitting around the table for about an hour and all they do is look at their phone. They are all sitting at the same table but they are not speaking, everyone is just looking at their phone. When I see that I think to myself what is the point of being together in the same room if you are going to stare at your phone. You can do that at home by yourself. I also agree that children today do not know how to be children because I see little kids with tablets and cellphones. I know that there are apps that help them learn but they are so young they do not need to be exposed to the technology. Because they are going to become reliant on the technology.

On the other hand I do not agree with the video because I have a group chat and we still spend time together every week. There are times where we are playing on our phones but majority of the time we are talking and just spending time with each other. The group chat can be hectic but it makes planning and communication a lot easier. We also use these social tools to talk to family and friends that are far away from us and it is our only way to interact with them. Technology also keeps us updated which can be very important, for example school emails are very important. information on finals week, school work, blackboard updates, registration and much more. Yes we are reliant on technology but we can do so much more with it. When we are with other people we should put our phones away and just enjoy each other’s company.

This article talks about how there are projects that are looking into the creation of technology that is specified for pet’s to use or interact. Reading this article brings up a question, will technology change the way we interact with animals positively or negatively? I ask this because at the moment such projects seem cool, fun and funny but what such technology lessens actual interaction with animals/pets or weakens the ties/bonds? Take the PetPal for example. it allows a pet owner to watch, communicate and feed their pet from far away. This seems novel idea because you won’t have to worry about forgetting to put food our for your pet or if you are faraway and miss your pet, you can see them easily but could there come a time when such interactions become the norm instead of actually going up to your pet and interacting with them through physical means? I think about this because in class, we talked about how social media (Facebook, Twitter) is one of the main ways of interaction that people have with each other now and before social media, physical interactions was the main way. So, I think my main question is, does technology strengthen or weaken bonds that we have with other people and will technology strengthen or weaken bonds with our pets?

In this article, it is stated that in Italy, instead of having a court handle copyright infringement, regulators are given the power to handle such situations. In the case the article talks about, a website containing 11 movies was blocked by the regulator AGCOM. This is seen as a drastic move because upon further inspection, the site removed all of the movies so instead of blocking the site, AGCOM could have properly contacted the site owner to tell him to remove the content, however, they decided to in a sense “squash an ant with a hammer”. Another problem with what they did is that AGCOM said that the website was guilty of massive infringement even though that is an overstatement. The problem with this is that AGCOM is setting themselves up for future issues by giving such a small issue a drastic action and by being so loose with their definition of massive infringement. This reminds me of how in HCE, Shirky essentially says that we have to focus more on how to remedy issues instead of stopping them from popping up. In this case, sites that have illegal content are impossible to stop from being created but when found, they can be shutdown, however if the definition of what is allowed and what isn’t is too loose, then it could be troublesome to handle either. My question is, should user generated materials be regulated?

This article begins by citing the experience of a young woman named Sarah Maguire in losing her cellphone after a night of drinking. What happens is that she uses an iphone application called “find my iphone” to discover the location of her phone. She then goes alone to a house where the application indicated and confronted a man about the cellphone, eventually getting it back. What Sarah Maguire did may have seemed very brave but in my opinion was very foolish. In many cases of lost or stolen cellphones, civilian efforts to retrieve their phones do not always end up as easy and clean as Sarah Maguire’s case. In the article, it talks about how an off duty officer called upon three other off duty officers to go and retrieve his son’s stolen phone after using a smartphone gps locator to find it. He did this because he didn’t know what he might be walking into. The article also talks about cops warning people to call the police and to not act by themselves in such situations. After reading this article, I feel as though technology is causing people to not think clearly. What I mean by this is that especially in this case, people can locate their stolen phones but instead of thinking clearly and calling the cops, they decide to go in themselves. If a person gets their phone back by confronting the thief themselves. So my question is, does technology lower our common sense?

Not many people use Internet Explorer today because many people have switched to Chrome and Firefox. But here is another reason not to use Internet Explorer! I read this article recently where Homeland Security is recommending that everyone use a different browser than Internet Explorer. Apparently version 6-11 of Internet Explorer has a security bug, where hackers can gain access to your computer and your information if you click on a bad link. Microsoft was alerted about the bug but they have not found a solution the flaw. So everyone do not use Internet Explorer!

Hackers are everywhere and using Chrome or Firefox does not prevent hackers from hacking your computer but the bug is so serious that Homeland Security is advising that we use another browser. We are always on the internet and we have a lot of personal information saved on the browsers. And if not the bug can also gain access of your hard drive so protect yourselves from the hackers as much as possible and switch to a different browser if you have not already.

This made me think about how much we rely on the internet. It saves our passwords, usernames, credit card information, home address and much more. We put so much information on the internet but we sometimes forget to protect ourselves. We mindlessly put information on the internet for convenience or to use social tools but we do not think of what would happen if someone gains access to this information. A lot of people have their Facebook or Dropbox linked to their computer, tablet and smartphone. This is why losing one of these items are so important to us because our information is on it. But with this bug you don’t need to lose your phone or computer, they can just access it from one bad click. Protect yourself from getting information stolen from you!

I recently read this article, about a man getting a divorce with this phone because he believes that he is spending too much time on it. In the article he mentions that phones are supposed to be an accessory but as time progressed it has become more than that. We are so addicted to our phones that we put it above many things such as our loved ones. I agree because I cannot remember a time when I am with family or friends and I am not texting someone else. To some extent I think that we are so addicted to our phones because we don’t like to be alone. For example, when we are waiting for someone we are on our phone because we are still in contact with others so we don’t feel “alone”. But the problem is even when we are with others we are still playing with our phones.

Throughout this semester, we have analyzed and seen the changes with technology and how it  revolves around our lives. Although many of us would admit that we can’t leave our smartphones at home alone and enjoy the day without it, there is one more thing that most smartphone users still unable to do/rather not do with their high-tech phones: Using their phones as payment tools.

In a new report from BI Intelligence, [they] explain why mobile peer-to-peer (P2P) payment apps offer consumers significant advantages over cash and check transactions. They make transferring money faster, less expensive, and more precise. They also reduce the hassle of going to a money transfer agency, remembering a checkbook, or finding an ATM.

Many new generation of apps are invented to help consumers with using their phones as payment tools but still, many would pass that offer. Let’s see why.

Most people don’t trust their phones to do certain payments such as purchasing an item on Ebay, Amazon, or many shopping sites. However, in the context of peer-to-peer payment transactions such as money transfers (Chase Quickpay, PopMoney,etc), this payment apps is really helpful. Many people, including myself, rather not store some personal information and purchase an item online because of these top three reasons below.

Where do you stand?

[If the chart is unclear, open this link]

Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/the-incredible-growth-of-payment-apps-2014-4#ixzz30HcOzfPn

As I was trying to upload my photos from my phone to Dropbox last night, I found out there was not enough space left to upload the photos. Therefore, I clicked on the button “Get more space”. The page in the picture above popped up. The first option is to upgrade your account, and of course, not for free. In order to get 50 GB of space, I will have to pay $99 per year. I was shocked by how much I have to pay to get some online space. If I had to pay $99, I would rather buy USBs.

Without a doubt, I looked at other options. Surprisingly, all the other options were free, and one thing they had in common is that they somewhat requires you to use social tools. First, if you have a Facebook account and Twitter account, by connecting your accounts to Dropbox, you can get 250MB free space right away. Second, by referring to a friend, you can get 500MB free space. In my opinion, one of the most efficient way to refer to a friend is by using those social tools, such as Facebook, Twitter, and email. For example, if you have 300 Facebook friends, and one third of your friends (100 people) signed up for Dropbox through your reference, you will be able to get about 50GB space on Dropbox. In other words, by using social tools, you have saved $99.

First of all, why would companies ever want to make such deals that they don’t seem to get any direct compensation for? In my opinion, this is because they understand the value of social tools. Dropbox wanted its users to be its advertisers as well. This is the similar idea from the video Generation Like. Companies nowadays realize the value of sharing among its users. Therefore, companies like Dropbox would be willing to give up some of its profit to gain potential users and earnings. However, what if all of its users use social tools to get free online space, and no one actually needs to pay anything in the end. Do you think it is realistic and realizable?

So if one is unsure of something or would like a second opinion, where does one turn to these days? The internet. Some may turn to Yahoo Answers to ask their questions, or may simply turn to social media such as Twitter, Facebook, or even YouTube to get feedback. Using the internet as a tool to ask questions is useful in terms of gaining wider opinions and views.
This article is in relation to a couple not knowing what to name their child, who then thus turned to the internet community to help name their child. The father started the website, namemydaughter.com, where people were freely left to suggest baby names and would cast votes on what name one favored over another. Although the winner of the name was ridiculous, the parents went with the second most voted on name from the site.
I feel like this type of action where one seeks the help of the internet community is beneficial and enjoyable, nevertheless the ones who make unnecessary comments or hateful comments. Making a site like this brings the internet community together, thus also creating social groups.

I found this interesting as team 1 just made their presentation about flash mobs and protests.

As the basketball playoffs continue, a silent protest broke out before the game between the Clippers and Golden State Warriors. The owner of LA Clippers, Donald Sterling, made racist comments during a conversation with his girlfriend and eventually led to the woman stating that he has a whole team of black people playing for him. He responded “You just, do I know? I support them and give them food and clothes and cars and houses. Who gives it to them? Does someone else give it to them? Do I know that I have – who makes the game? Do I make the game, or do they make the game? Is there 30 owners that created the league?”

This controversy and negativity floating around the team became a distraction for the Clippers. To make a unified statement, they all tossed their warm-up jackets with the Clippers name on the front to midcourt and then warmed up with their shooting shirts inside out so the word “Clippers” are not across their chest. Do you think the team made a good statement by doing a silent protest? How effective do you think it was?

Privacy has been a concern for a while. In past four years, I have heard many times that there’s no such a thing called “privacy”. However, the author of a NY times article gave the issue a different dimension. The article I was reading is here.

The author has taken a lot of time and spent some good amount of money as an attempt to protect her privacy. I would simply give up since I can’t really do much to protect the privacy of information that I put on the web! However, I do like the 2 questions she has posed. They are here: Can we ensure that those who can afford to buy privacy services are not being deceived? And even more important, do we want privacy to be something that only those with disposable money and time can afford?

Last month, Facebook bought a company called Oculus Rift for $2 Billion. WOW! What makes this company so special?

They are attempting to revolutionize the way we watch movies, by mass producing a headset that allows us to be completely immersed in the image in front of us. The company wants to produce a product that is for all consumers, so the price will supposedly be affordable. But what does this mean for our eyes? And what about the intimacy of watching a movie with other people? I can’t tell if this is a good invention, or an invention that will begin to tear humanity apart.

When we watch movies with other people, it is a shared experience that provides us comfort and the ability to be on a personal level with someone else. If it’s a comedy, you laugh together. In horror movies, you experience the anticipation together. Action movies, you’re entertained together………..etc. My point is..this is taking away from that experience..are two people supposed to sit on a couch together with the glasses on and time everything correctly so the movies are playing at the same time??? It just seems so awkward….and when I think about the ROOT of it: that is, Mark Zuckerberg bought this company, after creating a social media platform that was at its core an outlet for on campus dating…well then it starts to make sense that he would go and create something that would further divide the human race…

Although one could argue that Facebook has allowed for a feeling of togetherness, I kind of feel like the numerous outlets in which we portray ourselves has left people feeling incomplete, and confused about their own identity…because there are so many different representations we have of ourselves: one through Facebook, Instagram, Twitter….these seem like separate entities of our personalities and I feel like this brings about a lot of self-identity issues for people my age.

What are your opinions on Oculus Rift? Is it a beneficial or harmful invention?

“Help us make up who we want to be” is the phrase I constantly saw on some subway advertisement lately (please refer to the picture). What caught my eye at once were not only the amazing make-up looks, but also a girl named Michelle Phan. On the advertisement, it says Michelle had over 5 million YouTube subscribers. This YouTube millionaire girl interested me and I decided to watch some of her videos on YouTube. Surprisingly, when I looked her up on YouTube, her subscribers on YouTube had raised to over 6 million already. Later on, I found out all she used to become a successful woman today is a laptop and a camera. She started with posting make-up tutorial blogs at first, however, as more bloggers requested; she posted her first video on YouTube in 2007” (Wikipedia). Her growing popularity on the internet attracted many beauty brands to offer corporate sponsorship to her, such as Lancôme. In last year, L’Oreal sponsored Michelle to start her own beauty brand “EM” (Wikipedia).

Michelle’s successful career reminded me of Steven, the 14 year old skateboarder in the video Generation Like. Similar with Steven, they are both popular people on YouTube, and they both earned corporate sponsorships by their popularity on YouTube. All they used to become known was a camera to take videos and a laptop to upload videos. It was the power of social tools that made their talents known. Without YouTube and blog, Michelle would probably only become an ordinary make-up artist. It was the social tools that empowered Michelle to reach out to public who may be interested in her videos. In other words, it was the social tools that allowed Michelle to attract her consumers and sell her brand today. Do you have great business ideas, too? If yes, then utilize these social tools to start to build your own business today!

For Michelle Phan’s interview by Australia Sunrise TV Program, click Here.

I was reading this article on Mashable about how there are social seating services that allow you to connect with other people 35,000 feet in the air. It works by letting travelers choose their seat mate by looking at other travelers’ profiles on Facebook or LinkedIn. I thought this was interesting how airlines were utilizing their airplanes as opportunities for travelers to network and connect with each other. This is an innovative idea and it’s a great way for people to utilize their time while being on a plane. The article also mentioned how two professionals had the chance to be seated with each other while heading to a TED conference. It’s actually kind of cool to have the opportunity to talk to someone who you wouldn’t normally have access to. Who knew that your social media profiles could be utilized to help you meet someone 35,000 feet in the air?

However, there are some negative aspects to it such as being matched with someone unwanted or the awkwardness by being refused by a seat mate. Also sometimes people just want to wind down and escape from having to do business so planes provide that temporary liberation for them. But what do you think about this social seating service? Do you think other airlines should jump on board with social seating services and allow travelers to network and connect with each other? Do you think that more travelers are going to be interested in using this service or would this service just be for professionals to network with other professionals if the chance arises?

About two year ago, I participated in a flash mob proposed by a school club called TOM’s. TOM’s club is a charitable club that tries to help the children in poverty by promoting the company TOM’s promise that every pair of shoe you purchase, another pair of shoe will be given to a child who walks barefoot.

The idea of this flash mob event was to raise awareness of our club on campus. We started the club with only 7 officers. Besides having a regular meeting every week to plan for the flash mob, the main way we communicated was through Facebook. By inviting our friends to the Facebook page, our group grew fast. Every Facebook member was updated with the dancing practice time and location, and those who could make it to the practice participated actively.

This reminds me Clay Shirky’s book Here Comes Everybody, when he talks about the ice cream flash mob that was formed by using social tools. It was social tools that enabled the ice cream mob to reach out to the large population without alerting the Lukashenko government (Shirky 168). Indeed, it was also social tools that enabled TOM’s flash mob to take place. With Facebook, we reached out to as many students as possible and kept them updated with all the information without needing to text people one by one. At the end, we had about 50 participants in the flash mob and over a hundred members on Facebook. I can’t imagine how the event would turn out without Facebook.

For reference to the flash mob video, click here.

  After watching the “Generation Like” video, I realized how much our world has shifted. Society is seeking for attention from anywhere they can get it. What stood out to me was why people have such a desire to get likes. I believe people want likes for Fame. Getting thousands to millions of likes, means getting noticed by the public, businesses, and sponsors.

  According to Doug Rushoff, just like the “Hunger Games, kids are out there alone just trying to survive.” This is a metaphor for how kids are being played by the gmae-makers, competing for attention, fame and a feeling of self-worth.  Through social media, people have a way of changing the advertising and marketing industry. Teens are becoming the marketers. Tyler Oakley has paved the way to getting fame through social media. The way he connects and interacts with the web community has opened opportunities, sponsorships, and brand marketing. What I understood from the documentary, teens that are active on web and get recognized are noticed by companies who wants to work with these teens to get there ads seen and views that will be profitable to sell their products. Ads are coming at us faster than ever before, in moments through “shares” and “likes,” in the age of social media, companies have mastered the art of Facebook/Instagram/ Twitter marketing.

  The relationship between young people and companies looks to be a great partnership for everyone, Rushkoff questions this pathernship. Rushkoff explains the concept of “empowerment” as a way of getting consumers, especially young people into spending countless hours endorsing brands for free. Companies have carefully designed, timed, and calculated marketing messages, Rushkoff calls this “serendipity by design.”