In “Here Comes Everybody” Shirky talks about groups and grouping so much. He says that the tools on the Internet have made it very easy for users to group together. I tried long and hard thinking about something I could use as an example for grouping. Something from my life that I use everyday, there was no way it could be hard to think of something. And then it hit me. It was sitting there in front of my face this whole time, usually on my computer screen. It was so obvious.
Reddit.com
A quick disclaimer here, if you have never been to Reddit or know nothing about it you may want to just avoid going there. It’s not that it’s a bad site but you will lose a good chunk of your time and life to this website. It’s addicting. It will suck you in. There is no way to fight it. Get out while you still can.
Ah, with that warning out of the way I can get on with what I was trying to say. Reddit creates grouping by allowing users to subscribe to different “sub-reddits” which each have their own specific content. These sub-reddits can range from any topic you can possibly imagine. There is one devoted to pictures, one devoted to funny things, there are ones for each religion and those not religious, there is one for each political party, one for movies, music, sports, books, seriously if you can think of a topic it probably has a sub-reddit.
Since each person can subscribe to different sub-reddits, it creates a unique experience for every different user on Reddit. And more importantly each sub-reddit becomes its own little community.
While these groups may not solve any of the worlds problems or really solve any problems beyond helping each other with boredom. Some sub-reddits are helpful for things such as fixing things around the house, or learning guitar or relationship advice but nothing real major. But that’s not the goals of these groups. These groups are solely designed for the point to get like-minded people and those who share the same interests to the same place on the Internet where they can share ideas and thoughts. And making a sub-reddit and joining it is as simple as a button click.
While nothing really mind-blowing it is a solid example of what Shirky was talking about. The ease of tools can allow people to group together with relative ease and in this case the grouping happens at a website where each topic has its own community, resulting in a website where you can combine multiple interests into one website. The Internet truly has made it easier to connect with like-minded people.
Now if you will excuse me I’m going to go on Reddit.
Thursday, April 5, 2012
Who are you really?
In class we talked about how creating your identity is different online when in adolescence as compared to adulthood. I wanted to expand on what I wrote for the in class writing and so I can up my blog count for the project.
I believe that the Internet is greatly affecting how we create our identities in our adolescence. I’m going to sound really old here but when I was a kid we didn’t really have the Internet so you spent a lot more time outside with people, playing baseball, hanging out with kids around the neighborhood etc. Basically you had to go outside and interact with people to create friends. By that I’m trying to say that you basically created your identity by whom you hung out with and what you did and there was no real way to fake that identity. With technology now, kids, or really anyone for that matter, can create their own identity online that is completely different from whom they really are. You see multiple people that create their own “online identity.”
I’m not sure if we will watch the film in this class but the film “Catfish” deals with this online identity issue. In the film one of the filmmakers falls in love with a young girl who lives half way across the country. She can sing, is attractive, shares the same interests, seemingly the perfect girl. As the days go on their relationship gets more and more serious and soon the three friends making this film take off to go meet her in person. What they discover is that this young girl he has been talking to really is a middle-aged mom who had just created an online persona. When confronted she basically breaks down in tears saying she couldn’t stop living that second life.
What I’m trying to get at with that little bit about the movie is that I thought that technology only really affected the way younger people create their identities, but it affects adults just as much.
The tools on the Internet just make it too easy for people to change you they really are. Or maybe it allows them to be their true selves. Since nobody knows who you truly are online you can do or say anything. Some people use the Internet to try things they are too afraid to try in real life. Others discover things they find out they truly love by finding it on the Internet. So this whole muddying of your identity that they Internet can cause can be used for good.
So overall I find that the Internet creates issues for people trying to figure out their identities no matter what age. For kids it creates problems in creating their identities. With adults, it creates problems in that it challenges what people thought their identities were. Sometimes this can be for the better as people find things they really love and sometimes it can be for the worse as people create second lives on the Internet. Either way it’s making it a hell of a lot more confusing to really find out who somebody is.
I believe that the Internet is greatly affecting how we create our identities in our adolescence. I’m going to sound really old here but when I was a kid we didn’t really have the Internet so you spent a lot more time outside with people, playing baseball, hanging out with kids around the neighborhood etc. Basically you had to go outside and interact with people to create friends. By that I’m trying to say that you basically created your identity by whom you hung out with and what you did and there was no real way to fake that identity. With technology now, kids, or really anyone for that matter, can create their own identity online that is completely different from whom they really are. You see multiple people that create their own “online identity.”
I’m not sure if we will watch the film in this class but the film “Catfish” deals with this online identity issue. In the film one of the filmmakers falls in love with a young girl who lives half way across the country. She can sing, is attractive, shares the same interests, seemingly the perfect girl. As the days go on their relationship gets more and more serious and soon the three friends making this film take off to go meet her in person. What they discover is that this young girl he has been talking to really is a middle-aged mom who had just created an online persona. When confronted she basically breaks down in tears saying she couldn’t stop living that second life.
What I’m trying to get at with that little bit about the movie is that I thought that technology only really affected the way younger people create their identities, but it affects adults just as much.
The tools on the Internet just make it too easy for people to change you they really are. Or maybe it allows them to be their true selves. Since nobody knows who you truly are online you can do or say anything. Some people use the Internet to try things they are too afraid to try in real life. Others discover things they find out they truly love by finding it on the Internet. So this whole muddying of your identity that they Internet can cause can be used for good.
So overall I find that the Internet creates issues for people trying to figure out their identities no matter what age. For kids it creates problems in creating their identities. With adults, it creates problems in that it challenges what people thought their identities were. Sometimes this can be for the better as people find things they really love and sometimes it can be for the worse as people create second lives on the Internet. Either way it’s making it a hell of a lot more confusing to really find out who somebody is.
Watch what you say because people are listening
In this class we talked about the power of social media in politics and the power of social media in general. We talked about what you say on Twitter and Facebook can be used against you in job interviews and in the professional world. This post is going to be along those lines.
I’m a big fan of college sports, especially college football. I find every aspect of the sport intriguing including recruiting. This blog post is going to be a story of how a top ranked recruit lost his scholarship because of his Twitter feed.
Yuri Right was a top rated recruit from New Jersey. He was being recruited by Michigan and had a scholarship about all locked up to play football there.
That is until they read his Twitter feed.
I won’t actually repeat what he said because although this is just a class project it is still on the Internet and will be linked to my name and I like to think I understand my digital footprint enough to not have that linked to my name. I have seen the Tweets though and most of them contain very strong profanity, racial slurs, degrading words towards women and overall, things that you wouldn’t want associated with a job/company or in this case a university.
Wright lost his potential scholarship to Michigan and instead got one at the University of Colorado because college football is corrupt and the only thing that matters is winning (but that’s a post for another time and another blog). He was also expelled from his high school over this incident. The issue here is that this young man was not really educated on how what he says on Twitter is available to everyone.
He, at the time, had almost 1,600 followers and chose to make his tweets public for all to see. That’s his first mistake. His second mistake was writing tweets that were much better saved for the locker room or his buddy’s basement. It seems that younger kids don’t fully understand the power of what they put on the Internet.
Here is an article posted by Sports Illustrated that details certain high school athletes and how they are using Twitter and how it could come back to haunt them. It also talks about something one college is doing that is very interesting.
The University of Arizona has a social media like training for its new recruits coming into campus life. The course teaches them basically what to say on Twitter and what not to say. It details the impacts of what these kids say because as high profile recruits at a Division 1 football school they will have lots of people following them from all types of ages and professions.
The bottom line to follow is if you wouldn’t say it in front of your mom don’t put it on Twitter.
This is a step that I believe high schools should take with all students, and not just student athletes. As kids are getting on the Internet earlier and earlier it becomes adults responsibility to instruct them on the importance of keeping their digital footprint in line and in this particular case, keep their dirty mouths off social media.
I believe the best course of action would be to teach kids the proper and safe use of social media at an early age, possibly as early as middle school so kids can understand the impact and the consequences of posting things on the Internet. That way kids won’t put themselves in danger of harming their future job offers or lose a full ride scholarship to a major college football program.
I’m a big fan of college sports, especially college football. I find every aspect of the sport intriguing including recruiting. This blog post is going to be a story of how a top ranked recruit lost his scholarship because of his Twitter feed.
Yuri Right was a top rated recruit from New Jersey. He was being recruited by Michigan and had a scholarship about all locked up to play football there.
That is until they read his Twitter feed.
I won’t actually repeat what he said because although this is just a class project it is still on the Internet and will be linked to my name and I like to think I understand my digital footprint enough to not have that linked to my name. I have seen the Tweets though and most of them contain very strong profanity, racial slurs, degrading words towards women and overall, things that you wouldn’t want associated with a job/company or in this case a university.
Wright lost his potential scholarship to Michigan and instead got one at the University of Colorado because college football is corrupt and the only thing that matters is winning (but that’s a post for another time and another blog). He was also expelled from his high school over this incident. The issue here is that this young man was not really educated on how what he says on Twitter is available to everyone.
He, at the time, had almost 1,600 followers and chose to make his tweets public for all to see. That’s his first mistake. His second mistake was writing tweets that were much better saved for the locker room or his buddy’s basement. It seems that younger kids don’t fully understand the power of what they put on the Internet.
Here is an article posted by Sports Illustrated that details certain high school athletes and how they are using Twitter and how it could come back to haunt them. It also talks about something one college is doing that is very interesting.
The University of Arizona has a social media like training for its new recruits coming into campus life. The course teaches them basically what to say on Twitter and what not to say. It details the impacts of what these kids say because as high profile recruits at a Division 1 football school they will have lots of people following them from all types of ages and professions.
The bottom line to follow is if you wouldn’t say it in front of your mom don’t put it on Twitter.
This is a step that I believe high schools should take with all students, and not just student athletes. As kids are getting on the Internet earlier and earlier it becomes adults responsibility to instruct them on the importance of keeping their digital footprint in line and in this particular case, keep their dirty mouths off social media.
I believe the best course of action would be to teach kids the proper and safe use of social media at an early age, possibly as early as middle school so kids can understand the impact and the consequences of posting things on the Internet. That way kids won’t put themselves in danger of harming their future job offers or lose a full ride scholarship to a major college football program.
Click Share and Become and Activist!
Going off that last post discussing getting people to become active in a protest by making it simple in on the Internet, this next post will discuss something very similar but with a little different result.
It was something that if you visited any sort of social media site, even those that loosely define themselves as such, you couldn’t avoid seeing or hearing it about it. I’m talking about the Kony 2012 video that was set up by the organization Invisible Children. The video was released on March 5th, 2012 and was a video detailing Invisible Children’s “Stop Kony” campaign, which was an effort to have Ugandan war criminal Joseph Kony arrested for his crimes. The video’s goal was to make people aware of this situation and to push people to call for his arrest.
The video exploded and became viral almost immediately. You couldn’t log onto Facebook without seeing that ten of your friends had posted the video on their walls or were talking about it. Invisible Children’s goal of getting this info out clearly worked and they did it in such a simple way. All you had to do was watch the video and then click share and boom; there it was for all your Facebook friends to see.
But this wasn’t as black and white as it seemed. As days went on issues began arising over the video. While what Kony did was bad, some people believed that Invisible Children distorted facts to make the situation look worse than it really was. Some people began informing others that Kony and his supporter’s left Uganda six years prior to this video. So the video wasn’t as straightforward and truthful as people thought. It wasn’t straight good versus bad.
But it didn’t matter that the facts weren’t all straight. It mattered that people got the info they needed and more importantly, they shared that information. Also by watching that video and sharing it, you felt as if you were truly doing something good. You were fighting the forces of evil and putting a stop to a criminal warlord all from the comfort of your home. The video also linked you to merchandise you could buy, which funded the “Stop Kony”, campaign, or so people thought. But the fact of the matter is that they created an easy way for people to feel involved when really sharing that video didn’t do anything in the long run other than spread information that wasn’t entirely truthful.
The fact that so many people fell, or bought into this video, kind of shows just how little we know with what’s happening around the world. The fact that Kony hadn’t really been prominent in six years takes away some of the impact of the video. The rally of support behind the video was good but, to me at least, it seemed more like a money making scheme than a legit attempt to get a war criminal arrested. I also hated how multiple people on my Facebook feed quickly became social activists after sharing the Kony video. It’s amazing how many social activists come out of the woodwork in an attempt to look smart on a social media site, when they seriously knew nothing of an issue that has been happening for quite some time before seeing this movie that took millions of dollars to make. It was just annoying and another example of people creating this identity for them online that isn’t any way related to their real identity.
But in terms of getting everybody’s attention and creating a lot of media buzz, Invisible Children struck gold with this one.
Just please in the future people remember, clicking “Share to Facebook” does not make you an activist.
It was something that if you visited any sort of social media site, even those that loosely define themselves as such, you couldn’t avoid seeing or hearing it about it. I’m talking about the Kony 2012 video that was set up by the organization Invisible Children. The video was released on March 5th, 2012 and was a video detailing Invisible Children’s “Stop Kony” campaign, which was an effort to have Ugandan war criminal Joseph Kony arrested for his crimes. The video’s goal was to make people aware of this situation and to push people to call for his arrest.
The video exploded and became viral almost immediately. You couldn’t log onto Facebook without seeing that ten of your friends had posted the video on their walls or were talking about it. Invisible Children’s goal of getting this info out clearly worked and they did it in such a simple way. All you had to do was watch the video and then click share and boom; there it was for all your Facebook friends to see.
But this wasn’t as black and white as it seemed. As days went on issues began arising over the video. While what Kony did was bad, some people believed that Invisible Children distorted facts to make the situation look worse than it really was. Some people began informing others that Kony and his supporter’s left Uganda six years prior to this video. So the video wasn’t as straightforward and truthful as people thought. It wasn’t straight good versus bad.
But it didn’t matter that the facts weren’t all straight. It mattered that people got the info they needed and more importantly, they shared that information. Also by watching that video and sharing it, you felt as if you were truly doing something good. You were fighting the forces of evil and putting a stop to a criminal warlord all from the comfort of your home. The video also linked you to merchandise you could buy, which funded the “Stop Kony”, campaign, or so people thought. But the fact of the matter is that they created an easy way for people to feel involved when really sharing that video didn’t do anything in the long run other than spread information that wasn’t entirely truthful.
The fact that so many people fell, or bought into this video, kind of shows just how little we know with what’s happening around the world. The fact that Kony hadn’t really been prominent in six years takes away some of the impact of the video. The rally of support behind the video was good but, to me at least, it seemed more like a money making scheme than a legit attempt to get a war criminal arrested. I also hated how multiple people on my Facebook feed quickly became social activists after sharing the Kony video. It’s amazing how many social activists come out of the woodwork in an attempt to look smart on a social media site, when they seriously knew nothing of an issue that has been happening for quite some time before seeing this movie that took millions of dollars to make. It was just annoying and another example of people creating this identity for them online that isn’t any way related to their real identity.
But in terms of getting everybody’s attention and creating a lot of media buzz, Invisible Children struck gold with this one.
Just please in the future people remember, clicking “Share to Facebook” does not make you an activist.
Sunday, April 1, 2012
Saving the Internet one phone call at a time
People in America don’t like it when their freedoms are taken away or threatened. So when word came down that congress was trying to pass a bill called the Stop Online Privacy Act (SOPA) people didn’t take too kindly to it. The purpose of SOPA is to expand the ability for United States law enforcement to fight online trafficking in copyrighted intellectual property and counterfeit goods. What people were worried about was the extent of this coverage. Some people were worried that if you did something so simple as use a picture on your website that was taken by somebody else without properly sourcing it, that action could lead to you getting arrested for stolen intellectual property. Regardless, it was going to change how the Internet works and people didn’t like that.
So people began creating movements to protest this bill. At first it was as simple as sharing a video that was explaining what the bill was all about. As that video became viral more and more people began to take notice and the number of people against the bill began to rise.
Word quickly spread of a “blackout” day that some websites were going to do. Wikipedia spearheaded the move and it was reported that 7,000 other websites participated in a blackout that day. Each website that participated described how SOPA would change the landscape of the Internet and it gave people ways on how to make their voice known in protest and that was really simple. Call or email your state representative and let them know your disapproval of this bill.
To link this back to “Here Comes Everybody,” Shirky says the tools need to be simple to get people to join in. Everybody knows how to use a phone or email program and these websites gave you an easy way to find your contact information of your state representative. The amount of support for opposing the bill was overwhelming and the bill was announced as postponed.
This is just another example of if you can get people to rally behind something and make it easy for them to do so then they will. Nothing is easier than calling or emailing someone when their information is given to you. It was a great idea of a protest and the blackouts really got to people. It just shows you yet again, if people are interested (or in this case against) something and you make it easier for them to contribute, people will flock to that something and do their part. In this case, that was used for a good purpose.
So people began creating movements to protest this bill. At first it was as simple as sharing a video that was explaining what the bill was all about. As that video became viral more and more people began to take notice and the number of people against the bill began to rise.
Word quickly spread of a “blackout” day that some websites were going to do. Wikipedia spearheaded the move and it was reported that 7,000 other websites participated in a blackout that day. Each website that participated described how SOPA would change the landscape of the Internet and it gave people ways on how to make their voice known in protest and that was really simple. Call or email your state representative and let them know your disapproval of this bill.
To link this back to “Here Comes Everybody,” Shirky says the tools need to be simple to get people to join in. Everybody knows how to use a phone or email program and these websites gave you an easy way to find your contact information of your state representative. The amount of support for opposing the bill was overwhelming and the bill was announced as postponed.
This is just another example of if you can get people to rally behind something and make it easy for them to do so then they will. Nothing is easier than calling or emailing someone when their information is given to you. It was a great idea of a protest and the blackouts really got to people. It just shows you yet again, if people are interested (or in this case against) something and you make it easier for them to contribute, people will flock to that something and do their part. In this case, that was used for a good purpose.
Let's all get together and make a website that will change the Internet
One idea that is discussed in “Here Comes Everybody” that I really like is the idea of collective action. This idea is that people share things and as people share things that can lead to cooperation. You can have people come together and work on a common problem just by sharing what they know or what they are passionate about. An example is the first blog post discussing the missing phone but the perfect example of collective action has to be Wikipedia.
The simple idea behind Wikipedia is that anybody can go in and create a page for a topic or edit an existing page. You basically get a chance to show what you know to millions of people that will visit that Wikipedia page. Submitting something to Wikipedia and seeing it every time you visit a page makes you feel like you have accomplished something. And that is the basic idea behind collective action. It’s people coming together and sharing what they know which turns into a good finished project. There is no way one person or even a team of people could create anything like Wikipedia. You need the help of everybody coming together and simply just telling what they know and provide something that backs that up.
Another thing with collective action is that it doesn’t ask too much from the people that are helping cooperate. You really only have to do one small thing and then you are done. With Wikipedia you just have to go to find something that you know and put it into the article for that topic. It’s simple to do and you feel good because you are helping to an overall completion of a project.
There are some issues with collective action but Wikipedia seems to bypass most of them. One of the issues is people who are just freeloading. It always happens when you have to do a group project, there is always one person who refuses to do any work or will do the least amount of work and stick their name on the project. With Wikipedia the people who are freeloading are people who don’t edit any pages or help with the upkeep of the website. But the number of people who do edit the pages and try to improve the website is so high that it doesn’t really matter that people like me go on Wikipedia almost everyday and never edit anything or add anything to a page.
Another issue facing collective action is that some individuals will purposely harm a collective action effort. This is probably Wikipedia’s biggest fear when it comes to harming the collective action they have going. Since anybody can go on a page and write whatever they want it can lead to people reading wrong or misleading information. Wikipedia has gotten good at catching these errors and you also have the users policing the pages, but you still run the risk of reading false or wrong information, especially when you look up some of the more obscure topics. This has potential harm to people like me who use Wikipedia when doing school reports and such. But every collective action is subject to these issues and Wikipedia seems to handle them very well.
Wikipedia is THE perfect example of a collective action. Just a bunch of users coming to a common cause to make Wikipedia one of the best and most useful websites on the Internet, there really is no better example that has such a large impact on something as large as the Internet. Have I mentioned I love Wikipedia?
The simple idea behind Wikipedia is that anybody can go in and create a page for a topic or edit an existing page. You basically get a chance to show what you know to millions of people that will visit that Wikipedia page. Submitting something to Wikipedia and seeing it every time you visit a page makes you feel like you have accomplished something. And that is the basic idea behind collective action. It’s people coming together and sharing what they know which turns into a good finished project. There is no way one person or even a team of people could create anything like Wikipedia. You need the help of everybody coming together and simply just telling what they know and provide something that backs that up.
Another thing with collective action is that it doesn’t ask too much from the people that are helping cooperate. You really only have to do one small thing and then you are done. With Wikipedia you just have to go to find something that you know and put it into the article for that topic. It’s simple to do and you feel good because you are helping to an overall completion of a project.
There are some issues with collective action but Wikipedia seems to bypass most of them. One of the issues is people who are just freeloading. It always happens when you have to do a group project, there is always one person who refuses to do any work or will do the least amount of work and stick their name on the project. With Wikipedia the people who are freeloading are people who don’t edit any pages or help with the upkeep of the website. But the number of people who do edit the pages and try to improve the website is so high that it doesn’t really matter that people like me go on Wikipedia almost everyday and never edit anything or add anything to a page.
Another issue facing collective action is that some individuals will purposely harm a collective action effort. This is probably Wikipedia’s biggest fear when it comes to harming the collective action they have going. Since anybody can go on a page and write whatever they want it can lead to people reading wrong or misleading information. Wikipedia has gotten good at catching these errors and you also have the users policing the pages, but you still run the risk of reading false or wrong information, especially when you look up some of the more obscure topics. This has potential harm to people like me who use Wikipedia when doing school reports and such. But every collective action is subject to these issues and Wikipedia seems to handle them very well.
Wikipedia is THE perfect example of a collective action. Just a bunch of users coming to a common cause to make Wikipedia one of the best and most useful websites on the Internet, there really is no better example that has such a large impact on something as large as the Internet. Have I mentioned I love Wikipedia?
Friday, March 30, 2012
Digital Nation thoughts
This post is also one that will shy away from “Here Comes Everybody” but is still a post that relates to class. I’ve also decided that while there will still be more posts related to “Here Comes Everybody” I will write posts about other things related to class so I can keep this project fresh to read but also to write. I am assuming that as long as I keep the posts related to class they will still be within the confines of the project grading criteria…….right?
Today in class (3/30/12) we Digital Nation for what seemed like the 100th time, although it was a part we haven’t seen before. The part we watched today dealt with Internet addiction, especially seen in South Korea and how the South Korean government is trying to handle this Internet addiction. Being included in the gaming community I have read stories of people in these Internet cafes that have died from long gaming sessions. People will literally sit and play and do nothing else. I remember reading one report of a man who died playing the computer game Starcraft for over 30 straight hours. He never left his seat, not to eat or use the bathroom. Disgusting, I know. But the thing is, is that South Korea is taking a good step forward by recognizing that there is such a thing as Internet and gaming addictions. This is something that America should consider so we don’t have to hear stories about people letting their children drown in the tub because they are too busy playing games on Facebook.
But the thing that really stood out to me in the part we watched today was when they went to a school and they were teaching really young kids etiquette on the Internet. The most amazing aspect was that they teach these kids “netiquette” at a very early age, basically the same age they teach these kids how to read. At first I was surprised that they held using the Internet as the same level of importance as reading but in a country that deals with a strong addiction it makes perfect sense and is something that should spread across the world. By teaching these kids how to properly use the Internet and how to use it in moderation they will grow up and hopefully be able to control themselves and not fall victim to over usage. With kids be taught at such a young age they can also be taught to use the Internet as an information tool first and an entertainment tool second. That is something that I think will pay off a couple generations from now for them as they raise these kids as using the Internet to help with school projects and to find information instead of just using it as a distraction. Of course this will also fall on parents to make sure they practice this train of thought at home.
I really believe that by teaching these kids the proper use of a computer and the Internet at such a young age will pay off in the long run and is a model I would like to see parents/schools take up here in the states. Too often it seems that parents use the Internet as a way to distract their kids and don’t teach them how to use it properly which leads to kids giving away personal information and downloading things that give the computer viruses and things like that. I like to think that when I have kids I will teach them how to use the Internet properly and teach them to use self-control when it comes to computer usage. I will probably wait until they have learned how to read first and I probably won’t teach them to sing a song like those South Korean kids in Digital Nation. Ok maybe I will teach them that song.
Today in class (3/30/12) we Digital Nation for what seemed like the 100th time, although it was a part we haven’t seen before. The part we watched today dealt with Internet addiction, especially seen in South Korea and how the South Korean government is trying to handle this Internet addiction. Being included in the gaming community I have read stories of people in these Internet cafes that have died from long gaming sessions. People will literally sit and play and do nothing else. I remember reading one report of a man who died playing the computer game Starcraft for over 30 straight hours. He never left his seat, not to eat or use the bathroom. Disgusting, I know. But the thing is, is that South Korea is taking a good step forward by recognizing that there is such a thing as Internet and gaming addictions. This is something that America should consider so we don’t have to hear stories about people letting their children drown in the tub because they are too busy playing games on Facebook.
But the thing that really stood out to me in the part we watched today was when they went to a school and they were teaching really young kids etiquette on the Internet. The most amazing aspect was that they teach these kids “netiquette” at a very early age, basically the same age they teach these kids how to read. At first I was surprised that they held using the Internet as the same level of importance as reading but in a country that deals with a strong addiction it makes perfect sense and is something that should spread across the world. By teaching these kids how to properly use the Internet and how to use it in moderation they will grow up and hopefully be able to control themselves and not fall victim to over usage. With kids be taught at such a young age they can also be taught to use the Internet as an information tool first and an entertainment tool second. That is something that I think will pay off a couple generations from now for them as they raise these kids as using the Internet to help with school projects and to find information instead of just using it as a distraction. Of course this will also fall on parents to make sure they practice this train of thought at home.
I really believe that by teaching these kids the proper use of a computer and the Internet at such a young age will pay off in the long run and is a model I would like to see parents/schools take up here in the states. Too often it seems that parents use the Internet as a way to distract their kids and don’t teach them how to use it properly which leads to kids giving away personal information and downloading things that give the computer viruses and things like that. I like to think that when I have kids I will teach them how to use the Internet properly and teach them to use self-control when it comes to computer usage. I will probably wait until they have learned how to read first and I probably won’t teach them to sing a song like those South Korean kids in Digital Nation. Ok maybe I will teach them that song.
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