Post #12: Final Post - How and Why Technology is Part of my Life

     From the moment I wake up, almost every day the first thing I do is reach for that rectangular object and turn on the screen to wake myself up. I might pull up a YouTube video or start playing a game on my phone to get myself awake. While I eat my breakfast, I watch more YouTube, and while I make my way to class, I listen to music. In a lot of the classes I attend, we either watch some slideshows or work on our laptops using Google Docs or in the case of my game design classes, work using game engines. Whenever I have free time, I'm most likely playing video games as it's my main hobby. Really, any day of my life won't just involve technology, but technology tends to instead be the main focus. Why does technology play such a large role in my life?

    I grew up at a time when the iPhone was a brand new thing so I sort of got to see how smartphones and other new technologies made their way into the lives of the many people around me. That's not to say that technology wasn't already part of most people's lives at the time, as almost everyone watched television and maybe had a laptop or standard cell phone, but smartphones changed everything. At first, smartphones just seemed like phones with big touchscreens, but they quickly became more than that. Suddenly, you could play video games on your phone, watch TV shows and movies, and access the constantly growing internet just about anywhere. Throughout my time in elementary school, I wasn't allowed to bring my phone to school, or any devices for that matter, and the amount I used technology during a school day was limited. However, the moment middle school started, everyone had a phone on them, and so I was able to start bringing mine as well, my dad also gave me a data plan allowing me to finally connect to the internet wherever I was. Middle school also necessitated a need for laptops which the school provided, but eventually, I just started bringing my own. To think that in such a short amount of time, I went from rarely using technology in school to using it daily throughout the majority of the day is kind of insane.

    When I compare how much I use technology today compared to a decade ago, I wonder why my usage has skyrocketed compared to then. Is it simply because I'm older and have both more freedom and a need to use technology or is it because technology has become so ingrained in our society? Even back in middle school, we didn't get our laptops until 7th grade, and my high school had only gotten outlets installed throughout the building a few years prior. Shopping used to be done almost entirely in person, and now it's done primarily online. Most jobs now require the use of technology, with some even getting entirely automated by technology as we saw with IN THE AGE OF AI. Times have clearly changed as we see technology everywhere we go to the point that it's almost unavoidable. To think there was a time in my life when I, and everyone else had no idea what Amazon was.

    So why is it that technology is everywhere? Why has it become a massive part of our daily lives? One of the more obvious reasons is because of just how useful technology is. The invention of television allowed people to enjoy entertainment and get useful information like local and national news or the weather forecast all from the comfort of their own homes. Then of course smartphones came into the picture allowing access to what TV offered whenever you wanted and wherever you were, in addition to internet access and video games. Why go out to the store when you can order it? Who needs to hand wash dishes when I have a dishwasher? People wouldn't use all this technology if it didn't make life so much easier and more convenient. However, most of the examples I just gave are pieces of technology that we have willingly allowed into our lives. We purchased the TV, smartphone, dishwasher, etc. but what about the technology that entered our lives by force?

    Everything has its pros and cons, and technology is no different. Take surveillance cameras for example. They're meant to keep us safe by keeping watch of our homes and businesses to help catch burglars and criminals. Plus, they can help you see if you've received a package or what your dog is doing in the backyard. Because of the many pros surveillance cameras offer, they can be found just about anywhere, from people's homes to public spaces like libraries and even parks. Now, everywhere you walk, everything you say or do can be recorded by someone. In most cases, the person who recorded the footage legally owns it and can choose who is allowed to see it. For example, if someone has confidential information recorded by their cameras, they have the right to withhold that information. Local law enforcement can record and withhold footage taken in public spaces as well and whether or not we should be able to access that footage is still being argued. Personally, I don't like the fact that I could unknowingly be recorded at any time and then not have the ability to access footage of myself.

 

  Of course, the examples of useful technology I gave earlier also have their pros and cons. TVs, smartphones, and dishwashers can be expensive to use, as they affect your electricity bill. Staring at screens all day can have harmful long-term effects on your health, and yet we still use these devices daily. For most of us, the pros outweigh the cons, at least with the technology we willingly use. I'm sure many of us don't want AI to take over our lives, but if it's useful, it's going to be used. Personally, I'm alright with AI being a part of something if it's an objective improvement. At the moment, I don't think AI has a place in entertainment, at least not as a replacement for humans. Still, if the growth of smartphones is anything to go by, I believe we're going to start seeing AI pop up in a lot more places within the next decade, especially with how much it's already grown.

    Overall, technology is and will continue to be a huge part of my life, and many other's lives for the foreseeable future. It seems as though it's been permanently integrated into our lives with its use in education and general everyday life. Technology will only continue to grow with new technologies like AI as it continues to try and improve our lives. Still, there are dangers that come with every new piece of tech, but every new invention comes with its own downsides. Hopefully, these dangers can be minimized so our lives can continue to improve. I don't dislike technology. With how often I use it it would be strange if I did. I just hope it continues to be more of a positive thing than a negative one because I really can't see how I could remove technology from my life with just how prevalent it is.

Post #11: EOTO Reaction #2

    After watching everyone's presentations, the topic that I found the most interesting was News Deserts. These are essentially areas with little to no access to credible or comprehensive news sources reporting on local issues. Communities can become News Deserts when local news sources begin to diminish often due to a lack of income. The disappearance of local news in communities leads to them becoming isolated from the outside world which turns them into News Deserts.

    Something I took away from the presentation was how important local news is for their communities as being unaware of local issues or what the local government is doing can be a dangerous thing. It's important to be aware of what is going on in your community and where your taxes are going. This information influences who you vote for and whether or not you decide to continue living where you are. News Deserts lack this information making it very dangerous for the people living there as most of them will have no clue where their money is going or who they should be voting for.

Post #10: In the Age of AI

    Throughout the documentary, I learned a lot more about AI. I mainly learned about how it works and how it's currently being used. Deep learning allows AI to learn much faster than humans can leading to AI being smarter than most humans in many cases such as when it beat the champion of the board game Go. Facial recognition allows AI to learn and detect any person's face from multiple angles which has made it nearly impossible for people to keep their identity safe. AI is also being used in self-driving cars which while they still need some work may soon replace taxis and Uber drivers and could even remove the need for a driver's license.

    After watching the video, I would say the thing that makes me the most worried about AI is the decrease in job opportunities in many industries. Sure, some industries are being affected more than others, but almost every industry is being negatively affected in some way which as time goes on will lead to fewer and fewer jobs to a point where finding a job for some people will be almost impossible. The main reason I find this so frightening is because it doesn't seem like there's a solution to this problem. AI is going to start taking away jobs, and there won't be enough new jobs to replace them. As someone majoring in Game Design, the job I'm aiming for isn't really at risk of being replaced by AI anytime soon, but future generations are going to have fewer options for careers they want to pursue thanks to AI.

    Still, despite how bad AI seems, its usefulness has cemented AI into our everyday lives, whether we like it or not. Almost all of us use Face ID to unlock our phones and even laptops and every time we so much as touch the internet, AI makes note of whatever it was we did. We rely on the services that AI is a part of so much that it's nearly impossible to avoid it at this point. Hopefully, something can be done to lessen the negative effects of AI, as the positives of AI will surely keep it a core part of our lives from here on out.

Post #9: Alternative Media

    For this EOTO project, I researched Alternative Media. Alternative Media, sometimes referred to as Underground Media, is media that isn’t under the control of a higher power such as a business operation or government agency. It involves more traditional media such as newspapers as well as newer media like websites and podcasts. Alternative Media gets its name by being an alternative to Mainstream Media due to the bias often found in Mainstream Media as well as Mainstream Media outlets often being unable or unwilling to offer the alternate opinions that are found in Alternative Media.

    Alternative Media has existed for centuries but hadn’t become a specific form of media until the 20th century due to social unrest starting to become much more common. The media first started as printed publications before growing to include radio, television broadcasts, and even low-budget movies around the 1960s. With the growing popularity of the internet, Alternative Media would start to appear online through websites. The internet led to a massive increase in Alternative Media outlets due to how easy it was for people to create their own websites and blogs, allowing more independent writers to get their opinions out into the world.

    Most of the time, Alternative Media publications and outlets start out fairly small which forces them to use more affordable methods of distribution such as blogs and newspapers. This often affects the quality of the work they're able to put out. As these publications grow their viewer base, the quality of their work improves. It also allows them to use more expensive distribution methods letting them put out more work faster, plus they can afford to use the more expensive forms of the media like short films.

    Despite the various kinds of Alternative Media, it remains much more hidden and hard to find compared to Mainstream Media. There's a reason it's called Mainstream, as often all you need to do is turn on a television or head to a news aggregator to see news from Mainstream news outlets and publications. Why is it that Alternative Media is so hard to find? Often, Alternative Media companies are much smaller in comparison to Mainstream Media, which leads to Alternative Media companies having way fewer resources to not only expand but also advertise themselves. However, one of the main reasons Alternative Media isn't mainstream is because of how specific they are. Mainstream Media is mainstream because it covers news of all kinds. Alternative Media on the other hand tends to produce content that is made for very specific groups of people. For example, some produce mostly conservative content, while others produce mostly liberal content. This forces Alternative Media outlets to remain small because they only cover a specific niche thus leading to their audience being niche. Alternative Media also doesn't really have any television presence at all. This is why there was an explosion of Alternative Media when the internet came around thanks to how easy and affordable websites were.

Post #8: Invasion of Privacy

     After watching the TED Talks, I've been further informed on how technology is used to invade people's privacy, but also how some technology protects people's privacy. Every action we make online is permanent, even if we delete it, the information is still out there, and that is a big issue.

    As I talked about in my last post about the internet, it's become a major part of our everyday lives. We use technology to not only access the internet but also to communicate with others from any distance. Most Americans carry their phones with them everywhere they go; thus, they're almost always being tracked. Anything they do or anywhere they go is turned into data which is collected by the government.

    The main problem I have with this is that we have little to no control over this data collection. I don't even think we can access this data, and even if we can, it's most likely a very difficult process to acquire. At the very least, one of the TED Talks showed me that some of my data is encrypted such as my phone calls and text messages so I can feel better about communicating with others that way. Still, so much data is collected every day, and not knowing what is or isn't being collected is horrible. The last thing I want is to someday see information about me that I thought was private to appear in a place for the public to easily see.

Post #7: The Innovation of Internet

     For this post, I want to view the internet through the lens of diffusion theory. The internet has been around for a while yet it took some time before it became a core part of most people's lives.

 
  The first early adopters of the internet would be those who purchased home computers starting in the 1970s. These early home computers couldn't do a whole lot, but the consumers who bought them wanted them so they could be part of the "Information Revolution" or the future of technology.

    What caused the internet's first spike in popularity was a combination of new discoveries. The growing popularity of email and the invention of DNS (converts hard-to-remember IP addresses into simple names) were some of the main causes of the internet's first spike in growth. This all caused the network to grow from 2,000 hosts to 30,000 from 1986 to 87.

    The main reason the internet hadn't exploded in popularity yet was because of the barrier to entry. Advanced knowledge of computing was necessary to dial into the internet at the time, so access to the internet needed to become easier to allow those with very little computing knowledge to use it. This was solved with the introduction of the World Wide Web in 1989. It was invented by a man named Tim Berners-Lee who had proposed the idea to his employer to structure and link all the information on it's computer network to make it much easier to access.

    In 1993, the Mosaic browser launched allowing those outside of academics to use the internet. This led to people discovering how to easily create HTML web pages, leading to the number of websites on the internet to grow from 130 to over 100,000 over the course of just 3 years. By 1995, the internet had now reached millions of users, with the most popular browser at the time Netscape Navigator having over 10 million users alone.

    The internet would continue to grow from this point onward, yet there were still many who weren't using it. This would all change with the introduction of the iPhone and other smartphones in the late 2000s allowing people to access the internet from just about anywhere.

    Nowadays, almost everyone uses the internet to some extent, and many of us use it on a daily basis. It's become basically essential to our daily lives and it's difficult to see what things would be like without it. However, there are still parts of the world that don't have easy access to the internet like we do. Many developing countries live without the internet opting for other forms of communication instead. The internet continues to grow to this day and there are no signs of it slowing down. Will the internet eventually reach all parts of the world, or will there always be somewhere that simply refuses to use it?

Source

Post #6: Anti War Voices

     For this post, I read an article from The American Conservative related to the war in Ukraine. (Article) This article talks about how our country can no longer afford to send money to Ukraine and yet we still get and fulfill the requests for financial aid. The article states that the Senate leadership of both parties are "holding the government hostage" to "force out hand". The article then goes into the risks of America getting involved in the war and how the longer this goes on for, the more chances there are for things to escalate.

    Up to this point, the news I've heard about the war in Ukraine has been nothing like what I read in this article. While I may not know why exactly I don't get to see this perspective at all, despite it seeming like most Americans agree with what was stated in the article, I can certainly tell that something or someone is preventing me and many others from seeing this perspective. I would think that it would have to be someone in a position of power who would have the ability to influence what websites can appear to people using the internet. News aggregators use algorithms to display news that are tailored to each user's interests, and yet despite many Americans being on the same side as the people who write these articles, the algorithms don't show people these articles. Perhaps someone blacklisted these anti-war websites from the algorithms on purpose to prevent people from hearing these voices, but of course, it's difficult to know for sure.