QotW9: STOMP- news from You, by You, for You.

As technology becomes more advanced, we can update news almost anywhere at anytime. Using just digital camera or camera from mobile phone, one can be journalist reporting news that would not be covered by local newspaper or television. News that are reported from the citizens give us different perspective of events that happening around us everyday. Blog is one of the places which provide this opportunity to people like to become a journalist of my own. As Dan Gilmore mentioned “To understand the evolution of tomorrow’s news, we need to understand the technologies that are making it possible. The tools of tomorrow’s participatory journalism are evolving quickly.”

Citizen Journalism

According to wikipedia (2007), citizen journalism also known as "participatory journalism," is the act of citizens "playing an active role in the process of collecting, reporting, analyzing and disseminating news and information". Citi zen journalism is the news from citizen, by citizen and for citizen. So to get new from different point of view and the one that you cannot find in news paper, internet is the best source.

With internet and blog to make news available easily, we are no longer live in dark age where we have to gulp everything that have been written in newspaper.

STOMP

STOMP (Straits Times Online Mobile Print) is one the citizens journalism that availble in cyberspace. STOMP integrates content and activities in the three platforms of print, online and mobile. It delivers content which is interactive and which will help develop new communities of Singaporeans bonded together by shared interests. The Straits Times Editor Han Fook Kwang explained, "In the new media environment, newspapers have to be more than just passive providers of news. They have to engage their readers in areas which appeal to them. We have to provide readers with new avenues to express themselves, to enable them to interact with us, and among themselves." (STOMP, 2006)

This site is very interesting and interactive. As I browsing through it, I noticed they provide a section where you can ask anything about a correct-spoken-English (you cannot find this in local newspaper) called English As It Is Broken.

Another thing is they also provide a section where you watch videos that being recorded in some events. This Stomp-cast section is very useful when you got no time to watch television and you can update the news from here.

What Can Be Done?

When I go through some of the news that being published, I noticed that the news is more like entertainment section in newspaper. As you can see in Singapore Seen section, they do cover news that you cannot find in newspaper with the readers point of view.

But what is lack here is the Journalistic kind of news and writing. I feel like I am reading an online magazine. Beside that, like Jiayi mentioned in her blog, STOMP can add a section about politic where readers can give out their thought, idea and opinion Singapore government. With this section hopefully Singapore can develop a truly democracy government where people are allowed to speak out loud their thought, not hiding it.

References:

"Citizen Journalism" (March 28, 2006) From Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, Retrieved March 28, 2007, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizen_journalism

Gillmor, D. “We the Media: Grassroots Journalism by the People, for the People” (July, 2004). Retrieved March 28, 2007 from http://download.nowis.com/index.cfm?phile=WeTheMedia.html&tip

STOMP (2006) From Singapore Press HoldingsRetrieved March 28, 2007 fromhttp://www.stomp.com.sg/

QotW7: IMVU-what a great way to escape

Yes, I would like to consider twitter as online communities. Most of the COM 125 A/B members are joining twitter and we share everything there. It’s like we are having class discussion in cyber space.

Online communities are become more and more popular. We can be anything we want, do anything we want to and meet anybody that we do not even know. Rheingold would define virtual communities as “social aggregations that emerge from the [internet] when enough people carry on those public discussions long enough, with sufficient human feeling, to form webs of personal relationship in cyberspace”. I will describe virtual/ online communities as a place in [internet] where people with the same interest gather and share information and has a possibility to form a more personal relationship wit one another. (Fernback & Thompson, 1995)

Online communities such as twitter, skype or imvu have become some of the most popular site to form a community. So, what is online community actually is? According to Fernback & Thompson (1995), communication is the structural process that associated with community.

Well, in twitter or other online communities, people tend to share things that they won’t share in real life. They can have different personality but in the same body. So, what make people want to do so? Why they are not doing so in real life? Well, it’s to escape the problems and the issues of the real world. (Barlow, et al. 1995, p 43).

I do agree about it. I, myself, am engaging in so-called ‘second life’ at IMVU. IMVU is a graphical instant messaging client (3D chat) currently in beta stage with more than 3 million users. [1] It is developed by IMVU, Inc., by Will Harvey, a video game developer and founder of There, a similar 3D virtual world (IMVU, 2007).

In IMVU, you can choose your own avatar. They give you a choice of what kind of skin color you want, the shape of your hair, your eye and every other thing. Before you start the game, you will be given a tutorial of how using you avatar. Like you can see it’s a one minute tutorial where they teach you how to change your mood (you can even have a flirty mood!!), expression (imagine that your avatar are doing a puke expression :P) or even moves (like breakdance).







After the tutorial you can have a chance to chat with your friend or totally a stranger. You can have a chance to meet someone new just by clicking the ‘chat now’ button. As you can see below, I am meeting a total stranger and we are chatting in the room like starbucks.

As for me, I prefer to chat in IMVU rather than twitter. In IMVU, you can meet new friend from other part of the world (above is from Florida, but he is from Puerto Rican: so cool!!). I even learn other language too. Besides that, I have a body that represents me in the cyberspace. It likes you having a real chat. I am more and more addicted to it as I can be whatever I like; say anything I want without having a pressure from anybody in my real life to be someone that society wants you to be.

Conclusion
Second life gives you a chance to taste a different you!

References

Barlow, John Perry, Sven Birkets, Kevin Kelly and Mark Slouka. 1995. "What are we Doing On-Line." Harper's, August, pp. 35-46.

Fernback, J. & Thompson, B. (1995). Virtual Communities: Abort, Retry or Failure? Retrieved on March 15, 2007 from http://www.rheingold.com/texts/techpolitix/VCcivil.html

IMVU. (2007). In Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved on March 15, 2007 from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IMVU

QotW6: No Tresspassing Please!!

In today’s era, cyberspace has become one of the most favorable place to expand your network. Websites like My Space (myspace.com) or friendster (friendster.com) provide internet users a medium to “socialize”. Users may unconsciously reveal some information that they will not reveal in Face-to-Face (FtF).

According to Rosen (2004), “…the easiest way to attract the attention and winning the trust of the strangers is to establish an emotional connection with them by projecting a consistent, memorable, and trustworthy image.” Is it worth? What I meant here, some people may reveal whatever information needed to gain the acknowledgement from strangers to become their friend. Take this privacy policy from my space (myspace.com):

MySpace.com collects user submitted information such as name, email address, and age to authenticate users and to send notifications to those users relating to the MySpace.com service. MySpace.com also collects other profile data including but not limited to: personal interests, gender, age, education and occupation in order to assist users in finding and communicating with each other.

MySpace.com also logs non-personally-identifiable information including IP address, profile information, aggregate user data, and browser type, from users and visitors to the site This data is used to manage the website, track usage and improve the website services. This non-personally-identifiable information may be shared with third-parties to provide more relevant services and advertisements to members. User IP addresses are recorded for security and monitoring purposes

We may reveal such information due to our need to find a friend. Some people may reveal even more than that. Do we really need to reveal such information meanwhile we do not know who read it and that they gonna do about it. But it’s like health: When you have it, you don’t notice it. Only when it’s gone do you wish you’d done more to protect it (Sullivan, 2006).

One’s may feel certain emotional attachment by reading your personal information that has been published in the internet. But, can you really trust that stranger. Sure, you can read his/ her personal information in return. But can you guarantee that it is authentic. Is the stranger being sincere about himself?

Privacy in cyberspace is one of the most difficult things to be taken care of. Just click your name is search engine and voila there appear your name. What you may think the safest may be the dangerous think for you.

Yes, you want the freedom of speech, but we all must know the limitation of our information that can be revealed. Too much information revealed will be to dangerous, too little information is not enough.

My opinion about today’s networking is the boundary between privacy and public information start to fade out. What we all known as personal information in the past has become information that easy to get. Blog for example, has become the most popular medium to self revealing. As you can read in the internet, what you wouldn’t know through FtF communication can be found easily. Some people use blog to seek emotional support. When you feel down, you write. When you are happy, you write. People who keep in track with your blog may know and feel certain bond even you haven’t met them. This thing really sounds creepy for me, that is why I do not like to set up a blog. I prefer to write in book and face a small chance of being exposed rather than receiving a lot of comment for what I felt.

Like one of my friend, Susan (not her real name), she like to write her daily activity, what she felt, and load some picture in her blog. Well, she must not realize that how much information she has released without knowing there might be somebody using her information for something bad.

My picture, from my blog, has been used as a class’s web link without my knowledge by my teacher. I do not mind though, but I would prefer to be informed first. What I want to say at here is even a picture that you put for fun, can be used for something else without you knowing it.

ps: no offense for the last paragraph, just want to use it as example. peace! :D

Refernces:
Privacy Policy. (n.d.). Retrieved on 9th March 2007, from http://www.myspace.com/Modules/Common/Pages/Privacy.aspx

Rosen, J. (2004). "The Naked Crowd". Retrieved on 9th March, 2007 from http://www.spiked-online.com/Printable/0000000CA5FF.htm

Sullivan, B. (2006) “Privacy lost: does anybody care? MSNBC Interactive. Retrieved on 9th March 2007, from http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15221095/print/1/displaymode/1098/