Online/Hybrid Class 5: Bloggers and Citizen Journalists

The issue that citizen journalists have is that most of the time, they are unwilling to put the time, the work and the objectivity to the story. Shel says on “More Thoughts on Blogger/Citizen Journalism” that social media is changing most institutions and that includes journalism. This statement is true, but it is not going into the right direction. For example, Shel wrote a story in his blog about NotchUp where they “claimed, in their presentation, that word-of-mouth among enthusiastic alpha users had taken its new service viral… Within minutes, [he] received a significant handful of Twitter responses, from readers on three continents, saying these guys were spammers and their claim was highly misleading.” Now because Shel does this for fun and does not work as a journalist anymore, he did not mind getting back with NotchUp Company in order to know what they thought about the stuff people said about them.

One of the advantages that Citizen Journalism has is that it can provide the most current information on an event. For example, a plane crash (Heenan) where you’re the first one to experience because the crash happens outside of the window, a neighbor’s wrongdoings of beating a dog and recording it with a phone camera, or pressing the government about a particular issue for the betterment of the community, where the blogger gets a bunch of responses and links about the same issue. These and many more instances where paid journalists can’t be at the scene is an advantage to all.

On the other hand, Astrochicks is a blog that does not have an “About” section. It has a few advertisements on the top and on the right hand side of the page. But is the person a truly a journalist or a citizen journalist? The writing is professional; I suppose that all celebrity’s pictures are not from the web blogger, but from other websites. However, it provides its own horoscopes, tarots, gossip and so on. The author of the blog can be a citizen journalist with good skills, and who gets sponsored by some other companies with advertisement in order to keep providing all of the celebrities’ news. I placed this particular website because just as the candidate is helped to promote his campaign by a citizen journalist – the Citizen Journalism: From Pamphlet to Blog presented on the video below – this web blogger from Astrochicks might be the same unprofessional journalist who gets paid by some companies who trust him/her.

Blogs that I Read

Please never replace these blogs for any love therapy counseling, but take them as the basics from an expert’s advice.

I think Jennifer Jones’s blog is part of what citizen journalists do. Even if she does not link to other websites on her posts, she links to the stories she writes about a specific category in order to find them easier. Also, she has some links on top of the page and they go directly to her work. She obviously writes from what she is taught in college in previous year and from her long-time experience in her career.

I read her blog and I found out that it helps people for anything that have to do with love and not so much loving issues, such as, affairs, anger, and how the partner or both can get over them, plus all those negative behaviors that could affect anyone’s relationship with their loved one. This is for people who are in love, want to better the relationship to not only satisfy their significant others, but themselves through a happier loving style.

Also, I read Doctor Becky’s blog and it has many advices from what happens in everyday life with a loved one to what might cause depression in a relationship where the problem is actually outside of it. I recommend you read the article Dating with a Brain, Vintage Column: Is it Heartache or Heartbreak? The first one gives you tips on how to go step by step in the needed dating issue and the second one gives the difference between a Heartache and Heartbreak and when it is time to move on.

"I Blog, Therefore I am a Blogger" (Hennan)

What Sullivan says is hard work. It is similar to the “Social Networking Wars” video because many times we are overloaded with information on what other bloggers comment, critique, add or suggest to our Posts. We don’t have the time to answer to all tiny questions. Some of these examples are journalists and professors who do their work online and whose jobs require them to work hard and to be attentive at people’s need. It would be nice if these journalists and professors get pay all the time for answering at each of the online news’ readers’ questions, as well as, the online students. Journalists will always have unsatisfied readers and professors will always have unsatisfied students. But there is simply no time, no pay and no energy to satisfy people’s needs. However, both professional workers do the most important stuff that their job requires them to do.

“Writing in digital spaces” (Heenan) is in fact better than writing outside the internet where most of my stuff would go to my professors, boss or loved ones. This is because I can have corrections, questions and clarifications from other bloggers. It will help me to expand my work in order to make it better. I think of blogging as a Creative Writing Class Discussion in the ENG 210 I took last semester. This is because we would discuss each other’s papers having the professor as the one who would correct students and sometimes give an insight to what students said on their comments. Also, she would also give an insight to the author of the short story that is being discussed. The only disadvantage bloggers have when they Post their work in order to get some feedback and discussions, the author does not know if the person is to be trusted or not in their comments. But before the blogger takes any step further, such as making corrections, improvisations, etc., it is the blogger’s job to identify who wrote comments on their post in order to know how much importance or seriousness he/she would give to the comment.

Online/Hybrid Class 4: Blogs, Blogging and Bloggers

All I’m hoping to find while I’m blogging is“[to discover] my own interests” (Blood)I would probably say just as Blood said “I thought I knew what I was interested in, but after linking stories for a few months I could see that I was much more interested in…” something else. Also, I am hoping that my readers leave comments and see what they think about it. Maybe it can help me to grow as better person with the new quality that my commentator passed me. I’m a blogger who searches from everything from the simple things to what to wear to seeking advice in order to help me choose better decisions in my personal life with my boyfriend, family, church, etc. I just want to know what’s out there and see if that fits me spiritually. But most of the time I enjoy finding those answers outside of the internet because it does not feel the same as when I seek advice from those I love because I expect their answers to be accurate. It is probably because they’re sympathizing with me right after I tell them what my problem is. I see their face expressions, I see their eyes, and it is something that blogging cannot offer me at this time. “­­­­­­­­­­Let me propose a radical notion: The weblog's greatest strength — its uncensored, unmediated, uncontrolled voice — is also its greatest weakness.” How do I know if the blogger who’s advising to do this, when he/she does not even do it? If bloggers want to help others when they do not even help themselves, I call them weak. Therefore, I agree with what Blood says in that bloggers give powerful information, but it can also be weak in the sense that they are hypocritical.

This also goes with what Winer says about “stories that are passed from department to department in a professional organization can morph into something that bears no resemblance to the facts, or to the original author's point of view.” It is hard to be a public person who wishes to advice others and does not practice it.

Blogging for Money Or for Genuine Fun?

I was looking for a blog that talked about Hawaii, and as I was looking on this website, I was wondering how the blogger – a guy because he mentions that he has a wife – had so much time to invest in his blog. But as soon as I was starting to feel comfortable with the page – that I relied as a truly friendly relationship he has for his readers – then I saw the sponsors. He gets paid to write his experiences in Hawaii, which is not bad at all, but I think it is forcing the person to write his personal experiences with friends and family for a living, unless he truly loves blogging, then it is okay. If not, then why would a person work for something he/she does not like? This disappoints me. If you have a blogging account is to be in contact with friends and not to satisfy the needs of a company who wants to use YOUR persona to make ends meet. I know it is none of my business, but how can you sell your personal life to others? I think that all those who keep blogging their personal life for money, at the end it could take sides of what to tell and not to tell because of what the advertisers think. I’m not saying that he or any other blogger should denigrate advertises if these provided bad service about a particular experience they had in Hawaii, but in my personal opinion, blogging your personal life to others for money is hard to do because you want to expose yourself as a free blogger, but there are still limits because employees want to please their bosses.

I worry about this because how can one trust if the blogger is genuinely telling his experience online? I would like to know from the blogger if he would avoid buying costumes from the advertisers he has in his blog in order to avoid any biased experience? Or does he buy from these shops and never writes about them?

Ethan Zuckerham – History of the Internet

Ethan was telling us that “a lot of the really interesting community stuff were invented in 1982 or 1979, are we all suddenly putting attention to it? … they all look like this one…” He was saying that all the good blogs, information and entertaining while being educational at the same time, are now kind of gone. I think it is true because we can find more stuff online that are not made by reliable company. Users, such as My Space, Blogs, Face book and others outnumber private companies. And even private companies are not supposed to be trusted a lot. Whose information are we supposed to rely? It leaves me with the thinking of what’s going to happen to my future children. I hope they do not get fooled by trusting the internet. I also hope that the government gets more involved in it. But whose money are we going to use? We are in a recession right now and will probably not get out of this one until we get old. I remember there is a popular case called Megan Meier story where the girl killed himself because Josh (a guy who never existed and Megan fell in love with) told her on My Space that “the world would be better without her.”

Peaceful Message

This post made feel so calm not only by reading God’s Unconditional Love, but it made me feel at peace. I would like to know why we humans still judge others for who they are and what they do if we are not anyone to judge? The only being who judges is God. Of course we need to have lawyers, courts and all that, and that is good. But who has a right to judge others for the way they dress, the way they love or the things they like?

Also, through Contemplative Prayer: One Step Beyond post sounds a comforting one. It says the following:
“… life and growth are founded on faith in our own basic goodness, in the being that God has given us with its transcendent potential. This gift of being is our true Self. Through our consent by faith, Christ is born in us and He and our true Self become one. Our awakening to the presence and action of the Spirit is the unfolding of Christ's resurrection in us.”

Oh my God! This might be the answer to be happy. All we have to do is to let God to live in us.

Online/Hybrid Class 3: Changes and Transformations

By answering Tim Jackson's question of "[w]here do we want these technological vehicles to take us, and why?” My answer for this is that we humans expect both technology and internet to take us away from our real and hard world. We hate to go to the bank to make a payment, so instead of spending gas and time to go to the bank, we do it online. Obligations that once were a hazard to do, such as, sending payments by mail and the company not getting these letters on time, it is over. Now, we can rely on the internet that will give us at least a confirmation number as proof of the online payment. Another example is when we want to do our chores in less time, so that’s why students like me buy our books online avoiding us to stop by the bookstore.

But I think that many times we expect too much from the internet in which it is supposed to have a fast service and free stuff. One of the free e-cards companies that send late electronic cards are Gusanito because I think that they are swamped by so many customers that many of the receivers get them late on special days like Valentine’s Day or Holidays. We also expect the internet to fulfill the needs that we love and care for that special person when we could actually buy a real Valentine’s Card at Wal-Mart.

On the other hand, I agree with Kevin Kelly that we will be “dependent … on what the Machine knows about us and about what we want to know… It will become our memory. Then it will become our identity” (Kelly, 5). It’s already happening, if we are in google and type the word “eat”, next time when we write a word that starts with the letter “e”, the internet will gives us the option to choose the word “eat” or we can still continue to type the different search we want to know. This helps as a memory and a nice reminder of what we are looking for in the past. But this can also become our identity because when we sign up for a website magazine, or any other type, we end up having a bunch of e-mails that sometimes we do not even have the time to read in order to find out what are in those. We’re probably becoming too dependent on the internet, especially on news that keeps updating everyday. It’s a distraction for students who do their homework or when they have a purpose of finishing an online chore, but when they turn on the computer, the distraction appears on the Home Page of the web window.

People who will have time to veg out all the tons of information out there are the ones who will get paid, love to correct others, and get upset if they don’t do it. For example: ASU librarians get paid by students’ tuition. The librarians’ jobs are to find out who wrote the information that they look at and if it’s reliable for students to use. Also, Wikipedia is as good as the Webster’s Dictionary because even if we do not have people who get paid to sort through the infinite information, there are so many professional people who get into the same information others are viewing and make corrections. The consumers are still us, web users, who have the responsibility to make good transactions at our own risk and need to verify if the website is reliable to give our bank account numbers.

Reflection upon the Blogs I have Examined & Badger’s Claims

The kitty blogger tells me how much she – let’s say the blogger is a woman – enjoys playing with cats. At first, the impression I get from her is that she looks obsessed with cats because she has pictures of them showing off their bellies and not any other position. In fact, her persuasive introduction to see the blog is Come worship kitty belly with us! As I scroll down the blogger’s page, it tells me that she might just be a fake cat belly rubber because on her Friend Links she included the Hepper website which is a tall stand that includes a bed for cats. It made me rethink if she had a cats’ fanatics’ blog for propaganda. Is she actually the person who sells these especial tall beds for cats? Then she has another one that seems to be only truly interested cats’ fans’ bloggers without giving any advertisement. I’m not sure what the blogger’s interests truly are for creating a cat lover’s blog, but they could be for advertisement, for fun, or just to be a productive and creative person who advertises for free in order to help cat owners to solve their problems.

But who needs a tall stand with a fixed bed on it? My Chihuahua who acts like a cat needs one because she loves to lie down on the sofa and on a rocking chair, but never on the floor. For this reason, I could say that the blogger seems to be a sincere person who only wants to help others, but one never knows. My conclusion is that I agree with what Badger has to say that “[t]he information imparted by the blogger’s photograph inevitably influences how we react to the words that surround it.” This depends from the point of view that we criticize or start to opinion about.

Does Blogging make you a better writer?

I like how Jenny Cromie describes each of the “five ways that blogging” (Heenan) can improve our writing. As a student who has been speaking English for three years – where not only reading my first ESL stories persuaded me to become an English student – I agree with all the five points where she says that blogging has “helped her:

discover her voice;
connect with readers;
get feedback;
get disciplined; and
write faster.”

Even five years ago – as an ESL student – when blogging was a nonexistent meaning because people did not talk about it, besides I wasn’t a technology know-it-all, I think that ESL tutors helped me with all the five qualities above. But as I keep writing on MySpace or either in this blog, I have noticed that it still helps me to connect with all of you. Not only does it feel good, but it is a faster way to get both new insights and feedback from readers which makes me disciplined. And yes, every time I write, I think I become faster and that makes me feel proud of second language skills.