My relationship with the internet is about as rocky as the mountains that run from Canada to New Mexico. We've been in a serious relationship for quite some time now and after being together for so long, we are starting to hit some really intense rough patches. However, when I'm feeling down or just wanting to relax and hang out, the internet is always there for me. What can I say? I'm in love.
In class, we read an article about the internet by Steven Johnson that talked about people's relationship with the world wide web and what good things come from it and what bad thing come from it as well. For me, I'd have to say that I am about a 50/50 on a good day....well really any day and here's why. I'll go on the internet for school and homework which equals good, however I'll also go on the internet while doing homework and watch YouTube videos or go on Facebook which equals bad.
I have been messing around online before, just reading things on Facebook or catching up on the videos from my subscriptions from YouTube and I'll see a video that interests me so I'll click on it and watch it, then I'll do it again with another video and before I know it, it's three in the morning and I'm watching videos of naked men fighting snakes in the mud or creepy puppets murdering children. I have no idea how I got here, but I'm here and it's happening. Sometimes I'll just sit back and really evaluate my life and my time and question my decisions.
But, the internet may taketh away but the internet also giveth back. I am much more connected with my friends and people from all over the world thanks to the internet and specifically, Facebook. I'm on there daily checking my news feeds and seeing what my friends are up to. I also find internet articles or sites very helpful such as Dictionary.com, Wikipedia, Urban Dictionary, and several others. I like that I can go on to KCRG.com and read interesting news stories without waiting for the 6:00 or 10:00 news. I would say that to a certain extent, the internet has made me smarter or at least let me be smarter by giving me tools to further educate myself and I like that. I'm glad I'm of the generation that is so fully immersed in the internet, I just hope that it doesn't become a huge negative issue in the future.
Thursday, December 5, 2013
Tuesday, December 3, 2013
News: Real or Fluff?
We watched several news stories from ABC World News in class and then we talked about how they are either real news stories that are important or fluff stories that are there to just fill up space. This was part of what Chuck Klosterman was talking about in his article.
When we watched the news stories, it was the day before the 50th anniversary of JFK's assassination, so the bigger news story was of that day when the president was killed. The story went into detail about the plane, Air Force One, that carried the president back from Dallas. They had to cut out seats and other parts of the plane to get his casket into the body of the plane because they didn't want to put him in the cargo hold. Then they talked about the days back and the ride back as well. The plane is now a memorial and is out of use, however I believe they said 7 more presidents used the plane after Kennedy before it was retired. Now this story is a big one. They gave detailed information about the situation and also unknown facts about the plane that some people, myself included, did not know about. It was one that many people would have liked to hear, especially the older population who were around when Kennedy was killed. It's important because the death of the leader of a country is huge, especially when he is assassinated.
Now, there were several "fluff" stories that they stuck in there between the bigger more important stories, like one about same sex marriage that got about 30 seconds of attention. There was also a story about an American Korean War vet who was "captured" by North Korean officials while leaving after being there for some sort of remembrance event. This story might have been moderately important, but it got little air time and didn't have much information or detail. If they really truly cared about an 85 year old man being kept from returning to America by a country that we aren't very friendly with, it would have been as big as the Kennedy story and would have probably had guest speakers. But none of that happened and there wasn't much of detailed information. That is why I think it was just a filler story to take up time before the JFK story.
When we watched the news stories, it was the day before the 50th anniversary of JFK's assassination, so the bigger news story was of that day when the president was killed. The story went into detail about the plane, Air Force One, that carried the president back from Dallas. They had to cut out seats and other parts of the plane to get his casket into the body of the plane because they didn't want to put him in the cargo hold. Then they talked about the days back and the ride back as well. The plane is now a memorial and is out of use, however I believe they said 7 more presidents used the plane after Kennedy before it was retired. Now this story is a big one. They gave detailed information about the situation and also unknown facts about the plane that some people, myself included, did not know about. It was one that many people would have liked to hear, especially the older population who were around when Kennedy was killed. It's important because the death of the leader of a country is huge, especially when he is assassinated.
Now, there were several "fluff" stories that they stuck in there between the bigger more important stories, like one about same sex marriage that got about 30 seconds of attention. There was also a story about an American Korean War vet who was "captured" by North Korean officials while leaving after being there for some sort of remembrance event. This story might have been moderately important, but it got little air time and didn't have much information or detail. If they really truly cared about an 85 year old man being kept from returning to America by a country that we aren't very friendly with, it would have been as big as the Kennedy story and would have probably had guest speakers. But none of that happened and there wasn't much of detailed information. That is why I think it was just a filler story to take up time before the JFK story.
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)