Someone Else's Term Project - Gold Mining

Jennifer Wong's term project about gold mining has really gave me an insight about the business itself. Before this presentation, I know that people are letting someone else play their account to 'farm' for items or make their character stronger, for a fee of course. After hearing this presentation, it pretty much stereotypes Asians as hardcore gamers since the majority of these gold farmers are in Asian countries. These people earn next to nothing as they spend countless hours playing a certain MMORPG; this is like the new age of the Industrial Age. As a MMORPG player myself, I feel offended that people are getting stronger and getting rare items that they did not earn by themselves. Most of these sites are not trustworthy neither, the next thing they know, the people who paid for this junk could be scammed or obtain a virus inside their computer. I know one friend who accidentally clicked on one of those sites, and his computer was heavily infected by a certain virus, making him reformat his computer. Gold farming should be stopped, not only for the people working in them, but for the honesty built among players like me.

My Term Project Presentation

Surprisingly I presented my presentation late because I truly though that May 5th was a Thursday, which was supposed to be a Tuesday. That was a blunder on my part, but I'm glad Prof. Friedman let me present first thing on the next class. Overall, I think I didn't do as well for this presentation because I clearly read from the paper and not memorize it. I sounded real nervous (but then again I always do) up there and I thought I was going to fall apart. I rushed in some parts and fumbled around a little to find where I was. But in the end, I pulled through and even made the class chuckle. I should have taken it more slowly and prepared more time on it. Oh well, at least it is over.

MMORPG's are growing everyday; new ones are made while old ones are being improved and added upon. People are being drawn into it, making them play these games casually or nonstop. In fact, some people are hooked on it so bad, that one case was reported that someone has injured his niece by throwing her down the stairs. He said that it was not his fault but hers, which is surprising because he injured someone in real flesh and blood, yet he did not cared for her and only cared about his major party going on in some dungeon somewhere. People like him bring shame to gamers like me. As a gamer, we should play MMORPG's considerably and should be aware of the environment around them. I play MMORPG's excessively in terms of hours invested in it, but I am still aware of my family and friends and tend to them whenever I can.

Our Class Wiki - So far

Our class wiki has a lot of information about New Media, even more so with today's semester. Each link covers a separate part of New Media, like politics, news, entertainment, etc. My job in the class wiki is the editor, I clean up and change some things around to make sure the wiki looks good and consistent. There are some issues with the wiki at the moment, minor issues like Facebook not being in the Social Networking category, some rogue topics here and there, and some of them look like a rush job to just to get credit for contributing (like a topic about Twitter with only one word and a site). I'm more of a clean-up crew in the class wiki and there's lots of more work to be done. Hopefully I can do as much as I can before the semester ends.

The Next New Thing

We already have a popular site to watch things (YouTube), we already have a popular site to listen to things (Pandora), now we should have a popular site to taste things. We always see delicious foods on tv, books, magazines, etc. but we never really get to taste them. How do we know if that food is good? How do we know if it is bad? We won't really know until we try them for ourselves, and that usually takes time and money (if you have to go out and eat a certain food in a restaurant). To be able to taste things online will be a spectacular thing to do. With the rate that technology is improving, it would not be surprising that they would provide a special tab (clean of course) to put into our mouths and have a popular website that have a huge plethora of food that we can taste. The tab will simulate the food that we choose we want to eat by changing the taste of our saliva temporarily. If people can't afford these special tablets, the website can provide makeshift recipes which taste like a minute at most to prepare, like combining ketchup with mustard to get a 'taste' on how the food will taste like. We already have our sense of sight and hearing stimulated, the next thing that technology should tackle is the sense of taste.

Advice to Baruch College

Baruch College is a great college and it can be made even better in numerous ways. My advice for Baruch is to make interactive chatrooms with advisors, professors, departments, and offices like the Bursar. With these interactive chatrooms, students can talk to the person they need at the comfort of their seat. Also, students may be too busy to go to talk with their advisors about important issues because of work, family issues, etc., so with these chatrooms, students to schedule an appointment with them online and chat with them online. Not only should Baruch make interactive chatrooms with offices, they should be able to do things online, like drop a class and pay for their tuitions by credit card online. This makes the filing process instant and convenient.

Another feature they should add is to have interactive helpers for people who are roaming around the Baruch website. They can provide assistance to find what they need and direct to the appropriate site and person (which should be also be available to talk to online). With today's fast and demanding society, Baruch should make almost everything available online, while providing excellent services to everyone.

Old vs. New

Not a lot of people know this, but there is a various distinction between 'old' media and 'new' media. Old media consists newspapers, magazines, journals, etc. New media consists of blogs,YouTube and amateur videos,wikis, etc. Old media can be described as one-way communication because what we have on there is what we get, in other words it is static. For example, in paper encyclopedias, all of the information that we have from there is what we get, no new information can be added by anyone or yourself until a new edition comes out. However in new media, it is more dynamic and interactive than old media. An example of a new media version of an encyclopedia is Wikipedia, which has information as vast as an encyclopedia, but it keeps building upon itself every day and it is built by the people and yourself.

Modeling Reality With Virtual Worlds

Virtual worlds are quickly on a rise, and it is taking the world by storm. There are many virtual worlds out there, such as social networking like Second Life and IMVU, and mass-multiplayer online role playing games (mmorpg's) like Everquest and World of Warcraft. These virtual worlds allow players to create their own avatars that best suit their looks or their ideal looks. Then the players use their avatars to interact with the world and other avatars, much like what we do in real life. People can party, have fun, hang out, chat about almost anything, etc. It has become so popular that companies are using it to their advantage; IBM is using Second Life to create a training program for their employees, allowing them to have freedom and easy access as long as they do not break the rules.

However there is some distinct features of virtual worlds. Users in social networking can create their own world that they can control; the environment, setting, theme, etc. VLES is a great example of a virtual world that's similar to the real world. But in mmorpg's, players have to play by the game's rules, but they have the power to control the game's economy as they see fit. For example, one item can be sold for 100 gold but in a couple of months or so, the price can go up to 5000 gold, indicating an inflation in the economy, much like the reality. Mmorpg's mimic reality more than social networking because worlds in social networking are created and controlled by one or few people, while vast amount of players control various mmorpg's.

Social Networking

Everyone should know what social networking is, and even if they didn't, then they are most likely doing it everyday. Myspace, Facebook, and Twitter are some examples of social networking and they have thousands of users on everyday.

Social networking is mainly used to keep in touch with friends and perhaps create new ones with others who have similar interests with yours. People can not always keep in touch with each other in real life because they are probably busy with school, work, etc. Thus they are not able to see each other in real life or talk to each other on the phone. But with social networking, they can keep in touch with friends they have not seen in months or even years. People can check each other's status, photos of themselves, 'chat' with each other, and other various things.

There is of course a dark side to social networking, and it usually involves meeting new people on Myspace or Facebook. As pointed out in this article, when meeting new people who they don't know in real life, they don't know if the stranger truly wants to be their friend. All they have to do is click on the 'add friend' button and boom, +1 to your friend list. But how much do you know them? Are they truly honest? Also, some people stay on those sites for too long, gaining the title of "[insert site here] junkie" and probably compete to gain as much friends as they can (with probably over 90% of them being strangers).

I can't really say much on how they can evolve in the future, since I don't use them at all. All I can think of is having real-time video interactions with each other, with probably at least 1 hour requirement before adding them as friends. Again, this is a grey area since it's really hard to enforce things online.

My New Media Class - So Far

My New Media class so far has been an interesting one. I signed up for this class expecting to learn things like wikis, blogs, online gaming, and I am getting more than what I expected. I now have a hands-on experience in wikis and blogs, which I have not before.

I did not know that there was something called 'web 2.0' which is currently the most advanced technology out there. With the power of the Internet, it can connect everyone from many different places together and allows them and us to collaborate with others and take on complicated projects. Also, it allows people to converse and interact with others from various backgrounds, like Second Life. Second Life is so popular that even a big company like IBM implemented their learning program in Second Life [http://www.workforce.com/section/00/article/24/61/08.html]

Also, with the emergence of New Media, some of the Old Media are being replaced. For example, people can watch videos and full-length episodes online instead of watching TV. With broadband internet, it is possible to stream it without worrying being too slow. Newspapers can also be read online instead of getting hard copy newspapers and books can be downloaded inside special pads that can be like a compact electronic book.

New Media is continuing to grow and it will not seem to stop. No one knows what it will grow into, only time will tell.

Blogs vs. Wikis

Blogs and Wikis are prime examples of New Media and Web 2.0. Many people can come together and collaborate on topics that interest them. Both of them are widely popular and widely used. These two relies on collaborators to work together and provide a place for people with similar interests to come share their views, exchange information, and comment on each other. Examples of blogs are blogger and livejournal, and examples of wikis are wikipedia and wikis.

However these two things have their differences. Blogs is considered an online journal that people can read online. It can public or private, depending on the author's settings. Also, only the author (and maybe some collaborators) can edit the post, while all of the other users can leave comments on the post. Wiki's however, is a public database that is accessible to everyone, almost without limits. Anyone can create and edit inside wikis as they choose, and they can sign up to make themselves identifiable. There is a lot of freedom in wiki and it is easy to use too.

Checking out some social networking sites - Photobucket

I've been using Photobucket since October 10, 2004, and I must say that it has evolved over the time. At first, it was just a place where you can upload your photos (only) and show it to others via direct link (for me at least). Now you can upload videos as well and share it to the public, there is an option you can choose whether to make your photos private or public. You can also put a password on your album so only certain individuals have access to it.

They also give you an option to edit your pictures as soon as you upload your picture. Back then, you can only rotate or resize it; now you can do a plethora of things like add special effects, decorate, add animations, etc.

Luckily, uploading pictures is just as easy as back then, with new options. Just click on the 'Choose files' button and choose a picture you want to upload, and that's it! You can also acquire pictures from web sites, mobile phone, and email.

Normally you get the free account which of course have limitations; like 1 gb space, 25 gb bandwidth, 5 minute max video length, and 1024 x 768 max picture size. You can upgrade to Pro anytime with some limits removed and the rest upgraded for $40 per year.

If you want an easy place to upload pictures without all the hassle, try Photobucket today.

What is New Media?

Back in the day, when the Internet was considered new, it was a place where we can get information and chat among with other friends an family through instant messages or through electronic mail. However, this Internet was a one-way deal; we ask for the information we get, we get the information, that is it, no feedback whatsoever. Now, with the rise of New Media, this has all changed as the Internet has went from static to dynamic. This is a new phenomenon that is sweeping the world, as countless users interact with websites to make it better. Now it is not what the Internet can do for us, but what we can do for the Internet.