The End of Privacy

     There has been much debate over the use of social media sources to gather information about perspective students and employees on deciding whether to accept or hire this person. The question arises of whether or not this form of information can and should be used as a resource. In my opinion, I have no problem with them looking at social media profiles to gather information. Some would argue that this would invade privacy, but I beg to differ. First off, the user's information that they are accessing is something the user wrote and posted online without being forced to do so. Ultimately, it was the user's decision. You would be foolish to think the stuff posted on these social media sites would remain private. With people sharing other people's posts and pictures constantly online, someone you don't want is bound to find out.by accident. I would agree with items on the user's profile should not be seen by outsiders; however, as our class discussed, the user may, without realizing it, accept a perspective college of theirs Facebook request. This then gives the college access to the user's entire profile and pictures.
     Another reason people get mad about this so called "cybervetting" is some people on these social media networks try to put on a filter or mask of who they are online. I believe that if people or going to perform this act, they should just use an alias name to prevent the people they don't want to see their profile from seeing it. Why not keep all personal information to yourself?
     In the end, I believe Andrews goes to far in her Social Network Constitution. She claims, "social networks are private spaces and that employers, schools and other institutions are prohibited from accessing social network pages or taking adverse actions against a person based on anything they post on a social network." I don't believe social networks should be the sole reason for choosing one candidate over another; however, if there are two candidates that are closely matched in credentials, I think using a social media website to see how they present themselves is a great way for the company to see what type of person the candidate is without completely knowing them.

Google: Always Increasing Market Share

     Google is becoming an incredibly powerful player with the vast number of online services that people use in their everyday lives. As I am writing this article, I am using Blogger, Google Chrome, Google Search, and my Android phone. All of which are products of Google. Besides the popular Google products like Youtube, Gmail, Hangouts, and Maps, Google is now developing a broadband fiber optic internet service, and they mentioned in a conference that they want to develop themselves as a wireless cell phone carrier. Essentially, if this were to happen, someone could have their Android powered cell phone that uses Gmail, Youtube, Google Chrome, Hangouts, Google+, Drive, Maps, and many more Google apps. Then they could potentially be using Google's cell phone service or WiFi with their fiber optic network. This raises the question: Is Google becoming to powerful in our everyday lives? Is it getting to the point of addiction? In my opinion, Google is becoming a little bit too powerful: however, I don't currently see this as a bad thing. From my experience of exploring multiple platforms and services, Google by far offers the best on the market. Sometimes its the simple things like in Chrome where the URL bar is also the Google Search bar making it simple and easy to navigate. Sometimes its the detailed customization like add-ons and themes that enhance the experience for the user. Google makes it simple and easy to use their services while also offering the customization and complexity many advanced users want to access. As far as Google becoming an addiction, I see it more as a means for getting the information we seek on a day to day basis. So I see it as an addiction to obtaining information and less of an addiction to Google. People want to achieve their online goals in a fast and simple manner, and Google is the one offering the best solution. Privacy and independence can also be an issue when Google is the one-stop-shop for all services. I definitely believe privacy can be a big concern. If something happened to Google, they would have all the information the consumer has been giving them from search queries to when you are going to yoga class next week. If the consumer used a bunch of different, at least the amount of information given would be dispersed widely across the internet with less risk involved. It is the same concept as investing all your money in one stock versus putting it in a mutual fund. People ultimately have a choice on where to go for their services. It is not any harder to type in bing.com vs google.com to make a search. I believe that, until a company comes along and offers up a worthy challenge, Google will continue to dominate the realm of the internet.

Jason Kottke: Scrutinizing Liberal Arts

     After reading the transcript from an interview with Jason Kottke by Rebecca Blood, I was able to grasp a greater understanding of blogging and what drives the writer to continue producing new content regularly. Jason Kottke is a passionate blogger for kottke.org who is willing to express his opinions about a variety of different topics that interest him. He differentiates himself from the likes of other blog formatted websites like ESPN and Droid Life because his topics of interest are not as specialized. I am glad Jason started his blog out on his own terms making him more relatable to the audience that have the same passion for a particular topic. When Jason was discussing what new bloggers can write about in a blog, I agree with starting off with a specific topic because there are a lot of people who need some form of structure to get started. Furthermore, Jason goes into how he displays his personal identity on the blog. For the purposes of our small class size, displaying personal information is not as big of a deal. For Jason, however, the sheer number of people visiting his blog would favor allowing a smaller about of personal information being exposed to the public. The question in the interview that funneled the greatest reaction from me was the one on advertising on his blog. I believe that adding advertisement banners are better than asking for donations from the readers. When asking for donations, I think it puts more pressure on the writer to satisfy what the reader wants to read instead of what the writer wants to write about. When an ad banner is used, the writer can say what he or she wants without worrying about trying to get more donations. The downside of ad banners for some people, on the other hand, is the credibility of the author is lost due them selling out to gain more money. Additionally, some people feel the content quality and interactions with readers slowly reduce. My personal opinion is that there is a reduction in the quality because the author will try to appeal to more people to increase visitors and ad revenue. It also makes the page more cluttered with unnecessary spam. Overall, Rebecca brings up good points about blogging that can help me and many others to understand blogs.

My First Post

My first post.