For my class assignment, we were required to create an avatar (a digital simulation character in a virtual world) in Second Life. This site, or rather lifestyle encourages an individual to “have fun, flirt, or simply flaunt [his or her] creativity in a world where [one] can experience and create anything [he or she] can imagine. Created by former Linden Lab CEO, Philip Rosedale, dreamed of virtual worlds connected with one another that would encourage dreams to come true. Second Life was created in 2003 and as of 2011 has about one million active users.

As a novice user I was a bit unsure of what I agreed to in my free account. Immediately “landing” on the Second Life Welcome Island, one becomes acquainted with the basic tools and steps to explore Second Life. After, I continued to build my personal profile and change my avatar figure from a floating blimp-like boat to a robot. As I entered into another portal which took me to an unknown island I found myself interacting with people. And on occasion, beyond the chat window, I would hear people trying to talk to me through my headphones. I was 1) afraid to respond and 2) did not know how to set up my microphone. I continued to venture through several “realms” and just explored these unknown places, but for myself, I think I was looking for a greater satisfaction in Second Life.

That greater satisfaction sprouted from exploring in the real world and being pleasantly surprised or even scared of the unknown or what I came across. But almost immediately, I was fixated on the fact that Second Life is in fact, just a virtual simulation for me. There is no connection for me and my avatar and the people I am interacting with. For myself, I believe that facebook is even pushing the limits of interaction with other people without having face-to-face interaction. And Second Life completely removes my being (my physical being) from even revealing itself to other new individuals I come across. This is just the first or second day I have been using this so I hope that I can find, perhaps more fulfillment in using this free virtual simulation site when I continue to use it. But for now, I think I still prefer the real world and what is has to offer to me.

The Cult of An Amateur: How Today’s Internet is Killing Our Culture is a 2007 book written by entrepreneur and internet critic Andrew Keen. Andrew Keen is a British-American entrepreneur and author, particularly known for his view that the current Internet culture and the Web 2.0 trend may be debasing culture and how it undermines experts and the work of professionals.

Within this book, Keen focuses on how web 2.0 is now creating a democracy of amateurs, turning intellectual traditions and institutions upside down. The “amateur” also known as a “dabbler” or “layperson” according to Keen is being celebrated within the internet world today. The democratic approach to sharing information on the internet and every individual having a say has changed the way we receive and spread our knowledge. But what Keen sees as being harmful to the world is that this celebration of democracy has become overly radical and is in fact harming the morals of scholarship and the creation of wisdom. USA has prided itself on the hard work and rewards for excellence of individuals, but like the “fifteen minutes of fame” trend, today we see “amateurs” and beginners receiving the same amount of recognition and praise. The geniuses and experts of the past, Keen believes, are the individuals who have “gone beyond the “wisdom” of the crowd and the mainstream public opinion and bestow on us the benefits of their hard-earned knowledge. So it brings up the question, how does anyone know who’s right?

My personal belief is that we need a balance between the amateurs and the experts. When information became easily accessible to the masses via the internet, it allowed for many opportunities to arise, including the user to become the producer of his or her own content. Our society sees the internet as a place where we can gather and then spread information quickly and to a large audience. But with all of this information, it truly does become hard to sift through all of it to find the truth of what we are searching for. It becomes more of a he said, she said, the site said, and our sources get lost or do not have any outside credentials. It is hard to create this balance because if we lost one, (hard-working individuals who become professionals) then we lose a lifestyle and goals or if we lose the other (individuals being able to speak freely and give their advice/input) then we lose a sense of democracy which America prides itself on. Keen has touched an issue that I think we will still face for many years to come, but the next question is, who will be next to control the information we seek?

This blogpost is focused on religions trying to reshape themselves within the digital community. The Religious Dispatches magazine released an article in December called the Five Social Media Trends that are Reshaping Religion. The article focuses on how certain media trends cause religions to change how religions communicate with their followers and prospectives. Elizabeth Drescher is a professor at Santa Clara University. She has a PhD in Christian Spirituality from the Graduate Theological Union and an MA in Systematic Theology from Duquesne University as well as an MFA in writing from the University of Pittsburgh and a masters in Public Policy from Carnegie Mellon University.  And she is also is the author of Tweet If You ♥ Jesus: Practicing Church in the Digital Reformation (Morehouse 2011).

It is interesting to see how religions are compromising traditions from the past to accommodate present trends. Fifteen years ago no one would have thought a priest or a minister would tweet prayers, stream live videos of sermons and provide a “jesus daily” page, but nowadays, it seems almost mandatory for a religion to survive in this digital society. Honestly I believe the only thing that is constant in our lives is change. And this is how it has always been, but now change arrives at an incredibly fast rate. Religions are struggling trying to keep up with the pace and in this article Drescher points out five trends that have formed from religious groups trying to adapt to the newest way we communicate with one another. One of the trends that Drescher mentioned that I thought was interesting was the O Holy App trend. This trend is focused on the amount of religious apps being created for digital devices like an iphone or an ipad. One of the apps in particular I learned about was the Confession: A Roman Catholic App. This app allows a penitent to confess his or her sins and provides a step-by-step guide to the sacrament.  While I am not sure where I stand morally with religious apps that seem to be replacing traditional ways of confession sins, I do appreciate religious groups trying new ways to reach out to their audiences. Below I have provided the excerpt from Drescher’s article on the Holy App section:

 3. O Holy App

With more than half a million apps now available for the iPhone or iPad, and maybe 232 for the Android, it’s clear that the number of religiously-themed apps is growing. Apps are available for adherents to just about any religious group you can think of (includingPastafarians), and have been developed for a large number of congregations, dioceses, and other religious organizations (though it’s hard to know what one is meant to do with most of them).

Prayer book apps, those for on-the-go spiritual practices, and other tools that integrate spirituality into everyday life have been most popular. Others, like the now notoriousConfession app, which kicked off the year with as much fanfare and as theological confusion over whether one can be absolved through an app-based confession (per il papa: ix-ney on the orgiveness-fey), highlight the importance of creating apps that support personal reflection and provide information that can be carried into face-to-face relationships.

If the folks at Nielsen are correct, smartphones will continue to overtake, uh, dumb phones, making app-based connection and information-sharing a continuing growth area. Religiously-themed apps are certain to be an important part of that, but unless they grasp the digital trinity of social engagement, spiritual meaning, and incarnational potential that makes such apps truly worthwhile for believers and seekers. They’ll likely find their apps among the thousands ignored each year.

I think religions need to step-up their significance in the internet world to maintain their presence in the modern world. But I also fear what could ultimately be the failure to all religions is if they make too many changes. Religions will continue to change certain foundations and structures that make them what they are when adapting to digital communication. Gone are the days of reading lessons from a book, instead lessons can be found in the form of tweets and facebook statuses. It will be interesting to see how religions stand out from the rest of the internet community. Where they will go next. And how significant they will be in an tech-savvy individual’s life.

Audacity is an internet site that provides free editing and recording for slicing and mixing audio. The site guides you with a step-by-step process and includes help, downloads and developer information. Specifically for blogs, personal sites and company sites, Audacity: records live audio, converts tapes and records into digital recordings or CDs, cut, copy, splice or mix sounds together and much more. This site provides video tutorials for setting-up recording, basic editing tools, importing audio and adjusting sound levels.

I personally think this site is very helpful because it allows for an amateur like myself to gain a better understanding of how to use podcasts on my personal sites. A nice addition to the site are the articles that they provide describing what a podcast is and give a brief history of podcasting. I have never used a podcast for any sites before so Audacity is a simple, free Cross-platform Sound Editor that is easy to navigate and an open source software easily available for anyone to study or use.

Santa Clara University teamed up with Heyday publishing company in the Spring of 2000 to launch the California Legacy Project (CLP) whose goal is to raise public awareness and appreciation for California’s cultural legacy and encourages faculty and students in their creative and scholarly interest in Californian culture. More importantly for this blog post is the addition to the book series, which is the new public radio programs that hope to establish a more vibrant and interactive identity within the online community. CLP aims to fulfill the mission through achieving specific strategic goals. They want to: 1. Demonstrate the contemporary relevance of California’s multicultural and historical legacy, 2. Explore the relationship between Californian tradition and Californian innovation, 3. Provide a public forum for shared discussions between faculty and students about California-related material, 4. Promote attention to California’s history in the Santa Clara University community and 5. Foster student/faculty collaboration on California-related research projects. CLP wants to gain recognition within the Santa Clara community through their book series, site and radio scripts.

One of the radio scripts I read and listened to was about Gellet Burgess (1866-1951) an engineering professor from MIT. Gellet came to California in 1887 and rather being known for his engineering feats, his achievements and recognition came through his unique poetry and quirky characters like the the “Goops.” CLP provides 3 scripts for Gellet focused on three of his classic poems that he contributed to the California community and later to the rest of the nation.

Another script was focused on Mary Bowden Carroll who came to San Jose from New York in 1892.Ten years in Paradise offers readers a sunny perspective on the Santa Clara Valley. The novel includes Carroll’s observations of the good relations between rival colleges: Santa Clara College and the University of the Pacific. Carroll’s novel provides insight and guidance to understanding business and social life in the Santa Clara Valley.

Both scripts are two examples of the importance that CLP wants to place on the individuals who made important contributions to California’s history. It seemed that most of these radio podcasts focus on literary contributions, but perhaps their next expansion will be recollections of important events that took place in the late 19th and early 20th century California.

NPR released a podcast February 9th, 2012 about Wael Ghonim. The podcast and article is titled, ” Wael Ghonim: Creating A “Revolution 2.0” In Egypt. This article and podcast focuses on Wael, an Egyptian Activist who became the public face of the revolution. In Revolution 2.0 Wael explains how his facebook page, “We Are All Khaled Said” influenced the Egyptian community and what consequences he faced with this facebook page as well as providing an insider’s account on what he experienced during the Egyptian protests. The facebook page emerged after graphic pictures of a 28-year-old man (Khaled) who was killed by Egyptian security officials spread throughout the internet. The main goal for the facebook page was to reveal the bad practices of the Egyptian police.

Initially the page was run by “anonymous” but Wael revealed via the podcast that his identity was learned because he sent out an event update through his personal facebook page rather than through “anonymous.” Shortly after the Egyptian security officials found his identity, they kidnapped him and was repeatedly interrogated. Wael this entire time stayed true to his beliefs and was hurt by being called a “traitor.”

He told them “You can torture me as much as you want, but you’re not going to get this out of me because this is not true. I would prefer to die than to admit something I’ve never done, that I think is completely wrong.”

Wael’s disappearance spread on the internet and he returned from interrogation. After, Ghonim has been hailed for his efforts in the Egyptian Revolution. The fact that Wael utilized social media like Facebook and Twitter changed the way revolutionists and activists communicate. In our world today we are constantly encountering information via social networking sites. It is incredibly interesting to see how we are taking advantage of these sites like Facebook to disseminate information to the masses, but like Ghonim says at the end of the article, social networking is an available tool now to show change, but it cannot be the only tool in making change. I agree with Ghonim that relaying information needs to be spread through many different mediums; i.e. word of mouth, social networks and the change that has been made through revolution on the streets. A successful revolution can start with one person, but it is many who will make change. If social sites help raise concern and participation, then it most definitely should be taken advantage of.

Here is the link below:

http://www.npr.org/2012/02/09/146636605/wael-ghonim-creating-a-revolution-2-0-in-egypt

The article, “The Revolutions Were Tweeted: Information Flows During the 2011 Tunisian and Egyptian Revolutions,”researches quantitative data that tries to understand how Mainstream Media (MSM) tries to distinguish themselves in social media networks particularly Twitter. More importantly though, is how does the mainstream news organizations separate themselves from “non-professionals” within Twitter and the constant flow of information from real-time newsworthy events.  Gilad Lotan is the Vice President of Research and Development at Social Flow. At Social Flow they extract the conversations, datasets, and complete sets of information from social networks like Twitter and Facebook to try and comprehend what your audience is doing, talking about and clicking on in real-time on Twitter and Facebook. In this article above, Lotan and his team members utilize this data to conceptualize the information flow on Twitter based on the Tunisian and Egyptian Revolutions.

Structured as a Quantitative Research Paper, Lotan creates a number of variables to compare professional journalists to “non-professional” tweeters. We are now trying to understand where our information is coming from therefore we question between what is truthful information and rumor. The primary information that comes from Twitter is easily forwarded on by other journalists and individuals and posting activity serves as key information routers.  Journalists and activists serve as the primary information sources but in contemporary society, we tend to find out information based on short excerpts or a one-liner description from other individuals or people that we follow. We not only receive our news from the television, radio or print newspaper now, but also via social networks. And because the news is coming from a hybrid and dynamic information network whose structures and influences change depending upon how a variety of individuals act, news organizations need to research and understand how their reporting fits into these constantly changing social networks like Twitter. The Tunisian and Egyptian Revolutions are just the start in trying to understand how much of an influence Twitter has and the hybrid networks to come, will have on society’s new coverage and who will be providing the ground-breaking information. I think in the near future, the news organizations are going to have to figure out another way to entice their readers onto their tweet pages. If an individual is reporting, more than likely, in my opinion, will I also want to read what he or she has to say about the news they are covering, because they always provide a different perspective with perhaps new information as well.