Modern Day Social Networking

Since it was established, the internet has grown to be more important than the computer itself. Till this day it has influenced the behavior and personality of the people that use it. The internet allows one to express their views and be able to find their identity through different social networking sites such as Myspace, Facebook, Tumbler, and etc.  

In the documentary “Growing Up Online” some of the issues that were raised were the dangers of not having anyone to be able to monitor the internet. Since parents would not know what their children are looking at, this would open the doors for bad behavior such as talking and messaging with strangers and sexual predators. The presentation also revealed teens showing off their different personalities which they would be afraid to show in public. An example of this was Autumn Eddows, who has had an increase in confidence was from Growing Up Online. She was from a small town and was not accepted until she went online and found a group that she could relate to. Autumn was shown as a Goth. She had no friends and after her parents shut down her site she had lost all her confidence. The internet has many social networking sites which later contribute to the addiction of always wanting to be connected. We constantly want / need to check an email or a message of a friend. The internet is also said to be a waste of time as there are more productive things like reading that can be done instead of using a websites like Sparknotes.

In my opinion I feel the documentary twisted some of the information which made me disagree with some of the details. The use of a few bad cases compiled together made the internet seem as an unfriendly place in the PBS presentation, as they were trying to show the internet as a place where only bad things can happen. An example of this was how one of the students sent explicit messages to another student which led to a fight. In my experiences many people tend to be themselves on social networking sites; however I understand how people may change their identities online to achieve something for themselves. On a site like YouTube which has millions of users and commentators, many people like to express their views by using crude language because of the simple fact they can and will likely never get a response. We can’t say that the creation of the internet has had a negative effect on people because the truth is, till this day the pros of having the internet far outweigh the cons. 

President Obama’s Campaign

Many of the methods and implications of the Obama campaign have successfully helped him win the 2008 presidential election by the proper use of social networking tools, and a team of supporters which were established by the brilliant use of the internet and its databases. The overall propaganda and media that surrounded Obama helped him become one of the first presidents who successfully programmed the internet to his benefit. Obama and his campaign used the internet to create a social networking site known as MyBo in which he received millions of dollars in donations which led him in taking the lead with supporters. MyBo was a sophisticated website as it allowed seeing the public records if the person has voted in the past. This was a strong accomplishment for Obama as the MyBo database could find people in different regions and pair them up to complete different tasks. As described in the article Obama could find people with minimal effort as you could go online and search through the database of the people that live in your neighborhood. As Obama dominated social networking with features as one time donations his website included videos of himself debating other candidates. Many presidential candidates did not properly manage the internet which let Obama take full control of the web. It is important for people to understand the benefits of using the internet for their campaigns because they can reach out to a lot more people and get there name known. 

Opposing Articles by Clive Thompson, Sue Halpern and Eli Pariser

The people that use the internet daily are able to create and form ideas which help us understand the different point of views seen by people from all around the world in the comfort of one’s home. It is also important for an individual to have freedom to see what is going on throughout the world as many governments try to hide the truth. Even though some methods of Google and other websites personalize your search results I think it is aggressive. The search engine is able to hide links and websites that it feels may not be appropriate and may display unneeded links. In a democratic government such as the United States the internet should be used without restrictions as a powerful source of information.

In the article “Mind Control” and the “Internet” by Sue Halpren google distinguishes your web search that will most likely correspond with your own ideas. As a result of this the internet becomes a place where the resources and links you see satisfy your own needs. Another type of information that accommodates to your ideas is the advertisements which are created specifically to what an individual likes or might buy. Even though many people dislike these ads, I use the internet so frequently that I often overlook and filter out the ads. Thankfully today we have powerful tools such as add-block to block ads on webpages.

 In contrast the article written by Clive Thompson talks about the significance of having many friends with different opinions. Thompson explains that keeping a tight circle of friends, actually puts one in a disadvantage because of the fact they will most likely know the same things as you.  Instead someone who tries to meet new people will be at an advantage because they will be able to learn something new. This should encourage more people to be social and take advantage of all the information that is available to the human mind