Reaction: American Psychosis

I have to begin by saying that my overall reaction to this article was, in a word, terrified.  All we hear today is talk of how poisoned our society has become and how it is slowly crumbling, but to see it written in such a descriptive, well thought out, and painfully accurate way was truly eye-opening.  As I read, I could only shudder at the thought of what the future of our society will bring, and how frightened I am for the children that will be forced to grow up during that time.  In my opinion, social media is both the problem and the solution to our societies obsession with material things and superficial states of mind.  First off, social media is part of the problem because it is what has allowed it's users to become the "look at me" generation; the generation that is completely obsessed with attention, and the generation that feels the need to share every detail of their lives.  After all, I have had the pleasure of hearing people actually say, "If you don't post it, did it really happen?"  Thanks to social media, we have the ability to give live updates of what we're doing, where we are, who we're with, what we bought, what we ate, what we think, what we're wearing, and everything in between.  The real question is, who cares?!  Unfortunately, this generation can't deny the fact that they do.  They have been trained by social media to become engrossed in the lives of others; worshipping and envying celebrities, while liking or judging the photos and status updates of those that they know.  Social media has made everything about our lives public, so who could help but to enjoy the show?  That being said, social media has the potential to be harnessed, and it's power can be used for good.   It can be used for promotions, for charities, for spreading the word on what's wrong with our country and what we can do  to fix it.  Surely these topics are already out there in the social media world, but how are we to see them when our timelines are filled with friends posting song lyrics, or the latest news on Justin Bieber?  The only way our society can be fixed is everyone buckles down and makes a conscious effort to changing their love of superfluous living.  Sadly, I don't see that happening anytime soon.

Planning the Instagram Project

Here is just a quick brainstorm of my likes, hobbies, and goals that could possibly be used for the instagram project:

1. The beach
2. Animals
3. Nature
4. Theatre
5. Food
6. Travel
7. Bayshore
8. Running
9. Delta Gamma
10. Writing
11. Netflix
12. My parents
13. My siblings
14. My extended family
15. New York
16. Tampa
17. L.A.
18. Fashion
19. Magazines
20. Reading
21. Writing
22. Crafts
23. Smiley Hall
24. Fruit
25. Being vegan
26. My friends from home
27. My friends at school
28. Plant Hall
29. Clearwater
30. The mall
31. Coffee
32. Candy
33. Yoga
34. Dancing
35. Singing
36. Listening to music
37. Sleeping 
38. Volleyball
39. Italian/German heritage
40. My laptop

Google Results

I have to admit that the thought of googling myself did strike up some fear within me.  However, not a fear of finding raunchy or incriminating photos, mostly just embarrassing ones.  To my surprise…I was right!  The results were chock full of my extensive high school theatre career; wigs and all.  Many of my friends and of course some of my own twitter pictures were displayed, along with screenshots of youtube videos of some performances I have done.  Yet, because my full name is Elisabeth and I go by "Liz" or "Lizzy" on social networks, I was able to get different results from different searches.  My nickname searches were clearly the ones that led to Facebook photos and other items from social media.  The Elisabeth searches, however, led to more academic related pictures, such as my flip book and my video art thumbnail from Santiago's Art and Technology class.  Either way, I am proud to say that I have no complaints with what people can find of me on the internet, and I definitely plan to keep it that way.

Life with an iPhone

How has my life changed since purchasing an iPhone?  As much as I would hate to admit it, it has probably changed for the worse.  Despite the convenience of a cell phone, and especially a smart phone, I can't help it to sometimes think of the fact that, in a simpler time, people did survive without them.  I often wish to be able to go back to that time where phones weren't chained to hands and eyes weren't glued to screens.  A time where people did not feel the need to publicly post every minute of their lives or spend excessive amounts of time stalking someone else's.  Social media is a great way to keep in touch with friends, but having apps like Facebook and Twitter in the palm of your hand is just another way to feed the addiction that our society has with sites like these.  With our heads always tilted down to our screens and our fingers constantly texting or tweeting, the ability to be personable and have a conversation with someone face to face is a rare skill these days.  I only bring up these negative aspects of the iPhone because I have personally witnessed how they affect those around me, but there are clearly positives to the phone as well.  The fact that it is a mobile computer can come in handy for endless amounts of tasks ranging from easy e-mail access to looking up a great restaurant.  As someone who is terrible with directions, the iPhone's Maps have also been very beneficial to me.  Some of my favorite apps that I often use (other than the social networks) would have to be Afterlight, a very detailed picture editing app, and TED, an app that is something like youtube but for inspirational speeches.  I would recommend either of these apps to anyone that was interested in the topics discussed on TED or in art and photography.  In today's world, the only way I could ever picture my life without my iPhone is if the whole world got rid of their's as well.  If I were to live in a world full of iPhones without one…there's a strong chance I wouldn't make it.  Despite the negatives and positives that there are to iPhones, the fact is that we can never go back to a time where they don't exist, and can only look forward to the future.  

First Day Feelings

When scheduling for classes, there was not much I could tell about what Digital Citizenship would entail other than the fact that it was required for a Communications major.  After our first class, I can honestly say that not much has changed.  That being said, my mind is completely open to anything and everything that this class has to offer.  The fact that this is the first time Digital Citizenship has been offered at UT is really exciting for me as a student, and I find it amazing that we have the option to mold the class to be what we want.  As far as myself and my goals are concerned, I don't have one specific career planned for the future.  I truly love every path that a major in Communications can lead to, and the fact that it is so broad allows me to explore all of my options.  I enjoy working with different forms of media, so that is one aspect of the class that I know I will love.  As far as the rest of the course is concerned, my main goal is to get as much out of it as I can and to further open my mind to new things.  Having such a broad major means never knowing what skills will come in handy, and therefore I look forward to taking away as many skills as I can from Digital Citizenship this semester.