mattdacosta

[mattdacosta]

Earth is an Advertisement

As you write you blog, there is probably an advertisement banner somewhere on the screen. Before you watched the documentary, Terms and Conditions May Apply, you most likely had to watch one or a few advertisements. While you were buying your book, Cognitive Surplus: Creativity and Generosity in a Connected Age, you had to have received banners of "other books readers bought." And after you bought the book, it is guaranteed you received emails about books to buy similar to yours.

The point is that we live in an age where everything we do is counted, measured, watched, and then turned into a profit making machine tailored specifically towards our needs, interests, and wants. No matter if you are on your phone, laptop, tablet, reading a magazine, or walking down the street, you are always, and I repeat ALWAYS being exposed to ads.

Google Glass' Ads Are Helpful

In her book, Massively Networked, Pamela Lund tells a story about buying a flower for her daughter.

She explains as while she was driving, her 'device' sent her an ad for flowers at Plantworld that are half off. It sent her this add because she posted a status earlier about how she was to visit her daughter Isabella. Her cloud knows that Isabella likes to garden and that Plantworld is on the way to her house. Isabella loved the flower.

She calls these interactions between the world, us, and advertisements "Your Daily Life: Smarter and More Efficient" (Lund, 694)

Not Your Father's Ads

Ads nowadays aren't what they used to be, ironically thanks to browser cookies and the NSA. Since databases collect our clicks and the NSA collects everything we put on the internet, ads are tailored towards the specific user.

I never see ads for flowers or curtain rods. Instead I see ads for sports tickets and gym gear. And believe it or not, these ads have saved me a lot of time and money.

Thanks to Facebook knowing that I go to a lot of sports games, a banner ad on the side of the screen appeared for a website called TiqIQ. This is now my go-to site for sports tickets as it lists tickets from every site, not just the specific site you are on.

So now, if I'm using Google Glass and walk into the Ace Ticket store that is across the street from the TD Garden an ad will only pop up for sports tickets, potentially saving me money.

Or if I go into a Dick's Sporting Goods and hold up a pair of knee wraps, an Olympia Sports ad might pop up showing that those same knee wraps are $15 dollars cheaper there. I pretty much do that now but instead of the ad finding me, I have to manually search the item and hope that I come across the place that has the cheaper price.

Ad 2.0: Advertising a Better Life

Human interaction with quantifiable ads are creating a convenient, more efficient world. Allowing people the free time to become more creative than ever and push our world towards greater heights and greater quality of life.

In his book, Cognitive Surplus, Clay Shirky sees this free time created by convenience in tech outlets and platforms as an asset. "One thing that makes the current age remarkable is that we can now treat free time as a general social asset that can be harnessed for large, communally created projects, rather than as a set of individual minutes to be whiled away one person at a time" (Shirky, 10)

With marketers becoming more sophisticated and precise in the ads they show and to whom they show it to, it is creating a life of convenience. Instead of having to do a Google search of products and looking through countless online websites, ads are doing that for us.

Lund states that the data we feed into social networks, when paired with "increasingly smarter algorithms and marketing analysts can predict how likely you are to respond positively to a particular offer." (Lund, 924)

This weeds out all of the junk ads that we don't like or respond too. We will only be fed ads that we use and that we have a positive reaction to. It's a win-win for everybody.

Works Cited

Lund, Pamela. Massively Networked: How the Convergence of Social Media and Technology Is Changing Your Life. San Francisco: PLI Media, 2012. Print.

Murray, Nick. "Glass Invasion." An Experiment in Social Media. Tumblr, 14 May 2014. Web. 14 May 2014.

Shirky, Clay. Cognitive Surplus: Creativity and Generosity in a Connected Age. New York: Penguin, 2010. Print.

Hello Google Glass, Goodbye Privacy

Glass is just the next step of marketing and advertising jumping out of our computers and into our faces.

Google Glass is only in the beginning stages of, but as Josh Lowensohn writes in his article, Google Glass Now on Sale to All in US, but still in Beta,...

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Q: What Dreams May Come? A: Whatever Google Creates

We are in a world where technology advances are happening so quick, it can cause anxiety to someone who is trying to keep up. If we harvest the technology at our own pace, we can engulf ourselves in a creative wonderland.

Google Doesn't Deliver

One of the biggest players in this wonderland is Google. Their wearable device, Glass, allows users to interact with apps and interfaces thats are projected on a screen in front of them that only the user can see. THIS IS GOING TO TAKE OVER THE WORLD! Right?

Google's public release of Glass left people with dim hopes that they can take the next step into becoming a cyborg. This highly remakrked, highly marketed device barely had enough units to cover the demand. Tech-junkies everywhere were left in disappointment as the device that everyone thought was going to revolutionize every human life as we know it only reached about 10,000 of those lives. Or .00014%.

The Doubters

In his article on The Verge, "Google Glass on sale now on sale to all in US, but still in Beta," Josh Lowensohn writes that "Google says it's built up its stock again, and wants to get the device in the hands of anyone who wants to buy it — as long as it's got the units on hand."

Lowensohn is one of those junkies who expected Google to pull through with their promise as they always do. He feels that Google has abandoned their people and products. He wraps up his article by writing, "Google's offered a development platform on top of Glass to build tools that might make more sense in front of your eyeballs than on a smartphone screen, though more recently has turned its attention to the wrist with Android Wear."

What Dreams May Come

Tech celebrant, Pamela Lund, calls this "inductive imagination" and "fantasy imagination." In her book, Massively Networked," Lund writes about the side of tech that is for the good of the people and allows people to live in a more quantifiable, organized world.

Inductive Imagination

She says, "Inductive imagination gathers input from ordinary experience and puts these elements of experience into a fresh interpretation...inductive imagination brings something new into the world through reinterpretation of things that already exist" (Lund, 382).

Google Glass does this with the maps feature. When walking around a city, you can get info and tidbits on buildings and landmarks you didn't know about. This also applies to the golf course feature. Golfers can now use Glass to see a bird's eye view of the course, wind speed and direction, as well as previous results.

Fantasy Imagination

Fantasy imaginations "extend elements from common experience in novel and unexpected ways" (Lund, 410) This imagination takes reality and alters it, transforming the familiar into an alternate perspective.

Glass embodies this imagination through use of gaming apps. Games on Glass take the world we see and turns it into an interactive gaming platform. We know this style of reality as "augmented reality."

Future We Dream Of

There will always be the doubters and skeptics. We can't let them get in the way of where technology can take the human race. With tools like Google Glass slowly taking its final form, there is no ceiling for advancement into a Utopian-like world.

Works Cited

Lowensohn, Josh. "Google Glass Now on Sale to All in US, but Still in Beta." The Verge. The Verge, 13 May 2014. Web. 14 May 2014.

Lund, Pamela. Massively Networked: How the Convergence of Social Media and Technology Is Changing Your Life. San Francisco: PLI Media, 2012. Print.

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Bad Apple: Apple's Censorship of the App Store

We are in an age where governments are dipping their pen in major tech corporations' ink. What they are trying to create is a technological totalitarian state through digital censorship.

Best Friend Apple

If there is one thing governments want, it's control. If there is one thing major corporations want, it's control. When the two converge, they have the power of total domination.

When we think of tech giants the name Apple either the first or second name to be said. Most people think of Apple as this clean cut, do no wrong, everybody's friend type of company. They are the Derek Jeter of technology.

Unfortunately, Apple is everybody's friend. And actually good friends with a lot of governments. Good friends agree with each other.

In her book Consent of the Networked: the Worldwide Struggle for Internet Freedom, Rebecca MacKinnon writes, "As a condition for entry into the Chinese market, Apple had to agree to the Chinese government's censorship criteria in vetting the content of all iPhone applications ... available for download on devices sold in mainland China." (115)

They did just that. They removed any app that related to the Dalai Lama and Rebiya Kadeer, an exiled Uighur dissident leader.

Apple has tapped into full Big Brother mode just to obtain market access. Something they once mocked in their 1984 Super Bowl ad.

Big Brother Apple

The App Store censorship isn't only confined to China's walls. They have touched down here in America, the land of the free and the home of the brave.

Guidelines have been recently released for any developer trying to publish an app. Some of the restrictions deal with nudity, military actions. government issues, and religion.

What ever happened to freedom of speech? The tech giant's suppression of freedom of speech is a sucker punch right in the Constitution's gut.

Although, some of the apps that are banned are insanely controversial. Take Sweatshop, for instance. This app is a game where the user runs a factory and their success is based on how many deaths or injuries occur to their employees.

Michael Thomsen, writer for Complex, believes that no matter what the content is or how controversial the matter is, it is our right to access these materials.

Since we pay for the phone, service, utilities, a lot of apps, music (we actually are supposed to pay for music), and videos, we are sort of mini shareholders.

In his article, Why Apple Shouldn't Censor the App Store, he writes, "There is no rationalizing Apple's behavior on the App Store, it is an open and unapologetic censor using the most parochial standards to determine what is and isn't appropriate. When you buy your way into Apple's technological ecosystem, you're paying to have blinders installed, barely perceptible though they may be."

Thomsen is a 100% believer in the walled garden effect. This "ecosystem" that Apple has us thinking we are in is guarded by walls imported straight from Alcatraz.

Bringing Apple Back On Our Side

In her recent blog post, Allison Hannah writes, "Changing the world with digital media means creating public and civic value online. We must care enough to use our tech tools to create value. When we care, we can all make a difference in the digital media revolution."

The only way Apple will even think about changing their policies is if we voice together. Our free expression rights are threatened. As horrible as it sounds, tech companies own us.

But at the same time we own them. Without our dollars going to their products, they cannot survive. We are in the early stages of a digital revolution thanks to the power of the internet.

Tech companies are the newest edition to the oil company effect. No matter what they give us at and at what price, we will buy their product because we have come to rely on it.

We all need to listen to MacKinnon in her statement to the people of the revolution that these companies, especially Apple, will only change once "their customers and users force change upon them--just as citizens have forced change on governments that ultimately realized that their survival required it."

Works Cited

Hannah, Allison. "Digital Media Revolution." Internet Communication & Culture. Tumblr, 17 Apr. 2014. Web. 05 May 2014.

MacKinnon, Rebecca. Consent of the Networked: The World-wide Struggle for Internet Freedom. New York: Basic, 2012. Print.

Thomsen, Michael. "Why Apple Shouldn't Censor the App Store." Complex.com. Complex, 11 Apr. 2013. Web. 05 May 2014.

[mattdacosta]

Not Again!

From January 2013 to July 2013, Google removed "more than 100,000,000 links to infringing webpages." Yes, you read that right.

After that time span, Google was weeding out around 15 million web pages from their searches per month. The numbers slowly declined as time went on.

Let Us Search

There is nothing more annoying then doing a search on Google and seeing the list at the bottom of all of the sites they removed from the search.

Not that I am looking to illegally download anything. (Not trying to incriminate myself.)

Pirate's Booty

Pirate Bay is genius by off shoring their server. Being a peer to peer file share only helps their cause.

The Pirate Bay wasn't on Google's top-20 list due to a few reasons. One, they are constantly changing their domain name. They like playing a little game of cat and mouse.

Two, it is peer to peer like I mentioned above. The Bay only holds about two million magnet links. By using UTorrent, users seed their downloads and allow others to download their content simply by putting it on The Pirate Bay.

So essentially, The Pirate Bay isn't putting out the information. They are merely a meeting place for sharers. This is like meeting your friend at the corner, borrowing his new cd, downloading it to your iPod, then giving it back.

It's just we, I mean they, are doing this online.

Works Cited

Ernesto. "Google Removed 100 Million "Pirate" Search Results This Year." TorrentFreak.com. TorrentFreak, 25 July 2013. Web. 24 Apr. 2014.

Google Censoring Torrent Related Search Results

Google is being urged to exclude outgoing links to the famous torrent hosting website The Pirate Bay. This could soon set the standard for web censorship.

Ave Ye Heard of The Pirate Bay?

The Pirate Bay has been growing steadily in both users and contributors and has become the household peer to peer file sharing site. What makes the website so remarkable is the content it provides.

Due to it’s servers being hosted far off the coast of America’s soil and strict laws on copyright, The Pirate Bay’s chest is packed full of illegal content. If one wishes to wade through all of its content it wouldn’t be too difficult to find a recently release film or album of reasonable quality.

Illegal? Shut it Down!

The process in itself is actually worth protecting. Users upload and download data simultaneously from hundreds of other computers which lessens the load on the offshore server.

The content itself sits in a legal grey area. Due to America’s restrictive copyright laws virtually nothing is sent to the public domain. Previously a work could continue to generate revenue for fourteen years before becoming a public good. This would allow the public to use and own content without the fear of legal action being taken against them.

Technically with a few exceptions, the copy of “Gladiator” users are sharing should belong to them already. They’re only accessing what should be a public good.

Google Guides the Flock

Monkey see. Monkey do. Holds strong in the corporate world. Once other companies see that they can start limiting what users can access, it’s all over.

Imagine a world where Comcast decides to block any channel still showing reruns of Full House!

Scratch that. I welcome the change.

Read More

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Police Raid Home Over "Parody" Twitter Account

A fake Twitter account under the name of Peoria, Illinois mayor Jim Ardis caused a two to three week investigation, leading to a home raid.

Three people were brought to the police station from the home and two people were taken from their workplace.

What About the First Amendment?

"The raid has raised questions about how free speech is defined and monitored by governments in the Internet age." (Al Jazeera)

Twitter suspended the @Peoriamayor account weeks before the raid. The account bio stated that it was a parody, meaning fake, account.

Clearly Fake

It did include a picture of the Mayor and his city email but the account was clearly fake. The tweets frequently mentioned sex and drugs.

I don't know what goes on in Illinois, more specifically Peoria, but a mayor tweeting about drugs and sex? Right away that breathes parody. The police didn't think so and took things a little too far.

"A parody means it's fake. It was even listed as fake," Pratt said. "It was a joke Twitter account, and they searched the whole house."

Police Chief Says It Wasn't

Police Chief Steve Settingsgaard said in an email response, "I don't agree it was obvious, and in fact it appears that someone went to great lengths to make it appear it was actually from the mayor."

Reports say that Ardis requested the investigation. Sounds like a serious case of hurt feelings.

Only One Non-Twitter Related Charge Made

So no one was arrested in connection to the account but one person was charged with marijuana possession.

Settingsgaard says "officers were investigating it as a possible case of impersonating a public official, an offense punishable with a fine of up to $2,500 and up to a year in jail." (Al Jazeera)

Works Cited

Al Jazeera and Wire Services. "Parody Twitter Account of Peoria, Ill., Mayor Leads to Police Raid." America.AlJazeera.com. Al Jazeera America, 18 Apr. 2014. Web. 24 Apr. 2014.

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Teaching Twitter

A survey of around 2,000 colleges by the Babson Survey Research Group has found about 80% of faculty members are using social media in their lesson plans.

Ryan Lytle, of U.S. News, claims "Social media has found a prominent place in the college classroom."

Of these media using teachers, "only 2 percent of professors reported using the microblogging site" (Lytle).

Little Known Uses of Twitter

1. Creating a Personal Brand

Students looking for jobs cannot only rely on grades. Personal brand creates a personal voice. 

The content they produce shows insights into who the student advocates for.

2. Learning to be Concise

Twitter allows 140-character limit.

Twitter's limits force students to condense thoughts and leave out junk. Turning this to a full paper can only produce upside due to the weight each word and each sentence holds.

3. Personifying Characters on Twitter

Natalie Wilson, lecturer at California State University, had her students express knowledge of the Twilight series writing style using Twitter by personifying characters using the Twitter site.

Some of her students created campaigns to get rid of Bella's (the main character) social platform.

"It was really impressive what they did," Wilson says. "It was much more effective than just sitting in the classroom talking about the characters."

4. Teaching Execs about Social Media

Social media has no doubt changed the business world. Information is constant. Business execs now more than ever have to react to ordeals quicker through social media.

New classes are teaching students the skills needed to make these quick reactions with effective quality control.

5. Bringing Clients to Class

Teachers are using Twitter to connect their class to clients. 

"Students at DePaul University can go to Twitter for lecture notes in the Entrepreneurial Strategy course, led by Patrick J. Murphy, the associate professor." (Lytle)

Murphy gets her lecture notes from Twitter, allowing her students to access them and business to see what her class is talking about. Murphy says that she has already gained clients through this practice.

More and more students are buying into her plans. Productive students in her class have gained business relationships with professionals because Twitter directly connects the student to the pro.

Works Cited

Robert, Lytle. "5 Unique Uses of Twitter in the Classroom." US News. U.S.News & World Report, 24 May 2014. Web. 20 Apr. 2014.

Tons of web devices are being used to get students actively engaged in scholarly pursuits. Whether it’s online talks or smart blogging, high schools and colleges alike are latching onto these methods to get students involved.

But what effect does this process have on schooling and the web as a...

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Googlism: Church of Google

In an age where people are coming together online to collaborate on projects, a new religion has emerged: Googlism. Google is the closest thing to an actual god the human race will ever see. There is proof.

Personal & Communal

Clay Shirky, in his Cognitive Surplus, argues membership of groups can be difficult enough that members need an emotional commitment to stay through the tough times. (163-164)

This is almost an exact copy how major religions started. Religions formed to build communities. They are social groups people can look to when they are lonely and need personal connection.

In Christianity, people have faith in Christ, becoming a celebrant of life and life after death. In Googlism, members have faith in Google, becoming a celebrant of the internet and all it holds.

"Googlism does not follow any particular ideology. We welcome all sorts of differing views into our community." (The Church of Google)

Google: Savior

Internet users are being spied on. That is a fact. With other companies seeking to make profit using our information, Google is fighting back in our interest.

Brett McLeoud, a UMD student studying Internet Culture wrote in a recent post, "Humans must stand for their rights. Fortunately for us, companies like Google are securing our futures as best as they can."

Jesus was crucified to keep the sins of the human race safe. Likewise, Google is losing out on astronomical profit opportunities to keep the data and information of the human race safe.

Opportunity

Shirky also argues that sharing used to have a high degree of difficulty but social media has changed that. (173)

Thanks to Reddit, (a social site where members can share ideas on certain topics), hosting the largest Atheism group in the world, non-believers collaborated to form the only science-proven religion in the world.

Proof in Google

Google is the closest thing to an all-knowing being. With over 9.5 billion web pages at its command, She can sort through them using PageRank to make information easily accessible for humans.

Google is everywhere. With Wi-Fi and internet available all over the world, Google can used wherever you are.

Google answers prayers. One can pray to Google by doing a web search on any problem they have. Just like "God," Google simply provides answers and try to guide you on the right path. You have to decide what to do with the info.

Google is immortal. The internet can never be destroyed as it is not a physical being. Therefore, Google will last forever.

Google is infinite. The internet is always growing leading to Google forever expanding Her index.

Google remembers all. Your searches and page visits are Cached. Thoughts and ideas are posted on the web and then Cached by Google. When you die, your thoughts will live in Google's Cache forever. "Google Afterlife"

Google can do no evil. Part of Google's corporate philosophy is that they can make money without being deceitful.

Google is the most searched God. Google trends show that "Google" is searched for more than "Jesus," "Allah," "Buddha," "Christianity," "Buddhism," Islam," and "Judaism." COMBINED!

Evidence of Google's existence is abundant. Religions make insane claims and need insane evidence. Want evidence of Google? Go to Google.com. 

*Not to mention the religion isn't looking to become the most profitable organization in history and the members have to pay taxes; looking at you Catholic Church*

Works Cited

MacPherson, Matt. "The Official Church of Google."Theofficialchurchofgoogle.org. The Official Church of Google, n.d. Web. 16 Apr. 2014.

McLeoud, Brett. "Privacy Expired." Brett McLeod UMD. Tumblr.com, 27 Mar. 2014. Web. 16 Apr. 2014.

Shirky, Clay. Cognitive Surplus: How Technology Makes Consumers into Collaborators. New York: Penguin, 2010. Print.

[mattdacosta]

Google to the Rescue

"Like other technology and communications companies, Google regularly receives requests from governments and courts around the world to hand over user data." (Transparency Report, Google)

Way of a Warrant

Google has recently put out a video on YouTube displaying how the deal with the countless requests made by agencies to provide with personal data. The video claims that "Google upholds your rights by upholding the Fourth Amendment." (Google)

The Court Process

Investigator goes to court if they have enough evidence to issue a search warrant

If the Judge inspecting the case feels there is enough evidence, he will issue a search warrant

In Google's Hands

Screener: the screener sorts search warrants.

Producer: examines warrants and protects users by catching errors and decides what info to provide. Sometimes they find out the request is meant for a different company.

Once the producer narrows down the warrant by either calling the agents or they will go to court and ask the judge to amend the warrant.

Next, they notify the user that law enforcement has made a data request.

After the producer narrows down exactly what data to produce, they provide the investigators with the data along with a Certificate of Authenticity.

Sometimes the producer will act as the Custodian of Records and will fly to the courtroom to authenticate that they are using the exact data that Google provided.

Requests Up, Data Down

In the report, the requests for user info has gone up from 12,539 on 12-31-2009 to 27,477 on 12-31-2013.

The percentage of requests where data was produced has gone down from 76% on 12-31-2010 to 64% on 12-31-2013.

Works Cited

Google. "Google Transparency Report." Requests for User Information – Google Transparency Report. Google, 27 Mar. 2014. Web. 13 Apr. 2014.

Google. "Way of a Warrant." YouTube. YouTube, 27 Mar. 2014. Web. 13 Apr. 2014.

Reddit Offers Public Space for Interaction

The ad on the sidebar of the website, Reddit, caught my eye this morning. Unlike typical websites, Reddit’s ads primarily consist of promoting the website itself; Reddit gifts, Radio Reddit, things of that nature. The one that caught my eye reads, “Tell the government to get a warrant- the fourth ammendment applies online too.”

Using the Web for Social Interaction

There’s a picture of a man dressed brightly behind a computer screen, with the shrouded black figures behind him, all with a bright blue back drop. The quote above is at the top of the image. It’s eye-catching. Maybe even provocative. It grabs attention on it’s site from it’s continuously scrolling reader.

This one ad poses a statement while highlighting a controversial question about the government and privacy concerns. It poses the question, “why do we let the government search and seize our information?” Seemingly alluding to the NSA and the scandal after Edward Snowden spoke out about surveillance issues in the U.S.  It makes a statement: we’re being watched.

What does the ad do about it? It’s not merely offering a statement against the NSA. It goes beyond the personal sphere of reflection and provides a public sphere for redditors to discuss the issue (not to say that the conversation on threads are always golden). But the provision is there nonetheless.

Bridging to Community

The potential to create a community and generate a real conversation is there. Reddit provides that as a forum with threads on all kinds of issues. Some threads are personal, some are more serious. As an open website of information it has an agenda to post an ad like that: keep the internet free and open for information. Just by having an ad that poses this statement portrays the desire to move it to communal, and maybe even into something more. 

The name of the thread is “Protect your Rights,” ( http://www.reddit.com/r/ads/comments/1z36qg/protect_your_rights/?already_submitted=true ). Although not much conversation may be occurring right now, it has the potential to. A community board such as this also has the potential to move from community conversations to social changes. 

A free and open forum that provides a community with ongoing conversation allows for people to interact and plan, maybe even cause social change.

Works Cited

“Protecting Your Rights.” Reddit. User: Snowboi. 27 February 2014. Web. 10 March 2014.

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Cyborg Seniors

A study by Pew Research "says catching older Americans online is slowly becoming the norm — and some are adopting smartphones." (Brown)

For a long time, there has been a huge generation gap between the baby boomers, Generation X, and Generation Y.

Generations do differ, but less because people differ than because opportunities do. (Shirky)

Seeing Use For Tech

The elder crowd is slowly adopting the many uses of tech and the internet.

They might not be able to fully understand all of the apps on smart phones, the insane amount of social networks, or dissect every feature but a few key uses have drawn more and more older people to digital devices:

Connect with grandkids

Online finances

Health Services

They Weren't Raised That Way

The problem is that older people never had to rely on these types of tools and devices to stay connected or handle personal business. This is a group of people where their form of a status update is getting home before the street lights came on to tell their parents where they have been.

“You ask, ‘Do you want to get online?’ and they may respond, ‘I don’t know what it would do for me. But if you say, ‘Would you like to see the newest pictures of your grandchildren or get new information on your health services?’ they will say, ‘Yes!’ They just don’t always see tech as that gateway.” (Thomas Kamber, executive director, Older Adults Technology Services)

*Is it ironic that I am writing this on a laptop my parents bought my Grandmother this past Christmas so she could go on Facebook to keep up with the family?*

Works Cited

Brown, Damon. "Seniors Slowly Adopting Technology, but Tweets and Selfies Still Rare." Al Jazeera America. Al Jazeera, 3 Apr. 2014. Web. 09 Apr. 2014.

Shirky, Clay. "Opportunities." Cognitive Surplus: How Technology Makes Consumers into Collaborators. New York: Penguin, 2010. 121. Print.

[mattdacosta]

Having Trouble Staying Off Your Phone? There's An App For That

UNICEF has designed an app where all you have to do is stay off your phone for "10 freaking minutes" and with every 10 minutes you stay off your phone, they will provide a full day supply of clean water to a person in need. (Beer) 

Facebook Actually Doing Good In The Community

"Last year, UNICEF's Tap Project and agency Droga5 challenged you to turn your Facebook network into a fundraising network to help provide clean water to people in need." (Beer)

This is the same concept as the usual function of the app but this time it is staying off the Facebook site.

The Only Problem Is We Are All Addicted

"I Will Never Delete My Facebook!" writes blogger Chris Webber.

I mean I'm not one to judge, maybe if he sees that it can possibly save someone's life he might just stay off of Facebook forever. But I personally know people that won't give any cares in the world and will stay on their phone regardless of the social justice it could do.

So What You Have To Do

Download the app and turn it on

Set your phone down somewhere nice

Live your life

Save someone else's

Works Cited

Beer, Jeff. "If You Can Stay Off Your Phone For 10 Freaking Minutes,            Kids In Need Will Get Clean Water." Co.Create. Co.Create, 21 Feb.        2014. Web. 07 Apr. 2014.

Webber, Chris. "I Will Never Stop Tweeting." Technology Takeover.                Tumblr, 3 Apr. 2014. Web. 07 Apr. 2014.

As I write this post, I’m retweeting. I’m checking Facebook. I’m looking through Tumblr. Reading an email about some homework for another class. And ordering some books from Amazon. It’s multitasking on my computer in the most basic sense, right? But would you say I’m really focused on any one..

[mattdacosta]

Twitter and Elevators

You are wondering what do elevators and Twitter have in common...

The are the first short-term communications medium: "They took no more than a minute or two, often less." (Wilk)

"Like Twitter, the primary value of elevator communication was in making people feel connected, in creating a community" (Wilk)

We are also more likely to tell more to strangers in an elevator even if we don't know who they are. This is where elevators and Twitter meet with each other in a bad way.

Our feeds are filled with people telling their hearts and secrets. Sometimes we are even the spiller of the beans without knowing it. This is because of the ease and shortness of the post.

Some poor folks end up spilling their beans to new bosses. 

Elevators Getting Attention

For a while, a Twitter account @GSElevator  was tweeting tidbits of conversations heard in the elevators of Goldman Sachs employees.

One of the tweets read: “The fact that there are ugly hookers tells you all you need to know about free markets … and men”

Come to find out, the moderator of the account wasn't an actual employee at Goldman Sachs and they weren't really over hearing conversations.

This "Big Brother" Elevator Isn't Science Fiction

Credit Suisse, a financial-sector, has elevators without buttons that are remote controlled. They say they do this so they can send clients to their right floors in certain elevators to be more efficient. They have also been accused of helping U.S. clients hide assets from the IRS.

"But in the Senate report on the scandal, it is described as an almost sinister experience, implying that Credit Suisse managers tightly control transportation and communication inside their offices in order to prevent the kind of leaks supposedly originating in Goldman Sachs elevators."

This is sort of like China, Iran, and Turkey banning Twitter so they don't post anything bad about their leaders or allow any Wikileak type posts.

Works Cited

Levinson-Wilk, Daniel. "Tweeting Between Floors." Al Jazeera America. Al Jazeera America, 26 Mar. 2014. Web. 09 Apr. 2014.

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Negative Reactions

After the $2 billion deal that sent Oculus Rift to the all seeing Facebook, the Oculus owners are getting an upsetting amount of negative feedback.

"These are the kind of mergers that make me cringe," wrote one commenter when Business Insider broke the news on Facebook. "Good companies being swallowed by the Industrial Facebook Machine." Death Threats

"We expected a negative reaction from people in the short term, we did not expect to be getting so many death threats and harassing phone calls that extended to our families," he wrote. "We know we will prove ourselves with actions and not words, but that kind of sh-- is unwarranted, especially since it is impacting people who have nothing to do with Oculus."

Not What They Expected

The company was expecting a positive feedback that over shadowed the negative. In one of the Reddit posts, they wrote how they understand that people are upset but after all the answers they have given the public they don't quite know why.

Really?

Hmm, let me think for a second...

Your company raised $2.4 million through Kickstarter. It's not like the community gave them twelve dollars and a few burgers from BK, they gave them about two and a half MILLION dollars.

Kickstarter is for independent companies. The people donated their money to go in the direction they promised. Then to sell out to a giant who doens't always come through when they buy a smaller company and who isn't the most ethical company is insane. It's a slap in the face.

Works Cited

Szoldra, Paul. "Oculus VR Employees Are Getting Death Threats Following The $2 Billion Facebook Deal." Business Insider. Business Insider, Inc, 30 Mar. 2014. Web. 31 Mar. 2014.

The Oculus Rift is a virtual reality platform, invented mostly for video gaming that was founded via Kickstarter. However, Facebook now owns this platform. The obvious question many have right now is “What’s a social media company going to do with virtual reality?” As journalist Vincent...

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Police Replaced By Cameras

One of the hottest debates right now is privacy vs. security. How far can security go without going over board?

"On this week’s “TechKnow,” contributor and former CIA officer and analyst Lindsay Moran visits Persistent Surveillance Systems, an Ohio-based company that uses high-resolution cameras mounted on planes for neighborhood surveillance.

The PSS system is relatively cost-effective and gives police the ability to observe activity before, during and after a crime — but the concept of aerial surveillance has many citizens up in arms with privacy concerns." (Kile)

Replacing Cops

The city of Dayton, Ohio has just cut over 10% of their police force due to budgets and is now planning on policing their streets via cameras attached to airplanes.

“We’re not going to get those officers back,” said Police Chief Richard Biehl. “We have had to use technology as force multipliers.”

"During a demonstration flight in 2012, PSS technology was able to track a robbery suspect from the scene of the crime — and thwart another attempted robbery in progress." (Kile)

The cost of these planes is around $1,000 an hour for 120 hours (per contract.) Cheaper than that of having to pay a human officer.

This plan was shut down when the city raised opposition against the use of the planes. They pretty much said it was the same thing as using drones.

These cameras are only spying on people and getting lucky to see a crime. I mean, if you have cameras on an entire city, watching all they do then they will see you committing a crime. They will also see you getting dressed in the morning. And who knows who is behind the screens watching what the cameras are recording.

Works Cited

Kile, Meredith. "Privacy vs. Security." America.aljazeera.com. Al Jazeera America, 27 Mar. 2014. Web. 27 Mar. 2014.

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Companies are using brain games to attract and keep social media users interested in marketed items.

Robert McChesney, author of Digital Disconnect and professor at the University of Illinois, says “What people are exposed to significantly shapes what they will demand.” (76)

So as you are...

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The world we call home is living in fear. The future that Orwell’s “1984” depicted is slowly coming true as Big Brother is keeping his eye on us.

The company trying to stop us

CNN Money’s Jose Pagliery put two articles out on the same day. Two articles from two opposing forces pertaining to the...

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PERSONAL DATA: THE NEW OIL

Personal data has become the hot item for governments and for businesses.

This is no longer a conspiracy theory that the neighborhood “whacko” is preaching about. Your data is being sold and you are being spied on.

Pratap Chaterjee, from the progressive/liberal activist site AlterNet, writes, “Inside your mobile phone and hidden behind your web browser are little known software products marketed by contractors to the government that can follow you around anywhere.”

How Do They Get Our Data?

We Give It Away

Have you ever read through the pages upon pages of the Terms & Conditions? My guess is no.

Most companies such as Google, Facebook, Twitter, and even our cell providers use our information at our consent, just by us clicking the “accept” button.

Facebook is now famous for spying as they have written in their Terms that they can access our messages, likes, comments, and other data logged into the site. Everyone accepts the terms because that’s the price we have to pay to use their services.

Because of this, most of the spying is unfortunately legal. “Today, the surveillance state is so deeply enmeshed in our data devices that we don’t even scream back because technology companies have convinced us that we need to be connected to them to be happy.” This is basic advertising 101 on the grandest stage.

Professional Surveillance Companies Check this out: these guys are paid with our tax dollars!

These companies use a technology called International Mobile Subscriber Identity (IMSI). “These highly portable devices pose as mini-mobile phone towers and can capture all the mobile-phone signals in an area.” (Chatterjee, alternet.org) The IMSI catcher tricks phones into sending its data to the catcher.

These catchers are small enough to fit into a briefcase and are no larger than a cell phone. “By setting up several ISMI catchers in an area and measuring the speed of the responses or “pings” from a phone, an analyst can follow the movement of anyone with a mobile phone even when they are not it use.” (Chaterjee, alternet.org)

One of the main players linked to this is the Harris Corporation. They provide technology to the FBI to track where we go via our mobile phones. This corporation has been awarded almost $7 million in public contracts by the FBI since 2001. They have recently designed an IMSI catcher named “Stingray.” “Court testimony by FBI agents has confirmed the existence of the devices dating back to at least 2002. (Chaterjee, alternet.org)

Another company, James Bimen Associates, has designed a software that lets the FBU hack into people’s computers. *The FBI has not denied this.* The FBI seems to have learned from Apple, who constantly hires the hackers behind the jailbreaks to develop the features and designs of updated iOS. It’s just the FBI is hiring the hackers to steal our info to sell to companies such as Apple.

Once a user has hacked into a computer, the possibilities of cyber theft are endless. “For example, SS8 of Milpitas, California, sells software called Intellego that claims to allow government agencies to “see what [the targets] see, in real time” including “draft-only eamiles, attached files, pictures, and videos.

Such technology can also remotely turn on phone and computer microphones, as well as computer or cellphone cameras to spy on the target in real-time.” (Chaterjee, alternet.org) This is freaky because as I type this on my Bluetooth connected keyboard, my iPad camera is looking dead at me.

Data Brokers You ever wonder why ads on Google pages are always for things you are interested in? Well, its these guys.

They sell our Google clicks information to advertisers. They also keep track of reading habits and the questions we search on Google. Facebook is also a player in this as they sell our “likes”, our comments, and the clicks on pages. A known company linked to this activity is Acxiom.

The Next Step: Predicting the Future

Companies like Raytheon, a major U.S. military manufacturer, are using all of this data to predict what people will do next. Raytheon’s latest project is a software named “Riot” that uses data from social networks that draws up numerous spider diagrams that predict where users are most likely to go next and who users are most likely to communicate with next.

“Raytheon’s Rapid Information Overlay Technology software extracts location data from photos and comments posted online by individuals and analyzes this information.” (Chaterjee, alternet.org)

Light At The End Of The Tunnel (For the Lund-Heads)

Not all business and agencies are using our data against us.

Save The Trees

In a recent blog about a digital paperwork service called Canvas, Devon Drennon, Vice-President and Channel Sales & Business Development, suggests that data collection could end paperwork for workers on oil rigs.

Meredith Kile from Al Jazeera America, the un-biased fact based news outlet, took his point and applied it to the basic work force. Kile writes, “Using a mobile wi-fi connection to track ‘on the clock’ workers at a company could eliminate the need for manual timecards and give employers more accurate payroll data.”

Looks like I won’t be fudging my timecards at work for much longer.

Not Only Giving Customers What They Want, But HOW They Want It

Many of the companies that do their own form of data collecting use the info as a tool to better serve their consumer. They do so in order to “better tailor their products or services to each individual customer.” (Kile, aljazeera.com)

By using the data and behavior stats, companies can now fix the shopping experience for each customer based on their previous interactions with the company, brand, and their products.

At the End of the Day

Everything we do is tracked and stored in data pools. Whether we like it or not, we can’t live private lives anymore. There’s nothing we can do about it. How we deal with it though is up to us. I say, just accept it, move on, and don’t incriminate yourself.

Works Cited

Chaterjee, Pratap. “How Private Tech Companies Are Collecting Data on You and Selling Them to the Feds for Huge Profits.” Alternet.org. AlterNet, 8 Oct. 2013. Web. 24 Mar. 2014.

Meredith, Kile. “Need to Know: How Mobile Data Collection Benefits the Consumer.” Aljazeera.com. Al Jazeera, 13 Mar. 2014. Web. 18 Mar. 2014.

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WHAT THE HELL WILL IT BE LIKE FOR MY KIDS?

That picture just made me think of my unborn kids and the unfortunate tech world that they are going to take part in.

I remember watching an episode of True Life where the people lived their "true" lives on virtual reality sites. Most of the people did it just because they were too shy, but now that they can be fully immersed into a virtual world, why ever unplug?

Kids do it now with social networks. I see my cousins in high school that will write freely to girls on Instagram or Facebook but then if we see those girls out in public it's like they don't even know each other. Or my cousins will talk amongst themselves about how they know her and their conversations on the social sites but won't dare talk to her in person.

These augmented reality set are cool, I can't lie, but I do fear that over time they will enslave us. There's no limits to what a person can do in these games/worlds. You want to fly? Then fly. You want to have insane strength? I'm sure you can buy an add-on.

The Really Scary Part

I say this in all my posts: everything is hackable. Imagine a kid that devotes all their time into their virtual worlds where it literally becomes their lives and then all of a sudden someone hacks into their systems. The physiological damage that this can cause is something straight from the movie Inception. In the movie (spoiler alert) Leonardo Dicaprio's wife commits suicide because she doesn't know what is real or fake and she has become so deep into the dream world where they can control everything, her regular life wasn't enough.

Moral of the Story:

We are screwed.

This is something that worries me, truly.

What dreams may come?

Google Glass, Oculus Rift, and soon to be countless other augmented reality devices are becoming more and more integrated with our lives. Soon, they will overrun them, and even the simplest task may need the assistance of technology in order to complete. 

Why is this a problem?

See above photo, scary, isn’t it? I fear that one day we will spend so much of our time enjoying a virtual reality in the stead of our own that we will inevitably boot ourselves out of existence. Imagine a world where machines do everything for us, yet the roads are barren, and so are the fields that we are supposed to be out frolicking in, and the lack of new symphonic sound in the air is maddening. Where is the cultural boom that was supposed to happen once our tech took care of the rest?

I’ll tell you where, the muses of the future are locked away in their cubic studio apartment, trapped in a corner like a junky, tweaking out to something other than drugs: virtual reality. 

Why leave the house when you can have everything you could ever desire from the comfort of your own home?

Is it happening?

The short answer, yes, and here’s how. It used to be, back in the day, that people would actually enjoy talking to each other. Humans are social animals, and in our quest to be better connected and available to the mass public, i.e.: billions of people that none of us will ever meet or even hear about, that we have created a system in which we have alienated ourselves from our natural social construct.

We avoid eye contact in an elevator, sitting beside someone in class is only an option if all other seats are taken, even lunchtime meetings with real life friends are often spent staring down at a smartphone, only looking up to acknowledge one anthers existence to show a funny picture that was found or, dare I say it, take a selfie.

We have become out devices, and lost a large piece of what it is that had made us such a special species to begin with.

What’s the worst that could happen?

The worst, would be the slow deterioration, and extinction of our species. We will be so consumed by the guilty pleasures of an alternate reality, say, for example,  a virtual lover with the tech to make you feel “just right-” with the added benefit of being able to be turned off, literally.

What then? Without reproduction those who have become a slave to their pretentious realities will die off, little more than a spec and a clip of data- their entire lives played out, recorded, and only a molecule in the cloud other’s realities.  We become worthless.

Ponder this:

vimeo.com/8569187/

What happens when everything we touch, everything we do, is aided by this type of technology? Will we Devolve?

Flesch-Kincaid Reading Ease

67.9

Word Count

503