The Internet: Curse or Blessing?

A lot of what we have talked about in class so far has been about the negative and positive aspects in using the internet. Many people are nostalgic and adamant about "the good old days" before the internet being better, and our generation being flawed. In Boyd's Chapter "Researching Cybercultures" she brings up a very valid point: the internet has become overwhelming and searching through it has become a task in itself. Although I agree - searching for articles for research isn't easy and search engines don't always discriminate well - I also think this allows us to explore. We have huge access to amounts of information that wasn't always found at libraries. Sure, librarians can catalog and probably help you find something more specific to a topic than Google might be able to. But there are certain things you can't research so easily.

Take some examples:

Say there is a boy in small town Alabama, who is struggling with his sexuality and has no information on what this may mean in a larger context, or no examples to follow. The Internet has many articles about gay rights, other people to relate to who are gay, or could probably even answer some of his questions. But he wouldn't have been able to find those answers circa 1950 in a library.

Say someone is doing a project on human trafficking in the US. There are SO many more articles, news stories, hotlines, organizations, and tips online than in a library. There is some information a library can't provide you with (say a hotline to NHTRC - national human trafficking resource center - which by the way is 888-373-7888 & if you are interested in this topic I am passionate about it and would love to talk about it for DAYS.)

So yes, there is a lot of clutter. There are projects for school where utilizing librarians would probably be a better idea than consulting Google. The internet is full of crap. Yes. But it is also filled with research, information, and guidance for those issues and questions we have that we can't find in a library. Today, part of librarians job now includes helping students navigate through the clutter. But is it THAT big of a deal, that we'd want to sacrifice all the other information we have gained and go back to having only libraries at our disposal? I think it's worth the time and energy to search through the clutter than to give up a whole world of knowledge.

Google: A Negative or Positive Power?

Google is not just a search engine now. It has snuck its way into our multiple uses of the internet (mail, calendar, videos, blogging, and many more.) It does have a lot of power in our lives - I think I'd have a meltdown if Google stopped working for a week. As an office assistant, my entire job heavily relies on it and as a freelancer I wouldn't be able to function without my Google calendar keeping track of work hours and keeping in touch with clients. But does that mean it is a negative thing? No, not necessarily. 

I'd like to think that this is one of those innovations that past generations fuss about but that ultimately, has a positive effect on people. Like when the typewriter came out and people thought that this type of technology would ruin writing and our "literacy" or "intelligence" or whatever their relatively silly argument was. And how the printing press by Gutenburg was challenged by multiple critics. And although they were right about some things - like the protestant reformation - but it also revolutionized our world. Ordinary people wouldn't have had access to the knowledge they did and we wouldn't have grown in the way we have without it.

I wouldn't feel as comfortable to wander the streets of Rome aimlessly and get lost during study abroad if I didn't have google maps on my phone to find my way home. People wouldn't be able to have meetings across the country through Google Hangout. And group papers may not be as easy if we didn't have Google Docs to share files and edit group projects. Google does have a lot of power in our lives, but it isn't GOOGLE we are reliable on, its the services they provide. If Google didn't exist, we'd probably be "addicted" to another site providing these services. 

I think there are some concerns with privacy, and I've heard skeptics say that Google searches through your email. However, Google and other people on the internet cannot search out what you don't provide. So if you don't want people knowing where you live, don't provide that information. Also, I think there is a rightful concern for the Google Streetviews. It is one of the apps that I'm not sure is necessary. It would make sense to establish  a street view for businesses and what surrounds them, so that people who are visual can place where the business is in a particular location, but there isn't a point to having residential views. 

Bloggers on Blogging

I searched through many of the bloggers listed as available to us. Click after click after click. Nothing was catching my eye. When I stumbled across Heather Armstrong's page I finally found something that interested me. Here was a blogger that got me: a designer that wanted to write. Who understood the frustrations of clients and the need to stray away from Photoshop now and again. Although her life has changed since she started her blog, and she now writes a lot about raising a family, I found the beginning of her blogging story relatable, as I'm sure other parents find her story about raising a family relatable now.

Her reason for writing seems to be a reason most people start: for herself, for her family. She says she wants tell a story in a way that her family can feel as though they've witnessed an event as well - especially when it comes to her daughter. She wants to provide her perspective from small things and little occurrences in her everyday life - not big ideas such as political debates and grand gestures. Those are the things I enjoy reading about though. There is another blog called "Enjoying the Small Things" that I LOVE reading (and by love I mean I have become so enthralled by this story, I crawl into bed with my laptop and admire her pictures and story, and reading late into the night. It's like a giant, bestselling novel I can't put down.) The everyday life is relatable and doesn't require a background of knowledge in a specific topic. It's real.

I think the reason both of those blogs (Heather's and "Enjoying the Little Things") are successful is because they are honest. As Heather notes "I say things people are afraid to say." I think the interview helps unravel this idea, and shows the reasoning behind the blogger's writing. Even though we may see it and be able to identify it, hearing it first hand from the blogger hits the nail right on the hand and helps us new bloggers to understand it. And, hopefully, to find inspiration and reason from it.