What is the attraction of alternate realities like Second life?

In the words of Godin Second life lets players “find their tribe”(TED2009 2009) be it vampires, sports fanatics or single people looking for dates, all kinds of groups exist in second life and players can communicate and form relationships within the virtual reality game. Unlike real life people in second life represent themselves through self-constructed avatars enabling then to project the image they wish people to see.

Second life has its own currency which can be exchanged for real money (Linden 2011) therefore people can get real paying jobs, buy clothes, houses, attend events, learn, invent, create etc through the virtual environment. Therefore it is possible to make money from second life to support your real life.

Therefore it could be said that alternate realities like second life allow people to transcend their physical location and embodiment and in order to live in an virtual world, although as Malpas points out this doesn’t “release from the limitations of embodiment” (Malpas 2009) in the real world. In order to contribute to this online society users still need to operate a form of ICT of some description, therefore second life doesn’t replace real life it just an alternative way for people to connect and to contribute to their tribe.

 Linden, R. 2011. How to sell Linden dollars. http://community.secondlife.com/t5/English-Knowledge-Base/How-to-sell-Linden-dollars/ta-p/1018151 (accessed 16/11/11).

Malpas, J. 2009. On the Non-Autonomy of the Virtual. Convergence: The International Journal of Research into New Media Technologies 15 (2): 135-139. http://con.sagepub.com (accessed

TED2009. 2009. Seth Godin on the tribes we lead. TED Ideas worth Spreading.

3.4: In what ways are virtual worlds different from the 'real world'? In what way are they the same?

From what I understand of the Malpas reading it is incorrect to think of the real world virtual worlds as separate entities as virtual worlds are depended upon and based upon the structures of real life.

Malpas states  “There is thus only the one world, and the virtual is a part of it”  (Malpas 2009 p.136)

He notes that real and virtual worlds share similarities such as

o   Communication models

·      Linguistics:  the same languages are used in and out of virtual worlds for people to communicate

·      Reading of content: we attach and associate meaning with objects in the real world and these associations are reflected in the virtual world

o   Relationships

·      The basis of a virtual relationship relies on “honesty trust and respect” (Malpas 2009 p. 138) which are the same things we value in face to face relationships

o   Ethics and Law

·      Virtual life is still answerable to the laws of real life e.g. you still have to sign legal terms of agreement to play a game of join Facebook, these are laws made in the real world

·      The ethical beliefs of people in the real world are reflected in the virtual

The difference between the real world and the virtual are

·      That the virtual world cannot operate without the infrastructure that exists in the real world – the real world can operate without the virtual

·      Virtual worlds can be constrained by “genre-specific frameworks”(Malpas 2009 p. 138) and as such do not offer as much diversity as the real world.

Malpas, J. 2009. On the Non-Autonomy of the Virtual. Convergence: The International Journal of Research into New Media Technologies 15 (2): 135-139. http://con.sagepub.com (accessed 16/11/11)

3.3: Are you worried about surveillance on or through Facebook? Why? Why not?

“Teens today grow up in a state of constant surveillance where there is no privacy. So they can’t really have an idea of it being lost. The risk of the government or a corporation coming in and looking at their MySpace site is beyond their consideration” (Westlake 2009 p. 32 quoting Berton 2006:A1).

My days of being a teenager are long gone, but I am also not worried about Facebook surveillance. I am aware that Facebook is in many ways a public place and, as with any public place, I understand that I do not have full control over what happens in it. I can only control what I submit to the site.

I could be filmed on CCTV when walking down the street, or be filmed on security cameras when entering a shop. I assume someone, somewhere is keeping a record of my credit card transactions, phone calls, TV shows I watch through pay TV,  tax returns, when I pay my rent, travel overseas, get a parking fine or visit the doctors. Be it they are different government departments and different businesses monitoring all these things that make up daily life but they are still monitored. Facebook to me just feels like an inevitable extension of this. I am not sure if its right, but it is reality.

 I am fine with Facebook collecting my data, as I am with other businesses and government departments doing the same thing, but in the same regard I don't want it used for immoral, unethical or illegal purposes. Facebook surveillance seems to me to be a big issue when put into the context of surveillance in every day life.

Westlake, E. J. 2008. Friend Me if You Facebook Generation Y and Performative Surveillance. Project Muse 52 (4): 21-40. https://auth.lis.curtin.edu.au/cgi-bin/auth-ng/walkin.cgi?url=http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/the_drama_review/v052/52.4.westlake.pdf (accessed 14/11/11).

3.3: Can you really build a community on Facebook or is it all just a bit meaningless? Give me some examples of Facebook communities.

I think now more than ever Facebook offers a huge scope for creating communities.

My personal Facebook account follows along the same line as Westlake discusses when she states  that the "online world of Facebook reflects the local, “on ground” life of its specific users" (Westlake 2008 p. 23). My account is made up of friends I have met face to face, its a little community of people in my life.

Facebook today also allows users to create pages based on common interests and themes such as
"Local Business or  Place", "Company Organization or Institution", "Brand or Product", "Artist, Band or Public Figure", "Entertainment", or "Cause or Community" (Create a Page 2011) so the commonality that people form communities around no longer needs to mimic outside social circles and personal relationships. I imaging this type of pigeonholing of interests makes good business sense - as a way of collecting and packaging data for resale, but it still does allow communities to form while it performs this function.

 Create a Page. 2011. http://www.facebook.com/pages/create.php?ref_id=20531316728 (accessed 15/11/11).

Westlake, E. J. 2008. Friend Me if You Facebook Generation Y and Performative Surveillance. Project Muse 52 (4): 21-40. https://auth.lis.curtin.edu.au/cgi-bin/auth-ng/walkin.cgi?url=http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/the_drama_review/v052/52.4.westlake.pdf (accessed 14/11/11).

3.3 What is a 'participatory reading'?

Westlake refers to participatory readings as when:

"An internet reader contributes to the text in several ways, not only by connecting pages and text through links and Hypertext, but often by amending or editing content." (Westlake 2008 p. 26)

Therefore adding content to Wikipedia is a part of participatory reading, as is using hyperlinks to direct your reading. I also think participatory reading is when you collect hyperlinks and add comments ( in Facebook, or a blog for example) in order to keep a record of what you have read, or to gather information.

Westlake, E. J. 2008. Friend Me if You Facebook Generation Y and Performative Surveillance. Project Muse 52 (4): 21-40. https://auth.lis.curtin.edu.au/cgi-bin/auth-ng/walkin.cgi?url=http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/the_drama_review/v052/52.4.westlake.pdf (accessed 14/11/11).

3.3 How do you use Facebook? Do you chat? Update? Link? Share? Poke? Create fake profiles?

I'm on Facebook. I update my status occasionally, chat with friends and upload photos. I've created a group around the production of a short film my husband was involved in making as a way of keeping in touch with all our new contacts and I have also created a fake profile for an art unit I studied last year. The unit was called Art and Creativity and the assignment was to think of  "100 things to do with a bucket" - my bucket gained a persona and joined Facebook.

I found it interesting to read about Facebook as a performance (Westlake 2008) as I find that I tend to "perform" or alter my personality more to suit the face to face interactions of a work environment than I do on my Facebook profile.

Office jobs require professionalism that in turn, I feel, requires you to keep parts of your personality under wraps. For example - in work life you should ignore the rude comments of a customer and tolerate the nasty witch you sit next to in order to maintain and air of professionalism, keep the peace and get the job done.

While on Facebook you can unfriend people you don't like, or hide their comments, and choose the things about yourself that you want to let people know. Facebook is a social performance while professionalism could be explained as a corporate one. Or maybe this is more reflective of my desire to avoid confrontation which according to Westlake is a typical attribute of Generation Y. (Westlake 2008 p 37)

Westlake, E. J. 2008. Friend Me if You Facebook Generation Y and Performative Surveillance. Project Muse 52 (4): 21-40. https://auth.lis.curtin.edu.au/cgi-bin/auth-ng/walkin.cgi?url=http%3A%2F%2Fmuse.jhu.edu%2Fjournals%2Fthe_drama_review%2Fv052%2F52.4.westlake.pdf (accessed 14/11/11).

3.2 - Notes on Networks or Information

In the ilecture this week Dr Tama Leaver discussed the evolution of blogs, stemming from the creation of blogging software (such as the one I’m using Blogger.com) that made publishing on the net accessible to the average web surfer. In terms of news, Leaver states that the amalgamation of media companies in the past means that the majority news corporations are owned by a small few, and as such the content they publish is viewed by the general public with a sense of skepticism (Leaver 2011). Therefore news blogs have become a popular part of today’s media landscape, as a way for people to seek differing points of view, or to read or add opinions about news items. As discussed in the readings for this week, Blogs too have issues with credibility.

Reading 1: Blogs of War by Melissa Wall gave an overview of the history of Journalism including those who create news-based weblogs. War believes that blogs offer society a new form of Journalism that is forms a symbiotic relationship with traditional media sources. As Wall states “news blogs typically don’t generate original content but rely on other sources for their links as inspiration for commentary”(Wall 2005 p. 156) meaning that blogs rarely uncover new news items but do critique, comment on, offer opinion and new information to news items  from existing sources such as a traditional newspapers. Wall states that while although bloggers are not journalists in the traditional meaning of the word, they do gain credibility by providing links to their sources of information, and through their more personalised, opinionated writing style.

Reading 2: The Mobile Phone and the Public Sphere by Janey Gordon looked at how mobile phones are used to report news and circulate information focusing on the relationship between citizen journalists and the gatekeepers of information. Gordon's research into the reporting of the SARs epidemic in China found that despite the general public having access to the technology to broadcast news to the world , the exchange of information can be controlled by governments via laws and firewalls the prevent information getting through. Her  research into the London bombings found that citizen journalism by victims and witnesses supported the traditional news institutions by operating as an source of information and images that they then used as a part of their coverage (Gordon 2007).

A ted talk on the creation of wikipedia by Jimmy Wales discussed the virtues of collective intelligence through his creation of a free encyclopedia of which content is added to entirely by volunteers. Wales has managed to harness the peoples desire to participate in the way history his told. His talk revealed that there are gatekeepers within wikipedia, volunteers who vote, administrators that hold more wight than voters and himself, the “monarch” who makes the rules. Although Wall states the information on wikipedia is a credible and reliable source he encourages people to test it for Quality assurance.

The task this week was to note the blogs I visit and what attracts me to them, I read a lot of trade blogs but no news blogs so decided instead to take a look at one news items across multiple platforms – blogs owned by newspapers, a weblog about news and wikipedia to see which one I found more credible. The news item I chose was the News of the World Phone Hacking Scandal which I found interesting as it questions the ethical collection of information by large media corporations in order to sell news as a commodity.

The Daily Telegraph:

Searches on this site brought denied access to articles with headlines that looked to have the potential to shine the Murdoch's in a poor light such as Murdoch accused of false blame shifting. The first news article I could actually access was entitled James Murdoch denies knowledge of hacking . While the author does acknowledge that the article was written for a paper that is owned by the same parent company involved in the scandal, to me it is not a credible news source. A news company embroiled in legal scandal over ethical reporting is not the one I turn to for the facts.

 

ABC NEWS:

This is a source I feel I can trust, mainly because it is government owned although I am now a questioning my judgment as isn't the role of journalists to report on the running of government? How does this work when it is owned by government? Anyway in regards to the phone hacking scandal, the ABC uploaded a short clip from a news bulletin called “A quick guide to thephone hackingscandal”. This clip reminds me of educational lectures from university which is perhaps why I trust it and proves Walls theory of credibility through the style in which information is presented. I feel as I have been educated after watching this, not as if I have had the wool pulled over my eyes.

 

LSE Blog:

Well I think Ive just found a blog to read that discusses news topics. LSE is the The London School of Economics and Political Science and I think proves that not all blogs are uneducated one sided drivel. The post entitled Phone-hacking and press reforms: British journalism needs anew sense of ethics but politicians should not be allowed to move the goalposts stands back from the sensationalist headlines and places the phone hacking scandal in the context of politics and law to reveal more sides to the story. I like the wider angle view point and the idea that the information presented is not done so as part of a mud slinging match between news corporation and news corporation. Hyperlinks is what gives this story credibility as I can access the writers (Charlie Beckett) biography, other blogs, books etc which brings as sense of trust due to his willingness to be accountable for the information presented, and not posting anonymously.

 

Wikipedia:

There is a lot of information in the wiki post called News International Phone Hacking Scandal, and to be honest too much to read. I tend to follow up on information presented on Wikipedia, it could be credible but as there is no one person accountable, I find it good to check the facts they present. For this news story alone it is a great resource to find articles about the phone hacking scandal (there are 288 references at this point in time) and it is great having links to all people involved, but in my mind is not credible information on its own.

 

Gordon, J. 2007. The Mobile Phone and the Public Sphere. Convergence: The International Journal of Research into New Media Technologies 13 (3): 307-319. http://cvg.sagepub.com (accessed 9/11/11).

Leaver, D. T. 2011. Networks of Information: Blogging, citizen Journalism & collective intelligence. Curtin University of Technology.

Wall, M. 2005. Blogs of war: Weblogs as news. Journalism 6 (2): 153 - 172. http://jou.sagepub.com.dbgw.lis.curtin.edu.au/content/6/2/153.full.pdf+html (accessed 8/11/11).