Community of Practice

I believe online communities are very helpful to the individual, especially when someone feels "alone." In an online community, it's the exact opposite of this where you feel a sense of security. For example, my aunt lives in upstate Connecticut. The closest city is about 2 to 3 hours away and the woods is basically her back yard. I would not say my aunt and uncle are secluding themselves from society, but the property is very "out there," and it always has been. We only see each other a few times per year. Even when I got a cell phone text messaging was not really helping their connection with the rest of the family. Once more and more social networks starting coming out, the family began using them. Me and my aunt have now been part of a great online community for the past three years. With school I am online a lot, but I try to stay away from the social networks because of the addictiveness is entails. However, when my brother, father, aunts, uncles, and cousins are constantly participating in this online community, it gives me great motivation to participate. It has helped keep the family much closer rather than distant. We get the best of both worlds here. The family has been getting into this routine about posting facts and asking questions daily. I do learn something new everyday in the classroom, but I never thought I would be learning something new from an online community we create between our family. So, I am not only learning about each family member's lives and keeping up to date, but I am also learning cool new facts about this life in general. The Internet is a great tool and I suggest everyone to start taking advantage of it.

Social Networks Becoming Invisible

Personally, this transition would affect me a lot. If we are moving towards a complete "online community" it will be a very depressing time for myself. I love to go into a music store and search around for my new favorite CD that I will listen to for weeks. Sadly enough, the only books I read are textbooks that are mandatory for school. I do remember in a lecture we had a few weeks ago, you spoke of Google Books, where you ultimately could do anything you wanted with it. You can buy a book or you can just "browse" by typing words into the search engine. Google will display every time that word comes up in that specific book. If I enjoyed reading books, this would be a very fascinating feature. So, if books were to make this transition I really would have no problems with it. My entire life has been surrounded by music. My friends from home to college are obsessed with finding that new, awesome, underground band that no one has heard of. And I hear of new music either through radio, going to music festivals, or word-of-mouth. However, when my friends tell me about new bands, it all comes from the Internet which is really no surprise. Overall, I'm somewhat split on how I feel about the situation. For movies, the only place I ever feel good advertisement and promotion is through commercials on the television. I rarely find new great movies through the internet. I am not dependent on the Internet which is a comforting fact. I like to hear about music through my friends and I enjoy seeing commercials for up-and-coming movies. There's not much more I can ask for.

EBay

I have used EBay many times in the past. One experience sticks out to me as devastating. I am a huge New York Knicks fan and for years I have been looking for an Allan Houston jersey that is my size. I came across one jersey that read medium. I say to myself, "Perfect! finally an adult jersey my size." The jersey in the picture looked reasonable, and since it was a close-up the display looked very big. A couple weeks later I get the jersey in a very small package. It ended up being a "kid's medium" which it stated no where on the advertisement. Before completing the order I had to place all my debit card information through "PayPal," which made it very easy purchase. Overall, this was the only time I had a bad experience. I have bought plenty of old Nintendo 64 games and old controllers in mint condition through fair prices. So, with the example being the only terrible experience through EBay, I am sure I will be using the service in the near future.

You have an important personal question...

Before coming to JMU, as a Freshman the college campus can be very intimidating. I had a lot of personal questions running through my mind. Questions like, "How am I going to survive? How am I going to live on my own? How do I do well in a college class?" The first thing I ran to was the internet and the first search engine I could think of was Google. The procedure was fairly quick, and very easy to access. I typed in the search engine, "tips for first year college students." All these questions were circling through my head, and Google made me extremely relaxed once reading all the tips provided. So, instead of typing in a question into Google, I typed in more of the subject of my question. This appeals to me because I believe Google is the easiest, fastest way to get the answer you desire. The only thing I do not like about the search is you are almost forced to type in subjects rather than questions. For years it seems search engines have been trying very hard to make it possible for people around the world be able to type a simple question and get an answer. Now, I'm not saying you can't do that because there are simple questions that have simple answers. However, when the question becomes more complex, you are forced to type in subjects rather than the whole question itself.

Member Of a Group

I am a member of the fraternity Pi Kappa Alpha. As a chapter, we are organized by an executive board who makes the "executive decisions" for our fraternity. The executive board consists of a president, two vice presidents (internal and external), a treasurer, a secretary, a risk manager, the sergeant at arms, and the pledge educator. These positions are elected every year. The entire board addresses the chapter every Sunday on new information and new events that will be taking place. They cover the week we just went through, and the future weeks ahead. Now, I don't want to say the executive board tells the fraternity everything. There is a meeting prior to our "chapter meeting" where "exec" discusses major issues that not everyone can hear. The reason why we elect these individuals is because we have trust that they can lead our fraternity to success and there must be disclosure, or separation between exec and the rest of Pi Kappa Alpha in order for that to happen. So, our "manager" would have to be our president, because he appoints every meeting and is the leader of every discussion that takes place in our chapter meetings. Like I said before, not all information is distributed, but that is up to the executive board to make these decisions.

Social Networks

I believe all the social networks mentioned in the question have been great tools in present day society. I call them tools because they have so many different functions. For example, Facebook was originally created for a social network consisting of college kids. I believe that was the main focus. As time went on, the amount of users on Facebook grew exponentially. In my mind, I feel as if Facebook started having the same motives as Google does today. I'm not saying there objectives are the same, I am simply saying the way they generate revenue is identical. However, in no way is it a scam. Facebook has become very user-friendly because it goes above and beyond the "social network." It has been great for non-profit groups to get huge turn-outs at certain events because Facebook has become a major promotion tool in our society. It not only helps promote non-profit groups, but also small bands that people may not know too much about. In a sense, it provides people a chance to speak up and be noticed when these type of people are never heard. I believe these social networks stand for a good cause and a great promotional tool for all who choose to use it. And by promotion, this can go from an individual, a small group, to a major business. This is why the social networks are so effective because anyone can use them.

Loyalty Cards

I had a history teacher for two years in high school who always had a story to tell. One was particularly on his wife who loved to shop. At least once every couple of weeks, she would come home and go on and on about how she "saved" so much money at the store. He would say, "the only reason you bought any of these items is because they were on sale, or because you had a discount card." I could not agree with him more. The whole idea behind loyalty cards, or discount cards, is to buy more of the store's products. Essentially, you are not saving money, you are spending money. If you never had a discount card for certain products, you would never buy them. So, no, I do not believe our purchasing privacy is worth a discount. In my mind, I believe the whole "discount idea" is just a huge scam to reel in customers into making them believe you are saving when you are really spending. I know it is difficult to keep one's privacy in the society we live in today, but, if there were no discount cards it would be one less thing to worry about. I do see the positives that come out of these cards to aid in their marketing tools demographically.  However, there are multiple alternatives in finding your target audience and I just feel discount cards should not be one of them. For example, surveys could be handed in and out of stores. You could also have surveys online, or, simply have employees casually ask quick questions that could benefit the business for research. Again, there are many different ways to go about researching for your business, and discount cards, in my mind, should be banned from the American society.

Google

I believe from a business standpoint, what Google is doing is smart. The Chinese government can be strict when it comes down to censoring. Their citizens do not possess the freedom that Americans have. In China, if Google refuses to censor certain things, the Government could ban the search engine from the entire country, losing a huge portion of their revenue. Every country in this world has different beliefs and there is no way around it. If you want to do business in different countries, you must be flexible in order to make everyone happy. China has been brought up through a very strict past. These type of "orderly" values are engraved into their minds, and most likely will never change. I, without a doubt, have no problem with information being filtered in China. It is simply what works for both parties.

What name would you liked to be called, your major, your career plans, and what you hope to learn from this course.

1.) Andrew
2.) Communication (Organizational)
3.) My career plans do not stretch too far right now. I recently had an internship at a tanker brokerage this summer which fits perfectly with my major so that can always be a fall back plan. However, what I will strive for is a career in marketing, specifically advertising. And by advertising, I mean anything from billboards, newspapers, magazines, to television commercials.
4.) Well, I am an "Educational Media" minor for a reason. I love working with my computer and technology in general. Working with technology and media cannot be more relevant in our lives. So, I would really like to be able to take as much information as possible, and place it through the most effective ways using the available technology and media offered in our present day society. Practice makes perfect, and that's what I hope to learn from the course.