FInal Blog Post

Technology can be a good thing just as it can be bad. Technology has lead to amazing developments within our society. Growing up as a child in the 2000s is when technology was at its peak. My first phone ever was an LG Cosmo. It was not touch screen and it had a sliding out keyboard for texting. The games the phone included was poker, pac-man, and tetris. There was no social media besides myspace and only adults used that at the time. When I was little I thought myspace was a homework app where you're supposed to write so I never touched it. Technology started to advance more after the IPhone and other touch screen phones came out. As well as when Mark Zuckerberg created the first social media app, FaceBook. Soon after, many other social media apps came to be such as Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat, Vine, Music-ly (now TikTok). I was in the age range of ending elementary school and going into middle school when I first got instagram and that is where it all started.

When it comes to a "healthy" relationship with technology, if I have to be honest I would say no I wouldn't be considered a person with a healthy relationship with technology for a numerous amount of reasons. Personally I believe the time where I grew up was the last group of kids from a young age would be fine with living with no technology. It started to advance at a crucial part of my life which was leaving childhood and becoming a teen. My parents gifted me with a phone at a young age for safety and because it seemed like every other parent was doing it at the time. Ever since gaining a phone, it has become my main source of communication and without my phone I feel very disconnected from my friends, family, and even the world. The other day I was doing a homework assignment, one of my friends texted me and I picked up my phone to answer, it died. Immediately ran to my room and sat there feeling so disconnected and sort of antsy until it turned back on. 

With the advances in technology there comes social media. In my own personal opinion I feel that is what takes up a lot of my time. I procrastinate a lot with homework or personal things I need to do because I'd rather sit there on my phone watching TikTok for hours and worry about it later. With technology and social media, I believe it has made me aware of a lot of things that I wouldn't hear or see on a daily basis without it, yet there is so many sources and people out there spreading false media and information that changes a lot of peoples opinions on things without knowing the truth. Personally I like to do my research on things that I hear before just believing it. 

My friends relationships with technology are a lot like mine, I'm not suggesting everyone and every situation, yet very similar worries or things we care about. Such as how many likes I'll get on a post on Instagram or being extra insecure because of photoshop and bad body images. My families relationship with social media and technology on the other hand is completely different. My parents don't worry about the things I worry about, they tell me how it is minuscule, which is probably right but I can't help to care. I have a brother and he's about two years older than me, I feel that him being a straight male makes him not care about what he posts or how many likes he gets because most boys I know couldn't care less about something like that.

When looking at someones online footprint, that can determine a lot about who they are from what they post or say. Looking at my online footprint, is surprisingly low. Yes, I have basically every social media and post a lot, but I keep my account on private because I don't want just anyone be able to access that. I know what you're thinking and that there is always a way around the privacy setting and you're right. When I post something, I post to the standard of my morals and values that I was taught from my parents. When googling myself the only thing that pops up is my Instagram handle and there is not one picture of me, rather there is Linkedin pictures of some of my family members. Technology has created some amazing things and one of those things that I talked about was social media. There is good and bad in everything, it is up to us how to prevent the good from going away.

Blog Post #10

It it hard to depict benefits with privacy from all this new AI technology. Personally I don't see any pros I mostly only see cons to this because of the lack of privacy. This new technology such as Ring Door Bells, Amazon Alexa, or even Google take away from peoples privacy. Ring Door Bells track when you leave the house, when you come back, who comes back with you. There have been a few instance where hackers have been able to get into Ring Door Bells and their secuirty cameras and watch and talk to people in their own homes. There was this one instance when a hacker was talking to a little kid through a baby monitor which is very scary, very serious, and a big treat to privacy and secuirty. 

The Age of AI documentary shed a light onto some of these issues and possibly worse things that could happen in the future. Personally it freaked me out and didn't sit right with me. There already is a lack of privacy in todays day in age. Theres a theory that our phones listen to us thats why we get ads for things we have never searched up but have only vaguely talked about and our phones picked it up. These are all cons dealing with privacy. In my opinion I see no pros to privacy dealing with this because we are not gaining any privacy, it seems we are constantly loosing it. With The Age of AI I believe it isn't a good thing because it can lead into many harmful, insecure, and bad outcomes with technology which doesn't need to go that far as AI. 

Blog Post #3

On the Eight Values of Free Expression, the one that resonates with me the most would be the sixth option Promote Tolerance — see Lee Bollinger, The Tolerant Society: Freedom of Speech and Extremist Speech. This one resonates with me the most because it is about Freedom of Speech. Freedom of speech is a right granted to every American citizen under the first amendment. It allows any person or group to express their thoughts, ideas, feelings, or beliefs that no one is allowed to take away from them. The First Amendment protects any type of speech whether that is positive speech or hateful speech that is why it is called freedom of speech. Having to hear hateful speech helps us to become more mature and tolerant within our own society which is a good thing. Hate speech can spread positive learning as well such as teaching others and especially young people the difference between good and bad and steering them on the right path. I believe it is good to see both sides of things. That way you get all of the knowledge and having the freedom of speech in our country allows that to happen. With the  Eight Values of Free Expression the one that feels most important to me is number two, Participation in Self-Government — see Alexander Meiklejohn, Free Speech and Its Relation to Self-Government. I feel that voting is of most importance in today's society. With voting and each opponent it is vital for each candidate to be able to express what they want to achieve, strive for, and offer to the table so the voters have all the availability to choose their preferred candidate with all the information. To have a fair and right election, we want each voter to be informed with each side fairly. With recent and past elections there has been a debate with fairness and legitimacy. The idea is to stop that conspiracy so that each person has a fair election and vote. On the Eight Values of Free Expression, number four, Individual Self-Fulfillment ( aka Self-Actualization) — see C. Edwin Baker, Human Liberty and Freedom of Speech, feels most personal to myself. It is about free speech with an individual's personal self. Free speech deals with a person's own self, identity, and what they believe. That is very important to me and feels most personal to me. I feel that because it is important for any person to be able to express themselves the way they want. Whether that be that way the dress, what kind of music they listen to, religion, and to be able to have the ability to express virtually what they believe. Something that I see in action today is number 5, Check on Governmental Power (aka Watchdog Role) — see Vince Blasi, Checking Function of the First Amendment. This is about government power and abuse. Some examples of that include Watergate, Irangate, and Clintongate. Recently the FBI invaded former President Donald Trump's home. The raid on his home was due to classified information. The government and FBI went through his house and documents to look for wrong doings while he was in power. 

 

Blog Post #5

In Main Stream news and media, even though it may be relevant and true, it is censored in a way. Take ABC News for example, you might find similar topics in articles, news clips, or stories as to what is on https://www.antiwar.com but it is not quite how that website is explained and sorted out. On Antiwar they have a bunch of different countries and under each of those countries there is links to articles about what current news is going on. This gives a variety of new news sources to look at and stories about topics we may have even heard about in our daily news that we receive everyday. I feel this could be a sense of censorship because it is hidden and not popular to the public eye for everyone to see and read. The other website https://www.theamericanconservative.com I have never seen or heard of earlier. By browsing through their page I can see that it isn't like any ordinary news source. It makes me wonder as to why I haven't seen or heard of it and who is censoring this type of news.

Blog Post #9

The Sherman AntiTrust Act was founded and passed in 1890. The Sherman AntiTrust Act authorized the federal government to institute proceedings against trusts in order to dissolve them. The purpose of The Sherman AntiTrust Act was to promote economic fairness and competitiveness to regulate interstate commerce. The Sherman AntiTrust Act I believe had some valid ideas and points but it didn’t last all too long. The Sherman AntiTrust Act was named for senator John Sherman of Ohio. John Sherman was the chairman of the Senate financial committee and secretary of the treasury under President Hayes. After a decade the Sherman AntiTrust Act was invoked. The Sherman AntiTrust Act was unsuccessful because of the narrow judicial interpretations of what constitutes trade or commerce for all of the states. The Sherman AntiTrust Act outlawed "every contract, combination, or conspiracy in restraint of trade," as well as "monopolization, attempted monopolization, or conspiracy or combination to monopolize”. Before it was outlawed the Supreme Court said that The Sherman AntiTrust Act can’t prohibit every trade that is being made. The Sherman AntiTrust Act was made to help smaller businesses and the working class. I think this is one of the greater purposes of The Sherman AntiTrust Act made. The Sherman AntiTrust Act was amended by the Clayton Antitrust Act in 1914. The Clayton Antitrust Act addressed specific practices that The Sherman AntiTrust Act did not ban. At the time when The Sherman AntiTrust Act was first founded and passed, many people were very upset with large corporations like Standard Oil or American Railway Union. These two large corporations were seen as unfairly monopolizing certain industries. A lot of people saw and felt like they were hit with high prices with essential goods. Competitors felt shut out by large corporations to keep other enterprises out of the market. After this started happening, a big shift occurred in American business and marketing. Big business arose in the early 19th century. Some American lawmakers thought the right idea was to regulate business practices more strictly. This is where The Sherman AntiTrust Act comes in. The Sherman AntiTrust Act created new laws and ideas such as the Clayton Act. The Clayton Act came out in 1914 and its objective was to prevent unfair methods of competition in the business world. It banned price discrimination and anti-competeitive merges. The Clayton Act declared strikes, boycotts, and labor unions legal under the federal law. This became widespread and a lot of support until lawmakers wanted to keep the market economy competitive while business is changing. Here are some interesting facts about The Sherman AntiTrust Act. If you violated the Act you could serve a hefty punishment of 10 years prison time as well as paying a fine up to a million dollars for an individual person and 100 million for a corporation. There have been a few of today's companies who have been accused of violating The Sherman AntiTrust Act. Some of these companies including Google, Microsoft, and Apple have all received complaints. The Sherman AntiTrust Act and The Clayton Act both remain in force in America. 

https://www.investopedia.com/terms/s/sherman-antiturst-act.asp

Blog Post #7

 The present technology has spread because as it advances we advance with it. I feel that some of the later generation adapts slower or not at all to new or upcoming technology because of their beliefs and maybe because things are advancing to past. For example not matter how many times I try to explain what snapchat is to my mom and how it works, she will never fully get it or understand how to use it. She has Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and even Tiktok and she completely understands all of it but I think to myself why can't she ever figure out Snapchat. I believe this could be maybe it's just a confusing technology that she doesn't get because so many new social media apps came to us so quickly. The younger generation adapts and develops faster than the older generation because they have not known anything else. For example my generation, when I was born there was cell phones and way more technology then when my parents were born so I think having some sense of growing up with technology and watching it advance makes it easier for say my generation to adapt to it. I believe there are positives and negatives to new technology especially social media. I feel some of these apps are nice to have but you don't necessarily need them. For instance I think Tiktok is a fun social media app where you can be creative and I get a lot of laughs from. Then there's Instagram where I don't normally go on everyday and don't post all too often. On Instagram people also like to edit themselves too much especially celebrities who set a false body image to many girls. 

https://www.googleadservices.com/pagead/aclk?sa=L&ai=DChcSEwjvt_2d5sz6AhUxFdQBHSezAV0YABABGgJvYQ&ae=2&ohost=www.google.com&cid=CAESa-D2gEBAZreNAK_1j4xp9orgk5_zKaX3rJ1L2oU50Skagn-u3hWDzz0titp2BRTNmW-YRnzxRAOAkdAjV-ipPd17h65yU4Z3d-UGrjTHu_d51WWZxhfxDtJxhQFP0OGnE6auYjEh1_7ET1fs&sig=AOD64_0rOUCQ7q0V48HwvYxPK3udszuW7Q&q&adurl&ved=2ahUKEwi8t_Od5sz6AhV9nWoFHXN2BlIQ0Qx6BAgKEAE&dct=1

Blog Post #11

 

In group 3, one of the presenters did her presentation on the Gatekeeping Theory. I found her presentation to be very insightful and interesting. The definition of Gatekeeping Theory is selecting and then filtering items of media that can be consumed with time or space that an individual happens to have. I have heard of the name Gatekeeping Theory but never have learned up until the presentation what it truly meant. I found it to be very a very interesting theory.