Webhunt2 Response

The DL model, if used to replace the traditional university, would definitely have a drastic impact upon the interconnectedness of the staff, students, and community involved with the university. Without face-to-face interactions, it is very hard to create or maintain the emotional bond needed to build relationships between students, staff members, the community, and towards the university itself. Digital learning provides convenience, but there is no such thing as working together and for someone outside of ourselves when we are sitting behind a monitor with no interaction to the outside world.

Privacy: The Social Security Number and Identity Theft

In this digital age is has become so easy for and individual's privacy to be compromised by technology. Risks involving technology and identity theft is oftentimes ignored by the general population since it is something that most of us can not physically see - it is a process that is invisibly, yet its results and consequences are very real. The social security number is one thing that we should be concerned about when considering the risks of having these identification numbers in databases that can easily be hacked and used for identity theft. Many examples of such breaches upon personal information can be seen in this website that shows us just how many breaches have occurred between the years 2005-2007: http://www.privacyrights.org/ar/ChronDataBreaches.htm#CP

As we can see through this website, identity theft through hacking into databases or computers is a common occurrence since many of these sources contain sensitive data, such as our social security numbers.

Self, Identity and Community

For this assignment, I observed postings from the following Usenet groups: rec.music.beatles, soc.history.what-if, and alt.tv.american-idol.

Usenet groups such as the ones listed above are a means in which people of common interests use to share their thoughts and ideas. They are the tools that individuals use to generate and sustain an "online community"; however, according to Christopher Scheer, a freelance writer and editor, the communication that occurs through computer networks will never measure up to actual human interactions. This is attributed to the fact that computers decrease and limit human contact which in turn "weakens people's sense of community and widen existing social divisions."

Communities require human interaction and interpersonal communication, which web-based forums tend to limit to words on a page. In addition, online forums are also restrictive in its topics of interest. People form discussion groups which are limited to their interests online, neglecting the diversity of human life in off-line communities. Web-based forums are often controlled by a few dominant members of the group with other participants acting as the audience of the main group's ideas. Participants never really know who they are speaking to, aside from the information that the individual is willing to offer them and even so, it is unsure that the information being provided is even true. In effect, the perceived reality projected by web-based forums is one that transforms the idea of community into social interactions based on mere personal preferences, which do not require a commitment to the whole; however, human communities require much more than personal interests to exist. Human, off-line communities require interconnectedness between many different peoples and generally seeks to promote the common good of all its members, regardless of their differing interests.

This interconnectedness is partly dependent on how much we can trust other members of the community. When observing the activity of the three forums, it seems highly unlikely that the majority of its forum members would be willing meet and collaborate with each other in person. In fact, many of these members tend to participate in these online interactions specifically because they do not have to see or talk to the other participant face to face. Online discussions provide individuals with a "safe" haven to speak their minds without the fear of rejection or social repercussion. In turn, it also causes some individuals to act in a manner in a way they would never act in "real life". Things such as "flamewars", heated arguments or online "fights", exist as a result of the freedom offered by Usenet and other forums. Although google groups which I visited did not have many instances of flamewars, I do realize that a fair amount of this activity exists in other forums such as SXDX (a forum for the band Social Distortion). I will admit that I have personally witnessed the instigation of flamewars on this particular site. The funny thing is, though the individuals sound "tough" online, in reality the authors of such posts were really friends of mine - video game nerds who enjoy music as well as their fair share of history and politics. Bottom line: they would never attempt to act in the manner they do on those forums in real life. Another good example of this alternate ego is the article published by Wired Magazine, "An IM Infatuation Turned to Romance. Then the Truth Came Out." This article follows the story of two IM-ers who both falsified their identities to start a romance with a younger partner. Eventually, this virtual romance became so heated it transformed itself into an infatuation was perceived as reality to both parties - real enough lead the 45-year old former marine (claiming to be an 18 year old marine), Thomas Montgomery, into killing out of jealousy for this internet romance. On the other hand, Montgomery had been led to believe that he was in a romantic relationship with an 18 year old girl named, "Jessi" when in reality, the person he'd really been involved with was Mary, a 45-year old married mother who was using her daughter's screen name and identity to generate virtual admirers in the chat room.

The development of digital technology and internet communication has undoubtedly influenced the way individuals generate their ideas of self, identity and community. Although Usenet groups have brought many people together through their common interests, it has also altered our perception of community in leading individuals to believe that the reality being presented by these groups is what the real world is also experiencing outside of these discussions. Virtual reality and reality become harder and harder to distinguish as people begin to identify themselves with the persona they present behind their online masks.

Webhunt #1

This webhunt helped me to better understand the ways that computer technologies benefit society. I was definitely surprised by the abundancy of resources available through the google website alone, such as google books, scholar, and groups. I was also surprised with the various hardware available for the disabled, such as the refreshable braille display.

The section that I was most interested in during this Webhunt was History, Culture and Art. The distribution and availability of such resources in history, culture and art have definitely become more efficient with computer technology. Being able to complete this webhunt alone, is proof towards this very aspect. Without computer, I would have never been able to sit at home and identify what "digital medievalists" are, or how to translate my name into "cuneiform". Instead, I most likely would have made a trip to the library to do some book research on these topics. On a much wider scale, computer technology has made information that was once exclusive, available to people all around the world. For example, rather than having to travel all the way to France to learn about the Les tres riches heures du Duc de Berry, we can now learn about it online and see it online as well.

The website that I relied on the most to search for the webhunt answers was Google.com; however, other relevant websites included wikipedia.org and the databases available to CSUF students from the Pollack Library website. These websites are very useful to anyone doing research on any particular subject because they offer an abundancy of information in a single place. Although wikipedia.org may not be as reliable a source since its pages are created and edited by everyday people, it does offer various resources and links at the end of their articles that one can go to to examine other opinions on the subject being researched.