Blog About Twitter

From what I can tell, being new to Blackboard and Twitter, there are some similarities when having a discussion. Both allow for naming topics and writing about them as well as responding to other peoples posts. However twitter seems to do this more interactively. As far as these being compared to in-class discussion, to me there is no comparison. Despite the fact that these interfaces allow for discussion they loose all of the personal interaction which means there is no body language to help convey ideas, you can't hear someones tone of voice which can also alter the meaning of a sentence. To me there is just nothing that can replace actually interacting with people.       

Social Networking Sites

Facebook, Twitter, Myspace, and Instigram are all social  networking site however they all have their own unique characteristics and capabilities. Facebook for example allows users to send messages and pictures both privately to their friends or put just put them out for anybody to see. Where twitter allows people to make comments on specific topics and is not as orientated towards your own friends. Myspace allows for its users to basically design their own webpage with all the things that interest them and share it with the world. Then there is Instigram which just allows users to share photos.  

Blog v Wiki

Blogs and Wiki's, though both useful web 2.0 tools have similarities but also are very different. Blogs are a more personal, where people can go and discuss a topic and comment on other blogs, where wiki's are a more structured approach at information sharing.  Also blogs do not allow for people to update or change what you wrote, they can comment on but cannot change your comments. Where as wikis can be updated and edited by users of the wiki.

Brooklyn Blog Helps Lead to Drug Raid was an example of a collaborative effort by a community in Brooklyn to get rid of a neighbor hood problem. Blogging about the crack house gave people an ability to maintain anonymity well still sharing and expressing there concerns about what they saw going on in the neighborhood. This goes to show there is a wide variety of uses for blogs.  

As far as a new use for a wiki, I believe it could be an effective tool in the financial industry. Working in the financial industry often times when people are out sick or go on vacation someone who has never performed there duties is required to do so. I think utilizing a wiki to explain how to do each specific task could be an effective way to provide an entire firm the details of each employees day to day tasks making life much easier for someone who is covering someone else.  

Project Topic

For my project I am doing an analysis on electronic books, newspapers and magazines. I plan on analyzing both the good and bad sides to these new forms of media. There are potential risks from not having hard copies of these different media outlets. I believe there is also tremendous upside to e-versions of media, such as the convenience, the ability to to publish and distribute new news stories, books, and magazines in a matter of seconds.