sure do hope this works... final essay.

here is the link... i think...

http://docs.google.com/Doc?docid=0AYUopT0KUpNHZDVzOWhwOF81YzZ4djh0ZHQ&hl=en

the end...

I would have to say that the most memorable thing I learned this semester has been just how powerful and influential the internet can actually be to literacy and writing. As I will admit in previous posts, blogging never really appealed to me, and I never gave blogs any credit for being anything of worth. However, as we continued through the class and incorporated blogging and internet literacy into our classroom discussions and assignments, I started to appreciate what people can post on blogs and what can be written online. I always understood that the internet was a prime source for communication via email or social networks. I now know – thanks to this class – that the internet is also very powerful in the exchange of ideas, the promotion of discussion, and the growth and spread of information and stories all over the world. A specific event I remember talking about in class that demonstrates how the internet promoted discussion and the growth of a story involved the class of children that sang a song about Obama. This story made news all across the nation and turned into a topic of controversy and haste. Sadly, the video possibly could have just started out as a post on YouTube by a boasting and proud parent, but with the big powerful internet, or at least the users of, the children were being seen on televisions all across America… ha, they are famous now!

I guess that also goes to show how my views on reading and writing on the internet has changed as well. It is powerful and can be effective. I no longer view it as just postings by any ole’ person online who just wants to post something – these people actually know what they are talking about and present good points. My reading and writing in general has changed by being able to write something on the spot with a short amount of time and actually have it mean something. Before, it would take me hours to come up with an idea, and days or weeks to really get down on paper (or Microsoft word, haha) what I wanted to say. Now, through this blogging, I am able to have an idea, organize my thoughts rather quickly, and write. I try not to accredit this to my procrastination and being forced to come up with a decent post at 10:45 in the morning, but whatever works I guess!

Essay #2...

One Very Active News Story

When I usually read an article in a magazine or a story in a newspaper I do not focus on the viewpoint, or ask myself how the story or point of view may have been changed from the original story. That is typically not something you ask yourself while skimming through The New York Times or an edition of People. I don’t ask myself what facts may be distorted, if the story is being blown out of proportion, or if anything is being sensationalized. I just read the story and left it at that because I never knew you could look so deeply into the different aspects of it. However, I now know that a news story can change and can develop into something different or something completely new over time. A news story can have a life, and through the different forms of reporting and blogging, a news story can develop multiple lives.

Recently, celebrity and talk show host Oprah Winfrey announced she is ending her daytime talk show after 25 seasons. This indeed was a huge story that made headlines in all the tabloids and even newspapers from all across the globe. However, the different view of the situation among people, and the different ways the story has been used to create new ideals about uprising stories has lead to a plethora of posts across the internet and across the press.

The story started when Winfrey first announced she was retiring her show to her producers and staff. She then announced on her talk show that she was ending the hit program and the news stories rolled of the press before the ending of the episode. The first few renditions of the story simply stated that Winfrey had chosen to end “Oprah” in 2011 as reported by major news sources such as the New York Times. In an edition of the New York Times it states that Winfrey “is ending her successful daytime talk show in September 2011,” to do new things. The New York Times does not get into the personal aspect of the situation, just presenting the information that she is ending the show after the contract expires and venturing out to do new things. “She is expected to concentrate on OWN: The Oprah Winfrey Network, a cable channel” even before the contract for the talk shows ends to show that Winfrey’s “programming can sustain an entire cable channel and that she’ll remain a central cultural figure.” The facts presented by The New York Times had no opinion attached to it and had no slanted information.

However, as we venture to the Pacific Coast, the Los Angeles Times based in Los Angeles, California has a very opinionated view of the situation. As the article reports for this press you are able to pick up that the author believes Winfrey is just setting herself up for failure. The author, Kelsey Ramos, asks leading questions about whether Winfrey is “jumping the shark” and questioning whether she will be able to attract celebrity guests and ‘big wigs’ on her new network. The story has developed from one being just about the end of the show to one of entertainment for people wondering if she will be successful in her new line of work. Questions begin to rise about possible different reasons behind why she is actually calling it quits on the show. In the Los Angeles Times Ramos quotes different people speculating Winfrey’s ‘actual’ reasoning about her change in plans. “I predict Oprah running for president in 2012,” one man states, clearly voicing his opinion and implying how powerful Oprah Winfrey has become in the world over the years. This shows that the story has gained a personality and is not just about the facts anymore. The story has become one of entertainment and gossip. The story from this perspective has a negative tone to it as the author seemingly bashes Oprah Winfrey.

This story also has had positive coverage from different sources as well. The life of the story has gone from one of just facts to a life with different perspectives, such as the negative standpoint discussed earlier. This story is getting coverage all across the globe. According to David Usborne, a writer for the London based newspaper The Independent, Oprah Winfrey is a “monarch of daytime chat,” who has had success for upwards of a quarter century. In this article, the life of the story has grown and progressed to something that is praising Ms. Winfrey, unlike that of The Los Angeles Times. It is also more than just mere facts as we can sense the authors feelings toward the matter as he speaks lightly of the subject without any harshness when he says “the sun will set on the Oprah show,” leaving no negative connotation to the subject. In the Los Angeles Times author Ramos has taken the story and turned it against Oprah implying that she will be unsuccessful in her new line of work because she has done it for so long and knows nothing else, contrary to what Usborne is implying about Winfrey success and how she can only push herself further through the different paths she is now taking.

The life of this story has also developed in a new sense due to the different rhetoric different sources have used in reporting. CNN was successful in relaying the basic facts about the ending of the Oprah show when first presenting the information to the audience, however, through different forms of forwarding CNN illustrates various opinions about the event. CNN quotes Ellen DeGeneres “I think she has blazed a trail. She is an amazing woman,” which promotes the audience to see Oprah as a positive figure and now gives a nationwide approval of her, or at least whoever is watching CNN. FOX News also promotes a positive life to the story of Oprah’s talk show. As the title hints by making the reference to a classic movie, the ‘Yellow Brick Road’ is indeed coming to an end, but Oprah’s success is emphasized in this story, which makes it more about the entertainment of her life and success rather than just the news story itself of her show ending. This presentation reviews over Oprah’s life and how she came to such success and what to expect in the future. FOX was able to take the story about the show ending and came up with a new idea that opened up the discussion and promoted conversation about what to expect from Oprah in the future. This again is broadening the life of the story and making it grow.

We are also able to see the different life the story about Oprah has taken through the use of blogs. It is easy to see the mixed emotions among bloggers as you skim through blog after blog concerning the issue. Some people are rather happy to see the show off the air while others seem to be so bothered therapy may be necessary. Nonetheless, blogs have created a whole new life for the story entirely. One blog doesn’t even focus on the Oprah show ending, instead, the blog is mainly about what is going to come of daytime television and who will take her place. This blog, by Andrea Reiher, focused on Ellen DeGeneres and the possibilities she had with her talk show. But the thing that really interested me with this blog was the various comments left by the other bloggers. One comment read “The end of Oprah's show almost coincides with the end of Obama's presidency,” which now turns the life of the story from being about the end of the show to one about the rumored connections between her and President Obama. Something entirely new was able to spark a conversation that has roots linking back to the main idea of her show; however, the main idea is now about the speculation of relationship between Winfrey and Obama.

As you can see, a news story can take up a life of its own based on who reads it, who reposts it, who edits it, and what ideals make spark from it. Anyone can take a news story and make something new and different out of it. As the story of Oprah ending her hit daytime talk show entered the news “sphere”, it became subject to all sorts of reinterpretations, distortion, gossip, and other forms of reporting and relaying the information and facts in different manners (Jarvis). When I first read an article concerning Oprah Winfrey’s talk show ending, I gained basic facts about when the show was ending and a simple explanation behind why, nothing more. The more I read, the more I began to realize just how much the story itself can change, and I saw how an author is able to take something and by ‘taking an approach’ is able to create new conversation and new discussion about something that is related to the primary story, but had a topic about something else (Harris). To me, the life of this story has been taken just about every direction it could possibly have been taken. The different sources have restated information about the ending of the show, as well as give personal opinions as to why the show is ending. They have had different viewpoints and feelings about the issue, and have even created a new story involving Obama. The life of a news story very active, I guess you could say.

Works Cited

Harris, Joseph. “Rewriting.” Logan, Utah: Utah State University Press. 2006. Print

Jarvis, Jeff. “The Press Becomes the Press-Sphere.” Buzz Machine. 14 April, 2007. Web/

“Oprah Ending Talk Show in 2011.” CNN. 20 November, 2009

“Oprah Winfrey Tells Audience Her Show’s ‘Yellow Brick Road’ Is Coming to an End.” FOX News. 20 November, 2009

Reiher, Andrea. “Oprah Winfrey Ending Her Talk Show, Plans ‘To Make History.’” ZAP 2 IT. 19 November, 2009

Ramos, Kelsey. “Oprah to End Her Syndicated TV Show in 2011.” Los Angeles Times. 19 November, 2009. Print.

Stelter, Brian. “A Tearful Winfrey Explains Her Departure.” The New York Times. 20 November, 2009. Print.

Usborne, David. “Oprah Winfrey quits TV show after 25 Years.” The Independent. 20 November, 2009. Print.

the end.

In Harris’s chapter “Taking an Approach,” he discusses a type of writing that is rather different from the different techniques he wrote about in the earlier chapters. Coming to Terms, forwarding, and countering “are ways of marking out your words and ideas from those of the texts you are working with”, or as I see it to represent information, whether agreeing with the text or challenging it (Harris 73). However, this new way of taking an approach requires a writer to transform a text and the various ways of another writer, or as Harris puts it “the moves and interests of another thinker (74).
This new concept was hard for me to grasp at first. I did not really understand what it was asking me to do and what technique it aimed for me to pick up and use. The different examples that Harris gave bettered my understanding, especially the example involving the Aretha Franklin song. The idea of the first song by the male was able to evolve into the well known song “Respect” by Franklin working in the ‘mode’ of Otis Redding, but just taking a new approach to the matter: a feminine standpoint.
In the different blogs that I am reading I am able to see this technique quite often once I started looking. The way the various authors of the blogs used news stories, events, or even pictures with captions to talk about something and express opinions or just elaborate on an idea used this technique. The way the author of the blogs or even the author of the news stories in The New York Times depicts a writes style of thinking, and demonstrates how they take an approach to the texts.
This way of writing can either do many things to texts. Opinions are just that, merely opinions, but when an author can transform a story to something that has been worked through their opinions and evokes an idea that is that of the author, the facts can be distorted and viewpoints can change.

from the start...

After looking skimming through all of my blog posts from the first half of the semester, I found it very suiting to make this blog a revision about my very first blog post I wrote. This blog was about our reaction to the assignment and what we thought of the blogging experience. I chose this blog because I feel as if my view on blogging has changed and I am able to have more of an input now on the blogging experience as a whole being more experienced.
In my first blog, most of the details I mentioned had to do with the ‘physical’ or ‘technical’, I guess you could say, aspects of blogging. I discussed the different issues I had with learning how to simply set up the blog, and the different decisions I had to make when it came to appearance. In this blog I seemed to stress that appearance was important and really focused on what others would think about me and what others would view me as depending on the physical appearance of my blog. I remember thinking that I wanted to seem interesting; therefore, I chose polka dots as my background and came up with a ‘cute’ little title. (This seems ironic to me, considering the discussion we had today on the blog post about America and ‘cute’ things...) However, after looking at all the blogs I have read in this class, I notice that I in fact do not notice the appearance of other blogs. I simply focus on their content. I believe this has to do with the growing understanding I have of blogs now, and the appreciation I have now for their different ideas and opinions, rather than their creative side.
Also, going along with my first blog, I still agree that blogs are a way to express your opinions, but I see now that there is so much more to blogs than just opinions. Through the course of this class, I see that actually useful information can be presented in a blog, and through different techniques, such as linking or forwarding, we are able to find other means of information, making blogs a very useful resource.

reen(counter)

When I think of countering, I think of the simple way people argue another point which is opposite what another author has wrote about or demonstrated. I just think of people arguing or debating upon a point or about an idea that is different from one another. In a way, that is indeed what Harris is trying to say countering is in his book: that a person used another person’s idea and presents the other side, but Harris’ countering has a different point, I guess you could say.
Harris states that the reason he thinks a writer should counter another piece by someone else would be to move the conversation in new directions. He talks of how when people debate or argue about their viewpoints or ideas, they do just that, argue. The point is not to just state that the other person is wrong and that their text is faulty or to criticize them. Harris seems to be saying that if you find a well written text that has good points and does put up a good argument, but are able to offer a different viewpoint and are able to counter their text in a way that opens up new discussion and converts the conversation about the text in a new direction, you have successfully countered something, and done so with a purpose.
An interesting article I found on The Huffington Post involved an author discussing the different viewpoints of creationism and evolution. The author discussed the viewpoint of a Muslim and their beliefs, and then countered that viewpoint with the uprising belief of creationism in Turkey…which was then main focus of this article – Turkey’s beliefs. The author offered both viewpoints as part of his argument and depiction of Turkey’s beliefs, but used the different techniques that Harris mentioned (Arguing the other side, uncovering values, and/or dissenting) to push the conversation and discussion along the path of his argument.

straight forward(ing)

When first approaching this assignment, I of course had my own ideas and expectations of what it would be about. When relating the word ‘forwarding’ to writing, I specifically and technically just think of using direct text and ‘forwarding’ it in your paper to help make a point of to demonstrate something. Although Harris’ idea and explanation of forwarding somewhat touches on that meaning and definition, I would say that the point he is trying to make is that forwarding is more about using the work -whether in print, picture, video, song, or some other form of displaying an idea- to focus more on what your project is and how to forward something to extend its uses, not so much on a text and “what its author has to say,” as Harris puts it.

Harris mentions four different ways in which an author can forward another document: Illustrating, Authorizing, Borrowing, and Extending. He goes into detail of each, describing and giving examples of how each can be incorporated into your own work to push ideas and push discussion, which was also a main point in this chapter: discussion.

Harris mentions quite often about how important it is to write a piece of work that will evoke discussion and conversation. He seems to be saying that by forwarding something by another author, you are creating a conversation about their work and analyzing the meaning and using their source to enhance your ideas or develop them, just as what you are writing will allow other writers to do; to use your work to open yet another discussion or carry on the conversation.

In one of the blogs I am following, Hot Air, I remembered a specific article I had read about Democrats in New York City. In the article “Dems miss an opportunity in New York City,” author Ed Morrissey uses the technique of illustrating when he directly quotes from another source about the topic of the race for mayor in New York City. In a nutshell, the article was about how democrats didn’t do enough and push their campaign to win the election over the less favorable republican. Morrissey develops his own idea and strongly argues or defends his opinion by using an excerpt from the source and then pushing his own ideas of why the election had such a result.

Blackboard...why must you be so mean?

So, blackboard is down, and I have no way of obtaining the prompt for this blog. I just remember reading over it earlier today and having a few ideas. Maybe if I was a better student and made a hard copy of all the ‘important stuff’ I wouldn’t find myself in this situation. Blackboard isn’t supposed to be up and running till 10 am on Sunday, if it even works then, so here goes my blog about what I THINK IT SHOULD BE ABOUT!!!
Comparing the Huffington Post and Hot Air, my 2 blogs of choice, to The New York Times. I guess the most basic comparison we can make between these 3 different sources of information is just that… they all are capable of supplying a group or person with information about something. Each person, depending on their interests and purpose in reading the source, go to the site or pick up the paper (or go to the paper’s site, haha) to acquire information. Which brings me to another way to compare these 3 sources, the type of media used to get their stuff out there
Being that the Huffington Post and Hot Air are blogs, the only way to view their material is through the internet. Although the New York Times was primarily a print based source of news, through the use of internet and technology, this news is now more easily accessible to viewers all over the world thanks to the internet and the creation of the New York Time’s website.
Also, the information that each source displays and the content of the pages differ through all 3. While the New York Times covers most topics on a wide variety of things, the Huffington Post and Hot Air are more specific with their news and broadcasts over the blogs. All 3 sources have something to do with politics and issues of the such, however, Huffington Post has information relating to celebrities, comedy, books, and even specific cities in America.
I am glad that I chose the blogs I did and also have the opportunity to read the New York Times. I think that each will enhance the others in some way or another and I should be able to have a variety of knowledge that I obtain through the different sources.

3 minutes left... so this was all about evolving.?.

Yelp, evolution and evolving. The world of blogging as discussed in Sullivan’s article, and that little sphere of Jarvis is all about how something has evolved and changed and fits into the world today.
When a blogger blogs about what is happening in the world, they have to be getting their information from somewhere, right? So it is like what Jarvis is saying about the influence of other things on our news in his sphere. We have the media who portray the information to us in one way, then when that information is blogged about, subtle changes in the information can make slight variations in the factuality and validity of it. Which after being read by fellow bloggers, can provoke even more change after they decide to blog about it, or talk about it… you see where I am going with this?
Today we are people who rely on many sources to obtain news and information, whether from friends, family, newspapers, TV, internet, or some other way, we are always capable of finding new information about something. In Jarvis’ little sphere, (sorry I refer to his work as ‘little’, it just personally adds some humor), he is trying to show how the way we used to be and the way we are now with news has changed drastically as far as how we become aware of things. It used to be just straightforward ‘here is the new’. Now, however, it is not so straightforward. We instead have all this extra stuff that can be added in there through different means, such as blogging.
I can definitely relate to the little sphere. I am not one to rely solely on any one news broadcast to obtain knowledge about the world… not saying that that source would be completely factual and have no opinions lying within it anyhow. It is simply entertaining to have other means of gaining information, and makes it interesting to view things from other’s opinions. I like being able to have different choices.

crossing my fingers... sure hope I went down the right path.

As I read the prompt for this blog I was very happy that we were asked what parts confused us… so let me just go ahead and tell you that everything confused me. Well, the first time I read the article at least, and even after the second time I read it, I still ventured to a fellow classmate’s blog to see if the idea I had about it was on track.


Then I read the darn thing a third time. I’m still not promising any amazing thoughts, though…


Anyhow, the press sphere. An interesting concept proposed by Jeff Jarvis about how the media and press has changed the way people perceive information through the news and other news sources. Jarvis focuses on how stories can really be developed, or made, depending on a different input, rather than just the story itself. He mentions how with the addition of links and discussions online the story can take a new direction or meaning, and the idea may even be distorted.
Jarvis says that we have a desire or need that is fulfilled through the addition of all these extras when the press ‘enhances’ a story. In his diagram of the sphere some of the influences are peers, government, work, and media – just to name a few – and it is easy to see how these could influence a person into seeing something a little distorted.
I like how a fellow classmate said something about the press sensationalizing the material to really get the public interested. It is sad that in order for our society today to pay attention to basic news, it has to be all glammed up with additives. A story in the world today can’t merely survive on its own without the ‘other stuff’ that makes it interesting. It seems as if in order for a person to make their own opinion of something, or to understand something, they must have the opinion or ideas of someone or something (government, press, etc.) else.

I'm a big kid now.

I really have enjoyed reading the New York Times this past week or so. Of course, as with any and every newspaper or news website there are stories and posts that interest me and stories and posts that don’t.

With The New York Times, you can find just about anything on any topic that you would like to look at, so finding something that I could sit down and read was not hard at all. So, oddly enough, while scrolling down the page, the very first thing that I clicked on to read more about was a picture of a house. The article was about what type of house a certain amount of money could buy someone in a particular place. The picture was what caught my eye, being a huge A-Frame structure that instantly made me daydream of living in it, however, I honestly liked thinking about the different aspects and value of money, like what it will buy you and not buy you depending on where you are. This really amazed me.

Of course, I had my fair share of balloon reading through The New York Times, as I am sure everyone did through some news source or another. I read on the topic of the little boy in the balloon in regards from everything to the actual event and the horror of it all, to the attention seeking parents…oh how embarrassing! This story is becoming another ‘Michal Jackson’; we are all just getting sick of hearing about it.

I also read about the war in Iraq quite often. Before, there was hardly ever a time I would focus on the war or read about it, and I barely paid attention when something came on the news broadcast on TV. But being able to pick what I wanted to read so I didn’t overwhelm myself with the information allowed me to become a little more informed about what is happening.

There were many more things I read about while reading through the material in The New York Times. The stuff that I did read had an impact on how I participate in conversations around me, which I rather liked. For instance, I was on the phone with my uncle who is in his early 30’s. He was talking about how he and his fiancé are going to build a house on their farm in stamping ground. This made me think of the article that I read about houses. I mentioned to him how I had read the article in The New York Times and then discussed how different amounts of money would buy different size houses. We talked about how interesting it is going to be to see what the same amount of money will buy here in Kentucky. I could tell he was happy to be having a conversation about something other than what homework I had to do, not to mention he was impressed with me actually reading a news paper, especially The New York Times.

Thumbs Up for The New York Times… not only do I become a more informed citizen, but you make me look good, too! :-)

Pretty Colors...

Never realized how little politics and things of such interested me till I started, well, attempt to follow the blogs I chose. First off, the blog Hot Air.
Of course, you cannot have a blog involving politics and not mention the ‘big man’, President Obama. As expected, most posts mentioned, if not completely revolved around, Obama, but that is accredited to the fact that he is just so ‘involved’ with things. Fox News is surely getting the attention from this site, and Obama (I just giggled). There were a few separate posts about Obama and his view on Fox, along with Obama and his Obama Care plan and (still) Obama vs. Palin posts. This blog was rather easy to navigate. I really like how they pick and choose different headlines from news sources across America, which are and are not related to politics, to place in a nice little box at the top of the page. Quite interesting stuff indeed; I read about marijuana in Sacramento and the dreaded H1N1. Oh, and the audience – intended for those who are just looking for some information about the world, and politics, and issues and whatnot. It was informing, with some humor, and some videos. Well, a lot of videos…I guess I should mention that this blog is a video blog. Every post is a video with commentary, which does make it (thankfully) more interesting and easier to read than just straightforward “here is some info about healthcare”, woo.
Now on to The Huffington Post. I think I could possibly spend hours on this site, very interesting. This is a place where I can find info about politics, if I still want to know anything else after sifting through stuff on Hot Air, but also learn about world issues like charities and the homeless, view funny pictures, check out celebrities… and then there was something about men and goats J…I really don’t know. This blog has a wide variety of topics, so a wider spectrum of audience members is likely to be attracted. Surprisingly, this site had fewer adds than Hot Air, which I appreciated. –Hot Air had advertising about finding money, finding the diet that works, and finding the ‘perfect one’… bull- This was also a very *COLORFUL* site… every time I clicked on a new tab at the top of the page, the color scheme changed… WOW! This, sadly, entertained me, and I felt need to mention this in my blog. Lame, I know.

I didn't post the URL's... oops.

http://bitten.blogs.nytimes.com/

http://hotair.com/

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/theblog/

I finally decided.

I will be following The Huffington Post, Hot Air, and Bitten - a blog about what else, FOOD!

I chose these blogs simpy because they seemed interesting and I personally did not want to get too much in to politics and things of the such, although Hot Air does have a big political influence. The Huffington Post seemed interesting with the news about celebrities and I did not lose interest of the site within a few minutes like I did many others.

I chose Bitten because of my personal interest, as I am sure of everyone's personal interest, haha, with food. The first blog I noticed was a recipe, however, the more posts I read I realized that the discussion did in fact grow to different things, not just how to make something. I hope it is entertaining,

let us compare...

After reading through a few blogs of my classmates, I realized that I had forgotten a few different sources of which I obtained information and kept ‘in the know’ with the world. But lucky for me I can mention those in this blog because those other sources are similar to those of others as well.
Like in Megan Floyd’s blog, English 105-07 (http://meaganfloyd.blogspot.com/), she mentioned how she watched CNN and for 3 weeks it had nothing but Michael Jackson’s death coverage. I remember how I also would skim through the channels and notice that ‘Michael Jackson’ was always headlined at the bottom on the screen. I will admit that for a while, maybe a few days, I may have actually been interested in the loss of the pop star. I wanted to know how he died, if anyone was really connected to his death, and just other information you desire when hearing of an unexpected death. However, I quickly grew sick of hearing about Mr. Jackson. So I can agree with Megan as she questions why more important news isn’t being focused on more. I remembered why I just recently stopped watching CNN regularly.
Another comparison I found between my classmates news obtaining sources and mine was in Jessica’s blog, Jessica’s Blog for English 105 (http://ranaesdayenglish105.blogspot.com/), when she describes how her boyfriend talks about things he learned from Comedy Central. I also come across new information from the people that I am around when they talk about topics or headlines in the news that I may not be aware of. This usually, if important enough, sparks an interest and leads to me to further investigate by searching for the stories online.
However, as also found in Jessica’s blog, I noticed a difference within the type of places considered to find information. Her boyfriend uses Comedy Central to learn about things in the news, and this I would honestly never have thought of. I did not realize that such a place would have the purpose of supplying people with information like that.
I’m looking forward to reading more blogs by my classmates and learning of other resources for obtaining information about the world around me. I sure need new sources other than my usually boring coverage by the local broadcasts.

Well Hell, if I didn't just forget that this was due this morning!

There are many different ways that I obtain news and information about what is going on in the world around me. I use these different ways depending on where I am and the different circumstances or situations of which I am in.
Before coming to college, I would regularly watch the local news, WYMT, or read the newspaper for my town, The Appalachian News Express. These were sources that reported mainly about what was going on within my county, along with about seven or eight surrounding counties, and also big or important stories throughout the state, nation, and world that were considered ‘important’ enough to be mentioned.
Now that I am in college, and now that I am 4 hours away from home, I am unable to receive the broadcast for the news program on the television, however, I do occasionally sit down every now and then and skim through their website just to ‘catch up’ on things. Just the same as I do with the newspaper’s website… Although I do get aggravated that their sites are not always up to date, but that is besides the point…
I watch the news broadcasts for Louisville in the morning before class trying to not be so clueless about my new home, but I will admit that the only real stories or information that interest me are the ones involving weather, and for the most part the weathermen are never correct, leaving me wearing snow boots and mittens on a bright, sunny, WARM day.
Another source where I obtain some type of information regarding news that generally has nothing to do with my location is the radio. I usually listen to the satellite radio news stations to hear information and news about major cities such as New York or Chicago along with international news. I will switch over to AM/FM when I want to hear news more localized, such as weather or traffic reports.

Should have listened when he told us where to put this thing...

http://docs.google.com/Doc?docid=0AYUopT0KUpNHZDVzOWhwOF80Z2Jzc3hmdHM&hl=en

English Final Draft

ELVIS!!!!

http://docs.google.com/Doc?docid=0AYUopT0KUpNHZDVzOWhwOF8zZmt0djNuZDk&hl=en

yelp. sorry i had to actually post my essay.

Don’t Blame the Internet

I honestly could not tell you how many times I have heard the question “Are you on that crazy myface again?” For one, it is either Facebook or Myspace, not myface, but I really never feel like explaining this difference to my grandma, her being so ‘behind’ with technology and such; she barely knows how to turn on a computer, much less understand the difference between two popular social networks. I have noticed that no matter what I use the computer for, I am always being accused of just wasting time on the internet on these sites, or other sites that are said to be useless and junk. My grandma, as I’m sure most older people do, tells me all the time that the internet has nothing but hurt the way our ‘youngsters’ are being raised and taught. She says that we probably don’t even know what an encyclopedia is, and looks one day for paper and pencil to have no value and have them stop being made because everything is being done with all this ‘digital nonsense.’ I usually just let her go off on her rant about the modern world and tune her out; she is always going to think everything was better back in ‘her day’. This is probably because I know that I have not let the way I use the internet effect my everyday life. I don’t talk to people in internet lingo like I would when I want to shorthand conversations during chatting or instant messaging. I know what an encyclopedia is; in fact, I have one, along with a dictionary and thesaurus in my dorm room right now. I even write hand written letters every now and then, not just emails. However, I can’t say the same for others. It is sad to realize that maybe the internet does affect people in ways that is not to their benefit. Take my little brother for instance. I remember the week before I started college; he had left a note for my grandparents and I on the kitchen table telling us that he had went to his friend’s house to play basketball. It read: “goin to masons. B bak round 7.” Of course, this was ridiculous to my grandparents, and even I thought it was a little pathetic that he didn’t take the time to spell out even half the words in his seven word not. I started wondering if he wrote like this all the time; and I started wondering if the internet really had such a negative effect on the way people read and write today. Are we really falling victim in the literacy world due to the internet?

Needless to say I was very relieved, yet somewhat shocked, when my little brother’s seventh grade English teacher sent home his personal narrative from his portfolio with only minimal corrections; the majority having nothing to do with grammar. In fact, this is the case for most people. They never struggle with writing properly in regular forms of writing like classroom assignments, and still are able to use internet short hands while online to communicate quickly. Not to mention our writing abilities physically, like being able to type many words per minute, has increased overall for people of all ages. The advantage to type things out has many advantages. The writer is able to make corrections easier than with paper and pencil, or especially pen, because you just hit backspace and have no evidence that you had once recorded another idea. Sharing the document is also easier as it can be emailed or posted to a blog.

“Those blogs are nothing but gossip,” is another stab I have heard from non-users of the internet. “Anything wrote on the internet has no value, especially not like a book.” So do the older generations really think that we young people are not capable of writing anything useful because we only write that ‘useless junk’ on the internet? It isn’t too pleasing to think that whatever you may write will never gain any credibility because of the medium it was displayed on. I personally think that I am a decent writer; being capable of writing something worth reading and writing something of value, whether on the internet or handwritten. Yes, I may do more writing on the internet through blogs, email, chatting, or even updating my Facebook status, but I am writing, and it does have meaning. I am actually writing more than people 20 years before me. The people who only wrote what they had to for class.

But can you say that all the writing I or anyone else does while on the internet has any beneficial factors to it? I could post blogs every half an hour, and still have no significance. I could email my friend from across the country and not have any meaning to it other than to say hi. Is this type of writing really positive? Of course, any type of writing can give you practice if you do it properly; it involves an effort by that person. By participating in different forms of writing online like in the posting of blogs, the writer must challenge himself to tackle the new and different obstacles that are found when writing in different ways. Just as Andrew Sullivan mentioned in his article “Why I Blog,” there is a type of challenge that requires the author of the blog to have enough courage to post their thoughts. Blogging allows for the criticism by other people and makes the author focus on different ways to please his or her audience. This gives the author experience in audience, which is fundamental in writing any paper.

Just as people are writing more than ever before, people are reading more on the internet. I t may be because most types of readings are so easily accessible through the internet, and ranges from a wide variety of material that interests every type of person. It can be argued that the reading people do on the internet has no benefit to the development of their reading skills. The way that the information is received and processed in the brain is not properly training our minds to think and understand; we just skim the material and don’t develop an understanding of what we are reading. Author Chris Hedges argues in his article “America the Illiterate,” that people today don’t really read things to understand, people just read things to get the facts and never focus on truly understanding the topic or allowing any real comprehension. However, reading is reading, and any type of reading requires the comprehension of the material and therefore is exercising your reading abilities. The different forms of reading have nothing to do with the value of it. Whether they read news stories, emails, blogs, or other forms on online literature, people are reading, it just depends on how much they choose to get out of that reading and whether they really use the information to their benefit.

Author Nicholas Carr argues in his article “Is Google Making Us Stupid” that the way people use the internet has affected the way our minds think and comprehend things. His point seems to say that America is growing more ignorant everyday because of the dependency we are developing for the internet. The need to do something for ourselves and actually think about a task or piece of information is decreasing as the internet makes it so easy to become dependent and rely on a type of technology to just give us the answers. I know that I am guilty for every time I am given an assignment requiring information that I need to research, I head straight for my computer to log on to the world wide web. I can easily find thousands of hits on just about any topic I can think of, and not have to step foot into a library like in the past. The internet has made it possible to find information with sites like Google, Bing, and Yahoo. These search engines allow you type in a phrase or topic and they automatically generate a list of sites relating to those words. But does this really eliminate the need for libraries? Can a person really find all the information they need for everything on the internet and is this resource really harming the way people think by simply decreasing the effort required to obtain information? I would think, that just like reading and writing choices, they affect the internet has on your overall thinking and comprehension depends on how much you allow it to. As I mentioned before, I do acknowledge the fact that I rely on the internet to supply me with information through search engines and different websites, but in no way do I believe I am dependent. I am not a walking encyclopedia, so of course I need some type of resource to obtain information, but I can navigate my way through a library if need be. Just recently I had to complete an assignment that required the use of our library on campus. I successfully found the book I needed through the, yes, online catalogue. However, I did have to physically go to the library and locate the book on the shelves. I then had to take the time to sit down and go through the book, reading pages thoroughly to get an idea of the information. I had no trouble with the use of the library, and honestly have no preference between it and the use of the internet, as long as I am able to complete an assignment or find out what I need to know. The internet is easier and accessible at all times, and compared to a time consuming library that isn’t open at all hours, choosing the internet shouldn’t always be considered a quick and easy way out of things, but a reliable resource that provides promptly. What bad is there in that?

So it really depends on which aspect you choose to look at when trying to decide if the internet is changing the types of readers and writers people are becoming as they use it, and just what type of readers and writers those people are. For the lazy internet user who just blogs all day about what interesting television program they are watching and responds to live conversation with internet lingo; or to the person who actually reads about useless information, that form of internet activity is not likely to benefit them whatsoever in growing and developing in literacy and those aren’t going to be good readers and writers. But when a person chooses to use the internet as a source of knowledge and engage in the information and when a person writes about things that can impact someone or just has a purpose, they can develop as readers and writers. It all just depends on the person and what they allow themselves to become. The internet has not created the kind of reader or writer people become; people allow themselves to become a certain type of reader or writer.



Works Cited
Carr, Nicholas. “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” The Atlantic. The Atlantic Monthly Group. July/Aug. 2008. Web. 27 Sept. 2009.
Hedges, Chris. “America the Illiterate.” Truthdig. Zuade Kaufman. 10 Nov. 2008. Web. 27 Sept. 2009.
Sullivan, Andrew. “Why I Blog.” The Atlantic. The Atlantic Monthly Group. 18 Nov. 2008. Web. 27 Sept. 2009.

maybe this one will work?

http://docs.google.com/Doc?docid=0AYUopT0KUpNHZDVzOWhwOF8yaGJwY2tkZmc&hl=en

Extended Essay

The link to my essay.

http://docs.google.com/Doc?docid=0AYUopT0KUpNHZDVzOWhwOF8yaGJwY2tkZmc&hl=en

Class Assignment 9/25/09

This article focuses on a study about technologies used in the classroom. It investigates the different ages of students and which methods they like to be used in the classroom.

http://docs.google.com/fileview?id=0B4UopT0KUpNHNjYwMWQxODEtNjU2YS00NmRlLWEyNDUtMTc5ZDU0M2YzYmU2&hl=en

the last one...

Coming into this class, I honestly had no idea that it would have anything to do with blogging, or the Internet for that matter. I thought I would just come in, listen to endless lectures, write a few papers, cry over those papers, eventually correct those papers, and in the end earn my credit. However, this class has been made into something very interesting through the incorporation of the blogs and use of the internet.

At first, I was skeptical. I did not like how this class was not conventional and was far from what I was custom to in all my previous classes. I knew this was college, and it is extremely different than high school, but having my professor assign blog posts, now this was something unexpected. However, I find that I have learned more than just how to post things online through Blogger. Through the different articles we read (Sullivan, Carr, Hedges, etc.) I began to see that writing was viewed in many different ways than what I was taught growing up. Although the articles were simply critics going on about their beliefs and opinions, it was interesting to see just how they were able to defend their argument. I enjoyed finding that I really dove into the articles, sometimes feeling extreme anger or disgust with an author, and completely agreeing with others. I can’t really find anything that I think was too displeasing about this experience. Yes, Hedges offended me to the point where I felt like burning his article, but that was just his opinion, and it was quite humorous. I didn’t particularly hate that experience, or that author, I just didn’t agree with him.

I know my opinion on blogging and the Internet has changed. I know I don’t feel as guilty every time I venture to the Internet, thinking that I could be doing something more productive than just sitting in front of a computer screen writing an email to a friend. The writing I do has more meaning now and isn’t useless, as I used to consider it. All writing, whether on blogs, email, essays, journals, or any other type has some significance, to someone.

Nothing against journalists...

It is a good idea I decided against becoming a journalist I guess. In another ‘I hate everything’ article by Chris Hedges, he sure shone a light on how something else is failing due to the new ways of the world. This time, the internet and large corporations are going straight for the throats of the News rooms. I will give Hedges some credit; he was not as provocative in his argument. He did supply a few links, and the accusations did not make me want to throw my computer across the room, so overall, it was an easier read. In his article, he was trying to display how the use of internet news sites were taking away from the popularity of the common newspaper, and how large corporations pretty much controlled what was on television broadcasts of the news. In my last blog over Hedges article “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” I will admit that I was probably not as skeptical about his opinion as I should have been. I just simply read the article, and let my views be based on what he thought. But the more I consider what he said, the more offended I grew. So when reading this article, I found that I tried more to find ideas that challenged his. Sure enough, he said something that offended me again. The way he says that we “live under an illusion,” makes me believe that Hedges’ feels superior to everyone else on this planet. Blaming the people for what is happening to our society is not going to accomplish anything. Yes, journalist may be losing their jobs, and newspapers and broadcasts may be failing or changing completely; but Hedges just needs to wake up and realize that things are changing and sometimes it may be for the better.

On the contrary, Clive Thompson feels very different from Hedges. The impact that the internet has had on our society, especially the younger generations, is quite positive. Not only are we writing more than ever, we are focusing on things such as audience and tone. The internet has increased communication and the amount of writing people do over the past decades, and I personally I don’t see how anyone can make anything negative of that.

I am trying to be a critical thinker here and see from both perspectives… Okay, I do admit that I favor Thompson, because I simply don’t care too much for the way Hedges attacks everything in the common person’s way of life. We use the internet, we chat, we blog, we don’t always have 45 minutes to sit down and just read the newspaper… well, I am sorry, Mr. Hedges. Maybe those poor little journalists can all sit down and blog about their troubles of how the big bad internet caused them to lose their job. I’m sure more people will read that than something in their local newspaper, they may even be fortunate enough to receive a link for Monster and find a new job.

so maybe I like picture books...

…and maybe I like to go to fast food restaurants because I like to see what my food (should) look like before I order it, but I definitely do not consider myself illiterate or anything of the sort. Yet, as I sat and read Hedges’ article “America the Illiterate,” I kept coming across words that I didn’t know, and I kept having to reread entire sections because I didn’t understand something. So, that got me thinking: what if Hedges is right? What if our society really is as bad off and in such a critical shape as he is making it out to be?

According to the article, around 92 million Americans are illiterate or barely literate; that is nearly a third of our population. That seems pretty critical to me. I suppose that is like saying that 1 in every 3 people can’t read, or can’t read as efficiently. You really can’t expect to have a functioning, successful society when that many people don’t know what is going on because they can’t even read and understand the world around them. Hedges feel as if the American Public is powerless because so many people are illiterate; therefore, they are not able to be active and contributing citizens to their society.

The way that some Americans are finding to just get by in the world contributes to the growing illiteracy rate and can somewhat be compared to Carr’s view of the internet. Carr believes that the Internet is prohibiting and hurting Americans because it enables us to have a quick and easy answer and way to or for anything; sort of like a cheater when it comes to actually using your brain to investigate something and put effort toward gaining knowledge. Just as illiterate people have found ways around not being able to read, again, like a cheater. Picture books, fast food menus, and visual signs are all ways of making the illiterate’s life easier; all mechanisms that have been created and do not promote any desire to learn to read.

Maybe America isn’t quite as bad as Hedges makes it out to be. Maybe the truth isn’t so devastating in reality. I know I certainly was skeptical of this article as if seemed too vicious at first. However, the troubling part is that America really is struggling, our economy really is failing, politics are more corrupt than ever, and the people simply can’t do anything about it because many just don’t understand.

pancake people in a syrup named google

So, is Google really making us stupid? According to Nicholas Carr, Google, or the Internet more or less, really has altered the way our minds work.

I, like Carr, am used to sitting down and reading books and articles in magazines no matter their length. However, I have found that over the past few years or at least the time period that I have been an internet user, I rarely find interest is just sitting down and reading, and would prefer to read things over the internet in a ‘condensed’ form. It is like the world has become so fast paced that we don’t have time to read through pages of information in books like research used to require. We don’t just read a book to gain knowledge about something that interests us, when we can ‘Google it’ and come up with 500,000 hits that can sum up the info, or so you believe, in a few paragraphs. Why waste your time, right? The Internet has made obtaining information, communicating, and everything in between require less work and a lot easier.

That’s not to say that people don’t read anymore, because Carr feels as if we do in fact read more than previous generations due to the different mediums where writing or text has become available. The difference is the type of reading. The type of reading and thought process books require differ greatly from that of the Internet. Carr refers to a research by a group of scholars at University College London when demonstrating that the way readers think, write, and read has changed from traditional ways in that they simply skim text versus thoroughly reading and understanding. The minds of the readers were scattered as they jumped from site to site, collecting bits of information, and then going on to a new source. This seems to say that the basic facts have become more important rather than an actual understanding.

To have no real knowledge about a lot of things does a person no good. To be wide and thin, like pancakes as it is mention in Carr’s work when he refers to a quote by Richard Foreman, or to have no fill of information except the vast network that the Internet supplies, yet still no understanding for this information could indeed be impairing the human mind. Google may have not been intended to make people ‘stupid’, but by people consistently using Google and other search engines of the Internet to ease any workload and get things accomplished quicker and easier, is hurting them.
http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200807/google

rewriting

If you remember one of our recent classes, you will recall the exercise where we came up with different ideas and thoughts of what the definition of the word writing is - to express our thoughts or emotions, to use paper or other means to record and transfer, to organize thoughts and to convey clear messages –just to list a few. After reading the introduction and first section of Joseph Harris’ book “Rewriting,” the author’s opinion if writing, according to this book and in regards to the writings of others, is more than just recording thoughts and ideas. Harris feels as if writing is more than just expressing how you feel or what you individually think. Writing also includes being able to use the work of others and actually understand “what a speaker is trying to do,” and then using that to explore your own ideas and be assertive in anything that you may write (Harris 3).
Harris focuses on what it means to be able to actually read someone’s work, to understand what has been said, and then to ‘participate’ in writing. His goal is to teach the reader of the book how to be active in writing and how to ‘do things with texts’. As the title of the book states, Harris calls this form of writing ‘rewriting.’ You are, in a sense, rewriting the works of others by drawing from, commenting on, and adding to them after you have come to an understanding of what they are trying to do.
Harris’ form of actively interacting with other writers in ways to comment and add on to their ideas can be related to the way Andrew Sullivan writes in his blogs. In a blog, you have the opportunity to comment on what the author has said. This is the idea that Harris has proposed -“to take a stance toward the works of others,”- and Sullivan’s blogging requires the interaction of people in their writings, even if it is just through their commenting on a blog post.

I'll tag you

When comparing my internet reading and writing notes with my classmates, I began to see some habitual similarities in the way we all used the web. Checking facebook, as many have already mentioned, is clearly a main priority once we have logged on to the internet.
In a world where modern technology dominates in form of communication, it becomes easy to stay in contact with people, or to engage in social networking, as most college students do, thanks to the internet. Our last blog demonstrated how different people use the internet as a resource for different things: news, education, entertainment, socializing, shopping, etc. Every person seemed to have a routine of when they logged on, where they went first, where they went last, where they spent the most time; the activity online was very habitual.
Every person also had their own type of ‘personality’ that was distinguished by which sites they logged on to most often. The gamers were easily identified by addicting games, as the social butterflies were with facebook or myspace, and the students interested in society with The New York Times or CNN. However, I was also able to see how diverse people were, as they stretched out beyond their usual genre of sites and all met for some ‘nice’ wall post exchanges and picture tagging on facebook. As I mentioned earlier, facebook is taking over. Almost every blog I viewed had at least one facebook login every 48 hours. The need that our generation has today to stay socially interactive with the people around us, or even not that geographically near us for that matter, has made the social networks of the internet today some of the most actively used sites out there.
The internet may have previously been used mainly as a resource for information, but has grown to a popular means of communication and entertainment. A new type of information that allows the world to stay connected.

Labor Day Weekend Internet Activity

These are the site I visited from Sept. 4th to Sept 7th.

Of course: University of Louisville
Blackboard
Ulink
Email
I kept up to date with my classes; used the online study guides, completed an essay for my Honors Modes class using the Library Resource page and guidelines found on Blackboard. I used the Ulink page to review over my fees. I also regularly (3-4 times a day) check my UofL student mail account. I sent mail to different students involving something I am involved with on campus. I also sent an email to one of my professors about a form I needed her to complete for me.

Yahoo Mail
I don't check this very often. I don't get any useful mail on this account. I checked it once this weekend, only to find that a book I had ordered last week was finally being shipped.

Blogger
I keep reading about Carrotspeak. She is interesting, or at least to me. I finally posted a comment on someone's blog, (I kept forgetting). I'm still trying to figure out how to navigate this site, so I don't spend much time reading anything as of yet; most of my time is spent exploring.

Facebook
Every college student's addiction. I check this when I am bored and am in 'procrastination mode'. I mostly went to my aunt's page on Friday and Saturday because we were trying to figure out where we would meet on Saturday so I could give her the football tickets I had to pick up for her. I visited my boyfriend's page, which still has not been visited by him in a few weeks. I visited a few friend's pages that I have not seen in a while. I left my boyfriend's neice a comment. She thinks the world of me, and I knew it would make her day to have a comment from me. I was in a good mood.

Myspace
I also check this, like facebook, when I am bored. I had a new message from my boyfriend, Jordan... I guess it was about time I told you his name. Put me in a good mood. I wrote him back, and left a comment, like every other day. Then I visited my friend Sarah's page. She goes to the University of Tennessee, so I looked at her pictures and commented on one of her dorm room. I also visited my little brother's page. I go to his page when I'm a little homesick; I oddly enough don't go to his page often, if you would believe it. Nothing new going on with him, and that isn't odd at all.

Scott Kay
This is a jewelry site. I looked at rings, yes, engagement rings. Not for any particular reason, I just like looking at engagement rings. If you are interested at all, I find that I lean toward the princess cut white gold rings.

U.S. Bank
I thought someone had used my debit card, I was ready to call the police. So I logged onto my online account and after about half an hour of staring at the screen about to cry, I realized that I had used the card to buy football tickets. I felt dumb.

Ask Jeeves
I had to ask Jeeves about the HDMI cable that is used with TVs and DVD players. I have been unable to find a connection between my TV and DVD player using the HDMI cable, so I turned to the internet for answers. After many more failed attempts, I gave in, went to Wal-Mart and bought the standard cable, you know, the one with the red, white, and yellow ends.

Lupus Foundation
I have lupus, so I try to visit this site often. It offers support and comfort when I am having a difficult day or having a flare up. I didn't feel very well Saturday because I was nervous about performing at the game that night. I read about how another person with lupus deals with stress and nerves.

YouTube
I just wanted to listen to a song. I don't typically use YouTube to view videos or anything, just to have some background music when I'm doing something else. I wanted to play this one specific song for Jordan.

Pandora
I use this site to listen to music that I like. If you are unfamiliar with this site, you start out by naming a song or artist that you want to hear, and then the site selects music based on similar aspects of that song. I like this site because I am able to experience new music that is similar to my taste. I still have control of whether or not a certain song or certain type of music is played just by selecting a button that indicates if I like the song that is being played.

XM Radio
I usually log into my XM account when I am working online because I like to have background music. I know what channels I like and have presets of channels I like. I know whay type of music is going to be played, so I listen to certain stations depending on my mood and what I am doing. I mainly listened to channel 20, which is XM 20 on 20, a channel playing the listener voted top 20 songs of that hour. I listen to this channel when I just surfing the web or want more modern music.

Words, of all sorts, have never seemed so now. P2.

After reading Andrew Sullivan’s essay about blogging, “Why I Blog,” it is easy to see his positive view about blogging and the ‘blogosphere’, as he calls it.
Andrew finds blogging as a means of instant personal satisfaction when writing something in that very moment. After writing for years under an editor whom he worried about pleasing, he was introduced to blogging, and instantly felt more comfortable being able to express his thoughts, ideas, and just write without having to worry about going through any process of editing and approval. Many people would find this as a better way of writing because there is really no need to worry about revision, unless, however, you would find it personally more harmful to have your fellow bloggers scrutinizing your ideas.
Andrew found that blogging was easy to get hooked to because he enjoyed the simple experience of being able to broadcast his own words into an “exhilarating literary liberation,” since blogging was more about improvisation and thoughts that raced through your head while you were typing.
This is what I believe is Sullivan’s real purpose for blogging; the overall rush and excitement that comes with being able to express yourself at the moment, however you like, without fear of judgment; the “intoxicatingly free” form of writing that is so easily published for the world to view, and desires comments and input of all kinds: both good and bad. Andrew tells of how bloggers are subject to being criticized or at least challenged when blogging about their opinions. This to him is wonderful. Having someone interested in what he has to say enough to even challenge it shows that what he feels, what he experiences, shows his personality, and what he simply has to say matters and is important.

I hope I’m not the only one who finds it ironic that we are blogging about blogging. The experience is indeed new to me, despite being an avid user of the internet, so I was a little skeptical when approaching this assignment. I was honestly not really aware of what a blog was, the purpose of one, or how one went about creating one.
My adventure started out just about the same as any other online setup: enter your email, set up a password, and so on. That part was simple, except for that one security part where you have to read those distorted letter and numbers, but I managed to decipher the code. Then came the tricky part; making the blog personal. I have always had problems with choosing usernames, URL’s, or anything of the sort because I think about the meaning behind everything, and think I have to have the ‘perfect’ name or title. So it sure didn’t help when that part of the setup described the step as being a title that would appear on the dashboard, which made my decision that much harder because I didn’t know what a dashboard was, therefore, I didn’t know how personal to make it. I did like how the blogger had the option of what background to use for the blog. I’m a creative and artsy person, so this was a nice little touch. I also think that the idea of a blog is similar to that of a note on facebook or a bulletin on myspace.
For me, writing a blog could be compared to writing because it is basically a post about your opinion, and I find the most enjoyable papers for me to write are the ones where I can openly and freely discuss my opinions.