Finished with the Final!

I just finished and submitted my final paper for this class to the drop box. I'm definitely a little burnt out from writing over the past couple days so excuse me if I'm not as fluent in this blog post. I want to talk a little bit about the process that I followed for tackling this paper. Although it isn't too much different from how I write my other papers, this one requires a blog!

So I started out by picking a topic (duh!). I chose Made To Break because having worked in a retail technology field for a long time, I was interested in the ideas of planned obsolescence. After having decided my topic, I scoured the web for relevant sources that would compliment Slade's book. A few of the sources were mentioned in my previous blog, but I also managed to find a couple more including an article about the cost of recycling computers and a short write up about planned obsolescence from a perspective other than Slade's.

When actually writing the paper, I developed 5 subtitles so that I included everything that I wanted to discuss as well as everything what was included in the prompt. The subtitles are largely split up based on what sources the information in that section came from, but the more I started writing the more overlap developed. While my paper discusses alot of the social and economical aspects of planned obsolescence and environmentalism, it also has a brief summary of the history of going green as well as some observations on the development of green IT.

Overall, I like to think that I created a pretty well rounded paper based on the topics that were presented so I am satisfied.

I think that is it...
Yeah, it is.

Blogging for Fun

I thought I would take some time off from writing my paper to catch up on some miscellaneous blog entries. Since we are required to have a total of 20 blogs entries, I will do two of these and one more about the final. (Maybe it could make up a little bit for the one technopoly blog I missed)

So I thought it would be fun to blog about a website that has become kind of my ultimate pass-time. The website is called Reddit (Reddit.com) and is essentially an online community that allows for users to create their own pseudo-message board type webpages based on pretty much whatever topic they feel like sharing. Alot of the site has become subject to spreading memes (unfortunately) or posting rehashed internet images and videos. What keep me coming back is though is the original content forums (or subreddits as they are referred to on the site.)

Some of the ones I read on a daily basis are AskReddit, AMA, Today I Learned, and a few others which are a little less popular. AskReddit allows users to ask this large internet community pretty much anything they want. Some people come with problems at work or school that they need some advice for and others just ask some ridiculous question to see what people think. Alot of the time I find that there are questions on their that I have often asked myself, so its really cool to read how other people sometimes engage in the same thought process.

IAMA is a concept that was totally new to me upon first discovering it. It is a page where people say who they are, or some other unique thing about them and let other users ask them anything (AMA = Ask Me Anything... or I Am A something or other...) The people on there range from has been rock stars to albino people. You really can never expect who to find on there.

I'd really recommend checking this site out if you ever need to kill time on the internet. It's up there with some of the best. (Also, it might be worth noting that it is significantly more SFW then 4chan.org)

Getting There!

So I am making pretty decent progress on my final paper (as I should be the day before its due!!!). I want to use this blog entry to talk about some of the sources I am using other than Slade's book.

The first one I found was from WebEcoist.com and is essentially a description of the history of the 'Green' movement. I believe that a brief history is required in order for me to effectively convey the message of this paper. This article discusses how today's idea of the green movement is actually a culmination of something that has existed for over 40 years. The aspect I like most about this article, which really made me want to include it in my paper, was that is claimed to debunk some of the false information that is generally associated with the green movement. I understand that going green is a big ethics issue and it can be really easy for people to simply write about their opinions, especially in the the cyber-world. This article, I feel will give a nice, objective look at the green movement and will compliment Made to Break nicely.

The next source I am using is called Harnessing Green IT and I found it on the IEEE library database. This is an academic journal entry about efforts put forth in order to make technology a little bit greener. The article acknowledges the points made in Slade's book and offers different approaches for combating this problem. I feel like this source will be a great way to tie the two topics together and provide some sort of conclusion.

I also want to note that you will see Wikipedia in my works cited page. I believe that after completing the midterm project that I have developed practical methods for using information from Wikipedia so I wanted to use it.

At this point I am about 5+ pages into the paper and still have a section and the conclusion to go. I will probably do another blog entry after I finish the paper, which will hopefully be tonight.

Facebook III

The last few chapters of the book focus mainly on some of the financial and social aspects of Facebook. They discuss in detail how Facebook was on its way to become a billion dollar company and how the site was starting to integrate itself into the everyday lives of people across the world. For this blog post I would like to focus more on the social aspects of Facebook, especially that which has only come to light in the past year or so.

There was one quote in the last section of the book that really stood out and got me thinking about how much it probably affected a current Facebook trend. The quote was when Mark Zuckerberg asked Larry Page, google's co-founder, if he used Facebook. Page responded saying that the site just was not geared to him. This must have got something rolling in Zuckerberg's head because the next year the influx of adult Facebooker users was astronomical.

Parents and other adult humans seem like the final frontier for new Facebookers and it is certainly taking its toll on how younger users perceive the social network. Speaking from personal experience, in previous years (circa 2003-2004, when I was a young teenager) it wasn't too difficult to keep attitude towards your friends separate from your attitude towards your parents. I looked at it more so as a respect thing. I was still going to be a kid and do really stupid stuff, but I was good enough to do right by my parents and never really get into serious trouble. Facebook is now eliminating that distance that kids try to put between their parents, which is not really a thing, unless you are impervious to embarrassment and invulnerable to groundings. The more I use the Internet, the more I agree that it is a pretty decent tool for emotional outputting, but could get real weird, real fast.

I'm sure most people have seen this site, but it puts into perspective the idea of what I am talking about, here it is. My Parents Joined Facebook

The front page has a flowchart, and while it is meant to be humorous, it has an amount of truth to it.

Final Phase I

So today I started thinking about the Final paper for this class and have decided that I want to write about the second topic involving Giles Slade's book, Made To Break. In general I thought that book was a better read than Postman and my decision was made solely on the basis that if forced to choose, I'd rather read Made To Break again.

After analyzing the topic question a little more, I really got to thinking about the underlying hypocrisy that has potential to exist in a society that disposes such a high amount of usable goods while at the same time claims to be environmentally conscious. I hope to find out some really interesting facts about this once I start delving a little more into the topic.

While tackling the project, I want to focus on a few key points. Oddly enough, I'm not exactly sure what they are yet. I know I'd like to discuss the technology movement and the 'green' movement independent of each other first. I always believe that its important to provide descriptions of two things you are comparing before you actually compare them, especially in a research paper. This way it doesn't leave the reader in the dark when you start making arguments. I havn't really started research for this paper yet, but I plan to the middle of this weekend. I'll post back with another update then.

The Facebook Effect II

In this installment of the Facebook Effect three part blog mini-series we start to the see how Facebook is transforming from a dorm room project to a billion dollar company. The first part in this section of the book discusses investors, specifically that of the Washington Post. Thefacebook (at the time the 'the' was still in there) was ready to take the next big plunge into corporatism. They allready had some investors that Sean Parker, formerly of Napster, had dug up, but this one seemed like a big deal. Kirkpatrick emphasizes the positive vibes that Zuckerberg and Don Graham, leader of the Washington Post, were bouncing off each other during their meeting. While Kirkpatrick still hardly remains objective when discussing Mark Zuckerberg I can realize that this moment is a big one for the company.

By this time, it is clear that Zuckerberg is hardly a business man. He has a set of ideas derived from psychoanalyzing average college students that he and other people know have the ability to make a lot of money. However, advertising is how you make money on websites and this is something he has expressed a strong disinterest in. I feel like the introduction of investors as large as the Post would eventually lead to the increase in advertising that we experience on Facebook today.

Throughout the next couple years, due to the help of major investors, Facebook started incorporating new applications into their website. The photo app became one of its biggest successes as well as the ability to plan events and invite people to them. By 2006, Facebook was in a good place and had just implemented its newest addition to keep people up-to-date on what their friends were doing. This idea was the 'News Feed'. The algorithms involved behind what shows up on the News Feed were pretty interesting and lend themselves to a lot of the data mining accusations made against Facebook. The News Feed apparently analyzes your Facebook habits and bases what you will see on the your frontpage on that. Recently the same thing has been done with the Facebook Ads. They cater to your claimed interests and then request feedback on whether or not you thought the ad was helpful. As far as advertising goes, its still annoying, but at least its better than looking at stuff you have absolutely no interest in.

The Social Network Extra Credit

I went to see this movie about a month ago, but wanted to write about it now while I was in the midst of reading the Facebook Effect. For this blog entry I want to give a short summary of the plot, provide my own criticisms, and then finish with a comparison of the movie to the story that we are reading about in Kirkpatrick's book.


While attending Harvard University, young programmer Mark Zuckerberg, creates a website called 'FaceMash' that takes pictures of girls on campus and allows other students to compare their looks or 'hotness' to each other. The website creates such a stir that Zuckerberg instantly becomes well known and is sought after by a group of frat brothers attempting to make a Harvard exclusive social networking site. Zuckerberg agrees to do it, but then takes their core idea (which is that users must have a harvard.edu email address to use it) and applies to his own website that he called 'thefacebook'. Zuckerberg brings his roommate, Eduardo Saverin, into the project by having him supply the start-up capitol to get the site going, but then once the site escalates to a certain point, Saverin's shares are dropped well below 1%.

From here on out, the bulk of the movie takes places during the trial where Mark Zuckerberg is being sued by Eduardo Saverin as well as the frat brothers. As each person involved in the case makes their statements, and we see flashbacks of how actions unfolded.


The first thing worth noting is that this movie uses the real names of most people involved and is more or less telling a story of events that actually happened. This is not new to movies, but I thought that it was pretty neat they did it this way instead of making a movie about some arbitrary social network and having the plot loosely based on Facebook's story. It felt more real to me and at the same time gave audiences a pretty decent crash course on how Facebook came to be so popular (although its almost guaranteed that some aspects of the movie were inflated for entertainment purposes). The best part of the movie, for me, was the dialog. It was consistently witty and creative while paced appropriately such that there were hardly any moments that allowed for an absence of attention. They did this and still managed to keep the plot easy to follow which is impressive considering the movie clocks in at just about 2 hours. While not be a huge fan of the actors involved in the movie (i.e. Justin Timberlake and the Fake Michael Cera kid) I thought they a good job creating a dramatic interpretation of this real life story.


After reading more than half of the Facebook Effect and watching this movie, it was nice to see the story from two seperate angles. Kirkpatrick really made you feel like Zuckerberg was a revolutionary while The Social Network gave off this vibe that he was a kind of a self-centered backstabber. This put me in good spirits to know that the reality of the situation probably fell somewhere in the middle. It's so difficult sometimes to determine when the people that wrote these stories are trying to give you facts or entertain you, but I suppose thats the magic of the media.