#Selfie

The Selfie cyber culture today are concerned with their online presence, appearance, reactions from followers and their results. When you post a photo of yourself on the internet to be looked at by your peers or people you may not know, when you get a like your ‘up’ but when you get no likes your ‘down’. There is also the danger that your self-esteem may start to be related and tied to how many likes or comments you receive once you post a selfie. Lauren McMahon, writes about our selfie obsessed generation on TheCircular.

I have taken selfies, but really not to extent that some people do. We all have our Facebook, twitter, Instagram or Snapchat friends that really love sharing their ‘staged’ mug. What prompted me to write this blog was a recent grocery shop I was on. While shopping in Lidl I saw a girl by the fruit section taking a selfie of herself and a banana. She obviously wasn’t happy with the first result because she went on to take a few others from different angles. Then, there was issues with the filters she was using so, she rang someone who helped her through the dilemma. It was a tough call, but they decided that ether ‘Perpetua’ or ‘Hudson’ would be just fine. These are filters on Instagram for those of you who don’t know that can distort the colours of the picture you take. I waisted about 6-7 mins of my life watching her, but she saw it as she devoted 6-7 mins to maintain her online image and presence.

Selfie accessories…

selfie buttons

standered selfie stick

iPhone camera trigger

zuckerberg selfie stick

selfie brush

timer capture

We are even accommodating the selfie culture by creating selfie accessories. Now I would have thought that you need 1- yourself and 2 –  a camera, but NO. The selfie enthusiast will come complete with a bank of accessories. Such as, The Selfie stick which to be honest I can see the benefits of it. Like, if you were taking a group picture and you want to be in it, its amazing. Whip out the stick, pop your phone on, time the shot, DONE. Everyone’s happy. This stops you from asking a stranger around you to take the picture, and you don’t have to worry about your phone/camera being broken by another, who’s only trying to help or being stolen by that person! (because it has happened!!) You also don’t need to use a tripod, you don’t shake your hand as much with a selfie stick and there is much less of a chance of dropping your phone with the selfie sticks. Phonearena.com surprised me. The only selfie accessory to date that  I was aware of was the selfie stick, but there’s more. They have composed a list of the 5 most useful selfie taking accessories for the selfie-obsessives. Read about them, quite interesting really. One does not simply just take a selfie.

I personally thought that the HISY button was clever as I use a similar device for photo shoots as a photographer. It’s almost like the amature’s progression button towards professional techniques. HISY aims to help you take a selfie with an iPhone more easily. It’s a simple button that connects to the phone via low-energy Bluetooth, and takes control of the built-in shutter camera. HISY’s battery lasts for two years if you take 100 photos daily, which means the little’o button will last for a while. And when it expires, you can replace it with a plain CR2032 cell straight out of your local electronics shop. Of course, the gizmo can be used not just for selfies, but for all kinds of photographs too, even video. HISY doesn’t need a special app to run, it connects directly to the iPhone’s camera app, and can only be used with iPhones ISO7 or newer. Unlucky for the Android selfieists.

As much benefits as there are for using the selfie stick, there are a few cons too….

Museums, concerts, stores and some clubs are now banning the use of these sticks as there seen as a hazard and disturbance. In early March, two American tourists were arrested after they carved their names into a wall at Rome’s Colosseum and then the pair took a photo using a selfie stick. (true story). Rebecca Strong, Staff writer for Bostinno, has written an interesting article about our selfie obsessions and writes about it as an addiction. Can you actually develop a selfie addiction. When I thought about this, the answer I came up with was, Yes. Like any other addiction, it would come down to your personality and how influenced you can be as a person by trends, fads, peer pressure and whats fashionable.

In 2014 Ellen DeGeneres broke the Internet & beat Obama with most retweeted tweet with the Oscars Selfie with a Samsung on stage, but later switched to an iPhone backstage, which makes me ask the question, what is the selfie enthusiastic’s phone of choice for #Selfie. Bostinno have actually gone the extra mile and have listed features of the most popular selfie phones and also have taken the same picture with each phone to show you the difference in quality.

Few Facts Of the Origins of the word Selfie:

In November 2013, the word “selfie” was announced as being the “word of the year” by the Oxford English Dictionary, which gave the word itself an Australian origin. A “selfie” is, according to the Oxford English Dictionary: ”a photograph that one has taken of oneself, typically one taken with a smart phone or webcam and uploaded to a social media website.” The example they use is super-helpful because it also contains some etiquette advice: “Occasional selfies are acceptable, but posting a new picture of yourself every day isn’t necessary.” (hint, hint). Also The word Selfie, was coined by a drunk Australian in 2002. On January 28th 2014 The Chainsmoker’s released a song called #Selfie. It took the world by storm and verified the selfie culture as we know it. Bustle is a good website with great articles and facts on selfie origins.

Some people take the selfie obsession to far (Girl with the Banana in Lidl) or even the Cellfy Stic (which is now mainly used for bathroom selfies)… WHY??? -> others are just jumping along on the trend band waggon as am I. Selfies are fun, rather than living in the moment and remembering it from memories, you can take the memories while living in the moment.

So Until the next blog post,

The Web Changes News – And PR – Forever

Introduction

Since the beginning of time humans have engaged in different forms of communication and its the medium of communication that we use, has changed. We started with gestures and developed verbal communication and then we learned to write. We have communicated the same way every time, the sender sends the information through a medium to the receiver. Within the last few years with the developments in digital communication, the medium for delivering news has shifted from printed news to online news. This has brought a major transformation in news paper sales firstly and it has drastically changed the way public relations management is controlled. People now have come to expect that along with an old media approach, that their will also be a new media approach. Many people would be of the opinion that the old style media, for example, a press release to a newspaper company for publication via print is dated. While I would agree some what with this, being a digital native myself, I still would firmly believe that we as PR practitioners should never rule it out completely because there is still a reliance on these means of communication to a certain demograph of people.

How ‘new’ media differs from ‘old’ media

The Internet in recent years has brought a revolution in how we communicate, which has summoned a transformation in how Public Relations is practiced. Before there was a heavy reliance in the print media press release and now we are seeing a steady shift to online press releases. With a rapid change in technology and digitisation, it initiated a shift where people are now currently moving away from printed text to digital text for news, learning and communication. PR practitioners now need to adapt their skill sets to be more relatable to the shift in the newer digital trends. Rupert Murdock in 2005 addressed the American Society of News Paper editors in Washington DC and tried to convince people, that the ‘traditional’ media, or as we know it now, ‘old’ media, is changing as people are now using different means of gathering news. (Guardian, 2005) 

“We need to realise that the next generation of people accessing news and information, whether from newspapers or any other source, have a different set of expectations about the kind of news they will get, including when and how they will get it, where they will get it from, and who they will get it from”.

When Murdock put his voice forward in 2005, he was initially laughed at by his peers. Now 10 years later, the print media has succumbed to the demand for online news. Every paper available in shop shelves now have an online version for free or you can avail of a subscription online. People don’t just want to rely on one source of information when they are looking at the news. A lot of this could be due to the cynical nature of people nowadays, but is also to do with the fact that people want more opinions and versions of the same story, particularly if its of interest.

“What is happening is, in short, a revolution in the way young people are accessing news. They don’t want to rely on the morning paper for their up-to-date information. They don’t want to rely on a God-like figure from above to tell them what’s important. And to carry the religion analogy a bit further, they certainly don’t want news presented as gospel’ – (Rupert Murdock, 2005)

Carnegie carried out a report on how there is a definite migration of old media to new media between the ages of 18-34 on how people access news. The dramatic shift in how young people access the news raises a question about how the scale and the flow of information will interact in the years ahead. (Carnegie 2015) The report showed that in 2005, there were already trends to show where old media news was headed. By using internet portal sites, our phones, tablets, we are now able to source news other way than just print news papers. We can access, blogs, forums, news websites and social media. Each of these devices and functions have challenged the way we access information and process it. It challenges the way traditional media and its historic function and puts to question where traditional news media will be in the future. It’s also posed a challenge to who produces new. Citizen journalism, blogging sites are changing the nature of how we as PR practitioners manage our clients reputation and because of this, we are now using these tools too, to come before possible issues online.

The paradox between how new media is now used rather than the old types of media, is that, it was the digital immigrants who invented these technologies, but its the digital natives, who don’t see restrictions with new media uses are developing the mediums in which we view media. People born from the early 2000 on are described as the digital natives and the generation before are the digital immigrants.

Jeff De Graff, author and journalist for the Huffington post describes digital natives as Free agents:

‘ They view the world horizontally, in equalitarian terms. Rather than dividing the world into hierarchies, they see everyone as existing on an equal level. They embrace the benefits of sharing things and ideas with each other and, in doing so, they cross boundaries. They are driven by values. For this reason, many of them are distrustful of traditional cultural and social institutions: marriage, religion, government. In opting out of these institutions, they have declared themselves micro segments of one — free agents.’

In 2005 when Murdock addressed the American Society of News Paper editors, he received an aggressive response. Digital natives imagine a world with minimal institutional structure and are more open to diversity in cultures and backgrounds. PR practitioners who are still learning new technologies have an advantage now where they can learn from the digital natives and keep up with the new trends in PR and their clients reputation.

It is the opinion of Alyshia Kisor-Madlem, blogger and journalist, that it really comes down to numbers when you think about how the web has changed news today. For example, the traditional print media for the New York Times has a circulation of 2 million copies, while the online version has over 15 million visitors a month. (Blastmedia, 2012) .

I believe that while printed or old media still remains important and will do for at least the next 10 years, newspaper companies should be preparing for and gearing towards having a smaller printing demo graph and working on their online presence and persona. PR partitioners currently depend on old media trends like newspapers and radio to manage their clients retains with the mass public, but they also now have to include digital and social marketing services. Renatta Murphy, the managing director of Cameo Communications in Cork, Ireland, has been quoted saying that ‘If for example, if The Examiner in Cork, stopped or shut down, it would affect all Cork PR Practitioners work. It would make Clients divert their business to a part of the country where their was a large-scale news print’. (PR talk, 24.03.2015) I believe that currently, today businesses should and still do hold a lot of value in the old styles of media, but for a PR partitioner, it does depend on who you’re representing and what they need you for. Roderick Udo, event manager for Appelpop festival also said during his presentation for The Art of The event seminar in 2015, that while there is now a heavy reliance on social media to promote and inform members of the public events, you should never underestimate the power of traditional media like the press releases, articles in magazines and news papers as the target market will always have access to these forms of media. I do believe that it had added to the PR practitioners job, but I believe it has enhanced it. You can reach all types of audiences with editorials online and also with physical print copies from media sources.

Conor Barron, the digital Marketing executive for Bord Gais Energy, wanted to promote the Bord Gais energy Theater to a younger audience, and the vast majority of this PR awareness campaign was mainly promoted by new media means like the use of twitter, hashtags and google + hangout to appeal to the target market it was trying to reach. (The Art of The event seminar, 2015). The type of media predominantly used for this campaign was new media, if this campaign was carried out by traditional means of media, it would not have carried over the same effect as it simply would not have reached the necessary target market.

The impact of the web on traditional mass media

It used to be the case that with ‘old’ media, almost everybody in your locality would get their news from a few select newspapers, radio stations or television channels, and so we as PR practitioners knew which channels to use to reach the general public. The PR profession had mastered communicating through traditional media but the emergence of the web meant the tools and tactics we used to reach our publics had to be developed quickly or we would be left behind.

New media and communication technologies have had a noticeable impact on public relations, in particular how organisations are able to communicate with their multiple publics. A multitude of studies have examined the phenomenon of social media, and its impact on different types of organisations. (PRSA,2014).

Statistics from pew-internet show Demographics of Key Social Networking Platforms like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Pinterest and Linked’In. With multi platform use of social media, which is regarded as new media, on the rise, it’s now more important than ever for PR practitioners to adapt to using new media as well as the old media styles. Pew surveys showed that 52% of online adults now use two or more social media sites which is a significant increase from 2013 when it stood at 42%. It also showed that more than half of all online adults 65 and older (56%) use Facebook. This statistic represents 31% of all seniors that took part in the survey. Another statistic to take from their survey is that roughly half of the internet using young adults from the age of 18-29 use instagram and 49% of Instagram users use it daily.

Dustin W Supa, performed a qualitative and insightful study of how social media, otherwise known as new media, has impacted the PR practitioners job. The responses he received from interviewing 34 practitioners showed that many practitioners found that it gave them an advantageous approach to PR and carrying out their jobs and also found it easier to find out information on journalists. They also stated that their relationships with journalists have become more personal. The question asked, that provoked such a strong response was: “What impact has social media had on the media relations function of public relations?”(PRSA, 2014)

One practitioner responded:

“Definitely…it’s an opportunity to talk with reporters and establish a relationship in a less formal way. You can talk with them about anything from the weather, to a mutual favorite sport to the industry they cover. You can show them love by retweeting an article they wrote. Some reporters even tweet media opportunities that you can respond to right then and there…Overall, social media helps you see what kind of person a reporter is. It humanizes them, which in my opinion, makes it easier to talk with them when it comes to client work.”

The nature of new media also impacts news and how we consume it. Johanna Blakley gave a ted talk on how we are targeted by media and marketers and an interesting point I took from the video was that from their research carried out, it was females that are predominately social media networkers,  that use new media interfaces. Media companies believe that if you fall within certain categories that you are predictable in certain ways. Online media has also shifted the way that we are now demo graphed by media companies and we are much more refined as individuals now because of this. Traditional media demographics have changed. The TED talk is roughly 8 minutes long and below the video I took a few screen grabs of statics and their times on the video.

Reference Section:

• http://www.theguardian.com/media/2005/apr/14/citynews.newmedia – Date accessed 15/03/2015
• http://carnegie.org/publications/carnegie-reporter/single/view/article/item/124/ – Date accessed 18/03/2015
• http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jeff-degraff/digital-natives-vs-digita_b_5499606.html – Date accessed 22/03/2015
• http://blastmedia.com/2012/11/06/online-vs-print-media/ – Date accessed – 22/03/2015
• http://www.prsa.org/intelligence/prjournal/documents/2014supa.pdf – Date accessed 22/03/2015
• http://www.prsa.org/Intelligence/PRJournal/Vol8/No2/ – Date accessed 22/03/2015
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZR4LdnFGzPk – Date accessed 25/03/2015
• http://www.ted.com/talks/johanna_blakley_social_media_and_the_end_of_gender?language=en – Date accessed 25/03/2015
• http://blog.iain-tulungagung.ac.id/chusnulchotimah/wp-content/uploads/sites/28/2013/11/Global-Purel.pdf
• http://www.academia.edu/3245711/Time_to_bridge_the_gaps_issues_with_current_social_media_research_in_public_relations – Date accessed 25/03/2015

Cybercrime, Get Ready!

Its becoming harder to protect what you put out online, than your physical belongings at home.

Recently, a friend of mine was burgled. Her house was broken into while she was at work and a lot of expensive things were stolen. Her smart TV, Macbook Pro, iPad Air, the list goes on. However the robbers didn’t take the expensive granite top pool table, smart microwave(it talks to you, I kid you not), a orthopeadic massage chair or a load of other quite expensive valuables. She was very worried about her TV, Macbook and iPad Air, but it did occur to me, it would have been far easier to take some of the other items, I mean the TV was hard enough to mount on the wall (i was there), but taking it down, in one piece, must have been quite difficult. All the stolen instruments that were stolen, were connected together with the same iCould account and her iCould key chain stored all her email logins and her PayPal details. The detectives on site suggested to my distraught friend that it seems it was a cyber crime. My friend at the time snapped back and said she wasn’t “Hacked”, but burgled.

The detectives advised then that she had an awful lot of other valuables that would have held a better market price to sell off again. They said that the guys who robbed her, robbed only those items(the ones I listed above). He asked her what they all had in common, and she said her iCloud account. PANIC PANIC. Cybercrime can happen online, but it can also happen in the real world. Cyber crime apparently cost the Irish government 630 million euros in 2014. Read more about Irish cyber crime statistics in this article.

She did what she could to change as many passwords and wiped what she could from these devises, but really, had the damage already been done?? I mean she had left for work at 730am and was home at 6pm to find that certain items had been stolen. Had the burglars taken the information they needed from her, before she tackled what she could?? There was no way of telling. It got us into a very interesting conversation though. Even 5-10 years ago, if you were robbed, you were robbed. You didn’t necessarily panic at the thought of your couch, tv, desktop Gateway(computer) or your Dell’asourous box(computer) being lifted. You felt hurt, upset, invaded, insecure. You may have even felt a sigh of relief as the Computer you used, you didn’t know how to use it anyway to save such personal details of you on it!

Anyway to recap, we wiped her iCloud account from all stolen devises(obviously after we tried find my iDevises, FYI, NOTHING), took it to her savvy technician friend to remote wipe key chains, and she was advised to wait. She also had to contact her employer to let them know, as she would have had work projects on these devises that would not really have been for public knowledge. There is actually no way to hive yourself piece of mind in the case of this.

About 2 weeks after the burglary, she was contacted by AIB, her banking branch to let her know that in Dublin somewhere, (well I know where, but I can’t tell you) to advise her that there was a series of unusual transactions taking place together. My friend was putting diesel into her car on her way to work & at the same time someone was using it in Dublin & spending pretty flamboyantly. She verified immediately this was not her spending in Dublin and to cancel all transactions and her bank account.

Long story short, they burglars were found, as were a lot of her stuff, and from her key chain details saving her bank details, they had made A LOT of copies of the same card using a card copying machine.

Cybercrime will be a huge issue by 2020. If we don’t wake up and prepare, we will be sitting ducks for hackers, crackers and burglars all around. These burglars were not your usual run of the mill, steel and shift on goods sort, they were the type to see what had value and inside value that would give them more financial knowledge. Go-Gulf is a website that hosts a series of blogs on different topics. It’s an American website so the statistics will represent the american economy, but to be fair we are never too far behind. The blog post that particularly caught my eye was about the rate at which cybersecurity rates will rise and cost by 2017.

This TED talk features speaker James Lyne.He talks about cyber crimes that happen every day, and what we can do to prevent them or stop them completely.

“James Lyne reminds us that it’s not only the NSA that’s watching us, but ever-more-sophisticated cybercriminals, who exploit both weak code and trusting human nature.” – TEDTalks

Hackers and Crackers

Hackers…..

Hackers modify & add code – so when the code they edit changes, it does something entirely different than what it did before. Many people ‘hack’ their own systems to alter or change how their systems work, or hire hackers to do if for them.

Anonymous are a group of hackers you may know already. Most recently, Anonymous released a video and a statement via twitter condemning the attack on Charlie Hebdo, where 12 people including 8 journalists, were murdered.

The video messages they posted had a powerful announcement from Anonymous:

“We, Anonymous around the world, have decided to declare war on you, the terrorists” and promises to avenge the killings by shutting down your accounts on all social networks.”

On January 12, they brought down one of the Jihadists’ websites. However, critics of the action warned that taking down extremists’ websites would make them harder to monitor.

Wednesday the 5th of March, technology giants Apple and Google announced that a ‘Freak Attack’ left millions of users vulnerable to hackers, which they are working hard at the moment to fix. Software makers use US software makers to use weaker security in encryption programs sold overseas due to the USA’s national security concerns. Read the article on The Guardian website for more information about this potentially massive problem. Site’s like Groupon, Khol and American Express were affected and vulnerable since Tuesday the 4th of March 2015.

Dan Goodin, security editor at Ars Technica writes about the dangers of this ‘Freak Attack‘ and what it means for us and our privacy.

Crackers….. 

A cracker is seen as the more malicious of the two. Crackers break into someone else’s computer system or network. They intentionally bypass passwords, licences and computers and breach security. Obviously, the activities of most Crackers are considered illegal. This website gives an informative account of crackers and what they do that s illegal if you want to know more about Crackers. Fear not, you can protect yourself against being cracked or being hacked by following a few simple steps. It may not protect you fully, but it will at least make it hard for them!!!

 

Online Identity

Your Online profile Digital Identity is a term used to describe the persona of an individual which presents across all the online communities that you’re a member of. When we use sites or services like Facebook, Twitter, Amazon, Ebay, Google or LinkedIn, we leave a ‘digital footprint‘. Every photo you share, posts you make, items you search/buy, tweets you twurp or email sent, you leave a footprint. The footprints you make are used to generate your online persona and silently build an online profile of you. There are many websites that are starting to do this with striking degrees of accuracy. This information that is collected can be used to target you for marketing purposes, data collection, profile building, profile scanning, DNA data collecting, analysis & observation. I, like most of you would have assumed, the trails we leave are just for marketing. However, now that I am really thinking about what could very likely will be its other uses, its easy to see how our online information can be miss used. The black-market of the future will sell real lives or invented identity for a costly fee. People in the future wanting to start over and become someone else will have the ability to do so. I believe that society as we see it now, will in 30-40 years time, be drastically different. Picture a futuristic world where entry to buildings is based on an intelligence system that analyses your human presence & matches it ti its online data on you in a matter of seconds. The online data footprints we leave are all tracked, monitored & recorded. From now I recommend you to be careful what you share. Sites like specify, intel, pipl or even a quick google search will show what information about you is accessible to the public.

Every movement we make online its tracked so the image above as an imaginative visual of you.  Executive Chairman of Google, Eric Schmidt said: Online Developments in Anonymity. However anonymous you think you are online, even by creating a pseudonym, you can be ID’d. Andrew Lewman, The executive director of the Tor Project plans to re-anonymise the web. The Tor software confuses a users web traffic by bouncing the signal to different locations, so anyone that is watching is unable to trace who you are or where you are. Lewman spoke about how important our identity online is: “The ability to be anonymous is increasingly important because it gives people control, it lets them be creative, it lets them figure out their identity and explore what they want to do, or to research topics that aren’t necessarily ‘them’ and may not want tied to their real name for perpetuity,” Aleks Krotoski, has been writing about interactivity since 1999. She has a PhD in the social psychology of relationships in online communities. She also writes articles feature pieces and opinion pieces. While browsing, I came across an article she wrote on Online Identity: Is authenticity or anonymity more important?? The article is well worth a read as she questions and quotes high authority figures in the interactive world. How To Be ‘Identity Savvy’ online & to watch what footprints you leave Statistics from CNN show that Identity Fraud is on the rise and growing since 2010 where the figure rose from 10.2 million to 13.1 million in 2013. I have formed a few useful steps in how you can protect your identity online & use online applications wisely. We don’t need to live like hermits in tinfoil, but having a degree of awareness helps.

• Use strong passwords and do not share them with anyone. A random combination of numbers, letters and punctuation over eight characters long is recommended. Do not repeat a password that is used for other accounts. If one password is leaked, at least your other passwords are different.
• Check your billing and account records carefully to detect potential identity theft early. Online banking updates almost immediately. When logging in to your online banking system, ensure that you have complete privacy.
• If your signing up to newsgroups, offers, mailing lists, use your less frequently used email address. Be careful when signing up to mailing lists – spammers use the unsubscribe button to validate addresses.
• Only share your primary email address with people you know.
• Only make online purchases from companies that have a clear privacy policy and secure payment pages. There usually obvious to spot, Paypal for instance, have a specific size, and locations on websites they appear. Using Paypal is usually a safer alternative to using your bank card details online.
• Think before you fill out online forms. Ask yourself, how much information do I need to enter into this site?
• Keep a record of what information you have given to whom.
• Be careful how much personal information you post or reveal online.
• Users who share addresses, telephone numbers, birthdays, and other personal information put themselves at a greater risk of identity theft, stalking and harassment. This includes information you post on social media.

• If you use social networking sites, adjust your privacy settings to control the amount and type of information you want to share, so that people you don’t know very well can only see certain parts of your profile.
• We all have fun on social media, checking in, taking pictures of what we are doing and sharing them, but be careful how often you do this. Out and about statuses let people know your not at home. Take this lollipop!
• Think about what information you may have online that is spread across multiple sites. Identity thieves can piece together your identity from public information piece by piece like putting together a puzzle. The footprints we leave can not be washed away.

Mario Rodriguez who is a faculty member of Communications and Media Studies Department at Stetson University gave a TED talk the 12th of April 2013 on Facebook Privacy & Identity – Exploring your digital self. He studied Facebook privacy for his dissertation and compiled alot of primary research you might find interesting. His particular emphasis on privacy is not only relevant to the job market but shows that online privacy is an essential topic for cultivating 21st century media literacy. He also discusses Social media privacy and questions our representation online.

Digital Natives and Digital Immigrants

What is this all about?

Digital natives are the people who were born into a generation of technology and were born roughly from the mid 1990’s on. This generation is also referred to as the ‘Net Generation’. People born before this time would be known as Digital Immigrants.

Since time has begun, we have labeled each generation.

• The people who fought in WW1 are known as The Lost Generation.
  

• People born from 1916 – 1920 are known as The Greatest or The GI Generation as this generation fought in WW2 & the survivors that live to this day are honored veterans.

• The Silent Generation label was given to those born from 1926-1938 & they are known as the children of the great depression.

• The next generation from 1945-1960 was named The Baby Boom Generation.

• We called the next generation, Generation X which was people born from 1960 – 1982. This was a really nasty generation as families experienced lots of divorces and suicide and murder figures skyrocketed. However, this was the first generation to experience personal computing, gender equality and started more businesses.

• Generation Y came next which was people born from 1982-the mid 1990’s. My generation actually. We were the fortunate ones to be born during the big economic boom which was emerging through large developments in technology. They started ‘planning’ families with having deliberate children. Health care and education improved a bit, not by much depending on which country you were in. The USA & Europe would have had a similar change and advancement and some countries developed quicker.

• Digital Natives are the generation from the mid 1990’s and on to this day in 2015. They are the tech savvy’ist of us all. My kid cousin was born in 2008 and he is able to beat me by 204 levels in Candy Crush on his iPad & also fix the reason by iMessages aren’t sending? The Kid is 7 years of age and I just think he is wonderful. FYI he has been fixing my IT issues since he was 4 years old.

Digital immigrants include all those generations before generation Y and even some people in generation Y. Can the digital natives teach us? Will they take over from us? To be honest, to think about what way technology will be in 10 years time is interesting isn’t it? But is also a little scary. Just think, if my four year old cousin in 2012, fixed my iCloud back up & sorted the settings on my iPhone, with a limited verbal capacity & knowledge of the world, what will he be doing 10 years from then? Breaking firewalls, hacking Washington DC, controlling his own android robotic army?!?! these thoughts just cross my mind sometimes. Its really going to be based on his education that he gets now though isn’t it? The great Sir Ken Robinson gave a great TED talk into how schools kill creativity. Its really worth a watch.

The below video will bring you to youtube:

The link below will bring you to the TED website:

My only hope is that little Cian isn’t told to change and become a normal high achieving creature of the education system here in Ireland, that ends up with high points and does law, medicine or teaching. I hope he will be encouraged and led to a path of success by his teachers through life. Maybe a lot has changed now though. It might not be as unbalanced as what it was when I went through primary or secondary, where if you were good at art, and you exceeded all expectations in it, your maths grade decided if you made it to college or not. I hope that they will re address the system so he has a fighting chance of becoming the next Steve Jobs, Tim Cook, Bill gates, Marissa Ann Mayer, Joseph M. Tucci or even the next Mark Zuckerberg.

The digital native himself the other day, skyped me to inform me that he has to scroll down through his game for a while in candy crush before he finds me….. on the level ladder & added that his mom is still getting texts from me from my iCloud email.

I don’t understand it at all, and this smug 7 year old is just itching to fix it. He fixed an issue I was having with internet connectivity on his last visit when he was 6 on the cusp of turning 7. The type of age that a person in born into, moulds the person for the future. With the right guidance, education & support, they can be who ever they wish to be. Although it is intimidating, knowing that the digital native is gaining more knowledge and is going to lead the way to future advancements is exciting.

Jeff De Graff, author for the Huffington post wrote a great article on his point of view between the digital native and the digital immigrant. Lastly see this great quote by Rupert Murdoch as he talks about himself as a digital immigrant. 

Cybercultures, An Introduction.

The need to know…

Cybercultures is becoming a very talk about topic today. Cybercultures is a culture about the new or emerging developments from the use of computer networks for communication, entertainment and business.

It is also the study of various social phenomena associated with the internet and other new forms of the network communication, such as online communities. I used an online community before called imvu, it was enjoyable as it reminded me of the sims which has now become an online community too with the launch of sims 3.

Barry O Halloran, a writer on the website Whatculture, gives a run down of his top 7 online gaming communities. I was a bit surprised that World Of War Craft or Second Life did not appear in the list, but in comparison to the new online communities developed now, that O Halloran has listed, I can see there is much more choice and each community is more tailored to every persons personality, likes and dislikes.

I wouldn’t consider myself to be a big online gamer and I couldn’t say I have much experience in this area, but what I found next on the website upset me a bit!! He also has compiled a list of the 7 Worst online gaming communities and I will admit, that I chuckeled at a few, but was surprised that Call of Duty, Black Ops was the raining champion of the Worst!!

Cybercultures is also the study of other types of various network communications, wearable computing, social gaming, social media, mobile apps, augmented reality, and texting, and includes issues related to identity, privacy, and network formation.

This link to a TED TALK by Kevin Kelly, gives an interesting insight into the world of cybercultures. Its called The Next 5000 days of The Web.