Week 13 Reading Response
This week's blog calls you to post a draft of your digital discourse community ethnography. We have covered some ways to format your essay in class, and this posting is an opportunity to share your work and receive peer review. At a minimum, your posting should fill up one blog posting space (I believe there is a 1500 character limit), but you are welcome to use two or more posting spaces if necessary.
You will not receive credit for this blog without completing both an initial posting and a response, so even though the face to face sections are typically not required to post a response, this week's blog calls for a response.
____________________________________________________________________
After posting a draft for your digital discourse community ethnography, you should complete a review of the work completed by one of your peers. NOTE*** it is important that you review someone's work who has not yet received a review. If little Johnny gets ten reviews and poor Sally gets none, that wouldn't be too fair for Sally.
As you review, consider the following:
1. How effectively is the analysis of the community's communication practices delivered? Evaluate how the author builds CONTEXT, EVIDENCE, and subsequent ANALYSIS, and deliver suggestions for improvement. Is there enough evidence? and could there be other evidence the author needs to consider? Where would you like to see the writer develop more context or deliver more analysis?
2. Consider the overall organization of the piece. Re-organize the piece and deliver at least one way to reconstruct it. Explain your rationale for your organizational choices.
3. Consider concision and locate places where concision could be improved. re-draft a small portion (a paragraph) of the text in a way that improves the concision of that part.
4. Come up with at least two questions to help the writer develop his/her digital discourse community ethnography project.
The original posting is due by Nov. 11, 2012, by 11:59pm (Eastern Standard Time)
The response to a peer's posting is due by Nov. 15, by 11:59pm (Eastern Standard Time)
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0M08
ReplyDeleteI went online looking for communities that I can investigate and came across Song Meanings. This website is basically a social network for music lovers where you can search for your favorite artists and analyze the meaning of their lyrics. You can choose a song from any genre of music and put your own interpretation of the in the comment box. Some people have different views on the meaning of a certain song and they'll try to correct other interpretations. I originally thought that you just listened to a song and obtain a certain meaning right after listening, but after looking at a few interpretations I saw how deep people go into analyzing the meaning of lyrics. Also, I came across a ratings box where people can rate a person's comment about the song. It works like the "like" button on Facebook except you can actually rate down to emphasize you're disliking of someone's comment.
Tony Mirabelli touches on Swales's definition of discourse community to analyze his work. According to him, a discourse community has a broadly agreed set of common public goals. Everyone using this community has the same goal of giving their own evaluation of a song and posting their own lyrics for people to view and comment on. Mirabelli introduces the term multiliteracies to show that there's more to a community than just reading a text. There are numerous means by which one can communicate an idea both verbally and nonverbally. These include the many sources that people use to analyze a song which are reading the lyrics, watching the music video if there is one, and obtaining some background information about the song or person who wrote the song. I also decided to examine authority in this community according to the ratings and comments. Wardle uses Bruce Lincoln to discuss that authority "is the effect of a posited, perceived, or institutionally ascribed asymmetry between speaker and audience that permits certain speakers to command not just the attention but the confidence, respect, and trust of their audience."
Methodology
I sought to continue the tradition of Mirabelli and observe the different literacies that are used in this online community. I decided to create an account and join this community to have more access to the comments and posts. Then, I observed several songs that were quite popular today and read comments made by people to see how they interpreted the song. I decided to use one song in particular called "Some nights". Apart from the comments, there were little boxes next to the comments where a person can rate someone else's comment up or down. I decided use some of Wardle's ideas to take a look at how authority was gained in this community by examining these rate ups and downs.
I have been observing the online community for several weeks now, jotting down observations and writing a report with information of how the community works and patterns that I noticed while glancing at the many song interpretations available. The data collected was taken at no specific time during the week or day because I was able to get the same amount of information no matter when I looked. I sent emails to users trying to interview them to help further my argument but I wasn't able to get any responses but I'm able to get enough information about the community from my observations.
0M08
ReplyDeleteSome Nights- The Fun
The Fun is a music group that has been around for a long time but became popular after their radio hit "We are Young". They came out with another radio hit called "Some nights" that I thought would be a good song to examine because I know that there can be confusion about what it means. One could analyze the song differently depending on what they used to read the song (not just literally). This raised many people to interpret the songs in countless ways not necessarily making anyone right or wrong since it's mostly based off opinion, but the more resources that were used to communicate the idea of the song lead to the comment being more valuable amongst the other members of the community.
Music Video, Lyrics, and Background Information
The music video to this song makes a reference to war. This causes many people to take it literally and only interpret the song meaning in terms of being in a war. Seeing the visuals of the soldiers fighting gave them this idea. Numerous people made reference to the video in their comments and gave their interpretation solely off of that. For example, someone posted this comment," Whatever the message is, it seems to be war related because the video showed something from the American Revolution."
Apart from the video, there were people who went straight to the lyrics to find meaning. I saw several examples of this when I saw people post the actual lyrics to the song in the comment box and then interpreted it after. Some would interpret the song in parts, specifically after each stanza of the song. Here's an instance where someone posts parts of the song then interprets it: "Some nights stay up.. some nights call it a draw. Despite all the indecision as noted above, I still wake up every day and carry on; but I wonder what do I want then?" Response: He is clearly referencing some past strife with his family and reflecting on past decisions he made in regards to his family situation; as someone else noted most of the songs on this album are about his family. “Sorry to leave mom, had to go”.. pretty obvious something ugly happened there in the past. Further example, When he says my heart is breaking for my sister and the fraud she called love, he is clearly referencing his dislike for his sister’s significant other, but also when he looks in his nephew’s eyes (aka his sister’s kid) he thinks to himself wow, some beautiful things can come out of awful situations. Taken altogether, it seems like this song is about him just reflecting on his own life and searching for direction amidst a lot of indecisiveness – specifically in regards to past decisions about his family, his thoughts about himself, and his future and what he wants for himself. " This literal reading of the lyrics gave some people different ideas of what the song actually meant because they didn't see a picture of soldiers fighting but developed their own picture through the words.
0M08
ReplyDeleteFurthermore, there are people who go even further to research the background of the song by finding information about the person who wrote it. Here I observed people becoming even more analytical. Nate Reuss is the man who wrote this song and some people decided to take a look at the song from his perspective. Here is an interpretation of someone who has a little background information about the singer. "This song is all about Nate's transition from one life (his life at home) to a new life (his life as a celebrity). He wants to be famous and do what he loves, which is to sing, but he doesn't care about the money and doesn't want the fame to go to his head and change him. Because of this, he is conflicted. He's against all the attention that the world gives celebrities and doesn't want any part of it. He wants the world to fight back and be against the social norms of attention given to celebrities. However he has been exposed to this life and found some perks in it as well. This is what really makes his life and thoughts about this life more conflicted. Because of the fame, he thinks it's hard to differentiate between his true friends and people just seeking him out for his fame. Because of the perks of fame and this unwanted attention from people who are not his true friends, he is conflicted about this life. He sees and misses the "ghost" or himself in his life and he misses his home and parents. But, singing is what he loves to do and doesn't think it's work giving up even though he is against this life. He thinks this life is an example of a good thing that came from a bad decision, just as something that has happened to his sister. Being exposed to this life has made him question social norms and he sits up "some nights" thinking about this conflict." This person developed a picture by taking it from the songwriter's perspective and relating it to his life.
Signs of Authority
In this online community, I was able to notice a pattern of who had some authority and who didn't in the responses by the amount of rate ups or downs that they received for this particular song. One person posted a response that got ten rate ups which is the highest I had seen because the rest had around 2-4. I also came across a comment that had 6 rate downs and comments following it. The person who received the rate ups had a deep analysis of the song making references to the video, the lyrics, and information about the songwriter and some extra personal thought. The comment can be found in Appendix A. In terms of the person who got 6 rate downs, it was made clear that he wasn't aware of what was appropriate to write in a comment box so he didn't gain the respect of others on the community. This is the comment that the user made: " um ... really i just heard Some Nights dude forgets to take his Prozac ... whine whine whine ... poor poor thing ... whatever ... don't we have a country station where all the cry fests get redirected to?? the only war is in his bi-polar brain ... missing mommy & daddy ... grow the flip up dude". The responses to this were, "Nasty, nasty comment." and " First, get the shift key on your keyboard fixed. Second, people with "bipolar brains" don't have the option of simply "growing the flip up." They have the option of letting things kill them or killing themselves first. At least in my case. Every person is different. Third, don't comment if you don't like it." People didn't hesitate to set the original commenter in his place because a comment like that was unacceptable to use here.
Results
I will be separating the results for multiliteracies and for authority displayed in this online communtity.
0M08
ReplyDeleteMultiliteracies
Most people wouldn't think that having literacy has anything to do with listening to a song to derive some sort of meaning to it, but literacy doesn't have to be something you physically read or write. According to Mirabelli, literacy exist in many forms that can be visual and audio as well. In the examples I displayed above, people not only read the lyrics of the song to give it meaning but they were also able to read a video and apply what they visualized to a song. Another thing that people did was actually read the songwriter. After gathering enough information about the artist, certain patterns become noticed about who they really are which becomes a form of communication to the song interpreters because they are able to tie that background information to the songs the artists compose. This helps form a better understanding of the story the artist is trying to tell through the song. An example to show this idea is Taylor Swift. Her personal life isn't kept private so everyone knows whenever she is in a relationship and going through a breakup. People then notice a pattern of a new song coming out relating to a breakup that she just had. They are then able to make the conclusion about what she is referring to in the song. I noticed that the more literacies that were communicated to the analyzer, the more accurate their description was.
Authority
Since this community is based off of personal opinions, I didn't think that anyone would have authority. But my observations show otherwise as some people either really respected someone's interpretation or were offended by what they put. They voiced their respect or dislike by responding to the initial post or by rating something up or down. I observed the post and comments of someone who had a +10 rating and of someone who had a -6 rating. Those were the two highest numbers in terms of what was rated up or down. When something is rated up, it shows that people value the comment that was made and it steers other commenters to read it over any other comment. I observed that when something was rated up, more and more people would post their own comments using the ideas from the original poster. When a comment was rated down, people would team up and insult person who posted something that wasn't appropriate or the situation. They'd form an argument and state points about why they're wrong and tell them to basically stop writing nonsense.
Conclusion
A lot more thought goes into interpreting a song on this community than one may think. The actual interpreter has to refer to many sources to be able to communicate their idea such as reading lyrics, viewing a music video, obtaining background information on the song writer and obviously listening to the song. These are the multiliteracies used as a form of communication to the song interpreter for them to be able really analyze a song's meaning. Some people incorporate all the literacies I discussed into one song, providing them with a more accurate analysis of the song. There's an ample amount of thought that is put into most of the comments displayed on the online community which in turn earns them a plethora of respect. To show this respect, other users will agree with the comment by posting their own comment using these ideas and rating the comment up. Clearly, when someone just posts something to try to be funny, other users will say anything to put that person down. In the example I provided, the user wasn't able to adapt to the ways of the community. He didn't have an understanding of how the community works. I believe that the user was known as what Mirabelli calls a "tool"- not a true member of the community . Instead of keeping his thoughts silent while others presented their deep analysis, he gave his own "interpretation" in a way that was deemed inappropriate to display as a comment. This example shows that being in this online community requires more than just hearing a song and writing about it.
1. The evidence is very good with lots of specific examples to showcase what is being said and backup the analysis, the context could be improved on to deliver more of a visual appeal for the reader because I don’t feel like a have a good understand of the website because only Some Nights-by F.U.N. is explained deeply, the only the reader knows is that it’s a community where people comments on songs and share what they think it means and give comments a rating when there is probably more to the website. The analysis using Multiliteracis, Signs of Authority, and methodology are very well thought out. Great start to an essay but there is always room for improvement. I would like to see you consider the typical member and if the community has a cultural base for example maybe it’s mostly a community that is involved with media and arts or something of that nature. You can deliver more context on what songs are portrayed and how different genres of music attract different group of people and use the comments to show similarities or differences.
Delete2. I would re-organize the piece by taking you lens towards the end and placing that right after you explain the website, just a slight shift. My rationale behind it is that instead of giving all the information first it might be more beneficial to explain your lens and give a preview of whats going to come of your analysis. This can help the flow of information in the mind, I think your essay as it stands is just as good both ways but its recommended to explore different options. Your paragraph with the music video and lyrics and background can be also broken up to exemplify more points.
3. –This is a re-construction of your first paragraph to make it more concise.
Song Meanings is a social networking website for music lovers that allow you to search for your favorite music and genres to analyze the meaning of their lyrics. You can choose any genre and pick a song to deliver a comment of your interpretation. Members of the community have variation views on each other’s comments and they can be rated up or down, very similar to the “like” button on Facebook. Originally upon entering the website I thought that after hearing a song you could obtain one specific meaning right away, but after a few interpretations of other members I could see how deep and insightful their comments are.
4. What other elements are present in the website that influence how the communication unfolds in the community Song Meanings?
5. In your seventh paragraph, what information is necessary to get your point across? Do you want to focus on the discourse community or the song ?
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ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
Delete0037
ReplyDeleteTwitter
Within Twitter are a lot of different groups or communities; Each group within twitter has completely different ideas and posts about completely different things. Popular Twitter users can be anyone, many celebrities have millions of followers because there fans want to see what they are actually like, it also blurs the line between a regular person and a celebrity because you can interact directly with them. There are a few regular people who have created a Twitter and because of their unique ideas they have become Twitter celebrities.
Many average people have gained authority and celebrity status from twitter by imitated celebrities, for example, @Wizdom is a parody account for the rapper Wiz Khalifa. This account gained millions of followers because Wiz Khalifa didn’t have a verified account. This account retained followers because of the quotes and interesting things they posted. @TheFakeESPN has about 400,000 followers and they are a random group of people who post funny things about athletes and sports news.
I’m an average user of Twitter, I started Twitter about four years ago and I only post a couple things per week. Over the last four years I’ve only posted 1,300 tweets, when you compare this to one of my friends it would look like I’ve been using twitter for only a short time. @Dean has 24,000 tweets and he’s only been using twitter for a year. There is no set standard for how you should behave on Twitter, everyone has their friends that follow them and everyone talks about different things. You can decide on Twitter what type of person you want to be, and how you want to communicate and your followers will naturally start thinking like you do. The majority of Twitter users don’t argue with others because the people who see their posts agree with and are interested in what they are posting.
There is a very simple language requirement on Twitter, firstly all of your posts must be one hundred forty characters or less. You also can post hash tags at the end of your tweet to give that tweet a category, when random twitter users want to read about Sunday NFL football they might search for the hash tag, #football #Sunday #NFL or they can go more specifically and search for the team they want to learn more about by simply searching #Chargers or #San Diego. Twitter is a very simple form of social networking, it’s for people who want to talk, not necessarily to their friends all of the time, and they want an easier way to do it. Each social networking site offers different things. For people who want to write brief statements or post things about wants going on a this very moment in time, then they use twitter instead of other sites like Facebook or Youtube. Members of Twitter are encouraged to post about anything they want to, for example, they can post about their life, sports news, world news, or anything else they find interesting or they want to share with others.
How do newcomers gain authority when they join Twitter?
New users can instantly gain authority if they have a lot of friends that use twitter, they will be able to gain a lot of followers just from that. After all of their friends have followed them they can gain authority from posting things that get retweeted by their followers. If some of their followers retweets a post it will be seen by all of that person’s followers and they might even retweet it, this could end up being seen by many more people than just your own followers.
How is your identity different on Twitter than from real life?
I know that for me my identity on Twitter doesn’t change too drastically, I still post about sports and music, which I talk about with my friends in real life. Some things I’ll post on Twitter will be related to what happened in real life and I will say things that I won’t necessarily say to my friends in real life.
0037
Delete1) Maybe you should go in depth about what Twitter is because I don’t know what Twitter is and you barely describe what it is to me. Add more evidence to back up what you’re trying to analyze.
2) No organization, you can easily group it together with a topic or something. There isn’t any head title, you just keep writing
3) Last paragraph, “My identity on Twitter doesn’t change much since I started twitting. I still talk about sports and music both in Twitter community and to my friends in person. Sometimes, however, I post things on Twitter that I might not say to my friends in person. (because... I will give an example here and then analyze to make the paragraph more effective.)”
4) In third paragraph you said you’re an average Twitter user, can you describe what an average Twitter user is? Can you be more descriptive about the term you’re using? For example, I don’t know what a hash tag is, you should maybe consider defining what it is.
0037
ReplyDeleteIntroduction
League of legend is an online strategy game. In the game, you pick a hero and play him in the battle. The battle calls you to communicate and interact with each other to strategize the battle field. There is also a blog out of the game where people communicate their strategy. During the heat of the game, strategies are usually broad and abrupt. Out of the game, strategies are usually more thorough because then you have more time to think and counter your options. So I will be dissecting both the blog and in game communication.
In the game, five people are random pick into a team. Each person will choose a hero to play as. Over time, minions will spawn on both your team and your opponent team. Your objective is to destroy their main base before they destroy yours. There are three paths to from your base to your enemy base and vice versa. You have to use your skills and your teammates to complete the objective. Some people have poor communication skills and some people won’t even communicate at all. As a new member of this community, I will see through a naïve pair of eyes.
My rhetorical lens before I analyze this community were how does literacy hold within the community, who have authority within the community, how they achieve it, how the participant solve problematic issues, and how will the blog communication be different from live game communication.
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ReplyDeleteContext
ReplyDeleteThrough playing, I learned that not only English speakers play the game. Some people in the community speak Spanish, I’m going to ignore them and just talk about the English literate in the community
During game play, people are very short and to the point. Before the game, while you’re picking character, people can communicate within their group for about sixty seconds. While they are picking their character and choosing masteries or perks, people usually say one or two words. For example, people with just say “Top, Mid, Bot” for the path they are claiming to protect/attack, and sometimes they say who they want to go with like “Top with Jax” and “Bot with Darius”. This is the basic communicate before actually playing the game. Sometimes, rarely, people try to have a conversation before the game to pump up everyone else. I notice that when we communicate more before the game, we also communicate more during the game.
The communication in the game can be bad or good. Sometimes people lash at their own teammate because they die so much, but most of the time people have a good sportsmanship in the game. However, I notice that the more communication in the game there is a higher chance the team has of winning. When no one talks in the game, people can get easily ambush and team on. For example, in an actively engaged talking game, if someone going through the top path says, “Teemo is MIA” (MIA stands for missing in action). This will let the other teammates know that he’s not on the currently at the top path and might be teaming middle or bottom. While on the other hand, if that person who been fighting Teemo all this time notice that Teemo is gone and they didn’t say anything, others will usually get ambush and get killed.
In the blog, people analyze character and talk about specific things about the game play. People usually have dispute about the characters in the game because most of the character in the game is about preference and how you play. Because one person is good at Morgana doesn’t mean others might be good playing her. In the blog, people still use short notation like TT for three vs. three and OP for over powering. However, they put more meat per post even though they use short hand annotation.
Since the characters in the game are meant to be have the same advantage, people’s arguments about who’s the best and who’s to counter can’t be resolved. The people in the blog usually are more argumentative. I will be analyzing why. The literacy in the blog is also a lot more complex than the literacy during the game. For example, people talks about action and references which have nothing to do about previous post, without background knowledge, those who aren’t a part of the community for a while will not understands what’s being said.
How Literacy Is Hold in The community?
ReplyDeleteThe reason people have to use shortcut like MIA in the game is because when you’re tying, your character just stands there. The Discourse of the game calls for the person to work strategically with their team. People find short cuts in writing to get the point across without wasting time. For example, I can say “Watch mid, defend bot, Annie is OP” so that people will understand what’s going on and help out and yet it doesn’t make me go idle from my batter. The literacy in the community calls for short burst of information so that people can continue playing the game without losing.
Literacy in the blog shows a different Discourse within the community. The conversations on the blog are usually harsher than those during game play. For example, one person will say that Teemo is the best because he can do this and this, then the next person would bash on him and says yea but I can easily take Teemo out with this person and so on. People in the blog usually get counter by others and most of the argument or topics on the blog will not be resolve. I believe that blog community is more argumentative than the live game is because during the live game you have to talk to your teammates and they are on your team. While, on the blog basically everyone is your enemy. So the Discourse within the two is very different and people have a different approach to the blog and live game.
1) Can you explain more about the language? You didn't really explain well what "top with" and "bot with" mean.
Delete2) Instead of organizing by the subject your talking about you should describe one section like "the LOL blog" and analyze it with the different questions you use.
3) First paragraph under Context: "Through playing, I learned that not only English speakers play the game. Some people in the community speak Spanish, I’m going to ignore them and just talk about the English literate in the community" From my experience playing League of Legends, I learned that not only English speakers play the game. Some people in the community speak Spanish, I can't associate with these players because I don't know what they are talking about. I will focus on the English speakers in the League of Legends community.
4) Can anyone play League of Legends? What kind of people play and/or what age group do the majority of players represent?
Blake Anderson
ReplyDelete0119
A Face to Face Interaction Gone Viral
Longboard and Me:
In today’s society, almost every person uses the internet or some sort of networking device almost every day of their lives. The internet has expanded communication to an entire new realm, digital communication. Before the internet, many discourse communities had to act face to face or through other means of communication such as mail; now, the internet can be used in seemingly endless ways to expand communities and advance their communication and influence. One specific community that I noticed evolving is the discourse community of longboarding.
I find this community to be very interesting because even I had not realized that a common hobby had turned into an expansive network. A few years ago, my brother and I invested in longboards and it became a causal pastime that we would do during our free time. As time went on, we both became more interested and attempted to learn more about longboards. We would ask our friends questions, experiment without own boards, and if we had any other questions, we would “Google” them. It wasn’t until I performed the social accepted verb of “Google” it that how huge the longboard community was; websites, blogs, Facebook pages, business sites, pictures, videos, and so much more, all relating to longboarding!
Introduction:
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately, the common perception of long boarders isn’t the most respected stereotype. Many people think that is you ride a piece of wood with four wheels, it’s a skate board and you are a skateboarder and skateboarders aren’t known to be the best contributions to society. Let me just say that destruction, trespassing, vandalism, and drugs have been tagged to their names. However, some of this may be true, but there is much more to this hobby of mine.
To me longboarding had always been relaxing and an escape from everyday life. It releases stress and it was a way to make new friends and be involved in something that you enjoyed. Many of the people that I met who know something about the community also feel the same way and take the activity in the same manner. These aspects also became apparent throughout my research and to me and this is the perception that people need to have about the community.
Methods:
ReplyDeleteThe idea of longboarding originated in Hawaii. When the waves were dull, surfers would grab their boards and imitate the motions of surfing by switching positions and skimming their hands across the ground to practice surfing. It wasn’t until the 1950s that longboarding was commercialized and sold on a mass scale. Society had changed this practice of surfing and turned it into its very own x-sport. Once online sites and advertisement became easily accessible, this pastime became viral and ever more influential; soon enough it found its way to me.
Familiar with the community, I knew that I need to get involved with digital spaces that related to longboarding to further advance my analysis. Some of the methods I used to acquire data were interviews, experiments, former knowledge, analyzing sites, and throughout my research I came across different tools that shine light onto the community and bring new aspect into it that I had not realized before. I also, used concepts from various author such as James Paul Gee, Grant Davie and Joseph Williams. These concepts will be further elaborated upon throughout the analysis of my research.
One of the key pieces of my studies was an interview conducted on the creator of the Facebook Group UCF’s Longboarding Knights. Sean Roberts, the creator and an accounting major currently enrolled at UCF agreed to a very informal interview over Facebook message. The interview was only six messages but it held key information that supported my thoughts of the community.
Browsing through websites, I had expected and somewhat overlooked the digital media that was on these sites. But as I became intertwined with UCF’s Longboarding Knight, the indirect meaning behind the digital media became apparent. According the Roberts, “The reason for creating the group on Facebook was to try and get many people to go together on longboarding runs”; but the group had changed to be much more. People had started posting videos and pictures of them longboarding or their own longboards or related paraphernalia. This brought an entirely new type of communication into the community, one that consisted of not words, but pictures.
Results:
ReplyDeleteTime and time again, I noticed a general personality that many of the members of this community held. From UCF’s Longboarding Knights, the multi-million dollar corporation’s websites such as loadedboards.com and originalskateboards.com, to forums, a sense of informality and affability revealed itself. Grant Davie’s analytical concepts are easily related to these places when regarding the informality of them. In both of the different domains mentioned earlier, brand name websites and forums or groups, the exigence, or reason for communication, ranges from the reason to make money as a business or to meet new acquaintances and be surrounded by people who share common interests. However, even though these two areas are on different sides of the spectrum, they carry the same audience and personal tone of writing, informal and friendly.
This tone also relates to James Paul Gee’s idea of an “identity kit” that comes along with a Discourse. Discourse, as defined by Gee, is a community that consists of a different type or literacy, or mastery of a language within the community. Most of the people in this space, or the parts of it that I am exposed to are amiable and welcoming, whether they are corporate business men, or a local long boarder just trying to find some buds to cruise around with. This persona makes it very easy for new members to be enculturated and adapt to the literacy within the society. As mentioned before the reason, or activity system, the common goal of the community, could be to make new friends and learn more about the target subject, so who wouldn’t want more members in the community who could fulfill this goal?
Because of the informal nature of the community and overall general atmosphere, errors within writing are usually disregarded or entirely irrelevant. The idea of Errors comes from Joseph M. Williams. Williams questions the social and linguistic forms of errors such as grammatical and spelling mistakes, and says that they are different to each and every person in each and every community. In UCF’s Longboarding Knights, someone could write a formal business proposal that is notarized, or could just write “YO WHO WANTS TO CRUISE?! HMU.” Either way, the audience understands the rhetors exigence and will respond without much questioning.
A rhetor is anyone who uses a type of communication to convey a message. I noticed that the rhetors, the people who speak or in this case post, that create or post on forums and groups all have the same desire of exigency in the actions. Roberts states “I never considered the informality of how the comments would be but informal is good, as long as people meet up and have fun boarding around that’s all that matters.” This makes the exigency behind the creation of the group simple and narrow but it does not restrain the potential outcomes of communication within the community, just the same as many other spaces of this digital discourse community.
Another lens that I viewed the community through is the use of visual types of communication. Pictures and videos are commonly shared within this community regularly and sometimes more often than words. Also, the results of some of this visual communication and meaning results in a heightened interest of new members because they can see what longboarding consists of and the interaction of members face to face; this is an aspect of this community that I do not believe many other communities contain. A simple picture of a longboard may seem to be so minor but sometimes the little things of an environment can mean everything to its members or others who may just be metaphorically passing by. This type of lens directly correlates to my first outside experience of UCF’s Longboarding Knights.
ReplyDeleteOne of my very first studies was accidental. I was with a few friends one night and I mentioned that someone had posted a picture of his and his friends’ new boards online. One of my friends said that he was an administrator of the group and he messaged them to see I they wanted to ride that night with their new boards. This was so spontaneous and unexpected but they agreed and soon enough we all met up on campus and longboarded around for at least three hours. These people had no idea who any of us were, the only thing they knew was that we shared the same common interests as them and that was all they needed to know. The invitation was so informal and the reasoning behind it correlates to everything that I believe the casual activity side of digital longboarded spaces consists of. This entire experience was unrelated to my research but it resulted in being one of the most influential pieces of evidence I have.
Conclusion:
Through my research, experiment, and interview, I can concur that the specific aspects of this community I am focusing on are, mostly, local and informal. The obvious background of the exigence and atmosphere is to be friendly and make friends. The act of longboarding for many is an act of relaxation and hanging back; this same attitude is carried on throughout the communication. The initial goal of the site has also expanded and members are posting pictures of what they have done to their boards and also their late night adventures with friends. Even corporate sites such as www.loadedboards.com hold a modern and urban feel to them.
0037
Delete1.I felt that your delivery was very effective when you put them in sections because it allowed me to stay on track with your information. However, I still am not sure of your main goal in choosing this community. You gave a decent amount of examples but they would be more effective if you explained them more.
2.I would put the Method section before the Introduction because the method seems to be a background section of your analysis. The reader will better understand your piece and your analysis if you explain how you are analyzing it. This way they can follow your transitions in analysis as well as look for key concepts in your argument(s).
3.Your overall point was great in your post but concision could be improved when it comes to your conclusion. You only gave a summary rather than analysis of your paper as a whole, which caused you to be concise. So, I suggest that you expand on your analysis as a whole in your conclusion.
4.Have you noticed different types/groups of people who are a part of the community? (gender, race)
How do you contribute to the community itself?
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ReplyDelete0119
ReplyDeleteGreenPeace Bloggers and the Promotion of Environmental Activism
Whether or not you “believe” global climate change is happening, there are many environmental problems in today’s world that need to be addressed. Greenpeace USA is one organization that is trying to make a difference. As the “largest independent direct-action environmental organization in the world,” Greenpeace is working towards a “green and peaceful future.”
It is apparent that Greenpeace would like to promote change by motivating more people to become environmental activists. There are links on the homepage to take visitors to other pages where they can make donations, write an email to the CEO of KFC about rainforest destruction, or find volunteer opportunities. In order for Greenpeace users to perform these actions they must first be inspired by the issues. “The Witness” is a collection of posts from “Greenpeace bloggers on the environmental frontline” that aims to instill a feeling of environmental responsibility in its readers.
I could not find an instance where formal research was conducted on how Greenpeace bloggers motivate their readers. Therefore, I will analyze many blog posts over the last month to find out rhetorical devices are used in The Witness to promote action in readers.
METHODS
I read through dozens of blog posts to get an idea of what rhetorical devices were used the most. I will use these findings to analyze the blog posts through the framing lens of Keith Grant-Davie’s work “Rhetorical Situations and their Constituents.” In this piece Grant-Davie proposes that a discourse is characterized by four main components: exigence, rhetor(s), audience, and constraints. Grant-Davie’s questions will allow me to show how each blog post is carefully formed to appeal to the reader.
I will also focus on other devices authors use to elicit certain feelings in the reader. Photographs, emotional arguments, empowering statements, and logic are all effective components Greenpeace bloggers use to motivate their audience.
ReplyDeleteCONSTITUENTS OF RHETORICAL SITUATIONS
Exigence. One of the “tags” on Greenpeace blogs is climate change. When you click on this tag, the most recent posts related to climate change are shown together. These posts can be seen as multiple authors contributing to the same rhetorical situation. At the end of all of the posts related to climate change, the authors, or rhetors, write empowering statements. One example in an article about hurricane Sandy read, “We must clearly and powerfully demand that global warming stop being used as a politically divisive tool and start being recognized as the long term crisis that it is.” All of the rhetors have a common goal. The goal of their discourse is to provide evidence and motivation for people who are likely to make a difference. The authors understand the need for bottom-up pressure. If their readers are convinced that this is a worthy cause they will confront politicians and corporations. They will tell powerful people what they should do to reduce the effects of climate change. All of the Greenpeace contributors want to educate a large number of people on issues like climate change to start a more effective movement for change.
Rhetors. The first group of rhetors on Greenpeace blogs is the bloggers. The most interesting part of their job is the multiple roles they play. These people are journalists as well as activists. One blogger, Andrea Rid, recently wrote an article about sustainably caught tuna in the Maldives. Her dual role was apparent in this post. She wrote about how she learned to catch tuna with a pole and line. She then provides the reader with facts about this method and more harmful methods such as purse seine fishing. She argues that consumers should fight against unsustainable fishing methods by buying more tuna caught by pole and line.
ReplyDeleteRid’s first role was as a journalist collecting information and writing this article. Her second role was elucidated by a statement at the bottom of the page: “Andrea Rid is currently onboard the Rainbow Warrior in the Indian Ocean.” The Rainbow Warrior is a ship owned by Greenpeace that travels around the world for environmental campaigns. Rid’s role on this ship is that of an activist. This is one example of how a Greenpeace blogger plays two roles. This shows the reader that the bloggers don’t just write about the issues, but they take action too. This is one way the authors can influence their readers to participate in environmental activism.
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ReplyDeleteAudience. Many of the posts in The Witness do not provide the reader with a lot of context. This means that a very specific and informed audience of environmental activists will be reading these posts. The authors know that the people who care enough to come to this site and inform themselves will already be a part of this "conversation." The reporting of news on this website contrasts greatly with the reporting on other sites because of the audience.
ReplyDeleteFrom my environmental activist viewpoint, I saw the language used and arguments made in a positive light. This again shows the importance of audience awareness. The authors of many blog posts use humor or esoteric terms to relate to environmentalists. For example, in posts about KFC’s destruction of rainforests, bloggers reference “the Big Dip’im.” This is an event on November fifteenth that will feature KFC’s Colonel dipped in one of their signature sauces. The audience will view this as a peaceful and hilarious way to protest KFC’s unfavorable actions. As for esoteric language, certain phrases like “vicious cycle” and “climate freefall” really resonate with environmental activists. These terms do not need to be defined for readers, they already bring up feelings that could lead to action.
Greenpeace blogs makes use of popular "tags" to direct its viewers to the issues they find most important. Some examples are "arctic drilling", "coal", and "deforestation." By grouping the most recent blog posts into these categories they are creating an "argument as a conversation” (Greene 10). Readers can see more context this way and view the diverse evidence presented by different authors. Seeing many blogs posts organized around the same issue could have a greater affect on the audience. A reader could be more likely to take action after seeing many different perspectives. Therefore, the "tags" are a great way for Greenpeace to motivate activists.
0m08
DeleteI thought that this was an interesting discourse community to choose because it makes people aware of something that really important to protecting our future with a better environment. I think that you built up a good context and offered really good evidence, but you should add a subheading with your conclusion and analyze it a little more. Also when discussing about the discourse community and bringing up the fact that it has a "common goal" you should refer back to Swales's for this and cite him. I found it very interesting that you used Grant-Davie to frame your evidence and thought that you did a great job of that. Perhaps when discussing the language used in the community, you can refer back to one of the other readings we did like Gee to frame that section. I also think that you can include another example of the blog as well.
0037
ReplyDeleteIntroduction:
Cooks.com is an online community based all around food. Users have the options to share recipes of all sorts. There are different categories of appetizers, Italian, poultry, etc. and there is always room for users to comment on each recipe. Cooks.com could be considered a blog in some sense of food, but the website is just more than recipes. There are sections that consist of nutrition facts, diet ideas, and conversions and substitutions. The community is a way for strangers to come together through the common love of food and staying healthy through food.
Question:
I based my diagnosis on whether users are more likely to comment negatively on classic recipes or original recipes; as well as who is more likely to comment and respond to what types of recipes. I decided on this question due to my love of cooking and my love led me to start my own baking business.
Resources:
I am using my analytical lens through Elizabeth Wardle’s “Identity, Authority, and Learning to Write in New Workplaces” and her argument on identity and authority. I will also use “The Psychology of Cyberspace” by John Suler. Speaking first of Wardle’s theory of having an identity in a community means actually being a part of the community. As well as having authority in the community means being well known throughout the community. Upon reading her article I think she gives off the idea that you have to have identity to have authority, but I beg to differ and believe you should have authority in order to establish your identity. I have switched her theory in my mind because anyone and everyone has an identity whether they know it or show it, but unless your identity means something to others and you put it out there so others will notice, it may as well be a thing of the past or personal secret that you keep to yourself. Establishing your authority is making yourself known and making a voice for yourself. Once you put yourself out there and give people a reason to listen and follow you then you are establishing your identity. People are not going to listen to and follow you based solely on the fact that you have a username and profile picture; however, what your biography and material on this profile say will give viewers an idea of what type of authority you produce. An authority will also set you apart from the people who are making a difference. I will use Suler because he gives a point that everyone has an identity in the online world, or cyberspace. I would like to use his theory of disinhibition because it basically supports Wardle’s point of identity and his point that everyone has an identity, whether the identity is true or false. The theory of disinhibition has the meaning that online people are more likely to create a false identity because people are not able to tell if it’s a fake personality as long as it makes an impact and is interesting to follow. After analyzing the points of Wardle’s and Suler’s articles it is safe to say that a majority of my framing will be based on how individuals can change when the internet is sitting in front of them and how they can form into new identities and personalities. Analyzing someone’s identity or multiple identities in different situations can result in an overflow of information.
Context:
What is behind Thanksgiving articles and recipes being posted? Are users of the website more likely to comment negatively on thanksgiving dishes because they are classics/favorites?
Analysis:
Users will comment positively if they have tried the recipe and they were successful. They will also comment in a positive mannered they are familiar with the method being presented in the recipe, so they might comment "adding nutmeg really does bring out the flavor". On the other hand users will openly comment negatively on a recipe such as oven roasted turkey because there is a specific way to cook it and it is a classic from like forever ago. If they notice the method is different or is definitely not going to work, users will forcefully or aggressively correct the method and user.
1. I feel that you were pretty effective in delivering the analysis of this online discourse community. I thought you did a good job bridging the gap between the context and analysis of your piece, but I feel that the inclusion of a few more examples will help strengthen your piece.
Delete2. I think the way that you organized this paper is great, but if I had to change it, I would place the resources section at the end of the piece because it is similar to a references page (in a way).
3. What are other examples of authority and communication that are visible on Cooks.com? Are you a member of this community, and if so, what kind of identity do you hold?
0M08
ReplyDeleteEveryone has that one thing that they absolutely “geek out” about for me its music. I absolutely love spending hours and hours listening to music and most of the time I have no clue what artist it is, but I know I love the song. For some people this love lies with sports, or food or clothing but for everyone there is that one thing that you could go in detail for days over and your friends start to get to get this look about them when someone ask you your opinion on the matter because they know they are done for. What you are a fan of can greatly determine how the general public perceives you. For example a man who likes football or hockey might be seen as a mans man but people might think something is a little weird about a guy being a fan of the ballet. These personas that are adapted from what you find yourself enjoying trickle right down to how people treat you. Going along with my love of music I decided to explore the inside of one of the biggest music fan bases on the planet, beliebers. Right now 30 million strong and ever growing. This particular fan base has quite a few misconceptions around them; most think that these are 13 year old, crazed, uneducated and socially awkward girls. When in reality where a small percentage of the fans might fall into this category the greater portion is nowhere near this notion.
To fully understand how their world works you must fully immerse yourself in as Gee explains in his work. There is no way to be one foot in and one foot out, full immersion is the only way to fully understand their dedication. I started my research on a site called BieberFever.com, a online fan community for Justin Bieber. From there I looked at some of the forums to try to get a grasp on who is who in the realms of this world, just by simply asking on the forum who would be a good person to talk to for information about the community. Time and time again I got the name of a young woman named Shelby. Shelby is 22 and resides in California and has been apart of the community since 2009. I was also able to get a hold of another California native Bree who is 21 and Taylor a Floridian who is just 14, both Taylor and Bree joined the community in 2009 as well. Only Shelby and Bree knew each other but I found it interesting that even though there was a massive age gap between the girls in California and Taylor there answers were almost exactly the same word for word. The mission of this community is clear, it is to support the pop music sensation Justin Bieber and these fans have all banded together to do amazing things.
part 2 0M08
ReplyDeleteA Belieber is a type of fangirl, which is defined by Urban Dictionary as a female who has overstepped the line between healthy fandom and indecent obsession. I presented this definition to each of the girls and they all laughed a little they say they agree with some parts of the definition and other parts not so much. They do agree that they are female and the fact that they are more than just fans, in fact I learned that is one quick way to offend a belieber is to call them a fan. They see a huge difference in between the two, which I will later explain. All of the girls disagreed however that their obsession was indecent, they all admit while they would do some out there things for Justin like wait outside a venue for hours or wait until midnight to go by a CD, they would never do anything illegal to put themselves in danger or him, that that is something that only a fan would do.
Although the forums keep great track of ongoing conversations, Twitter is the real means of communications for the members of this community. When using Twitter your conversations are reduced to 140 character messages, which makes communication a challenge but there are ways that online communities have overcome such shortcomings. With Beliebers there is a new sort of language that is formed, instead of fully typing out a member of the crews name simply their initials suffice for example Justin Bieber’s manager Scott Braun would be SB. Which makes trying to transcribe some conversations particularly hard if you don’t know all the players in the game. A belieber has to know not only who is Justin Bieber is but all the members of his inner network.
“At first it seems like a lot to remember considering that he has about ten dancers, six to eight musicians, a tour manger, two body guards, a videographer, a sound guy, heck even the bus driver. You have to know the names of all of them.” Taylor explained. When you get down to it there are about thirty to forty people depending on the time of year that you have to know in relation to Justin to be an affluent member of the belieber community. Beliebers operate under the notion that they are all a family and how are you going to be a family if you don’t know everyone in it. Beliebers accredit their closeness to not only each other but to Justin Bieber. This is one of the ways I have been told to distinguish a fan from a belieber. A fan simply only knows who Justin Bieber is but a belieber knows the whole family. Knowledge of the entire family shapes the communication between members because messages will go out like ‘SB ATL Mall 2:30’ which means that Scott Braun was spotted at the mall in Atlanta at 2:30. Something simple but if you were not fully immersed in the community you would not be able to fully comprehend you probably would of gotten Mall at 2:30 thinking it was just someone tweeting fro people to meet them at a certain mall at a certain time, but what you don’t see is the full meaning behind it. Without fully understanding the discourse you cannot fully appreciate as Gee says in his work. Full appreciation of this means knowing who Scott Braun is and knowing the importance of the role he plays in the community.
part 3 0M08
ReplyDeleteWardle explains how you have to adapt to new communities and show sin the story of Alan that your identity and perceived authority can play a role into which factors that you adapt to and which ones you don’t. In the case of Alan he thought he was above everyone else so he thought that they should adapt to his ways verses him trying to adapt to theirs. In the Belieber community as well you can see which members are have more authority by the way they communicate. These members will have full knowledge of the language and know what is happening at all times. Members who refuse to adapt the shorthand and abbreviations of the community are usually booted out. Knowing how to communicate with others is more than half the game the other chunk is knowing what is going on. There is usually about a two to three week period for each new member where they are sort of baptized by fire. In this baptism they are constantly bombarded with new information about what to say and what to do to fit in. How they handle those two weeks determines how they will be treated by the community for the rest of their time as a Belieber.
1. How effectively is the analysis of the community's communication practices delivered? The analysis of the community's communication practices are delivered very well. It was easy to understand and follow. You were able to build context through the examples of Gee and relating them to the work you have done. You found evidence through the research on the community and probably could have added a little more into you draft. You're analysis wear well rounded but put a little more info that could be interesting into it. Towards the end it seemed to dull down a bit; just try to keep the information coming the whole way through.
Delete2. The organization was pretty good with a few critiques. I feel as if the last paragraph should be placed more in the middle or add something to complete the draft at the end. Grab attention at the end and conclude the Belieber's.
3.The second paragraph starting with although could maybe use some concision. Just try to go a little more in depth there and bring it all together. Go more into the posts about Justin or something.
4. Have you considered interviewing a common tweeter of Jusitn?
Aren't there male Belieber's too?
0119
ReplyDeleteDigital Discourse Community Ethnography Draft
Note- the supporting information and examples are not in the draft because I am still trying to get information from members, it will be added once I get it. I am also currently working on presenting a different argument in communication.
The community I chose to investigate is a website called tattoobin.com. Upon entering the website at first glance you notice their slogan “A Community Hooked On Ink” which indicates that the members of this community are avid lovers of art and more specifically, body art. The website has 6 main tabs, Tattoos, Artists, Studios, Tat Chat, Videos, and Tattoo Battle. You can search for tattoos by body part, by category, or a keyword search. The website name comes from an idea of adding tattoos to a “bin” that peak your interest and they are basically a bookmark for later.
Each member of the community is able to create an artist profile that includes location, phone numbers, names, emails, other links, and descriptions. Many artists use this as a sort of marketing tool or an advisory method for new coming tattoo artists. Another interesting aspect is the tattoo battle section of the website, users can gain credibility and authority this way, by having the most wins and others can comment on their picture showing respect or congratulations.
When inspecting the community the first things I began to analyze was the anonymity of each user and their invisibility factor. The community does not embrace invisibility because you have to be a member to comment and use the functions that make it a community. But, others just like I have can examine and look through the community and be completely anonymous, but for my purpose it doesn’t matter because I am not a part of it. In regards to the members of the community’s anonymity, you can create any profile you would like, so essentially you can make a fake persona and have a real hidden identity that is never shown, others only see you as part of community in the light that you have created.
The other items used to analyze the community are authority and identity, very important things to look at to understand the structure of the community. When the member is creating his place in the community he can either be part of a studio or just a normal member, the purpose for being able to be classified as artists or studios identifies the members with the sub communities within the website and tattoo community. Those who are artists at shops have more authority and have better “bins” of artwork and showcases, their opinion is more respected throughout the community which is natural because they have more experience and a higher status of tattoo skill in the community. Members identities are portrayed in different ways, administrators or sponsor which are members who donated to the community, are more complete profiles and more trusted since the transparency level is more available to the average user.
Language in the community shapes the style of conversation through posts, tattoo contests or “battles” and an overall portrayal of emotion. For example a member had a tattoo that he named “Love for Breda” and posted for others to see. The tattoo got rated as five out of five, the emotion and language used shows the type of person the member is and creates a frame for which others think about and post in. “This tattoo shows my love for my city and my favorite soccer club. Everything I know and love lives in Breda and means everything for me. For that reason I wanted a reminder that I am a proud citizen of Breda”
The community of tattoobin.com answers a very specific question that my lens analyzed, what make a community run and continue to operate when there is no physical confrontation or communication to verify identity?
Alright so I will say 5 thing I have noticed.
Delete1. I love your topic simply because I feel like you challenged yourself by picking a topic that can be deeply analyzed although I do not see a very deep analysis, yet.
2. I enjoy how you set your paper up like a narrative but I would suggest that you should make it a little less choppy and a little more fluent.
3. I would say this is obvious but you definitely need more evidence in this paper, give stories or talk about certain tats
4. I would also use more examples from writing about writing to be on the safe side
5. Lastly, you should probably tie everything up together just elaborate more, you should really try to go more in depth...
Like I said though you have an amazing topic and it can go very far so work hard :)
0037
ReplyDeleteIntroduction
The online discourse community that I chose is GolfMkV.com, which is a forum that is dedicated to Fifth-Generation Volkswagen GTI owners and enthusiasts. This beneficial site provides a medium through which individuals can discuss and collaborate on different vehicle modifications, maintenance tips, and also share photos of their rides. This forum has tens of thousands of members from all across the globe. GolfMkV.com contains multiple threads that allow users to post discussions, advertise about upcoming events, deliver product reviews, and make suggestions to fellow users (including newbie’s).
For the past few weeks, I have observed this discourse community by scrolling through a couple different threads, particularly the ones pertaining to engine modifications, exterior modifications, and Do-it-Yourself descriptions.
I, myself, drive a VW GTI and find this forum very useful for discovering new information about my car and possible modifications that could be done. Many newcomers to GolfMkV.com will attempt to become an equal member of the online space by posting and introductory paragraph, focusing on their ride and its modifications. But, this action usually separates the newcomers from the more-experienced users since they most likely have not made any modifications to their GTI.
Authority
Based on my observations of the Golf MkV forum, authority is held by members who retain a superior number of posts and maintain high ratings. Members who obtain authority in this online discourse community are highly respected by fellow users and are also viewed as vast sources of knowledge and expertise when it comes to vehicle modifications.
Context
One of the major components of GolfMkV.com is the Do-It-Yourself thread, which contains detailed descriptions on how to successfully complete modifications to your ride, without the need of a professional. In response to this data, many users will rate the thread based on its instructions and the final outcome. For example, blkmagic2006gti, a prominent member of the GolfMkV Community, posted a DIY for the installation process of a short-shifter kit. Based on the appearance of the post, it is apparent that the author has a fairly deep understanding of the subject. Through the use of photographs, part numbers, and numbered lists, blkmagic2006gti is able to strengthen his explanation for the completion of the kit. The bottom of the page reveals the responses made by fellow users regarding the product’s installation. For instance, ReflexMkV, a fellow member of GolfMkV.com, praised this DIY by stating, “Great write up. Very well done,” and went on to recommend a similar product, which he felt was superior to the one provided in the thread. This is a great example of how communication and collaboration play key roles in this online discourse community.
I will have more information once I continue my investigation of this online discourse community.
1. i think that you need to elaborate more on the pieces we are comparing to. you have to pretend your talking to someone that has no idea what your talking about. you also need to compare the things you have found on the website to the things we read in class. you dont have much analysis for what your finding. i think you have the right track on the evidence from the site but your not tying it into our readings.
Delete2. you might want to try find different pieces of evidence that tie into one philosophy. you can write about the pieces of evidence and then the following paragraph analyze how the evidence ties to the philosophies. i would change the DIY section to the to, it is a pretty strong piece of evidence.
3. the third paragraph - "newcomers to GolfMkV.com will attempt to become an equal member of the online space by posting an introductory paragraph, focusing on their ride and its modifications. But, this action usually separates the newcomers from the more-experienced users since...." i think your statement contradicted itself. you said the new people write paragraphs of modifications but they stand out cause they probably havent done anything? im not sure if thats what you were trying to say or if you made a mistake but it sounded weird. i also took away that first sentence because you began by talking about yourself and then you just change to newcomers. If you want to talk about yourself talk about yourself, but i dont think its good to begin about yourself for one sentence and then move on to another subject that doesnt tie with anything else.
4. do you participate in coversations or just view them? if so, do you feel like your a major piece of the conversation with some sort of authority, or do you feel a bit outside the loop?
do you have anymore analysis in mind besides authority?
Part One: The Find
ReplyDeleteAs I was assigned a project in my composition class at UCF I was told to embark on a journey through cyberspace to find a digital discourse community. I began to search through different communities. I at first started with a community based on superheros, next a community based on shows on adult swim such as robot chicken, I also came across a community that discussed south park. Although I loved these communities, all that kept crossing my mind during my search process was my recent break up out of a 4 year relationship. I then thought to myself "hmmm...well if that's where my mind is then that is where I shall gear my school work towards...BINGO". After I came up with the brilliant idea of making my community geared towards dating and relationship advice I then began to search for communities. Within 10 minutes of searching I ran into a community where every type of crazy or typical issue in peoples' love lives was going on. From 14 year old boys asking how to ask a girl out or how to take off a bra, to 22 year olds having cold feet about being engaged, this community had it all. It was then I knew what I had to do-- go more in depth with my investigation and analyze these community patrons issues.
Part Two: The Evidence
About a week after finding my community I knew it was then time to go further with my mission of becoming and understanding my online discourse community to the best of my ability. I picked out a few situations of which I thought were the juiciest and decided to keep them on my brain throughout my daily life whenever I began to get mind tracked. There were so many stories and issues in this community that I decided to pick out 1 from each of the following generations: early high school, late high school, early college, grad school, marriage, marriage after many years. The divisions then broke down into different profiles and stories. In the early high school division, I chose to look futher into a 15 year old male who wants to ask a girl out on a date but feels overwhelmed with the rest (i.e. where to take her, should he kiss her, how to initiate holding hands, should he pay, how should they get there, etc). This user sparked my interest because he reminded me of how overwhelmed I was when I was 14 and began to experience dating so I even decided to post back to this youngster. I informed him that he should find out her favorite restaurant, and take her to a movie and to just take deep breaths and let their sexual tension make them hold hands and awkwardly peck, rather than him initiating anything and making her feel as if she is being pushed and pressured. Next, the late high school division was a typical problem for high school students around the ages of 16 and 17. This profile is about a couple who have been dating for 2 years and are seeking advice on losing their virginities to eachother. This couple realizes they have been dating so long but are still skeptical if they are ready to check their V-cards in to each other. I chose this community because I, myself wanted to take a hard, long analyzation into why we hold sexual intercourse as such a fragile thing at a young age, but seem to throw out the purity in it once college and full adulthood takes place. Thirdly, I moved on to picking the story/profile out for my third division--early college years.
The advice seeker I chose was a 19 year old female who is currently getting rocky with her boyfriend of 5 years. She feels as if they are meant for each other but they keep experiencing an on again and off again relationship which is even more annoying in real life than it is on the popular MTV show, Jersey Shore. She is seeking out ways to help them stay together and stop getting so shaky. I chose to analyze this young lady because I was very intrigued to see what advice was given to her and how she was going to take such advice and I was hoping to try and get a follow up from her. When it came to the category of grad school, I came across a 22 year old woman who is currently having cold feet about her current engagement with her boyfriend of 2 years. This woman, who calls herself Megan, feels like she may be making the wrong decision because although she has dated her fiance for 2 years, she is still not over somebody whom she dated for 5 years prior to getting in the relationship she currently is in. I chose to investigate Megan because her story was juicy and very fun to deeply analyze her feelings. After choosing a profile in the grad school category, I then came across a very interesting profile in the marriage category--a 35 year old male who can't stop cheating on his wife because she got some extra weight on her after having children. This was obviously chosen for it's scandal but also so I could relate back tot he profile I chose for the late high school division which was sex and how its meaning and purity changes in the eyes of people as we age. Lastly, I had to choose a profile of which fell into the marriage after many years category and chose an 60 year old female who is experiencing neglect from her husband because of being so comfortable and is becoming depressed because all of her children are grown up. I chose this woman's profile because i liked to look at her story and see if there is anything that I do to my mother that her children are doing to her to make her feel upset, and make sure I don't do that.
ReplyDelete0119 :)
0119
Delete1. I realize that this is a first draft, but there is no analysis here. It would have been nice if instead of listing all of your evidence you developed context, evidence, and analysis for a few of the situations. You don't have a lot of context here so you need to explain to your reader what principles you will be using to analyze your community. You have a lot of examples, but they really mean nothing until you develop your main point and analysis.
I think your paper will be really awesome if you first come up with a main point that all of your chosen situations will support. Then for each situation you should form separate context, evidence, and analysis. For your evidence, you shouldn't use the situations happening in these people's lives, but how they communicate with others about them on the website. With this in mind, your essay could turn out to be very interesting.
2. I think you should use the introduction, methods, results, and discussion format. This format is just like the ethnographies we have read in class. Many writers use this format because it flows well and provides a way to build up to your main point. Also, you should use paragraphs.
3. I will rewrite this section: "Thirdly, I moved on to picking the story/profile out for my third division--early college years. The advice seeker I chose was a 19 year old female who is currently getting rocky with her boyfriend of 5 years. She feels as if they are meant for each other but they keep experiencing an on again and off again relationship which is even more annoying in real life than it is on the popular MTV show, Jersey Shore. She is seeking out ways to help them stay together and stop getting so shaky. I chose to analyze this young lady because I was very intrigued to see what advice was given to her and how she was going to take such advice and I was hoping to try and get a follow up from her."
My rewrite: For the early college years division I chose to focus on a nineteen-year-old female who is having trouble with her boyfriend. They have been together for five years and she thinks they are meant for each other. Like Ron and Sam on Jersey Shore, they have broken up and gotten back together many times. I am very interested to see what advice she receives and how she responds to it. I am also hoping to interview her for more evidence.
4. What ideas from our readings could you use to elaborate on your observations of your community? Do the people that seek and give advice on this website exhibit any common behaviors that could tie all of your situations together?
0037
ReplyDeleteWhen I first thought about doing formspring, one event in particular struck my attention. It was a huge fight between my guy best friend, Chris, and my girl best friend, Ashley. (not their real names) They share another female best friend, Emily, and all go to the same school. The school they went to had a ratio of 4:1 girls to guys. So this school is full of drama and gossip. Rumor went around that Ashley liked Chris, but Chris was falling for their best friend. Chris ended up asking out and dating the best friend, behind Ashley’s back. This was the cause of an insane amount of drama. Since it was the time when formspring was a fad, everyone took to formspring to express their feelings. People were writing the craziest thing on Chris and on Ashley’s formspring. Since Ashley got mad at Chris and Emily for doing it behind her back, people began to rip Ashley on formspring saying things such as “ Don’t b mad cause the guy u love got ur best friend and not u.” This person ofcourse was anonymous so we have no idea if it was a guy or girl. Since both Ashley and Chris are my best friends, I was there to witness the pain this caused both of them. Ashley was devasted and would cry herself to sleep all the time, but when she would go back to school, nobody treated her any different. It was just a normal day at school as if nothing was going on. Her friends were still her friends and talked to her about anything but the Chris situation. She can walk around school and no one looked at her wrong or anything like that. But as soon as school ended, back came the posts on formspring. Now I actually know who it was that put this post as I found out later. He so happens to be a friend of Ashley. So I asked him why he said that and why he remained anonymous, and his only answer was “idk.” He said “ I felt like it was OK since everyone else was doing it and she wasn’t going to know it was me.” This ties into what Suler talks about in dissociative anonymity and disinhibition. He also remained her friend and acted like nothing happened at school. This person in particular uses toxic disinhibition to lash out at Ashley, and then seperates his personality online from the person he really is. He is actually very nice and usually helps people when they need it. At one point it felt like the whole school was ragging on her. But one posts stands out and says it all, “…Three, stop hiding behind a computer screen trying to act real cool and tell her straight up…” People just do things because everyone else is. About 20-30 posts are just telling Ashley to stop hating on Chris and Emily, she is jealous of them, or she had her chance why is she being selfish and not letting Emily get her chance. Now I talked to some people who posted some of these rude comments, and they said they did not like Ashley to begin with, or they began to not like her because what she was doing. So the fact that some people were being their true selves is brought up, but then again they had to do it anonymously. When I asked them why, one gave me the most interesting answer “because then everyone else would read what I said and they might start talking bad about me.” My next question was simply why? And she answered “I cant take that kind of heat, I think I would kill myself if people said these things to me.” Before I got to ask her how Ashley felt, she said “I know it was wrong but it felt good to get things off my chest.” This is exactly what Suler says in his piece about your true self. Just because she is a sweet girl on the outside, doesn’t mean she doesn’t have anger or hatred built up inside her, and she is able to use the internet and formspring to release that anger. And in order to protect themselves and their image, they do it anonymously.
1. Context- Your context should include more detail. Although you mention the theories you will be using in your ethnography, you fail to provide a definition to what each theory is. Remember you are writing this for someone who has no idea what you’re talking about. Give a little information about the authors as well.
DeleteEvidence- You are using a very good anecdote as your evidence but this should not be the only thing you analyze. Provide examples from other people and different stories to make your ethnography stronger, not just people you know in real life. Remember, the ethnography’s main focus is the online community, not your real life friends.
Analysis- The analysis needs to be deeper. Although you can associate your anecdote with the theories you mention, you need to expand on this. If your paper was divided in sections, it’ll be easier to notice the parts that need further analysis.
2. The organization of the piece is not effective. One long paragraph does not help the reader understand Suler’s theories and how you apply them to your evidence (in this case, the anecdote of your friends). You should consider dividing the piece into smaller sections in order to explain the context, evidence, and analysis separately. Of course, you will apply your context to your evidence, but introduce your framing lens first. Giving the analysis its own section, will give you more room to critically analyze all the evidence you gather.
3. Consider concision and locate places where concision could be improved. re-draft a small portion (a paragraph) of the text in a way that improves the concision of that part.
I would rewrite your opening: “When I first thought about doing formspring, one event in particular struck my attention. It was a huge fight between my guy best friend, Chris, and my girl best friend, Ashley. (not their real names) They share another female best friend, Emily, and all go to the same school. The school they went to had a ratio of 4:1 girls to guys. So this school is full of drama and gossip. Rumor went around that Ashley liked Chris, but Chris was falling for their best friend. Chris ended up asking out and dating the best friend, behind Ashley’s back. This was the cause of an insane amount of drama.”
My re-write: The online community formspring [explain the purpose of this community to those who are unfamiliar with it]. While looking at examples of people’s behaviors, one event in particular struck my attention. It was a huge fight between my guy best friend, Chris, and my girl best friend, Ashley. (Their names have been changed for the purpose of this paper.) They share another female best friend named Emily and they all attend the same school. As many other high schools, drama and gossip are things students often engage in. According to rumors, Ashley liked Chris, but Chris was falling for their best friend. Chris ended up asking out and dating the best friend, behind Ashley’s back, causing an insane amount of drama.”
4. Why do you assume that because the ratio of a school is 4:1 in favor of girls, the school is full of gossip? Do you think this is appropriate to state as a fact in your ethnography?
What other examples can you find in formspring that apply to the lens you are using?
Can you further explain formspring in this paper assuming the reader has never used this community before?
Gille, 0037
ReplyDeleteBackground
I am an active member of Instagram, which makes this an easier and much more interesting target to investigate as a community. Instagram is a website where people can take a picture of anything they want, edit it with the few options of effects, then post it for their “followers” to view (you can even add the picture directly to Facebook, Twitter, Email, etc).
Discourses
(Here, I will post about Gee’s writing we read about Discourses, revealed through Instagram).
Photographically active?
Each user has their own part as being an “active user”: to post photos often that may attract “likes” from their followers and to comment and/or “like” their friends’ photos. Instagram’s real purpose is for people to share their photos with friends and family, along with adding cool effects to make them more appealing to look at. Some people that are “hardcore users” may post photos every hour, which can get annoying if you may not know the person that well, or if they post photos that you don’t ever care about. I personally refuse to follow people like that because I get sick of seeing the same posts from the same people every day. Popularity is a big deal on Instagram because it almost seems like it could be a competition between friends to see who could receive more “likes” on a photo. Popularity for that reason does not seem that important, but people who truly have talent behind the camera and are popular for the amazing photos they post is a more valuable reason to be “popular” and to have many followers.
Freedom of Speech
Since Facebook and Twitter are slowly becoming websites full of advertisements, pop ups, chain messages, etc, this new and improved website, Instagram, is supposed to be ad-free which makes sharing photos even more enjoyable. Although Instagram doesn’t have pop-ups and advertisements, during the elections, people were constantly posting campaign pictures that either shot down their enemy opponent, or encouraged their followers to vote for their favored candidate. Everyone is going to post about what they believe in, whether their followers agree or not, which makes Instagram a perfect place for the opportunity of “freedom of speech”. If anyone ever posts something vulgar, inappropriate, or something that truly offends you, Instagram gives you the right to “unfollow” that user and not have to see any more of their postings until you choose to follow them back, if you’d like. People usually don’t have problems with others because everyone has their own beliefs and no matter what website you’re on, people are going to post whatever is on their mind, whether you agree with them or not. As a user, I am to respect other’s beliefs within their postings.
I personally love the idea of using instagram as your discourse community. I think that this community is a very hard community to investigate because there is not a whole lot of communication going on. Some things that may help you to investigate your community more throughly would be interviewing a couple of people who do use instagram. You could interview three people:
Delete1. someone who doesn't have an instagram: ask questions why they dont have one. What makes them turn away from it and such.
2. someone who uses instagram, but doesnt use it much. Like a normal user. ask questions as to what they fell within the community or something along those lines.
3. a frequent user. Ask what makes them post pictures as often as they do. Why do they feel the need to post irrelevant pictures.
Give more background information about instagram. Maybe figure out who invented it, what type of people use it, when it became popular, ect.
0119 (Part 1)
ReplyDeleteCommunication and Communities
Most individuals in the 21st century are familiar with social networks such as Facebook or Twitter, which have allowed many to keep in touch with friends and loved ones despite the distance separating them. The majority of users of social networks enjoy spending countless hours on the internet but never think how this has changed the way in which we communicate, both online and in real life. To further analyze this, choosing an online community, observing it, and becoming engaged in it for a period of time allows us to see the distinctions of the way of communication between its members. Online communities differ from those in real life because the lack of face-to-face communication provides people with courage to express opinions they would otherwise keep to themselves. I will analyze this phenomenon in my online community according to John Suler’s The Psychology of Cyberspace and his factors: dissociative anonymity, invisibility, asynchronicity, solipsistic introjection, and dissociative imagination, minimizing authority. In addition, it is important to note that language varies in all communities and the same is true for online ones. Language is transformed into one full of abbreviations and shortened, informal sentences when texting or chatting, for example. In the same way, each community consists of members communicating in their own way. In the online community I will examine, although the language used is not very formal, words and phrases specific to that community are present. I will apply the theories of James Paul Gee to achieve this. Gee emphasizes the “saying-doing-being-valuing-believing combinations” he calls Discourse, with a capital D. According to Gee, these “are ways of being in the world”. What this means is that language goes beyond the classroom and is learned through social practices. This is what Gee calls enculturation. Enculturation is an important part of the community I am studying as I notice that many terms used by members are specific to the Hospitality and service industry and only people who have been involved in it for a reasonable amount of time can use these terms as everyday words.
0119(Part 2)
ReplyDeleteA Whole New World
Surfing the net for interesting communities related to the areas under the Hospitality Industry umbrella, I discovered an interesting one called Flyertalk.com. Members in this community are referred to as Flyer Talkers, or “FTers” for short, and publish posts about positive or negative experiences while traveling, places they consider worth visiting, or the most attractive deals out there for frequent travelers. Other FTers read the posts and have the option of responding to them. Visitors are allowed to see highlighted stories and jump to different forums according to their interest. Forums are divided into categories, which include but are not limited to, travel technology, travel news, travel safety/security, luxury hotels, cruises, travel with pets, and many others. Members log in to their accounts and are able to post stories or news related to travel and share them with the world. Some do it with the intention of entertaining other FTers, while others do it to receive feedback or advice from FTers when they are not sure what to do after a particular experience. There does not seem to be a limit on the length of posts, although the majority seem to be no longer than a paragraph, with responses usually being even shorter. This community provides members with the opportunity to share unique stories from their lives as regular travelers familiar with several parts of the world. Furthermore, Flyer talkers appear to be a very diverse group, taking into consideration that anyone can join the community and the settings of stories posted consist of various cities and countries.
A Passion for Traveling
One of my biggest dreams is simply to travel the world. I want to accomplish this goal in my future and open my eyes to new cultures and languages. My plan is that my future career in Hospitality Management will lead me to this unique experience. For this reason, I have enjoyed the time I have spent observing the online community Flyer Talk. Its members have had the incomparable opportunity to spend time in a number of countries. Although it has been less than a month of observing this community, I have noticed that most people have positive learning experiences to share, which makes me want to pursue my dream even more. The negative experiences of members also teach me about travel, but they draw more attention to the behaviors of the members in the online community.
I have collected data of different posts to analyze using the theories mentioned in my opening. The posts I chose to highlight are the ones that caught my attention the most for one reason or the other. Because I have not traveled to numerous countries, the information I look for and stories I read probably differ from those of frequent, experienced travelers.
1. How effectively is the analysis of the community's communication practices delivered? Evaluate how the author builds CONTEXT, EVIDENCE, and subsequent ANALYSIS, and deliver suggestions for improvement. Is there enough evidence? and could there be other evidence the author needs to consider? Where would you like to see the writer develop more context or deliver more analysis?
DeleteI think you did an excellent job with your introduction and setting up the lens you would use to investigate you online community.I feel you provide ample evidence and support for your claims. I would like to see you develop more is how what post people are drawn to differ on their experience
2. Consider the overall organization of the piece. Re-organize the piece and deliver at least one way to reconstruct it. Explain your rationale for your organizational choices.
I think that the way you have constructed it was great I really can think of a way to reconstruct it , the introduction to the passion for traveling establishes a nice flow.
3. Consider concision and locate places where concision could be improved. re-draft a small portion (a paragraph) of the text in a way that improves the concision of that part.
I would rethink the opening a bit when you discussed other social media sites it kind of put my head in a different place and didnt set up for you to lead into Flyer Talkers
4. Come up with at least two questions to help the writer develop his/her digital discourse community ethnography project.
What places would you like to visit?
And does this site change peoples views on traveling?
When I first started researching online discourse communities I took a very lacksadaisical approach with the idea that I would be able to use pretty much use any community that I came across. Originally, I chose a blogging community called America’s Greatest Sports Fan’s with the idea that I would be able to easily relate and become quickly acclimated within the community because it was on topics that I had prior knowledge of. When I started trying to incorporate different framing mechanisms displayed by the authors we have previously discussed I soon realized that the community that I chose didn’t have enough users interacting to provide me with solid evidence to support my arguments. I then quickly had to reorganize my ideas and make a transition into another community in which I chose the popular social network of Twitter. Having such a large community and overall user population, Twitter has provided me with a prime source of contextual evidence. For those out there that unaware of the types of communication taking place on Twitter, it basically consists of users interacting through “tweets” which can be any bright idea or random thought that an individual feels the need to share with his or her followers. These 140 character posts provide its users with a place in which they can freely express themselves and gain feedback on their ideas.
ReplyDeleteThrough speculation and analysis of the multiple arguments posed by the several authors we have already discussed I came across many different interesting topics that are prevalent within the Twitter community. Whether it’s Mirabelli’s introduction of multi-literacies, Suler’s ideologies of disinhibition or one’s “true self”, or even the several other authors that disputed concepts of authority and identity. They are all very much alive within the community. Being apart of “Twitter Nation” for quite some time now, it came to my attention that there are many different literacies that users must learn in order to fully understand and successfully communicate within the community. Through contemplation within the multiple arguments I was able to see a very interesting aspect of authority versus popularity. Many of these concepts will be specifically illustrate within the different sections of my ethnography.
Methodology
My initial course of action when establishing my argument comes through defining the key concepts within each authors individual arguments. I have come to realize that if I am able to provide solid definitions of each individual case it becomes much easier to create parallels within my own experiences on Twitter. Instead of specifying or isolating an individual author I found that there is such a wide variety of communication on Twitter that I was able to touch on topics from each different author.
Multi-literacies
Just like in every other distinct discourse community, Twitter also has its own set of literacies that one may pick up through interacting with its other users. The aspect that I would like to ultimately touch upon lies within the feature that user have adopted in “hashtags”. Hashtags are simple subtweets that people use at the end of their tweets that may reflect how they are feeling about their previous statements. For example, a user who is trying to create a sense of humor may make a statement and follow it up with a specific phrase within his hashtag that lets users know he is being sarcastic. Others may use hashtags with the purpose of reflecting multiple thoughts about a specific issue. I plan on taking this into deeper discussion throughout the longevity of my paper.
0119 (Part 3)
ReplyDeleteUp in the air
I will first analyze how members communicate their ideas and tell their stories through John Suler’s factors in The Psychology of Cyberspace. The first factor dissociative anonymity applies to the members of the community when choosing to tell a story, especially a negative one. Because they are anonymous and the site never forces anyone to use a real name, we do not know who the characters in the story are, where they work or traveled. Unless the writer tells us so, we may not know what hotel, airline, or restaurant provided them with the negative experience they are sharing. An example of this would be the following flight attendant story:
“I was on a flight last night and apparently took a little long to put my baggage in the overhead bin. An apparently angry American Airlines attendant stated the following: "You stinky doe-doe head, please be courteous to the other passengers." She was not smiling or laughing at all. I was shocked that she would use such strange language. Later during drinks service as she was serving me water she apologized for calling me a doe-doe head. But then she said "I should have called you a noodlebrain," laughed hysterically and walked away. The flight attendant serving drinks with her didn't even react. This was just an odd thing to be told. I am not sure whether to be offended, disturbed or to laugh. But I'm also wondering if she may be mentally unstable and should be complained about. I don't think it is appropriate to call people doe doe head or noodlebrain.”
The beauty of this post is that we have no idea who this lovely flight attendant is or who the person telling the story is. Anonymity allows the writer to tell the story as he wishes and convey the message he desires without worrying that someone he knows or anyone else who was present during the situation may see it. He does not have to think of the consequences of his actions and only worry about the responses he will get from his fellow FTers. One response read as follows:
“Assuming that this happened as reported, I would definitely let AA know. I'm not sure I would go so far as to be offended, but this is certainly not appropriate behavior. From the way the report is written, it does sound more like an instability than an aggressive behavior. If so, that's probably more a cause for concern, and something AA would definitely want to know about. Cheers.”
This response is associated with Suler’s factor of minimizing authority. This factor states, “Everyone - regardless of status, wealth, race, gender, etc. - starts off on a level playing field. Although one's status in the outside world ultimately may have some impact on one's powers in cyberspace, what mostly determines your influence on others is your skill in communicating (including writing skills), your persistence, the quality of your ideas, and your technical know-how.” The person who replied to the original post is providing good advice but we do not know how likely it is for the first person to take this advice. Because the writer of the story does not know what authority or knowledge the person who replied had, they may not be highly encouraged to do as they were told because the credibility of the person replying is unknown.
(This is what I have so far of my ethnography. I am analyzing more examples I found and so far my ethnography is very long so I just posted this part consisting of 3 different posts for now. I look forward to your feedback.)
0119
ReplyDeleteYouTube is an online community where its user’s upload videos of different genres that include anything from politics to humor to informational guides. YouTube has become so popular that on any given day 60 hours of video are uploaded every minute, or one hour of video is uploaded to YouTube every second. Many users create their own username when they sign up to YouTube to create their own page or channel, and through this they are able to create their identity in this community. Usernames hide your true identity and in John Suler’s “The Psychology of Cyberspace” he talks about how this sense of anonymity and invisibility gives a person control of their actions knowing that whatever they may say they don’t necessarily have to take responsibility for. On YouTube authority is established through the amount of likes you may get on the videos you download, the amount of subscribers that follow your channel or the number of times your video is viewed. A great example of an authority on YouTube is Ray William Johnson. Ray has been on several news articles because of his impressive popularity on YouTube. Ray uploads humor videos, and his popularity placed his channel in the first position in 2011 with over 3.8 subscribers and over 1 billion video views. YouTube also rewards YouTube “uploaders” through monetary compensation. For example, Ray will often earn $5 to $25 per thousand views, and with over 2 million views on his latest video (well you do the math). Ray’s net worth is estimated to be $5 million.
What I believe YouTube brings to this world just another way for people being able to express themselves. On YouTube the way you express yourself is by uploading a video, commenting on a video, of liking or disliking a video. An example of expression through video is the “am I ugly?” videos that have started to become a disturbing trend in the YouTube community. This was recently broadcasted on the news; these videos are about young girls asking the YouTube community of their opinions on how they look. Because bullying has become a problem in today’s society the negative comments on these videos have become detrimental to these young girls and as a result these videos have multiplied. The form of expression through commenting is an important aspect in this community because you are free to express how you feel about the videos you watch. The username that I chose was one that didn’t expose my identity because I was aware of the commenting I would be doing. I commented on a soccer video that showed highlights of a game of my favorite soccer team, Barcelona against their rivals Real Madrid. In the commenting area I noticed that there was a fight going on that involved may users so I decided to join the war and I went there swearing and made the fight into an all out brawl to a point where I was no longer able to comment because of what I was saying. I noticed that this was out of my character that I portray in face to face interactions, but after I read Suler’s piece I realized the reasons why I had acted the way I did. What really got me thinking was that Suler also mentioned (aside from what he had stated about of anonymity and invisibility) about how he wondered if these certain behaviors that are expressed in these online communities reflect the true core of these people (myself).
0119
Delete1. You have a good starting position for your draft. However, you did not incorporate the techniques taught in class. You did not offer sufficient analysis of your topic. In order to clarify your analysis you should use the context, evidence and analysis method. You have the beginning part of the analysis by explaining John Suler's piece, however, you need to deliver more in-depth analysis. Since you are incorporating identity, you can also look into Wardle's and Gee's piece. Since this is the 1st draft you should incorporate more evidence in order to bring forth more evidence.
2. There is slim to no organization to this draft. Consider the CARS model in order to organize the piece. First start with the introduction of what YouTube is and how it works with a little background knowledge to that. After introduce your methods. One clear method that you described here was how you became indulged into an argument. Use that to your advantage. Your paragraphs need to be broken down in order for your idea to be clearly stated and understood by your audience. Your ideas seem to be morphed into each other, so a clear division needs to be done. For example, in your introduction you blended the introduction of YouTube and the context for you evidence together. In order for you evidence and analysis to be effective, you need to separate the two. Also, you need to develop a clear gap that you are trying to fill.
3. Your introduction could use some improvement. You began with simply introducing YouTube, then diving right into your analysis. My rewrite for you would go as follow: "YouTube is an online community where its user’s upload videos of different genres that include anything from politics to humor to informational guides. YouTube has become so popular that on any given day 60 hours of video are uploaded every minute, or one hour of video is uploaded to YouTube every second. Some users may log onto YouTube to fulfill time during their leisure period, however, YouTube may mean much more to that than other users. Some users log on to create and identity, become famous, or even make money from YouTube. In my research I wish to see what users really log on to to. In doing so I will be using ______, _____, _______, pieces from Writing About Writing." Or something along that line.
4. What gap are you trying to fulfill? Where do you see this piece going?
This community is a great form of expressing and one is able to see how different commenting is done according to the genre of video they watch. For example in my example of the soccer video, my commenting was done where I needed to back up my reasoning as to why my team was the better team (they had one in that particular game), I had to show that I knew what I was talking about through certain statistics and certain examples to prove my points. In an educational video that teaches you about algorithms your comments are going to be questions that you may have on that particular subject and most likely there won’t be a confrontation in the comment section. So different they way you comment on videos in derived from the video itself.
ReplyDelete(There is still some more research to be done and hopeful interviews as well.)
OMO8
ReplyDeleteIntroduction
For my digital community I decided to investigate Oxygen Online chat for the “Bad Girls Club”. This chat takes place online during the show. So whenever something spontaneous happens on the show people can talk about it. Since internet is a very popular thing when it comes to cellphones people can also use Twitter to make comments about the show by hash tagging it #BGC9. This categorizes the tweets so people can go back and look at the conversations that took place with people all over the world and the girls on the show. The online chat takes place online with one of the girls from the show. Here you are able to chat with one of the girls from the show and other people around the world. The only difference between this and Twitter is that with the online chat people can ask specific questions and get a respond. Twitter is more of just voicing your opinion online. I investigated both of the communities. I participated in an online chat and tweeted during the show to see how the interaction actually worked.
Methods
Gee introduced his definition of Discourse by saying that it is the saying, writing, doing-being-valuing-believing combinations that are being in the world. Gee says that when it comes to Discourse you’re either recognized by others as a full member of it or you’re not. I think that when it comes to investigating my online community I can use Gee’s framing to see how people that chat make themselves known in these communities. I observed and since there are so many people in this chat is it’s hard to grab the attention of the stars from the TV show. I observed and when people begin asking questions that refer to them being weak or insulting their character seems to be the spark of attention. Many of the users on this chat site would make comments about certain stars from the show were their favorite but when someone began to attack one of the stars from the show that’s when things began to heat up. pl After the show airs the producers go back and take certain tweets and air them on the show so they play on the re runs. I observed the different conversations that take place on Twitter and how people are able to be noticed and get their comments on Twitter important enough to air on the show. I have come to a conclusion that people that point out random things that the audience doesn’t notice. For example someone made a reference to one of the star’s looking like a cartoon character or how everyone was fighting but there was one girl sitting in the back chilling eating ice cream. I observed different tweeting episodes for two different episodes to see the kinds of things the producers allow to be appear on the show.
I will also use Nicholas Carr’s article “Is Google Making Us Stupid” because talks about how people find it necessary to get involved with everything they stumble across on the internet or just take the main topic of each article. Carr says that it’s better to skim information just to see the existence before you let your mind get wrapped around with everything on the internet. I think that this would be interesting to apply this concept to this online community because if people just skimmed through chat sites and tweets they wouldn’t get involved with arguments in debates about petty things on the internet.
Multiliteracies
ReplyDeleteMirabelli and Gee have a connection when it comes to framing. People don’t always read text they read situations. While investigating this online community I could see how during the live chat sessions people were trying to read situations as well. Everyone is entitled to their own opinion but you could see during the live session how people were trying to mediate when arguments broke out over the live chat. It was clear while on person had a negative comment people were able to empathize with both problems. Also this applied to people who came in during the middle of the live chat. They were clueless but the way they talked told that they were able to read people and their situations over the internet by looking at different expressions such as smiley faces, capitalizing letters, and so on. This also falls into the theories about how language that is used in communities is applied in certain communites.
Conclusion
I have concluded from my investigations that in my online chat and tweeting session that people are able to be a member of a community by the way they communicate. This is determined by the way people behave in a community, they type of language they use and how they express themselves. People can be read over the internet and by using different language can help people read them. Sometimes people do get caught up in the little things on the internet like Carr stated in his article.
0119
ReplyDeleteIntro:
As the internet's primary user uploaded video streaming website, YouTube not only does youtube have an incomprehensible amount of videos, but communities exist for any topic known to man. Among a variety of other topics which I find interesting, the YouTube community I'm most involved in is that of airsoft players. Airsoft is a military simulation game, similar to the concept of paintball, in which players equip themselves with realistic gear and firearm replicas that fire six millimeter plastic pellets. On YouTube, players share information about experiences, opinions, and technical advice in an effort to better inform others in the community. Although YouTube is seen as primarily a video sharing site, a large portion of the information exchanged is done so through text comments left under each video.
To many people, YouTube is seen as somewhere to waste time watching watching stupid internet videos; however, this community is not purely based around mindless entertainment, but rather a market of potential airsoft buyers. Because of this, there is an obvious presence from large international airsoft distributors. These companies are most often present in two ways: having their own channel to make reviews and advertisements, or by sponsoring an already established channel with free products to promote. This creates an incentive for users in the community who post videos to create a respectable image for themselves in an effort to not be overshadowed by these colossal companies and to potentially be noticed and sponsored by one of them.
Method:
I've been a part of the YouTube airsoft community for just under four years, which is a substantial amount of time to observe a community. Shortly after I started watching airsoft reviews, tests, and game footage, I thought it would be fun to start my own series of videos to get in on the action. Since then, I've amassed over fifteen thousand subscribers and six million total video views. Over the time of growing my channel, I've devoted many hours to not only watching videos from other channel as a way to research airsoft gear that I'd like to purchase, but I've also answered tens of thousands of comment questions and read through enough text conversations to fill a novel. Although I have no way to read through personal message between other users, I do have more personal messages between myself and other YouTubers to study than I could possibly read though.
0119 Part 2
ReplyDeleteResults:
The user's age is not required to be displayed on their YouTube channel, but through text communication styles, a users level of education and maturity can be easily determined. The majority of serious airsoft players are in their teens and early twenties, although the distribution of age grows as a direct result of the growth of the sport. The amount of effort put in and what a user wants to achieve through their channels is apparent as well. Some users are in the community purely to see cool airsoft videos and contribute nothing to the sport or community. These users tend to be on the younger end of the spectrum and utilize the anonymity to troll more serious community members. Others are there to further their own knowledge by researching new and existing products. Although not always the most influential in the community, they do contribute to some conversations and do so with a moderate level of respect and formality. Channels which contribute the most are those who post regular videos; whether it be reviews, tests, or game footage, and frequently participate in text conversations. These users tend to be the most mature and knowledgeable about airsoft
This group of users who regularly post is the most interesting because they have the most to gain from the community. The videos posted on these channels are carefully filmed and edited to present the information at hand in the most professional manner. Each video is scripted and, if needed, filmed several times over until perfected. Once uploaded, work still needs to be done for these videos in the comment section. With the steady flow of people clicking each video, all questions have to be skillfully answered in a kind and informative manner in the hope that the new viewer might choose to watch other videos or subscribe. As these airsoft review channels grow, they gain the attention of other channels looking to do a cooperative video, and sometimes even companies looking to sponsor new reviewers as a marketing technique. Users message back and forth with these other parties in an effort to further their channel. A clear example of what not to do in these situations was clearly demonstrated by a conversation I had with a viewer several weeks ago. As a larger YouTube reviewer, I was approached by a newer reviewer who asked "Yo bro can you give a shout out to me?" This request was immediately off-putting because he called me "bro", but I still proceeded to check his channel for on the off chance that he might have good content. I was greeted with a troll-face background and a video of him puking after trying the cinnamon challenge. I replied "Sorry, I no longer do shout outs upon request" and was almost immediately greeted with his reply of "Fuck you and ur reviews." As someone who receives this hate on a regular basis, I wasn't shocked, but rather amused. On the other hand, I've dealt with extremely respectful channels who professionally requested that I look at their channel and, if I saw fit, mention them in my next video. One of these channels did have a expertly designed channel with well edited videos and received a shout-out from me. Over the following week they gained close to five hundred new subscribers because of it. Conversations between YouTube channels and established companies go much the same way, with immature messages being denied or ignored, and formal requests moving closer to a company sponsorship.
0119
ReplyDeleteMy digital community is called The Poet’s Sanctuary where novice and amateur poets can post their poems and receive feedback from others. I chose this community because I write poetry myself and I could potentially become an active member of this community. People tend to join communities to create identity, fulfill a sense of belonging, and also receive benefits from that specific community. I want to find out if novice poets achieve what they seek from this community. Poets come here to improve their poetry and better themselves as poet. Are these needs met from this community? What does the community offer to these novice poets and does it prove to be effective?
In order to find this out I will analyze the community physical attributions, but the way that the members interact. In order to analyze this I will be using multiple readings taken from Writing About Writing. Some frames of lens that I will be using are the Lexi theory and identity theory by Wardle, James Paul Gee’s concept that language is not what you say, but how you say it, and multiliteracies by Tony Mirabelli.
The Categories
The foundation for writing good poetry derives from knowing what language to use in order to effectively convey your emotion and message. If you use incorrect or misleading language in your poetry then the reader can be confused on the purpose of your writing. The Poets Sanctuary allows its users to post the poems into different categories such as The Sadness, The Enlightened, The Heart, and many other categories. The language and word choice will display what emotion the writer wants to convey and why they chose their piece in the category they chose.
I browsed around two categories on The Poet’s Sanctuary: The Sadness and The Enlightened and selected a couple poems to analyze. One poem from The Sadness category called “Build-a-Girl Work Shop” speaks about how a girl feels like she needs to be “manufactured” in order to be her lover’s perfect girl. She uses language such as “instead of being perfect, like I know you want. I ended up an ugly little Chucky doll” and a lonely little Chuck doll, pleading for your forgiveness. I'm sorry.” Then I went to The Enlightened category and picked out one poem called “Its Amazing”. I noticed language such as “It's amazing what you can do” and “But you fight on You get through it You find the strength To get out of bed.”
Both these poems use very different language choice to convey their emotion and purpose. Elizabeth Wardle’s Identity, Authority, and Learning to Write in New Workplaces analyzed how lexis, the language writers choose to use, affects their piece. According to Wardle, you must use the correct lexi in order to “fit into” the community. If these poets used the wrong form lexi, then it would not make sense into the community, or the category, that they chose to be a part of. Writers need to acknowledge and take into consideration what lexi they are going to undertake in order for their writing to be effective and convey the mode of emotion that they want their audience to feel.
1. You were able to incorporate techniques that were learned from the reading we have been introduced to. I liked how you were able to incorporate Wardle and Gee with the concept of language. You did state in the beginning aboiut identity and i think you can also talk about identity and the importance in this community. You didnt specify if the users use their own name or if the are hidden behind a username but whatever it may be wardle, Gee, and Suler can be brought up on the sense of identity. I loved the examples you showed and i do think this will be a very interesting ethnography because of how you are looking into the use of language in two completely opposite genres.
Delete2. A mistake I made was organization and i will be looking more closely into the CARS model. Your organization was indeed good i liked the introduction to your community but i felt that it could use a bit more elaboration on the methods you are to take.
4. what predictions can you make on how language in these different genres are utilized?
aside from reviewing other people's work, do u plan on conducting an interviews?
3. My digital community is called The Poet’s Sanctuary where novice and amateur poets can post their poems and receive feedback from others. I chose this community because I write poetry myself and I could potentially become an active member of this community. People tend to join communities to create identity, fulfill a sense of belonging, and also receive benefits from that specific community. Poets come here to improve their poetry and better themselves as poets. I want to find out if this community is effective to novice poets in achieving this improvement from this community?
Delete0119 Part 3
ReplyDeleteDiscussion:
Tony Mirabelli, a graduate of University of California-Berkeley with a Ph.D. in Education in Language, described in his paper "Learning to Serve: The Language and Literacy of Food Service Workers" the literacy which can be learned by working as a waiter or waitress in a restaurant. Giving examples of different situations experienced by restaurant waiting staff, he demonstrates different types of literacies learned and applied to life, which contradicts the societies notion that waiters and waitresses are uneducated and ignorant. This same view can be applied to the certain YouTube communities and the time spent there. Through practice, communicating with other users and sponsoring companies on YouTube can help someone develop a more mature and professional tone to their speaking and writing. The ability to be anonymous in the comment section of a video and through private messages on YouTube eliminates any prior judgement from the recipient of the message. As for videos, no one viewing it has any background information and can only judge you based on the quality and content of the video. Those in the community who opt to exercise this ability to improve their communications skills are more openly accepted and almost celebrated. Those who resort to immature and unprofessional techniques are ignored and criticized.
(This ethnography is far from done. It is extremely unorganized and I'm still working to get more examples and do a better analysis of what I have.)
0m08
ReplyDeleteThe Annals of Living Well and Hearty—an Ethnography of Organic and Raw Foods via the Internet
The twentieth century was interesting for the human body and soul. Chemicals became the rage and people seemed to forget the path of wholefoods. As the nineteenth century slipped into the burgeoning 1900s, the giants of the producing world rolled out GMOs, trans-fats and artificial sweeteners coupled with pesticides to shoo away the tiny critters that could ruin crops. It wasn’t until the mid-sixties and the pinnacle of raw living, Silent Spring, did Rachel Carson shed light on the future issues of living in such harsh conditions. Even though most of the world has shunned the practice of raw and organic living a small collection of purists stayed close to the human evolutionary dietary concerns. Today their successors run multi-million dollar companies and are beginning to spread their beliefs to the future generations of the earthen caretakers.
Raw and Organic foods have a stigma that has been pushed by the conglomerates of refined and processed foods. Now, one might be curios to wonder why we need to revert back to the organic and raw food style of eating. Researching the people that are staunch supporters, this researcher has come to the conclusion that raw and organic foods have more nutrients and help harness proper growth in the human diet. The Organic and Raw food sites never pushed their agenda but merely pointed out the facts the media tries to hide. These are Health Nuts, as the average person labels those who adhere to this radical health lifestyle.
Introduction:
ReplyDeleteI went online with the soul intent on finding the alternative world of organic and raw foods. I finally stumbled upon the perfect blog; a very interesting twist of blog, news and a hodgepodge of how to perfect your chemical laced diet. At first I thought that Organic Authority was one Health Nut’s endeavor but as I delved into the realm of eating healthy I realized that people could Tweet, repost on Facebook, Stumble Upon and Google-Plus. This interested me very much as I found it quite helpful that people wanted to share their great love of organic living with others. With my readings this semester I want to use the visual aids that accompany the articles and eventually the reposts that draw people in. People use discourse in many different ways and I believe Gee helped me find the perfect way to discover this new online community. Raw and Organic living has always interested me; it touches the soul and makes me crave more knowledge.
Through the many years of traversing college I have come across numerous people who have influenced my small minded world. I have known from the many people that I have come across what Organic Living and Raw foods means to them and I have always been keen on learning more but alas I had no time and not enough funds to pursue such a worthwhile endeavor. I plan on using Gee, Wardle and Grant Davie to make a concept in this article. During the course of my project I interviewed a novice Health Nut who happened live in the same apartment complex as me. Brandon Stone, a lover and critic of modern living, first stumbled into my life during a Comm 100 with Steven Neil. Currently enrolled and loving his chosen career path—he plans on becoming a small time business owner by selling organic soaps, snacks and scents. Brandon Stone introduced me into the Organic Community. Through this website people communicate via posting, videos and pictures that capture the attention of Dr. Oz enthusiasts. Looking through this lens of analytical thinking it made me ponder the importance of visual aids coupled with the captions that stir vivid and emotionally rich thoughts.
Introspective Quandaries:
ReplyDeleteIn my paper I had the desire to get to know who I wanted to be in the future. Did I want to look at alternative ways to fix myself or continue on a path of nutrition based excellence. I decided to go for Raw and Organic foods after I watched so many shows on Dr. Oz tell the world why living organically and raw was the way to go. At the end of my quest I came to the conclusion that I had so desired to know.
Methodology:
ReplyDeleteOver the course of this discussion I saw that the people who posted and read on my community were vigilant and very worried about each other’s’ health. I read and poked around more than one website but found that overall the Health Nut Community was a wealth of knowledge that only wanted to help those who were knew or were old and needed more guidance. I didn’t want to be part of the collective so I just watched from the outside. I didn’t like them on Facebook or sought their Twitter. I merely used their Twitter account as a favorite and looked at their Facebook page through the search engine; I wanted to be a scholar. I know that you always change a society when you change it. This normally comes from the act of searching for clues in person but on the Internet I could look all I wanted and not have anyone know I was ever there. This helped me through my searches as I could read all about them and not have to show my illiteracies to them face to face as the only person I met was already a friend and wanted to help me along my path.
Grant-Davie was very important on this online community—Rhetorical Situations and their Constituents played a vital role in how I saw fit. The Raw Food and Organic Community has established major territories (primarily through the internet—neo Healthofites are young and looking to prolong their already long lifespans); established a niche by creating a way to learn about the unpublicized articles that flaunt the web with their forbidden knowledge; and in the end they have occupied their niche with their very Googled and Tweeted audience to want to tell the world all about the discourse and exigence of their community. With Grant-Davie I realized that the audience was apparent. The audience desires and seeks ways to be part of; most if not all of the audience isn’t by happenstance.
Wardle came into play in my research as well. The audience commands authority in the way the comment on the posts. Over a period of a few articles one gets the impression of those who surf the websites on a daily basis. They seem to input their thoughts, link in other news articles and comment if in through tenure as Health Nuts if they have had the same or different results. The audience and the rhetor become garbled once one starts to read the comments. At first the author of the article is the rhetor but soon the audience changes and morph into the one telling the current audience what is up. This was a new thought to me during this course as I never truly believed this was important; I now know I was mistaken. The symmetry that I found is breathtakingly strange as one sees the important of literature in any form of communication.
ReplyDeleteGee found his beliefs creeping up as I read more and more on my online community. Discourse was very important in my readings; through discourse became more than words. Discourse became the photos and the hashtags and the every growing identity that tagged along with being wrapped up in a community. The way that people grabbed on to the ways and beliefs of this community astounded me. The easy and loving manner of the Raw and Organic community is cloaked in some very heavy foreboding. The community knows that their ways are being hounded by the government. In states people have had their organic farms raided and a woman had her edible herb wall torn down by the police because it was against the law. These new Hippies of the technological age have a strong identity that they would rather be light and easy going. But in the end they are becoming thicker; their identity is moving toward something harsher with every passed law. The end state of the Raw and Organic community is to have a healthy and every present world without the state telling you how to eat milk.
The community I chose was informal and every open. The only thing they want is to be open. Their discourse is not strange or esoteric but written by Yuppies who normally have gone to college and or are educated in unconventional manners. The articles they wrote about—making your own creams, stockpiling healthy snacks for the winter in a reasonably cheap manner—were important to their target audience. They looked to please who the original bloggers were. They community—along with Brandon Stone—was very happy with their life style. As I interviewed Brandon Stone over a cup of herbal tea and freshly grown Topsy Turvy salad tomatoes I came to the same conclusion I had once I read online. Being organic and eating raw doesn’t have to be at once but gradual with little increments to let your body adjust. Being in this community made me feel better for a better world and a greener America in the ensuing future.
ReplyDeleteConclusion:
Reading and talking to my interview subject I threw away my idea of Beatniks, Hippies and fanatics. The audience was for everyone. The world to them was open and free and they wanted to show how to be like them. They don’t force their ideas on anyone but rather tell you when you ask. Vitamins are their mainstay and fresh organic veggies are to stay to be eaten with clean raw grain fed beef (or protein supplements if Vegan). The rhetor—unseen but loved authors of the blog—wanted to do just as Blitzer said exigence was. The Rhetors asserted their beliefs that there were certain problems that needed to be addressed and the world could fix them. The discourse involved in this community was not pithy but rather on-going. Each topic, each article, each posting and each picture plastered on their website was made to show how to make each person who read their website a better person. Not morally but healthy.
0037
ReplyDeleteGuitar Web Forums
As a musician who has just recently moved all the way across the country to come to UCF, I found myself without a circle of friends and especially other musicians. After looking up some information on Google about how to gain notoriety for YouTube videos (of which I had been and was continuing to produce and publish) I was referred to joining a web-based guitar forum, so that other musicians could see, hear, and critic my work. Soon after, I found myself a member of guitar-forums.net. And as I quickly came to realize, people’s identities on this forum were no different than on Facebook or Twitter.
In Suler’s “Psychology of Cyberspace” he made interesting points as to how people’s personalities are different online than in face-to-face meetings. After reading this I set my mind on trying to find members of this community which had fallen into this psychology, and see how these identities played a role in determining how the members acted towards each other, and also how it established authority within the forum.
The context:
As a stereotype, loners and people with security issues are the ones prone to join a web-based forum. Why would someone outgoing and with loads of friends who share common interests need to join a forum of strangers? Although a stereotype, I thought it would be interesting to see if this stereotyped identity played through into any of the member’s online personalities, or if people changed into a different identity when online as Suler suggested. Why could we as members interact perfectly fine with strangers in an online community but in person we would not act with the same measure of outgoing-ness? I wanted to see how being a part of a web forum such as this one changed, or did not change, people’s identities and how they interacted.
The Evidence:
Myself. When starting research for this ethnography project, I realized I had fallen prey to the very identity I was searching for on this forum. The shy guy who could interact perfectly with strangers only because they were behind a computer screen. When I am with my friends or people I am comfortable with I am extremely outgoing and confident. But since I left my comfort zone of friends and family behind in Minnesota, I no longer have any comfortability with anyone yet to the same level as I did before. My shyness had depicted a different identity than the one I truly possess. In classes in college and around campus I have a much different identity in terms of interacting with teachers and students than I did in high school, where I knew everyone and was part of the jock crowd, leaving me at the top of the social chain. So why the change? How do our identities so quickly change, even when we know in our hearts our true selves? Applied to my forum research, how many of the other users joined just to be able to break out of their own bubble and comfort zone? Did they too know their true selves, yet had no other way to feel comfortable than to join a face-less forum?
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ReplyDeleteThe Analysis:
Everyone has a different reason for joining communities of any kind, whether online or in person. Some may seek friendships and interactions with others who share their same interests. Some people may just feel uncomfortable with their current identity in life and like Suler claimed, are using cyberspace to express their true selves without the face-to-face reactions or criticisms of others. What I have found through looking at this community is that it is not much different than face-to-face relationships. In the beginning, just like with the first time you meet someone, most people act different; they don’t feel comfortable with themselves as they are and try to be someone or something better to impress people. But as time wears on and the individual becomes more comfortable their true nature shines out, and I found this to be the same on the forum. The authority members of this community genuinely seemed to act the same towards all of their fellow members. Example. There is a “Welcome New Members” section of the forum where new members are encouraged to post a little blurb about themselves and to be welcomed in by the forum family. In almost every single entry, the same few members posted welcoming them to the community. One or two of these people welcomed me in as well when I joined. The analysis of this is that although all of the users may not be their true selves (as if we met in person), the community allows a second chance for all people; to become whatever identity they want. It doesn’t matter if you change, as Suler said happens; it is a place for all people to be whatever they see fit. And maybe this freedom of expression is all it takes for someone to break out of their comfort zone identity and eventually let their true identity shine.
1. Honestly, there is very little analysis. Most of your analysis section is evidence that you should have presented earlier. Also, I don't believe that you need to have headings for context, evidence, and analysis; the sections should all flow together. Likewise, it is unnecessary to begin a sentence with, "the analysis of this is that..."
DeleteYou do build context well, but some parts of your intro would make more sense as context and some parts of your context should be your thesis. In my opinion, stating your personal experiences is not very strong evidence. You cannot be sure that your feelings are representative of the whole community. Even if you do use yourself, you need to include specifics of how your identity changed when you interacted with others in the forum. To substantiate your point, which could be very interesting, you need a lot more evidence. Right now, I am not convinced.
To develop your analysis it would help to consider individual instances where you noticed identities changed (this may be hard to do this since you don't actually know these people in real life). You would build context by describing one of the psychological principles in Suler's piece. Then, you will bring in evidence, quotes or anecdotes, from the forum. Finally, you would say something insightful to bring it all together. This will keep you from begging the question like you are now.
2. Your introduction and context in this draft could be reworked to form an introduction and methods section. Then you would write your results in the format of context, evidence, and analysis I described above. Your conclusion would pull everything together.
This format is just like the ethnographies we have read in class. Many writers use this format because it flows well and provides a way to build up to your main point.
3. I will rewrite this section: "Myself. (not a sentence) When starting research for this ethnography project, I realized I had fallen prey to the very identity I was searching for on this forum. The shy guy who could interact perfectly with strangers only because they were behind a computer screen. (not a sentence) When I am with my friends or people I am comfortable with(,) I am extremely outgoing and confident. But since I left my comfort zone of friends and family behind in Minnesota, I no longer have any comfortability(not a word) with anyone yet to the same level as I did before. My shyness had depicted a different identity than the one I truly possess."
My rewrite: My experiences demonstrate how one can form a different identity online. When I am with friends, I am outgoing and confident. Since I have not connected deeply with anyone here, I am not as comfortable interacting in person. On the guitar forum it is easier to interact with people because I can hide behind the screen. My transition in real life caused my identity online to change.
4. What terms from Suler's piece can you provide examples of in your community?
Are there other framing devices you could use to elaborate on your observations of your community?
Brandon Jones 0037
ReplyDeleteFans are more than fans, they’re knowledgeable viewers:
A Digital Discourse Community Ethnography
Introduction
The fan, short for “fanatic”, is sports most precious gem. Without the enthusiasm of sports fans there would be no sports. This is particularly true of basketball, at the NBA level, because fans are the centerpiece of the sport and are the defining factor in many of the sport’s most important decisions. Fans of a NBA team can be the difference between a player going to the All-Star game and the difference between a team staying in a particular city. A community that I have investigated is centered on fan’s opinions. Bleacher Report is an online community that allows fans and journalists to come together to voice their opinion on their favorite sports. The website is divided between different sports and divided even more between the teams that participate in that sport. In my research I focused on NBA basketball portion of the site. Users are unpaid contributors, so they find solace in earning marks that are displaced on their profile page which have icons that distinguish what events they have covered and what other networks they have written for. For example, a torch may be used if the writer covered the 2012 London Olympics and a basketball may be used if a writer has written columns for ESPN.com’s Heat Index. There is also a side bar on their profile page which lists specific achievements they have garnered on articles they have written in the past. They are visualized as gold, silver, and bronze medals and when hovered over they display what achievement the writer has accomplished. For example, one medal could say “article has received 50,000 reads” or “article received 500 comments.” Some writers in this community are indeed published columnist while others are simply fans that love the game. In this community are not going to have the tools and resources available to professional writers and companies like advanced statistics, in-depth interviews, and so on so they end up doing what writer James Paul Gee calls mushfaking, or making do with what one has. As a result of this, many articles in this community are based solely on opinion and preference of certain teams and players, therefore making them extremely biased. Many of the contributors in this community are not known personally by the people who read their articles, let alone ever seen by these people except for a 2 inch by 2 inch profile picture. Of course these writers and columnists do use their real names, but we as readers do not know the true nature of who they are and what their beliefs are aside from what they tell us in their articles and columns. However, many people just label these writers as fans and say they have no credibility whatsoever. I have set out to prove that these fans are not just fans, they are knowledgeable viewers.
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This is as far as I’ve come with my DDCE, I’m not entirely sure if my argument has a strong enough basis or if i should find another argument or change communities. I’ve gone as far as introducing the community I’m am investigating and my gap is included in the last two sentences. In my DDCE, I am going to prove that fans do not have to be published writers to create newsworthy articles.
After analysis and speculation of Brandon’s blog I have realized that he seems to have chosen a very interesting community. From my understanding there seems to be a lot of different means of communication happening within the network. I liked how he explained the different aspects of the blog and I feel that there is a lot he will be able to talk about when trying to incorporate the ideologies of the several authors we have already talked about. In terms of evidence, there is definitely a lot of different issues to be discussed in terms of topics such as identity, authority, etc. In relation to creating context and analysis, Brandon analyzed the blog rather than the issues taking place within the blog. I’d like to seem him establish an overall argument that he can support by incorporating the multiple concepts illustrated by the authors we have already discussed.
DeleteThe organization was pretty smooth for the most part but I would like to see him take his piece from analysis of the community into making actual arguments about the community. I think once he reflects back on the issues from authors like Wardle, Gee, and Swales he will be able to really connect the communication to their points that they made. Eventually by connecting these points Brandon should be able to find an overarching argument. I think it’s going to take a deeper analysis of the entire picture as a whole as appose to each individual point.
Concision was a topic that wasn’t necessarily brought up with in the blog. Brandon did concede that he hasn’t really gone that deep into the process of his discourse community but concision is an issue that needs to be talked about. I think that he will have a lot more freedom to talk about concision because individuals have a lot more room to argue their points whether its in an article or a comment. There doesn’t seem to be and restrictions in terms of words count or posts.
How can you incorporate the authors we have previously discussed?
What is your overall argument for the piece?
0119
ReplyDeleteReddit is a well-known online community that allows for its members, or “redditors”, to post content and also comment on them. The postings are either links or self-posts (texts written by the redditor) and they are organized into different groups called “subreddits”.All posts are part of the “upvote/downvote” system which allows members to vote for or against other members’ posts according to how relevant the post is. Comments within the posts can also be upvoted or downvoted. Individual votes can be changed freely by the member who voted. The newest posts with the highest amount of upvotes will appear on the main page of their subreddit. The main page, or front page, of Reddit displays high rated content selected from the main page of subreddits. The front page is constantly changing due to the high amount of activity by the members.
The community within Reddit I will be investigating is the subreddit /r/AskReddit, which is one of the most popular subreddits. In this subreddit, reddit members ask a question in the title of their post and in the post other members answer it and comment on the answers. These questions can be about absolutely anything as long as it meets certain rules. Some of these rules are: that the questions must be thought-provoking, there cannot be any personal information posted, and the questions’ purpose cannot be to gain publicity.
The framing lens I will use to investigate my community is Suler’s Psychology of Cyberspace. When I read this piece I was interested in the disinhibition effect, dissociative anonymity, and invisibility. The disinhibition effect can either be benign or toxic meaning that it brings out the positive or negative side of people. People in an online community might act more generous than they would in real life by complementing or helping another person on the web. They might also act in a rude and malicious manner, making threats and making people feel like crap. Dissociative anonymity is being able to keep your identity hidden because people will only really know only what you tell them about yourself. This anonymity relates to the disinhibition effect since people feel like they can be more open. What they say cannot be connected to their identity outside of the internet and they do not have to take responsibility for what they share. “Invisibility gives people the courage to go places and do things that they otherwise wouldn't.” Invisibility is similar to anonymity but different because invisibility is more physical. People might know a lot about who you are when you are on facebook but they cannot physically see you, meaning body language and expressions are not seen. This is a very important part of the disinhibition effect because it allows for a bigger range of discussion due to not being able to see an immediate sign of disapproval that would alter a discussion significantly if it were to be face-to-face.
Within /r/AskReddit there was a post that caught my full and undivided attention. This question absolutely met the rule that requires questions within this subreddit to be discussion-inspiring and thought provoking. The title was, “Throwaway time! What's your secret that could literally ruin your life if it came out?” Wow what a crazy question, would people really write about something like this? That’s what I first thought, but then I clicked on it and people actually poured out their deepest, darkest, most personal secrets and my mind was blown away. For example, one person wrote “I lit a tree on fire for kicks, and ended burning half a forest down and several homes went up in flames in the process. I wanted to say ‘i did that’ when I saw it on the news.” Someone commented on that saying “I appreciate your anonymous Internet honesty, but as a firefighter I gotta say fuck you.” Another person shared a story that was pretty long so I will just summarize it. He shared that when his cousin died when they were seventeen, there was a reception after the funeral at his cousin’s house. He went into his room, stole all the money that was there and other valuable things that would go unnoticed. No one in his family ever found out and he does not regret it and will not admit it. I shared these two responses to the main questions because they got myriad responses from other members.
ReplyDeleteThis is the disinhibition effect in full effect. They say and share all these things about themselves because it will not be directly linked to the rest of their lives. This is a place where benign disinhibition and anonymity are practiced to ask questions and create discussions that people can relate to and share their experiences openly. This anonymity is seen in the forest fire story because that person can be open and not go to jail because there is no way to know that person’s actual identity. Invisibility is also practiced. I noticed things that people commented on that they would not actually say to that person face to face because they would not have the courage.
1. Your topic is quite interesting and while reading your ethnography, I had to refrain from going to read that thread for myself. The evidence of the initial posts was great, but I would be interested to hear more about the replies to each post. How did people react to these revealed secrets? What were other reactions to these posts? Did people celebrate the funeral thief, criticize him, or gently encourage him to confess? This will help give a bit more for you to analyze and add to the length of the paper.
Delete2. I don't really have any criticisms for the way you organized the ethnography. You started with a general overview of what Reddit is, then moved into the subreddit, explained the viewing lens, and finally explained the specific post which you were going to analyze.
3. Here is my attempt to rephrase your last paragraph:
In any other situation, this information would not be freely shared, but due to the disinhibition effect, users openly reveal secrets which would otherwise get them in a lot of trouble or even arrested. Both the funeral thief and arsonist would be severely punish if their acts could be linked to their identities, but because of the anonymity of reddit, nothing can be done. Anonymity also allows other redditors to comment, criticize, and comfort the original poster without feeling as though they are being too invasive or potentially offensive. Because all parties contributing to the conversation know that they will never meet each other face to face, their invisibility allows them to say whatever is on their mind without having a direct confrontation. In addition, what information the user decides to share depends on what will give their comment the most dramatic effect; such as the one commenter revealing that he was a firefighter. This fact, whether the truth or a complete lie, gave him extra backing to criticize the OP.
4. -How did users implement the up/down vote system on controversial posts such as the two examples given?
-Did any debates on the morality of a particular post develop, or did people simply put in their criticisms and move on?
Tumblr has gained a lot of popularity in the recent years. I joined the online blogging community in my junior year of high school, and since then I have found that Tumblr is a multifaceted community, with subgroups and unspoken norms that separate the ‘authority figures’ from the ‘noobs’. Because Tumblr is so diverse, having blogs dedicated to everything from politics to television shows, there are many different rules that exist within the grander entity of Tumblr in smaller communities. And within each of these communities are a separate set of rules and authorities.
ReplyDeleteWhen I first joined Tumblr I quickly noticed the very specific lexis used in certain situations. In the fandom communities it is common for excitement to be conveyed using nonsensical ‘keysmashing’ or by responding in small simple questions. For example, when news about a very popular show is released comments on the posts may be ‘aksldjfwiejf’, ‘can’t’, or ‘WHqaT Iz t hIs I caQN’t eAVen’. It’s important to know that these responses are considerably more popular among those who are not considered as authority figures and only within certain facets of the much larger Tumblr community.
In more formal blogs, such as political blogs, the lexis is considerably more professional. Many of the political blogs that I follow participate in open debate. To gain validity in these debates proper grammar and intelligent speech is an absolute must if you wish to be taken seriously. There are, of course, exceptions. On many occasions these political debates begin deteriorating into profanity spewing matches, much like any political debate on MSNBC or FOX News.
The formations of authority figures within these two particular communities are just as different as the forms of lexis. Generally, one’s authority is decided by the amount of followers he or she has. I may have 200 followers and be considered to have more authority over a blogger with only 30 followers. However, blogs exist that have tens of thousands of followers and these bloggers are referred to as ‘Tumblr Famous’. Some of these ‘Tumblr Famous’ users include internet sensations such as John Green, Tyler Oakley, and even child actor Cole Sprouse. This process of gaining authority brings about issues within the communities though. Just because a seventeen year old blogger with twenty thousand followers does not mean they are more qualified to speak intelligently on a certain topic than someone with twenty followers, but because the second blogger has less followers and is less well known his or her opinion will carry little weight even if they are actually more qualified to speak on a certain topic.
Fandom blogs, blogs dedicated to a certain tv show, movie, or book series, develop authority figures based on talent. Those who are artistically talented are considerably more likely to have authority within the fandom. In the Sherlock fandom, one of the most popular artists goes under the URL GeotheBio, who states that she has around forty thousand followers. She is considered an authority figure because of her artistic talent seen through her Sherlock comic strips and her follower count.
I think that investigating Tumblr is a very good idea. However in this draft I think you should format it differently. You didn't really state your method. I didn't really see where you were going with this. You talked about authority which was a really good point but I think you should go more into depth and look at Tumblr in more than one lens. To reconstruct it I think that you should begin with headers. For example label the first line introduction then introduce Tumblr then do the same for the method. Also I think that you should conclude a conclusion as well just the audience can see your point. In order to get a better feel of your conclusion I would sum it up as " Authority run thoughout Tumblr but it takes talent in order to determine someone's status on Twitter.Fandom blogs, blogs dedicated to a certain tv show, movie, or book series, develop authority figures based on talent. People use their artistic ways to express themselves over blogs and this helps establish their authority. " This is just a way to start out the conclusion and then you could go from there. Basically I would like to know your method and how exactly did you go about researching Tumblr.
Delete1.Right off the bat I noticed you needed more background on what Tumblr is so that someone who has no idea what it is could get a thorough understanding. You also need more examples of specific things, like when you mentioned “proper grammar and intelligent speech”. Quote an example of that from the site. There are some good parts of analysis but you certainly have to go more in depth. The main thing that I think you need to work on is your context. You mentioned authority and lexis but you need to incorporate some of the articles we read to further support your claims. Elizabeth Wardle’s reading goes into lexis and authority. Use the lenses to expand on your analysis.
Delete2.This piece is not very well organized. The first paragraph or beginning should give a very detailed explanation on what your community is. You can label it Background if you want. After that you need to explain you lens comprehensively with support from the readings we have done. This can be the Context. The next few paragraphs should state your claim, and provide evidence and specific examples. This is Evidence. Then you will give an in depth analysis of you evidence through your lens. You can label this one Analysis.
3.My re-draft of paragraph three:
Lexis is noticeably more professional in more formal blogs, such as political blogs with open debates. Proper grammar and intelligent speech are crucial aspects of participating in these debates, in order to gain validity and serious acknowledgement. (Provide an example of intelligent speech). In some instances the debates might take a full one-eighty and turn into not so formal debates. Debates, like the ones on MSNBC or FOX News, contain a heavy load of profanity. (Provide a quote to support this).
4.-What is your claim and the gap you are trying to fill?
-What readings will you use to support your analysis?
0119
ReplyDeleteLeague of Legends (LoL) is an online video game that contains a multitude of discourses within its own general discourse. In this game, players strategize and brawl in a 5 verse 5 or 3 verse 3 battle to try to get to the enemy teams base and destroy their nexus, which ultimately wins the game. The discourse language of League of Legends is the discourse that is recognized by all players. We all know that certain phrases like adc, mid, jung, support, and top are to show which of the 3 lanes of the map the player would like to play in or if the player would like to fight in the jungle instead of a lane. Typically the adc (attack damage carry) and the support would go bottom, the mid would go middle, the top would go to the top, and the jungle would run around in the jungle and help all lanes. A feeder, probably the most commonly seen term, is used to describe how a character “fed” or gave too many kills to the enemy player without getting kills for themselves. These kills allow the enemy to gain gold and buy items from the in-game store that can cause your team to lose. However, since the game is constantly evolving, so is its discourse and play style. New meta, a common phrase of LoL, is used to describe a new way of playing and can be good or bad. This has been a very common phrase because tournaments for the game have been going left and right and the players determine to make a new meta strategy that will leavers viewers in awe.
Most players of the game speak English on the North American server, but occasionally a team is not able to do well because one player speaks Spanish instead. The primary language of League of Legends North America is English, but on the Asian servers this is not the case. Though each server has it’s own dialects, LoL is one of the only places that can enable communication even through diversity of language because of it’s text based discourse. Instead of group chats, there is a conversation box and all player know what mid, bot, adc, jungle, and support are no matter of dialect because it is essential to the game.
In LoL, there are 2 different types of matches you can go into: ranked and classic. Classic is a mode for people who either want to have fun or try some sort of new meta strategy with the occasional hard head, while Ranked is for players who are all about winning and occasionally throw people under the bus as much as they can to try to divert attention from their own flaws. These two modes have completely different discourses. In classic, people are friendly; we all want each other to get better but we know that instead of scolding its often better to just give advice and help the player. There tends to always be one person on the team who tries to be as brutal as they can, often saying phrases like “worst jax na”, a reference to the champion (Jax) that the person is playing and the na (North American) server that we play on.
0119 part 2
ReplyDeleteThe reason that I establish the change of discourse between classic and ranked is that in ranked there aren’t very many friendly people. Though both ranked and classic share the exigence to win, the fun that comes from simply playing in classic is lost if the game results in a defeat. The discourse of this is fairly set in stone unless you are a professional gamer; you have to play safe and harass the enemy as much as you can without dying. Feeders are often ridiculed for their behavior and are not given advice on how to play better but rather shunned for the rest of the game. There are essential discourse phrases that make or break a players game such a mia, b, ward, re, care, and gank. Mia, missing in action, is the typical League speak for when an enemy moves out of their lane and is no where to be found. Typing mia makes your team aware that your opponent can pop out at them at any time. It’s counterpart, re, means return or returned to lane. This makes your team aware that they can move out now without a fear of being ganked. A gank occur when an enemy either moves out of their lane or comes out of the jungle to attack one of the lanes and try to kill all or some enemies in it. However, if you are going for a gank on an enemy player, the person you are tying to help must type in ward to acknowledge that there is a ward in the bush you are standing in that allows the enemy team to see your location. Without this warning, you can be ganked and killed without a clue of what is going on. Often times if an opponent player is seen moving from their lane, the player in the lane will type care top, bottom, or middle to acknowledge the direction the opponent moved to.
LoL focuses on teamwork through discourse. Without the discourse the team would fall, and without a team working together the discourse would have no meaning. The play style of the game is what gives the discourse meaning, just like it would within any other discourse community. The language of League speak is constantly evolving with every new meta idea and crazy glitches within the game. As the game and the players continue to find new combinations of items bought and plays that can be with the items, the game will continue to grow it’s discourse and welcome new ideas that may erupt.
I find it interesting how quick everything can change from friendly to not so much depending on what server you are on. Questions that quickly came to my mind when reading were:
DeleteHow do you gain authority in this community? And
How are tokens reinforced?
Are there specific medals or monetary values that are placed on you as you progress and what is your motivation to continue to play the game. I find this community very helpful and interesting and I think it would help you to review Gee's definition of primary and secondary discourses (discourse that offers rewards like prestige, wealth, etc and discourses that do not).
Your community is a very good one to investigate I must say, because off the top of my head I cannot think about many games where there is a sort of friendly/novice type of gamplay and a more expert style. The only thing I can think of is how some games have Beginner, Medium, and Hard levels.
I would advise you to separate your DDCE into sections and start off with a header that says "introduction" when you start to discuss your community. I also think you should incorporate some evidence from your own experience in playing the game. Even though your analysis of gameplay is pretty thorough many people have not played the game so you can walk them through it a little bit more with your evidence. Your DDCE will look similar to this with split sections:
Introduction
League of Legends (LoL) is an online video game that contains a multitude of discourses within its own general discourse. In this game, players strategize and brawl in a 5 verse 5 or 3 verse 3 battle to try to get to the enemy teams base and destroy their nexus, which ultimately wins the game. The discourse language of League of Legends is the discourse that is recognized by all players....
Evidence
.....
Methods
.......
Results
....
I cant put any of the other material of your draft into a category because I'm not sure if this whole draft is your introduction or if it is supposed to be split into sections. I think I notice a bit of a gap when you start discussing two different types of discourse communities within the one LoL discourse community when you start discussing the two modes. I would like to see you analyze this a little more. What significance do these to sub-discourse communities serve? I think you can do a lot analyzing on why or what is so intriguing about the differences between two different communities with their own characteristics that our housed under one central community.
I hope you are able to use my questions to organize your DDCE into split sections and give us more insight to your community. There are a number of aspects you can focus on in your community whether it be the institution of two different communities within your discourse community, the focus of teamwork within your discourse community, the language and abbrevations used that are specific and distinct to your community, or something else. I would look forward to seeing a finished version of your ethnography.
If you are a woman then you have probably heard of the book 50 Shades of Gray and even if you are a man, you most likely have too. Have you ever wondered where this series of book originated? While I was deciding which discourse community to research about I came across an article about 50 Shades of Gray and how the story came about. The book originally was titled Master of the Universe and was published on a site named Fanfiction. The plot of the story was centered around Twilight’s two main characters, Edward Cullen and Bella Swan. I immediately began to research the site Fanfiction. The stories that are written on this sight are all fan made and are typically centered around a certain TV show, book, movie, and so on. These fans create different stories based on their perception of what they would like to happen on the show/book/movie in the future. This site also allow for reviews, which provides feedback for the authors and gives the readers a chance to voice their opinions. Another feature on this site is the communities’ tab. This tab is for authors/readers to discuss current TV shows, movies, books, and so on.
ReplyDeleteIn the text, “Identity, Authority, and Learning to Write in New Workplaces,” Elizabeth Wardle states and argues that identity and authority directly affect and discourse community, or in her case “activity systems.” According to Wardle, everyone must learn to write for his or her new community in order to earn an identity and to gain authority. A simpler understanding of a discourse community would be to think of a discourse community as having a common set of public goals. Everyone in this community share one common goal: to write a story the fits their desire about a certain show, movie, book, and so on. Wardle states that to have identity within a community you must be able to adapt to the new communities needs. This means that you may not write a story about Edward and Bella under the Gossip Girl tab. The Gossip Girl tab is strictly for stories about the tv show and book series. Edward and Bella would belong under the Twilight movie or book tab. To have Authority within a community the stories that you write would receive a considerable amount of attention. The story The Master of the Universe was a story that gained a lot of authority within in the community that it was involved in. The reviews and number of chapters would be the determinate in how much authority one has in their community.