Be
sure to post the four digit course section at the top of your blog
posting. There is no need to include the ENC 1101 part; Just put the
four digits of the course section. After you post the course number, you
are welcome to give your posting a title if you so choose.
Harold Reingold makes the following point in his opening chapter of Why You Need Digital Know-How—Why We All Need It:
One tool that I do feel comfortable generalizing about is the importance
of questioning my own communication practices—recognizing which
media and mediated social activities I tend to avoid, which ones attract or
distract me, and which lead and mislead me, and reflecting on why I react
in these ways. (8)
I want you to mine your Net habits and write a detailed self analysis of your own attention regarding use of social media and interacting within and on the fringes of online communities. What activities capture your attention the most, and to what end is your attention being utilized? How are you deploying your attention? When your laptop is open and you are at a lecture, how are you focusing your attention (or) how are you not? What can you do to be more mindful of your attention in online spaces?
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The second portion of this blog calls you to connect what you have learned to Grant-Davie and Haas and Flower as a mode of rhetorical analysis for Reinhold's introduction. You might use a Grant-Davie's constituents of rhetoric to examine and analyze a portion of Reingold's introduction. You might also look at the text as a rhetorical reader and examine the goals that Reingold sets up as well as the exigence he perceives.
Your original blog posting is due no later than Sunday, Sept. 30 by 11:59pm (Eastern Standard Time).
Your response to a peer's posting is due no later than Tuesday, October 2 by 11:59 pm (Eastern Standard Time).
0M08
ReplyDeleteUsually when I'm using any form of social media, the things that capture my attention are funny memes or statuses that involve meaningful quotes related to life. Sometimes I see music videos that are posted which also capture my attention. For instance, I was introduced to the music video "Gangnam style" a couple months back through a Facebook post from a family member. This video captured the attention of the whole world to a point where it was even all over the news. I guess you can say that I need to be entertained in some way for it to grab my attention. I try not to focus on the pointless things that are sometimes being posted. Sometimes I see memes about sports that I don't really care about so I tend to ignore those. I hide people from my timeline if all they do is post what they're doing every second of the day or are letting off their anger, happiness, or sadness in a status. On Facebook, I've subscribed to people, movies, books, television shows, and music that I like. This gives me an update on these about what's going on for each of these categories. For example, I follow the show "Pretty Little Liars" on Facebook and I usually see postings about upcoming episodes or information revealing stuff about the show since it's a mystery/drama. Recently, I've been having to submit most of my work online for my classes and I'll admit that it is a huge distraction because I am always tempted to either go on Facebook, youtube, or to even just surf the web randomly. In fact, while currently writing this blog, I went online to take a small break and ended up wasting two precious hours in which I could have probably finished this assignment. To refrain from getting distracted I'm beginning to entertain myself by playing music from my iPod which actually helps me to focus on my work. I think this is because I usually want to finish whatever I have to do before my playlist is over as weird as it sounds, but in the end it proves to be efficient. I don't usually take my laptop to lectures because I know that I will not be able to focus on the lecture one bit. If I am asked to bring my laptop and use it for a class, I usually don't go on any website other than what the professor is telling me to go on. I put the thought in my head that if I get caught, I would be in a lot of trouble so this helps me to stay away from the temptation of straying away from what I should be focusing on. I really just need to be aware of what my priorities each time I am using my laptop and know what my task is. This is what will help me become more mindful of my attention in online spaces.
0M08
ReplyDelete_______________________________________________________________________
For this second portion I am going to use Grant-Davie's constituents of rhetoric to examine a piece of Reingold's introduction. Starting with the exigence, I believe that the need for this introduction is to make people aware of how they use the Internet and ways that they can use it to where it won't harm them since it's not just something we can escape. We have to deal with all the new technology and learn to adapt to it in ways that are beneficial to us. The discourse or message is delivered by the rhetor (Grant-Davie) through this introduction addressing solutions to adjusting to this new world of technology. He states in his discourse that if we become skilled in 5 literacies (attention, participation, collaboration, the critical consumption of information and network smarts) then we are will be benefitting ourselves as our future revolves around the media. We will learn what to do to avoid distraction or anything that will lead us astray from what we should actually be doing. Reingold states a specific audience in this introduction saying that it caters to adults are have skills in using online tools and networks but have trouble focusing, young people who just go online for fun, parents who are a little hesitant about the new generation of technology and who are beginning to adapt, older people who lived without this technology that are also afraid of this new trend, business people who want their employees to become capable of using the net within the enterprise, and finally educators who want to inform their students about how they use the internet and to make comparisons of today's literacies with that of the past. A possible constraint on this introduction is that there isn't really any evidence yet about what the media does to our minds and the social lives we have.
I think that it is interesting that that video caught your attention and not only you but everyone else around the world. I have never heard of it. I do agree with you that if you are entertained then it is really easy to keep your attention focused on something that you come across over the internet. Also I like how you talked about how you play music when you do your work in order to help you finish the task that you are doing because you want to finish before your playlist ends. I can tell you have a strong understanding of Grant Davies constituents of rhetoric. You were able to establish the rhetor and display that the discourse is make people aware of how they use the internet and what ways it can harm people.
Delete0M08
ReplyDeleteWhen it comes to my usage of social media the things that tend to capture my mind the most are articles about celebrities, new release of music and artists, memes, and quotes that I can relate to. It’s always nice when I’m surfing the internet to come across celebrity news because it’s entertaining to see how social media can take something that is so small and make it so big over the internet. When the release of new music is advertised I am always excited to press play and see what the song is about and the type of instrumental being used. Memes are always good to come across. They are kind of like you have to be there to know what it’s talking about. I see them almost as an inside joke. I like coming across different quotes on the internet. Twitter is a good place to find a lot of quotes and it’s fun to read quotes that celebrities and singers tweet about. Twitter is where a lot of news is released also. Singers usually announce the date when a new record will drop and that is always helpful. On Twitter majority of my followers are celebrities and singers because I don’t have a lot of time to watch TV and catch the latest news. So Twitter is a fast way to find out information quickly because it gets straight to the point. Facebook is where a lot memes are and every now and then my friends on Facebook will post an interesting quote that catches my attention. I spend a lot of time on YouTube and usually when I’m watching a video there is always advertisements for other music videos that will pop up at the bottom of the screen and this always captures attention because it makes me want to click on the ad and see what the video is about. I usually hate commercials but a lot of time the thirty second commercials that are displayed online are really captivating. Usually they open with something questioning so that way you don’t click out of the commercial. It keeps you locked in until the end. When I have my laptop open and I’m in a lecture I keep all of my social media websites closed because I know I will be tempted to lose my train of thought and focus on what’s happening somewhere else. So I keep all my social media websites closed that way I can focus on the lecture.
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I am going to use Grant Davies constituents of rhetoric to examine and analyze Reingold's introduction. Exigence is the need for something and I believe that Reingold’s exigence for this piece is to make people aware that the internet can be misleading and it is important to know when to block out certain information and learn to evaluate and take in important information. Since technology is all around us it is impossible to avoid therefore its okay to use the internet but it’s important to protect yourself of the harmful things out there. For example, Reingold’s talks about how Twitter is an example of a social medium that can be a waste of time if the reader doesn’t have good discipline when it comes to their attention. Reingold stresses how it is important to know who to follow on Twitter due to the type of messages that people share over Twitter to propagate to their own networks. The constraint in this article is Reingold’s desire to be convincing not demanding that the social media is affecting our minds, relationships, and society. The discourse that is being displayed is to learn control attention online in order to be able to filter out and concentrate only on the tiny relevant portion of the small moments of information. The audience that Reingold is trying to reach out to in this message is worried parents, anxious students, concerned teachers, managers, employers, and policy makers.
0119
ReplyDeletePart 1:
After reading Reingold's introduction, I have realized that I am somewhat of a "technoskeptic" and instead of being an active participant in online media I "passively consume". A lot of times I resent the internet. I really don't go online unless I have to.
Recently going online has been associated with more work. For all of my classes I have to use one or more websites to complete my homework. When I spend several hours per week on the MyMathLab and Mastering Chemistry websites working, the last thing I want to do is spend more time sitting at the computer.
Sometimes, I'll use social media for enjoyment. I mainly like looking at pictures on Facebook of close friends and family. While I enjoy looking at these photos, I do not enjoy commenting on them or "liking" them. This seems pointless to me. Who really cares what I think? I can make a bigger impact by doing things in real life to better myself and society.
Other than for limited communication, I use the internet to look up things that I'm curious about or that come up in conversation. This comes up a lot when I'm talking to my boyfriend. We will disagree about something, and then I'll have to Google it on my phone right away to see who is correct. These quick searches, along with checking email and doing homework make up probably ninety percent of my internet usage.
When it comes to attention, it is very important to me to not be distracted in class or in other social situations. I want to use my attention to focus on the real world. I don't bring my laptop to school because it's heavy and I don't want to be like the many distracted students on Facebook and other websites. Reingold talks about the students in his class who are looking at their laptops instead of him. This seems to me like a serious problem. Even as some students are paying attention or looking at a professor's PowerPoint on their screen, others are not. In my biology class one day, the guy to my right was looking at slutty girls on tumblr and then doing his math homework, the girl in front of me was lurking people on Facebook, and the girl to my left was writing a report for another class. It makes me very upset that these students would come to lecture just to be rude and do something else. Therefore, I try to keep myself away from the internet and social media to not become addicted.
I do not want to be like people who spend most of their time on social networking sites. I think to some extent they encourage ignorance which is my worst enemy. This being said, after reading Reingold's introduction I believe that I could benefit from developing my online literacy. I thought this piece was interesting because I could use Reingold's information to learn how to change people's attitudes. I already know how powerful social media is and I might use it in the future to organize people for a good cause.
0119
ReplyDeletePart 2:
Reingold is trying to help people develop their online literacies so they can improve society. He sees an exigency for this purpose because many people are using the internet in ill-advised ways. He believes bad uses of the internet will lead to "torrents of misinformation, disinformation, advertising, spam, porn, noise, and trivia." Instead he wants to motivate people to learn how to use attention, participation, collaboration, critical consumption of info, and network smarts to work with others to solve societal problems.
He explicitly states that his audience is "worried parents, anxious and enthused students, concerned teachers, curious managers, ambitious employees, thoughtful entrepreneurs, reflective online enthusiasts, puzzled policymakers, and technoskeptics who are just trying to cope." He wants all of these people to know that they have something to gain from "protecting" themselves from or taking advantage of today's media.
Reingold establishes his ethos by relating to the audience through his own experiences. He talks about how his daughter and his wife both have a delay in drawing themselves away from their phones or computers to interact in person. He admits to having the same problem. He also writes about his extensive use of computers, the internet, and all new technologies. It is also important that he states that he wants to "be wary of trying to sell to others the generalizations about life online that [he] found to be true through [his] own exploration." All of these things him a more reliable rhetor for this specific argument. He draws from his experiences and facts to make people aware of the impact they can have through online communication.
There are several constraints Reingold deals with. It is significant how he briefly mentions negative effects the internet can have. He mentions these as a concession, but does not expand on them because he wants to keep his reader focused on the good things since that is what his book is about. He doesn't want his audience to get discouraged. Another constraint is the audience's attention span. Reingold realizes that attention spans are shrinking so he keeps the reader engaged by frequently bringing up how he can instruct them on how to "master the use of [their] attention." This is effective to some extent, but since this is the introduction there is no real instruction yet. Consequently, the reader could be lost in the more technical parts at the end of the introduction.
0119
ReplyDeleteWhen I am using social media its usually to do everything from seeing memes, to YouTube videos to celebrity posts. To start I usually find all of this information on Facebook, twitter, YouTube its self and an app called “Funny pics.” Through Facebook and Twitter there are usually links or photos posted that I find amusing like “lol cats” or other pictures or sayings that are so dumb that they are funny. Now although there are a lot of stupid funny pictures posted there are also some cool pictures/videos and some inspiring quotes and photos. For example through Facebook there are a lot of links to YouTube to see cool videos. I know somebody posted earlier about “Gangnam Style” in the post section but I just wanted to reiterate that when I found the video on YouTube I just thought it was awesome, funny and inspiring. It made me want to go out and create something cool. So most of the links online can be stupid but some of them are for the better of society, for fun. When I’m at a lecture with my laptop I usually have the like the professor wants is to have open along with a Facebook and Twitter tabs just to stay up to date I won’t use the Facebook or Twitter tab to get distracted it’s just there for incase I have an important notification or if I see something relevant to class that I can bring up. I will also have Microsoft word open to take notes. I will mainly focus on the lecture. To be more mindful of my attention in online spaces I could possibly limit or not let the internet get more into my life than it already is.
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For this second part I have to use Grant Davies constituents of rhetoric to examine and analyze Reingold's introduction. The exigence Reingold uses in this section is to make people aware that the internet can be misleading and to know when to block out certain information. Because of his audience he shapes his whole piece to form into information that the people of today understand, like how twitter users can relate. When he talks about Twitter he says that’s its an example of a social medium that can be a huge waste of time if the reader doesn’t have good discipline and comprehension of what is being put into their timeline. He stresses that we will learn what to do to avoid distraction or anything that will lead us astray from what we should actually be doing. So he is saying that we need to try to stayed focused which is audience is not that great at focusing. As a writer and user himself he knows that he must constraint the use of social media and he does a great job writing to let users of social media know that they should find a way to constrain themselves when using social media
Everything you said in the first part of your response made sence. I always see a bunch of funny/interesting stuff when on facebook or youtube. It's interesting that you don't get distrated from Facebook or twitter during a lecture cause it takes a lot to not get sucked into it so I give you props for that. For the second part of your posting, I thought you did a good job of analyzing Reingold's introduction, it was brief and straight to the point yet you still were able to explain it really well.
DeleteBrittan Petty
ReplyDeleteOM08
PT 1
Normally when I use any type of social media, it is often out of boredom. When I am on Facebook, the things that capture my attention are funny statuses, interesting pictures, and certain music videos. Statuses about sports, picture quotes, and “like” this page are typically things I tend to overlook. Also on Facebook, I tend to like pages of TV shows, Artists, Books, Movies, and people that I enjoy to keep up with. For example, I like the page “Gossip Girl.” In my news feeds, recaps from previous episodes are posted, statuses about the next episode are posted, and ect. Instagram is another form of social media that I tend to use quite a bit. I go on Instagram whenever I want to catch up with what my friends are doing. Pictures of food, places, and events tend to capture my interest, whereas pictures of quotes and bathroom mirror pictures do not. Twitter is another form of social media I use. I do not really have a certain way of using twitter. I typically use it when I am in awkward situations or very bored in class. On any normal day, I would never use twitter. When I open my laptop to do homework, I tend to steer off course. I go on Facebook, surf the web, or watch music videos. Having a deadline really motivates me to get back on track and so does listening to music. Christmas music is what I will listen too because it is very relaxing and mellow. During lecture, I never go on the internet. I turn the wifi off so that I will not have any distractions. I just need to become more aware of what I am doing each time I log onto my computer to complete school work. Most of it forms as a habit and if I can break that habit, then I will be golden. This will definitely help me become more mindful about online spaces.
Brittan Petty
ReplyDeletePT 2
I am going to use Grant-Davies constituents of rhetoric to examine and analyze Reingold's introduction. Exigence is what calls the author, or rhetor, to write in the first place. It is a sense of urgency, a need that must be met. In Reingold's Introduction, the need for it is to help people become more aware of how internet spaces are sometimes very misleading. He wants to show people where and when certain information should be blocked out and taken in. Reingold also wants people to know that the internet is not going anywhere and we need to learn how to handle the new flows of technology, media, and attention in a healthy, flexible,grounded manner. (Page 5) The audience that Reingold wishes to reach is stated very clearly in the section “Who Needs to Read This Book, and Why?” People who need to read this book are: adults who face challenges of time and attention management, fearful parents of young people who go online for the first time, young people immersed in digital spaces, old people who where here before digital media, business people who want their employees net smart, and educators who wish to help students. A constraint that Reingold states is that there is not very much information available to what happens to our minds from the social media mishaps. The discourse that is being displayed is that we need to try to control our attention and habits when we go online. We need to pay attention to the “5 Literacies:” attention, participation, collaboration,the critical consumption of information, and network smarts. (Page 5) When enough people learn these skills and become proficient, a healthy new economy, policies, and cultures can emerge.
Catherine Rucker
ReplyDeleteENC 0M08
Usually when I’m on the internet, I head directly towards YouTube. I love watching videos, and if I’m not watching anything, I use the site for music purposes. I like listening to music while getting my work done, and with YouTube, you can access virtually any song you wish to hear. It’s easier than buying it off of ITunes and isn’t illegal (like pirating songs off of various websites). I don’t have a Facebook account, and I’ve never wanted one, so looking at posts and being distracted by it isn’t a problem. However, I do own a Twitter account, but I hardly ever use it. I don’t think to post anything because I feel that none of the people that follow me really care about what I’m doing, and truthfully I don’t really care for most of the things that they’re doing or saying either. When I do post something, it’s mostly because I feel like I’m obligated to. I told a friend once how I felt about posting on Twitter, and she was incredulous. She told me that she couldn’t believe that with however many people that followed me, I’ve never said or done anything important to them. So now I feel that maybe posting one or two things every few weeks wouldn’t hurt, but I still doubt that people really care about where I’m going, or what I’m doing. With sites like YouTube, I find it’s fairly easy to be mindful of where I place my attention. If I happen to see a video listed that’s sketchy or questionable, I avoid it; plain and simple. It’s actually kind of ridiculous how out of touch I am with social media. Sometimes I’ll find out something, and it’ll be week or month old news. I just can’t bring myself to care that much because there are so many other things to do. I never bring my laptop to class unless it’s required for that particular day. It’s too heavy, and even though typing is more convenient than writing everything down, I find that in classroom settings where the lesson is being lectured, I like to write down my notes. It just seems as though what the professors are saying sticks in my head more, and I’m not tempted to go on different websites and not pay attention to what is said.
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Haas and Flower write about experienced readers’ verses average students in a college setting. They say that the experienced readers were able to apply the concept of rhetorical strategies more efficiently than others while the students were able to only comprehend the text using the context and feature strategies. Content Strategies are concerned with what the text is about; functional feature strategies are concerned with the function of the piece; “what is it supposed to do?” It had been observed that the students were well acquainted with the latter because they had been taught to use them all throughout their high school experience. However, when it came to analyzing the rhetorical side of the text, such as the purpose, context, and the effect it had on the audience, it was shown that they were less familiar with it. The experienced readers were able to think of the text in the rhetorical sense as soon as they began reading it. In regards to the introduction piece by Reingold, I believe that the same results could be apparent if a regular student and an experienced reader were allowed to read the text. However, I do believe that Reingold’s introduction was pretty straightforward in its context. He clarified his exigence for writing the book, which was to present a way to use social media intelligently, and even presented the various audiences that could be affected by his research. I don’t believe that the regular students would struggle as much with so much information about the text presented to them in the introduction, but it’s hard to say.
Blake Anderson 0119
ReplyDeleteOnline digital communication and media has become more influential in the past years that any other kind of communication in my opinion. Everyone has their own niche online whether it is social media such as Facebook and Twitter, more intellectual sites that post articles, journals and blogs, or the online gaming community. Many overlook the amount of time and attention that they put forth into these types of online communities because of their realization, or lack of it, of the potential and influential aspects that they attribute. One can only understand so much by hearing and reading the words of what online spaces can do; to truly comprehend its prominence, and individual must experience it for themselves.
Personally, I feel quite intertwined and enveloped by online networks. From applications as small as Instagram to the gaming community of massive multiplayer online role playing games, MMORPGS for short, I experience different aspects of this influence every day.
I wouldn’t consider myself to be just another typical person who bypasses the significance of these communities because of the relevance of it to my life. In some situations I do cause it to be irrelevant and extraneous; Facebook and Twitter are perfect examples. There is not much for me to say about Twitter simply because I do not have one, but this does have a somewhat large meaning; common online social Medias don’t acquire my attention. My Facebook profile, on the other hand, is only permanently logged into my web browser because of the convenience and the escape that it offers me from boredom.
Created by my friends roughly two years ago, my Facebook profile was neglected because of its owner’s skeptical nature about its content. I felt as if the only think people use Facebook for is to gain attention from open-ended misleading posts or to bitch and moan about how “this slut” wore the same dress to the Homecoming dance as them. I must admit my assumptions were incorrect to some standard but still do this day I have no an avid Facebook poster; I keep my personal life to myself and use the social media site for entertainment or communication purposes.
One massive community that many do not realize is as vast as it is or even out there is the online gaming community. I consider myself a member of this community and these are the people who involve themselves with this public domain. There mere details of which games I play are irrelevant but there is a multitude of them and this is where my attention is pulled when I have free time or other opportunities.
Many of my friends play these games along with me and we can communicate through in-game interfaces or over audio software such as Skype or Mumble. This not only entertains me with fake realities but it grants a social aspect that is hard to maintain in college because of the physical distance away from my friends who have graduated and stayed at home or moved to a different university. Keeping in touch with them is much simpler with programs such as Mumble and Skype even if we aren’t playing any video games and we are just online conversing, which is usually the case.
Journal and article blogs have the same relevance to my life as Twitter does. These “intellectual sites” could probably offer me some useful knowledge and it will probably do we good to rummage through them every now and then but unfortunately I haven’t found any that pertain to my interest; not that I have searched much. However, if I do ever stumble upon an online magazine or something of the sort I may look into it for some time and who knows, it may become a new hobby of mine.
ReplyDeleteTechnological communication and digital media has become so popular these days and it most certainly has had an impact on my life. These impacts range from the measly fifteen minutes spent on Facebook to the entire days spent on my laptop playing games and reading up on the newest technologies and updates. I have realized how influential online communities and networks can be and this is partially a factor in what made me choose my major, Information Technology. I am becoming ever more aware of these digital spaces every moment I am using them and my dream is to one day to create and manage one of my own. There are so many options and routes I could take to reach this goal but I am sure with the way technology is developing today, it won’t be a problem finding my niche in online communities.
Reinhold’s book on online digital communication and spaces use has very clear evidence of the aspects of a rhetorical presentation, as presented by Grant-Davie.
Reinhold, the writer of this book, uses his opportunities of the World Wide Web to influence the viewpoints and awareness of his audience in the importance of his concerns. He does not create the exigencies that worry him he only comments and elaborates on the effects of the already existing exigency.
Reinhold is trying to make the users of the online world aware of the potential consequences of the excess and unrestricted use of it and what we have become as a result. He finds exigencies in his exert because he is becoming ever more aware of the costs and outcomes of extensive improper internet use. Reinhold is trying to warn and deter his readers away from improper use of online spaces and he is trying to educate them on the proper ways to go about your business online.
Reinhold specifically states that his audience is "worried parents, anxious and enthused students, concerned teachers, curious managers, ambitious employees, thoughtful entrepreneurs, reflective online enthusiasts, puzzled policymakers, and techno skeptics who are just trying to cope.” Obviously one can defer from this quote that the rhetor is trying to reach a multitude of different audiences and because of the domain of where his article is posted he is aware that anyone could access his exert no matter their situation.
In further analysis I realized that Reinhold is trying to relate to his audience by putting himself in their situation. He explains how his family is in a situation that he is concerned about. His daughter and wife both have a hard time putting their phone down and initiating a person to person interaction instead of a digital one.
The constraints that Reinhold has to deal with through his writing are somewhat ironic. He warns his audience of the consequences of improper internet use but where is his article posted; the internet. I feel that he carefully choses the information that he uses to still relate to his topic and not contradict it. Other than this, Reinhold gets his point across in a very direct manner and disregards many other potential constraints such as the opinions or existing situations of his audience.
0037
ReplyDeleteWhen I get online, my first instinct it to go right to the social networking sites; these sites capture most of my attention for the duration of my time on the internet. I read the statues and the stories, I see the pictures, watch the videos, and comment about things here and there. I cannot deny the fact that I am completely addicted to the internet. I follow the lives of people I’m friends with on Facebook, and famous people that don’t know I exist on Twitter. I learn a great deal of news from these social media sites; I also use them in a way to broadcast news about other pertinent bits of information. I’m online for a multitude of reasons, but the biggest of those reasons are for communication and entertainment.
When I am on the internet, it is easy for me to stay on task. However, as new bits of information come up on my newsfeed or timeline, my thought process changes; with that, so does my attention for certain things. Most days I will start off with looking through Twitter. If someone tweets something interesting, I will search further for more information about the subject of their tweet. For instance, if a band I enjoy listening to tweets about an organization I have never heard of, I will use the internet to find out more about that organization. In that way, my attention span jumps; however, I am always conscious of how I got to the web-page in the first place. Although, if I am truly interested in a subject (social or educational,) I can research it and stay attentive for hours; I would be lying if I said that I haven’t looked up outtakes and interviews of one of my favorite TV shows for an entire day. To put it simply, if I enjoy what I am seeing on the internet, I can stay attentive for hours.
In contrast, if I am on the internet for something I am not particularly interested in, I cannot seem to hold my focus for longer than an hour. My mind will begin to wander and I will find myself on a social networking site instead of a site about the thing I am supposed to be researching. That is a HUGE reason why it is hard for me to take my laptops to class. If I enjoy the class, no problem; if I am being lectured to about the molecular structure of rocks, there is no doubt that I’d be on my laptop looking up other information or making snarky comments about the lecture on twitter. In order to keep myself focused on a particularly unpleasant task, I give myself an ultimatum. If there is something I’d rather be doing (such as watching a TV show or listening to music), then I make a deal with myself to finish the horrible, menial task so that I can do whatever I want afterwards. This tactic normally works, especially when I have to study or write an assignment. Even now, for this assignment, I made a deal with myself that if I finish this, then I can listen to Go Radio’s new album. The fact that I am typing this assignment up is proof that this method of mine works.
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ReplyDelete-continued-
Grant-Davie’s constituents of rhetoric can easily be applied to Reingold’s introduction to better understand the message he is trying to convey. Reingold discusses the need for individuals to comprehend the power that technology can provide; he even states that, “When enough people become proficient at these skills [attention, participation, collaboration, the critical consumption of information, and network smarts] then healthy new economies, politics, societies, and cultures can emerge.” (5) This would be the exigence of his message. The more that people understand the media and the information constantly surrounding us, the more that society as a whole can use it for our benefit instead of our inadvertent confusion.
A constraint that is made clear in Reingold’s introduction is that each individual has to discover for themselves the beauty (or not so much) of the internet and technology. Just as each person is unique, so is the way they view technology. Reingold states, “There is no single recipe for a mindful life in the digital mediasphere; reflection is required.” (8) This can both be a positive and negative constraint because each person can utilize the information in a different way; some may choose to broaden a perspective and research new ideas. Others however, may just use it in a way that will allow them to forget “real” problems and stay ignorant despite the amount of knowledge at their fingertips.
To apply Reingold’s introduction to Haas and Flower’s article, readers will have to delve a bit further into the meaning of the passage. To be able to comprehend and apply Reingold’s sentiments to their lives, readers will have to be able to see that the information stated is more than what meets the eye. Instead of reading the introduction in a matter-of-fact, “knowledge tell, knowledge read” manner, they will have to analyze the passage and glean what Reingold is saying. This too, varies from person to person, just as the constraint did. However, I am sure that audiences exposed to this much technology will be able to figure out the meaning of Reingold’s message soon enough.
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ReplyDeleteWhenever I open my laptop to work or to just goof around the very first website I go to is Pandora. Pandora is the greatest website to come about since slice beard. A little background that will help with my explanation is for you to realize that I enjoy listening to any genre of music, except country. I have personally gone through a stage for every single possible genre. I had the Blink-182, Sum 41, Bowling for Soup phase 7th through 9th grade. The Disturbed, Breaking Benjamin, Green Day phase took its course during 8th through 10th grade which overlapped with the Asking Alexandria, Bring Me the Horizon phase. The Mac Miller, Meek Mill, Drake chapter has always been apart of my life but in 11th grade it really defined where my heart lied with music. This is why I find Pandora to be so great. It has the ability to change my mood in moments and generate numerous memories from my past. The second website that I pull up, which is majority of people’s first, is Facebook. Everyone always has friends that are doing something that is more fun then what you are doing to force yourself to go onto Facebook. Memes on Facebook are some of the funniest things and always make my day better every time I see them. There is always someone on Facebook that uploads the most recent “viral video” and you have to click on it so that you can talk about it with everyone else. In addition, the link takes you to YouTube 99% of the time and once you are on YouTube consider the next hour of your life to be wasted. If this path has not happened then I will usually find myself on Netflix watching a random old movie or some funny television show. My Internet experiences travel these two paths when I open my laptop. If I am in class I try to keep my laptop away because I can be easily distracted however once I realize that I have not been paying attention, I quickly avert my attention away from the computer screen and onto the professor.
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For this part, I am going to use Grant-Davie’s constituents of rhetoric to analyzed and inspect a portion of Reingold’s introduction. A potential constraint on this piece is that we are unaware of the long term effects since this is a new issue up for debate in the last decade. The exigence I think that Reingold is trying to communicate is that we need to embrace what the Internet has to offer instead of “sticking our head under a rock”, so to speak, and attempting to pretend it does not exist. He also believes that the Internet provides a service of teaching us how to interpret what is being presented and form a decision of whether or not it is accurate information being displayed. We learn to discard the pop-ups and certain information that we just know to be fake or false advertisement. In addition, since there are such adverse ways to get onto the Internet he describes that we must stress the fact that we need to keep our personal information as personal as possible. The discourse delivered by the rhetor addresses solutions to the ever-changing world of technology. He mentions that becoming skilled in the literacies of attention, participation, and network smarts, critical consumption of information and collaboration demonstrates that we have used modern day technology to benefit use for the better. We can, although its not always, learn to avoid procrastination by not being as distracted as easily. This brings up who his intended audience is. The audience, as explained in the reading by Reingold, for the introduction are teens who venture onto the internet for fun, adults who use media in their everyday life, but also have a hard time focusing, parents who do not completely agree with the change or who are beginning to change, educators who want to teach their students, and business people.
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ReplyDeleteNow that I’m in college when I get on my laptop it is most likely for homework or research for class and I use my iPad or phone to check twitter, facebook, and emails. So, when I log onto my laptop I have the intentions of going straight to webcourses or the blog for English but I usually go straight to twitter or facebook even though I just checked it on my iPad or phone. I don’t know what it is about checking facebook so often because there usually isn’t anything different in five minutes. I guess it’s the idea of always being informed or the fear of missing out. Checking twitter every minute is necessary in my opinion because user compose tweets by the second and if you don’t check twitter in a ten minute time frame you most likely just missed out on an entire conversation two people had or someone explaining how their night went. More than one person is doing this at a time so that’s why it becomes a social media addiction. I know that I am naturally a person who wants, and doesn’t necessarily need, to know everything. So , if I get on twitter with the intention of just checking the last ten tweets I’ll end of checking tweets from an hour ago trying to piece together someone’s story. There is no point in following people if you’re not going to pay attention to and read their tweets. Even though I am so adamant about reading tweets, I am not as active in actually tweeting. I will compose at least one tweet a day but unless I am telling a story or having a conversation with someone it doesn’t go past that, but I will retweet more than I compose my own tweets. I usually retweet things that make me laugh or sound like something I would personally say. I don’t retweet or respond or pay too much attention to parody accounts or users who try to give out inspirational advice, because twitter is on the place to give or take life lessons; therefore, I cannot not take those accounts serious. I use twitter to entertain me at times but to mostly keep in touch with new and old friends because I didn’t make my twitter account until about three days before I graduated from high school. I am the type of person who likes the benefit of being informed from a social networking site but I don’t like to put all the effort into keeping my followers or friends (facebook) informed and updated. I use twitter to say humorous things or random thoughts but I use facebook to update family friends about school and life in general. I am more concerned about likes on facebook than I am about retweets or favorites on twitter. I also use twitter now to meet and get in contact with new people in college. When I was in high school it was cool to add a new person as a friend on facebook but now the question when meeting someone is “what’s your twitter name?,” then they say “follow me and I’ll follow back.”
I don’t take my laptop to my lecture class because I feel like I would become easily by the access to the internet and miss something important the professors says. Although, I would probably take notes more efficiently by typing and organizing I don’t think it’s worth it, because my notes would be useless if they’re well organized but don’t contain any valuable information. Every day I personally witness numerous students chatting on facebook or shopping for shoes while the professor is lecturing then hurriedly switching windows trying to catch and type what the professor just said because they were not paying attention, now they have to look around and ask what the point was. I haven’t found a way to be more mindful of my attention in online spaces because I eventually get the assignment completed with plenty of time to spare. Nevertheless my assignments could probably be completed in two hours less time if I did not have access to the internet while I was working. I know this to be true because when the wifi on campus was not working I was “forced” to do my work that did not require the internet or a computer.
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I will connect to Hass and Flower as a way to give a rhetorical analysis to Rheingold’s introduction. I chose Hass and Flower because they talk about how a reader understands and interprets a piece of writing. I can relate to the freshman writer, Kara, in their study because she often times finds articles confusing and does a summary about what she read instead of an analysis. The way Kara felt about Sylvia Farnham-Diggory’s Cognitive Processes in Education is exactly how I felt about Rheingold’s Why You Need Digital Know-How-Why We All Need It. The title of his article confused me and I had to read it several times until I finally came to the consensus that it would be about some form of technology. So upon reading the article I was just as confused as the title made me but took away that technology is a great distraction that is getting worse with each advancement in technology. I could pick out that he talks about how twitter makes a countless amount of money because it has so many users. I also picked out that readers and users of technology have to ignore “crap” that is put out there to distract us on the internet. Therefore, his overall point in my final opinion is to stop depending so much on technology because in the end it can hinder you by distracting you and giving you useless information.
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ReplyDeleteReading Reingold’s article made me realize what it is I do when I go on the internet and social media sites like Facebook. I would say 90% of the time when I open up the internet is when I’m bored. I have my four websites that I commonly visit and all of them are sports sites except Facebook. Reingold says in his introduction that it is important for us to think about what we’re doing when we browse sites instead of just going through the motions. I happen to be one of these people who just goes through the motions and skims the surface of news articles and the news feed on Facebook. Every now and then I will see an interesting article on espn.com that I will investigate but that’s about it.
To me social media sites are distracting and addicting. I have a Facebook and I always catch myself just scrolling down the news feed with no idea what I’m actually reading. I do not have a twitter account just for this reason because it would just add another distraction in my life. When I go to my classes I like to leave my laptop in my dorm because I know if I take it I will be really tempted to open it up and ignore whatever the professor is saying. The times that I have to bring it to class I like to leave it in my backpack until my professor says it is necessary I bring it out.
Personally I believe that after reading Reingold’s article on a scale of 1 to 10 of having an active mind while you are on the internet, I am about a 3. This is something that I need to change and I can start by not pulling up the internet just when I’m bored and start reading deeper into articles versus just skimming the title of them.
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If Grant-Davie, Linda Flower, or Christina Haas were to read Reingold’s article on how the internet is changing our way of communicating, the first thing they would point out would be his exigence for writing it. He obviously sees a problem in society that we are using the internet the wrong way. In some ways this article was very similar to carr’s writing about how google is making us stupid. Reingold says how we are just going through the motions when we read online and how we need to engage more to the topic. Another major issue the misusing information, and not knowing when you are dealing with good or bad information. His discourse is very straight forward, saying how he is worried about how the world is going with the internet and its need to change. The audience of this article is really anybody that visits the internet which is just about everyone in today’s world.
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ReplyDeleteI have many bookmarked websites that I immediately go on when I open my laptop. Even if I planned on starting a homework assignment or doing something else I always see those YouTube and Facebook names at the top of my screen and it’s hard to resist the urge and not click on one of them. I spend my most time on YouTube every day because I am subscribed to people who make daily videos that I enjoy watching. I watch some videos from Phillip DeFranco who makes the news interesting to watch. He always adds his view and personality to the news and he gets viewers involved by asking them what they think in the “question of the day.” I also watch funny videos from jstustudios who go around falling in public, videos from prankvsprank; a couple that enjoy having prank wars back and forth.
Other than YouTube I also use Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, and Instagram. Facebook I check everyday to see what my friends are up to and to communicate with people at UCF in the “Class of 2016” page. I use twitter because I get to not only see the thoughts of my personal friends, but I also get to follow my favorite athletes and celebrities. Twitter really grabs my attention because people post funny things, inspiring quotes, and just random stuff that happens in their daily lives that you can relate to. Twitter is a completely different atmosphere than Facebook. Tumblr is a website I go on every once in a while just to look at cool photographs and gif images that move. Most of the people I follow on Tumblr post really cool photographs. Instagram is something I just started using, it’s only on your mobile device and since many of my friends are using it I thought this would be the perfect time to start since I just got my first smartphone. On Instagram I can follow my friends and my favorite celebrities and see cool pictures that they have taken. With Instagram anyone, regardless of talent, can become a photographer. The simple filters that you can add to your photos through Instagram makes your photos look a lot cooler.
When I go to a lecture I usually don’t bring my laptop with me, unless it’s required. This helps me from going off track and not paying attention to my professor. Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube require a lot of your attention and while your using them you can’t really multitask. This is a big problem for me because when I’m stuck in my work and I open one of these websites I lose track of what I’m doing and waste a lot of time reading posts or watching videos. Instagram and Tumblr are websites that require very little attention because you can just scroll through photos and look at them without having to sit and watch a video or read anything.
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To examine Harold Reingold’s introduction as a mode of rhetorical analysis I will first start out with his exigence; his reason for writing this article. I think his exigence is that he wanted to inform us, Internet users, about how we are using the internet and help us become aware of our attention while using certain social media websites. Like I said about Twitter, YouTube, and Facebook wasting my time and moving all of my attention to reading or watching someone, Reingold says that Twitter can easily waste a lot of time if the user isn’t careful. Reingold’s main purpose of writing the introduction was to make us aware that we need to have the discipline to use social media in a limited amount. These websites aren’t meant for you to spend hours on per day, just short limited time periods. Reingold explains that many of us are misusing these websites and it is affected our life; through work, relationships, and every other thing. This is the disclosure of Reingold’s introduction, he wants us to be mindful of how much attention we’re giving social media over our real lives and what really matters. Reingold’s audience is almost anyone these days, working parents, kids, college students, professors; he is talking to everyone who uses the internet and wastes there time and attention on these websites. He wants us to see how the internet is affecting our lives.
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I personally do consider myself to be “attached” to facebook as others would be. I think that I have been able to avoid the social media vacuum that has gone around with all the news sites and apps that everyone has. I was able to dodge the twitter and instagram bandwagon so far as well. When I first get on a laptop or computer, my first reactions is not always to go on facebook. Depending on the reason I am going on the computer is what will determine where I go. If I am going on the computer to look up information, then I can control myself to the point where I can manage to type the correct letters and not unconsciously type facebook. If I am extremely bored and find myself on the computer then yes, the first place I will go is facebook.
When I am on facebook, I tend to just skim the news feed for interesting stuff. The things that tend to catch my eye are the funny pictures posts, or posts from my closer friends. If I see their names, I automatically read their status or post. If it is not a close friend or a picture I tend to just skim right over it like it isn’t even there. I also don’t dive deep into the facebook pool; I tend to stay on the news feed. Once I finish skimming through the news feed for a little while and satisfy my boredom, I just close it out and that’s it. I don’t leave it open on the screen all day.
If I was in a lecture and I opened my laptop, I think I would be able to focus on the subject at hand. If I open it to take notes, I will go write to notes and start typing away. If it is a very boring professor and I can’t stand the class, then I will open the laptop for entertainment, which will bring me to facebook.
I think in online spaces, you just need to be able to control your mind. You can’t let yourself get sucked into the vacuum. Once you find yourself going deeper into the social networking sites, it’s like digging a hole. Once you get so far , you don’t want to come out, and you can’t come out. I think that’s where people that are obsessed tend to be. They go deep into sites and look farther than just the news feed and then they can’t turn of the laptop.
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ReplyDeleteUsing the constituents of Grant-Davie, it is very easy to see the exigence in Reingold’s writing. Reingold is trying to help us understand that it is ok to use these social media sites and all the fun stuff on the internet, but we need to mindful in doing so. We as a culture need to understand how to carry ourselves through these sites, and not get sucked into the madness that goes on through the internet. The popular, more visited sites are meant to give you power. You can click whichever link you want. You don’t have to go to one site over the other, it is entirely your choice. But what what people aren’t seeing are those people that try to overpower you and force you to certain sites. You may think it was your choice, but something caught your attention and now you r clicking this link over that one. This is where I think Haas and Flower come into play. Their argument is that anyone can read and “understand” what’s going on, but very few are able to go deeper into it and realize the meaning behind it all. Anyone can look at a picture and get their own interpretation of it, but no everyone will see the message the artist was portraying. The reason the artist made the picture in the first place. On the internet see pictures and they get hooked, and find themselves digging another hole deep into a random site that they have no business on. They don’t understand that the picture that caught their attention had a reason behind it. They knew how to get people attention and make them forget about what they were doing and attract them to their site. If people can just look beyond the picture and see that the site is just a distraction, then society would not be falling into this cyberculture we are digging. Tying in to Grant-Davie, the advertisers have the audience in mind when they create the picture or words to put on the internet. They know they are targeting those people who are curious and will click anything that catches their attention. They do not go for those people who know very well what advertisers are trying to do and refuse to get sucked into the vacuum. Another constituent is the rhetor, or the advertiser in this case on the internet. When a rhetor must convince the audience to help with the problem he presents, the advertisers are the same way. They must adjust their advertisements to the audience they are trying to appeal to. This is how they suck in the people deeper into their sites. Little by little they take away the power of the people, by bombarding them with so many good looking things that they just can’t resist. They are so indulged in the advertisements that they lose power to click any link to any site.
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ReplyDeleteWhen asked to recall my own online media habits there is no other way to describe them than the fact that I am a total social media junkie. I thrive on it and it is one of my worst habits. For me to even do homework on my computer, I have to disconnect it from the Internet because if I don’t I will never get anything accomplished. I have the attention span of a fly when it comes to the internet the simplest thing could attract my attention and send me into a whirlwind of task that set me further and further off my original course. I don’t even take my laptop into lectures because I know for me it would only cause greater distraction. I wasn’t able to log on to any social media site until I was 16, per my parents rules and as soon as I got one I became hooked. It is so weird, the way people describe addiction is how I feel about Facebook and twitter. I literally feel like I am about to explode if I go one day without checking them or even I don’t check them a couple times an hour which makes classes even harder for me. It’s so weird to me how such a subtle change can evoke a complete change in character. Since my sixteenth birthday I have become way more involved online, I spend three to four times as much time on the computer as I did before. The littlest things can grab my attention. If someone tweets a song lyric, then I have to look up the song, after which I have to look up the artist which leads me to looking up if the artist is on tour if I liked the song and seeing if I can get tickets to the show. This leads me back to Facebook where I search to see if any of my friends are going which leads me back to twitter a couple hours later either happy because I can go to the concert or sad because I cant and the world seems to be over in my mind. A picture on a timeline can spark a whole new train of thought and before I know it I have looked up different type of flowers for four hours. I cant even put a subject heading on which type of post grabs my attention the most the truth is, I am just naturally nosy. I feel this undying urge to know everything that is happening around me and the Internet brings a wealth of knowledge to my finger tips at lightening fast speeds. The fact that it is possible still boggles my mind and there isn’t much of my life that I have lived without the internet, so you would think it would be something that I am accustomed to by now. To be more mindful of my attention in online spaces is learn how to prioritize task, so that when I am doing homework and something pops into my head I don’t go on an expedition of frivolous searches but finish the task at hand then go off to my other inquires.
I used to be like you when I first got my Facebook page. I didn't even make my own Facebook, my friend made me one just to have one. I used to check it all the time whether it was on my phone or in between assignments on the computer. I think using Facebook is such an addiction because it is a lazier way in stay in touch with people, your friends, even if you see them everyday. I recently deactivated my Facebook account to see if I could go a month without checking it every time I got on the computer. So far I haven't been on it for a week and I think about checking it every time I have a couple minutes to spare. It is weird not being connected through the Internet but I also think that it will help me cut down my usage of the internet. I also liked how you described the distractions that even a picture or word can provide. It is easy to roam the internet after you see something because all the information and search engines are provided for you on one convenient space. Technology has made it possible for our minds to wander aimlessly for hours.
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In this weeks reading I have learned once again that I am an inexperienced when it comes to the world of English. Although I have always been an avid reader, analyzing text for deeper meaning has always boggled my mind. My high school English teacher tried, to teach rhetorical reading strategies in her class, and despite all her efforts I never fully understood. A lot of the writing that we analyzed was older than my great grandma and I could barely comprehend the English in the piece let alone analyze it for deeper meaning. In some of the works I remembered a simple rose stood for the prosperity of the land and that there was good fortune ahead or something crazy like that, I was the poor kid who only saw the rose and didn’t see all that it represented. From the reading I have learned that my current reading status is typical of freshman in their first year of college and that the skills I need to acquire to read at a higher level require me to look past the superficial layer of the passage. In the reading it talked about how inexperienced readers are more on an information getting hunt versus searching for deeper meaning. I wonder if FCAT has made this more prevalent, because the reading passages aren’t really there for you to analyze they just ask simple questions that can be directly taken from the text. It seems as though the author wants college professors to realize that rhetorical strategies is something that isn’t an entrance skill for college students today it is more of a skill that must be taught upon entry.
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Social media has had quite an impact on my life as it has for most other people. Whether or not I have a desire to go onto Facebook, if I have free time, I automatically open it up on my phone or laptop. I scan through everyone's statuses and look at all of their pictures or memes. I usually scan over the memes and pictures that are about sports and politics and pay more attention to the statuses of my friends. Occasionally someone will suggest a cool video for me to watch on YouTube, but otherwise, I hardly ever visit that website. Twitter and Instagram are two other social networking sites that I have on my phone. I occasionally look on Twitter to read a few things, and then immediately exit. I absolutely love Instagram just because it allows me to add different lighting effects to my pictures and communication is almost entirely visual. Even though I feel compelled to open up Facebook almost every time I get on the computer, if I have something that I know needs to be done and I need to focus on it, I do not feel the urge to check Facebook. For me, it is merely an outlet for when I am bored. I have only one class that I bring a laptop to and that is only on occasion. When I do bring it to class, I open up to one website or Microsoft Word and I don't feel the temptation to get on any other website. Facebook controls a lot of people's lives and I try to not let it control mine. I hardly every post statuses and rarely upload anything. It is merely something I use to peruse for a few minutes. I find it easy to keep my attention on the task at hand because I have learned the price to not keeping good self-discipline.
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ReplyDeleteTo examine Reingold's introduction, I used what I learned from Grant-Davie. As I was reading "Introduction: Why You Need Digital Know-How—Why We All Need It", I trued to keep in mind what Reingold's exigence was. I believe that he feels that we all need to stay mindful when using social media. We can enjoy the frivolities that they provide for us, but they can not control our lives and we can't go crazy over them. Our culture needs to be aware of what we click on and what we post on these websites as well. Haas and Flower make a very valid point with their argument: anyone can read and understand what it is that they're reading, but very few are able to delve a little bit deeper and actually truly understand what it is that the reading means. Most of our society takes things that they read on social networking sites to a whole new level. They don't always interpret the same meaning that the author intended to get across and in some cases, that can cause a lot of problems. It is our duty, if we are going to use these websites, to use them properly and in moderation.
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ReplyDeleteSocial networking has to be my life. I’m a complete addict, whether it be from the simplicity of posting a tweet, to the complexities of editing a picture to post on tumblr. I’m completely hooked, a total junkie. I would have to say that what grabs my attention the most of anything would be Facebook. You basically view your friends lives within a few words. You can read what they did, where they were, or how they felt. It’s a universal way of creeping in my opinion. I just love knowing about what people do throughout their daily lives. It intrigues me to know where they went and what they've been up too. I guess my biggest enjoyment of the social networking would be being able to converse with people you rarely get the experience of speaking with face to face. It’s like your own little world and anything goes. The funny thing about that is social networking is the biggest attention seeking distraction for myself. I’m always scrolling endlessly for new posts on facebook, new tweets, or new tumblr posts. I doesn't matter to me what it is, as long as it diverts my attention. That’s the whole point of the social networking “game”. Throughout my day, I would have to honestly say I spend nearly 50-75% of it multitasking on the social networking while doing my routinely activities. My attention shifts quite frequently, but as I reach things that are higher on my priority list, I tend to null the distractions as best as possible. I normally don’t take my laptop to class for multiple reasons, the biggest being the infinite amounts of distractions it can be. I’m a solid gamer, so chances are I’ll be playing a game or on my Facebook. I’d find some way to divert my attention from the “boredom” of the lecture to something else. If my laptop is open, chances are I’ll be distracting myself. In a majority of my classes I found myself holding back from these urges as my grades are on the line. In most cases, I try to prioritize properly so I can convince my mind that the importance of one thing is greater than another and thus I would minimize distractions. For example, as I’m doing this assignment, I convinced myself that I need the grade and that it’s more important than playing a game of LoL, or getting on FIFA 13. I made myself believe that, so thus I’m doing it with as minimal distraction as possible.
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ReplyDeleteI am easily the most distracted person I have ever known (and probably the most distracted person many of my friends have ever known) so when I take a “5 minute break” to stop myself from being too bored from an assignment I usually end up getting back to the assignment a few hours before it is due. Most of my wasted hours go to Facebook, Skype, video games, and the long lost Myspace. The first form of an online community that I was a part of was Xbox Live with some of my class mates. These were the days that Halo 2 came out and most kids were playing it since it was the sequel to a ground breaking Xbox game that finally had a multiplayer that you could play online. Little did I know that this one game would lead me to years of addiction in video games. With the simplicity of Xbox Live my friends and I could talk and play video games with each other in the comfort of our own homes. As school started to progress and get more complex I needed to find a way to get study guides done, and since I could not find some of the answers I was forced to make a Myspace to ask around to see how the people in my class found the answers. However, this too led to a new online community and with all of the customization, pictures, profiles, and live feeds there was always funnier things to see or read every minute. Luckily, Myspace’s reign ended in ninth grade. Unlikely, Facebook’s never-ending reign was just getting started. Every since I made a Facebook I have been drawn into multiple situation, conversation, and status exaggerations from friends and coworkers alike. However much I may hate the addiction, Facebook has given me access to numerous study guides and helped me meet many new friends through the course of my high school years and I am very grateful for that. For a while, my affiliation with video games had come to an end. I no longer played Halo or any other Xbox game for almost a year, but my friend Miguel got me addicted to a new game: Gears of War. I had seen footage of the first Gears of War and never liked it too much but Gears of War 2 is still one of my favorite games. I played this game for hours and after a while started playing in competitive gameplay, causing my addiction to grow even stronger. The game that broke this addiction is League of Legends, a game that I still play today. This game led me to my fourth and final online community, Skype. Skype went hand in hand with League of Legends and is mostly used to talk to friends while we play a game. Throughout my life, video games have been a link that has connected me, people that I know, and even people that I don’t know in real life. Now, in college, my focus is on my laptop. I only take my laptop to my Writing Studies class though, since it is my only class that is small enough to make me keep my attention on the task at hand. All of my other classes are lectures so if I took my laptop to class I would not take a single note but I would go through every Facebook post of the day. Though my need to play video games online has come to an end, I am still reliant on Facebook and Skype to keep up with friends that have gone to different colleges and states; though I am usually mindful of my time nowadays, sometimes my attention just happens to be concentrated at the wrong post at the wrong time.
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As I read Why You Need Digital Know-How—Why We All Need It by Harold Reingold and analyzed it with the rhetoric analysis presented by Grant-Davies, I noticed that Reingold has nothing against the internet. He doesn’t think it is making us stupid, but he agrees that it can if we let it. The exigence that Reingold is trying to achieve through his article is to let his readers know that we have coated the internet in useless information and fictional information that others perceive to be true. Though the internet holds information that almost everybody needs for different situations such as a college student’s homework or a bussiness man making his resume for an interview. We all need information that we can find on the internet, and Reingold tries to make a point out of both the information that is factual and the information that is fictional. Nowadays, fictional information is found all over the internet and, in my experience, when people think of fictional information on the internet they focus their attention to wikipedia, a site that does have some fictional information but also contains factual information that many students have used in essays and studies. He also makes a point that we are continuously evolving and adapting in the era of technology. As more technology comes out, we adapt to the new functions that it can be used for. One of Reingold’s exigences is to make sure that we do not fall into these inventions so hard that they consume our everyday lives.
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ReplyDeleteMy internet use consists of relatively little posting compared to how much information I consume. Out of the hours and hours spent lurking social media sites such as Facebook, Reddit, and several forums, I only post when I see absolutely necessary. When browsing Facebook, I skim through and ignore most of the pointless posts from people I barely know while I search for posts from the hand full of people I actually talk to. Looking back at my timeline, It's been over two and a half months since I've posted a status or picture. The most I do on a daily basis is "like" a handful of posts by my friends. Most of the stuff people post now-a-days is copied from some other place on the internet because they think it's funny. This brings me to the topic of browsing Reddit. Besides YouTube and Netflix, Reddit is the site to which I devote the most time. I rarely post except for in smaller subreddits that I can directly relate to and have an interest in such as /drawing or /airsoft. I do spend a considerable amount of mindless time on /pics or /funny (something Reingold wouldn't be proud of). For the past four years, I've been heavily involved in YouTube and several communities on it. This is the only social media site to which I regularly post. Consisting of one or two weekly videos and too many comments/replies to count, my time spent on YouTube is more significant than the time I spent on any other social network. As for media sites like Twitter, Instagram, or any similar site, I don't post enough to use it nor do I care what you had for breakfast/what it looks like with a sepia tone filter.
For the sake of this question, I'll substitute my tablet for my laptop (or lack there of). On days which I don't think I'll need my iPad, I avoid bringing it altogether. I prefer taking my notes on paper because I won't be distracted by any apps or notifications. In situations where I am using my tablet or desktop computer to do work, I try to close all programs except for the ones I immediately need. Before I am able to open up any distractions, I can normally realize what I'm doing and avoid distracting myself further. Unfortunately, some assignments, such as this one, require extensive time "researching" habits on Youtube, Reddit, and Facebook.
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ReplyDeleteReingold, the rhetor, mentions ways in which he uses the internet and common social network sites as to relate to his audience. He explains how he, his wife, and his daughter are all quite attached to their electronics and have trouble separating themselves from these devices. By showing how he isn't perfect and struggles with being mindful about his internet usage, he comes of as less preachy, which helps the audience absorb his message instead of rejecting him as someone pointing out the flaws in society and demanding they change.
The audience to which he is speaking is, as he states in the text, parents, students, teachers, managers, employers, and entrepreneurs, enthusiasts, policymakers, and technoskeptics (pretty much anyone who is concerned about the internet turning peoples brain to useless grey matter).
The need, or exigence, Reingold sees is that people are becoming too reliant on the internet, too trusting in the internet, and too consumed by the mindless garbage that many people share on the internet. He uses Twitter as an example of our need to be mindful of our internet use and not let this great tool destroy us. He mentions how easy it is to throw away valuable time on Twitter by mindlessly reading tweets with no real purpose. He also brings up a good point of how we need to also monitor what we post on twitter (and any other social network), as it strongly influence how people view us. He also discusses the importance of people's ability to filter out useless or false information from the information we really want. Even if someone goes to the web with good intentions hoping to research something, the internet will likely bombard them with the completely false theories of Joe Shmo before any useful information is found.
One negative constraint placed on Reingold is that the short attention span of most internet users may cause people to simply skim through or pass by his extensive article. One of the very things he is trying to avoid could cause his message to go unheard. His article being on the internet could be a positive constraint as well because it shows he is an internet user just like his intended audience. He is much more likely to reach internet users via the internet than if he were to try and spread his message on the radio or television.
Using Haas and Flower's work to view the topic of people on the internet, web users who look for rhetorical situations while they browse the internet will fair much better than those who take a simplistic look at the internet. People who look for an underlying need in people's posts, or consider the audience that content was meant for will be better able to gather useful information. Those who take the internet at face value will scoop up a lot of useless lies along with the information they were searching for. As was mentioned in "Rhetorical Reading Strategies and the Construction of Meaning", the use of rhetorical situations while reading could simply mean the reader is more advanced than other non-rhetorical readers. This is unlikely though, especially in the case of the web and it's social media sites because many people use the internet as a way to gather information without having to think very hard.
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ReplyDeleteMy involvement with online social media is heavy and frequent. I have Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram accounts; all of which I frequently use. I also am a member of two online guitar forums. These media outlets attract me for various reasons. Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram all attracted me because I want to stay connected with friends and celebrities that I like. I use Facebook as a mode of connection with family members and friends to which I do not see often. I do not have people I don’t know as “friends”, nor do I post pictures of me doing things my family would not be proud of. Facebook to me is purely a way to speak to people I care about who are not present, and also to see pictures of them to know what is going on in their lives. I am attracted to Twitter because of the ability to “follow” popular athletes and celebrities of which I am a fan. I also use it as a connection to friends. But what separates it from Facebook is that on Twitter, I post statuses of what I am doing much more frequently. Twitter to me is a place to post the day-to-day activities of my life, where I use Facebook as an outlet for only the big events in my life. I am attracted to Instagram because it is a site purely for posting pictures. This way I can see what my friends are doing through images, and not words like on Facebook or Twitter. I am attracted to the guitar forums because I am a passionate guitar player. Joining these forums helped me connect with others who shared my passion for music, and gave me a way to talk to others who could give me tips on how to improve as a musician.
When my laptop is open while at a lecture I tend to not focus my attention. Going on one of these social media websites is very easy and tempting. It is because of this easy distraction possibility that I don’t often bring my laptop to lectures. I want to focus on my class and studies, and this presence of the internet can take away from that. However, depending on the subject being taught and the professor teaching it, sometimes I am able to completely ignore these temptations if I am being kept interested by the class. My point is that to determine if my attention will be focused or not, it is all dependent on the class and the interest-level being kept up by the teacher. If I am interested in the subject, I am far-less likely to screw around on the internet and more likely to pay attention.
What I can do to be more mindful of my attention in online spaces is to simply resist the temptation to go onto the internet. If I really care about my grades at all, which I do, it isn’t that hard to just get over the temptations and focus. However, if I feel it is too tempting and I can’t resist the temptation to drift off of my focus on the lecture, I could simply disconnect from the internet so I won’t have the possibility to go onto these social media sites.
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ReplyDeleteLooking at the paragraph by Reingold as a rhetorical reader, I can establish that Reingold’s goals for this text are to show his audience what social media outlets he uses and which he doesn’t; to show which lead and mislead him; and also why he reacts to each media outlet the way he does, so that we the audience are better-able to interpret those goals in our own lives. The exigence he perceives is that social activities can be good and bad for each of us who use them, and that we need to know why we react the way we do to each one so that we can better understand ourselves and our use of these outlets so we can use them for good, and not distracting, purposes. His audience is the readers of this text, but more specifically those people who use social media outlets.
I can definitely tell that you have a strong sense of what rhetorical situation is and what its components are. When you were talking about the audience, you only skimmed over it. In the text, Reingold goes over in detail who his book should be reaching out too. The exigence that you wrote about is really similar to that of mine. I agree that social media is good and bad, and our reaction to it is what makes or breaks the social space. I agree with the the goals that you set out and believe he is after. I do have one last question, are there any constraints about Reingolds introduction?
DeleteI do not think I could live in a world without the availability of technology or the Internet. Every since I was little, I have been on some sort of computer whether it was the old Gateway I had or the new flat screen HP my parent just bought or my 4G Smartphone; I am forever using the internet. When it comes to social media I do not consider myself to be as involved as others kids my age because the only site I actively participate in is Facebook. I do not have a tumbler, a twitter account, a form spring, or a pinterest. One social networking site is enough for me. I do think that these social media outlets have become an integral part of daily life for most populations in the first world because it provides an extra communication source and allows for more sharing. This means more sharing of personal lives, more sharing of businesses, and even more sharing in the political world.
ReplyDeleteI always like having a computer in front of me but coming to college made me realize how much I depended on computers for work and amusement; this is because I don’t have a computer to call my own. I am one of those people that likes to have multiple windows up on my computer while I am trying to perform certain tasks. I will generally have a window up for Pandora, a window up for my email, a window up for assignments, a window up for news, and a window up for Tetris. I like to have all of these windows up because my attention to each one is continually changing; I get distracted or bored with one, so I go to another. Most of my attention goes to music that I am listening to and chatting with people on Facebook. I do not really look at much besides that on Facebook because I get uninterested after a while reading pointless posts but I do enjoy looking at funny pictures or videos that people post.
My attention is used for many things regarding the Internet and I think, compared to others in my generation, that I focus less on social media sites than I do on news sites or science websites looking up interesting facts. It is easiest for me to focus when I have headphones on with music blaring. I do this so I can drown out those around me, especially useful in the dorm, because I tend to pay attention to their conversations if I can hear them. Also, it helps to close windows to keep distractions down.
When I am in class, I try not to have a computer because I will be doing other things instead of taking notes and I think that handwritten notes are more of a benefit to me. However, if I do have a computer in class, I try to only have word open so I do not feel tempted to wander about on the Internet during a lecture. I also will take notes slower so I do not have time to go back and forth between multiple windows; it helps me focus more on what the professor is showing or saying in class.
I think one of the most important things to do to be more mindful in online spaces is to pay attention to what you are participating in online. Pay attention to chat rooms, pay attention of what you post, pay attention to what you click on, and pay attention to what you should be doing. The Web can be very distracting because there is so much information out there to be looked at or searched so you have to know what you should be looking at or what might help you while performing specific tasks. It is also important to be mindful of the information you are consuming. You what to improve your knowledge base but remember that everything is not true on the Internet and make sure that when you are searching for information on a specific topic, to know what kind of websites you are looking at for information.
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ReplyDeleteWhen using social media, it usually is an escape-goat from my work or attention of something for a moment, only to take a break and ease my mind or to “kill time.” For instance, on websites such as Facebook I may go on Facebook for no purpose but to just relax and see what other people, particularly my friends, are up to. This is in some means a stress reliever, but at times, I notice what I am doing and become agitated that I am procrastinating. While on social media, humor and comedy draws the bulk of my attention, only followed by something that I am deeply interested in. The comedy that I find on social media is the escape-goat that I talk about; it can either bring me back to the real world, or take me away from my current task. I do use social media to stay updated on certain topics, generally non-important but some are serious. On Facebook, I am subscribed to the “How I Met Your Mother” page; this gives me interesting facts or details about the show as well as upcoming or past episodes. However, at times I find myself using social media for no apparent reason but to just be on it, like many people, I’ve been on Facebook for no reason, just looking for something that interests me in my “news feed.” I do not use or generally bring my laptop to lectures; I find that it would be too distracting and that it may impede my attention towards the lecture. To become more mindful of my actions in online spaces, I can become more aware of my presence there and the reasoning behind it. This would make sure that I am using social media only for positive reasons and possible needs for it, as well as limit my use of it. This would enforce more appropriate use of social media and create fewer distractions when other work must be done.
I can definitely relate to using Facebook as a way to mindlessly kill time. While I do have a couple friends who do things I care about, most of the posts are pointless and don't interest me. Opening Facebook has become such a habit that I automatically log on when I go to my computer only to realize later on that I meant to start a school assignment.... not waste time. I also agree with not bringing a laptop, or in my case an iPad, to class. The pros of typing notes don't outweigh the cons of getting side tracked on Facebook or some other app.
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ReplyDeleteReingold discusses the capabilities of living in a cyber-world and the positive effects, however, he proves the point that you must be mindful and wary of your actions and the consequences of how you use these digital tools. Reingold instantly proves the point in his first paragraph of his introduction by saying, “…the ways people use new media in the first years of an emerging communication regime can influence the way those media end up being used and misused for decades to come.” Reingold’s exigence targets that we must be aware of the dangers of this new digital age and learn how to benefit from it. To abuse digital culture while it is still in its youth will cause it to be used that way in future years, but, if used appropriately and for the right intentions, that will be the idea and thought behind the use of this digital tool. The digital age is overwhelming to many, and enticing to even more. With it encompassing much of the world, Reingold stresses how increasingly important it is becoming to stay up-to-date and aware of your presence on and understanding of this digital age. Reingold faces many constraints in his argument, a few being that the people growing up with this technology at their disposal feel that they know everything about it and need not worry about what will become of it, whereas on an opposite note Reingold mentions people who are old enough to remember what it was like without this technology may be fearful of it and avoid it. Reingold directly addressed and identifies his audience in his introduction, noting who should read his book and why. From adults seeking time management and young people who use this media only for fun, to businesspeople and educators who want to make connections with customers or students. In relation to Haas and Flowers’ reading, everyone will create their own perception to how they can become more aware to this technology and put it to good use. Like in their reading, networking is multidisciplinary and must take prior gained knowledge to fully understand the topic. In Reingold’s article he mentions that a background of basic knowledge detailed by sociology would allow people to relate to this technology and the aspects of it.
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ReplyDeleteMy net habits I would say are pretty common to that of most teenagers. I typically am a user of Facebook and instagram and thoroughly enjoy posting on both sites. Honestly, (and I mean being bluntly honest) I would say the activities that capture my attention the most would be Facebook and instagram fights, photos of attractive guys, any political debates, postings about crazy pop culture news, funny jokes, memes, and photos of attention whoring girls (honestly, you all know you open up the photo and if you’re a guy you check it out and if you’re a girl you compare yourself to said person… it’s natural human nature) who post suggestive pictures of themselves. I would say those entire sub parts of my overall attention span are evenly spread out, not one thing captures my attention more than the other except for Facebook fights. Most of the time I think they are annoying but I read them anyways, but typically after about a minute of reading about people talking about how they want to meet up and go at it just annoys me. I would say that I do a good job of not letting it grab my attention at inappropriate times. I typically just read social networking posts like that in my spare time or when I have a minute on my iPhone. When my laptop is open during a lecture I shut the internet off and just type what the Professor is saying so I can insure that my mind doesn't wander. I would say one thing I can do to be mindful of my attention in online spaces would to play music while reading such things, that way after the song is done and I want to change it to another on, my mind has to pause what it was doing to pick a new song and can give me a chance to think if I really need to be reading and focusing on my attention on whatever I was doing, or start doing my school work.
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DeleteI am very much like you. I find myself enjoying the dramatic situations; when in actuality they're the most pointless posts online. i think it's just the intensity of the fight that gets interesting and intrigues us to continue reading. The other posts I enjoy are quotes. That's probably the only good things written. Everything else is just gossip or drama that really shouldn't even be posted online. I'm like you and probably most others; I only go on social network sites wen I am bored and there is nothing else to do. This is sad the era we live in; where people post what they're doing 24/7 and everyone actually cares. I only wish I group up back in the day without all these technological advances and ways of interacting. What ever happened to a face to face chat, or lunch get togethers. I think thats how all fights should be to, don't high behind a screen, handle it and move on. This generation is definitely not on that would survive back then.
One of the most important concepts, that Grant-Davie, Haas, and Flower write about, to apply to Reinhold's writing is the discussion of understanding rhetorical situations. They all discuss how to understand particular rhetorical situations and how to apply strategies such as context clues, perception checks, definition of constraints, understanding who the rhetor is, and figuring out what the exigence and discourse are. Reinhold's exigence is that people do not know how to use the Internet wisely in today's technologically centered society. He wants to inform the mass about his own personal literacy experiences on the Web and how to use techniques to help you improve your attention, participation, "crap detection," network smarts, and collaboration while online. I think that his intended audience are those using any form of online communication; this is because he discusses many was in which people are involve on the Internet but he also wishes to speak to multiple types of people. Some are tech savvy, some are afraid of using devices, and some are just inept when using a computer. Not that to be any one of those is negative but in the world we live in where almost everything is stored on hard drives and information is powered by its distribution through computers, it is smart to "know how." Applying the examinations or rhetorical situations provided by Grant-Davie, Haas, and Flower, we can conclude that Reinhold is giving examples of how to apply such concepts to the Web; not only to know the situation you are in but also to understand, analyze, nd successfully participate in using the Web in a wise way that will benefit you.
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ReplyDeleteSocial Media plays an enormous role in our society and for us students, can very easily hinder the ability to focus and be attentive to our work. I utilize Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, some in different amounts but all three equally contribute to a decline in attentiveness towards my work. I do not post or update much on Facebook, very sparingly do I make posts or upload content; I mostly spend time browsing at other people’s statuses for mere entertainment and rarely do I interact with others. Twitter is my least active social tool and I just browse for humorous tweets and quotes from viral Twitter accounts. I use Instagram more often to browser for pictures and post some of my own. It is very easy for me to feel the need to speed up or “kill” time by accessing these social tools. I generally am very disciplined and when I am in a lecture, or a working environment I place these tools aside in order to focus and be attentive. In my computer I do have website I always have a tendency to check and when I need to avoid these distractions, I open up the application of focus and remain in that application. I exercise good discipline and am able to ignore these social tools in order to accomplish any work related task I am working on. For others, self-discipline may not be enough and I have seen tools that allow you to block certain websites for a timeframe if it is ever desirable to resort to those extremes. What is truly important is to recognize the repercussive effects of engaging with these social tools instead of devoting your attention and focus to an important task.
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ReplyDeleteI personally don’t use Facebook. I’m paranoid of the media out there and how my personal life might be on the web. I don’t like people knowing what I do and such. I also don’t like to look up people status and what they are doing. It just seems like stalking to me. In my opinion, people that stay on Facebook 24/7 have no life and they are the anti-social. I’m the type of person who prefers to hang out with people in person and not over the web. Almost every night, I and my friends hang out and I think that’s the way it should be.
The majority of my time on web is probably playing games, if I’m on at all. I rarely talk to anyone online except long distance friends. And when I do talk to them, I use Skype. Other times, I talk to people online through gaming, but that’s very rarely. What captures my attention most is probably funny YouTube videos, which I also don’t go on much. I use Pandora to listen to music. My other time on the laptop is usually for school work. I’m not much of a web person, I prefer social interaction in person.
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Reingold’s introduction explains how people misuse Facebook and Twitter. People don’t consider their time online or know who’s really reading their privacy. The information people put in the net about themselves are open others. In Grant-Davie, rhetorical situations influenced writers and speakers to communicate in a certain way. Those writers and speakers are used to the rhetorical situations and they are well aware of their audience, situation, and purposes. When people use communication on Facebook and Twitter, we do not think about the rhetorical situations and often people learn their consequences. For example, Michael Phelps video of him was posted on Facebook and in less than a week, he became infamous and it negatively affected his credential. Reingold’s purpose in writing this is to help the people protect themselves about the misuse of the internet such as Twitter. People need to discipline themselves on the social media. I believe we should write with rhetorical situations in our mind when communicating on social media. We have to think about why we say what we say and what is its purposes. Who are we trying to communicate with? Who will read my post? Is this what I really meant to say? Reingold’s believe we need to be more caution about the media. Reingold want people to use the internet, but we have to use it in a smart way.
ENC 0119 Part 2
ReplyDeleteWhen looking at Reingold’s writing I was actually thinking of exigence before I even started. Since it was on my brain I decided to think about the exigence in the writing. Grant David piece was fresh in my mind so it really helped me find the exigence. I figured that Reingold was trying to inform us that although the internet is an awesome source for entertainment and a social bonding, our society shouldn’t succumb to being idiots with it. Social media can sometimes be a practical brain washing mechanism. It tells people what is cool and what isn’t, it tells others how they should look and act and what they should be up to in order to be socially accepted. The images and writings posted online are there for a purpose beyond just one’s entertainment. In terms of Haas and Flower, this is primarily what their argument focuses on. Although some people use the web for entertainment and social bonding, not everybody realizes there is meaning behind what is posted. For example, ads on websites are there for a reason. If one were to be on a gamer’s blog website, they might see ads for game fly or game stop, if one were to be on a blog about women’s health, they might see tampon ads or chocolate ads, if one were to be watching porn, they might see ads over other websites or online sex stores. These ads are there to lure the user of the original website into a new website and sucks them in…It’s what the creator of the ad wants them to do. It’s sad but most of our society just gets sucked into this electronic world rather than seeing the bigger picture.
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After reading Reingold’s opening chapter to Why You Need Digital Know-How—Why We All Need It, it gave me a way to describe my internet and social media habits: I am not an “active participant” (18 Reingold) in social media. This is the main example that may shock you: I do not use Facebook. It never appealed to me. I keep in contact with those who matter to me by talking on the phone or texting. Recently I actually made an account, but only ended up using it to keep track of when some UCF organizations and clubs have meetings and events. And now, I usually don’t even bother checking that. In addition, I do not have a Twitter account, or a Tumblr, though I do find Tumblr amusing. I am afraid to create a Tumblr and get addicted to it. I already have one addiction: Reddit.
Reddit is my go-to website for passing time and procrastination, and has been for about a year or so. Before that, I wasn’t much for social media. Often I have found myself “bored” with Reddit, only to open another tab, and habitually type “reddit.com” and end up there again. Similarly, I have been surfing Reddit on my computer, grab my phone, then forget why I grabbed it, and end up on the Reddit app. “You can check out any time you like, but you can never leave!” Reddit is pretty much the only social media I use, and even then, I am a “lurker.” I have an account, but even if I am logged in, I rarely upvote or downvote content, and I’ve yet to comment. However, I can spend hours at a time on the site. It is clear that Reddit can occupy a lot of my attention, but it only really distracts me when I am sitting in my dorm trying to study or get reading done. Usually I can start doing homework once I actually decide to. Rarely do I feel like I have to “tear myself away” from Reddit, or the internet in general.
Luckily, I have managed to stay off of Reddit when I am in class. I am perfectly capable of ignoring Reddit when I have a lecture to pay attention to. After all, I am paying for the class, not to sit on the internet while I ignore my professor (I’m speaking to you, Mr. Redditor who sat next to me in COM 1000 on Friday. You complained about failing the last quiz, but you browsed Reddit during the entire lecture. Nice one.). It is rude and only causes your grade to suffer.
To be more mindful of my attention in online spaces, in Reddit specifically, I can consider Reingold’s questions: Is “my own activity of the moment really as significant as what is happening in the rest of my life”? and “What am I supposed to be doing right now?” In other words, I need to reflect on if whatever article I am reading, pun I am laughing at, political argument I am criticizing, or YouTube video I am watching is more important than whatever I am supposed to be doing at the moment. For example, reading the latest news article on Mitt Romney can wait until I am finished with my Algebra assignment. It is all about prioritizing my attention towards what needs to get done as soon as possible, and what is simply acting as a distraction at the moment, even if it is stimulating. You need to reevaluate how you spend your time online if social media is running your life in such a way that it starts to distract you from your academics and other priorities.
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Growing up in the 21st century, I have witnessed the increasing use of technology in this time. My Net habits are not drastically different from most adolescents and college students. I utilize the internet for academic purposes as well as social media. Even when I go on my laptop to complete a school assignment, I end up on Facebook, checking my e-mails, or engaging in another activity that does not relate to my assignment. My attention drifts to social media once I get bored or frustrated with an assignment I do not want to complete. What I pay attention to online depends on whether I should be doing something else and I am just online for entertainment, or I am searching for something specific. From middle to high school to college, I have experience a great increase in the use of the internet for school purposes as well as social sites. Because a great amount of work for school is completed online, students have to adapt to this way of learning and have to know how to use the websites necessary to succeed academically. In addition, we voluntarily engage in social media with sites such as Facebook and Twitter. In my case, I find myself going on my Facebook account at least once a day since I communicate with a lot of old and new friends. The different pictures my Facebook friends post capture my attention most of the time and serve as a huge distraction when I have schoolwork to do. I do not have a Twitter account and do not plan to make one, since that would simply add to my list of distractions. Furthermore, even when I do not have my laptop in front of me, I can still access the internet with my smartphone. The Instagram application, for example, is one that allows me to easily share pictures and look at other people’s pictures; before I know it, I have spent too much time just scrolling down the page staring at pretty images. I am more active online when something interesting is going on in my life and is worth sharing, through either posts or pictures. I can also be what Reinhold considers a “passive consumer” when I do not have anything specifically to share and I am just on the web for entertainment.
In class, when allowed to have my laptop, I find myself typing anything instead of using an actual notebook and often staring at the screen, as if something amusing would suddenly appear just by looking. I pay attention in class but just knowing that my laptop is there causes me to think that I have to use it somehow even when there are moments during the lecture when it is completely unnecessary.
Thinking about my communication practices online, similar to completing my think-aloud protocol and analyzing my writing process, causes me to think about my online communication practices and be mindful of what I do and why I do it. This can lead to recognizing when I have been using a social site such as Facebook for too long and it is time to so something else. It also allows me to understand what situations cause me to be more active or to communicate with certain people more. I am not sure how my habits would change if I kept analyzing my communication practices but for now I am just more aware of what I do.
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Reinhold’s Introduction consists of claims about the use of media, more specifically the internet, in today’s society. I will analyze this Introduction using Grant-Davie’s constituents of literacy: rhetor, audience, exigence, and constraints. In this case, the rhetor states he is a professor at a university. However, throughout the introduction the rhetor adapts to different roles depending on the message he is trying to convey. For instance, when discussing our attention, he uses himself as an example of an ordinary person spending time online and having to finish what he is doing at the moment on his computer before even greeting his significant other when she arrives at the house. By playing multiple roles depending on the “reality” he is discussing, he is able to keep engaged the distinct members of his audience.
In this introduction, we do not need to think critically about the intended audience since Reinhold clearly states that his writing is directed to “worried parents, anxious and enthused students, concerned teachers, curious managers, ambitious employees, thoughtful entrepreneurs, reflective online enthusiasts, puzzled policymakers, and technoskeptics who are just trying to cope” (5). These people will benefit from the knowledge the rhetor will share with them about the reality of the use of the internet. It is evident that considering the audience was an essential part of this book. Knowing his audience aids the rhetor to target specifically those people who can learn to use the net more properly and discuss the problems out there that need to be fixed.
The exigence for this article is the need to communicate information learned about the internet to a broad, more modern, audience. The rhetor sees the problem with people nowadays misusing the web instead of creating a better culture. He establishes the need to communicate his findings about literacies, more specifically, the five that are “changing our world”. Reinhold names his five literacies “attention, participation, collaboration, the critical consumption of information, and network smarts” (5). Starting with attention, the exigence here seems similar to that of Nicholas Carr’s “Is Google making us stupid?” People cannot focus as they did before in real-life situations because they are so consumed in the web. In the section of “Calibrating your Crap Detector”, not only does the rhetor play the part of a normal person exposed to the different kinds of both useful and useless information, but he raises the need of knowing that the “good stuff” is out there and it is important for us to know how to find it. When discussing the way in which people participate in the media, he raises the need to understand how media changes our lives, the benefits of collaboration, and the different ways in which people play a part in it by being either active or passive. Finally, aware that having knowledge of the nature of networks is crucial in this century—this is the exigence—, he writes about the origins of the net and what makes this world so small.
A constraint in writing this piece is that the rhetor is targeting a broad audience of all ages, and very likely, multiple different backgrounds. The rhetor needs to adapt his writing to everyone who will be reading it. He uses this constraint as an aid to get his point across. An example would be when he lists the people who should read this book and elaborates on why they should read it based on the fact that everyone has different experiences with the net. For instance, a parent may be worried about their young child’s use of the internet while a businessperson may worry about their employees’ use of the net or the way in which the company uses the net to communicate with their customers. The main point made in the first few pages is that no matter the age of the person reading this introduction, they can all gain valuable knowledge about what the rhetor calls the “know-how”.
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ReplyDeleteGrant-Davie and Haas and Flower provide excellent insight into analyzing rhetorical situations. Given Reinhold's excerpt, we can systematically apply the constituents of rhetoric described by Grant-Davie to break down the rhetorical situation and identify the key elements that comprise it. Reinhold presents the exigence by alluding to the importance of mindfulness when engaging with social media. You can extrapolate further and conclude that Reinhold is urging the audience to learn to categorize social media and be able to conduct an analysis of how to engage with the social tools. Aside from simply utilizing with these social tools, comes the need to understand the hazards of using these tools and how to implement methods to protect oneself. The audience whom Reinhold addresses is the online community, users and people who actively engage with the social media. One constraint I see in this developing rhetorical situation is the necessity to create a connection with the audience as a whole and with the individual reader.
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ReplyDeleteSocial media has become a part of my every day life. I constantly check Facebook and twitter to see what all my friends are up to. I also use YouTube a lot to not only find funny videos but to also help me find new music. All three of these tend to distract me from what I actually try to do. An assignment that should take 15-20 minutes takes me over an hour because of the distractions I have from social media. Even though I try to find a way to push these things away from me while I try to do homework, I always get distracted. It has gotten to a point where when I know I have a big assignment, I have to shut off my internet. During lectures, I know that I am in a specific area where that is not allowed so it's not as hard to stop myself from engaging in social media during lectures as it is when I'm on my own. And even though I do engage in social media a lot, I still prefer having a face to face conversation with someone and actually hanging out with my friends instead of engaging in a group text.
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When I was reading Reingold's "Introduction: Why You Need Digital Know-How—Why We All Need It", I read it as a rhetorical reader and realized that even though he has nothing against the world wide web, he does however point out how harmful it can be in the long run. He points out how we need to be aware of what we do on the internet and that we should not abuse it. When people write for an audience, they are aware of who they are writing to. Yet when they post a status on Facebook or a tweet on twitter, most people tend to forget that what you post is open for the whole world to view. Today''s society should always write with their audience in mind, even on social media. If we stop ourselves from writing things that will harm us in the future or be something we regret, then Reingold got his point across to us.
0037
ReplyDeleteWhen I am on social media sites, for me it is mainly pinterest and instagram, what catches my attention is pictures. Whether it is artistic photos, funny pictures (ifunny and memes), hair and beauty photos, or pictures at interesting events, I enjoy knowing what my friends are up to, learning how to curl my hair or make my skin softer, or getting to see something new or trending. I don’t think my attention to social media sites is being utilized to help day to day productivity, but it does the job of entertaining or teaching me something new like a recipe, how to French braid, or make the perfect smoky eye.
I tend to only use social media sites when I am bored or trying to make time past by faster. I wouldn’t allow myself to let my attention get so deep into a social media site that it could distract my studies, work ethic, or slow down my day. I like to have a productive day each and every day. Therefore constantly being on a social media site is not acceptable to me. When I am in class, I am focused on the lecture and if my laptop is on, it is because I am researching the subject or following the PowerPoint that is being projected during the class. Most people should control how they utilize their time in social media networks and strive towards a more productive day. Rather than following someone on twitter or instagram to find out what our friends are doing, we should pick up the phone and have an actual conversation.
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Rhetorical Analysis of Reinhold's introduction
Exigence: The need to show the audience that how a person uses social media sites determines what that person will get out of it. Wants to promote social media as a source for information rather than a site to socialize
Ex.) “This know-how, from the art of growing social capital in virtual communities to the craft of cultivating wiki collaboration, might determine whether life online will drive us to distraction, or augment and broaden our minds.”
Rhetor: Reinhold, productive users of social media networks (the know-how users)
Audience: naive users of social media networks
Constraints: Many users don’t know the possibilities and uses of the social media; five digital literacies
Jayda Burkhardt
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ReplyDeletePart 2
While reading Reingold’s introduction, acting as a rhetorical reader as described by Haas and Flower allowed me to identity some of his exigencies and goals. In addition, keeping Grant-Davie’s constituents of rhetorical situation in mind also allowed me to identify Reingold’s identity as a rhetor, his audience, and his constraints.
Reingold assumes the identity of a scholar who has researched people’s interactions in “virtual environments” and how to be mindful about how one is spending their time online. He identifies himself as someone who can help his reader understand what social media means to them and how it impacts their lives both positively and negatively. His exigencies include the need to discuss how people can stay alert to how they are spending their time in social media, and how virtual environments have affected and continue to affect our lives. Reingold actually explicitly states his intended audiences, under “Who Needs to Read this Book, and Why?” (4 Reingold) His audience ranges from people who need help with time management concerning virtual environments, to businesspeople, those curious about new media, and educators who wish to help students think about their media use. Reingold’s constraints when discussing this topic include his generalizations from his own experience, because, as he states, “one of the things I’ve learned about social media is that the same activity can be a lifeline for one person and a distracting compulsion to others. There is no single recipe for a mindful life in the digital mediasphere; reflection is required” (8 Reingold). A positive constraint for Reingold’s discourse is the varying audience his message can appeal to. It is easier to get a point across when many people are willing to listen and understand what you are trying to explain.
Overall, acting as a rhetorical reader causes one to analyze the situation behind Reingold’s text instead of simply reading it for the information, otherwise known as “knowledge-getting” (132 Haas and Flower). The reader does more interpreting when searching for rhetorical situations in the text.
0119
ReplyDeleteThe activities that capture my attention the most are Facebook and a new activity for me recently has been Reddit. On Facebook I’m usually interested in my notifications, not so much what people post unless it is a funny picture. There are way too many people on Facebook that post things nobody cares about. They do it just to bring attention to themselves and sometimes I feel like commenting, “Nobody cares” but that would be mean. The only time I would message somebody is if they message me first and the conversations are normally a few messages long. Reddit is a website I go on to get a good laugh from funny pictures, GIFs, or memes posted. My friend was the one that got me hooked on this site, but unlike me he is on the site all the time. When he is at home he goes on it on his computer and when he is in class he goes on his phone, usually showing me funny things during a lecture. My attention is being utilized from these two sites mainly to cure my boredom and kill time if I am at school or at home. I don’t bring a laptop to lectures but if I did I know I would not be able to focus much because as soon as I get a tad uninterested in what the professor is saying, I would go on Facebook or Reddit. Many people like typing their notes, but I prefer writing them. Unlike my friends, I do not have a twitter account and I am glad because most of them are not mindful in the way they use it. I can be more mindful of my attention in online spaces by not using the internet to click on things that distract me and deviate my attention away from what I have to get done.
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I kept in mind the Grant-Davie reading as I read Harold Reingold’s introduction. One of the three constituents that were on my mind was the exigency of Reingold’s introduction. Reingold made it clear that his focus is not “Is the internet making us stupid?” but “How can we use social media mindfully and effectively?” The audience Reingold is trying to influence is made very clear by him in his introduction in the section “Who Needs to Read This Book, and Why”. Here he mentions adults, parents, young people, old people, businesspeople, and educators. He looks at the internet from an optimistic standpoint even though he still realizes that there are powerful agents that are trying to take control of individuals, like governments and corporations, that may constrain our freedom of sharing and consuming media in the future. Reingold also stresses that sites like Twitter and Facebook can be a waste of time only if we are not mindful, so we need to learn the literacy of attention. The plan is to get people to know how to use information provided by digital technology properly. Improving crap detection skills will help in retaining the good info and filtering out the bad info. We have to think about what we are doing and why we are doing it in order to be more mindful.
Technology has become so prevalent in todays society that there really is not much to do that does not involve the Internet. Many students do their homework on the Internet and even when your not doing school work you’re surfing the web. Usually when I’m on the Internet I get distracted by websites that capture my attention. Social networking sites such, as twitter and Facebook are always up and running when I am on my computer. Other sites that grab my attention are YouTube and Pandora. I also enjoy watching new clips on sites such as cnn, msnbc, and abc. These sites are very distracting when I am trying to get work done. I usually bounce between sites and that causes my train of thought to be disturbed. For example, when I am at my history lecture or my CGS lecture I find myself checking my twitter account repeatedly. Usually when I need to really concentrate on schoolwork, for example exams, I disable my Facebook and twitter. This limits the distractions to a minimum.
ReplyDeleteContinuing on, I am going to use Grant Davies constituents of rhetoric to analyze
Reingold's introduction. Exigence is defined as an issue, problem, or situation that causes or prompts someone to write or speak. The exigence in this piece is that technology can be misleading and distracting. There is no way to evade the Internet. A personal example of this is that right now I am trying to do my homework and view my twitter account at the same time. It is a distraction, and if it didn’t exist I probably would have had this assignment done hours ago. The discourse is that we need to be able to focus our attention on things that are important, not unnecessary such as twitter. Reingold is trying to reach out to an audience that consists of concerned parents, worried students, and troubled teachers.
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ReplyDeleteWhen I am online on my social networks, I am there to be entertained. My absolute favorite thing to do while I’m online is to look at memes. I have subscribed to a variety of different pages on Facebook that post memes so I know I’m going to get a chuckle whenever I’m online. These pages post memes related to sports, celebrities, and politics, my favorite being the sport-inspired ones. From making fun of Kobe’s knack for not passing the ball to the replacement refs in the NFL, these have it all. Another thing that catches my attention is when people post music or music videos. You can almost guarantee that if someone posts a link to a song on YouTube, I’m clicking it. I have found so many great songs this way, I force myself to do it. Without people posting songs all the time, I believe the variety of music I listen to would be much smaller. You have to keep an open mind and listen to different things, and this helps me do that. Facebook isn’t all good though. Whenever I go on there, someone is always complaining about stuff nobody honestly cares about. I don’t pay attention to people who post statuses just to get attention or for likes. Another thing that angers me is when people update their statuses every 5 minutes and my whole news feed is just full of their statuses. It just is a waste of time reading these statuses, so I often block people who annoy me or delete them from my friends list. This is the main reason I have started to move away from Facebook to Instagram. The only things that are posted to Instagram are photos, so there are no annoying statuses to sift through. I definitely like this better than Facebook since I still can find entertaining things on it without all the crap and drama. Laptops can offer a lot of opportunities for distraction if they are used in class. When I have my laptop in a lecture (which is always), I make sure not to log on to any social networking sights. To be mindful of my attention, I just remind myself that my priority while I’m in class is to learn, not scroll down my news feed. It will cause me to lose focus on what is being discussed and I will not learn anything in that class. I get distracted easily enough already without this added distraction. If I’m looking at my social networks during class, I might as well not have even gone.
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I will use Grant-Davie’s constituents of rhetoric to analyze Reingold’s introduction. The exigence of the piece is to inform people that they need to use the internet, social networks, and the media in the correct ways. They are all good tools, if used incorrectly or at the wrong times, they can do more harm than good. The discourse is needed to teach people to be mindful of how they use social networks and all their components. It can accomplish this by showing negative effects of using the internet at the wrong time or what happens if you focus too much on it. One could become distracted and allow the internet to take over their life. The rhetor is Reingold, who is trying to solve a problem that new, advancing technology presents through his discourse. The role he takes on for the discourse is one of a responsible user of the internet and its resources. He is trying to pass on this responsibility on to his audience. Reingold states in his piece that is target audience is "worried parents, anxious and enthused students, concerned teachers, curious managers, ambitious employees, thoughtful entrepreneurs, reflective online enthusiasts, puzzled policymakers, and technoskeptics who are just trying to cope." A constraint on the introduction is that he has to show people he is an avid user of the internet and social networks without using vocabulary and phrasings that only an expert such as himself could understand, but vocabulary and phrasings that the common internet user can understand.
My phone is the most addicting piece of technology I own- it's everything I need all in one. As far as the Facebook and Twitter phenomena go, I don't have either one. But while I'm in a lecture class, you had better believe that I am texting my boyfriend or that I am looking through Reddit. I usually purposefully distract myself at "appropriate" times, such as when my biology teacher rambles on about a story that is loosely related to the subject of molecules. I realize it's time to stop when I see that she has moved on to the next PowerPoint slide. I know what I should do, which is leave my phone at home, but I cannot bring myself to do it! I always think, "What if something bad happens!" But I could change the setting from vibrate to silent. That way I am not distracted during class by a vibration in my pocket.
ReplyDeleteReinhold's introduction basically wants to let the reader know that they should know how to wisely use the internet with all its media. It can be an informational resource, and it can be hours of distraction. We can blame this technology for why we didn't turn our homework in on time, or for who was one of the best dressed at the Emmy's.
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ReplyDeleteSocial Media has had a huge impact on our present day society. Most people who own a computer have some form of email or blog account. I can’t seem to go five minutes without checking my twitter or facebook and having a smart phone with internet access just fuels my addiction. It has its negatives but overall I think that social media has opened up so many doors and changed the way people interact with each other. When you’re trying to finish an assignment or study, having facebook open in the next tab is generally not a good idea; which is exactly what I am doing at the moment. I love websites like pinterest or tumblr where you scroll through different pictures. These sites are great when I am bored and have nothing to do but can really distract me when I am trying to be productive. I have a very hard time staying on task when I have access to the internet and can go onto these different websites. It is truly amazing how much time I have wasted sitting on a computer going on different blogs accounts and social networking sites. Over summer term I never had a problem with getting distracted in my lecture class because I did not bring my computer to class. Now I prefer taking notes on my computer in lecture classes and I am constantly finding myself checking different sites while the professor is teaching. If you look around the different computer screens in my class you will notice that several other people are doing the same exact thing. I think that limiting the time I spend on different websites would be an effect full way to keep my attention focused on the task at hand. If I only allow myself to take a break when I’m working then I will satisfy my need to know what is going on in the world and be able to continue what I’m doing.
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ReplyDeleteWhen it comes to social media I really don't use anything such as Twitter or Tumblr all I really Use is Facebook and I rarely post any statuses on my Facebook page. Facebook really isn't a distraction I go to Facebook here and there to sometimes talk to friends or just to look at people statuses how they are doing. I mainly like to communicate with my family over in Mexico because calling to Mexico is pretty pricey so instead of paying for an overpriced phone bill I can talk to them on Facebook for free or communicate with them through 0ovoo. I was actually looking at my Facebook page and I noticed that I haven't posted anything on my page since June 11 and the dates after that I've only been tagged in photos and in other posts my friends have posted. What I do check Constantly are Results of soccer games especially when my favorite teams play like Barcelona from Spain or Cruz Azul from Mexico because I'm a soccer fanatic and I like going on websites that Show game highlights or when they show results of the past week when they rate the goals in the Top 10 on ESPN. Also after school I go on Yahoo as soon as I get home and I look through all the news highlights and I like to see what is trending now. What I hate the most now a days is that educations now relies on technology to make certain things like homework more easier for teachers and students. My homework assignments are online and it's very distracting because we have all this power on my fingertips literally that any distraction can happen like going on YouTube and listening to the latest hits or just going on ESPN to check the latest results on our favorite teams or go to Netflix to take a break and watch your favorite show on Netflix. It is very distracting and it really doesn't allow you to get your work done on the time that you wish it would be done. Another thing I've been using the Internet for especially this past weekend was going online through my PlayStation system and playing on line against other people around the world in fact my brother also plays videogames online black ops especially and he likes to play against friends when they can't come over to our house he can just log onto to the Internet on your game system and play with his friends who live across town. When it comes to education like when your trying to do that research paper, instead of going to the library and searching for the information you need for your paper for hours you can just type it up and get your information online all information you need for that research paper. if you need to send a message to someone or communicate yourself to someone instead of the old days of sending a letter, you can just send a simple email or a text message and now you don’t even need a computer to do that anymore but rather from your phone and in those circumstances technology is very useful and I feel like Harold Reingold and the reading from last week Carr, who was wondering whether Google or just this high-technology around this is actually making us stupid because we rely so much on technology to show us information rather than us thinking of the information by our self and challenging ourselves to our mental capabilities that we should be able to do, Instead we have this technology that can give us the answers we are looking for and Even though I don't bring my laptops really to class to I do get distracted by my phone especially in chemistry when I am bored I just pull out my phone and look up the news or just play games to pass the time and really these are my Net habits.
Gille, 0037
ReplyDeleteWhile being overtaken with social media in my everyday life, being involved in everyone else’s business and details about their lives are a “necessity”, as most people would see it. While I’m not all that interested in everyone’s personal, physical, emotional, and relational problems, I’m more attracted to pictures and funny statuses on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. I enjoy the creativity that comes along with the idea of having a Facebook. I can’t really control myself when I have my laptop or cell phone in front of me all the time; the addiction is hard to turn down. Even in class, while I am not as involved in a lecture as I should be, I am tempted to check my latest updates on the social media. I think what I and the whole world needs is a realization that social media isn’t the only thing that keeps the world revolving. There needs to be a break between reality and the internet, because we are all a little guilty of taking it a little far. The fact that I can barely ever focus on homework without having to be talking to someone through my cellphone or the internet, is saying something extravagant. I personally need to learn that I can live without knowing what all my friends and family are doing at all times; I need to begin to focus in on the importance of my education and reality! To overcome this, I need to draw a line between what I need to do at this moment and what can wait for later. Basically, I need to get my priorities in line, before I will be able to fix anything else.
0M08
DeleteI have really never considered the creativity of Facebook and instagram, I myself am more into the gossip side, but that is a personal flaw. I also agree with you that society needs to break away from the claim that the internet has on us. I find myself so involved in it, I will message my parents and they will be just in the other room. The lines are blurry on how much is too much but I think as a society that we are definitely to dependent on the internet and I for one am very guilty of this. I also feel that you have made an effective plan to overcome your internet dependency.
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ReplyDelete0037
ReplyDeleteSocial media as a whole encompasses so many sites, blogs and picture sharing communities but I only actively use three; Instagram Facebook and Twitter. With these three social Media sites I always make it a point to go on them at least once a day, not because I am addicted to them but instead use them as an almost safety blanket when I get bored. I feel like this is because now with smart phones it takes two clicks, five seconds and you can see what Jill ate for lunch. Another reason why these social networking sites are blowing up so quickly and on such a massive scale is because of how little attention needs to be paid to it. Checking any of the three sites I listed is an extremely easy task, just open it up and read maybe an 8 word long blurb or look at a picture. In fact while I’m writing this sentence I am looking at a status update from one of my old teachers.
This brings me to my next point of what I use these sites for; each one has a specific purpose. Instagram is a picture sharing network and that is to see what all my friends are doing and where they are. Facebook is to keep in touch with all the people I’ve met over the years and twitter is to keep me updated on what’s going on in the world. With the people I follow if something big is going on I’m sure I’ll hear about it.
These sites because they are so easy to use and very tempting while in class. This is why I don’t like bringing my laptop to class unless absolutely mandatory. These sites cause such a distraction and are detrimental to my learning.
To examine Reingold’s introduction using Grant-Davie’s mode of rhetorical analysis it calls to break down the piece and figure out the key points. First the exigencies of the piece, why did he right it? I feel this was a warning of sorts to let people know what is happening with social media. To tell people that these sites in fact can be harmful to one’s mind and how distracting they can be. The audience trying to be reached is obviously users of these social media sites but also people affected by others using these sites such as parents or friends. A constraint is that there really is no hard data to back his argument. It is hard to measure in numbers what effect these sites have.
0037
ReplyDeleteWith the technology that is available in the world today, social media plays an important role in the lives of countless individuals. In my own personal life, I rely on social media, such as Facebook, to stay in contact with my family, friends, and also to follow my favorite celebrities. I deeply enjoy scrolling down the main wall, laughing hysterically at funny posts and memes. To be honest though, I don’t even check online social media that often because it proves to be highly repetitive and it doesn’t seem that interesting to me to know exactly when someone went to mow his or her lawn. Over the few years that Facebook has been around, I have noticed how it has taken an unhealthy control of some of the lives of my friends. I attempt to diminish its effect on my own life by minimizing the amount of time I spend on it. I usually never bring my laptop to lectures because it will most likely prove to be more of a distraction then an aid to my work. For me, writing my notes with a pen and paper helps me to remember the information I am learning. If there is truly a compelling need to surf the web during a lecture, then my iPhone comes in handy.
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For the second part of this blog posting, I will use what I have learned from Grant-Davie’s Rhetorical Situations and Their Constituents to generate a rhetorical analysis of Reinhold’s introduction. When I first read the introduction, I immediately thought of Nicholas Carr’s article, Is Google Making Us Stupid? With this in mind, Reinhold’s major components were easy to recognize. To discover the exigence, I believe that we all need to ask ourselves this one essential question: Why was the Internet developed? The key to this question is that great power comes with great responsibility. It is up to us, the individuals who possess the power of the Internet, to use it wisely as a tool for the further development of one’s self. With all of the information available to us on the Internet, it provides the circumstances for innumerable constraints. From social media to online gaming, there are quite a few distractions that altar our view of how we should use the Internet. The discourse of Reinhold’s main point is enforcing the idea that people need to learn how to use the Internet to the best of their abilities. His instructions task readers to exercise their integrity and receptivity in the best manner possible. The audience of Reinhold’s piece includes parents, students, employers, and all other individuals who have access to the power of the Internet. From an external point of view, the negative effects of social media greatly overpower its positive aspects. Some individuals spend so much time online that they completely lose their personal face-to-face interaction skills. It is mind-boggling to me to think how people can be sucked into a dark and endless world of social media, when there are so many more interesting things to do outside their own door. If you consider the path of human history, it is quite pathetic that we have succumbed to such a pointless and unnecessary material object. The human race was able to survive the horrors of the Black Death, but the important question is what will be left of us as social media gradually takes an uncertain control of one of our most basic skills: communication.
Brandon Jones 0037
ReplyDeleteWhenever I am using the internet, I almost always get distracted from the eye –catching headlines on my homepage, “msn.com”. Even when doing this assignment, it’s easy to get distracted when seeing something like, “Guns sell for $504,000 at auction.” When using social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter, the things that catch my attention and most of everyone else’s are the subject that involve the most controversy. You are more inclined to look at something that is evoking emotions from your friends and it almost always causing a negative response. Other times, people are often discussing subjects dealing with pop culture or what’s happening in the news currently within a social network. That usually seems like a green light for others to voice their opinions, so it’s always interesting to see what others think. I guess the activity that catches my attention the most is discussing what happens in the real world amongst my peers. This usually happens when someone on Facebook posts a status that poses a question and asks for responses to that particular question. When seeing any headlines dealing with sports or pop culture it immediately draws my attention. When I am at a lecture and my laptop is open, I try to pay attention by not looking at my computer and shutting down any internet windows that are open. I do not pay attention when I get bored and I start to surf the web while half-listening to the lecturer. To combat these distractions, I can try to shut the internet off when I am not using it and hold off reading articles on the web by setting a time later when I can go back and view them.
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Grant-Davie’s first argument states that he believes that exigence is the motivating force behind a discourse and that it requires a more comprehensive analysis. Reingold states that “The mindful use digital media doesn’t happen automatically. Thinking about what you are doing and why you are doing it instead of going through the motions is fundamental to the definition of the mindful, whether you are deciding to follow someone on Twitter, shutting the lid of your laptop in class, looking up from your Blackberry in a meeting, or consciously deciding what links not to click.” Reingold is trying to get us to develop more ways to be aware of what we are doing online. Grant-Davie is essentially doing the same, although more broadly by asking us ‘what is the point of what we are doing? Why? What is the purpose?’ Both authors are essentially asking for us to be more aware and Reingold wants us to use the internet more responsibly. It almost reminds me of Nicolas Carr’s “Is Google Making Us Stupid” in that they both might agree that the internet is a tool that can hinder or help us. However, Carr seems to look down the internet and Reingold seems to call for more use of its sophisticated functions. It’s like he commissions us to spend less time reading about gossip and checking the scores and use more time using the internet’s tools for research, knowledge and improving our intelligence.
ENC 0119
ReplyDeleteI often find myelf scrolling through several social media sites only to find out the most irrelevant and useless data. Countless terrabytes of useless data are scrolled through and brieflly read by me on a daily basis.This time is often used when I should be fulfilling other obligations, such as homework.Social networking sites or youtube tend to have the bulk of my attention when my laptop is open. In the end about half of my attention is actually being spent on the actual assignment. This is most of the time reflected in my grades.which arent bad, but they are not up to par.
When I am in lectures and my laptop is open, i may or may not be active within the class. If I feel that the class lecture is trivial and or i will not need the information than my time on the laptop will be spent doing other tasks completely unrelated to the class. This will drive my attention away from the professor giving the lecture and towards someone who may be posting about how bad their day was. However if my attention is fully focused on the lecture than i will be actively taking notes on word or possibly audio-recording the lecture as I type. I may often be doing in depth research into what the teacher is talking about so that I may have a better understanding of the subject.
To actually be mindful of what I am doing I would actually have to block myself from these social networking sites. This would allow me to be more active in typing up notess rather than browsing the web for pointless bits of information. Once I see that I am restricted from these sites my mind will be free to come back to the lecture and become active within it as well as focused on the topic.
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Reingold's Exigence revolves around the idea that people tend to spend most of their time on the internet, putting aside most of the tasks at hand that must be accomplished. Reingold goes on to state that this is an okay thing to do, but suggests that one does what they should to be mindful of how much time they are using to do so. This article can be seen as a rhetoric for those who spend too much time on the internet and not doing the tasks set fourth for them.This can be seen by Grant-Davies definition of a rhetoric. Because of this exigence set fourth by Reingold, one could infer that Reingold sees that too much time is being spent on the internet in a time wasting manner.
00M0
ReplyDeleteI rarely use social media. The sites I visit the most are instagram and Twitter. The activities that capture my attention the most on these sites are things my friends post going on in their lives or quotes. The other main posts on Twitter are comical tweets, other than that I'm not usually interested. For this reason I deleted my Facebook. I don't like knowing what people are doing or thinking 24/7. My attention to comical and informative posts are only to read it once and not spend so much time on it. I find myself browsing when I'm bored, not just for the fun of it. The pictures that catch my attention are tattoos, couple photos, and hilarious posts by my friends. I follow only my friends I want to keep in touch with or people who often post something that make me laugh. If someone is always negative I usually unfollow.
During a lecture if my laptop is open my attention is usually on Amazon.com shopping to find something I need or want for a cheap price. I'll always find myself on that site if I understand a course already. To be more mindful where my attention is focused I could close my laptop in class rather than having it open. I would be forced to then pay attention rather than browsing, unless my ADD kicks in and I begin to catch every movement in the room. Then in tho case, another source would had amy attention.
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Haas and Flower focused on the differences between people who have been reading for a long while and college students like me. When using the rhetorical strategies the students were able to understand it but not really familiar with the purpose, and the more experienced ones were able to use the strategies and seemed to be more familiar with it. The content strategy focused on what the text was saying and the functional strategy was looking for the purpose. If using Reingold's introduction the same thing would have happened if they could read the text. Reingold presented his exigence as informational: how to use social media for the better. In his research he had everything listed out to make it simpler.
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For my second portion I Will be using Grant-Davie's rhetorical situations and their constituents to Examine this introduction. The audience in this introduction are stated directly in which he includes the younger generation who go online and are more technologically capable and also the parents of that young generation. This introduction also reaches out to the elderly who are afraid of this new technology because they never had it when they were younger and think it’s the devil. It also includes the business sector and how they are able to incorporate their business and go online where they are using this utility as a way to expand and bring in more customers. In this introduction I think the author wanted to make his audience aware that one needs to be more aware and pay more attention to the information presented to us on online that way which we can filter out the good information from the bad information , he called it calibrating your crap detector. This introduction was Delivered by the rhetor or who tries to give us some tips in which one can benefit from so we can adjust to this advancement in technology he called These the Five Literacies which include attention, participation, collaboration, the critical consumption of information and the networks smarts and in his mind he believes that through this when people obtain these five Literacies , basically a utopia can emerge with healthy new economies, politics, societies, and through this new cultures can also emerge. The only possible constraints I can think about are critics who believe that this technology is making society better and others who may argue that it is hurting us today.
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I typically use the internet as a reference tool but I am accustomed to implementing the web to experience new media as it unfolds as well. Whether I am looking up a new concept or re-reading an article for a class assignment, I always try to soak up every crucial bit of knowledge and wisdom the online world has to offer. Counter-productive habits among the likes of endless YouTube viewing and sifting through one dull meme after another, do not appeal to me. I have no disrespect, some YouTube videos are well thought out and rather clever. For a website to grab my attention and keep it, I feel it must have some intellectual worth. I just want to learn, not waste my time. Often, the most engaging activities in which I become involved retain my attention the best. If I join a discussion or take time out of my day and listen to a newly released song, I feel I have achieved a sense of personal growth from the preceding moment. This feeling pushes me to use the full extent of my knowledge, previously learned or even just picked up, to do the best I can. My attention becomes focused and I achieve what I set out to accomplish. When my laptop is with me in class I leave it open, but only for reference. I get distracted rather easily and would prefer to listen to the lecture and keep all of my attention on retaining the material covered. Being more mindful of my attention in online spaces would require me to limit my distractions and focus more on the meaning and rhetorical contexts of the situation.
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ReplyDeleteWhen I am using Tumblr the things that grab my attention are very different from the things that grab my attention on facebook or Twitter. While I’m on Tumblr, I am usually drawn to posts that have a political base or that have pictures or gifs in them. Many people on Tumblr use gifs to convey emotions rather than expressing them through text. So when I see a post that has a string of gifs or photos attached to them I am more interested in the post, especially if the pictures are humorous. However, when on facebook, it is almost the exact opposite. I avoid pictures and usually only focus on the statuses and posts of my close friends. The way I communicate differs as well. I am much more active in communicating with others via Tumblr than Facebook or Twitter, where I don’t really communicate with others at all. I find it considerably easier to convey my ideas and feelings through Tumblr because the rules of communication are a lot more flexible there than other social networks of which I am a part.
I try to avoid using my laptop in class. I am easily distracted during lectures I do not find engaging to begin with. I can find myself drifting in my own thoughts, so using my computer during lectures is not a particularly good idea.
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Reingold’s piece reminded me of Carr’s bit about technology changing the way our brains work. Reingold addresses the role of technology and its effect of rhetorical situations. He begins by acknowledging the audience right away, letting the reader know just who his intended audience is. This will help the reader understand why he writes the way he does and shows the influence of the audience.
Online literacies differ greatly from print literacy, in my experience. The net has warped our method of communication through various way, shortening the character count, being able to post pictures in lieu of textual responses. For example, I am much more apt to respond to others through Tumblr, where my responses can vary from serious to extremely sarcastic and the overall response from the Tumblr community is still unpredictable. I really enjoy that aspect of online communication. However, communication via Facebook and Twitter are not the same for me. I tend to avoid communicating through Facebook because, oddly enough, it seems much more formal than what I am used to. I feel rather boxed in when I am using Facebook or Twitter because of the character count and because I personally know the people that will be reading my postings. I feel that I have to hold back what I would normally say and censor myself, which is constantly irritating. The rhetorical situations that I find myself in in the Tumblr community are more vibrant and considerably more fun to engage in than the situations that exist in the bland world of Facebook. The constraints are more positive than negative and the audience is one that I find myself more comfortable with than my audience on Facebook.
oMo8
ReplyDeleteI’ve always recognized the fact that I tend to be very cyclical on my use of social media, particularly during my high school days and early college years. Now, I feel that I have reached a sort of equilibrium. At some points in my past, I was always on facebook, constantly posting on my friends walls, checking out their posts – this was before the days of the news feed. Then there were instances where I would shut down my facebook account entirely, for several weeks at a time, to get off the grid. Facebook was once described to me as a way for you to find out about your friends, without actually having to talk to them. So in a way, it’s almost a crutch for the anti-social. Now, I mostly utilize facebook as an instant messenger, with facebook having taken the place of AIM (AOL instant messenger). The same can be said for my vk account (the Russian version of Facebook). Another reason for using the messenger, rather than posting on their walls, is issues with privacy. It has nothing to do with paranoia – for if I truly felt that way, I would not be posting online at all – rather, I feel no need to broadcast my thoughts to the rest of the world. I tend to tailor the wording of the conversation to a very specific audience, usually a single person . Something that you are unable to do with a public posting. Also, when I send a message to a friend, I always make sure that what I tell that one person, I would not mind if it went public. The character of Ms. Maudie in To Kill a Mockingbird, makes a very poignant statement that I think is relevant to today’s environment of social media. It is something that I remember to this day. She states, “Atticus Finch is the same in his house as he is on the streets.” As for some of the other prominent social media sites, it depends upon the service. I hold instagram in the same light that I hold twitter, a service that I don’t see any need for. I take a look at reddit, imgr, and 4chan about every other week.
The exigence for this piece is to make people aware of their use of the internet since it is so prevelant. The message has to deal with the prevalent use of technology in our lives. Reingold has several target audiences. Among them are the older generation who doesn’t know how to utilize this technology, educators, younger people, and adults who need to focus.
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Reingold is trying to convey an exigence that one needs to understand their personal communication practices. He intends for his audience to take an introspective look at themselves and determine what compels them to engage in social media via attention. The audience will then determine whether or not they in fact received the message and interpreted correctly.
After reviewing my own personal role in social media, I have realized the things that attract my attention most are issues dealing with sports, music, and occasionally I will take a look at news breaking current events. The social networks that usually catch most of my attention are Facebook and Twitter. Although they are both similar in concept with many of the same capabilities, I feel as each specific network serves its own individual purpose. For example, I seem to use Facebook to stay in touch an up to date with a wider scale of family and friends as appose to Twitter where I only really follow the people that I find most interesting. This group of people often consists of close friends, inspiring celebrities, comedians, or simply acquaintances that live eventful lives. There are many people I am Facebook friends with that I don’t follow on Twitter partially because I don’t find their lives or the things they have to say as interesting. On Twitter people are a lot more personal and their posts are a lot more current. People seem to tweet a lot more than they post on Facebook. In terms of distractions, one that has recently caught my attention in social media is Instagram. My tendencies on Instagram are very similar to that of Twitter being that I only stay informed with the people that interest me. Like Twitter, Instagram is a more current and personal network that gives users the ability to specifically narrow down and choose who they want to follow. A lot times I will follow friends or possibly photographers that share pictures relevant to my interests. From time to time, I will also find myself reading articles on MSN or AOL when I check my mail. Sometimes I will read the entire article, but usually I skim through to the good parts. When in class or listening to a lecture, I never like to bring my laptop unless I am specifically asked because I am easily sidetracked by anything and everything other than what I am supposed to be doing. I can usually find some reason to not be paying attention so bring my laptop to class is a no go. When it comes time to get work done I like to turn off my phone and unplug my internet connection so I can focus directly on the task at hand. This way I seem to be more efficient and effective in completing my work.
ReplyDeleteThrough analysis and speculation of the arguments by Hass, Flower’s, and Grant-Davies I believe the most effective way to fully understand Reingold’s piece is to use Grant-Davie’s constituents of rhetorical situations. By organizing his introduction in means of exigence, rhetors, audience, and constraints it is much easier to accumulate an understanding for the piece as a whole. It seems as if his first point of action is to explain the need for mindfulness when searching the web. He believes that awareness is a “prerequisite to detection” and understanding. We must be aware that some of the information we find across the web may at times be helpful but also misleading. He wants us as readers to understand that because there is such an easy access to a wide variety of information we must be mindful in what we believe. As the main rhetor of his introduction, Reingold goes on to break down his piece into five distinct literacies. He expounds upon the importance of attention, participation, collaboration, the vital consumption of information and network smarts to a wide variety of audinces including people of all age groups, along with businessmen and educators. He notes that society will often look for any given opportunity to draw astray from the original task of what their actually suppose to be doing.