Fourth Set - Communities and Connection

This is a list of the last set of presentations:

Wikipedia (Louis, Andrew, Danica)
Twitter (Jared, Joshua, Tyler)
World of Warcraft (Claire, Jennifer)
Augmented COmmunication (Dieu, Anna)
Linked in (Minhtrang, Wen)
YouTube (Mitchell, Amanda)
Facebook (Jocelyn, Elaina)
Groupon (Steven, Kristina)
Skype (James)

Third Set

This a list of the third set of presentations (Education and Learning)

Rosetta Stone (Louis, Andrew)
Baby Einstein (Jared, Jennifer)
Smartboard (Claire, Elaina)
ExmoBaby (Dieu, Anna)
Lumus (Minhtrang, Wen)
Adobe Connect (Joshua, Jocelyn Steven)
Gameification (James, Kristina)
Edmoto (Danica, Tyler)
Cellphones (Mitchell, Amanda)

Sherry Turkle featured on SourceFed!

Exmobaby

Please see our presentations on Exmobaby in the following videos:

The Pros:




The Cons:

Adobe Connect

Adobe Connect is a web conferencing software that allows people to host meetings, teach classes, consult with remote colleagues, invite outside experts into your class, and provide online training for users.

Watch us play with Adobe Connect:

Thinking about the readings:

I was able to find a few passages in Turkle’s Alone Together, that deal with multitasking and its growing relevance to modern society. Some believe that multitasking is “the crucial skill” for working and learning in this digital age, and that traditional teaching methods “hamper student learning.” Regardless, studies consistently show that multitasking actually reduces efficiency and productivity and that students who busy themselves with other things during class often don’t do as well as students who leave their computers at home.

- Jocelyn

Sherry Turkle writes in Alone Together that that new technologies can bring on anxieties and disconnection. With technology, we have the ability to place people away into varying ranges of intimacy. If phone calls are too intimate, text offers a better solution. If face-to-face interaction is too personal, then we have Adobe Connect and other web conferencing tools to allow us to separate. We honestly don't know what each other are doing while we web conference, which can cause us to question if we really are communicating. As admitted through first hand accounts in Alone Together, people can't even focus on a web conference without seeking out email or Facebook, making the conversation disconnected. (Turkle 13-17). Nicholas Carr writes that because of technologies ability to monitor our life and to send us reminders and notifications, we actually want to be interrupted. "We crave the new even when we know that 'the new is often more trivial than essential' "(Carr 133-134). Therefore Adobe Connect causes a social disconnect by allowing us to keep people at comfortable distances and by allowing us to grant our needs for new data income (notifications, alerts, reminders, etc.) to make us feel satisfied and at peace.

- Steven

In Rewired, Rosen states, “The stark reality is that today’s kids just can’t do one task without wanting to do a bunch of other things at the same time. It’s a way of life for them. The natural inclination to multitask in these young kids probably has many sources, including the cool, dazzling, multifunctional new devices that permit and encourage multitasking. What might this constant need for multitasking mean to parents and educators? For one thing, it could mean that long cherished demand for improving learning and raising grades . . . simply might not work anymore.” The world of technology is constantly changing, and education needs to keep up with it. Adobe Connect supports a wide range of media content, which can enable a sort of multitasking, and can generally improve interest. I think that Adobe Connect offers a great, interactive experience that can take the learning style of modern day kids into consideration.

- Joshua

NOT COOL Instagram Presentation

Not Cool Presentation

Instagram is a social media app focusing pictures. Users can upload pictures from their phone or take pictures through the app itself to share with their followers. Negatives of the app include logistical problems such as the 2"x2" photo grid, limited filters and inability to format multiple pictures into one image. And while there is a way to flag unsavory content, younger users can still easily access inappropriate images of things like illegal drug use and people practicing self-harm. There is also the potential for users to develop a skewed perception of themselves based on others' approving of their self image. If a teenage girl looks on the popular page and sees the skinny bikini model with 300 likes, while their smiling self portrait only received 15 likes, then our young teen will start to associate social acceptance with being a certain weight, having a certain style, or even being willing to expose themselves in more mature ways. While I personally LOVE this app, I recognize its drawbacks and realize that this push towards a more visual form of social media will have a huge impact on how we view ourselves and others.

Instagram "Not Cool" Prezi

What is Google Wallet?

What's cool?

Google Wallet is the wallet for the 21^st century.   Incorporating all the ways we spend money today into one, easy to use application, this technology will grow fast and has much potential.  The Google Wallet application has the ability to store rewards cards, works as an online shopping account (similar to PayPal®), and syncs automatically with Google Offers. 

Rewards cards can quickly add up in a “normal” wallet depending on the person, and especially for the everyday mom.  Putting rewards all in one electronic location makes them much more manageable and accessible.  The online shopping account differs from PayPal® in that it pulls funds directly from your Google Wallet account, allowing all of your purchases, online and offline, to stay in one location—the palm of your hand.  Google Offers is a complimentary service that provides users with relevant discounts and coupons presented by merchants.  Rather than searching for coupons in magazines or missing in store deals by a few hours or days, you can relax with Google Offers, which shows you deals and coupons relevant to your proximity to stores.   If you take a vacation to Destin, Florida, you’ll be offered deals from stores in that location, only for the time of your stay.  Also, the application for Google Wallet locks with a PIN number, and Google argues that their wallet is safer than the leather one in the seat of our pants or purses.

Google Wallet incorporates every facet of the purchasing experience into one location, allowing us to stop multitasking. In Rewired, Larry Rosen maintains that the current thought today amongst psychologists is that multitasking is bad.  It slows down our task completion rate. Google wallet is a good example of a piece of technology that helps us cut back on our multitasking; because it cuts back on the need for so many different ways of processing purchases, shopping is now much simpler and free of multitasking.

-Louis Anzalone

What's not cool?

Even though Google Wallet seems like a great convenience, it is currently a very limited technology in the United States, and there are potential social implications impending widespread usage.

As it stands now (20 Mar 12), there are only twenty-three vendors that accept Google Wallet listed on the official website.  None of these vendors are Single-Tap Merchants either.  This means that the Google Offers features of the program are not accepted anywhere in our city.  In addition to having trouble finding places to use Google Wallet, it is only compatible with one phone on the American market—the Nexus S 4G by Sprint.  This is a relatively new phone on the market having been released less than a year ago.  Limiting this technology even further are the limited payment options. The only two types of accounts you can link to your Google account are Citi MasterCard and pre-paid accounts held by Google. I think that these limitations combined really diminish the effect that Google Wallet can have in its current stage.  Google is making efforts to work around all of these issues already, so they are only temporary and not the main focus of the negative argument.

It is much more important to consider how Google Wallet will impact our daily life if it is widely implemented.  The concept of numbers is a very important step in human development. Wolf speaks of it briefly when talking how it is related to learning to read in Proust and the Squid. It is required for abstract thought about math.  Without a firm grap of this concept, everything from counting to using equations becomes almost impossible.  Children grasp the concept of numbers through hands on interaction with counting.  If you can count objects in one group and add them to the count of another group, you can perform addition. If you can see and count ten objects, you can imagine ten groups of ten objects each or multiplication. Google Wallet removes the need for counting physical money.  If children would start using this technology before they have a firm grasp on the concept of number, it could greatly impair their mental math skills. The other main concern with the app is that this app will increase a "have verses have-not" trend seen in society today.  Can you imagine the last time you had to wait behind someone writing a check? It seemed like it took an eternity because we have become so used to quick, electronic transactions. The swiftness of electronic transactions has prompted many retailers to stop accepting checks completely. This technology has the potential to replace debit cards. There are many reasons why Near Field Communications readers will be preferred over credit card swipes. There are no moving parts and no chance of getting an inaccurate read, for instance.  Because NFC will only be available on smart phones, there is a great portion of the population who will not be able to use this technology.  What would happen if vendors started only accepting NFC devices? 


-Andrew Griffin