I Googled Myself and This is What Happened...

After hearing everyone present their blogs yesterday in class, I heard a lot of people talk about how when they were younger they would always Google themselves for fun. Nowadays it is not considered fun or cool if you have the most information about you on the internet.

I haven't Googled myself in while so I reluctantly thought I would give it a go. The first place I looked was Google Images and there were a decent amount of photos of myself of pictures I posted on Instagram, LinkedIn, Twitter, YouTube thumbnails and even an old picture of my mom and I from an article I wrote about her awhile back. I was not surprised to see these pictures pop up because I know I post pictures of me on Facebook and Instagram all the time so no wonder why I would see some of them on here.

Then I just regularly Googled myself to see what websites would come up and this is where it got a little bit weird...

As I was scrolling I came across a website called MyLife.com. Before clicking into it, it had said "Background Information Found on Leah Hershberger, Haddonfield NJ". So I obviously had to click on it because I had never heard of this website before and I was genuinely worried about what "background information" they had on me. 

It knew where I was from, how old I was and even told me what my online reputation score was. I'm still not quite sure what that means but my rating was a 3.25/5. On the right hand column there was a tab saying "Leah's Criminal Records". Now I know for sure that I do not have a criminal record so this made me think they made one up or they just want me to click on it to see if I in fact have any or not. I clicked it and sure enough it wanted me to pay a large chunk of money to view "private" information on me. They also stated that the number of other websites that know all of my information is pretty high, almost too high. This made me worry because I would have never known about this website if I did not Google myself in the first place.

I did another Google search on this website and came across an article written by Fox13Now.com.  

They wrote about how a woman found this website with her name, address, email and her profile picture was a photo of her three year old daughter. I know right? So scary.

According to Fox, "In 2008, the site now known as classmates.com faced a class action lawsuit accusing the company of false advertising and deceptive marketing. Tinsley settled, paying $9.5 million. Then again in 2011, the site now known as MyLife.com faced another class action suit claiming they were using similar tactics under a new name, but that suit was later dismissed". 

From now on I am going to be very careful with what I put out there on the internet because websites like this one is not a joke and it's real. Do you dare to Google yourself now?

My Blogging Experience

Blogging has changed the world of mass communication in many different ways.

Personal blogging (or personal homepages) started back in 1994 with the first blog being written by a college student. Soon after in 1998 the first news blog post was written on “Hurricane Bonnie” and the damage it caused on both North and South Carolina.

Around this time in 1994-1999 there were only 23 blog pages in total on the internet and when we think about how many there are today, there are probably thousands maybe even millions out there. Nowadays people blog about anything they feel like including topics like fashion, news, haircare, sports, travel, lifestyle and so much more.

Because of the easy access we have to websites like Blogger, Wix and Wordpress, they make it simple to create your own blog and write whatever you want on it. Blogs are very popular these days because of the wide range of people who blog on a daily basis.

This is one reason why blogging has changed communications because of the idea that anyone can do it if they have a passion for it. Once you have a couple blog posts up, you have essentially created your own website which can then turn into your own personal business.

I urge everyone to at least try blogging at some point in their life. I have grown up watching YouTube and reading some of the blogs that my favorite YouTube influencers have written and I remember thinking that one day I want to write a blog on my travels or my everyday life because I thought it would be fun and interesting.

After taking this class I realized that I actually like blogging a lot especially about things that are happening in the news because it keeps me up to date while also sharing my opinions with everyone. Because I consider myself to be a fairly shy person, I wish I would have started blogging earlier in life because throughout this semester I have found myself being a more opinionated and informed student which has helped me in all of my classes.

I cannot wait to continue blogging and expressing my thoughts and opinions on here so I
hope you stick around!

Group #4: Theories

Last week in class we had four PowerPoint presentations on concepts including: Awareness, Media-sphere, Theories and Policy. For this blog post I will discussing the key terms that group number three talked about. 

To start off, the first idea this group talked about is the "the tendency to believe information to be correct after repeated exposure". We sometimes tend to believe repeated false news that is so ridiculous and untrue and we are not quite sure why we believe it in the first place. The example that they talked about was Donald Trump and "fake news" that surrounds his presidency and then they explained the evaluation of the validity of fake news. 

The next term was Confirmation Bias which occurs when an individual looks for and uses information and ideas to support their belief or when we really want certain ideas to be true. After researching on my own examples of confirmation bias I found that it is when two people have very different or opposing opinions, based on their beliefs, that are related to the same subject.

After talking about confirmation bias, the class learned what Gatekeeping is. Gatekeeping is the process through which information is filtered. This means gatekeeping is another way of surveilling and monitoring information and data individuals have.

Agenda Setting describes a powerful influence of the media and the ability to tell us what issues are important and which are not. This tends to be common in political campaigns because the media may not be effective in swaying public support towards or against a particular issue or candidate.

Next was Overton Window which is a spectrum of ideas on political issues that the public can understand and agree on. An example that this group had talked about is Gay marriage. They said that an idea like this will never happen or become legal but the window of people for or against gay marriage shifts and changes with every political person in power.

Lastly group number four talked about the Spiral of Silence. This is made up of three components - 1. Your “Sixth Sense” 2. Fear of Social Isolation 3. Hesitant to Express.

Pretty much every term and theory this group talked about was new to me and I enjoyed listening to their presentation and learning new things along the way.

Is Your Privacy Even Private Anymore?

Most of us know that what we do online is not private nowadays and that everything we post, like and comment on will be there forever even if you delete them. But do you know how much of your life, outside of social media is being tracked and recorded on a daily basis...?

There is something called an "Electronic Tattoo" which basically means that people from all around the world are watching what you do online through the things you post and share on any social media platform. You are essentially leaving digital footprints behind that shape your online reputation.

While watching one of the Ted Talks on our class blog website, I learned that police officers are also taking away our right to privacy. In America, officers are tracking people's cars even if the person driving has done absolutely nothing wrong. They are scanning and taking photographs of the car and license plates of where people are going and who else is in the car with them. Police officers then store the photograph in their file just in case they need to use it against the person in the future. International Business Times wrote, "the information can reveal personal information, such as where you go to church, what doctors you visit and where you sleep at night" (IBT.com).

If you thought that was scary, think about how much you use your phone on a daily basis. Our cellphones are wired for surveillance first before anything else. When you are on your phone, making phone calls or just scrolling through social media, someone or something is most likely watching what you do and listening to your private conversations.

We lost the idea of privacy when we started using apps like Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat and even when we started using smartphones in general since everything we do is recorded and saved forever. So what do you think? Do you think the billions of people in the U.S. should continue to use phones that are wiretap friendly or not?

Here are the links to Ted Talks I referred to above:

• https://www.ted.com/talks/juan_enriquez_how_to_think_about_digital_tattoos?language=en
• https://www.ted.com/talks/catherine_crump_the_small_and_surprisingly_dangerous_detail_the_police_track_about_you
• https://www.ted.com/talks/christopher_soghoian_a_brief_history_of_phone_wiretapping_and_how_to_avoid_it?referrer=playlist-big_solutions_using_cell_phone#t-69174
• 
  

Total Information Awareness: Good or Bad?

Have you ever wondered if anyone has information on you that you do not know about? Well the Total Information Awareness (TIA) program does. 

The TIA is a branch of the Department of Defense based on pulling together as much information as possible on as many people as possible into an "ultra-large-scale" database. That information is then available for the government officials to look at in order to identify terrorists. The TIA is the closest program there is to a true "Big Brother" because there are people who watch pretty much everything you do all the time.

TIA is run by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency that works on military research. Government records of individuals' medical and financial records, political beliefs, travel history, prescriptions, buying habits, school records, and all ways of communication including social media, phone calls and emails. 

A lot of people do not like this program because of the lack of privacy. Almost everything we do online and in real life is tracked and recorded for government officials to look at. The TIA holds a tremendous amount of power over all United States individuals. Total Information Awareness damages American Freedom because innocent people will be considered suspects without ever being able to clear their name for something they did not even do. 

I think the TIA can be a very good thing at times by protecting our country from terrorists, but it can also be a scary program because of the loss of privacy and the uneasiness individuals feel towards teh TIA. 

How Much of a Digital Footprint Do I Leave Behind?

Have you ever thought about how much information there is about you on social media websites? When you sign up for Facebook, Twitter, Instagram or any other social media platform, you are prompted to submit your full name, email address, a profile picture, and maybe a home address or phone number. This data is then stored online and unless you make your profiles private, everyone is able to see your information.

I admit, I do use social media every single day just like my family and friends do. I wouldn't say that I am the most conscious person when it comes to my profiles because my Instagram, Twitter and Facebook are all public for the world to see. Because of this, I believe that I leave behind a pretty big digital footprint.

My most used social media sites would be YouTube, Instagram and Twitter. I share a lot about myself on YouTube by video taping myself wherever I go, showing off where I am, what I'm doing and who I am with. If I wanted to I could set all my videos to private, but that would defeat the purpose of even posting them in the first place. YouTube can be a bit "sketchy" at times because you don't know exactly who is watching your videos or how they stumbled across your video or channel to begin with.

When it comes to Instagram, I have two accounts. My first account, which I have since about middle school, is my main account that I post often on about for my family and friends to see. My second account is one that I have recently made is strictly for my YouTube channel. I have an Instagram account for YouTube because that way when I post about new videos being published on my channel, I can post a picture to Instagram, add hashtags that are relevant to the video to the caption so that way more people come across my post and then they might be inclined to check out my channel, which helps me gain more subscribers all together.

Now for Twitter, I rarely ever tweet anything unless I am tagging my sister in something I found funny. Mostly I retweet or "like" certain tweets that I find humorous or relatable in some way. Usually I don't find myself on twitter as much I used to in high school because back then everyone was on twitter and that was the main way of finding out gossip, who asked who to prom, or whether or not our high school won their championship football or basketball games.

If you do just a regular search of me name on Google, you will find all of my profile pictures, random photos my parents tagged me in on facebook, an article from a magazine I wrote about my mom, instagram photos, YouTube thumbnails, and so much more.

I believe social media can make people lonely to an extent, especially when you see pictures of your friends or family all together and you feel left out because you didn't get the invite to join them. This has happened to me a few times and for a hour or two it makes me depressed, lonely and makes me almost hate social media because I had to look at something I didn't want to see. But for a lot of other people, they are perfectly happy with everything social media has to offer. Take my step dad for example, he is pretty much obsessed with Facebook and is constantly on it checking out what everyone's latest status is. He has never got tire of it or has gotten depressed over any aspect of it at all, and I don't think he ever will. 

So, what does your digital footprint look like?

The Pros and Cons of YouTube

Roger's Diffusion of Innovations and/or ideas explains how and why technology and and new ideas tend to stick around and how they are all adapted into our everyday lives. Nowadays, there are so many examples of social media apps and different types of technologies that we all use in our everyday lives.
YouTube, an online video sharing website and app, is one out of many of the social media platforms that have grown to be significantly more popular over the last few years. Of course, just like every other social media website, there are some pros and cons as to why someone should or shouldn't use YouTube.

Lets start with the Pros:

1. There is always brand new content uploaded everyday.
2. Anyone can upload videos and potentially start to make money by putting advertisements on your videos.
3. YouTube can be very educational whether that be school related, cooking, driving, or even DYI (do it yourself) related videos. 
4. It is available on every device (iPhone, Android, Windows, etc).
5. There is a feature for parents to block age restricted content for their children. 

And here are the Cons:

1. It can be addicting. You can spend hours on YouTube and not even realize it.
2. Lack of privacy.
3. There is good amount of inappropriate content published on YouTube.
4. Copyright infringement. YouTubers are always dealing with copyright issues when it comes to certain songs or re-using clips from people's videos in their own content.
5. Harsh or inappropriate comments. When posting your own videos you might come across people writing hate in your videos comment section because there are no restrictions or filters when it comes to writing a comment. 

YouTube is made for a wide range of ages, it isn't specifically made for anyone in particular. Kids can watch TV shows on YouTube, teenagers and young adults can watch their favorite YouTubers, teachers can show documentaries or educational videos to their classes, and even parents can watch the Late Late Show or clips from the Ellen Show on YouTube as well. 

I love YouTube and I have been using it for years now. I have seen some of my favorite YouTubers grow up on there and I have gotten to watch their channel grow to the millions of subscribers that they have now. I have my own YouTube Channel , and although I do not have as many subscribers as most people, I make videos because I enjoy it and because it helps me practice my editing and video making skills. 

The Values of Free Expression

In my opinion, the most important Value of Free Expression is Individual Self Fulfillment or Self Actualization. I think this is the most important out of all eight values is because it enables everyone to create their own identity and express themselves however they like to.

In a way, individuals demand self expression as a way to have their ideas be heard and to speak one's mind and if we, as United States citizens couldn't do this, then our country would not be the same as it is today.

The idea of free speech and individuals being able to express themselves freely plays a big role in the use of social media.

Social media, including Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, YouTube and many more are all very large platforms for individuals to go on to say what they want about whoever and whatever. People use at least one of these websites almost every single day because they want to see what President Trump is tweeting or what their family and friends are writing on Facebook. Without freedom of speech, the use of these social media platforms would not exist because there would be no use having them in the first place anymore.

What would happen if you couldn't write what you wanted on your Facebook wall or post a video of yourself on YouTube because you didn't have the right to anymore? Life as we know it would be completely different.

For an in depth article on freedom of speech in social media click here to check what Sara Hawkins has to say about it.

SNL Attacks President Trump?!

Over the last couple months, President Trump has been fighting against people on social media due to the sketches of mocked performances made by Saturday Night Live. A skit, which premiered on February 16, about a national emergency at the Unites States border of Mexico was acted out by Alec Baldwin live on the show. Shortly after, Trump tweeted:

Immediately after he had tweeted this, people angrily wrote back to him telling him that SNL has the right to freedom of speech under the First Amendment as stated in the United States Constitution. SNL is legally allowed to criticize, satirize and denounce political officials, including the President.

My opinion? While I do think a lot of Saturday Night Live's sketches can be very funny and highly entertaining, I also think that some of them can be somewhat offensive to not only President Trump, but other celebrities who have had their names brought up in a few of their skits. I'm not saying that what the show is doing is wrong, but at times some of the things that they air could be seen as disrespectful to a variety of people. That being said, the show is not violating anything under the Constitution, so if you do find the show to be offensive or you aren't interested in what it shows on air, there are other shows that are on and you do not have to watch it, right?

Click here for the link to the original article!

The United States Supreme Court

In class we watched a video on the United States Supreme Court and here are some of the things that I learned from it:

• The Supreme Court remains the most powerful Judicial body on Earth.
• In all of history there have been just over a hundred Supreme Justices, serving an average of sixteen years. 
• During the Marshall years, the new court gained respect as a co-equal branch of government.
• The Dred Scott case was a very important decision that the Supreme Court had to make. 
• Today the Supreme Court Justices look to the Constitution to resolve national problems. 
• The Supreme Court receives more than a hundred new cases every week, and 7,000 a year.

These are just some of the facts and information I learned from watching this video in class. The Supreme Court Justices are the final judge in cases involving the Congress and the Constitution. In all, the Supreme Court Justices is one of the most powerful offices in the Unites States Government and they pretty much determine the future of our nation as a whole. 

Arrested Because of the Pledge of Allegiance?

        I grew up in a school system that taught my classmates and I to say the Pledge of Allegiance every morning which seemed so natural and normal to me. When I saw in the news that an eleven year old boy was arrested for refusing to stand and recite the Pledge of Allegiance, I was completely shocked and honestly very confused.

        This arrest happened on February 4, when a boy from Lawton Chiles Middle Academy in Lakeland, Florida, was suspended and charged with "disrupting a school function and resisting arrest without violence" according to the New York Post, because he believes that the "flag was racist and the anthem was offensive". The mother of the arrested child, told officials that the school should have handled his disciplinary actions, rather than bringing the police into the matter. The sixth graders substitute teacher didn't want to "continue dealing with him" and she said that is the reason why she called the school's main office in the first place.
       Because Alvarez, the substitute teacher, did not know that students aren't required to stand and say the Pledge of Allegiance, she will no longer be able to work at Lawton Chiles Middle Academy or at any of the district's schools, mainly because of the harsh way this whole incident was handled.

Bringing the Constitution to Broadway

       In the fall of 2018, two-time Obie (Off Broadway Theater Award) winner, Heidi Schreck premiered her hit show What the Constitution Means to Me, and now it's getting moved to the big leagues, on Broadway in New York City. Schreck's play focuses primarily on when she was about fifteen years old trying to make enough tuition money for college with the help of her debate speeches about the Constitution and gender in American history. According to The New York Times, Schreck's play "is scheduled to begin previews March 14, to open March 31 and close June 9". In order for this play to apply to its younger audience, everyone under 30 years old only have to pay $30 for a ticket, which is really good for a broadway play! If you're interested in seeing this limited time play, you can check out tickets here!

Live Transcribe

      With over 466 million deaf and/or hard of hearing people in the world Google has finally designed an app just for them.

       Live Transcribe is a brand new speech recognition app for the deaf and hard of hearing that makes it easier to understand and read when people communicate to them.How it works is while the app is open, a person can talk and their words will instantly begin to display on the phone or computer.
      Then the deaf/hard of hearing person can read this and respond either by talking themselves or by typing out their answer directly on the app. Live Transcribe can recognize over 70 languages and it is available for free download on both Iphone's and Androids. Although I myself am not deaf or hard of hearing, I have taken sign language classes all throughout high school and have met and gotten to know a few deaf people during that time. But while taking this class I realized that not all deaf people know sign language and it is sometimes hard for them to read lips especially if you're like me and you sometimes talk way too fast. With this new app, the ability for a deaf and/or hard of hearing person to read lips will not be needed anymore because this app can pick up exactly what the other person is saying and communication between everyone will become more clear and easier to understand.

Click here for the link to the article!

Top 5 Sites

1. BuzzFeed

When it comes to reading about daily news, I always look to BuzzFeed for breaking news, viral trends and celebrity gossip. This website pretty much covers all the latest news updates that I need to know to start my day off. Another reason why this is my go-to site for news is because they also post videos on their YouTube channel. This is very convenient, especially for someone like me who is constantly scrolling on YouTube looking for something new to watch.