How We Use Social Media

            The idea of being able to communicate and interact with people we may have never met from any place in the world without having to leave the confines of our home is a profound concept and it is currently our reality. Social media, like print, was meant for the worldwide spread of ideas but today it seems to have taken on a whole new different purpose.

            Social media sites such as Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, and Twitter do in fact connect people from all over the world but at the same time they work as something similar to an online journal open for the public to see. I think we as a society have grown to be more self-indulgent rather than socially or self aware. When we post on social media sites, it’s not necessarily to inform or inspire others with our ever-so profound thoughts; we are more or less trying to document moments in our lives and hoping to receive recognition from others in order to validate the “coolness” of our lives.

            Though I don’t really post much, I am still guilty of not taking full advantage of social media in order to spread ideas or connect with people around the world but instead use it to fulfill my need to be entertained at any time of day. When I go onto my Facebook, Instagram, or Pinterest, I’m not looking to be educated on current events or participate in an online discussion of ideas; I’m trying to kill time between classes and maybe see what my friends are up to wherever they are. Sometimes I do catch up on current events while I’m on social media but only the ones that are trending on Facebook or Twitter.

            I think social media technologies might replace print as our main source of information because social media sites cater to the individual’s interests. You choose who and what you follow, befriend, like, etc. so in a way it weeds out most of the things that are of no interest to you and sprinkles in items that the people you follow or are friends with are interested or talking about and that becomes the way in which we receive information. Along with this individualized system of information, the visual aspects such as short media clips, images, and memes make social media a more entertaining way for us to stay somewhat informed, which is something that print struggles to do.

The Dangers of Censorship

In my sophomore year of high school, I took my first video editing class. It was held in the computer lab at the very back of the library. At this point, I had never ventured further than the nonfiction section where I would take my mid-morning naps during study hall on the floor between the stacks if the space was unoccupied. So on that first day of class, I boldly entered this new territory and the first thing that catches my eye, aside from the surprising amount of Mac computers that were tucked away in this room unbeknownst to most of the student body, was a big yellow poster tacked on the wall by the projection screen. In big black letters, the poster read: “CENSORSHIP KILLS CREATIVITY.”

           

            Since my first introduction to the idea of censorship existing outside of the realm of turning an explicit song clean for radio airwaves, I have grown to see its truly harmful effects to not just creative works but also our perception of the world. From a creative standpoint, censorship does in fact kill creativity because it can undermine the artist intent or distort the image of reality that the work is originally trying to reflect. I find that the latter more often than not applies to books.

            I’ve noticed a recurring theme that people try to censor is the topic of slavery or racial prejudices. There have been instances where people have wanted to censor Mark Twain’s Huck Finn, Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird, and now even history books. In fact, I came across an image online of a child’s history textbook where African slaves were described as “migrant workers” who came here for working opportunities. In my opinion, this type of censorship is unacceptable.

            I think when we censor works such as these and try to sugarcoat topics such as racism, slavery, etc. we are only cheating ourselves and future generations. These pieces reflect an important part of our American history whose effects still affect us as a nation to this day, and to water it down by wanting to take out the word “nigger” in Huck Finn, banning To Kill a Mockingbird, or twisting the truth of slavery, undermines the struggle and the progress we as Americans have made and specifically that of African Americans.

            Historically, we as Americans have done horrendous things and it may be hard to take sometimes or to understand but we have to know our history, our roots, in order to not make the same mistakes and to simply be better. How are we to move forward, if we don’t know where we’ve been? I believe when censorship is used in this particular way, it has the ability to erase our history for future generations. In that instance, we will not be able to move forward.  And by that definition, censorship not only kills creativity but it can also kill our history.

Book Publishing: Then and Now

Growing up, I’ve always liked to read and now that I’m a senior in college (which is kind of like being an adult but not quite) not much has changed. I love to read, books specifically. I feel as if in this day and age I have to clarify that bit. I love to read books. Not ebooks, pdfs on the computer, Kindle, Nook, or what have you – books with a binding, pages, and a cover. I like to physically hold a book, dog-ear it’s pages, maybe write a few notes in the margins here and there, and prop it on my bookshelf, watching my collection grow before my eyes. But even given my seventeen or so years of being a book-lover, I have never, and I mean never, given any thought as to how a book is actually made.

I, unlike a majority of the class it seemed, did not have the faintest idea of the origins of printing/publishing. Gutten-who? The name rings a bell… But now having read chapters two and three of The Book, I found it interesting his actual involvement with the printing press and how it is often perceived. Though it is often misconstrued that Guttenberg invented the printing press, his biggest contribution to the printing process was not the press itself because those had existed before his time was moveable type. But since moveable type was such a revolutionary concept at the time because it solved the problem of “creating moveable metal type quickly and accurately,” the Guttenberg Press became the top dog of all printing presses essentially.

These chapters also go into great detail about how the press actually worked, which was quite hard to visualize and follow. So when we watched the video in class of the man actually using the press, it definitely made things a lot clearer. Seeing this man use the printing press also made me realize how far we’ve come in terms of printing and publishing technologies. It may be a very generalized thing to take away from the readings but it truly is astounding to see how much effort went into printing one page and then comparing it to something like the espresso book machine, which can print an entire book in minutes. I can only imagine how much further we can innovate the printing and publishing process with the advancement of current technologies.

Reader Interview Synopsis

            For this assignment, I interviewed two people of each gender who varied in age, areas of study, and occupation to get a gage of their reading and social media habits. For the most part, their answers were rather similar with the exception of those that required specific information such as his or her favorite book. But overall based off my findings, I’ve found that people today spend most of their time doing something that is media technology related rather for business or for leisure as opposed to reading or something “unconnected.”

            Out of the four people I interviewed, only one person described himself as someone who generally likes to read while two people described themselves as non-readers, and one stating that it all truly depended on what she was reading at the time. In fact, the amount of time spent reading a book also depended on what was being read by the readers, meaning most of them felt like they could spend as little as thirty minutes to a whole day reading depending on how interesting the material was. But on average, when reading for pleasure, they could read for about 2-3 hours before stopping. In terms of what the readers enjoyed reading varied and reflected the areas of study and or occupations, including online articles, fashion magazines, espionage novels, World War II related books. But it was also clear that the readers didn’t enjoy reading things that qualified as literature, judging by the lack of literature books in their collections, which ranged from none to no more than 10. The readers, with the exception of one, also didn’t enjoy reading poetry, describing the process of reading poetry as something similar to “stabbing myself in the eyes,” and “a bad hernia.” However, when it comes to reading for work or school, the readers generally spent most if not all of their work/study time reading.        

            In terms of the readers’ involvement with social media, it is evident that the readers valued and spent more time online or “connected” than they did reading. The readers spent on average about seven hours a day on the Internet, with a big percentage of that time dedicated to time spent on social media. And when asked how much time did they spend “unconnected” to media technologies, three out of the four interviewees responded when I’m asleep, so roughly 8 hours. Even when it comes down to what their favorite forms of relaxation and entertainment, three out of the four people had the same answers: exercising and streaming video via Netflix.

            So given my findings, I think a majority of people in this generation value social media technologies more so than reading particularly when it comes to leisurely activities. This might be because we more so than not associate reading with work or studying, given that we spend most of our study and work time reading if not all of our time based off my results. But even though we spend more time using social media technologies, we still believe that reading is “stimulating,” “educational,” and “essential.” We may not value reading the same way we do social media these days but we can still recognize its importance.