The Age of A.I.

    The world that is operated through technology on a daily basis is constantly going through rapid changed. From day to day, there are more achievements that technology is making to become even more powerful than what it was yesterday. Although this innovation has generally brought us many good things to our lives, it has also posed a threat to society in ways that no one can imagine. The birth of Artificial Intelligence is starting to become a threat to human intelligence. In the documentary, "In the Age of AI (full documentary) | FRONTLINE", there is a clear demonstration that AI is "changing life as we know it--from jobs to privacy to a growing rivalry between the U.S. and China."

    There is an immense amount of information to take away from the documentary, to start, what stood out to me was the "Sputnik Moment". "The Sputnik Moment", was the wake-up call that the government got that A.I. is a critical thing for the future and that the U.S. needed to catch up and can't let another foreign country, "beat us at our own game".  China was and is approaching at a fast pace with artificial intelligence, and will look to catch up to the U.S. AI by 2025 and take over by 2030. This was surprising information that instantly caught my eye as to how much China has worked with the game of "Go", and how fast they are accelerating. The reason why this was surprising to me was that you always see the U.S. at the top of its game with technology, so to see another country operating at a faster pace, was eye-catching to me, and I'm sure with other viewers of the documentary. Interesting to watch what techniques and strategies this country, China, is working with to bring their Artificial Intelligence to the next level. 

On the other hand, it happens to be a bit frightening knowing that Artificial Intelligence is slowly taking over the world at a fast pace. Will AI be my competition when I enter the workforce? There are cases that are out there, that human intelligence will beat Artificial Intelligence, yet, this is still an intimidating threat that all employers must take into account, for their future. From what I was able to gather from the documentary, and outside research, was that Artificial Intelligence will begin to change the workplace and the work that humans jobs at their workplace. This innovation soon will be the takeover of humans jobs. What we can do to combat this change that is approaching, is to embrace it. Humans across the world are put at a threat with their jobs that will soon be taken over by technology, what can be done is that humans must find new activities that will provide them with the social and mental benefits of the job that they previously had. Companies going forward are going to have to change the way the job is operated by the employee, to prevent them from losing their job. Whether it's removing the mass amount of technology that is utilized, or conducting work that does not rely heavily on media work, precautions must be taken for these employers that have their jobs at stake. A.I. is taking over, and we need to find a way to adjust, adapt, and change.

Instagram through Diffusion of Innovations Theory

    For this blog post, I wanted to select a profound social media platform, and analyze it through the Diffusion of Innovations Theory. The platform that I have selected was Instagram, the reason why I have selected Instagram is that it is such a popular and mainstream platform, and I was curious as to how they built it up to how big it is today.  To dive a little bit into the Diffusion of Innovations Theory, this theory seeks to explain how, why, and at what rate new ideas and technology spread. The theory was invented by Everett Rodgers, Rodgers argued with this innovation, that innovation is communicated over time among the participants in a social system. With that being said, I will begin my exploration on Instagram, among the Diffusion of Innovations Theory. 

    When Instagram made its first entry into the social media world, in October of 2010, the application was a simple usage. Users were able to post pictures, like, comment, and follow other users. The app begins to fall into the innovation stage in April 2012, when Instagram made the biggest change for their platform. Instagram was brought to the Android operating system. This paved the way for a whole new market, which brought about Instagram’s next milestone within that month: 50 million users on the platform. With this, Instagram proved that it was here to stay. This was just the beginning for this social media platform, from this point on, Instagram only got bigger and bigger, pulling in immense amounts of users over the following years. 

    Instagram began to boom. Just the idea for users across the world to be able to share their daily lives through photo and video sharing, made it an irresistible app! Along with posting your own content, you are able to visualize and be other users' shoes. With Instagram, people were able to travel the world and were able to get exposed to a different social world, all in the palm of their hand. This was where everyone was at, Instagra usage spread like wildfire, if you were not on Instagram when its launching began, where were you then? 

    

    Although Instagram is a superb app to use that allows you to connect with friends on the daily and show off your everyday activities, there happens to be a bit of a downfall with that. With people becoming more familiar with the photo sharing ability, and knowing how to operate the camera more, people have started to take it to a new extreme. Lighting, photo effects, fake followers, and buying likes, have all been new implementations that users have been making to bring their account to the next level. People are starting o take pictures of themselves that almost makes them look too good. This has lead to many people comparing themselves to those users. Feeling like they're almost not good enough, constantly putting people down. This downfall has led a lot of mental health issues, with over 1,500 teens and adults having high levels of anxiety, depression, bullying, and FOMO.

    Instagram offers something different with their platform, compared to the other ones out there. The content that is put out on Instagram is more engaging than other platforms like Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook. The visual content is the best way to connect with your followers, and Instagram focuses solely on a high-end visual experience. Giving the user the ability to build their brand image through photos and videos, which is far more effective Facebook or Twitter or any other social media website.With having millions on millions of users that use their app everyday, Instagram continues to dominate the social media world by engaging a variety of audiences. Presenting them the opportunity for being one of, or the, best social media platform in the world. 

    In the case that Instagram has made for themselves, I believe the positives strongly outweigh the negatives. Although the photo sharing has been taken to a new level, where people are constantly comparing themselves to other famous celebrities where they have top of the line effects and lighting, the user is able to see beyond that. Instagram presents the consumer to share their lives in pictures, with high definition exposure. Along with that, you are able to sell yourself to others, and meet other people too. If you are able to see beyond that the people trying to pose their best selves, where in reality, they don't look like that, take Instagram for the great pros that it has to offer, and make something out of it. 

Anti War

    After perusing the websites of Antiwar.com and The American Conservative, I was honestly baffled, not by only the information that was shared on these sites, but that this information, nor these sites, is ever exposed to the world. The first website that I reviewed and dissected was "The American Conservative", and all I thought about was how all the articles and stories that were published, is information that would never be filtered into the everyday news. Articles like "More fog, more war", "The Collapse of Consent in Canada", and "Living in Truth, together", all provided compelling information that provided me different perspectives on how to perceive information, and digest it, when I was able to receive it.  A side that is never shown, unfortunately. This type of website and other websites just like this one will forever stay hidden from the world. The reasoning for why websites and the information that is contained in these websites will be covered is because they contained truth. The media and government are commingled in the sense of them being able to manipulate and create myths about information to make it more enticing for the viewership, and to make the news more dramatic. 

    It is a messed up process that the media and the government tend to do, in that the act of hiding certain information misleads the public of the information that they are receiving, by only framing the issue, and sugarcoating the truth of what is out there. With the sites that I have been exposed to in this course, although some information could be deemed invalid, there is a sense of realism, and truthfulness that is conveyed to the audience, not illustrating cookie-cutter information. They are hiding this type of information from these types of sources because they speak the truth, and sometimes on the media's side, the truth is not what they want to unveil. With mainstream news sites, a majority of that information is skewed and is not fully accurate. You can hop around from different major websites and gain different information on the same story. You need to expand your perspectives and horizons with websites, and check out websites that do not get much light shined on them to see the truth that you are not being exposed to. 

 

In our everyday lives, we are mainly subject to certain websites that go against antiwar voices and news points. The media and journalists have made this world not have an opinion on how they think about war and will continue to hide their viewpoints of antiwar. The U.S. has made absurd amounts of capital with their war efforts, and in the event, the public was exposed to the perspective son antiwar, people will begin to shift the direction of antiwar, which would lead to the U.S. not being wealthy with other war efforts. It is a financial demand that the U.S. is collecting for itself, and it will alter the information that is being conveyed in any shape or form and will continue to hide antiwar viewpoints and activities. 

EOTO Presentation: Email

     For my EOTO presentation, I selected to conduct and present my research on Email. The email, in 1971, was invented and founded by Ray Tomlinson. Tomlinson created the electric mail system on the ARPANET's system, "Advanced Research Projects Agency Network", which was utilized for academic and research purposes, as a techbed for networking technologies. This invention that was made by Ray Tomlinson instantly sparked communication between machines, which made it more convenient and practical to have immediate communication whenever, and wherever. Email started a boom within the communication world. Along with the basics of the email being invented, Tomlinson also was able to create the well know, "@" sign. With the "@" sign, the symbol gave the sender the opportunity to send certain messages, to a certain person. Instead of your email getting lost in a system, the user was able to directly "@" the user they wanted the message to directly be sent, and it was completed. This provided the technological world with an understanding of who their mail was being sent to, and who was sending them mail. 

                                                                            

    The main issue that was present, was related to the sending mail aspect. The main issue that was raised was "when sending a message from one computer to another within a network, how would one indicate where the message was intended to go?". The people that were recently exposed to this new era of communication were unsure of how to contact the users that they wanted to contact. As mentioned previously before, the "@" was the savior for that issue, in that the mail that was being sent was able to include a destination for the message, that was almost as simple as "Username@name of computer". By the year 1976, the @ sign was profoundly used, and the email world utilized the symbol and had a clear understanding of how to use it. 

          The email has had a major impact on how we communicate, day to day. The life of traditional mail is not as present anymore. The new way of sending mail digitally has officially changed how we communicate with one another. The way we pay bills and make payments is a much easier process when it's done through email, the traditional way of sending your bills is severely outdated. An email has made it a smoother process to make our payments in a matter of seconds. It is also quick and efficient, in the event you are in need to send a quick message to the person you want to contact, you are able to within a matter of minutes. In addition, email gives the opportunity to send messages that contain photos and videos. With that, some messages are necessary for imagery and can be transmitted through email. When having to operate with traditional, handwritten mail, those types of implementations were not able to be done. The email has brought a vast of different attributes to communication, by making it a quicker and faster process of communicating with one another and allowing us to directly send out messages to the specific person we wanted to get in contact with. Ray Tomlinson will go down in history for being an influential figure in the communication realm and has laid the foundation for his legacy to live on. 

Eight Values of Free Expression

    There are a plethora of values that have been implemented throughout America's time, that have separated them from other countries. Out of all the speech theories and or values that have molded this country, the one that resonates the most with me would be the freedom of speech, or in this case, "protect innovation." Which can be defined as "a community in which free speech is valued and protected is likely to be a more energized, creative, interesting society as its citizen actively fulfill themselves in many diverse and interesting ways" 

    Personally, I would claim that this speech theory resonates with me the most because every day I utilize the value of this free expression. This freedom enables me to speak my free, open, mind so that many others may disagree with what I say. In addition, having the freedom of speech allows me, and everybody else the right to criticize the government's policies. The government has implemented policies, and sometimes, I feel that the policies that they have implemented on society, I do not agree with, therefore I am able to express the way that I feel about that, due to me having the ability of free speech. 

  

The speech theories that I believe are most important are the theories of Protect Dissent, and Individual Self-fulfillment. Both these theories fall under the same categories of free speech, which ties my favorite right that I am entitled to as American citizen. With the factor of individual self-fullment, you establish who you are as a person by expressing yourself, which I feel important each day. Each person in this country has value in what point of view that they have pertaining a certain issue and or topic. Having the ability of Individual self-fulfillment and the theory to protect dissent, offer the astonishing right to express ad vocalize your thoughts and opinions towards anything in the world, without repercussion . With that being said, hate speech is not a legal term in the United States of America. 

  Out of all the speech theories that have been outlined, I would state that the one that feel most personal to me would be the theory of "Promote Innovation". This speaks on how a community in which free speech is valued and protected. This is most applicable to me because I hold an executive leadership position for my Greek Community, on how High Point Universityies campus. I have the ability to speak my mind in a community, where my word is valued and is highly protected. I thank the U.S. government for grantignme that freedom everyday, to speak my mind, and to have my word protected by the government.   

In today's day and age, I see the theory of "promote innovation", to be most utilized. There are a multitude of incidents where people in this world do not agree with a certain law, or agree with the outcome fo certain event, and begin to protest what they believe, and argue for what should be done. Instances like the Dobbs v. Jackson Abortion case, throughout that time period, people skipped work on a Friday in protest of the Supreme Court decision overturning the constitutional to an abortion. Women spoke and protested to how they felt about this given outcome, they utilized this value of innovation to have free speech and have in be protected within  a community. Another monumental event where someone has utilized would be famous, March on Washington speech given by, Martin Luther King Jr. This was the speech that remains one of the famous and important events in all of history. This speech clearly demonstrates the value that is given when one is able to express how they feel about a given topic or issue, the right to express yourself and create ones own identity is a powerful right that we as American Citizens are entitled to. Thsi right has granted only positive outcomes, and have allowed indivueals to speak their mind on how they feel, and to convey to the world their expressive opinion. 

History & Workings of the U.S. Supreme Court, Reflection

    What I learned about the supreme court, that I did not know before was truthful, how much power they hold. The name of the "supreme court", has an immense amount of worship, respect, and power its name, but, you do not know the amount of responsibility and work that the 9-person justice system holds. I also learned that the supreme court deals with specific issues, that range from "safeguarding liberty, preserving the union, and upholding the rule of law." This work which is completed by the Supreme Court, completes all these responsibilities for one of the greatest countries in the world, the United States of America. I personally, was not made aware of the specificity that the supreme court must deal with on a daily, and how much power, and how much responsibility they have to take care of, year in and year out.

 

    The most important takeaway point about the Supreme Court is that not all cases that are sent to the Supreme Court, which are more than one hundred every week, are all fully accepted. As a U.S. I was under the impression that each case that is sent to the Supreme Court to be dealt with, was accepted and taken into action. Instead, each justice is assisted by a small staff of law clerks, and secretaries - "but then each of them is individually responsible for deciding each case". The takeaway would be that each case that is sent, is not fully dealt with, the law clerks and secretaries are responsible for accepting or declining each case that is sent out.         

    The most surprising thing that I learned about the Supreme Court, was the ceremony that each justice has gone through before serving their term. In the youtube video, former President Reagen nominates an elected justice who he feels best will guide this country in its best form, the nominee then raises his right hand to vow their future duties toward the constitution, and that they know they are primarily responsible for the law. I was fully surprised that they had to go through that entire process, and I was not aware of the presidents being present in their nomination, along with the oath that is followed, to demonstrate their future duties and to understand what they are responsible to do whilst their job working within the law. It is a real process, that each justices vowes to understand. 

This video changed the way I viewed the supreme court, in the way how they deal with a grand amount of cases and responsibilities that each justice is responsible for. From a surface-level perspective, I was only made aware of how long each justice's term was, what kind of work they did, and how many served on the court. I was not made aware at all, of what specific cases, responsibilities, and power this 9-person Supreme Court holds. This video changed my perception of how much power the Supreme Court gets, they have the most important role in creating a strong, and powerful foundation for the United States of America's Government. To know that they are fully responsible for upholding the rule of law,  along with preserving the union, was a shocking fact that I heard from this video that completely shifted my lens on how I viewed the supreme court as a court system, their responsibly, the information that all of them behold, and more importantly, the power that all 9 of them obtain. 

This video view on the Supreme Court fully introduced me to the work that is done every week for the Supreme Court, how many cases that they deal with daily, and how they can come to the decisions to see which ones will be accepted or declined. This was a video that was compelling to watch and shifted my view on how important, and monumental the Supreme Court truly is.