leaderless

Last class I went back and forth between understanding what our professor was saying and what the guy who sits on the left was saying. These "smart mobs" may not have a leader, as in a face that everyone turns to or the typical hierarchal structure like most organizations- but they do have a catalyst person. Without this person, there would be no buzz about what to do, where to go etc. People would not even know that there was something going on. I think that it is important to note that this catalyst person does not intend for whatever small event they are responsible for spurring to turn into a large event or to gain as much momentum as it does. It kind of reminds me of the movie Easy A - when the main character tells her best friend a lie and before she knows it, there is a rumor going around the whole school. The connection is pretty weak, but just the unintentional snowballing effect is similar. The leader might not be essential to a "smart mob" but a catalyst person is crucial, otherwise these mobs would never come into existence. Without the first person sending the "wear black" text message, nobody would have known to do anything. 

wikipedia debate

last spring, i spent the semester traveling around the world on a ship taking classes and stopping at various ports to travel. choosing to go was the single greatest decision of my life, but that is neither here nor there. if curious: semesteratsea,org

while on the ship, we took classes through UVA and of course they required us to do research. the internet on the ship was very limited. we had an allotted number of minutes to use for the entire semester of internet time in addition to free websites (mostly news websites and online journals). one of our free websites was, and thus became our first step in getting information on a new topic. our professors even encouraged us to use it. granted, we didn't have much of an alternative, but we all sat in class perplexed at the fact our professors were encouraging the use of wikipedia. isn't it everything the academic world is against? we weren't to site it in any papers, but they did expect us to use it to gather information and they said that it is mostly trustworthy due to the vast number of authors constantly reviewing articles. the small articles could have incorrect facts for a long time due to the low traffic, but when researching the history of the great wall of china, chances are incorrect information won't last more than a couple minutes, if they even post it at all. moral of the story: on the ship, wikipedia was encouraged.

day one of class in clemson, my professor literally said these words verbatim: "if any of you cite wikipedia as a source i will automatically fail you, no questions asked." now, she was not saying you will get a failing grade on that one paper. she literally meant that you will fail the class altogether.

in a matter of months, i went from a learning environment which was an extension of the number one public school in america saying wikipedia was good to clemson, number twenty three, acting like wikipedia is the devil. the debate is real.

new beginnings

I had fun writing the instructions - I kind of turned them into a little art project but the writing part of them is still solid.

I am really curious about how the commissioned document will go. I think that the topic ranges can vary so much that it will be hard for him to give us guidance as a class. One thing I am hoping he clears up today is what kind of components is it necessary for our document to have?

As a sidenote - has anyone been reading about North Korea lately? Kim Jong II might be handing over the reins to his son?

http://www.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/asiapcf/09/23/nkorea.leadership.changes/index.html

Thoughts?

workworkwork. repeat.

this class is getting to be so much work i always seem to forget about these blogs but on top of the readings and the projects, does anyone else feel a little overwhelmed with the amount of work in conjunction with your other classes? maybe i am just taking too many classes but sometimes it is just a little daunting to stay on top of it all

the KISS principle

Since my mom is a graphic artist, ever since I was young this principle was drilled into my head. It didn't matter if I was making a science fair project display board or trying to come up with ideas for my senior seminar paper, she was always there to remind me of this concept:

keep it simple, stupid

So often in life, we try to come up with these super elaborate ideas and focus a lot on the fluff of making sure things look just the right way or start a paper that are encompassing of too many ideas into one general theme. Getting to my point, I think that if my mom had to give her advice on creating the instructions, she would tell me to keep it simple. This goes back to an idea I had while responding to a post, that we need to be both clear and concise, which will be a challenge but will also be the proof of a good set of instructions. Too far in either direction will make the instructions not very user-friendly. Keeping with this mindset, I chose to do something that I really enjoy and wouldn't mind spending considerable amount of time thinking about. I really love playing board games, and while I was abroad I learned a game called Hamchunk. I have taught all of my friends from home how to play and they love it too. This idea was the perfect combination of something simple but also something that I really enjoy.

writing for your audiance

After reading Lannon, I realize how imperative it is to know your audience. I have always known that it is important, but I never fully understood the necessity of understanding who they are and what skills they are coming equipped with. I always thought, "well, if you are speaking to teenagers then its good to know that so you can throw in some relevant examples." It goes further than that though, becuase I can think of several examples of when I was a part of something that I was not the intended audiance for something and I felt uncomfortable.

For example, last year I bought an entertainment stand that was not pre-assembled. In my dorm room with my three tools out, I was determined to get it together correctly the first time. The manual with pictures was not very well done and I ended up guessing for some steps. I like to think of myself as pretty handy when it comes to assembling things, so I felt confident making some guesses, but as I did so, I thought about the other people who purchase those goods who have maybe never assembled something before. That was an example of something that was poorly written for the audience.

Even when something is well written, if it is distrubuted to the wrong audiance it might not be effective either. I once tried to read my grandfather's medical chart to get the inside scoop on what was happening. What I saw looked like a foriegn language that I did not understand. The nurses and doctors fared just fine reading it. Conversely, I have taken a class that was taught on a remedial level. Even though the class is designed for upper-level students, I felt certain that the professor thought we were all fresh out of high school the way she was teaching. I find both to be equally frustrating. If its too complex for me, I get frustrated and don't want to engage but if it is too simplified I am bored and easily distracted.

I know that it is impossible to know your primary and secondary audiences perfectly, but I think it is very important to do whatever possible to pinpoint your audiance so your document can be specifically tailored to them.